On one side of the room, there are those who want to project to others that they know a thing or two about food. They gesticulate passionately, because it makes them look Italian and therefore more authentic. For these people, a familiarity with the intricacies of this vintage and that, or that culinary term and [...]
At the beginning of this year I decided to consciously try and move beyond what I diagnosed as “binary thinking.” Since then, the importance of such a transition has only become more apparent. This resolution is not, as some may be forgiven for perceiving, some self-aggrandizing intellectual conceit. It was necessitated by a realization that [...]
Alexander Lutchek refused to be wet. This resolution passed through his mind as he stood outside the “Hot Yoga” studio on Connecticut Avenue in Washington DC. To those passing by, including the local artist, Thomas Brown (who would later that evening paint the most famous work of his life, Connecticut Clown), Lutchek presented a most [...]
I had lunch today at the Taj Mahal restaurant on Connecticut Avenue in Washington DC. I love the Taj, even though it is not the best Indian restaurant in the city. Far from it in fact. My gratitude to the incredibly polite waitstaff chastens my descriptions. It may be sufficient, and sufficiently cryptic to say [...]
At the outset, it is worth mentioning that as I watched President Obama’s speech on Afghanistan tonight I realized that the luxury of not being governed by an idiot has yet to wear off. Obviously, the entire Iraq War has been a complete distraction from the efficient prosecution of the war in Afghanistan. On somewhat [...]
Some photographs from my trip this Fall to Five Islands, a fishing village on the island of Georgetown, along the Maine coast. I was drawn there by repeated reports of a bumper crop of lobsters this year and a consequent drop in prices to verily proletarian depths. Eager to reap the whirlwind and enjoy buttery [...]
My grandfather was a farmer, by which I mean he was endowed with all the wisdom and knowledge that one can only absorb through a childhood and several decades spent in dialogue with nature in all her many forms. I used to spend my summers on his farm. He would greet me at the start [...]
This morning I read a report of the BMW Design Talk at Concorso d`Eleganza, an annual vintage car-show in Italy. Set in the context of the current deep global recession, the participants talked about a redefinition of the concept of luxury and luxury goods. Photographer Thomas Demand described his view that luxury must now be [...]
My relationship to “animated story-telling” can be divided into two distinct periods, one separated from the other by about 20 years. The first spanned my childhood from about the age of 6 to 14 years and focused on what are generally known as “comics.” The second period was much less intense and came to the [...]
The progressive view today is that America needs to invest in its infrastructure in order to dig its way out of the hole in which it has placed itself. And when we think of infrastructure we thing of bridges, roads and broadband – physical things, divided into the shovel-ready and those that at some point [...]
