another day

I’m afraid daily summaries is all that readers of this blog are likely to get for the next week or so, since there isn’t a lot of leisure time at the moment.

This year like last year, my job is a new position for which the responsibilities and ground rules have to be invented on the fly. I like that sort of situation: being able to look at the landscape, decide what is needed, and then try to act on it quickly with all available resources. Technically I don’t even start until Tuesday, but I’ve been trying to set everything up in the office this week.

And Amazon, lightning Amazon… They’ve never sent books to me this quickly in Egypt before. Schopenhauer’s half-cynical remark is correct that when we buy books we often mistakenly think that we’re also buying the time in which to read them. There are a number of books on which I am already 5-7 years behind in reading, but you never know when the right moment will strike.

Some of highlights of today’s two shipments: Luhmann, Suárez, Edmund Wilson, and (on Wilson’s recommendation) Emily Post. I wouldn’t be able to afford the time just to read an out-of-date etiquette book for camp value, but Wilson convincingly paints Post as a literary talent, if also an outrageous social snob.

I suppose I’ll dig into Luhmann first, just because Levi’s manuscript has me excited about Social Systems. Still, Wilson’s little reviews are about as dangerous to have around as pistachioes or popcorn. You can’t stop eating them.