Note to self.

Be the best you can be.
Do the best work you can do.
Respect yourself.
Avoid apologizing.

Philadelphia

OVERVIEW
From old NYT articles
http://travel.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/travel/36-hours-in-philadelphia.html?ref=36hours

http://travel.nytimes.com/2009/05/10/travel/10hours.html?_r=0



FOOD

From KL
Many choices
http://www.tastingtable.com/city_guide/national/158

From KH
Anthony Bourdain goes beyond cheesesteaks (thank god!)
http://www.travelchannel.com/tv-shows/the-layover/episodes/philly

I learned about this via a podcast with designer Roberto deVicq de Cumptich (yup, that's a real name) http://ilpittore.com/



ART

From KC
Calder's Diana Re-gilded. Get ready to pose.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/23/nyregion/a-gilded-goddess-would-rather-be-in-philadelphia.html?ref=design&_r=1

Must-sees

Philadelphia Museum of Art
Barnes
Rodin Museum



OTHER

Science: Franklin Institute
Odditites: Mutter Museum
Muurals: http://www.muralarts.org/



HISTORY

Close to Independence Hall and The Liberty Bell

http://constitutioncenter.org/

Possible tea with Mama T
http://www.unionleague.org/



LODGING

Windsor Suites, sweets

Why Read Moby Dick?

Nathaniel Philbrick's Why Read Moby Dick? is a great incentive to reread Melville's masterpiece. In addition to plot tidbits, Philbrick gives the reader many facts about whaling, Melville, and the latter's relationship with his reluctant friend Nathaniel Hawthorne. Philbrick also brilliantly points out correspondences between pre-Civil War U.S. and parallels to the U.S.today. Each short chapter ends with an enlightening—if mildly irritating—moral tag.

Irritation aside, some of Philbrick's observations lend themselves to inspirational axioms. Here are a few of my favorite extracts from Why Read Moby Dick? I've italicized the back story to my quotes from Philbrick.

Page 122
Melville visits Nantucket a year after writing Moby Dick and meets George Pollard, captain of the whaling ship Essex, which was destroyed by its prey. Philbrick writes that Pollard was a "quiet, reserved survivor who had learned to live with disappointment."

For someone who has ceased to believe in his own immortality (and as we shall soon see, Melville had reached that point), life isn't about achieving your dreams; it's about finding a way to continue on in spite of them.

Page 126
After his death, Melville's family finds a possible clue to how Melville "managed to survive the forty-year backlash left by the creation of Moby Dick" (Melville worked for nearly two decades as a customs inspector after Moby Dick was published to unkind reviews) . . . .

Atop a table piled high with papers was a portable writing desk. Taped inside the desk, which had no bottom, was a piece of paper with a motto printed on it: "Keep true to the dream of thy youth."

SPOILER ALERT
The very last paragraph of Philbrick's Why Read Moby Dick? is as insightful as the rest of the slim volume (yup; I actually wrote "slim volume").

In the end, Melville had found a way back to the view espoused by Ishmael in Moby Dick: "Doubts of all things earthly, and intuitions of some things heavenly; this combination makes neither believer nor infidel, but makes a man who regards them both with equal eye." This redemptive mixture of skepticism and hope, this genial stoicism in the face of a short, ridiculous, and irrational life, is why I read Moby Dick.

Philbrick's book and summary above is why I may reread Moby Dick. But first, intrigued by the history and the tale that so struck Melville and impressed by Philbrick's writing, I will probably read, Philbrick's In the Heart of the Sea.

From Truth & Beauty

From Ann Patchett's Truth & Beauty:

I had been raised by Catholic nuns who told us in no uncertain terms that work was the path to God, and that while it was a fine thing to feel loyalty and devoltion in your heart, it would be much better for everyone involved if you could find the physical manifestations of your good thoughts and see them put into action. The world is saved through deeds, not prayer, because what is prayer but a kind of worry? I decided then that my love for Lucy would have to manifest in deeds.

Patchett's lines resonate, especially since the motto of The School of the Holy Child Jesus had the motto "Actions not Words" (I write, inactively . . . ).

Silk Satin Fabric

For Tomo:

In 2005, the gent at Promenade Fabrics in New Orleans said that this silk fabric, was originally intended for the movie "Gladiator." Someone asked him if he wanted the fabric and he bought it.

http://web1.userinstinct.com/19954983-promenade-fine-fabrics.htm
1520 St Charles Avenue









The photo below, taken in 2004, is a tribute to the Gulf and the oyster fishermen.

October 20-21, 2007. Tarrytown

August 12, 2007. Tarrytown

As always, the jpeg doesn't feature the type, but the lovely day is backed up online.