A World of Speculation

Shameless Plug

If you’re in the Portland, Ore., area and interested in writing, you might like an upcoming workshop: Saturday, March 5, in Portland, “Emotion-Driven Fiction” by Eric Witchey. This award-winning short-story writer will teach participants to make...

Parody Ad

OK. I’m evil. But I thought this was funny. Especially since VW is hopping mad about it. h/t: Jeff Jarvis, who draws some useful conclusions about Cluetrain marketing from the kerfluffle.

Battle Hymn of the Republic

I don’t know why, but the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” always brings tears to my eyes. I just got a disc of Gene Harris (jazz piano) playing spirituals with a rockin’ soul version of the Battle Hymn. Classic.

How are the kids?

We’ve all heard the complaints about the perfunctory How-are-you?s, the What-do-you-think-about-the-weather?s, the How-about-them-Yanks?es. Well, give me the meaningless inquiries about my health (which is fine, thanks), the weather (which I never quite know how...

An Olympic prankster defrocked

An Irish priest who changed the outcome of the 2004 Olympic marathon was defrocked. At first I was going to blog this little gem of a quote for its overwhelming clericalism: I now cannot preach, I cannot give out communion — I am little more than a pagan. After...