– Definition: n one who engages in a pursuit, study, science, or sport as a pastime rather than as a profession – Used in a sentence: “He is a true amateur of cooking.” – Why: What I would like to…
Author: Neal Ross Attinson
Neal Ross Attinson is one of those text-compulsives who feels naked without a keyboard, or at least a a pad and pen. He is unafraid of adverbs, loves astronomy and gastronomy with equally unabashed passion, and lives with/in an eclectic library in Sonoma, California.
Why I Love: Writing
IT’S THE SCARINESS OF THE blank screen. It’s the focused attention. It’s the mental sensation of assembling Tinker-Toy pieces into a coherent structure. It’s the way the hours fly by. It’s the nothing-else-like-it buzz (thank you, Stephen King). It’s the…
The Seven Don’ts (bagel reprise)
THE AUTHOR OF THIS PIECE is a “born and bred New Yorker,” but even here in the sticks some things are sacrosanct when it comes to that most iconic of Jewish foods. I agree with much of what she says,…
Minute Mitzvah: Saying the Shema
Today: Say the Shema. Explanation: The Shema (“Listen, Israel: יהוה our G?d! יהוה One!”), from Deuteronomy 6:4, is the statement of Jewish faith-commitment. It’s the first prayer we learn after birth and, if we time it right, the last prayer…
Raiders of the Lost Prayer
THE SCENE IS TENSE. RENE Belloq, a French archaeologist hired by the Nazi government (ptoo ptoo ptoo) to steal the Ark of the Covenant in the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark, is about to open the sacred artifact wherein…
Art Imitates Science Imitates Art
WHO DOESN’T KNOW “THE UNIVERSE Song” from the Monty Python movie Meaning of Life? The one that starts out, “Just remember that you’re standing on a planet that’s evolving / And revolving at 900 miles an hour…”? For years, I’ve…
What is “Experiential Holiness?”
SHORT ANSWER: IT’S PART OF the tagline for this blog. Longer answer: it’s a way of seeing and living that recognizes and hopefully honors the interconnectedness of all things, and That which makes them (it?) all possible. “Holiness” is a…
365 Names of God: The Beloved
THE BELOVED is most commonly a Sufi term, but not exclusively so. The idea of God as Lover may be outre to some, but the connotation of passion and all-involvement is a powerful one for many mystics (including the author…
Words to Bring Back: “Illicitator”
– Definition: n. An auctioneer’s shill – Used in a sentence: “Some of these political rallies seem to reek of illicitators.” – Why: It’s obscure, yes, but how many illicitators have YOU spotted recently?
Why I Love: Astronomy
IT’S THE QUIET THRILL OF your first look through a telescope and seeing Saturn’s rings for yourself. It’s the hush before the planetarium show begins. It’s the ancientness of the constellations. It’s knowing that others before you, perhaps all the…
First Graf(s): The Book of the Damned
CHARLES HOY FORT HAS A special place in my weirdological heart, as he was the first writer to compile an exhaustive list (four books full, in fact) of oddities and anomalies. He is thus the (unwilling) intellectual godfather of every…
Night, Fog, and One Hell of a Bang
IF I HAD KNOWN THAT our galleon would collide with a freighter, I would have worn a life jacket. The time was February 1988. Through a curious series of circumstances, I had signed aboard the replica galleon Golden Hinde II…