2023
Whenever I see an Econoline van, I think of a short story that Joe Haldeman wrote about a man who sets off a series of nuclear bombs in cities. Econoline vans play a role in the conspiracy. I read that story 50 years ago, but I still think of that story every time I see one of those vans.
“Doctor Who” showrunner Russell Davies says he grew up twice-closeted, hiding that he was gay and that he was a Doctor Who fan. For him, the two are tied together. “I’d walk home from school wishing I could turn the corner and see that blue box and run inside to escape everything. I don’t think that wish has quite gone.”
Recent college graduates are drinking less. It’s even a movement with a name, NoLo—no-alcohol, low-alcohol.
I’ve never been a heavy drinker, and over time I drink less and less. I rarely like the effect alcohol has on me.
But I do sometimes like a drink. I expect I’ll have one or two on Thanksgiving.
Search Engine: Why don't we eat people?
Today I learned that on Christopher Columbus’s second voyage to the Americas, he encountered a friendly tribe, the Arawaks—“fitted to be ruled and to be set to work to cultivate the land and do all else that may be necessary”—that warned him about another tribe, the Caribs, that were vicious and ate their enemies. We get the word “cannibalism” from their name. Queen Isabella of Spain said it was OK to treat the Caribs harshly because of their vile barbaric practices.
Search Engine podcast host PJ Vogt and his guest, writer Kelefa Sanneh, note that the Spaniards themselves were practicing something vile and barbaric—slavery. Finding slaves was a primary purpose of Columbus’s mission.
Also, the Europeans were big hypocrites because they themselves practiced cannibalism—grinding up mummies and consuming the powder as medicine. When mummies from Egypt became hard to procure, Europeans figured out how to accelerate mummification in fresh human corpses.
Search Engine: Why don’t we eat people?
Why the Senate is increasingly skewed on race, parties and policy The Senate overrepresents Republicans and disenfranches people of color and people who live in large states. The Washington Post, by the numbers:
If you are a resident of California, with 68 times the population of Wyoming, your influence in the Senate is paltry.