“I’ve always thought a hotel ought to offer optional small animals… I mean a cat to sleep on your bed at night, or a dog of some kind to act pleased when you come in. You ever notice how a hotel room feels so lifeless?”—Anne Tyler
“We hate Big Pharma. We hate big government. We don’t trust The Man. And we shouldn’t. Our health care system sucks. It’s cruel to millions of people. It’s absolutely astonishingly cold and soul-bending to those of us who can even afford it. So we run away from it, and where do we run? We leap … More Quote of the Day
I have an academic friend who went through a postmodernist phase, as he admitted later, to liberate himself from the shackles of orthodox Marxism. He read Derrida and thought he understood him. After a while, though, he started reading a biology textbook because “in addition to being interesting, it might actually be true.” The whole … More Science Denialism on the left
“After obsessively Googling symptoms for four hours, I discovered ‘obsessively Googling symptoms’ is a symptom of hypochondria.” ― Stephen Colbert
An actual conversation: “So you’re a doctor, a physician?” “Yes, I am.” “Can I ask you a question? Is it possible to get mild food poisoning? I think I accidentally ate dinner with a fork that touched raw chicken, and I feel mildly ill.” “It’s not my area of expertise, but I imagine if you … More Skill Sets
“My formula for living is quite simple. I get up in the morning and I go to bed at night. In between, I occupy myself as best I can.”—Cary Grant
Finding the right barber can be one of life’s greatest challenges. The first barber I have any memory of is Cliff, the barber in the neighborhood I grew up in. Cliff loved sports and talked sports incessantly. The Harlem Globe Trotters were staring to make a splash in the 1950s, and Cliff often said, … More Barbers
“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”– Winston Churchill
The polar opposite theory. Incumbent presidents are replaced by their polar opposites. Except for his gender, Trump is definitely the polar opposite of Obama. Obama has big hands. The persistence of sexism. The qualities Americans want in a president are incompatible with pantsuits. False memory syndrome. Some Americans really do want to make America great … More Ten Reasons Donald Trump May Well Be the Next President
We all fall victim to magical thinking at some point. For some, of course, magical thinking is a way of life; for others, exploiting magical thinking is a way to make a living. Many naturopaths, faith healers, fortune tellers, and the like may combine the two, believing in what they do as fervently as those … More The Coffee Table
No Harm Spilt 