Thank You!
Wow. Thanks Peter! What a dazzling birthday mssg. I love you guys. Thanks so much for the sparkling blog and sweet emails. I did indeed have a lovely birthday.
I started my day off early and rebelled in Bikram yoga class with an extra long camel pose (if you’re not familiar, it’s the one you spend the entire sweaty 105 degree hour and 20 minutes preparing to bend in half, backwards.) If done properly, you come out of it high as a kite. I was tripping for a splendid hour after.
It rained all day, so I decided to buy myself an expensive umbrella (the kind that hold ups against gusts of wind, rather than flipping inside out and flinging you onto a taxicab’s hood). I skipped home and spent the rest of the day polishing off Pudd’nhead Wilson. I used to think Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was my favorite, besides Hunter’s books, but Mark Twain has my heart for now.
Yes, I did watch most of the presidential debate. Seems to me it was a draw. Despite the polls, I’m feeling better about November thanks to the electoral predictions. More on that later.
Anyway, back to the books, another book. If you haven’t read The Best and The Brightest, by the late, great David Halberstam (which you probably have, as it’s sold almost 2 million copies since it’s publication in 1969) do. That’s what I’m reading this week for one of my seminars taught by Professor Todd Gitlin. I had no idea how much shadow the McCarthy era cast on politics of Washington leading up to Vietnam. Jesus.
So… back to Mark Twain:
We know all about the habits of the ant, we know all about the habits of the bee, but we know nothing at all about the habits of the oyster. It seems almost certain that we have been choosing the wrong time for studying the oyster. — Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar
Until next time, your friend, who just turned 29 again,
Anita Thompson
p.s. And a Happy Birthday to the lovely Jerri Merritt of Talkleft.com!
