The flagstaff at Carl Schurz Park, captured in an impromptu reflection pool.

¶ Matins: How about those bloggers, dropping off like flies? (“In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop“) No reader of Michael A Banks’s Blogging Heroes, the Takli Makan of this year’s morning read, will be surprised by the news that technews bloggers live like unhappy hamsters.

¶ Tierce: Zose Mosleys vill neffer learn! Grand prix racing czar Max Mosley‘s grandmother, Lady Redesdale, was inured to reading about her daughters’ antics (especially his mother’s) in the newspaper, but this story would probably have given her a nasty turn.

¶ Sext: Surely the most interesting story in the works right now — far outclassing our presidential election — is the run-up to the Beijing Olympics. If you ask me, Liu Qi was out of his mind when it lobbied for the honor of hosting the games.

¶ Vespers: It’s over when the little man squeaks. Sheldon Silver nixes Congestion Pricing.

Oremus…

§ Matins. But I, who was not made for sportive tricks, know how to take the weekend off. At least from sitting at the computer.

After the Saturday afternoon tidy-up, this weekend, I had plenty of time for the drudgery of making the wonderful new computer useful by installing a few handy applications, such as PhotoShop Elements. The attempt to load CuteFTP, the program that hauls pages from my computer to Portico‘s server, however, failed, doubtless because I’ve stuck with an antique version of the program that I’m capable of understanding. On the verge of tearing my hair out, I was struck by a bolt of insight: What, are you crazy? Fiddling with the new computer on a weekend afternoon, when the good people down the street are not on hand to fix your catastrophes? Why didn’t I find something else to do, the voice from on high suggested more calmly. I took the hint. Yesterday afternoon, I took a break from reading and straightened up my clothes closet.

§ Tierce. With the scandals in the background of the The Bank Job still in our faces, we’re given a little lesson in plus ça change. And having recently read every one of the letters collected in The Sisters, I’m sad to note that, with only one of the Mitford girls still with us, there won’t be any flying correspondence at the highest levels.

§ Sext. It’s as though the Party leaders were a collective matador, waving a red cape in front of Western outrage. Nobody in the developed world is particularly keen to see China prosper — if nothing else, growing affluence in the world’s largest marketplace threatens to drain global resources while spewing greenhouse gases. Will the Chinese enlist the sympathy and support of the West’s former colonies? Would it make sense to see Tibet as a “colony” of China — if Beijing weren’t so foolishly committed to handing out the far-flung goodies to Han pioneers? 

And what happens when Western athletes start complaining about atmospheric conditions in Beijing? Start claiming that the Olympics are bad for your health? 

§ Vespers. Congestion Pricing was a deeply flawed scheme. The attempt to divide Manhattan into two zones, one of which can be entered freely while the other costs $8.00, is really quite silly, given the fact that Manhattan is an island. The plan would have failed to toll the Harlem River bridges through which so much metropolitan traffic improperly flows. And little or nothing was going to be done about parking in the streets. I’m not terribly sorry that Mayor Bloomberg’s plan came to nothing.

But it remains appalling that the decision was in the hands of three Albaniacs. (As always: the Speaker, the Senate Majority Leader, and the Governor.) Actually, the hands of just one, as Speaker Silver exercised his de facto veto power.)

Drop me a line at rjk@dailyblague.com
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