I have always been repulsed by the suggestion that Mendelssohn's E-minor violin concerto is somehow feminine. This is like saying that Ingmar Bergman is feminine. In both cases, may we not say that only a man could have made such things?

Life.

Is.

Sunt lacrimae rerum, et mentem mortalia tagunt.

Et expecto resurrectionem mortuorum.

Are not these things true? How can these things be true? Quid est veritas?

Q. What is your only comfort?

I'm now 31. If you follow the old 1970's maxim, I guess you could say that I can no longer be trusted.

If you don't know Puccini, you have missed out on something wonderful which modern times has to offer modern man. (And I pity you.)

What things one losses through the rolling years? I think back to the days when I devoured Sibelius and Narn i Hin Hurin, or to the hours I spend enthralled in Euripides, and I almost wonder who that young man was. (I would like to be able to say, "Law School," but it really isn't that simple.)

in halls upheld     with huge pillars
of black basalt.     There bats wandered,
worms and serpents     enwound the columns;

Are "little people" a categorical imperative?

I read the other day that Woody Allen said that he would be gratified to be regarded as a "great European filmmaker." That struck a chord.

What cannot the myth in the Gorgias or the sixth chapter of the Gospel according to John be cited as authority in a judicial opinion? That categorical bar has always bothered me. It seems to make all of us that much the poorer for it.

The Ames translations of the Analects and Dao De Jing are very interesting! Anyone know anything about them?

Sunset on Mars

Spirit captured this haunting image of the sun setting over Gustev crater on Mars:

ICANN created a .xxx domain last Wednesday for pornographic websites. This should have been done a long time ago. Hopefully, it will enable the "zoning" of the internet and the eventual restriction of all online hardcore porn to a set domain.

(Thanks to Peter Krupa for the link.)