Today an Irishman told me I’m a very hateful person. He used the word “hate” and “hateful” at least sixty times. The reason is that he claims to oppose all violence under any circumstances, while I support violence to eliminate murderous terrorists. When I informed him that my brother and I came within two minutes…
Caffeine withdrawal makes you stupid
July 14, 2014
I can’t think right now. All I can do is sit and stare blankly. Caffeine withdrawal makes you stupid. Throw in stress and rotational vertigo attacks, and you have complete mental disability. Writing is beyond my capabilities right now, so we’ll go audio-visual. I took this photo a few hours ago, as I wandered aimlessly…
“I matter plenty.”
July 12, 2014
My perception of art keeps changing. Movies are especially vulnerable to my reinterpretation. Films I once loved I now hate, and those that I still like are sending me entirely different messages. The brilliant film Breach is up there in my top ten. I hadn’t seen it in a while, so when I watched it…
You don’t speak for me
July 11, 2014
Today I read a long blog post about how “90 percent” of us are furiously jealous of all good fortune that others enjoy. It’s only natural. If someone else is happy, successful, attractive, physically fit, talented, healthy, wealthy, and wise, the overwhelming majority of us wish ill on the person and hope they suffer calamity….
Do you have a price?
July 9, 2014
In the last year of my mother’s life, we talked a lot about the state of the world. Mom was born in 1928. Can you conceive the changes she saw in her eighty-five years? She asked me over and over why people did the things they did, and I told her that it was because…
Monkeyshines
July 8, 2014
I’ve always loved the word “monkeyshines.” To me it brings to mind disreputable incompetence. Clowns behaving badly. I discovered today that the word first appears in 1828 in a song called “Jump Jim Crow.” The song was popularized by Thomas Dartmouth “Daddy” Rice, who performed in blackface as Jim Crow. Apparently there was a real…
Thank you, Miss Carol Colman
July 7, 2014
When I wrote Ghosts and Ballyhoo, I had to leave out tons of stuff I wanted to include. There just wasn’t enough room. Also, I’m not interesting enough to publish a multi-volume memoir. One of the bassists who I didn’t mention in the book but who had a huge impact on me is Carol Colman,…
On mandated forgiveness
July 3, 2014
Louis Zamperini died today at the age of ninety-seven. He was an Olympic distance runner and the subject of Laura Hillenbrand’s book Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. I read the book and enjoyed it until the end. Zamperini forgave the Japanese war criminals who tortured him, even though they…
