Golden Sunlight Pours into the Bay.
The host will seat you now.

UD thanks Frances for the link.

From my hotel balcony: Naples, Vesuvius, Bay.

Sunrise.

My old buddy and traveling companion Peter definitely likes the good life.

But he’s not all about restaurants in Venice.

Whew. Just one of our routine, outside a nightclub, mass shootings.

The New York Police Department reassured the public that it was “not a terrorist attack.”

Madman or terrorist…

we’ll know soon enough.

***************

Probably terrorist. Definitely dead.

***************

‘An ISIS flag was attached to the pickup rear hitch.’

Bombe Glacée

“Even after losing his own fingers as a result of his homemade explosive materials, [Brad Spafford] made the apparent remarkable decision to keep an extraordinarily dangerous explosive material in the home’s freezer next to food items that could be accessed by the entire family,” prosecutors said… [Spafford] acknowledged keeping a jar in his freezer of HMTD, an explosive material that is so unstable it can be exploded merely as a result of friction or temperature changes.” Investigators found the jar stored next to food items and labeled “dangerous” and “do not touch.”

‘The [Indian film censorship board] has removed … hijab-burning scenes [from a political thriller made by an Iranian], which symbolise resistance in Iran’s ‘Women, Life, Freedom’ movement.’

Shot secretly in Iran, ‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’ has received international acclaim. It has won awards at Cannes and other major film festivals…

Here’s part of what you can’t see in India.

Fireworks, Venice
I'm doing what I did last year:

Standing on a cold Venetian balcony, listening.
The others have gone off to the canal
To see the fireworks. For me, enough to hear
The crack and blast of the show from a distance.

Under the stars, the sky flashes pink and green
With each explosion. The balcony rattles a bit
And, from dark corners of the city, unseen
Voices shout that a new year begins.

Strange to be here again for this strange
Light show, a sort of conceptual art,
Postmodern version of pitched battle,
Gunfight, terror, striking the heart

But sparing the body. Some of it
Sounds like gunshots, and then my frame,
Like the balcony, rattles a bit.
Absurd. But who can blame

Me for going there? The only bombing campaign
I'll ever know simply smokes up the air
And leaves me standing there
Wondering about skirmish scrimmage and war.

End of year wisdom from Charles Wright’s poem, “Disjecta Membra”

Take a loose rein and a deep seat,
John, my father-in-law, would say
To someone starting out on a long journey, meaning, take it easy,
Relax, let what’s taking you take you.

Cat sunning outside UD’s kitchen window, Venice
La Kid, Venice, Day One
Mr UD and Sarah’s delight overseen by one of five thousand servers last night at Wisteria, Venice.

A dinner-as-marathon joint where zillions of never before imagined dishes/drinks are whisked about you.

UD’s supposed to have dinner…

...here day after tomorrow. Will blog about it.

**********************

Also in the ordine del giorno – A second round of warhorses at La Fenice. Far as UD can tell, it’s exactly the same concert we went to in Venice last year: First half, rousing orchestral warhorses. Second, rousing vocal. Loved all of it – the best part was watching the local audience loving it.

We all rise for Libiamo at the end. SUPER rousing. This year, I’ll remember to bring the lyrics, so I can sing along.

UD Writes a Newspaper Poem…
... with words taken from an article.

Traffic Control

A tragedy of the uncommon in
Low-earth orbit impends. Some old craft can't
Even move on command; spaceship can burn
Their engines to put off junk at a slant

But the daemons of dead satellites and
Rocket bodies, fairings, wrenches, and gloves
Make a hazard zone for explosive wrecks.

A hypervelocity culture loves
And fears its hypervelocity tech.
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Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times

George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
The Electron Pencil

It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
Professor Mondo

There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
AcademicPub

You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann

Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
Dagblog

University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
Dissent: The Blog

[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
The Wall Street Journal

Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
Lee Skallerup Bessette, Inside Higher Education

[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
Sean Dorrance Kelly, Harvard University

Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
Roland Greene, Stanford University

The irrepressibly to-the-point Margaret Soltan...
Carlat Psychiatry Blog

Margaret Soltan, whose blog lords it over the rest of ours like a benevolent tyrant...
Perplexed with Narrow Passages

Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
Outside the Beltway

From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
Money Law

University Diaries offers a long-running, focused, and extremely effective critique of the university as we know it.
Anthony Grafton, American Historical Association

The inimitable Margaret Soltan is, as usual, worth reading. ...
Medical Humanities Blog

I awake this morning to find that the excellent Margaret Soltan has linked here and thereby singlehandedly given [this blog] its heaviest traffic...
Ducks and Drakes

As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
The Bitch Girls

Many of us bloggers worry that we don’t post enough to keep people’s interest: Margaret Soltan posts every day, and I more or less thought she was the gold standard.
Tenured Radical

University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
Mary Beard, A Don's Life

[University Diaries offers] a broad sense of what's going on in education today, framed by a passionate and knowledgeable reporter.
More magazine, Canada

If deity were an elected office, I would quit my job to get her on the ballot.
Notes of a Neophyte