Is Half A Wit Better Than No Wit At All?

Last evening Robin and I revisited an all-time favorite film of both of us. For me, it is at #2 in my lifetime ranking, with Lawrence of Arabia still at #1. What movie is that, you ask? … Stand By Me, I answer.

To me, it is just about a perfect movie. Sweet and sad and funny. A reminder of what it was like to be a twelve year old boy, that is to say, a barely civilized human being. When it was over, and the credits were rolling, it occurred to me that I had never read the source material, which is a novella by Stephen King entitled “The Body.” Hey, I can fix that, says I, and it is now my night-time reading.

Here’s the final scene from the movie. “I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?” What a great line.

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From The New Yorker

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Wednesday morning I spent sitting in the service area of the local Subaru dealership, having a trailer hitch installed on our car. The new vehicle will tow twice as much weight as our old one (and I’m not quite sure why there is such a difference). But one thing that we use the hitch for the most often is to carry a rack for our bikes. We’ve been fans of the platform-type racks for a couple of decades now. Their big advantage for us is that lifting the bikes onto the device is easier. And you can haul basically any bike with these things, no matter what it’s crossbar looks like. Or even if it doesn’t have a crossbar at all.

The only problem with them is that they are among the more expensive racks. More hardware and more engineering equals more expensive. Oh well, nothing’s perfect.

What I keep looking for is a rack and car combination that no matter where I go, my bicycling journey is always downhill, and the car is waiting for me at the bottom.

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The Republicans continue to surprise and entertain me with their seemingly unquenchable appetite for featherheadedness and self-destruction. There is no blather too ridiculous and no position too mean-spirited for them. The crazier the better seems to be the hallmark of today’s GOP.

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