To Manuela up in Montreal on Mittens

Good to hear that there is such a thing as heat up there! They do say that mittens can slow down reading---especially studied has been the mittens' effect on one's reading of Latin. It was even further determined in the more advanced study that one's reading of Catullus is nearly stalled with the use of mittens. "Mittens are worse than manacles" was the slogan in the pioneer studies done by one of the leading institutes on research of the effect of mittens on everything from arithmetical counting on the fingers to speed reading of the ancient languages. While the mitten was unanimously regarded as the principle protagonist in delaying one's ability to finish a pamphlet let alone a textbook, the scarf and down parkas were also implicated in the decrease in the grasp of grammar in general and Latin grammar in particular. However, I confess to having difficulty (and I'm not even wearing mittens) in understanding such a correlation between clothing and conjugations; but then again how can one argue with a study funded by the leading centers of learning and research? 

All this to say that I am quite glad on hearing that you will not be one of the statistics in these findings on mittens and other winter appendages! 

And since contemplating the latest study on mittens has enlightened me as to the possibility of mittens themselves being the culprit in the oversight in the uncut pages in Pickwick going unnoticed. I may contact the Institute in the Management of Mittens and perhaps they can lend more insight into this mystery. 

So Manuela, keep reading well, and of course I trust that you will continue to turn the pages of Catullus without the use of mittens.

Radical?

While I agree with Cardinal Burke's recent comments about the influence of 'radical' feminism in the Church I must ask: Why must we continually use the adjective 'radical' as if the ordinary variety were A- okay? Do we characterize its fruit as: radical abortion, radical contraception, radical homogenization of gender, radical homosexuality, the radical empty home? May we let our yea be yea, and our nay be nay as the good book says. Or perhaps we need radical yeas and radical nays?

"What a Show!"

On passing through the art gallery at the library a shrouded woman with sunglasses announces to me: "What a show! The imagination here is just exquisite!" One of the pieces of this show was a framed orange plastic comb. The shrouded woman departed and as I fixed my gaze upon the comb I tried, really I did, to see the genius in it. But all I came away with was the conviction that the real creativity was not the framing of the plastic comb itself but the original invention of an array of teeth that would when moved over the scalp make one a bit more presentable. Was not this really the thing that should impress?