182. Of this and that

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Money

I believe I've already written about my curiosity as to where money for something like a government military acquisition -- like a ship -- goes. In the same vein I wonder what the wealth of the average billionaire is actually doing. When people talk against the One Percent the assumption seems to be that their wealth is in gold and jewels stashed under their beds. In reality, I imagine their wealth -- when it isn't tied down in the stock of a company they are associated with, or in land -- is actively doing the kinds of things one expects capital to do. Perhaps we would want to redirect it to different sectors of the economy, or to different charities, or to different politicians, but that capital is still out there actively creating jobs of one sort or another. (Now I'm pretty sure I have written about this before.) Even the money they spend on themselves goes from pocket to pocket.

People really should be protesting me. Aside from supporting (in a very modest way) a number of modest cafes and restaurants, I spend almost nothing in ways that put dollars in the pockets of clerks or plant workers or artisans or even repair-people.

As I imagine Ford Madox Ford's good Tory landowner, one of his primary roles is to be the chief consumer of his neighborhood. Consuming the fruits of his tenants labor (or labour). Of course this is a role that Christian Tiejens shirked. Voltaire may have been much better in this regard. Also Vronsky. And do we want to be dependent on the occasional good seigneur? Especially when we know that the average landlord will see the benefit of clearing the land or in-closing the commons -- just as the average Clinton and Obama supporting landlord in SF sees the benefit of asking for the maximum rent the market will bear.

It just occurred to me that Sir Walter Eliot in Jane Austen's Persuasion could be the poster child for the economic quality I'm talking about. His inability to "retrench" would have been greatly beneficial to the common people around Kellynch Hall. We see him as vain and uncaring of others -- even when he is played by Tony Head (BtVS's Rupert Giles) -- but I imagine that, when they left for Bath, his purse was more missed in the neighborhood than was Anne's wisdom and good sense.

And now I'm wondering if any of the Annales School historians has studied the economic effect of the concentration of nobility in Versailles under Louis XIV? I'm guessing it was a sad time for the rest of France.

"Ballet of the good city sidewalk," with coughing 

This morning I had a very early doctor's appointment downtown -- so equal distance between my gym and the Bank Cafe (where I'm writing this. I even got one of the nice chairs in the window I'm so early). I woke an hour early and was walking to my appointment at the time when I usually wake up. My point being that I was seeing Bush Street at an unusual hour. 

This is the stretch of Bush I've written about before because it has so many French connections and because it is the haunt of the smoking gnome. I was only two hours earlier than normal, but the street felt so different I was reminded of Jane Jacobs's "ballet of the good city sidewalk" from The Death and Life of Great American Cities.

If I gave that woman a copy of the book, do you think I could get her to write her own description of the changes on Bush over the course of a day? No. But I love the idea. As perfect as Jacobs's Greenwich Village street was, this stretch of Bush may be even better. There are a number of small hotels and restaurants catering to tourists. There's the Tunnel Top bar and that nest of commerce by the Stockton tunnel that I've already written about -- including The Green Door Massage parlor

But there are also apartment buildings, the big parking garage, the church, the consulate, and the Goethe Institute. And of course the ebb and flow of commuter foot traffic that I've also written about before. 

Walking here to the Bank Cafe from the doctor's was like swimming against a salmon migration as I neared Market and the swarm of commuters exiting the train station there around 9am. And while 7am is early for me now, I know from my taxi days that the Financial District (and now the downtown part of SOMA as well) wakes up at 4:30am. Somewhere in there I'm sure there's a shift change with commuters (coffee cups in hand) starting to trickle in by car, bike, bus, train, and ferry while the "homeless" start to breakdown (some) of their camps and move into their begging positions.

YouTube

One of my favorite YouTube science presenters (?) is in the midst of a wonderful series of videos about Quantum Field Theory. (Here and Here and here and here .) I was promised a second video focused on Richard Feynman but there has been an annoying delay. (Here.)

My favorite Medium writer about science just did a wonderful piece on what's been learned about the universe (astrophysics, here) in the past hundred years. But it's almost like they are teasing me because what I want from both of these sources is more about Quantum Chromodynamics. 

It would seem to be the logical next step for the YouTube person, and perhaps the third step ahead for the Medium person. But I don't know if they see it the same way.

New book

Our latest book club title is My Name Is Lucy Barton. A novel by Elizabeth Strout. I'm enjoying it but there's nothing to write about so far. It's a refreshing change of pace, to be honest.

So, having said that I read a few more sections... The book, at least so far, is about how we are shaped by our childhoods; by how our parents managed their parental duties along with everything else in their lives. 

It's easiest to see this when the parents did an obviously bad job, leaving their kids with emotional injuries they often never recover from. But it's always worth being reminded that the parents who did a better job are also responsible for how their children turned out. At least to some extent. 

I'd say my parents did a great job up until I was about eight, and that may be the most character forming period. My mother always said I was born "this way" -- calm and reserved, I guess. Self-sufficient. Yet would I have stayed this way if I hadn't been so supported in those early years? No way to know.

Now, I remember the way my parents argued constantly, from the time I was eight or nine until I left home after high school, the way I remember that I had swine or avian flu several times in the 1950s and 1960s (that I hope will continue to give me some immunity in the future). I recall it but I don't dwell on it or remember the day to day anxiety unless I really think about it (like now.) The immunity I got from that experience has also stayed with me and shaped me in social ways. It's the main reason I can check off the "Single, never been married" option on some forms.

One of my online friends has had a life, but especially a childhood, that no one would believe if you recorded it in the form of a novel. She's more damaged but also more resilient than I am. 

Next - 183. Seeing the end