JONATHAN MILES’ (AND MY) RIVIERA
LIESL SCHILLINGER QUOTES SOMERSET MAUGHM’s French Riviera as “A Sunny Place for Shady People” in her review of Jonathan Miles’ The Once Upon a Time World: The Dark and Sparkling … Continue reading
YOU CAN COUNT ON US
I’M TALKING ABOUT THE CENSUS, not just matters of communal reliance. Indeed, John Lanchester offers 6500 words in “Get a Rabbit,” London Review of Books, September 21, 2023. Here are … Continue reading
BRINGING ZHUZH TO THE PADAWANS
LEXICOGRAPHIC PALS MERRIAM AND WEBSTER bring 690 new entries into their dictionary, two of them utterly new to me and included into today’s title. Here are tidbits about them and … Continue reading
CANDY MATSON—SAN FRANCISCO SLEUTHETTE EXTRAORDINAIRE
DURING THE GOLD AGE OF RADIO, a number of sleuths were Californians. Sam Spade’s encounters with Casper Gutman were in San Francisco, indeed twice: with the Maltese Falcon and the … Continue reading
AUTOMOTIVE BRAKING 101
CABLES ACTUATED THE EARLIEST CAR BRAKES. Indeed Ford continued with them until 1939. As you might imagine, maintaining equal actuation at all four wheels was a non-trivial matter. Replacing cables … Continue reading
ON CANINE AUDITORY PROCESSING
“WHO’S A CUTE PUPPY?” ASKS AAAS Science, September 15, 2023, in a Research item titled “Auditory Processing.” The item is based on a paper by Anna Gergely et al. published … Continue reading
OLDS CUTLASS SALON—EQUAL TO EURO LUXURY SPORT SEDANS AT A BARGAIN PRICE?
FIFTY YEARS AGO, IMPORTS WERE FIRMLY ESTABLISHED in the U.S. market. Not just sports cars and VW Beetles, but even at the luxury end of the market. In February 1973, … Continue reading
OVERDOING IT
IS THERE BETTER LIVING THROUGH OPTIMIZATION? Not necessarily, posits mathematical modeler Coco Krumme in her new book Optimal Illusions. In their review of the book in Science, September 14, 2023, … Continue reading
DETROIT RACES 1901
WHEN THE SECOND MOTOR CAR was built, its driver likely challenged the first. Thus came motor sports. According to Motoring in America: The Early Years, so it was in Detroit … Continue reading
TIN PAN ALLEY
NEW YORK CITY’S TWENTY-EIGHTH STREET between Fifth and Sixth Avenues is the legendary Tin Pan Alley, the center of American popular music at the turn of the century. (That old … Continue reading
Simanaitis Says 