Wednesday, November 1, 2017

A Random Assortment

~ Another excellent Olive Garden review. (By the way, since I read this piece, I've been getting ads for the Olive Garden on facebook. The likelihood of me going to the Olive Garden is, let's say, very slim.)

~ Is there anyone better than Tomie?

~ I was happy to hear that Ishiguro won a Nobel, but in all of the reflections on his work, no one captured what I think is most interesting--except this in the NYT:

His dual identity has made him alert to life’s dislocations; many of his characters are caught, in different ways, between worlds. 

~ Wow--this is straight out of Hobbes!

~ I don't think I would call it "emotional labor," but otherwise--good article.

~ On essential oils and multi-level marketing, including its connections to Christianity, but the part about Mormons was especially fascinating:

At first, doTerra’s distributors, whom it refers to as Wellness Advocates, were largely concentrated in Utah. Several doTerra executives are Mormons, and the company’s connection to the Church was an advantage, because distributors could rely on its large number of stay-at-home mothers and its naturally networked communities. Utah has more multilevel-marketing companies per capita than any other state; direct sales are Utah’s second-biggest source of revenue, after tourism. 

~ There are British detective shows that I haven't watched! (I count 6 that I haven't seen here.)

~ Alan Jacobs and, if he says so, Auden, are my two favorites. Is there a better meditation for Reformation Day?''

~ I think he's my all-time favorite writer, besides, of course, my husband.

~ The politicization of motherhood. I have thoughts.

~ I did not love Capture the Castle (too depressing), but please remain my kindred spirit nonetheless!

~ In which Marilynne Robinson lauds Tocqueville, humanist. (I don't mean to quibble, but I really can't help it--Tocqueville is the solution, but not just because he sees the power and importance of democracy. Also because he foretells the problems that accompany it. Robinson seems to think Tocqueville's praise of democracy and the problems of the contemporary world are two separate things--and the latter belongs to capitalism. I think Tocqueville sees them as connected. Although it very well may be the humanities (at least in part) that pull us back from the brink of the excesses of democracy and I wrote a paper to that effect in grad school and have been, since then, sad that I've done nothing with it. Although Robinson does it all much better.) (Also--Tocqueville sees a tension between government solutions and participatory solutions, which Robinson doesn't see.)

~ The Dying Art of Disagreement.

~ "The Misguided Student Crusade Against 'Facism'":

Armed with a megaphone and raised fists, the protesters shouted about the university’s rising tuition, a perceived corporatization of public higher education and my support for free speech on campus — a stance they said perpetuated “fascism and white supremacy.”
I have nothing against protest. It is a time-honored form of communicating dissent. Often, the concerns students express very much deserve to be addressed. But the tactic of silencing, which has been deployed repeatedly at universities around the country, only hurts these activists’ cause. Rather than helping people who feel they have little power or voice, students who squelch speech alienate those who are most likely to be sympathetic to their message.

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