Category Archives: Commentary

Opinion or analysis concerning whatever’s on my mind.

Thank you, and “I Could Eat Your Words”

Posted on July 28, 2018 by JMN

Check out this video on YouTube: Thank you to my precious, patient readers who spend a moment of their invaluable time to look my way here on EthidalDative. I can only strive to repay the compliment. And although I try … Continue reading →

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LinkedIn Just Gave You a New Reason to Make Fun of LinkedIn

Posted on July 28, 2018 by JMN

LinkedIn, a social network for people who enjoy soul-crushing banality, knows you get more than a few emails from randos wanting to add you to their “professional network.” Sick of reading messages from these random acquaintances looking to discuss synergy-based … Continue reading →

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“Los meros meros” again

Posted on July 28, 2018 by JMN

Guillermo Chapa was a member of the culture I was assigned to teach Spanish at as a rookie assistant-prof at Pan Am-Brownsville. I said teach “at” instead of “to” because almost all my students already knew the language — I … Continue reading →

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Los Meros Meros

Posted on July 27, 2018 by JMN

Check out this video on YouTube: I love this video. It makes me grin and tap my foot. Current Stats for Future Reference (2018) Decline in city’s median age last 7 years: 36.4 to 35.8. Hispanic population of county: 47% … Continue reading →

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The Road of Paint: Zadie Smith, “Henry Taylor’s Promiscuous Painting,” New Yorker, July 30, 2018 issue

Posted on July 26, 2018 by JMN

[Henry Taylor’s paintings are transfixing for me. I’m infinity shy of his league as a painter, but I was touched by the “road of chaos… road of paint” phrase that Zadie Smith uses to name the path that Taylor has … Continue reading →

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Overheard in the Teachers’ Lounge

Posted on July 25, 2018 by JMN

One of our football coaches, a vet in his forties, recounted how his wife ribbed him about being a neat freak. “Your underwear drawer is relentlessly organized, your t-shirts are folded, your Levis are on hangers!” she would exclaim. His … Continue reading →

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Botticelli Deconstructed

Posted on July 24, 2018 by JMN

youtube.com/embed/m4j4RwzE6j4 Hannah Gadsby on the “Birth of Venus.”

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“Shed Down By the River” Continued

Posted on July 23, 2018 by JMN

Two other things that impressed me: (2) Among my peers at the Facultad de Filosofia y Letras in Barcelona, the “pandilla” was the organizing social unit — congenial, urbane, catholic, benign, excluding neither the ill-favored nor the studious nor the … Continue reading →

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Shed Down by the River

Posted on July 18, 2018 by JMN

From the street it’s nondescript: long and low, homely brickwork giving way to corrugated metal, no windows. Flat, pedestrian, a second-rate, seedy, industrial-looking structure on a humble side of town. Patio and doorways are on the opposite side facing inward … Continue reading →

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Requiem for a Walking Stick

Posted on July 18, 2018 by JMN

You sweet bastard. Just two days ago I transferred you from the risky environs of the patio to the security of the Jatropha bush. Now I find you again on the patio inert, apparently expiring. What has hurt you? Or … Continue reading →

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