At Times The Rain Gods Drive Us Mad ...

Diana gifted me with The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.
I opened the first volume randomly and my eye lit upon:

"Jornada ... An act of a play; a book or canto of a poem. 2. In Mexico etc.: a day's journey; spec. one across a waterless dessert tract with no place to halt."

A more concisely perfect description of many second acts has seldom been penned.
--ml

Quandary #326

As beauty resides in the beholder's eye, so logic belongs to whoever defines its terms.
Your reasons are not mine.
Hence the difficulty of persuading by "reasoned argument."
Logic is a game of mathematics. Follow its rules and there is no escape. The conclusion arises from the premise.
Ventilate the game with reality -- which includes such messy things as passion -- and all changes. Surprising information appears and certainty is shaken beyond its foundation.
Not to worry -- it is all argy-bargy in the end.
--ml

Last Night I Committed Poetry – I Think.

Like the vivid hue

Of a young man's blue shirt,

Another's death engulfs me.

And, as promised, diminishes me.

Yet, after ebb,

I return to myself

a little closer

--ml

Forward Fulmanations

While assembling the recipes for Dum Luk's Ordinary I came across this file. It is a sketch to begin a book. But which one? The synapses issue a stale fart and inquire if any whiskey might help? I give my best rendition of a deer in the headlights in response.
This being more a writer's scrap book, or doodlewerk, I take the liberty of offering to quote myself:

Caveat 

Neither to inform nor instruct do I write. Rather I hope to share my mediocrities, triumphs, and the failures that made them both possible. This is a work of fiction. I have taken to heart the hoary mantra of Advice to Writers:Write only of what you know For years I fulminated against this as a homicide of fancy leading at best to mere journalism – and folk think me opinionated now! “Mere”, of course, meant journalism in theory, Kipling’s “who, what, where, when, why and how” purveyed by a neutral observer, not the ill-kempt, own horn sounding, condescending verbiage of modern infotainment (so little info and hardly more tainment, *sigh*). Life has beaten into me at last that what makes a writer valuable is his point of view – that is: the imagination through which the writer conceives this world. First, last and in-between a writer must study his own imagination. All that happens to him must be filtered, reduced, transmogrified in the lens and alembic of that organ. What emerges is mingled with dross. For a Shakespeare all is forgiven. The rest of us take our chances in a frequently harsh, and sometimes indulgent world, busy at telling its own story. Here you have not one, but a double-barreled blast of my current effusion. If you like it you obviously are a person of taste and discretion. If you cavil at the germ and quibble at the dross, no doubt you are a person of discernment. Please don’t tell me about the fault’s you find, I am already busy elsewhere. Instead write your own book stating your own truth. If that contradicts mine I promise I won’t bring it to your attention. If in the process you discover that picking a quarrel with me is not so important I will be pleased. You have been warned. Here goes.

"Double-barreled"? What was I thinking of?
... wanders off in a blue study
--ml

Just a Thought ...

This is my preferred campaign:

The progressive who's policy is:

”... It's simple. Its effective. Its doable. Right Now.”

and makes it so, wins.

Think: "Not Insurance reform -- but medicare for all."
or "This year the Bush tax cuts expire. Today I introduce the Obama tax reform -- one which lowers taxes on 90% of Americans while raising the revenue we need to defend, to leran, to repair and to grow."
or: "To survive, this great nation must be as good as its word. So today I have asked Congress to investigate all questionable actions of the previous administration to assure all of us, the American People and the people of the world, that in America we do not break our oath. And if any do so in our name, they meet prompt, swift, but above all, fair justice."

A different world? Maybe. But one that invites.

Aren't you glad I don't run the zoo?

--ml

But, Then ...

Conventional wisdom, as often happens, proved inapt in the particular situation.
--ml

Another Look at Freedom

xkcd illustrates one of Dorothy's favorite precepts:
"My freedom ends at the start of the next person's nose."
--ml

Old Proverbs Applied

If one engages in a formal process of separating sheep from goats, it is a good idea to be prepared for the goats to act like goats. Surprise at this result may not be an adequate response.
--ml

But What Is Truth?

Tim Abbott over at Walking the Berkshires has a couple of interrelated posts up. The elder offers a top ten double feature of historical dramas like Beckett and the Lion in Winter. Made at different times they still go together. Tim -- like the old actor, Henry, in The Fantasticks -- not only knows the ropes, but the ropes to skip. The second post points derisively at these.
Perusing them I was reminded of a young cinematographer manqué I once worked with back when Z was the heartthrob of all radical filmmakers. I was teaching a course in adaptation, turning a Mark Twain short story into a film.
Naturally the discussion in those very contentious years swirled around how true -- how faithful -- we could be to the text. At one point the C. M. stood up to announce: "The camera never lies."
"It never does anything else." I might have retorted.
Because the photographer chooses the subject, the frame, the mood, the lighting, the shutter speed and every other influence on the result, the camera cannot be a "warts and all" record of an event. The camera cannot help but lie -- that is, tell considerably less than the full reality of the subject.
--ml