Sunday, August 12, 2012
36 år siden jeg indvandrede til Danmark
I dag er det 36 år siden jeg indvandrede til Danmark, med to store
kufferter og en cykel. Copenhagen (filmen) viser Andedammen som jeg ser
den når jeg lukker øjnene. Du som er 14 eller 28 kan opleve alt det
idag. Jeg elsker Danmark og Skytsenglen og Naturlige og Rock'n'roll
Dreams og Punk Paraply og Børnene og Englebørn og Tudse og Ballur og fru
Hansens mælk og enogtyve nul nul spelt og ... og alle de små tudser,
endnu mere end nogensinde - stort knus til mit adoptive land.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Martin Amis, "Looking in the mirror now"
You have to love Martin Amis. Here is Richard Tull, the protagonist of "The Information":
"Looking in the mirror now, on the morning of his fortieth birthday, Richard felt that no one deserved the face he had. No one in the history of the planet. There was nothing on the planet it was that bad to do. What happened? What have you done, man? His hair, scattered over his crown in assorted folds and clumps, looked as though it had just concluded a course of prolonged (and futile) chemotherapy. Then the eyes, each of them perched on its little blood-rimmed beer gut. If the eyes were the window to the soul, then the window was a windscreen, after a transcontinental drive; and his cough sounded like a wiper on the dry glass. These days he smoked and drank largely to solace himself for what drinking and smoking had done to him-but smoking and drinking had done a lot to him, so he drank and smoked a lot. He experimented, furthermore, with pretty well any other drug he could get his hands on. His teeth were all chipped pottery and prewar jet glue. At each given moment, whatever he was doing, at least two of his limbs were immovably numb. Up and down his body there were whisperedrumors of pain. In fact, physically, at all times, he felt epiphanically tragic. His doctor had died four years ago ("Unfortunately I am terminally ill."); and that, in Richard's mature opinion, was definitely that. He had a large and lucent lump on the back of his neck. This he treated himself, by the following means: he kept his hair long to keep it hidden. If you went up to Richard Tull and told him he was in Denial, he would deny it. But not hotly.
None of this altered the fact that he had to take the vacuum cleaner in. [...]
By the time he had grappled the vacuum cleaner out of its sentry box Richard had long been weeping with self-pity and rage. He was getting good at crying. If women were right, then you needed to cry about three or four times a day. Women cried at the oddest times: when they won beauty contests, for instance (and when they lost them too, probably: later on). If Richard won a beauty contest-would he cry? Can we see him there, on stage, with his bouquet, his swimsuit and his sash, and with all his mother coming into his eyes?
By the time he got the vacuum cleaner out of the apartment and onto the stairs Richard was wondering if he had ever suffered so. This, surely, is how we account for the darkness and the helpless melancholy of twentieth-century literature. These writers, these dreamers and seekers, stood huddled like shivering foundlings on the cliffs of a strange new world: one with no servants in it. On the stairs and landings there were bikes leaning everywhere, and also shackled to the walls-and to the ceiling. He lived in a beehive of bikers.
By the time he got the vacuum cleaner down into the hall Richard was sure that Samuel Beckett, at some vulnerable time in his life, had been obliged to take a vacuum cleaner in. Celine, too, and perhaps Kafka-if they had vacuum cleaners then. Richard gave himself a loud breather while he looked through his mail. His mail he no longer feared. The worst was over. Why should a man fear his mail, when, not long ago, he had received a solicitor's letter from his own solicitor? When, rather less recently, in response to a request for more freelance work, he had been summarily fired, through the post, by his own literary agent? When he was being sued (for advances paid on unwritten books) by both his ex-publishers?"
"Looking in the mirror now, on the morning of his fortieth birthday, Richard felt that no one deserved the face he had. No one in the history of the planet. There was nothing on the planet it was that bad to do. What happened? What have you done, man? His hair, scattered over his crown in assorted folds and clumps, looked as though it had just concluded a course of prolonged (and futile) chemotherapy. Then the eyes, each of them perched on its little blood-rimmed beer gut. If the eyes were the window to the soul, then the window was a windscreen, after a transcontinental drive; and his cough sounded like a wiper on the dry glass. These days he smoked and drank largely to solace himself for what drinking and smoking had done to him-but smoking and drinking had done a lot to him, so he drank and smoked a lot. He experimented, furthermore, with pretty well any other drug he could get his hands on. His teeth were all chipped pottery and prewar jet glue. At each given moment, whatever he was doing, at least two of his limbs were immovably numb. Up and down his body there were whisperedrumors of pain. In fact, physically, at all times, he felt epiphanically tragic. His doctor had died four years ago ("Unfortunately I am terminally ill."); and that, in Richard's mature opinion, was definitely that. He had a large and lucent lump on the back of his neck. This he treated himself, by the following means: he kept his hair long to keep it hidden. If you went up to Richard Tull and told him he was in Denial, he would deny it. But not hotly.
