Oh Wow

There's some heavy breathing for book lovers at View From The Ledge.

Sydney New Year's

Sydney, Australia on New Year's Eve.

[It was relief to see people. I was beginning to think it was a clip from "On the Beach."]

The Charity at the Register

Last week I went scrounging for some après-holiday bargains and at Brooks Brothers found a shirt and trousers suitably discounted. There, too, the register clerk informed me that I had benefited from the largess of the store and asked if I might want to reciprocate in the form of a contribution to St. Jude's. Well, all right.

If you shopped at any number of stores participating in the hospital's campaign—including Williams-Sonoma, Kmart, CVS drug stores, and others—you also were asked to contribute. Chances are, like me, you dutifully added to the kitty. But I wonder how many, like me, came away with a bad taste from the experience, an unpleasant sense of having been imposed upon.

Read the rest of Eric Felten on "giving at the store."

Retreat

I'm facilitating a "Retreat" this morning. It's for a community group in which I'm active. The location will be at what was once an old stagecoach stop where people like Doc Holliday occasionally dropped by.

I'll let you know if he shows up.

When a retreat's goal is candid discussion, there must be enough red meat topics so the lions won't hesitate to roar, rip, and tear. We've got them, but invariably some new topics will emerge. That's good too.

The job of a good facilitator is to clarify. Much depends on knowing when to jump in and when to get out of the way.

It should be fun.

Quote of the Day

We don't stand on no ceremonies around here.

- Ma Kettle in "The Egg and I"

Miscellaneous and Fast

• Mary Jo Asmus: When you're the problem.
• National Geographic: Extreme earth wallpapers.
• Psychology Today: Spotting passive aggressive behavior in the workplace.
• Europe: The politics of war memorials.
• Peggy Noonan writing on catastrophic victories.
• Tanmay Vora on qualitative and quantitative compliance.
• What Would Toto Watch? on if Avatar had left out the politics.
• America's Cup: The Death Star entry.
• Charles Krauthammer on the Gitmo obsession.
• I want one: first images of an SMS 620 Camaro.
• Food icon Michael Pollan forages for food in New York City.

Tree Rocketry

Well, in an earlier post there was the guy who shot an anvil 200 feet into the air. It's only appropriate that we explore what to do with that old Christmas tree.

Where Do We Stand?

My post on breeding uncertainty is up at U.S. News & World Report.

Creative Process: Neverwhere

Then, in 1991, I was judging a literary award. There is an unwritten rule that all literary award judging panels must, at some point, meet in the Groucho Club, so it was there that we met and argued the merits of the books we liked and defended the ones we did not. After the judging was over, I looked up and saw actor and comedian Lenny Henry at the bar. He waved me over. We knew each other a little, had worked together on Comic Relief the previous year. “I was going to call you,” he said. “Do you want to make a fantasy series for the BBC? I thought it could be about tribes of homeless people in London.”

I went home. I thought about it. I didn’t want to write about tribes of homeless people, mostly because I suspected I could make living homeless in London seem attractive or exciting enough that someone might try it. But what about turning it upside down: the people who fall through the cracks. A London that falls through the cracks…

Read the rest of Neil Gaiman on the creation of his novel, Neverwhere.

Frost Break

Cultural Offering gives us one of the best from the old master.