Author: smartpeopleiknow

In praise of amateurs, young and old

Are you an amateur? Do you sometimes feel you can never accomplish anything doing something you love? Then here’s three good stories on amateurs doing great things you want to read:

  1. High school students discover exoplanets during mentoring program 
  2. Decades-Old Graph Problem Yields to Amateur Mathematician
  3. How older amateur athletes are staying fit through the pandemic

Not all amateurs can accomplish great things, but never let anyone tell you that amateurs are incapable of great things. Because surely they are. Go on, pursue the thing you love. Great things may result.

(Photo by Jamie Street on Unsplash)

Will a $15 minimum wage in the US be a good thing?


If you are wondering if a $15 minimum wage in the US will be a good thing or not, read these two pieces:

  1. Economists reverse claims that $15 Seattle minimum wage hurt workers admit it was largely beneficial
  2. How new research is shaking up the debate about a $15 minimum wage

My belief is it will be a good thing. We may get a chance to see that soon.

(Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash)

Everything you wanted to know about the Filibuster

 

That is an odd title, because while there is much talk in the United States about the Filibuster, they are really only talking about the use of the filibuster in the U.S. Senate. Mind you, because of the composition of that current political body, there will be much more talk about it. If you want to have some context regarding it, read this: The History of the Filibuster

If you just want to know about filibusters in general, read this.

(Photo by Joshua Sukoff on Unsplash)

The arc of every long project and what you need to keep it mind

 

This chart came from John Hendrix.  It is much like the Gartner Hype Cycle but with some key differentiators.

At the beginning of John’s curve you get an idea and as you imagine it more and more, the idea may get better and better.  You get excited about it. By the time you are about to start, you can imagine how great it will turn out. But it is only an idea still.

Then you start the project. As you progress, the idea goes from being Great to Good to Ok to Horrid. At some point you enter The Pit of Despair (or as Gartner calls it, The Trough of Disillusionment). This is the low point of the project. Like John says: a) you want to give up b) this is normal. Think of it as the first draft of something.

How do you get out of the pit? By applying yourself. By sticking to it. Slowly it gets better. It goes from Horrid to Ok to Good. It may even get to Great.  What will happen for sure is that it will Suck Less. (A concept I learned from Austin Kleon.)

When you have finished the project,  you may notice two things. One, it is different than how you imagined it. Two there is still a gap between what you had hoped for or imagined and what you had accomplished. It’s important here to acknowledge that and also acknowledge how far you’ve come and how good it is.

John’s chart is for art projects, but it can be applied to fitness projects, IT projects, home improvement projects….you name it.

Japan: more different than you might think

When I think of Japan, I think of cherry blossoms, Mt. Fuji, busy Tokyo streets, temples, sushi, and a homogenous society with very few outsiders. It turns out the last one is not really true. To see what I mean, read this: How homogeneous is Japan? – Noahpinion.

The author, Noah Smith, has depth when it comes to things Japanese and it shows in that piece. I highly recommend him in general, not just for things about Japan. But if your ideas of Japan haven’t changed in some time, that piece will give your brain a much needed upgrade.

To my daughter on her big birthday

It’s my daughter’s birthday today. It’s been a better quarter century with her in the world and in my world especially.

Fifteen years ago I helped her set up a blog where she could write about her summer: SRM @ 110. Just a few years ago I helped her set up a home page on github: Sophie Reich-Michalik. And twelve years ago I wrote this advice to someone who is (more or less) 25 | Smart People I Know.  Perhaps she can find some value with this too. I give her lots of advice. Some is even taken. 🙂

Happy birthday, Sophie! You’re the best! (I know, she always replies. :))

 

 

 

It’s February. A great month. Here’s why

I used to think February was a terrible month. In Canada it is one of the coldest and darkest parts of the year. By the time you get to this month, you’ve already been slogging through months of winter. The joy of Christmas and the New Year has worn off. February is bleak.

Now I think February is a great month. It’s a good month to make resolutions and challenge yourself. It’s a good month to get things done indoors. And it’s a good month to get ready for spring.

If you have to make resolutions or challenges for yourself, make them in February, not January. The latter has 31 days, the former at worst has 29. So if you are trying to exercise every day for a month or not drink for a month or…whatever….you have less days to get to your accomplishment. You will still have a sense of accomplishment and you will have an easier time accomplishing things.

