Tag: Novemblog 2017
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In praise of wedding reception air drumming
I didn’t realize I had a reputation. At a wedding recently, the bride and groom told me one of the things they were looking forward to the most was my air drumming. They had seen it in action at a previous wedding and had enjoyed it so much that they decided they would make time…
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Family Video to the rescue
Home for Thanksgiving weekend and in the market for a Christmas movie to watch, my sister suggested Die Hard. A great choice for many reasons, one of which being I hadn’t seen it in a while and was due for a seasonal rewatch. Plus my wife hadn’t seen it. (Perish the thought!) The problem was…
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Great Olin’s Raven!
The first baby in my family has arrived. Behold Olin Charles: I’ve made fun of my wife for all the pictures and video she takes of her sister’s kids. I get it now.
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Move it, McDonald’s
The replica of Ray Kroc’s first McDonald’s franchise in Des Plaines, Illinois, where I used to work, will be torn down next month: Kroc, considered by the company to be the founder of the modern chain, built his first restaurant in 1955 after franchising the brand from the original owners, Richard and Maurice McDonald. The…
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My Mount Rushmore of Singers
At this moment, anyway: Sam Cooke, Frank Sinatra, Julie Andrews, Whitney Houston With a runner-up trophy for Marty Robbins.
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Studs Terkel’s ‘Working’
I picked up a copy of Studs Terkels’ Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do, a sort of oral history of life and work in and around 1970s Chicago. I’ve kept it on my nightstand and slowly chipped away at it when I was between other…
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A Ghost Story
“O’er all there hung the shadow of a fear, A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is haunted.” – Thomas Hood, “The Haunted House” I thought of that poem, used to great effect in Slow West, after seeing A Ghost Story, David Lowery’s breath of a film.…
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‘Working toward the truth’ in “How to Think”
There goes Alan Jacobs being right again: it would be better for all concerned if we were content to say that our political opponents are merely wrong. But that’s unlikely to happen, at least widely, because once you say someone is wrong you commit yourself to explaining why he’s wrong — to the world of…