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.

“Self-Deleting Jews”

(Feel free to skip if you’re not hot for ethnoapologetics.) THERE’S AN UGLY MEME IN the Jewish community that may or may not have analogs among other minority groups: the so-called “self-hating Jew.” This term, most often used in online…

Two Indigent Sketches

1. HITCHHIKING THROUGH RENO IN 1985, I wandered by the green banks of the Truckee River, where a number of seen-better-days men lived in the park, in what apparently remained of their business suits. “Hey buddy, you got a second?”…

Dear Hollywood …

WHY DO YOU INSIST ON MARKETING to us as though we were all ignorant, venal, cynical, cruel, swinish oafs? We at The Metaphorager decry these loutish generalizations and will boycott the offending generalizers: we may not starve you into submission,…

Advice to The Younger Self

TAKE THE WORLD AND YOUR part in it seriously, but not yourself. Never refuse anything offered, but be careful about entanglements. You’ll need computer skills, but you’ll also enjoy them. Write. Stake out early your points of honor. Dream. Then…

Pithyism #36

IF A PREGNANT WOMAN ASKS you for anything — and I mean anything, no matter how odd-sounding or inconvenient — give it to her immediately or sooner. (This rule does not necessarily apply to any other human situation.)