In the cold northern hemisphere, you are likely spending more time indoors, so do some excellent indoor things. Why not take that time and start a new hobby? Or purge your closet/basement/attic of stuff you always wanted to get rid of? Or lie down and binge watch that show you always have been planning to binge watch? Soon Spring is coming and you will want to get outside. Now is the time to tackle all that.

Once you have done your indoor tasks, plan to do your outdoor activities. If you are going to do gardening in the spring, figure out how to do that in February. If you want to get a bike to do cycling in spring, start researching where to get the best bike before March comes. Whatever you want to do in spring, start thinking and planning for it now before it’s too late.

For more on why February is a great month, see this: February resolutions – Austin Kleon

(Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash)

January pandemic highlights and ramblings (a newsletter, in blog form, a month late)

Hey! How has your new year been? Mine has not started great: January was both tough and busy. I kept trying to get to this, but somehow never had the energy or the focus to write it. Now I have found both. Thanks for dropping by and reading this, my latest not-a-newsletter of highlights and ramblings since the last one in December.

Pandemic: we are now in the phase of the pandemic where we are being told in Canada to hurry up and wait concerning the vaccines. It’s been slow to get them, and slow to deliver them. The rate of progress has been discouraging. To make it worse, more variants of the COVID-19 virus have appeared, variants that spread more rapidly. I feel like someone on the Titanic waiting for my turn on a lifeboat while the ship takes on more water. And I am lucky to be able to stay at home and stay healthy. Meanwhile doctors are hospitals are overwhelmed and hanging on. Barely.

Vox took time to try and figure out why Covid-19 beat social distancing, lockdowns, and “flatten the curve”. Reading that could give you some consolation.

Of course, everyone had their monocausal explanations for why we are still struggling with the pandemic. The premier of Ontario brought in another lockdown because he said people are traveling too much. That’s one explanation, but not the only one.

In the early part of the pandemic I felt governments were strong on taking actions. They were like sprinters at the start of a marathon. Then things petered out. For example, the Federal government funded a Toronto COVID-19 isolation hotel. They pumped big money into the economy. Provinces like Ontario provided pandemic pay for frontline workers fighting COVID-19. But I never felt like they tried as hard recently as they did initially.

That’s not to say it is easy and they aren’t trying. This piece explains why
it’s so hard to ramp up Ontario’s COVID-19 testing. Yet it still seems like things are half hearted these days.

It’s not all grim, though much is. We have adopted. Sweatpants for instance :). And we are trying to maintain some form of work-life balance, but as my head boss says,  achieving healthy work-life balance in a hybrid work environment ‘remains to be seen’. Some of us are making unique friends (Riding Out Quarantine With a Chatbot Friend: ‘I Feel Very Connected’).  Some people tried to get out of their old pandemic habits and live better by taking on a Dry January. Others have taken up unusual self help books, such as this: A working from home manual in disguise.

I believe by the end of 2021 we will have put this pandemic behind us. Perhaps we will see a Roaring Twenties to match those of a century ago. Let’s hope, and for those who pray, let’s pray. Most importantly, let’s get vaccinated. If you want to know more about vaccines  in Canada, go here. More on that here.

Last word on this subject. If you want to know how others are getting through the pandemic, this is good: The Pandemic Logs in The New York Times.

The US: finally, after much nonsense, the worst president the United States ever had left the White House. What a long terrible four years it has been for America and the world with him nominally in charge. Whatever else the new president does, the fact that he is at least competent and not corrupt will be good for that country. I am hopeful for America, and my American friends, and I am looking forward to things getting better for them in the years to come.

Restaurants: I was drawn to this piece that Bon Appetit did some time ago on the best restaurants in Toronto . I wonder how many will still be around when all this is over. Some of them have taken to becoming takeout places, like this Michelin-starred restaurant, but many have not. Even for those that did, it might not be enough to get through to the other side of the pandemic.