None of this altered the fact that he had to take the vacuum cleaner in. [...]
By the time he had grappled the vacuum cleaner out of its sentry box Richard had long been weeping with self-pity and rage. He was getting good at crying. If women were right, then you needed to cry about three or four times a day. Women cried at the oddest times: when they won beauty contests, for instance (and when they lost them too, probably: later on). If Richard won a beauty contest-would he cry? Can we see him there, on stage, with his bouquet, his swimsuit and his sash, and with all his mother coming into his eyes?
By the time he got the vacuum cleaner out of the apartment and onto the stairs Richard was wondering if he had ever suffered so. This, surely, is how we account for the darkness and the helpless melancholy of twentieth-century literature. These writers, these dreamers and seekers, stood huddled like shivering foundlings on the cliffs of a strange new world: one with no servants in it. On the stairs and landings there were bikes leaning everywhere, and also shackled to the walls-and to the ceiling. He lived in a beehive of bikers.
By the time he got the vacuum cleaner down into the hall Richard was sure that Samuel Beckett, at some vulnerable time in his life, had been obliged to take a vacuum cleaner in. Celine, too, and perhaps Kafka-if they had vacuum cleaners then. Richard gave himself a loud breather while he looked through his mail. His mail he no longer feared. The worst was over. Why should a man fear his mail, when, not long ago, he had received a solicitor's letter from his own solicitor? When, rather less recently, in response to a request for more freelance work, he had been summarily fired, through the post, by his own literary agent? When he was being sued (for advances paid on unwritten books) by both his ex-publishers?"
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
to read, books about Venice
Cara writes: "Maybe Norwich for straight history. Jan Morris for wonderful writing. Mary McCarthy for being Mary McCarthy. Joseph Brodsky
for a completely singular book on Venice by a completely singular mind."
Matteo Casini writes: "The book by Crouzet-Pavan is a good book in
between scholarship and the larger public. Two books I always loved are Ruskin and Pemble, Venice rediscovered. The classical guide for all secrets of Venice is
Lorenzetti. (Cara: "smallish type and long, but critical"). I heard good things about the revised edition of Jan Morris and Crowley's account on the Venetian Empire."
Predrag has
but is undisciplined about reading them. So far, finished only Berendt - it is deliriously hilarious, Italy is Italy, but Venice is clearly still another level.
Cara writes: "Dream of Venice by Charles Christopher. J.G. Links is okay. There is an intriguing book (almost a novel) but actually based on family documents that were found. Very pleasurable. I thought
the Berendt book was the biggest piece of junk I have ever read about
Venice. Sorry. I know you enjoyed it but please do not take one iota of
it seriously as a portrait of Venice. The Venetians were furious at him,
and not because he was spot on. Quite the opposite. I think he was
desperate to get another book out after all the years that had passed
Since Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and did this miserably
forced and false book."
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Metronomy - The Bay
I like this:
Metronomy - The Bay,
and much else by David Wilson.
Dougal Wilson - Basement Jaxx - Take Me Back To Your House
Metronomy - The Bay,
and much else by David Wilson.
Dougal Wilson - Basement Jaxx - Take Me Back To Your House
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Christopher Hitchens: will miss you
As we will remember him:
“In the hate column: dictatorship, religion, stupidity, demagogy, censorship, bullying and intimidation.
In the love column: literature, irony, humor, the individual and the defense of free expression.”
As his friends knew him: the sentence least likely to be uttered by Mr. Hitchens’s was
“I don’t care how rich you are, I’m not coming to your party.”
“In the hate column: dictatorship, religion, stupidity, demagogy, censorship, bullying and intimidation.
In the love column: literature, irony, humor, the individual and the defense of free expression.”
