More Random Thoughts

Mark Rubin

Random thoughts. The Internet says random thoughts mean something, and that science agrees. Who knew?

My first random thought involves recycling. I keep two old-fashioned galvanized steel trash cans outside, near my kitchen door. The city picks up recycling every other Monday, so I carried that bin out to the alley. Lo, when I went to my city-owned recycle bin, someone had tossed in an Apple computer box. Very shapely. Stylish even, but it filled my container.

I solved the problem, but here is my question: Can you dump recycling in any blue bin? Or, just the one by your house? An inquiring mind needs a good answer.

Next up: living my life. I

Elmore Leonard and Sam Sifton

Mark Rubin

Elmore Leonard was a great writer, with an extraordinary way with dialogue. Sam Sifton writes pretty well, too. Presently, he’s the Food Editor for the New York Times, where he has worked for almost 20 years. (Mr. Sifton’s grandfather was Reinhold Neibuhr, who wrote the Serenity Prayer. It comes to mind often, but only after I have failed to appreciate the difference between what I can and cannot change.)

Every week Mr. Sifton sends What to Cook … emails. They bring me great pleasure, always, but I really enjoyed Cook Anyway, which I received on April 27. Mr. Sifton starts out thusly:

Good morning. One of the greatest first lines of a novel,

More Thoughts from the Self-Isolation Front

Mark Rubin

I’m here! Apologies – as always – for not blogging often enough.

Candidly, spare time involves more activities than “stuck” might suggest, and I’m spending writing time working on my personal memoir. I expect to be around for a long time, but I’d be a G.D. Fool if I didn’t note my age (62), my four pneumonias, and the absence of a solid, functioning health care system. Those who deliver health services deserve every bit of love we can offer them, but if we don’t take away from this crisis a recognition that we don’t have a functioning public health system, We. Are. Blind.

The memoir enlivens my time. I’m blessed, and

Numbers Illiteracy

Mark Rubin

John Allen Paulos teaches math at Temple University. He writes books, too. Good books. Books for lay people about math. One of which he titled Innumeracy … which is why this post got titled Numbers Illiteracy, as opposed to … Innumeracy.

Stupid numbers drive me nutso. They abound now, in an era when stupid, vapid creatures rule.

I hear lots of people talking about how the United States has the largest number of COVID-19 cases in the world. These comments come, mostly, from those whose fury focuses first on our Fearless Leader.

Well, duh! More people live in the United States than in any other country, save China and India. Among large nations we have, by