Gamestop: It has a bizarre time in the world of finance as several forces came together to drive stocks like Gamestock into the stratosphere, only to crash down again. In some ways, it was a bit of a mystery to me. Just when I thought I understood the story, so me new fact would come along. There was a number of good pieces on it. This one, for example: The GameStop Reckoning Was a Long Time Coming

Jeff Bezos and Amazon:  Jeff Bezos has left Amazon. No doubt he was not looking forward to more grilling from the government into his monopolistic practices. I don’t have much to say about him, other than he did  not seem to be a person you want to work for. Here’s hoping Amazon becomes a better place with the new CEO. Meanwhile here’s some markers on the man who ran that company. Like Larry Ellison and unlike Steve Jobs, I doubt he will be missed:

Quantity over quality : there is a great book called Art and Fear which gives lessons on making art. One of my favorite parts of it has to do with how a ceramics class was split into two: one group were given the task of making many vases (quantity) and another group of making one vase (quality). The first group would pit their best vase against the second group. In the story, the first group wins. The lesson: quantity beats quality. I love that story.

Sadly, the story isn’t entirely true. The details on that are here: The Credibility Is in the Details.

Recent blog highlights: here are some things I blogged about in January that I thought were worth reading:

Finally: here is an interactive web site where you can be a cat playing the bongos. Worthwhile! 🙂

And don’t forget…

Good news is coming. Meanwhile, thanks as always for taking the time to read this newsletter, and other things on this blog. I appreciate it.

 

A good American list of wines that Canadians can use

Most of the time, I find that wine recommendations for Americans are useless for Canadians to adopt, because most of the wines recommended are not available in Canada. This list of wine recommendations is different:  50 Affordable Wines You Can Always Trust | Food & Wine.

A majority of the wines are available, at least in Ontario. And needless to say, the wines are good. If you are looking for some new wine ideas, check the list.

 

The problems with supertall towers

I am not a fan of supertall towers. They are bland looking, and they add little to a skyline. Therefore I was glad to see this week that they are being exposed for being problematic. First up was this piece in the New York Times on how one of them has been having lots of problems:  The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks.  Then there was a more general critique of them here:  Why Pencil Towers are Problematic.

It seems to me that there are some problems with the buildings that not even super-engineering can fix. Perhaps this means that this is the beginning of the end of supertall buildings. I can hope.

(Image link to NYtimes.com)

The pandemic isn’t over and neither is working from home. Why are you working like before times?


Until recently, I was working like I always did: get up, get coffee, start work around 9 and finish work around 5 while sitting in the same place for the whole time. Then I read this:Working From Bed Is Actually Great – The New York Times.

After reading it, I thought: why am I working like I used to? Why not take advantage of being at home to work better? For example, last week I was working on a hard problem and I was sitting at my desk and getting nowhere. I decided to go out for a walk. After about 20 minutes of walking the solution came to me. I went home and wrote it up!

Likewise I have weights next to my desk now. When I get stuck I get up an do a microworkout. Other times I will take a break and do a drawing. Or stretch. Anything to get my brain going.

Consider shaking up your own work routine. I know for some people, that’s impossible. End of story. But if it is not impossible, try doing what I did. Or work from a different part of the house. Even the bed.

We are going to be working from home for some time. Let’s make the most of it.

(Photo by Avi Richards on Unsplash)

 

What do Bernie Sanders, billionaires, global warming and you have in common?


What Bernie Sanders, billionaires, global warming and you all have in common is this: you are all mentioned in one or more of these articles I found on economics. All good pieces.

  1. Sanders & Socialism: Debate Between Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman & Socialist Economist Richard Wolff | Democracy Now!
  2. Free exchange – Why Americans and Britons work such long hours | Finance & economics | The Economist
  3. Billionaires should be taxed out of existence, says Thomas Piketty
  4. The technological and economic prospects for CO 2 utilization and removal | Nature
  5. Daily chart – How much would giving up meat help the environment? | Graphic detail | The Economist
  6. The Flaws a Nobel Prize-Winning Economist Wants You to Know About Yourself
  7. Frederick Douglass Railed Against Economic Inequality

(Photo by rupixen.com on Unsplash)

Muji, but for houses


Now wait, you say, Muji makes things for homes. Well, yes m they do, but they also make homes. To see what I mean, see these links:

If you love Muji, you’ll love these links. How practical any of them would be in a Canadian winter, I don’t know, but they are inspiring in their own way.