As his friends knew him: the sentence least likely to be uttered by Mr. Hitchens’s was
“I don’t care how rich you are, I’m not coming to your party.”
Friday, November 11, 2011
Squabbling with the BMW GPS lady
I got to UF with surprising difficulty - because of the New York Marathon (50K humans, 100K feet running, 100K's watching) I could not move through the human mass from Lexington to 1st Ave - eventually found a way down 58th St to York Ave, where there were barely any people at all, and leisurely traffic.
UF then proudly took me for a ride to see changing colors in Connecticut in his brand new smelling BMW, the cigarette smoke has not burned itself in yet.
"Seeing changing colors in Connecticut" meant driving through insane traffic for hours (police has basically blocked off all bridges from Manhattan either because of the marathon, or because they felt like it - then we drew through some deliriously rich areas of Connecticut where each mansion is tucked away in acres of forest with fabulous colors of autumn leaves (as promised by NY Times), and then, without ever getting out of the car we turned back. Return trip was marked by squabbling with the GPS lady - UF disobeyed her every order and drove us through some amazing sections of Bronx where no white man has sat foot since the island was bought by the Dutch. By the time we got back to Riverside drive they made up. It turns out that the roads are filled with morons on wheels who do not know how to drive. UF suspects them all immigrating here from Ohio. It's because of them that it is now impossible to eat in restaurants, as eeeeverything now contains fruit. Not to mention how loudly they shout, deafened by their Ipods etc.
UF says The Book is almost finished - he'll finish it as soon as he stops smoking. Currently he smokes like a smokestack.
Then we talked about this and that, and at some point he started saying not nice things about his Woman, so I went to bed. All is all, he is doing MUCH better than any time in past three years, it was more fun seeing him than in a long time.
PS Vecchio objects:
UF then proudly took me for a ride to see changing colors in Connecticut in his brand new smelling BMW, the cigarette smoke has not burned itself in yet.
"Seeing changing colors in Connecticut" meant driving through insane traffic for hours (police has basically blocked off all bridges from Manhattan either because of the marathon, or because they felt like it - then we drew through some deliriously rich areas of Connecticut where each mansion is tucked away in acres of forest with fabulous colors of autumn leaves (as promised by NY Times), and then, without ever getting out of the car we turned back. Return trip was marked by squabbling with the GPS lady - UF disobeyed her every order and drove us through some amazing sections of Bronx where no white man has sat foot since the island was bought by the Dutch. By the time we got back to Riverside drive they made up. It turns out that the roads are filled with morons on wheels who do not know how to drive. UF suspects them all immigrating here from Ohio. It's because of them that it is now impossible to eat in restaurants, as eeeeverything now contains fruit. Not to mention how loudly they shout, deafened by their Ipods etc.
UF says The Book is almost finished - he'll finish it as soon as he stops smoking. Currently he smokes like a smokestack.
Then we talked about this and that, and at some point he started saying not nice things about his Woman, so I went to bed. All is all, he is doing MUCH better than any time in past three years, it was more fun seeing him than in a long time.
PS Vecchio objects:
Don't be silly, I grew up in that part of the Bronx. It is what inspired Ogden Nash to write "The Bronx? No Thonx."
Sunday, October 23, 2011
all things are ephemeral
My personal playwright, of K. und K. fame:
Even for someone who doesn't have a real job, I am always swamped with crap to do. I've come to the philosophical conclusion that nothing is eternal, all things are ephemeral, so one might as well blow off once and a while. After all, as they say in L5P this time of year, "Life's too short, so you might as well stop and smell the zombies along the way."
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Siri Answers Questions
Siri Answers Questions From Readers - NYTimes.com:
and now, the insult: Say hello to Iris, Intelligent Rival Imitation of Siri, or Siri backward, who surfaced in the wake of Siri's debut.
and now, the insult: Say hello to Iris, Intelligent Rival Imitation of Siri, or Siri backward, who surfaced in the wake of Siri's debut.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
That's my (much younger) sister
David Pogue, New York Times Oct 12 2011:
Siri is billed as a virtual assistant: a crisply accurate, astonishingly understanding, uncomplaining, voice-commanded minion.
Siri is billed as a virtual assistant: a crisply accurate, astonishingly understanding, uncomplaining, voice-commanded minion.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
I have a friend in Minsk, who has a friend in Pinsk
Edson is not a professional mathematician.
