Running After My Hat header image 4

Entries from May 2008

Keeping Myself in Suspense

May 24th, 2008 · No Comments

Over in the list of this blog’s categories, in the sidebar at the left, you will see “Writing” as a main category and — now, finally — a sub-category called “Merry-Go-Round.”
Actually, that sub-category has always been there. But in a WordPress blog, apparently, a (sub-)category doesn’t show up in the list until there’s an actual [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Language · Merry-Go-Round · Uncategorized · Writing

Thinning the Herd

May 24th, 2008 · No Comments

The blog known as Editorial Ass (which is short, of course, for “Assistant”) is written by an anonymous editor in NYC who identifies herself only as MoonRat. It’s linked over in the “Touchstones” category.
A recent post there, on the surface, was stimulated by a lecture, which MR attended, given by one Jonathan Karp, one of [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: E-Books, E-Reading, E-Publishing · Writing

The Boy Hears Himself (Part 1)

May 16th, 2008 · No Comments

During an… odd few years in my younger life, my friend Dean and I became absorbed in experiments involving a reel-to-reel tape recorder. The brand name which Dean and I both “owned,” in those days when electronics were still manufactured domestically, was “Recordio.” (And yes, all right: we didn’t own them; our fathers did.)
What “odd [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: How It Was · Looking Backward · Music · Radio

Remaking a Blog (a Little)

May 13th, 2008 · No Comments

Obviously, I’ve changed the name of the blog. The former Meat and Poison was all right at one level; I’d come up with it after recalling the title of a collection of essays by E.B. White, One Man’s Meat.
But really? The …and Poison was a bit creepy. Running After My Hat? Much more satisfyingly, umm, [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Running After My Hat

Boomer Memory

May 8th, 2008 · No Comments

The New York Times reported the other day on the frenzied efforts among Boomers to sharpen their minds — particularly the parts of their minds involving memory.
When David Bunnell, a magazine publisher who lives in Berkeley, Calif., went to a FedEx store to send a package a few years ago, he suddenly drew a blank [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: How It Was · Looking Backward

Signature Samuel L.

May 5th, 2008 · No Comments

Last night The Missus and I watched 1408 on DVD. If you’re not familiar with the film’s plot — or that of the Stephen King story on which it’s based — and don’t want to follow that link to the corresponding IMDB page, here are the tagline and plot summary from there:
Tagline: The Dolphin Hotel [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Movies

Department of Mixed Messages

May 1st, 2008 · No Comments

So I’ve got my annual car registration renewal notice here.
In Florida, Virginia, and probably some other states, car registration isn’t handled via a state DMV (although there is such a thing). Rather, it’s handled by the county tax collector. Presumably, this simplifies keeping tabs on everybody — the DMV doesn’t have to “know” you’ve moved, [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Language