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Father’s Day 2021: A few good things
By
Published: Jun 13, 2021
Category:
Holiday
Last year I said I didn’t want a single thing. Not in a country that has one child in six going hungry and has one in four kids inadequately fed. In honor of my brother, a remarkable father who lives near San Diego, I donated to the San Diego Food Bank. In New York, I gave to Food Bank for New York.
This year, I continue to favor giving in Dad’s honor before you give to Dad.
I know what I want for Father’s Day, and I know I’m getting it, because I bought it for myself. For a decade, I’ve worked on an Apple iMac with a 24” screen. Because I hate writing on a laptop, I treat my desktop like a laptop and, if possible, I take it with me when I go away. It’s a great machine. Reliable. Solid, like 20 pounds solid.
The just-released 2021 iMac is the Tesla of home/office computers. It’s thin as a laptop. It weighs 9 pounds. It is powered by something called M1, which integrates the processor, graphics, memory, and more onto a single chip. It is blazing fast. The camera and the sound are top flight. You have a choice of colors. It costs $1,250, plus the trimmings, which is slightly less than I paid for my old one. Watch the promo, you’ll see why I’m as excited as a kid at Christmas. Because of the choice of colors, this isn’t a good “surprise” gift. But if you show the promo to him and you can afford it… it’s spectacular. [To buy the iMac with a 24″ screen from the Apple store on Amazon, click here.]
This year’s theme is One Good Thing. It’s the French way. You buy one good blazer, and you wear it every day. It may cost more, but the cost becomes insignificant when stretched over years. Then again, it may not cost more. It may just be a Good Thing and a Great Value. Like….
Timex Easy Reader Watch
I had dinner with a major Hollywood personage the other week. He’s had giant hits, he has major money. In mid-conversation, he grabbed my arm, held it next to his. The same watch. Classic styling, functionally beautiful. It’s $10,000 cheaper than a watch that looks and works no better. $30.
Lypo-Spheric Vitamin C
Most of the Vitamin C in pills or capsules never reaches the bloodstream. Estimates of its absorption rate are less than 50%. Lypo-Spheric Vitamin C has a 90% absorption rate. This matters.
The Tender Bar
A boy needs a father. If he doesn’t have one, he needs some kind of man in his life. Or men, because it can indeed take a village…
Epictetus
Marcus Aurelius (121-180 AD) studied at the feet of Epictetus (55-135 AD). One man was an emperor, the other a former slave who lived simply and wrote not a word.
Levels of the Game
This account of a single match between Arthur Ashe and Clark Graebner in the semifinals at the U.S. Open in Forest Hills is the best book ever written about tennis.
Robert Caro: Working
Early on, a newspaper editor assigned Caro to investigative work. “But I don’t know anything about investigative reporting,” Caro said. The editor looked at Caro for a very long time. “Just remember,” he said. “Turn every page. Never assume anything. Turn every goddamned page.” He did. He still does. “Working” tells you how and why.
Poker as Life: 101 Lessons from the World’s Greatest Game
Poker is “brutal and primal.” You must play “with rapacity and toughness.” You may play with friends, but “you have no allies.” You must ask yourself: “Can I gut an opponent without flinching?”
Churchill
This short book is not about not Churchill the God, but Churchill the extremely interesting man. Johnson piles on the detail. Yes, Churchill drank whiskey or brandy all day — “heavily diluted with water or soda.” Yes, he stayed in bed as much as possible, for as he told Paul Johnson (who interviewed him at the tender age of 17), the secret of life is “conservation of energy. Never stand up when you can sit down, and never sit down when you can lie down.”
Viva la Repartee: Clever Comebacks and Witty Retorts
It sharpens the mind to read several hundred pages of great repartee —– which Mark Twain defined as “something we think of twenty four hours too late.”
A Sport and a Pastime
For me, James Salter was the most elegant writer in America. Surgical and swift, he could do more in a sentence than most of us can in a paragraph. In 1967, he wrote an erotic 192-page novel set in France. It’s about a rich young American and a French shop girl, and you can smell the wood smoke and see the expensive sports car as it turns off the leaf-strewn road into the small French town….
The Foreign Correspondent
The year is 1939. The head of the Resistance newspaper is assassinated. And then…
Married Sex: A Love Story
A husband and wife, married for 20 years, have devised a novel way to protect their marriage — if you’re tempted to cheat, bring that person home. Or as the line on the movie poster might say: “It’s not cheating if your wife’s there.” A dirty book? Only on one level.
John Prine
This was the best CD I heard two years ago. And last year. And now. This is the master’s voice.
A final song, just released.
Mulatu Astatke
Mulatu Astatke writes music, arranges it, and plays piano, organ, vibes and percussion. He’s from Ethiopia. Think: exotic, space-changing, hypnotic.
