Stephen Brown argues that Sid Vicious and Mozart shared the quality of primitivism, by which he means the winnowing away of unnecessary complications. I see his point with Sid, but in Mozart's case, I see it as the essence of the refining fire. Still, a good read and well-argued, even though, IMHO, wrong.

<I>Caution:</I> This is just a theory.

Frankly, I think this site has more Ronald Reagan than it needs, but it does have Richard Nixon's farewell address (man, I never get tired of that one) and a ton of other winners&mdash;in both text and MP3. Obviously slanted towards stuff they have audio files for, but a goldmine for those of us who appreciate good oratory.

<I>Ampulex compressa</I> is a wasp that uses its stinger to temporarily paralyze and then hot-wire a cockroach so that the wasp can "drive" the larger critter home, where it can lay its egg on the roach host and seal it into a nursery. When the egg hatches, the larva chews its way into the host, where it feeds itself and then spins a cocoon.

Beautiful photographs of ghost towns.

Hilarious rant by anthropologist Roger Sandall over Lynn Truss' <I>Talk to the Hand: The Utter Bloody Rudeness of Everyday Life</I>. I have to confess I haven't read <I>TTTH</I>, not least because I didn't enjoy her hectoring <I>Eats Shoots and Leaves</I>. Geeze, if you're going to write a book about the failure of everybody to observe proper grammar, wouldn't you want it to be copyedited to a fair thee well? Ms. Truss didn't proof her proofer&mdash;and all I could think as she wagged her finger was that she should have washed it first.

<IMG SRC="/images/archivesart/106howard.1.jpg" ALT="106howard.1.jpg" WIDTH=250 HEIGHT=250 HSPACE=4 VSPACE=4 ALIGN=RIGHT>Much as I like the prospect of being able to grunt a heartfelt <I>Je ne regrette rien</I> immediately before expiring, I know there will be too many what-ifs and wish-I-hadn'ts to make that even remotely possible. But here is one missed opportunity that won't flash before me, because John Atkinson has granted me a second chance.