Here’s where we get into things.
Monday
The message on a coffee mug displayed in a drug store window was “I prefer people over pets.” I don’t currently own a pet.
After Sunday’s full moon, should be an interesting week.
Classical Kids points out accurately that as far as big thinkers of antiquity go, Zeno of Citium doesn’t get a whole lot of renown these days. But here’s Zeno’s big insight, and it’s worth pondering: “Happiness is a good flow of life.” I like it. As we moderns like to say, “that resonates.”
Random personal observation: If you transpose the vowels in Substack you get ‘Sabstuck.’ OK, that’s enough vowel transposition for now. I’m more of a consonant guy anyway.
Let’s move on to the second day of the week that was.
Tuesday
The perfect album for your summer season could be Dusk and Summer by Dashboard Confessional. Re-recorded in 2019, this is a highly listenable, kind of under-the-radar, inspired recording that just might wend its way into your musical heart.
And yep, Dusk and Summer has been the soundtrack for the renovation job thus far. Does the song title “Screaming Infidelities” (off an earlier Dashboard Confessional album) echo in a distant way the “Elective Affinities” of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe?
Meanwhile, at the fixer-upper I’m working on there seems to be an old penny or two on all the old windows. To the point where it doesn’t feel like coincidence and I’m imagining they must have been put there by design at some point. Is “pennies on windowsills” a thing?
Wednesday
Not to brag or anything, but my Canuckle Game stats are getting pretty serious. At this point my ‘average guess’ number per game is slimming down close to the 4.0 mark.
Why do the names of the counties you drive though always seem more poetic than the names of the towns?
Thursday
Catching up on the Brain Food newsletter, I see Shane Parrish throws in a quote from the late essayist Christopher Morley. “There is only one success—to be able to spend your life in your own way.” I think there’s wisdom there.
Substack has quelled the quibblers to a degree by introducing a new way to publish from the app. Jasmine Sun says the mobile app for iOS “helps you post on the go.”
Friday
From one newspaper columnist to another:
Bob Dunning joins Substack after five and a half decades at his former employer. Welcome to the fold, Bob.
Saturday
The calendar on the wall says today is the start of the moon’s Last Quarter. Does it have any bearing on your general bearing?
Sign off notes
The column is somewhat truncated this week because of the big reno taking place at the new digs.
But a big thank you for reading this edition of Arthur MacKinnon’s Newsl—Newspaper Column.
See you after the elapsing of seven more of the smallest calendrical units, friends.