Semioclast

When I lived in the UK I worked as a barman (note fancy use of British slang). One night while outside casually smoking Lucky Strikes like some cool American expat I saw a fight break out between some drunks that security had ejected earlier in the evening. The smaller of the two swung a right hook and laid the other guy out. I was really impressed and until this day have cited that as one of only two instances where I have witnessed someone getting one-punched (the other was during a rugby match).

After 10 Bobbies showed up in a van and cleared the area with batons, we found a bloody wad of newspaper next to a trashcan. At the time I didn’t know what it was; I now know that it was a Millwall Brick.

Lessons learned:

1. Dennis Curtin of the Buffalo Old Boys is the only person I’ve seen accomplish this feat.
2. Creative use of game objects in the interest of griefing existed well before Second Life.

Via Bruce Schneier.

Richard Rorty died this past Friday. Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity was one of the first books of critical theory/philosophy/? I ever read. I am certain that I didn’t understand it at the time, although I think I have come to in recent years through a kind of recollective osmosis. And while I don’t really agree with many of Rorty’s points (especially as explained by his followers such as Michael Bérubé), I will miss knowing he’s around. Even if I disagreed with him on a philosophical level, I know that his intent was for an inclusive, leftist politics. In many ways, the rest is just bookkeeping.

h/t Ron Silliman

Vonnegut dead at 84.

He never did get around to telling us why he hated volunteer firefighters so much.

So it goes.