Summer filler

I’m glad to see that I’m not the only person around here interested in architecture (if one goes by some comments from the Vast Coachean Army). To tell you the truth, for me it’s a recent affair. For the longest time I couldn’t imagine anything more deadly dull, probably because I considered it mostly memorizing the differences between the different types of columns, which I find a virtual impossibility, even though even Jerry Garcia could almost count them on the fingers of one hand, back in the day. That’s the problem with a lot of academics, isn’t it? The important thing is not that you know that Doric columns bulge (which they do because they start with the letter D, which bulges, and which marks the alpha and omega of my architectural mnemonic devices), but that people who build structures to emulate ancient Greek/Roman stuff are making a statement different from people who build structures to emulate so-called Middle Ages stuff. That is, why is Washington, D.C., neo-classical while Westminster is neo-gothic? The answer is deep, and tied into history and culture and all that interesting narrative material I’m always harping on.

I’m in the middle of Architecture: A Very Short Introduction, the second book in this library of essays that I’ve found very useful (the first was on postmodernism). The author does not give us a survey of great buildings from the Pyramids to the erotic gherkin, but instead talks about the meaning of architecture. Our kind of stuff, eh? And, you can read it in a couple of sittings. And, it’s well-written. An instant addition to the old recommended list on the right.

For what it’s worth, I’ve got a couple of ideas for fillers over at DVM. They are so obviously going through a drought; you think I’m dull off-season? Anyhow, here’s a few questions you can ask the body forensic at random (send the $5000 for each of them to my home address):

• Who’s your favorite stooge (excluding Shemp)?


• Why should Wil Wheaton be hanged by the thumbs?


• What’s your favorite insect bite?


• If you could pick from any LD topic ever that never existed, what would it be?


• What’s the best necktie to wear when running critiques?


• What is Jon Cruz doing with all those $5Ks he’s collecting?


• Which pomo philosopher would you marry, if they were all hotties and roughly your age and correct gender preference, when it came time for you to settle down in the ‘burbs and buy a raised ranch?


• Since TOCs spelled backwards is Scot, should all national-circuit tournaments in the future make similar subtle reference to Sean Connery?


• Which part of the country has too many or too few TOC bids, and should we nuke them?

Hell, what am I going to with all my $5Ks????