The comedian and actor Richard Lewis has died at the age of seventy-six. The New York Times has an obituary.
Last night I watched “Beep Panic” (March 15, 2020), an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm in which Richard Lewis is prominent. Here’s an excerpt. The look on Lewis’s face at 3:10 made me laugh so hard I choked.
Thursday, February 29, 2024
Richard Lewis (1947–2024)
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
“The little clouds spoke for them”
Italo Calvino, “The forest on the superhighway.” In Marcovaldo, trans. William Weaver (New York: HarperCollins, 1983).
Related reading
All OCA Italo Calvino posts (Pinboard)
Tuesday, February 27, 2024
Bic Accountant Fine Point
I recall using a Bic Accountant Fine Point when I was a kid, and I remember the way the barrel’s edges cut into my fingers. Not a pleasant pen. The BAFP hasn’t been manufactured for some time, and I haven’t written with one in many years. I rediscovered these two in a cup of neglected pens. They’re so old that their caps lack the vent hole that’s meant to reduce the hazard of choking. Bic added a hole to caps in 1991, so these are some seriously neglected pens. Why did I buy them? To use when grading papers? I have no idea.
The Bic Accountant Fine Pt. still commands a loyal following. “I wish BIC had NEVER discontinued them,” says one Amazon review. The lowest price I could find online: $52.95 for a dozen. Highest: $14.95 for a single pen. That’s moving into Blackwing territory.
Notice the little Bic man on the barrel and clip. You can click on the image for a larger him.
If you’re wondering: these pens no longer write. I managed to get a few dim scrawls from one after repeatedly immersing the point in rubbing alcohol. But the ink won’t budge, which is probably a good thing — because if it did, I’d feel obliged to write with these pens. Instead, I’ll install them in a vitrine in the Museum of Supplies.
This post is the twenty-fourth in a series, “From the Museum of Supplies.” Supplies is my word, and has become my family’s word, for all manner of stationery items. The museum and its vitrines are imaginary. The supplies are real.
Other Museum of Supplies exhibits
Ace Gummed Reinforcments : C. & E.I. pencil : Dennison’s Gummed Labels No. 27 : Dr. Scat : Eagle Turquoise display case : Eagle Verithin display case : Esterbrook erasers : Faber-Castell Type Cleaner : Fineline erasers : Harvest Refill Leads : Illinois Central Railroad Pencil : Ko-Rec-Type, Part No. 3 : A Mad Men sort of man, sort of : Mongol No. 2 3/8 : Moore Metalhed Tacks : A mystery supply : National’s “Fuse-Tex” Skytint : Pedigree Pencil : Pentel Quicker Clicker : Real Thin Leads : Rite-Rite Long Leads : Stanley carpenter’s rule : Tele-Rest No. 300
A philosophy of art
“Art is the tangled mess of everything we experience but cannot express in any other way”: in today’s Nancy, a philosophy of art.
See also unicorn trend.
Related reading
All OCA Nancy posts (Pinboard)
Monday, February 26, 2024
How to improve writing (no. 118)
“What’s in Store for the Future of Higher Education?”: that’s the subject line in an e-mail from The Chronicle of Higher Education .
I ran this line past Elaine while we were walking. It took her less than a second to notice what’s wrong. Omit redundant redundancies!
Related reading
All OCA How to improve writing posts (Pinboard)
[This post is no. 118 in a series dedicated to improving stray bits of public prose.]
A dictionary of rice
“They have narrowed down the words in the four categories of appearance, taste, aroma and texture to about 100 and are now in the process of defining them”: in the works, a Japanese dictionary of rice.
[Not from a dream.]
Bumping into an ex-governor
I was walking into an office building, and out came Andrew Cuomo. I recognized him, but it took me a second to put a name to the face.
“Michael Leedy?” he asked.
“Leddy,” I said, “but how do you know my name? I’ve never been in trouble.”
“But I was,” he replied. “And when I was, there were a lot of show tunes about it.”
Related reading
All OCA dream posts (Pinboard)
[Likely sources: 1. The 2019 movie Bad Education. Hairwise, Hugh Jackman’s Frank Tassone bears at least a vague resemblance to Cuomo. Tassone was known for remembering names. 2. A PBS broadcast of a Tom Lehrer concert.]
Sunday, February 25, 2024
James Van Der Zee’s studio
[2077 7th Avenue, now Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard, Harlem, New York City, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click for a much larger view.]
Just a storefront among storefronts, but this storefront was one location for the studio of the celebrated photographer James Van Der Zee (1886–1983). There he is in the 1940 Manhattan telephone directory:
[Click for a larger view.]
In front of the store stands a display case full of photographs. The sign suggests an enterprise with several parts: PICTURE FRAMING / PHOTOS / HEMSTITCHING NOTARY. You can see the sign with greater clarity in a photograph by Van Der Zee himself, accompanying this New York Times article (gift link).
Three choice sources for Van Der Zee browsing:
~ A 2019 exhibition at the Howard Greenberg Gallery (click on Thumbnails)
~ A 2022 exhibition at the National Gallery of Art
~ The Metropolitan Museum of Art
No. 2077 today: Delhi Masala, an Indian restaurant.
I’ll add one more detail: a 1926 Van Der Zee photograph was the inspiration for Toni Morrison’s Jazz (1992). The photograph appears in The Harlem Book of the Dead (1978), a collection of Van Der Zee’s funeral portraits, for which Morrison wrote the foreword. Van Der Zee’s caption for the photograph:
She was the one I think was shot by her sweetheart at a party with a noiseless gun. She complained of being sick at the party and friends said, “Well, why don’t you lay down?” and they taken her in the room and laid her down. After they undressed her and loosened her clothes, they saw the blood on her dress. They asked her about it and she said, “I’ll tell you tomorrow, yes, I’ll tell you tomorrow.” She was just trying to give him a chance to get away. For the picture, I placed flowers on her chest.You can see the photograph in this New York Times article (gift link).
Related reading
More photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives (Pinboard)
Saturday, February 24, 2024
Today’s Saturday Stumper
The Newsday Saturday Stumper seems to have settled into a permanent state of way-difficult. Today’s puzzle, by Steve Mossberg, is yet another killer. I give you 5-D, ten letters, “Bears fan.” And 7-D, four letters, “Bar food.” Wut, and wut. My last answer was 5-D, and I knew it had to be right, but it still looked strange enough to send me to the dictionary. Strange indeed.
Some more clue-and-answer pairs of note:
4-D, eight letters, “Fellini’s first Oscar film.” It happens to be in our queue.
15-A, eight letters, “Storage facility.” “Facility” is mean misdirection, or merely a stretch.
20-A, seven letters, “Spaced out.” I was once told that I taught with a 20-A expression on my face. I was not, however, spaced out.
22-A, three letters, “Baby sitter?” Wonderfully clever.
28-D, ten letters, “Repurposing.” Always consider the part of speech, Michael.
30-D, nine letters, “Sphinxian.” Had to be.
36-D, eight letters, “Literally, ‘great queen.’” A little knowledge let me figure out the answer.
41-A, five letters, “Group in discussion.” Wildly misdirective. See 28-D.
42-D, five letters, “‘16 on 16’ competition.” A joke on, say, 3 on 3 in basketball? I don’t think the expression “16 on 16” has any currency in this form of competition.
46-A, three letters, “‘Quit clipping me!’” Another great clue for a three-letter answer.
My favorite in this puzzle: 54-A, eight letters, “Musician on the move.” Delightful.
No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.
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