I'm having a glaucoma test today. It runs in my family, so I'm going to get the disease eventually, but it may have cropped up sooner than later. I have two of the three symptoms. My eye doctor doesn't think I have it yet, but he's concerned. I'm looking forward to Blue Cross paying for shipments of weed and me telling Marie, "Back off, woman, it's medicinal. . . . And so's the beer and collection of Cheech and Chong videos."
Hopefully, the doctor's office lets me drive home afterwards, instead of forcing me to live on the Bowery: "[P]prosecutors accused a major hospital chain Thursday of ridding itself of a homeless patient by dumping her on crime-plagued Skid Row." How did they crack the case? They must've called in Sherlock Flippin' Holmes: A surveillance camera "recorded the demented 63-year-old woman wandering around the streets in a hospital gown and slippers."
The new ISI Books catalogue arrived. I love book catalogues. It's the only type of educational advertising I know of (not counting Miller Lite commercials, of course). Three new books look especially good: The Solzhenitsyn Reader: New and Essential Writings, 1947-2005, The Essential Russell Kirk, and Small is Still Beautiful: Economics as if Families Mattered, by Joseph Pearce (a book about E.F. Schumacher).
You thought I was exaggerating about the possibility of putting religious phallic symbols on tombstones of American military personnel? We either get a grip on what constitutes legitimate religion (which would entail getting a grip on some basic metaphysics) or find some sort of third alternative (a libertarian stripping of all religious symbols?), or the whacked-out religions are just going to get worse. "Self-proclaimed Jedis 'Umada' and 'Yunyun', joined by hairy wookie Chewbacca, called for official acceptance of their 'religion' at London's UN headquarters." How are you going to deny them? Because their religion isn't older than Steven Spielberg?
Neat piece about Marshall McLuhan, though rather harsh at points. Excerpt:
Like all originals, he suffered at the hands of admirers who assumed he was like them. Television people, for instance, thought that he loved television, since he talked about it so much; my observation was that he seldom watched it and certainly knew nothing about it. Those who were cool to religion took it for granted that he shared their feelings. I remember the horror on the faces of several academics, McLuhan fans all, when I mentioned that he was a Roman Catholic who went to mass every day.
Interesting, but brief, meditation: "Imagine what would happen if coffee shops were run like schools. Let's say that state and local officials granted Starbucks a 'public coffee' franchise, paying it $10,000 annually per customer (about what the public schools spend per pupil) to keep us all in caffeinated bliss." Click here to the read the common-sensical but widely ignored conclusion.
