By reading this page, you're living in the past — which is fine; I'm a sentimentalist myself. But here's the latest at derekbaker.com.
#39 :: September 28, 2005
While in Rome — when I wasn't busy doing as they did — I realized just how little I actually know about the Roman Emperors and Empire: the Cæsars, the Consuls, the Senate, etc. We saw the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill, which only piqued my interest further. So I picked up Robert Graves's I, Claudius as reading material for the rest of the trip and the eventual flight home. I finished it about a week ago or so, and bought the sequel, Claudius the God. These are turning out to be two of the most enjoyable books I've ever read: easily now on my top 10 list, perhaps to be on my top 5, if I ever make an actual such lists. They're full of true history, far more than most historical fictions, but they carry just enough detail and character interactions to make me wonder what's historical fact and what's Graves's fictional account.
An added pleasure is the new HBO series, "Rome." Which is typical HBO in a lot of ways in terms of the focus on sex and violence, but I'm enjoying the story because — at least as concerns Julius Cæsar, Pompey, Mark Antony, Brutus, etc. — it's like the backstory to the books I've been reading, so all the more interesting to me.
Outta Sight, Outta Mind
So...what'd I miss? How's the weather been?
Actually, I've been around the last two weeks, but found it tough to get back into blog mode after the previous two weeks, which were spent on vacation in Rome, Siena, and Florence, Italy. Sort of like a survey seminar in the origins and course of Western Civilization. Sure, you can take the extended semester course, which includes stuff about the French Revolution, the British Empire, and the American Century — but really, if you just want to hit the main points, you can do it in Roma (Roman Empire, early — and subsequent Catholic — Christianity, and some 20th century fascism and socialism thrown in for flavoring), Siena and Tuscany (the Middle Ages, wine), and Firenze (the Renaissance). You even get a better understanding of the Reformation — despite it being nowhere in evidence, of course — in the sense that you finally see what Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Ulrich Zwingli were all up in arms about.
The two weeks prior to that were spent getting ready for the two weeks in Italy and getting work taken care of in anticipation of being gone, so as it is, I haven't been in blog mode (read: mood) for about six weeks.
But today changed all that.
Let's see...where's my pad where I was keeping track...oh, here it is! That makes one indictment of a House Republican leader, an SEC investigation of a Senate Republican leader, the arrest of the president's chief procurement officer and an investigation into likely treasonous activity on the part of the president's chief political strategist and the vice president's chief of staff.
Gosh. Is anyone looking into Antonin Scalia's investments or his payments for speaking engagements? I only ask because — although it's a long-shot to think the Republicans controlling Congress, the Republicans controlling the White House, and the lead Republican on the mostly Republican-appointed Supreme Court could all be brought down in a string of corruption and criminal scandals in a few months — trifectas are usually long odds anyway, yet still sometimes pay off. So why not?
If I had a stronger stomach, I'd turn on Fox "News" to see how they're spinning all this — but unfortunately, I don't. Not that strong, at any rate.
Of course, I'm sure all of this is merely liberal noise attempting to distract Our President from his winning strategy in Iraq and his priorities to prepare the country for national emergencies and address the aftermath when they occur.
You stay focused, George! Don't let 'em get to you!
In fact, here, Dubya: drink this. It'll settle your nerves.
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September
...that month when the Chinese "August Moon" occurs and the German "Oktoberfest" begins.
In Internet terms, September is the month we're all in, forever: the Eternal September. That's because September "traditionally" represented the influx of newbies — then, university students — to the Usenet newsgroups of the Internet, which would take a while to settle down into normal usage patterns after the start of school each year.
However, in 1993, AOL started giving its subscribers access to Usenet newsgroups, ensuring a constant influx of newbies whose understanding of the Internet and adherence to netiquette would always fall short of the ideal once known to geeks alone. AOL ended Usenet access on January 25 of this year (known as September 4165, 1993, in snarky Usenet parlance) — but by that point, Google had already (April 2002) opened up Usenet to the worldwide web of its users, thus ensuring the Eternal September of our youth.
