Escaped Thoughts

Why We Don't Write

“This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated, if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it.”

Eeyore (via A.A. Milne)

 

Why We Write

“From things that have happened . . . and from all things that you know and all those you cannot know, you make something through your invention that is not a representation but a whole new thing truer than anything true and alive, and you make it alive, and if you make it well enough, you give it immortality….

That is why you write and for no other reason.”

– Ernest Hemingway

Bumpy Night

“Fasten your seat belts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.”

Bette Davis (in All About Eve )

Day of Rest

“Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop.”

- Ovid

Discovery's final countdown...

The final countdown..., originally uploaded by DaveDoop.

Space Shuttle Discovery (STS-133) reaches Pad 39A for the final time at 1:15am on September 21, 2010. Launch is scheduled for November 1, 2010 at 4:40pm.

A Cookie Monster

The return of Szarotka the Cookie Monster! (children and sensitive people: don't look!), originally uploaded by pyza*.

Horizon

http://29.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_li9nsudP6e1qz6f9yo1_500.jpg

Mount Auburn Cemetery daguerreotype

Lawrence Lot, Mount Auburn Cemetery, originally uploaded by George Eastman House.

Lawrence Lot, Mount Auburn Cemetery

Accession Number: 1974:0193:0096

Maker: Southworth & Hawes

Title: Lawrence Lot, Mount Auburn Cemetery

Date: ca. 1853

Medium: daguerreotype

Dimensions: whole plate, 16.5 X 21.5 cm.

George Eastman House Collection

General information about the George Eastman House Photography Collection is available at http://www.eastmanhouse.org/inc/collections/photography.php.

For information on obtaining reproductions go to: www.eastmanhouse.org/flickr/index.php?pid=1974:0193:0096.

dots or stripes?

dots or stripes, originally uploaded by ....casper.

Descent

Descent, originally uploaded by razorbern.

Slickers

I have a thing for the movie City Slickers which was a favorite of my oldest son. We watched it many times, and we still plan to do one of those trail rides one day.

The film has some moments that really click for me though...

Mitch has to give a talk to his son's class about his job. He hates his job at that point. It's his 39th birthday and he feels like it has all been a waste. Here's what he tells the dazed kids in his son's elementary school class:

Value this time in your life kids, because this is the time in your life when you still have your choices, and it goes by so quickly.

When you're a teenager you think you can do anything, and you do.

Your twenties are a blur. Your thirties, you raise your family, you make a little money and you think to yourself, "What happened to my twenties?"

Your forties, you grow a little pot belly you grow another chin. The music starts to get too loud and one of your old girlfriends from high school becomes a grandmother.

Your fifties you have a minor surgery. You'll call it a procedure, but it's a surgery.

Your sixties you have a major surgery, the music is still loud but it doesn't matter because you can't hear it anyway.

Seventies, you and the wife retire to Fort Lauderdale, you start eating dinner at two, lunch around ten, breakfast the night before. And you spend most of your time wandering around malls looking for the ultimate in soft yogurt and muttering "how come the kids don't call?"

By your eighties, you've had a major stroke, and you end up babbling to some Jamaican nurse who your wife can't stand but who you call mama. Any questions?

 

Daniel Stern (Phil), Billy Crystal (Mitch), Bruno Kirby (Ed)

The three city slickers get into a discussion of their best and worst days. Ed doesn't want to play, but they push him.

Ed: I'm 14 and my mother and father are fighting again... y'know, because she caught him again. Caught him... This time the girl drove by the house to pick him up. And I finally realized, he wasn't just cheating on my mother, he was cheating us. So I told him, I said, "You're bad to us. We don't love you. I'll take care of my mother and my sister. We don't need you any more." And he made like he was gonna hit me, but I didn't budge. And he turned around and he left. He never bothered us again. Well, I took care of my mother and my sister from that day on. That's my best day.

Phil: Geez, what was your worst day?

Ed: Same day.

Finally, Curly, the "real" cowboy that they meet up with in the film is pressed by Mitch about what he thinks is the secret of life (which is what he assumes he is looking for).

Curly: Do you know what the secret of life is? [holds up one finger] This.

Mitch: Your finger?

Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don't mean shit.

Mitch: But, what is the "one thing?"

Curly: That's what you have to find out.

March 14

March 14 is, for me, marked most importantly as my oldest son's birthday.

It's also Pi Day, commemorating the mathematical constant pi. 3.14159265358979323846 264338327950288419716939937510... (Even nerdier is Pi Approximation Day on July 22, celebrating the fraction 22/7. )

And on the birthday list - Albert Einstein, Billy Crystal, Diane Arbus and others.

March 14 is the 73rd day of the year (74th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 292 days remaining until the end of the year.

Footwear

Footwear, originally uploaded by ronk53.

Footwear
or not.
She said, "Wow, that's a surprisingly sexy photo."
I said, "You think so?"

Push!

, originally uploaded by shadowplay.