http://www.johnratliff.net (words fail me) Fri, 05 Sep 2008 21:13:37 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en "Never complain, never explain." http://www.johnratliff.net/2008/09/05/the-hardest-advice-ive-never-had-to-follow-until-recently/ My sponsor says, "Five years is when you figure out all the stuff you didn't let go of the first time." Joe Banks says, "There are certain doors you have to go through alone." John Keats says, "Do you not see how necessary a World of Pains and troubles is to school ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2008/09/04/sadness-accrues/ At some point during the '60s, Sammy Davis Jr. supposedly cried, "I've spent my whole life becoming white and now suddenly black is beautiful!" The Clintons are to aspirational politics what Sammy Davis Jr. was to blackness. They sold out hope long ago because they saw it as an impediment to ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2008/03/06/143/ I'm still investigating other options, but it's starting to look as though I'm going to have to shut down the comments section entirely. The number of spam comments has exploded in the past week orEsto requiere la casino en linea jugador para que coincida con la actual apuesta, y hacer ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/12/21/sad-comments/ Over the past couple of weeks I've taken three different loads of books to Half Price Books to sell. Probably about ten parcels in all, a parcel being either a liquor box or a grocery sack -- they're roughly equal in volume. I would like to say that I didn't ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/12/15/of-the-raking-of-books/ I stayed up till three this morning playing Scrabulous with Roy (we were separated by only ten points at the end, so I guess we're well matched) and occasionally spraying gasoline on the Austin Improv thread about the UCB show, which provided me with an instructive moment. Like a lot of ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/11/15/bigmouth-strikes-again-2/ Elgar's first cello concerto is the kind of music I would like to hear swelling in the background whenever I have to make a difficult decision, because it would make doing the right thing poignant and dramatic rather than just a pain in the ass. http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/11/15/a-little-help-here/ I keep getting drawn back into Hamlet. I listened to a recorded performance starring Simon Russell Beale on a recent car trip, and then reread it when I got back. Now I'm watching the 1964 Richard Burton version, a theatrical performance (filmed in front of an actual, coughing audience) that's ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/11/11/what-a-piece-of-work/ I'm hesitant to jinx it, but I'm doing sitting practice in the morning more regularly than I have for a really long time. I have no idea why I'm suddenly doing it after literally years of browbeating myself for not doing it, but so far so good.  Just as the starting ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/11/06/bustle-in-my-hedgerow-2/ Somewhat related to the previous post: one of the ways in which improv has blown my mind is that it's showed me new ways to think about music. I really didn't think that was going to happen anymore. It's not that I thought I was never going to be surprised ... http://www.johnratliff.net/2007/11/05/jazz-for-squares/