Quora

CafeBustelo wall 1500

quora moderation said my answer may need improvement

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I RECEIVED AN EMAIL FROM QUORA that read, “Quora Mod­er­a­tion col­lapsed your an­swer to ‘What ir­refutable facts do Trump sup­porters need to know about Trump to change their mind?’ for vi­o­lating a policy on Quora. Your an­swer may need im­prove­ment.” Re­ceiving what could only be in­ter­preted as a rep­ri­mand was a first for me—at least from Quora. [Continue reading]

SigmundFreud Surrealists 1500

you probably overrate that which you love

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THIS MORNING, the ques­tion on Quora was, “Who is the most over­rated music star of all time?” Rather than an­swer the question—which I don’t be­lieve can be an­swered to every­one’s satisfaction—I ad­dressed the as­sump­tions of the ques­tion itself.

My an­swer is in­dented below be­tween the im­ages of Bert Blyleven (with the ball) and Sig­mund Freud (with the cigar). [Continue reading]

ArthurRimbaud caricature Pericoli 1500 crop

symbolist poet arthur rimbaud has nothing to do with this post

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ANOTHER DAY, an­other ques­tion on Quora beg­ging for an an­swer from me. (Well, maybe not beg­ging, but looking like it re­quires my at­ten­tion.) Hope­fully, my an­swer will be un­like others that will be posted and if it doesn’t in­form, will at least entertain.

The ques­tion was, “Can you name an artist or mu­si­cian you had never heard of that people said was good and you dis­cov­ered those people were right? [Continue reading]

PsychedelicLandscape 1500 crop

I guess I’ll just have to remain anonymous

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THIS TIME, the ques­tion on Quora was “Why do you not want to be fa­mous?” and I read it at four in the morning. That’s be­fore I’d had the first sip of my Cafe Bustelo (a good coffee to wake up with). So I put on Miles Davis’s WALKIN’ (a good album to wake up with), took a gulp from my mug and re­sponded with this:

If I was fa­mous, there’d be all these in­ter­esting young men with ex­tra­or­di­narily ex­otic mind-altering drugs that I’ve never even heard of who would want to hang out with me and be my friend and have fas­ci­nating con­ver­sa­tions about re­ality just be­cause I was fa­mous. [Continue reading]

SandraBullock AllAboutSteve stairs 1500 crop

on the “rich lifestyles” of music artists and movie stars

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TODAY’S QUESTION ON QUORA that caught my at­ten­tion was, “How do music artists have such rich lifestyles if every­body pi­rates their music?” Since I had just fin­ished my mon­ster mug of Cafe Bustelo—and I tried honey in­stead of my usual light brown sugar as a sweet­ener, which I won’t be doing again—I thought I’d give it a go. [Continue reading]