Image is of the prefab hut.

If you need some inexpensive wall art to freshen up your place, here are 27 ideas

I have to say, having seen the rooms people work out of, you people really need some wall hangings. Seriously, those walls are dull! 🙂

Things are not hopeless, though. You can have nice and inexpensive things to freshen up those walls if you go here:

27 Inexpensive Posters You’ll Actually Want To Hang On Your Wall

There’s something there to appeal to everyone. For example, I like this:

It doesn’t work, but it is far classier than the button Trump had on his desk the resulted in a diet Coke for him whenever someone pressed it.

Will interest in the topic of fascism fade in the US?


Looking at this Google Trends line, there were two peak periods when there was a strong interest in fascism in the US: at the beginning of Trump’s term and towards the end. While those were peaks, there was much talk about fascism through his period in office. As he fades away (rots in jail?), I expect that interest to die off now the US has a new president. Let’s hope.

Meanwhile, the more and more I became convinced of the fascist behavior of the Trump administration, the more I started to read about it. Two links I found interesting were these:

  1. What 1930s political ideologies can teach us about the 2020s | Aeon Essays
  2. The Best Books on Fascism | Five Books Expert Recommendations

If you are interesting / worried about the rise of neo-fascism, I recommend those links.

(Image is one of the best books on fascism).

The worst ever president of the United States of America (revised) is…

No longer this guy:

Three years ago I argued Buchanan was the worst president, here:
The worst ever president of the United States of America is… | Smart People I Know

But a lot has happened in three years, and I now agree with Tim Naftali who argues that: Trump Is the Worst President in History – The Atlantic.

He makes a strong case. Not only that, but we haven’t even begin to know all the bad things Trump has done.

There have been many bad presidents, from Harding to Johnson to Nixon. But Trump takes the “prize” for being the worst.

On the new Raspberry Pi products: the 400 and the Pico

Years ago I worried if  the future for Raspberry Pi would dim. I am happy to say I worried for nothing. The good folks at Raspberry Pi continue to stride boldly into the future with new and better products. Case in point: the Pi 400 and the Pi Pico.

The 400 has been out for a short time, but it is still fairly new. If you are wondering if it could be effective for everyday use,  read this: Raspberry Pi 400 for working and learning at home – Raspberry Pi. I am seriously thinking of getting one for some basic day to day computing.

As the Pi Pico, it is brand new! If you are a fan of the Pi for IoT work, the Pico could be the device you want. To see what I mean, read this: Meet Raspberry Silicon: Raspberry Pi Pico now on sale at $4 – Raspberry Pi. I have order four! I can’t wait to try it out.

The future looks bright for Raspberry Pi.

It’s Monday! First up: dealing with your procrastination

Let’s face it: Monday is a good day to deal with tasks you’ve been putting off. So you write them down, say: this week I will deal with these! And then….you don’t.

It’s ok. Procrastination is a complex thing. If you don’t believe me, read this:
‘Why Do I Spend Weeks Avoiding Tasks That Will Take Me 10 Minutes to Do?’

So much of our culture rewards us for meeting deadlines, so we are encouraged to do things at the last minute. That can encourage our use of procrastination. Likewise, many of us do not acknowledge we have ebbs and flows of energy as well as ebbs and flow of mood. If we were to acknowledge that, we would schedule tasks when we know we have energy and in a good mood.

Read the article and pick out the things that contribute to your putting things off (e.g. mood). Then schedule and do those things that have been on your todo list for so so long.

Good luck!

(Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash)

On restaurants loved and lost: the Boulevard Cafe

On Harbord Street in the 1980s I fell in love with the Boulevard Cafe. My life was just starting, and my girlfriend and I were living just up the street from it, on Brunswick Avenue. We would stroll down and line up with the other people in the area for the wonderful Peruvian style food they had there.

It was the first time I learned to love fish. I come from Nova Scotia, but the fish was prepared terribly when I was growing up. Plus fish was associated with poor people food, unlike all the packaged food I wanted. I hated it.

Or I did until I had the Boulevard’s sea bass. (Sea bass was big in the 80s.) They would gently cook it and serve it with a perfect combo of delicious salad and fragrant rice.  I was instantly transformed into a fish lover after that first meal. Many a fish meal I had after that, and all were great.

