Archive for January 2000

African animals with unlikely names:

(All these animals may be seen at the American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West at 79th Street, New York City.)

Name: Gemsbok
Amazing fact: “They are much hunted for trophies, their flesh is tasty, and their thick, tough skin makes good leather.”

Name: Kirk’s Dik-dik
Amazing fact: “They live in thickets and are able to go without water for long periods.”

Name: Giant Sable
Amazing fact: “Bulls without harems may be solitary or associate in small bachelor herds.”

Name: Greater Koodoo
Amazing fact: “When startled, they may run only a short distance flashing the white underside of the tail in flight, then stop to look back.”

Name: Bongo
Amazing fact: “Bongos do not usually aggregate in large herds, but generally travel in pairs.”

Name: Giant Eland
Amazing fact: “… from a standing position, it can clear another eland’s back.”

Bonus item:

This quote from Theodore Roosevelt can be found in the foyer: “I WANT TO SEE YOU GAME BOYS I WANT TO SEE YOU BRAVE AND MANLY AND I ALSO WANT TO SEE YOU GENTLE AND TENDER”. (Curiously, it appears entirely devoid of punctuation on the wall, too.)

Go brave! Go manly! Go gentle! Go tender!

Brief reviews of various things:

The view of New York from room 1609 of the Salisbury Hotel: Unfortunately, sixteen stories doesn’t buy you all that much in New York. You get Planet Hollywood across the street and Carnegie Hall a little way down it, but that’s about the extent of it.

The view of Boston from apartment 28D of the “Eastgate” complex: Rather impressive–to the left, across the Charles River, downtown Boston; immediately in front, several skyscrapers, including the John Hancock building; to the right, past Harvard bridge, an illuminated, animated red triangle advertising the “Citgo” corporation.

Rebekah (of “the Org“): she’s fun and cool and buys her brother the kind of presents I’m not game to buy mine.

The first 144 pages of Truman Capote’s “In Cold Blood”: This is a famous book; frankly I don’t understand the appeal. It is, I suppose, done competently enough, but does it really need to be this long?

Toscanini’s “Hot Vanilla”: I so much wanted this to be tasty and delicious, but honesty compels me to report that it was, in fact, execrable.

Okay, so here’s what I did:

I spent New Year’s Eve in a barn in Vermont with–and here I will attempt to deploy a traditionally sarcastic phrase in a decidedly non-sarcastic way–the sort of people who make America great. To wit, these people.

Jessamyn took some photos although, as she says, they’re a little disappointing.