The Chosen Vehicle

A smile is the chosen vehicle of all ambiguities.

-- Herman Melville (1819 - 1891), American novelist, short story writer, and poet, Pierre: or, The Ambiguities (1852) Bk. IV, ch. 5

Organic Sense Lives

Media are means of extending and enlarging our organic sense lives into our environment.

-- Marshall McLuhan (1911 - 1980), Canadian philosopher, futurist, and communications theorist, "The Care and Feeding of Communication Innovation", Dinner Address to Conference on 8 mm Sound Film and Education, Teachers College, Columbia University, 8 November 1961

RIP Tom Lehrer

Alas, irreverence has been subsumed by mere grossness, at least in the so-called mass media.  What we have now -- to quote myself at my most pretentious -- is a nimiety of scurrility with a concomitant exiguity of taste.  For example, the freedom (hooray!) to say almost anything you want on television about society's problems has been co-opted (alas!) by the freedom to talk instead about flatulence, orgasms, genitalia, masturbation, etc., etc., and to replace real comment with pop-culture references and so-called "adult" language.  Irreverence is easy -- what's hard is wit.

-- Thomas Andrew Lehrer (9 April 1928 - 26 July 2025), American singer-songwriter, satirist, pianist, and mathematician, On the current state of satire, in Rhino Records online chat (17 June 1997)

RIP Ozzy Osbourne

People look to me and say
Is the end near, when is the final day?
What’s the future of mankind?
How do I know, I got left behind

Everyone goes through changes
Looking to find the truth
Don’t look at me for answers
Don’t ask me
I don’t know

-- John Michael (Ozzy) Osbourne (3 December 1948 - 22 July 2025), English musician known as the lead singer of Black Sabbath and for his solo career, "Goodbye To Romance" (20 September 1980) From: Blizzard of Ozz (Expanded Edition)

What Everything Else Isn't

Art is the means we have of undoing the damage of haste.  It's what everything else isn't.

-- Theodore Huebner Roethke (1908 - 1963), American poet, awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1954, Poetry and Craft (1965)

Our Willingness To Discipline

One of the widest gaps in human experience is the gap between what we say we want to be and our willingness to discipline ourselves to get there.

-- Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878 - 1969), American Baptist and Presbyterian minister, Living Under Tension : Sermons on Christianity Today (1941)

RIP Brian Wilson

All of us have the privilege of making music that helps and heals -- to make music that makes people happier, stronger and kinder.  Don't forget: music is God's voice.

-- Brian Douglas Wilson (20 June 1942 - 11 June 2025), American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer who co-founded the Beach Boys, At the induction ceremony of The Beach Boys into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (January 1988)

By This Embrace

Love and art do not embrace what is beautiful but what is made beautiful by this embrace.

-- Karl Kraus (1874 - 1936), Austrian journalist, satirist, essayist, aphorist, playwright, and poet, Beim Wort genommen (1955); as translated by Harry Zohn

Better And Smarter

I work quite diligently and wish that I were better and smarter.  And these both are one and the same.

-- Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 - 1951), Austrian-born philosopher who spent much of his life in England, In a letter to Paul Engelmann (1917) as quoted in The Idea of Justice (2010) by Amartya Sen, p. 31

Sa Dan

On Saturday April 12th I tested in front of my Taekwondo master instructor, 8th Dan Grandmaster Namsoo Hyong, for the rank of 4th Dan.  Tonight I received my new belt.  

Testing requirements included 20 poomsae (patterns or forms of about 20 movements each), including a creative poomsae of my own design, 40 different kicks, and numerous other combinations, with a few creative combinations of my own.  The testing culminated in sparring against a single opponent, and then sparring against two opponents at once.  

The last time I tested was April 2020, peak pandemic time, 5 years ago.  It took about 18 months to prepare for this test, including about 5 to 10 hours per week since the start of the year.

With this rank I have earned the title 사범 님 Sabeom Nim, meaning one who teaches, and who can perform all of the requirements at a high level.  In our system, you must be 4th Dan to judge Black belt tests, and to award others the rank of Black belt.  Achieving this rank checks off an item on my bucket list.  It will be about 4 years until I am eligible to test for 5th Dan, and from today's perspective, I wonder whether I'll test again.

Glad to have that behind me.

We Must Die

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.

-- Anatole France (1844 - 1924), French poet, journalist, and novelist; 1921 Nobel Laureate in Literature, The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard (1881) Pt. II, ch. 4

The Goal Itself

The value of the goal lies in the goal itself; and therefore the goal cannot be attained unless it is pursued for its own sake.

-- Arnold Joseph Toynbee (1889 - 1975), British historian and the nephew of Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History (1934–1961)

Nobody Ever Listened

Nobody ever listened to me until they didn't know who I was.

-- Banksy, prolific graffiti artist from Bristol, UK, whose artwork has appeared across the globe, Wall and Piece (2007)

A Million Amateurs

Never underestimate the power of a million amateurs with keys to the factory.

-- Chris Anderson (1961 -), editor-in-chief of Wired, The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More (2006) Ch. 5, p. 58

As Much As You Can

Find things beautiful as much as you can, most people find too little beautiful.

-- Vincent Willem van Gogh (1853 - 1890), Dutch Post-Impressionist painter, in a letter to his brother Theo van Gogh (January 1874)

What Comes After

What comes after is not always progress.

-- Alessandro Francesco Tommaso Manzoni (1785 - 1873), Italian novelist, poet, dramatist, and critic, "Del romanzo storico" (1850), in Andrea Tagliapietra (ed.) La storia e l'invenzione (Milano: Gallone, 1997) p. 64

Portals Of Discovery

A man of genius makes no mistakes.  His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.

-- James Joyce (1882 - 1941), Irish novelist, short-story writer, and poet, Ulysses (1922) Ch. 9: Scylla and Charybdis

Difficult To Resume

Nothing is more dangerous than discontinued labor; it is habit lost.  A habit easy to abandon, difficult to resume.

-- Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885), French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement, Les Misérables, Volume Four: Saint Denis and Idyl of the Rue Plumet, Book II - Eponine, Chapter I: The Field of the Lark

To Provide

The function of the artist is to provide what life does not.

-- Thomas Eugene Robbins (1932 - 2025), American novelist, Another Roadside Attraction (1971)

I Like Work

I like work: it fascinates me.  I can sit and look at it for hours.

-- Jerome K. Jerome (1859 - 1927), English author, Three Men in a Boat (1889)