tim merritt [dot] net

This is an idea that’s been buzzing in my head since I came across it: that the conservative movement has been, except for the religious zealotry, a move to transfer risk from large organizations (corporations, government) to individuals. Can’t recall where I first read about it, and though I believed it must have been an earlier post about Jacob Hacker on Crooked Timber, I couldn’t find it in time for this post.

Crooked Timber Reviews Jacob Hacker’s The Great Risk Shift

It’s an engaging idea, a “frame” for the issue that makes sense to me as a way to resist the often false choices that the government’s policy changes have forced on us, the citizens. Read the review at Crooked Timber, and the comments. I haven’t re-read it all yet with the attention it deserves. I hope to revisit this idea and flesh out some of my own responses.

A Photoshop tutorial on Making Your Own Passport Photos, found via LifeHacker.
The State Department has specific guidelines for photographers too. Should I post a copy of my passport photo here?

The Minimalist gives a handful of recipes: Eggs Take Their Place at the Dinner Table. At right is their shot of eggs poached in wine with homemade croutons. I’ve always loved eggs for dinner, but usually as breakfast for dinner, over easy with bacon and toast and so on, or sometimes a nice omelette. This article has some ideas that are novel to me, and some very tasty-looking recipes.

This is an old link I should have posted ages ago, from the UK’s Observer Monthy Music (“OMM”): Tom Waits on his cherished albums of all time: ‘It’s perfect madness’

In the first of an occasional series in which the greatest recording artists reveal their favourite records, Tom Waits writes about his 20 most cherished albums of all time. So for the lowdown on Zappa and Bill Hicks, step right up…

Here’s that take on Bill Hicks:

bq.15 Rant in E Minor by Bill Hicks (Rykodisc) 1997

Bill Hicks, blowtorch, excavator, truthsayer and brain specialist, like a reverend waving a gun around. Pay attention to Rant in E Minor, it is a major work, as important as Lenny Bruce’s. He will correct your vision. His life was cut short by cancer, though he did leave his tools here. Others will drive on the road he built. Long may his records rant even though he can’t.

I need to consolidate the music I’ve accumulated on the laptop drive and on one of my external backups, and boom, I come across this hint at macosxhints.com – Easily move music between drives with iTunes 7 – in my usual semi-daily Mac news browsing. Tomorrow night, it will be done. Life is good.

Plenty of company; Janine and Bryan and Alysse and Sean, and Wilma and Ed, and Debbie, and Pete and Nana, and the four of us, all for the birthdays of Jack and Nana and me. Good food, lots of stories and presents and Ellen made tiramisu. It was really good.