Also: "You spend all your life trying to save time, but when you get to the end of your life, there's no time left, and you'll go to heaven, and you go 'But wait, I had velcro sneakers, no-iron shirt, clip-on tie. What about all that time? It's gone.'"
And, though Seinfeld won't show you his Star of David necklace, he says "Yes, I wear a Star of David necklace, because it makes me feel closer to the people of Israel that I feel close to and that's why I wear it."
He reveals his favorite word: "quintessence." He discusses the meaning, but I wanted the OED meaning: "The most essential part or feature of some non-material thing; the purest or most perfect form or manifestation of some quality, idea, etc."
But that's the figurative meaning. You know it from Shakespeare, from "Hamlet" (1604): "What a peece of worke is a man..: the beautie of the world; the paragon of Annimales; and yet to me, what is this Quintessence of dust."
So what is the original meaning? "In classical and medieval philosophy: a fifth essence existing in addition to the four elements, supposed to be the substance of which the celestial bodies were composed and to be latent in all things; (Alchemy) this essence, supposed to be able to be extracted by distillation or other procedures."
Ah, the "quint" becomes clear!
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39 comments:
I'm impressed -- very!! -- that someone has finished up a Bic Pen, used up all the ink, before losing the pen. I have never done that.
My kid has that identical coffee pot. They are quite fun to make coffee with.
I liked this video. The riff on the Italian Company made me chuckle.
Clever and Lazy people are the ones that make ALL the changes
Clever and Hard working people make the changes happen
Stupid and Lazy people are NO PROBLEM, and will go along with the changes
Stupid and Hard working people are THE PROBLEM and will resist ALL (and ANY) Changes
type 4 people (Stupid and Hard Working) are usually named Karen
Jewish folks must be very conflicted.
Trump is a dip shit
Biden is a horror show - now with added pro-Hamas terrorists in his bucket of deplorables.
I.M.Hunsberger The Quintessential Dictionary, 600 words that, once learned (off flash cards, say) enable you to read all of Wm. Buckley, or Thomas Berger (Who is Teddy Villanova? opposite of "Althouse"), without looking anything up.
The 11th thing Seinfeld apparently can't live without is Howard Stern. Seinfeld apologized to Stern for calling him "not funny".
I'm a tech nerd. I have quantessence.
Ladies, do not try to deprive Jerry of his quintessence.
"In physics, quintessence is a hypothetical form of dark energy, more precisely a scalar field, postulated as an explanation of the observation of an accelerating rate of expansion of the universe.". Wikipedia
Placed an order for “Meditations”.
The Fifth Element!
Leelu Dallas Multipass.
I totally agree with Seinfeld here. My own favorite is the SwAK (Victorinox) Spartan. It's my daily carry. The Spartan is the quintessential human tool for 21st century humans.
Cue the Dr. Strangelove quotes on “purity of essence”
And cue Slim Pickens for his iconic “yeehaw”
In "The Holdovers" the Paul Giamatti character had a box of "The Mediations" in his office. The movie is directed by Oscar winner and Omaha Creighton Prep alum Alexander Payne.
Strangely, I watched this a few days ago, before you posted it! I was struck by (and agreed with) his comments about Levi's.
. . . . really, you can't even get the fit to be semi-consistent now?
Always a thoughtful guy. Seems to like order.
You spend all your life trying to save time, but when you get to the end of your life, there's no time left, and you'll go to heaven, and you go 'But wait, I had velcro sneakers, no-iron shirt, clip-on tie. What about all that time? It's gone.'"
A good joke from his standup, as cited in "Is This Something?"
I bought a Breitling Navitimer at an auction in Canada last month and it is awaiting time on the bench. The crystal is a wreck but the dial is in fantastic condition…
Enjoyed the video quite a bit. FWIW, I was dissapointed in his movie.
I have the same Italian style expresso pot, but I, like most people, do not leave the lid open. If you do that you have to stand over the pot in order to close it when the coffee starts to spurt. Much better to leave the lid shut and turn off the heat once you hear the percolating sound.
Amazon wants to sell me a Bialetti this morning…
Well, finally (!) the word makes sense. Thanks Ms. Althouse.
It easier to be contemplative and philosophical about life's problems if you're the Roman Emperor or have a billion dollars....I agree with his choices with the exception of his wristwatch and his coffee maker. They look fussy. Also, speaking as a narcissist, a Fitbit or Apple watch gives you so much more opportunity to observe your body and its workings. I think the original Mr. Coffee was a quantum jump ahead of the percolators it replaced and remains the Levi 501 of coffee makers. One caveat with the 501 though. It has a button front. Older men with prostate problems should avoid button fronts.
I'm glad people tell me that Seinfeld is funny. I wouldn't know otherwise.
I'm glad people tell me that Seinfeld is funny. I wouldn't know otherwise.
Seinfeld once again reminding me why he's great. He can take the most inane objects and make you laugh about them. Without saying "c***", balls, any other body part, White people this, Black people that.
