When Everything in the Machine is a Crisis, The Crisis is What Feeds the Machine

James Lileks finally found a way to inculcate his classic Screeds into his regular blog, calling it the Wednesday Review of Modern Thought. This past Wednesday, he groused about the overuse of “crisis”: One of the manifestations of twitchy, sullen, self-righteous miserabilism is the desire to see every problem as a crisis, and every crisis… Read More When Everything in the Machine is a Crisis, The Crisis is What Feeds the Machine

15 Mar 201915 Mar 2019 AndrewLeave a comment

If Blogs are Dying, We Shall Miss Them.

Lileks at his profound best. While most blogs weren’t deathless examples of great writing, there was the opportunity for individualism, and you don’t get that from a Pinterest page. You don’t get it from a feed of things snipped and reblogged and pinned and shoveled into The Feed. The web turns into bushels of confetti… Read More If Blogs are Dying, We Shall Miss Them.

22 Feb 201522 Feb 2015 AndrewLeave a comment

The Passing of a Dog

James Lileks says good-bye to his beloved Jasper, and as someone who still remembers fondly the dog of his youth (McGee, Bane of Moles, Scoffer at Chain-Link Fences), I was moved beyond the capacity to write anything useful in response. And what’s the point anyway? Everyone who’s had a dog understands; no one else could… Read More The Passing of a Dog

4 Feb 20144 Feb 2014 Andrew1 Comment

Rocking the Links

A few things to read that other people wrote: Stephen Green points out how Krugman tries to make capitalism pay for the sins of statists. How Richard Nixon forced the North Vietnamese to sign a peace, and why Bob Beckel is mad. RS McCain ponders the ineffable WTF-ness of South Carolina politics. Jeff Goldstein respectfully… Read More Rocking the Links

26 Mar 2013 AndrewLeave a comment

Apple is So Not Cool Anymore, It’s Making Handfuls of Money.

Lileks smacks around the tech scribes, weedy dweebs that they are: I don’t trust any sources that uses “Teens” as a category. What the 19-year old finds interesting is different than what the 13-year-old wants. Half the economy consists of catering to the various differences between 15 and 18. So when we hear that “Teens… Read More Apple is So Not Cool Anymore, It’s Making Handfuls of Money.

15 Jan 2013 AndrewLeave a comment

Lileks Speaks the Plain Truth: Vertigo is Lame

Duller than a great thaw is Vertigo, hurdling contrivance upon contrivance with such impossible conveyance of thought that one watches it like a man at a mark, praying that the firing squad kills you straight off. And while the preceding bastardization of Much Ado About Nothing is entirely too pretentious to be clever, it’s still… Read More Lileks Speaks the Plain Truth: Vertigo is Lame

3 Aug 20123 Aug 2012 AndrewLeave a comment

Lileks Roasts Bloomberg, and All His Flying Monkeys, Too.

Epic. (h/t Instapundit) As I said, it’s not about health. If it was, no one would mention the cost of obesity. It’s an issue only because the rest of us have to pay for it? If that’s the case, then there’s no end to the restrictions we can conjure up and impose with equal parts… Read More Lileks Roasts Bloomberg, and All His Flying Monkeys, Too.

5 Jun 2012 AndrewLeave a comment

Lileks on Gatsby

I’ve always rather liked The Great Gatsby, because I find Fitzgerald’s prose far better than any of the other Greats of the Roaring Twenties, especially Hemingway, who reads the way sawdust tastes, and Faulkner, who seemed to think that Henry James wasn’t quite loquacious enough. F. Scott never forgot that writing serves the story. However,… Read More Lileks on Gatsby

24 May 20126 Jun 2012 AndrewLeave a comment

Lileks on Drugs

May be even funnier than normal Lileks, be such a thing concievable. You get the dryness with a hint of frenzy. Went downstairs and turned on the TV and was amused to see I’d left off watching “They Live,” which is The Matrix except with a wrestler. Heh. But that’s on OTC pain pills. Wait… Read More Lileks on Drugs

17 May 2012 AndrewLeave a comment

Lileks on Hoarders

Good stuff: There’s always two stories, they alternate between them, and something is always about to happen, usually eviction. Last night was one of those really cheerful episodes where both stories end in failure. The fascinating part? Not the junk they keep, not the reasons they give, not the delusions they construct, but the immense… Read More Lileks on Hoarders

16 Feb 201216 Feb 2012 AndrewLeave a comment