And their soups. Their soups were incredible. I once had a garlic soup there that was so good that I still recall it decades later. It was simple, and yet I have often had garlic soup elsewhere and it never compared. They had many great dishes there, but the soup and the fish kept me coming back.

When we first started going, it was popular but not too busy. There was seating on both floors, and half of the upstairs was just a seating area where you could sip your drink and enjoy their  fireplace. I remember one night we were sitting there next to the fire, looking out over Harbord Street as a nice snowfall floated down covering everything. I could have stayed all night.

Later on the word got out and it got busier. The lovely seating area was replaced with more tables. The patio area in the summer was jammed with everyone enjoying the wonderful flavours that came out of the small kitchen in the back.

I was shocked to be riding my bicycle across Harbord Street a few summers ago and seeing it all closed up. It was then I took those photos. It was so good, I thought it would last forever. I stood there for quite awhile and remembered all the wonderful times of my youth sitting outside under the awning and living the good life with great friends and great food. I am lucky to have had such a time.

(In the top photo you can see the chimney where the fireplace was. In the bottom photo you can see the main doors that led to the dining room on the lower floor. The bulletin board would list all the specials. There would be tables put in front of the benches, and you either sat on the benches or chairs opposite. In the evening the lights would come on and it would seem magical.)

P.S. Over at Zomato there is still a copy of the menu and some other photos.

 

The last works of seven famous artists

This is interesting and something I’d like to see more of: the final works of famous artists. At Artnet.com they have at least seven of them: the Poetic, Heartbreaking Final Paintings of 7 Famous Artists, From Salvador Dalí to Marcel Duchamp.(They kinda gush a bit in that title. :))

Here is the last one from Dali:

That is interesting in itself. (Dali is always interesting.) But what makes it more interesting to me, as someone interested in the form of mathematics known as catastrophe theory, was that Dali was interested in and and inspired by it too. As artnet explaiins:

During the last years of his life, Dalí became obsessed with the mathematical catastrophe theory developed by French mathematician René Thom, who suggested that there are seven “elementary catastrophes” that occur: fold, cusp, swallowtail, butterfly, hyperbolic umbilic, elliptic umbilic, and parabolic umbilic. This painting, with its generous curves and sharp edges, mimics these catastrophic events in black lines painted atop what appears to be a crinkled white sheet of paper. The organic curves of a cello appear to one side along with, perhaps as a reference to his own famous facial feature, a handlebar mustache…

Fascinating.

Not your parent’s sofa

If you have ever shopped for a sofa, you can quickly start thinking that there is not much to choose from. If you think that, I want you to check out this: Sofa designs so good, they’re impossible to resist: Part 3 | Yanko Design.

For example, you have this burgundy beauty here:

As well as some that aren’t quite as out there, like this:

You might never want to approach any of them, let alone buy one, but after you are done looking at them, you will have to admit there is more than one way to design a sofa.

On friendship, it’s importance and limits

 I have been thinking a lot about friendships over the pandemic. I have wondered how many friendships will dissolve due to the distance imposed on us by this disease. I have wondered how many will strengthen afterwards when we have a chance to reunite. This crazy time has distorted our lives in so many ways, and our friendships will be one of those things that gets distorted.

If I have you thinking about friendship now, here’s more food for thought:

  1. The People Who Prioritize a Friendship Over Romance – The Atlantic
  2. Why You Need a Network of Low-Stakes, Casual Friendships – The New York Times
  3. The Limits of Friendship | The New Yorker

The pandemic will be over. When that happens, make sure you value the people who were your friends during this difficult time. Best friends are best. But go out and make more friends, too.

(Photo by Kimson Doan on Unsplash)

On Frank Gehry’s latest proposed building for Toronto

Starchitect Frank Gehry is proposing a new set of towers for Toronto, and BlogTo has the latest on it here: Frank Gehry towers in Toronto updated again and people say they look like cheese graters.

I like it. I like the lack of smoothness to it, a quality so many basic buildings have in the downtown core (though there are many good ones, too).  I like how it looks like towers of blocks slightly askew. I also like it has many units: we need more places for people to live in Toronto.

