chimpden

I travel frequently for work, most often in Europe and Asia, with the occasional jaunt to Africa or the States.

More and more, it strikes me that hotels just don’t “get it” when it comes to the Internet. Read the rest of this entry »

As I was finishing “Old & Rare: 40 Years in the Book Business,” Leona Rostenberg and Madeleine Stern’s fabulous book on their adventures in the antiquarian book trade, I came across a prescient bit on the dangers of technology as they saw it.

A brief digression: If you love books, Read the rest of this entry »

I once again have let far too much time elapse without posting here. Part of the problem is work. The other is that this remains an unshared slice of my life as far as the family is concerned, so I can only write here in small slivers of leftover time. Finally, Twitter is an unexpected diversion.

At the moment, I’m wandering around South Africa and being amazed every day. The raw beauty of the countryside beggars belief.  We sepnt today at a game reserve about three hours outside Cape Town. In lieu of a real post, here are a few snaps to give you some idea of the experience (I’m without photo editing tools, so please forgive the rough edges).

More photos after the break . . .

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I saw “The Class” last night and thought it was extremely good. Not “Milk” or “Waltz with Bashir” good, mind you, but good. The film is a pseudo-documentary set at a Paris junior high school, and portrays the tensions that arise as a young French teacher, François Marin (played adroitly by François Bégaudeau, the author of the book on which the movie is based) and his colleagues Read the rest of this entry »

When they sat down at the table she couldn’t manage to eat anything. She held Bob’s left hand in both of hers under the corner of the table and gazed at him.

‘Oh, Bob!’ she said.

‘Oh, Tessa!’ said Bob, taking a forkful of stew with his disengaged hand. . . .

. . .’To us, Tess’ he said.

She took his hand again. ‘To you, Bob. Whatever happens to us, I hope things always go right for you.’

Bob put his glass down. ‘Tess,’ he said, ‘I’m honestly not worthy of you.’

‘That’s a silly thing to say, Bob.’

‘It’s true, Tess. You’re generous and selfless in a way I could never be.’ He picked up his fork, prodded ineffectually at his stew for some moments, and then withdrew his left hand from hers. ‘I just want to cut up this piece of meat, Tess,’ he said.

Michael Frayn, Towards the End of the Morning

J and I saw Milk last Saturday at its first London screening, followed by a question and answer session with Gus Van Sant and Dustin Lance Black. In an unexpected bonus, James Franco also joined the fun. I absolutely loved the movie–Sean Penn was amazing. I don’t think I’ve cried that much at a movie in a long time. J teared up too, but she does that at movies a lot, so I’m not sure that’s entirely a fair marker (she also swears like a trucker, so don’t go getting the wrong idea). Read the rest of this entry »

Probably only news to me, but was pleased to find this on You Tube. You can also hear his 1936 National Lecture on Poetry here (RealPlayer required, sadly).

My reading time these days consists primarily of two 30 minute stints each week day on the Tube and three or four hours I cobble together most week-ends, so choosing a book is something I do with a reasonable amount of care. (For the same reasons, don’t expect eloquence here–this blog amounts to me rambling on about whatever happens to be on my mind, in whatever time I can scrape together.)

I bought Stepping Stones and moved it to the top of my embarrassingly large TBR pile for two reasons. Read the rest of this entry »

Conspicuous consumption might seem to be one of those areas to come under pressure given the state of the economy. Tell that to Motorola. With another example of the exquisite business sense that has helped the firm descend into the ranks of technology also-rans, the firm has come out with a $2,000 phone. The Aura, which went on sale Tuesday, has no functional features that can begin to justify the price. It is not a smart phone, cannot use 3G networks, has a run-of-the-mill 2mp camera, no GPS, no WiFi, just 2GB of memory and a small, circular display (the screen is, however, said by many reviewers to be of extremely high quality). And given that it’s driven by Moto’s mediocre software, it is already starting well behind many of its rivals. Read the rest of this entry »

I am insanely busy at the day job, so haven’t much time to post here. However, did come across this little audio gem. Enjoy.