Alvis Curves

This beauty was sitting by sitting by the curb near church this morning. It's a car, in case you're wondering. But what a car! I'd never heard of the English Alvis motorcar, nor ever seen anything like this 1937 beauty before.

Hubba hubba!

Booyah!

Apple stock closed over $90 today. Wish I'd had more money to put where my mouth was over these last 6 years or so.

Still, can't say I'm sorry I held onto half my holdings when I took some profits last year.

:)

The Oppression will Be Televised

The bad news is that police do stuff like this.

The good news is that, when it happens in public, technology gives eyewitnesses an opportunity to record what happens and try to get accountability.

I have no idea what happened before this video started: the tazed student did seem very disturbed already and his reaction was clearly politicized (one report says that he thought he was being profiled). Nonetheless, I can conceive of no excuse for the repeated tazering of a handcuffed person, or for the threat to taze bystanders who susbsequently asked for the cops' identification.

I think criminal prosecution of the campus police involved is possible and a civil suit is a 100% certainty.

On some level, I find the comments appended to the YouTube version of this video even more disturbing than the video itself. I am deeply distressed by the number of people who seem to find it a) funny (wtf?!?) because of the way the guy screams in pain or b) an example of just deserts because of failure to immediately and silently comply with authority.

And for those commenters who complain that the students didn't do more to intervene... when was the last time YOU jumped in between bullies and their victim (extra points for cases when the bullies were armed with disabling weapons and you were unarmed; extra super bonus points for occasions when the bullies were legal authorities). No? Okay then: stfu.

The Mall at Night

I still find Washington and its classic monuments achingly beautiful.

I shot this photograph on the mall when Abbie and I were going to hear Roz Chast speak at the Smithsonian.

The Problem with Beauty

A fascinating and clear analysis of the pitfalls of a culture obsessed with physical beauty: Why I Hate Beauty.

The article probably won't tell you anything you don't already know, but provides some useful constructs that could be applied to other categories as well. It also serves as a useful foundation for arguments about the vital importance of a cultural (or counter-cultural!) context for providing a balance of values.