Saturday, January 16, 2016
Singing out loud.......................
Bad Company.........................................Rock and Roll Fantasy
But...............................
"We can be knowledgeable with other men's knowledge, but we can't be wise with other men's wisdom."
-Michel de Montaigne
In commendation of age...........
“Alonso of Aragon was wont to say in commendation of age, that age appears to be best in four things: old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.”
-attributed to Francis Bacon
Jess is on a hot streak.................
..........................................We recommend checking in with Indexed every so often. To wit:
Fifty years ago......................
Percy Sledge..............................When A Man Loves A Woman
Highlights..............................
Montaigne concludes his essay:
"I will conclude this piece with this old line that I think is singularly fine and to the purpose: Each man's character shapes his forture."
-The Complete Essays of Montaigne
"Of the inequality that is between us"
as translated by Donald M. Frame
full essay may be read here
the hurdles of our wishes.......
Do you remember still the falling stars
that like swift horses through the heavens raced
and suddenly leaped across the hurdles
of our wishes--do you recall? And we
did make so many! For there were countless
numbers
of stars: each time we looked above we were
astounded by the swiftness of their daring play,
while in our hearts we felt safe and secure
watching these brilliant bodies disintegrate,
knowing somehow we had survived their fall.
-Rainer Maria Rilke
image via
Subtle..................................
The philosopher Alfred North Whitehead argued, "Moral education is impossible without the habitual vision of greatness." In 1943, Richard Winn Livingstone wrote, "One is apt to think of moral failure as due to weakness of character; more often it is due to an inadequate ideal. We detect in others, and occasionally in ourselves, the want of courage, of industry, of persistence, which leads to defeat. But we do not notice the more subtle and disastrous weakness, that our standards are wrong, that we have never learned what is good."
-David Brooks, The Road To Character, as extracted from his chapter on George C. Marshall
Friday, January 15, 2016
Go make it happen........................
Steppenwolf........................................................Born To Be Wild
Get your motor runnin'
Head out on the highway
Lookin' for adventure
And whatever comes our way
Yeah Darlin' go make it happen
Take the world in a love embrace
Fire all of your guns at once
And explode into space
I like smoke and lightning
Heavy metal thunder
Racin' with the wind
And the feelin' that I'm under
Yeah Darlin' go make it happen
Take the world in a love embrace
Fire all of your guns at once
And explode into space
Like a true nature's child
We were born, born to be wild
We can climb so high
I never wanna die
Born to be wild
Born to be wild
Opening paragraphs...................
It was 8:00 p. m. Tuesday, September 16, 2008. I was exhausted, mentally and emotionally drained, but I could not sit. Through the windows of my office in the Federal Reserves Eccles Building, I could see the lights of the traffic on Constitution Avenue and the shadowy outlines of American elms lining the National Mall. Dozens of staff members remained at work, but the corridor immediately outside my door was hushed and empty. Michelle Smith, the head of our communications office and my chief of staff, sat quietly, the only other person in the room. She was waiting for me to say something.
Four hours earlier, Treasury secretary Hank Paulson and I had sat side by side in tan leather armchairs in the windowless Roosevelt Room of the White House, steps from the Oval Office. A portrait of Teddy Roosevelt as Rough Rider on a rearing horse hung above a fireplace. Facing Hank and me across the room's polished wood table sat the current occupant of the White House, a somber George W. Bush, with Vice President Dick Cheney at his side. The president's advisers, Hank's senior aides, and representatives of other financial regulatory agencies filled the remaining dozen seats around the table.
Usually, the president liked to keep things light at meetings, by opening with a wisecrack or good-naturedly teasing a close adviser. Not that afternoon. He asked bluntly, "How did we get to this point."
-Ben S. Bernanke, from the Prologue to The Courage To Act: A Memoir Of A Crisis And Its Aftermath
Counter-intuitive.......................
From the article on the retail sector of the real estate world, titled Back to Normal?, in the January print issue of National Real Estate Investor:
But Moore isn't concerned about the increase in bankruptcies; he's reassured by it.
"The reason we weren't seeing any bankruptcies was because no one new was starting up -- there was an absence of new concepts," he says. "As the retail sector improved, people decided to jump in with new concepts. That's why we're seeing bankruptcies: not everybody is going to win."
Must have something to do with that necessary "creative destruction" part of a capitalistic economic system.
Fifty years ago.............................
The Yardbirds...................................................Shapes of Things
Predictions are hard............................
...............................................................especially about the future and especially about commodities.
Thursday, January 14, 2016
Quite enough of.................................
Ben Rector..........................................................More Like Love
I use to think I wanted to be famous
I'd be recognized out in a crowd
But the funny thing is anytime I've gotten what I want
It lets me down
But now I just wanna look more like love
I just wanna look more like love
This whole world is spinning crazy
And I can't quite keep up
It's the one thing around here
That we don't have quite enough of
So I just wanna look a little more
Like love
I used to think I needed all the answers
I used to need to know that I was right
I used to be afraid of things I couldn't cover up
In the lime light
I find the farther that I climb
There's always another line
Of mountain tops
It's never going to stop
And the more of anything I do
The thing that always ends up true
Is getting what I want
Will never be enough
So I just wanna look more like love
I just wanna look more like love
This whole world is spinning crazy
I can't quite keep up
It's the one thing around here
That we don't have quite enough of
So I just wanna look a little more
Like love
Like love
thanks Maggie
Strength undefeatable...............
Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. God Himself is not secure, having given man dominion over His works! Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold. Faith alone defends. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.
-Helen Keller, as culled from Let Us Have Faith
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