I do wonder, though, if the final version will look anything like that. Or even if it gets built at all. I vaguely recall that Gehry’s designs for his version of the AGO were scaled back due to lack of money. And the ROM designs of another starchitect, Daniel Libeskind, went through transformations as well, though I believe for different reasons It would be good to have more Gehry in Toronto. If we get it and what it will finally look like remains to be seen. It may not looks like a cheese grater at all by the time it appears on King Street.

Do you love minimalism? Do you hate minimalism? Either way, I have links :)

If you love minimalism, you will love these two links:

  1. A Minimalist Home in Japan Utilizes a Tent Structure With Open Air Sides | Colossa
  2. A zen minimalist cabin that brings nature in and takes distractions out | Yanko Design

They contain images of beautiful buildings in a Japanese minimal style that I love. (The image above is just one of many that will have to fantasizing about visiting them if you love this style too).  Well worth taking a look.

If you hate minimalism, then you won’t leave empty handed if you check this out: The empty promises of Marie Kondo and the craze for minimalism | Life and style | The Guardian

For some reason the Guardian has no problem finding authors to complain about minimalism. Oh well. To each their own.

Some poems of hope and resilience


If you need some hope and inspiration and find your typical Internet material isn’t cutting it, perhaps you need something better. If so, visit this site: Poems of Hope and Resilience | Poetry Foundation. 

There’s many good poems there that might help. As they say:

How can we find hope amid uncertainty, conflict, or loss? When we feel we have lost hope, we may find inspiration in the words and deeds of others. In this selection of poems, hope takes many forms: an open road, an unturned page, a map to another world, an ark, an infant, a long-lost glove that returns to its owner. Using metaphors for hope seems appropriate, as the concept of hope is difficult to describe. It is deeper than simple optimism, and more mysterious, delicate, and elusive. It is a feeling we must develop and cultivate, but like faith, it is also a state with which we are graced. Hope can foster determination and grit—the ability to bounce back and to remain determined despite failures and setbacks—when we make daily efforts to change and improve what we can control. These poems speak to the importance of hope and resilience.

Photo by Ron Smith on Unsplash

On the paths you get to choose in life


There are two sets of paths you take in life: those you choose, and those chosen for you. We comfort ourselves by thinking we have many opportunities to choose the right path, but often the right path is taken away from us, either directly by others, or indirectly through our circumstances. We also comfort ourselves by thinking we can influence others to take the right path by pointing out what is obviously the right way to go. Then we are surprised and saddened when they chose the wrong path.

All of that is a way of introducing these two articles on Terry Naugle. The first one is about him being sentenced to 15 years in jail at the age of 62. The next one is about him dying in prison a year later.

I don’t have anything more to add to this man’s life and death. It seems from a The paths available to him from a very early ages were the wrong ones. Later on he could have chose better paths, but it seems he could not make it over to them. His story made me think about how a good life can move away from us given the paths before us.

(Photo by Tim Umphreys on Unsplash)

Things to look forward to in 2021: growing a small garden


It’s important to have things to look forward to in difficult times. Planting a garden when the weather gets warmer can be one of those things.

If that appeals to you, you want to check this out and perhaps print it out: Everything You Need to Know About Vegetable Gardening in One Graphic. It’s a fine infographic and article outlining what you need to know about growing a plot or patio vegetable garden, including important info like when to plant (some in February!) and when to harvest. (You can see this in the snippet of the infographic is above).

You have to admit it is pleasing to think of going to your patio or plot and pulling up some nice greens to make a fresh salad. To turn that winter dream into a summer reality, check out the article linked to above.

On Jacobin magazine – a marker

Occasionally I like to capture and post markers on things in this blog as a reminder for myself. I have this one on Peter Thiel. This post is on a tweet from a Jacobin magazine author that captures what I think of that publication.

It’s a good reminder of me that some people further to the left of the political spectrum will always focus their attacks not on the right but those in the center and not quite as left wing as them.

