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Downtown
Paul Krugman’s latest piece is about New York City. He spent some time there this week, and among personal observations, points out that: “New York is looking pretty good right now. Housing is still unaffordable; the failure to build enough housing, not an imaginary crime wave, is the city’s biggest problem. But dire predictions during Continue reading
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Inept, faithless, and arrogant
Steve Schmidt put it eloquently: “Donald Trump’s national security team has been exposed — and permanently unmasked — as moral degenerates. They are incompetent clowns, who beggar description because they stand peerless in the entire history of America as singularly inept, faithless and arrogant. Michael Waltz, JD Vance, Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, Steve Witkoff, Stephen Continue reading
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This word is word
“Autology” is a word that was fairly rare even when it was in use back in the 1600s. It meant self-knowledge, or the study of oneself. Some years later there was also the form “autological” for referring to things having to do with autology. Since Freud didn’t happen across the word, it probably would have Continue reading
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Max and me
Max McCoy is a journalist from Kansas; you can check out his excellent work at the Kansas Reflector. I visited my favorite book store over the weekend and picked up a couple of volumes I’ve been looking forward to. I put one of them on my desk, just in front of my display, and opened Continue reading
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She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy
If you’re shopping for clothes, one option might be something made of “gabardine.” The dictionary says it’s a “firm, tightly woven fabric of worsted, cotton, polyester, or other fiber, with a twill weave,” which unfortunately does absolutely nothing to ensure that I’d be able to look at a coat and say “oh, that’s made of Continue reading
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Alias Smith and Jones
Most people, at least in western cultures, have something in common with super heroes. No, it’s not the obvious thing you’re thinking (you immediately focused on your ability to deliver a wry quip while vanquishing a super villain, I assume). It’s all in your name. In the English tradition — or I suppose the tradition Continue reading
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Cool!
English has loads and loads of pretentious, stuffy, and even bureaucratic words. But it also has some nifty ones. Like “nifty.” “Nifty” is a casual word for casual use, and it tends to be used in close connection with other casual words. According to the corpus of contemporary American English, the words most often found Continue reading
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Gentle there, sailor
Nautical affairs have contributed a huge number of words to English over the centuries. If you define “nautical affairs” broadly enough, that would include ships, sailors’ jargon, and even books and stories set in seagoing contexts. Patrick O’Brian wrote historical novels set on 18th century British naval ships, so his works certainly qualify. The books Continue reading
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The Curious 100
The Eames Institute has posted their list of “the curious 100.” It’s “a celebration of one hundred courageous leaders and creative minds across the United States who are harnessing the transformative power of curiosity to solve today’s most pressing problems.” The Eames in the institute’s name is Charles and Ray Eames, the famous design team that came up with Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. I shouldn’t be surprised, but she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my other blog, Techlimitics, where I’m grappling with the nature of simplicity.
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peterharbeson@me.com