Writing Worth Reading
Writing Worth Reading
Want to know how to lose weight, and keep it off, without surgery, supplements, weird diets or extreme exercise? The answer, for addressing weight gain and many other ills, lies in behavioural technology
In the Brazilian rainforest there is a town built around a church where worshippers drink hallucinogenic tea. "At the church entrance I was served a cup of the brew. I swigged it down straight away. Then I drank another cup"
Scenes from the diplomatic life, worthy of Lawrence Durrell. Embassies, like ships, have their barnacles: The local bores, gatecrashers, frauds and eccentrics "who attach themselves to the Corps and intend to stay firmly attached"
For one thing, no more parking spaces. "In peak periods, virtually all cars will be on the roads driving people around. In off-peak periods, cars will still be on the roads, they’ll just pull over to the side of the road and stop"
Good question, good answer. "If by contract you mean 'a contract as typically defined at law', which is to say a contract that has most of the legal consequences that a typical contract has, then the answer is: Largely not"
"I know it's wrong to covet my neighbour's ox, so I make a serious effort not to. My neighbour's chips are a different matter. For here is an unarguable truth: Food always tastes better when it's come off somebody else's plate"
Son's plea to let his mother go. "By promoting longevity and technologically inhibiting death, we have created a new biological status held by an ever-growing part of the nation, a no-exit state nearly as remote from life as death"
Essay. On growing up in an unhappy family in a blighted American town. "Fresno is amorphous, a conical blob that looks like a piece of bubble gum squashed against a sidewalk". Downtown died in the 1970s. Gangs took over the streets
"I would rather have been strung up naked by my toes, in the middle of the town square, have my naked body slathered in honey, and then have an entire battalion of honey-starved Winnie the Pooh bears set loose to devour me"
In which the author manages a brothel in the nation's capital for a few weeks until fired for alcoholism. The money isn't much good. But the work is varied, the people interesting and the fund of filthy stories incomparable
Enjoyable blogpost on how people interact with museum exhibits. Suggests we often look at paintings for just three seconds, and very rarely for more than 45. Fine art encourages us to walk in orderly fashion, but not so modern art
American edition of Elizabeth Badinter's book re-opens debate on breast-feeding, styles of mothering. Smart French parents affect "laid-back" approach to their children. For Americans, "obsessive mothering" is the class marker