On restaurants loved and lost

The pandemic has been hard on people and hard on businesses. One type of business it has been especially hard on is the restaurant business. So many has closed that it is hard to recall them all. Partially to remedy this, the Times did a piece on them: Remembering the Restaurants America Lost in 2020 – The New York Times

If you read it, you will likely see some you loved. One I always wanted to go to but never got to and now never will was Lucky Strike. Here’s how Julia Moskin recalled it:

Lucky Strike was for us. That’s how it felt in the early 1990s, when I lived in downtown Manhattan and my restaurant priorities were cheap red wine, good lighting and a potent steak au poivre. Lucky Strike was Keith McNally’s first restaurant of his own, and a looser, more fun sibling of the polished, magnetic Odeon in TriBeCa, which he had opened with partners in 1980.

At the time, Lucky Strike’s location was most accurately described not as “in SoHo,” but “near the mouth of the Holland Tunnel,” and its strip of Grand Street was desolate at night. The warmth and noise that it spilled onto the street made it a beacon for locals. We liked that the food was never quite good enough to draw a crowd. We liked that the rough floors and wine tumblers repelled the people who came looking for lychee martinis and tuna tartare. Mr. McNally went on to open bigger, glossier joints that are still with us — like Balthazar, Minetta Tavern and Pastis — and has closed almost as many, but Lucky Strike was the only one that was a neighborhood restaurant, and the only one I’ll mourn.

I was going to NYC a fair bit in the 80s and 90s, and I remember the buzz around Lucky Strike. I thought: that’s my kinda place. That’s the kind of place I want to hit when I get to Manhattan. But while I went to New York a fair bit, the times there were always short, and I never made it.

There are many great restaurants  I have gone to in my lifetime. Some like Lucky Strike were killed off in the pandemic, some closed long before that. Some of them are still on some form of life support, hoping to make it through to the bright side of this dreadful era. I want to write about those places before I forget them, for my own sake if nothing else. Although perhaps you will have the same thoughts reading them that I had when reading about Lucky Strike. If so, that will be good too.

Restaurant reside in the best parts of my better memories. It’s a good time to recall them, write about them here, and group them with the tag #restoslovedandlost

(Images from the New York Times article)

The worst technology failures of 2020, including one not considered a failure but could be the worst of all

This piece (Worst technology failures of 2020) by MIT Technology Review has a list of the bigger technology failures of 2020. Some of them, like Quibi and facial recognition abuses, are well known.

One listed here may be the greatest technology failure of them all, though for many it is not considered a failure at all. That is the unregulated pollution of space with tiny satellites. As the article states:

Since prehistory, humankind has looked upwards for awe and inspiration, to imagine what forces created the world—and which might end it. But now, that cosmic view is being contaminated with the reflections of thousands of inexpensive commercial satellites put aloft by companies like Amazon, OneWeb, and SpaceX, who want to cover the Earth with internet connections. Sixty satellites can swarm out of a single rocket.

To see what I mean, check out this picture from the article:

Telescope views from earth are being marred with the light of all these satellites. This is today’s problem. Tomorrow’s problem is going to be all the other pollution, light or otherwise, which is going to result from the rush to put things in space. Science is getting wrecked by this.

Already astronomers are thinking of putting telescopes on the dark side of the moon to escape such problems. But without regulation, who knows if even this will be successful? To hear Elon Musk yammer on, he’s just going to be throwing who knows what into space. He’s already launched one of his stupid cars into the atmosphere. Hardly the guy you can trust to be responsible when it comes to deciding what should go into space.

Here’s hoping that in the rush to do more and more space development (a good thing)  there is also an effort to make sure it is well thought and regulated (also a good thing).

If I had the space in a sheltered woods then I would build this home

So many small homes are…well…not great. Small! But nothing special.

This one is arguably an exception to it. Not only is it more attactive than most, but it is fairly fast to make: This DIY Guesthouse Cabin Comes in a Kit and Only Takes Three Days to Build | Apartment Therapy.

You can argue it is not a home at all. Fair. But it is related, I think. And worth checking out.

If you live in a small space and you are getting tired of it, this can help

It’s tough being at home all the time during the pandemic. It’s tougher still if you live in a small space. Indeed, the sameness and smallness of it can get to you.

One way to get some relief — short of moving — is to rearrange your space to make it seem newer and different. If you are stuck for ideas, you might be able to steal some from here: The Best Studio Apartment Layouts We Saw in 2020 | Apartment Therapy. Make a note of the ideas you like. Maybe get some paper and pencil and start drawing new layouts. Soon you will be on your way to freshening up your place.

