INTERVIEWING ONE’S CULTURAL HEROES IS one of the greatest thrills of a career in journalism — even of amateur journalism. Such was the position in which I found myself while working for Obscure Research Labs in the early-to-mid-1990s. It gave…
Category: Etc
Free of labels, which is also a good rule for living
How I Missed the Moonwalk
THE LAST THING I REMEMBER is Neil Armstrong opening the LEM’s front hatch to begin his televised and epic descent. When I was seven years old, and crazy for space, I had memorized the names of all the astronauts from…
Backyard astronomers are a special breed. They savor their moments under the stars. They have an infatuation — a love affair — with the cosmos that grows and nurtures itself just as meaningful human relationships do. Of course, it is a less definable one-way relationship, but I have come to regard that feeling as the closest I can ever come to being at one with nature. After a night under the stars, I have a sense of mellowness, an amalgam of humility, wonder and discovery. The universe is beautiful, in both the visual and spiritual sense.”
–Terence Dickinson, Nightwatch: A Practical Guide to Viewing the Universe
“The Merchant of Sonoma”
THEY SAY THAT THERE IS never any “first Jewish settler” anywhere — because no matter who it is, some other Jew was there beforehand. Better instead to say “first known Jewish settler.” And in the case of Sonoma, that honor…
Aside
VISITORS TO THE METAPHORAGER MAY notice that it’s formatted in two columns — the wide right-hand one with posts, the narrow left one with other stuff. In the spirit of “obnoxious self-aggrandizement,” here’s a quick top-down guide to the “other stuff”:
– SEARCH: Cast a virtual net for your favorite in-blog keyword(s); simply type it/them in the provided space and hit “Enter.”
– RECEIVE: Input your email address and click “Subscribe” to spice your inbox with our Monday and Thursday publishings (as well as occasional off-schedule goodies like the one you’re reading now).
AMERICA IS A PLACE WHERE Jewish merchants sell Zen love beads to agnostics for Christmas.”
— John Burton Brimer
Chanukah With Ramana
THE TECHNIQUE IS SIMPLE: JUST lay on your back, breathing, and take a complete and negative bodily inventory: “I am not my legs; I am not my feet; I am not my arms;” “I am not my mind;” et al.…
The #popscope Phenomenon
AFTER I BOUGHT MY OWN telescope (an Orion StarMax 90mm Maksutov-Cassegrain with equatorial mount), I would take it out in the early evenings on the sidewalk in front of our building with a sign leaning against the tripod that read,…
“Everybody Have a Nagila!”
IT’S THE WORLD’S SINGLE MOST recognizable Jewish song — covered by such luminaries as Harry Belafonte and Dick Dale — yet its genesis may surprise you. Another fine contribution from myjewishlearning dot com…
Leadership is not about the next election, it’s about the next generation.”
— Anon.
The Treachery of Elections
Click image to enlarge; if you need an explanation of the punchline, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Treachery_of_Images.
And now, suitably inspired, GO YE FORTH AND VOTE. (This charade has gone on long enough.)
You Too Can Be a Citizen Scientist!
IT’S CALLED ZOONIVERSE — AND IT’S revolutionizing science as we know it. Modern scientists (like the rest of us) live in an age of Big Data: zillions and zillions of units of information, too many for one person to effectively…