Love the part about "The secret to life is to waste time in ways that you like."
Great video. Classic Seinfeld.
PS: WWIII Joe Biden said, "Jewish folks must be very conflicted."
Some may be, but fewer every week. Many of us have been clear on these things for years.
One of my fave words is mucilage. It flows off the lips but your tongue ends up stuck in an odd place.
The quintessence of quintessence was this: the stars were observed to move in perfect circles night after night, not changing, not colliding and not fading. Nothing on earth behaved like that. Clearly, the stars were made of something other and better than the stuff making up us and our earthly surroundings and that something was quintessence. We and everything around were a messy mix of 4 elements - earth, water, air and fire; the stars were made of one perfect element as we see in their repeated perfect motions, and that element was aether or quintessence. Newton, however, said that the stars were obeying the same laws as the things on earth, and you can see how that would be the quintessence of revolutionary thought (ha, ha) - one law to explain obviously lawful and apparently lawless behavior
“ I think the original Mr. Coffee was a quantum jump ahead of the percolators it replaced and remains the Levi 501 of coffee makers. “
That wasn’t the jump. There were plastic filter holders that you put over a coffee pot and then you poured water into from a kettle. All Mr. Coffee contributed was heating the water in one unit with the pot and filter holder.. Same kind of filter, same pour over concept. It just saved you the trouble of heating the water in the kettle and doing the pour by hand, which is what a lot of people who look down on Mr. Coffee these days think is the better way to do it.
Victorinox Officer. In my pocket every day. I'd rather lose my phone.
I can't remember how many wound up in the trash at the airport.
Yes Patagonia makes good stuff.
"You spend all your life trying to save time, but when you get to the end of your life, there's no time left, and you'll go to heaven, and you go 'But wait, I had velcro sneakers, no-iron shirt, clip-on tie. What about all that time? It's gone.'"
Would you really want that time back, if you had to spend it tying your shoes and ironing your shirts? Not to mention fooling around with that silly coffee-maker.
His OCD has made him a fortune. I like how comfortable and unapologetic he is.
On the Levi 501's: Older men with prostate problems can still get easy access (not dissimilar to a zipper imo) by pulling apart on the buttons which then open quite easily. The harder part is buttoning them back up, especially if you live in cold climates and pee on a lot of trees on your walks in the woods where you have to take your gloves off to have the dexterity to button them back up.
Not a coffee drinker, but I recommend the Technology Connections YouTube channel for an explanation of how Mr. Coffee combined cheap manufacturing cost with setting the water temperature properly for making coffee. The hard part was keeping the water hot but well below boiling (boiling would have obviously been much easier to deliver.)
I am wondering what other readers of Marcus Aurelius' Meditations think about their own copies of the book.
Jerry Seinfeld owns (I looked it up from the image) a copy of "Meditations" which is $110 and soft-leather bound (gilt-edged) available from a site called The Daily Stoic. There are dozens and dozens of different editions, translations and commentary-added versions available at Amazon (where you can support this blog through the Althouse Amazon portal).
If anyone has a particularly favorite copy/edition of "Meditations," I'd like to hear about it. Seinfeld's leather-bound copy looks very nice.
My favorite part was his closing comment: "I wear a Star of David necklace because it makes me feel closer to the people of Israel, that I feel closer to."
Gilbar: If I remember correctly a German general stated those caregories for officers.
The smart and hardworking are to be sent to general staff because those types are needed there; the smart but lazy are field commanders because they will get the task done with as little effort as possible; the lazy and stupid are your usual type, able to complete assigned tasks, but not looking for new things to do; the hardworking but stupid are most dangerous to you because they keep coming up with bright ideas that actually damage the performance of your army.
A friend once related a story of a stupid hardworking officer that received a promotion and recommendation that the officer go to Corps, and I said that he was being promoted out of their hair, sent on to where he became someone else's problem.
In Re: Coffee pots. At the old youth camp I had a 5 cup electric percolator. The water was in the pot and a metal tube up to a perforated metal cylinder with the grounds. Upon waking I would set it to go and then head to the showers. When cleaned and dressed it was ready for me to have my first coffee and then wake the kids.
Chuck:
Gregory Hays' translation of Marcus Aurelius is excellent (scholarly and readable) and inexpensive: currently $13.27 hardback, $9.51 paperback at Amazon.
Looking for Ann of Althouse's 10 Things. Seeing a lot of Seinfeld these days. His series was irreverent. Kramer as a cognitively disabled man. "The voice." "Sponge worthy." "It's not a lie if you really believe it." (paraphrased) "I come from a long line of quitters." Agree with the yellow legal pads but hate Bic pens. Give me a Number 2 lead pencil, sharpened!
"Gregory Hays' translation of Marcus Aurelius is excellent (scholarly and readable) and inexpensive: currently $13.27 hardback, $9.51 paperback at Amazon."
I have the Hays translation, as well.
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