Jonathan's fed up

Enough formatting problems, text glitches, and software bugs! Mulberry Street is moving...to Mulberry Street.

I'm leaving blogspot (a decision which perhaps I should have at least slept on) and moving my blog to mulberrystreet.wordpress.com.

Eire, part 1

In a first for me, I've decided to publish entries from my travel journal on Mulberry Street. To round out the witty and insightful text, I'll include some of my own illustrations from the journal as well as a few examples of stunning photography.

Here's the cover page from the Ireland section of the journal. Overall I was pleased with the aesthetics of the page, though in retrospect I wouldn't have placed the ship so close to Fungie the dolphin (about whom you will read in future posts). Also, I really didn't need to draw the big lake in Northern Ireland. It seems to be just a strange, off-centered circle around the word Belfast. You can see that I went with my med school buddy DavidO and our literarily present companion Rick Steves.

A pictorial calendar of the trip follows. I ran out of ink in my regular ball-point pen, so later posts (and later details added to the calendar) are in the gel-ink pen. Things to notice on this page are that even though I've lived in Texas for 27 years (!), I still cannot draw the state. And my American Airlines eagle is fatter than the original. The car you see drawn in the calendar is our rented Mitsubishi Colt, affectionately known as "The Colt."

And in one of my more fanciful bird's-eye views (note abstract art-deco sun and sea monster), I detailed my path to LaGuardia and the plane's trip over the northern edge of Manhattan.

I know what you're thinking. "Wow, if you were sitting on the left side of the plane, you'd really get some good views of the island!" That's right. Don't think I'm not aware of that. I always try to sit on the left side of the plane both going to and leaving from LaGuardia, for views such as these. For you, Reader. For you. And now, the journal...

"We're now in the air. As can be seen from my diagram, the flight path took us over the Bronx. As I sat in my seat when first boarding, I was disappointed to be on the right side of hte plane--the photo I'd given to William and Katherine [as a going away gift from New York] had been taken from the left side of a plane en route from LaGuardia to Minnesota. 'Excuse me....excuse me!' a voice broke into my daydreams. 'I think you're in my seat.' Sure enough, I'd inadvertently sat in seat 12F rather than 12A.

"My new window seat afforded some amazing views of Manhattan--magically lit in the late afternoon sun, its rivers and the reservoir glittering in the light, its buildings rising between shadow-shrouded canyons.

"The George Washington Bridge arched gracefully in its mile-span across the Hudson River...

"...the little green dome of Fort Tryon Park rose gently in far north Manhattan...

"...and the spires of Midtown and the Financial District added contour, like push pins mimicking a relief below. Here was a city at rest; here was my home."

So there is entry number 1. Just for fun, here's another series of aerial shots of Manhattan. Worth a quick look.

How "on the go" changes us

The April 12 issue of The Economist had an outstanding special report called "Nomads at last." It examined the sociological implications of mobile technology like cellular phones, BlackBerrys, Wi-Fi hotspots, the ubiquity of the internet, etc.

While there is much to say regarding the technology itself, the report focused on how these devices change where and how we work, how we construct buildings, how we build cities, how we drive, how we relate to family and strangers, and how we use language.

The free online version can be found here. The webpage that comes up is merely the first article in the special report. Click on "next article" at the bottom for continued reading.

Read it. You will be a better person for it.

The Age of Turbulence

While my elderly first patient of the day took a quick trip to the lavatory before I brought her back to the operating room, I noticed her husband was reading Alan Greenspan's recent book, The Age of Turbulence. The avid Mulberry Street reader will remember this book from my November 19, 2007, post in which I repeated a reviewer's remarks, "...nobody ever accused Mr Greenspan of being a lively speaker, let alone a born storyteller, and no reviewer could approach this volume with anything but a heavy heart and a sense of duty."

I commented to the husband on the book, and before I could repeat the clever phrase from the review, the husband said, "Oh yes, we're good friends with Alan."

* * * * * * * * * * * *

When I was looking for a picture for this post, I ran across this one of a younger Alan Greenspan. This was taken probably some 30 years ago, back when he was 80.

Another blog

On the blog English Fail, I saw a funny post. The blog features pictures of grammatical mistakes seen by various grammarians who submit photos. (And for those of you who are worried about me, I do not spend most of my free time looking at grammar blogs. I do not have a problem.)

This picture had a warning sign,

BEWARE!!!

BRIGHT LIGHTS

DO NOT LOOK

DIRECTLY INTO THEM!

One person left commented that it had a haiku-like cadence. As for me, it reminds me of Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night."