Ayn Rand

Edited from a conversation with Joel:

Ever read Ayn Rand? I did fairly recently, and it explains a lot about libertarianism. You see, in America, it’s actually those honest corporation-owning americans who are being discriminated against. Why should they have to pay taxes to support people who didn’t have the same drive and work ethic as them? If those other people don’t own their own companies, it’s obviously their own fault - they should have worked harder! Class, education, and lack of social mobility are just excuses for the weak.

Also, Ayn Rand is a horrible writer (at least in Atlas Shrugged). Her allegories are paper thin, and the plot might as well not even be there. Once in a while she throws in an completely unbelievable love scene where they whisper sweet nothings about corporate profits and personal responsibility into each other’s ears. It’s awful.

Update - lots more discussion in the comments.

Litany

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general’s head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley,
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.

I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman’s tea cup.
But don’t worry, I am not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and–somehow– the wine.

– Billy Collins

Esoteric Jokes

A mosquito did cry out in pain,
“A scientist’s rotting my brain!”
The cause of his sorrow
was para-dichloro
diphenyl-trichloroethane

When Curtis Cooper and Steven Boone discovered the 44th Mersenne prime, Bruce Schneier had to change the combination on his luggage.

Man goes into a bar: Can I have a pint of adenosine triphosphate please?
Barman: Certainly sir, that’ll be 80p

Jean-Paul Sartre is sitting at a cafe, revising his draft of Being and Nothingness. The waitress comes out and asks him if he would like to order. “Yes madame, I would like a cup of coffee, please, with no cream.” The waitress hurries back inside, and just as quickly comes back out and says to Sartre “I’m so very sorry monsueir, but we seem to be out of cream. Would you like it with no milk instead?”

via this AskMe thread

There Will Come Soft Rains

There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pool singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone.

–Sara Teasdale

Sci-Fi Story

I stumbled across this neat old sci-fi story called A Pail of Air the other day (scroll down past the comments). It’s a quick read and I enjoyed it enough to pass on.