I went to Professor Weiss and asked him: "I have a blah that can be turn into bi-blah by Schzmolukowzsky's conjugacy. Has somebody generalized this Groethendieck categories of uni-blah with Schartzwitoskwicz points (fuctors for which the critical holonomy is diffeo preperiodic to an unstable climacterium), so the conjugated balh has monotone laps. Remember anyone who has done that?" You would ask the same, no? Somebody must have done it, it is so obvious.
Professor Weiss gives me a happy grin and says: "Of course. Since my childhood I had only worked on Schma, never on Blah, but my dear friend Vargas in Minsk knows everything that is to be known on Blah, ask him."
So I ask, and Vargas writes back: "From the best of my knowlodge, i don't know any result in this direction"
Wrong! Wrong comrade Vargas. This is how it is done:
1) when anyone asks you a real question (other than "How are you?") you immediately say: "Sorry, I do not work on Blah, I only work on Schma, but I have a friend in Minsk, who has a friend in Pinsk, who, .... knows all about Blah". An easy corollary follows:
Corollary: Weiss is a professional mathematician.
Subsidiary Lemma: Vargas is not.
2) Theorem: Every sequence of mathematical referrals is a closed loop, ie., no matter who you send me to, eventually the guy in Dnepropetrovsk will refer me back to Weiss,
but now Vargas has spoiled the game that Howie so professionally initiated.
On the other hand, Vargas is honest. Do I even have to cite any theorems on how unprofessional that is?
I went to Professor Weiss and asked him: "I have a blah that can be turn into bi-blah by Schzmolukowzsky's conjugacy. Has somebody generalized this Groethendieck categories of uni-blah with Schartzwitoskwicz points (fuctors for which the critical holonomy is diffeo preperiodic to an unstable climacterium), so the conjugated balh has monotone laps. Remember anyone who has done that?" You would ask the same, no? Somebody must have done it, it is so obvious.
Professor Weiss gives me a happy grin and says: "Of course. Since my childhood I had only worked on Schma, never on Blah, but my dear friend Vargas in Minsk knows everything that is to be known on Blah, ask him."
So I ask, and Vargas writes back: "From the best of my knowlodge, i don't know any result in this direction"
Wrong! Wrong comrade Vargas. This is how it is done:
1) when anyone asks you a real question (other than "How are you?") you immediately say: "Sorry, I do not work on Blah, I only work on Schma, but I have a friend in Minsk, who has a friend in Pinsk, who, .... knows all about Blah". An easy corollary follows:
Corollary: Weiss is a professional mathematician.
Subsidiary Lemma: Vargas is not.
2) Theorem: Every sequence of mathematical referrals is a closed loop, ie., no matter who you send me to, eventually the guy in Dnepropetrovsk will refer me back to Weiss,
but now Vargas has spoiled the game that Howie so professionally initiated.
On the other hand, Vargas is honest. Do I even have to cite any theorems on how unprofessional that is?
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Friday, July 22, 2011
Ketzel Cotel 1992-2011
Ketzel the cat is dead. This sad piece of news was broken by the New York Times's City Room blog on Tuesday.
Monday, June 06, 2011
Accentuate.us
accentuate.us is pretty cool (except that it does not work yet in either of languages that I need it for):
Dataists.com: "Many languages around the world use the familiar Latin alphabet (A-Z), but in order to represent the sounds of the language accurately, their writing systems employ diacritical marks and other special characters. [...] Speakers of these languages have difficulty entering text into a computer because keyboards are often not available, and even when they are, typing special characters can be slow and cumbersome. [...]
To solve this problem, we have created a free and open source Firefox add-on called Accentuate.us that allows users to type texts in plain ASCII, and then automatically adds all diacritics and special characters in the correct places."
Dataists.com: "Many languages around the world use the familiar Latin alphabet (A-Z), but in order to represent the sounds of the language accurately, their writing systems employ diacritical marks and other special characters. [...] Speakers of these languages have difficulty entering text into a computer because keyboards are often not available, and even when they are, typing special characters can be slow and cumbersome. [...]
To solve this problem, we have created a free and open source Firefox add-on called Accentuate.us that allows users to type texts in plain ASCII, and then automatically adds all diacritics and special characters in the correct places."
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