"I have the greatest job in the world, and my life revolves around my love for food - particularly devouring hot dogs." -Joey Chestnut My time in the City led me back to an old, well, not exactly love, but strong like. I'd drifted away from eating hot dogs. Peg doesn't much care for them, seeing as how they're the very wiggly embodiment of the ultra-processed foods she avoids (and therefore so do I, as her dining companion). But in New York City, hot dogs are everywhere. Not

“The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.” ― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations After posting probably hundreds of "my view out the window" shots to open these posts, I figured I'd start the day with a photo of what I'm looking at right now. My home office in Corning. Books that I love, and leaf through most days when I need a break from a work project. The Letters of Rupert Brooke. Bill Moyers's Genesis. Round the Clock, a photo gallery of images from the Eig

"It was a splendid summer morning and it seemed as if nothing could go wrong." -John Cheever On its way to being a blistering day out on the lake, with the onset of the heat wave we've been promised for the week leading up to America's 250th. I've taken that shot so many times over, what, three years now? I figured including Peg's cactus pot in the foreground would add a little conversation to the shot. We switched from strawberries to succulents this year because we're away

"One never reaches home, but wherever friendly paths intersect the whole world looks like home for a time." -Hermann Hesse Why was there no post this morning? Oh yeah--I was flying back from Perry to KELM. An early departure gives the best chance of avoiding thunderstorms in late June, so early it was. A lovely flight at 15,000 feet up the east coast. Here are a couple shots from the trip. No clue why the shot out the window was so blurry. Last night before I left the farm, a

"But when from a longdistant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, still, alone, more fragile, but with more vitality, more unsubstantial, more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls, ready to remind us, waiting and hoping for their moment, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unfaltering, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structur

"Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity, or neglect." — Captain A.G. Lamplugh Leaving Corning to go to the airport and fly home, and this is what's draped between me and my first stop in Greensboro, North Carolina. Not the worst I've seen, but not great. And there's icing over Pennsylvania, one day into official summer. I'd rather forgo this exercise, stay here and

"I hate the endless admonishments of a nanny state that lives in fear of its lawyers. While colonies of dim-witted traffic wardens swarm about looking for minor parking infringements, nobody seems to notice that our very social fabric is falling apart." -Christopher Fowler A lovely, misty, rainy affair out there this morning. I'd like it a lot better if I wasn't flying out of here tomorrow. The PIREPS this morning tell us there's ice and severe turbulence lurking in all that.

"We have to be part of something larger than ourselves, because our dreams are often bigger than our lifetimes." -Rosalie Bertell Yesterday tens of thousands of people lined Broadway along the Canyon of Heroes for the parade celebrating the NBA championship of the New York Knicks. I've been following this drama since we were there, and the whole city became caught up in the most dramatic playoff run maybe in all of basketball history. When the team arrived at City Hall, Mayo

"We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." -Winston Churchill Thinking of old Winnie this morning, of how he won the war by not losing it in 1940-41. Cities pounded into rubble, air force decimated, and yet the Brits soldiered on. They waited things out, and eventually the dictator who'd atta

“There are times for sleep, for inactivity, dreaming, indiscipline, even lethargy. You’ll know when you deserve these times. They come after you’ve been broken.” ― Mark Helprin, A Soldier of the Great War Another unproductive day. This last brief is proving to be a long, painful delivery. The arguments aren't flowing as they should. Maybe I'm losing my edge. Or I'm just exhausted after four months of juggling a very demanding academic program and this equally demanding job. I

"Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, and then for a few close friends, and then for money." -Moliere One can't really complain upon awakening and seeing this out the window just above your feet, Peg snoozing quietly alongside. As a friend of mine once wrote about Columbia, South Carolina, as his entry into a contest hosted by The State newspaper to come up with a motto for that charmless city, "It isn't so bad." This is the week of writing appellate briefs

“We reflect all our fans and their lifestyles, and what it takes to make it in New York City.” -Karl-Anthony Towns, New York Knicks “Michelle Obama is a man. Am I right, America?” -Jos Hokit, UFC cagefighter Saturday night Peg and I stayed up very late to watch one of the more dramatic sports moments in my lifetime, as the Knickerbockers claimed their first NBA title in 53 years. We're not basketball people, but it was hard not to catch the bug living in Manhattan those four

"My dream is of a place and a time where America will once again be seen as the last best hope of earth." -Abraham Lincoln This morning's revelation, courtesy of the Atlantic, was that we actually have not one but two organizations curating the events that celebrate the 250th anniversary of our country's mission statement and founding. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/06/trump-250-great-american-state-fair/687456/ Just in case it's firewalled, the gist of the article

"Never give up! Failure and rejection are only the first step to succeeding." -Jim Valvano The talk of the country this morning is the miraculous comeback of the Knicks last night in Game 4 of the NBA Finals. Down by 29, they came roaring back to win with a tip-in with 1.5 seconds remaining in the game. https://x.com/NBA/status/2064914494598381940?s=20 It was the greatest comeback, from the greatest deficit, in the history of the NBA playoffs. Conjecture around the virtual wa

"I have measured out my life with coffee spoons." -T. S. Eliot A better day yesterday. A midday nine-hole jaunt around the Corning Country Club took every bit of one hour and twenty-two minutes--basically a long lunch break. It also broke up the day into two manageable four-hour segments. And a missing piece of certified mail containing a large check showed up, twenty days after it was mailed. I was sweating bullets. It seems like a data point to document a federal government

"The totalitarian, to me, is the enemy - the one that's absolute, the one that wants control over the inside of your head, not just your actions and your taxes." -Christopher Hitchens A beautiful day out there, cloudless and seventy degrees. And yet, what a funk I'm in. And ridiculously enough, it's mostly about politics. Last night we watched Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, one of the funniest and most trenchant shows on television these days. Each week, Oliver unpacks o

"My people, my people, what can I say; say what I can. I saw it but didn't believe it; I didn't believe what I saw. Are we gonna live together? Together are we gonna live?" -Mister Senor Love Daddy, Do the Right Thing A short post again, due to a late start coming down the hill from Canandaigua and a deposition set to begin in a few minutes. A hell of a way to start the week. Last week I read an editorial in the NYT by filmmaker Spike Lee, reflecting on his and the City's lov

"And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." -Exodus 3:5 This morning's headlines called me up short with a story in the UK Guardian about the sudden proliferation of Christian energy drinks. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jun/04/jesus-christian-energy-drink The author took a tongue-in-cheek approach to the topic, and how could one not when trying to review with a straight face product

"You can tell it's good if you light it and a blue flame comes up; that means it's good moonshine and it won't make you go blind." -Johnny Knoxville A few days back, Jim's godfather sent me an article highlighting how much we pay in taxes on distilled spirits, and how it has driven a resurgence in bootlegging. https://reason.com/2026/05/27/high-liquor-taxes-and-a-home-distillation-ban-guarantee-a-thriving-booze-black-market/ I remember this was very much a thing in the north

"It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it." — Seneca When I first came into this profession, I carried a discipline I learned during my summer clerkship at Morris, Manning, & Martin in Atlanta (alas, recently swallowed by a huge regional firm, another point of light gone out in the legal landscape). The firm expected 1920 billable hours a year, pretty typical of Atlanta firms at the time. I figured I needed to work an average of 7.6 billable