An interesting trip...

An ad in an email I opened this morning informed me of the publication of a "new" book by William F. Buckley, Jr., who has been dead for so long that prepending "the late" to the man's name seems a bit awkward.

It turns out the book, titled A Torch Kept Lit: Great Lives of the Twentieth Century, a compilation of Buckley's obituaries and eulogies, is the brain child of one James Rosen, of Fox News.

I remember reading some of those obituaries as they appeared in Buckely's magazine, National Review, and was always impressed by their style and tone, particularly the ones written for people with whom Buckley had disagreed, on this or that subject, while the newly departed had been alive.

That got me thinking about one Hugh Kenner, who was (if memory serves) the first fellow BYTE columnist I had occasion to meet in the flesh, one evening after finishing a day of business meetings near Atlanta, Georgia. Kenner and Buckley were, apparently, friends from a while back.

I remember Professor Kenner as tall, bespectacled, well-spoken gentleman (he had a curious clipped accent), who was just as interesting in person as he was on the pages of the magazine (and on the screen of its electronic presence, the Byte Information Exchange). He lived in a house that seemed to me to be straight out of Life With Father, but with much nicer furniture and knick-knacks.

When he suggested vodka martinis as before-dinner drinks, I started to demur with some nonsense about how "real" martinis were made with gin, but Kenner gave me a "poor thing, you don't know what you're missing" look and convinced me to try one. It did not convert me, but it was a pleasant enough drink. I'll even order one, on occasion.

I don't remember other details of the evening (and no, Kenner did not get me drunk), other than the food being delicious and the conversation lively, centering mostly around computers and programming. (Perhaps, if I had focused on his being a professor of English at the university, I might have felt a bit more intimidated, but that didn't happen.) I recall he was kind enough to send me a copy of his next book, too.

And now, I really must put shoulder to grindstone and resume work.

Cheers...

It occurs to me...

I have always had a problem with the common formulations "... to be honest, ...," and "... to tell you the truth, ...," as they suggest the speaker is, by nature, not an honest person (my inner voice almost always whispers "you mean you've been lying to me all this time?").

I much prefer "...to be frank... ."

Which is what I think is meant, anyway, in everyday conversation. At least, it's what I mean, on those occasions when I want to be frank.

Now, some might say that "frank" is just a sugar-coated version of "honest," but I would disagree, and maintain that "frank" is a sugar-free version of "honest," where the latter describes "the way things are."

For example, if you want me to translate a document that you provide in an uneditable file format, where the text is marginally legible and strangely formatted, where many illustrations have embedded text, and where every other page is cut off about a tenth of an inch short of the text width, then I am being nothing other than honest in charging an arm and a leg for the work, and nothing other than frank in explaining why.

This "freewheel" needs more work. I need to get ready for taiji.

Cheers...