If you treat it like a game, it might actually be fun to redo your space. Maybe throw out some old piece or wall hanging and get something new too while you are at it.. Paint an accent wall, even.  With all this rearranging and redecorating you just might find your old place seems fresh and new again. And that will make the pandemic bearable over the next while.

(Photo by Alexandra Gorn on Unsplash)

If you are tired of cooking, you need quarantine cooking help


At the beginning of the pandemic there was lots of advice on  cooking and baking being published. Then summer came, and it seemed to have stopped. Restrictions loosened, people went out to restaurants, and in the meantime much of that advice got shelved.

It’s winter now.  In the middle of the second wave with more lockdowns and restrictions, we need that advice again. Bad news: I don’t see as much new material on it. Good news: the old material from before the summer is still good. Case in point, this, from the New York Times: Our Best Recipes and Tips for Coronavirus Quarantine Cooking – The New York Times.

There’s lots and lots of good advice and good recipes there. More than enough to keep you going for the next few months.

My favorite of the lot are the recipes from Melissa Clark. If you don’t know where to start, start there. But really any of the pieces in that long list of recipes and tips are good.

As Jacques Pepin likes to say: happy cooking!

(Photo by Jeff Sheldon on Unsplash)

 

Thinking about things Christopher Nolan while watching Tenet

I have been a fan of Christopher Nolan for awhile, although that love is subsiding and Tenet did nothing to help reverse that. I saw it recently, and while I liked it, like was the strongest emotion I could muster. As this says, ‘Tenet’ Is a Must-Watch for Action Movie Fans | WIRED,  maybe it would have been better on the big screen. I mean, films like Interstellar and Inception were.

I had mostly thoughts about Nolan as an auteur and director while watching it, and basically thought

  • He still loves playing with Time: Interstellar, Dunkirk and many other of his films explore and play with time as an element in his films. Obviously he really goes all out here in Tenet. It makes his films challenging and thought provoking at times. Not to mention confusing. Speaking of confusing…
  • He hates dialog. Ok, not entirely, but it is really hard at times to understand what is going on in Tenet. Not just because of the complexity of Time, but because Nolan does terrible things to the film by often obscuring dialog with sound effects. I mean it was hard understanding Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, but it gets way worse in Tenet.
  • He loves reusing actors. That is one of the things I love about Nolan’s films. If he likes you, you are going to get to act in a number of his films. Tenet is no exception.
  • He hates colour. Tenet is one washed out movie. When I think of it, many of his films seem that way to me, but I could be wrong. He’s no Wes Anderson, that’s for sure. I think the most colour he used in any of his recent films was for the character The Joker in The Dark Knight. Meanwhile in Tenet I kept thinking of all these great location shots he filmed and how they all seem like one big drab filter is applied to them all.

Nolan is a smart guy, and that comes across in how he uses time in Tenet and other films. That said, I never felt that one needed to be a philosopher or physicist to watch this or any of his other films. They’re fun sci-fi / action films that are more middle brow than anything else. Don’t be intimidated by some commentary on the internet. Grab yourself a bag of popcorn and watch the film when you are the mood for an action blockbuster. Just take note of what I said above. 🙂

(Image is a link from the Wired article.)

 

 

Illness mindset, pandemic mindset

This is a stark and great piece on how one woman found that her cancer from a previous time is helping her now:  I spent eight months in the hospital as a teenager. Here’s how it prepared me for the pandemic – The Globe and Mail.

It’s really worth reading. This part struck me in particular:

People have a tendency to believe that “everything happens for a reason”; that bad things happen to transform us into individuals who are more grateful, or open, or happy, or strong. So many well-wishers said this, or some version of it, while I was sick, and I hear it so often now, during the pandemic. But I think the real chance for something you could call transformation comes from accepting that there is no reason, and learning how to live with that.

I agree with this. As I argued earlier, many people will not be affected by the pandemic and will go back to their old ways. Those affected may become better people. Or not.

Something to consider as we slog through the days, waiting and hoping the vaccines take this all away.

(Photo by Anthony Tran on Unsplash)