David M. Rubenstein

“I analogize [private equity] to sex...You realize there were certain things you shouldn’t do, but the urge is there and you can’t resist.”^[8] 

- David M. Rubenstein speaking at Harvard Business School about the buyout bubble

Haha so this is why I was told I could not take any quotes when I heard David Rubenstein speak last term.

from Wiki:

David Rubenstein is the co-founder of The Carlyle Group, a global private equity firm. In the 2008 Forbes 400 ranking of the wealthiest Americans, Rubenstein was ranked 155th with a net worth of $2.7 billion.^[1]

Intellectual Crush

Last night at Pratt, during a lecture from which many members of the media were banned, Vogue's Anna Wintour discussed fashion bloggers and her "intellectual crush" on photographer Irving Penn:

"Irving Penn and I developed our own ritual that involved meeting every so often for lunch, either at Il Cantinori or the Union Square Café. Over lunch, he would talk about how Vogue had become so commercial, how everything had titles over it ... 'Anna, I don't understand how you can do this,' and that was just the first course … I would throw out an idea and he would turn me down. It took me a long time to realize that with Irving, no meant no. Now, I don't take no very easily, but I learned that with Irving, there was no revisiting. But then,
miraculously, we would hit a home run."

 From The Cut via Jezebel

Who do you have an intellectual crush on? ...I'll need to think about this one. 

Noblesse Oblige

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus endorses the concept, saying, "From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded." (Luke 12:48)

Sigourney Weaver...whaaaat?

Ummm....

"Jim didn't have breasts, and I think that was the reason. He should have taken home that Oscar. ... In the past, Avatar would have won because they [Oscar voters] loved to hand out awards to big productions, like Ben-Hur. Today it's fashionable to give the Oscar to a small movie that nobody saw." —Sigourney Weaver

Read more: Vulture - Entertainment News - Movies, TV, Music, Art, Books http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/#ixzz0l4qGZXZt

Action

"Action is the antidote to despair."

- Joan Baez, folk singer and activist

The Fun of Fund of Funds

Reading about Fund-of-Hedge-Funds and there's some good stuff here that can apply to more in life than just selecting managers.

In choosing Hedge Funds for their Fund-of-Hedge-Funds: "Thomas DeLitto, Permal's chief operation officer, says Permal operates on the premise that past is prologue."

About their investment in a specific manager: "He kept up this performance even as the market changed, Souede says. "That is the ultimate test -- to be good in all markets."

From Institutional Investor's Alpha Magazine.

Gagaloo

Lady Gaga says she's decided "to be single at this point in my life because I don't have the time to get to know anybody. And you know what? It's OK. Even Lady Gaga can be celibate."

Botchan by Natsume Soseki

Writing a response paper on "Botchan" by Soseki. The story is about a young man who moves from Tokyo to teach at a middle school in the country. Botchan was a reckless, bad kid so it's ironic that he's become a school teacher himself. The whole novel is rather blunt with hyperbolized text, but it has some interesting points about morality. Botchan is pretty bitter in general because his family didn't love him and now has no faith in the human race, really.

"Now that I thought about it, though, I realized that most people actually encourage you to turn bad. They seem to think that if you don't, you'll never get anywhere in the world. And then on those rare occasions when they encounter somebody who's honest and pure-hearted, they look down on him and say he's nothing but a kid, a Botchan. If that's the way it is, it would be better if they didn't have those ethics classes in elementary school and middle school where the teacher is always telling you to be honest and not to lie. The schools might as well just go ahead and teach you how to tell lies, how to mistrust everybody, and how to take advantage of people. Wouldn't their students, and the world at large, be better off that way?..."

Dissipating Confidence in the Runway

“Fashion today is an unstructured landscape in which ideas and trends exist concurrently,” said Simon Doonan, the creative director for Barneys New York. The notion, he added, of deconstructing and interpreting the runways for directions is stale, if not archaic. “It just doesn’t work anymore.”

- From a NYTimes article

This is exactly what I've been thinking recently -- re the majority of what I'm seeing on the runway in the past seasons (much less magazine editorials), I've had the feeling of "oh, that's pretty... but nothing I've never seen before."* Granted there must be plenty of designers doing new things, but they're not showing in the fashion tents to Hamish, Anna, Carine etc. I know I've logged quite a few posts on NY fashion week recently, but I don't feel like NY Fashion Week runways have conveyed anything new yet. I'm still waiting for something this season - something amazing, something fantasmical. Maybe next season...

*Exception: McQueen's amazing alien dresses last season. RIP.

DVF

“I always wanted to live a man’s life in a woman’s body,” Ms. von Furstenberg said in her show notes.

Verdict: Liked DVF show overall. Disliked most of the prints. 

Good:

 Every detail excellent except maybe the shoelaces and shoes.

 Beautiful. But a little Dries Van Noten circa 2 years ago, no?

 The shoes are perfection. The outfit, slouchy casual luxe.

Suit/Skirt look is a strong contender.

Almost:

Very, very, very slightly problematic -- is it the rosettes? The hemline height? The cut? So close.

Bad:

Please don't tell me ugly bubble prints are going to be in next year...

Andre Bazin

"...photography does not create eternity, as art does, it embalms time, rescuing it simply from its proper corruption."

-Bazin, 1945

Atlas Shrugged [E-mailed]

Here's an e-mail I received from a friend that I thought was interesting enough to post verbatim. I've never read Atlas Shrugged (I know, so sue me) but now my interest is piqued -- is the entire book very good?

___________________________________

From: [Dartmouth '10 retracted]

Date: 28 Dec 2009 19:23:31 -0500

Subject: interesting little tidbit
To: [Group of sender's friends including Georgina]
Reply-To: [Nickname retracted]

sooooo this break i've been reading ayn rand's atlas shrugged - really really interesting. buuut here's a passage i just HAD to share

about sex. you can interchange the him and her as you wish

"He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience - or to fake - a sense of self-esteem. The man who is proudly certain of his own value, will want the highest type of woman he can find, the woman he admires, the strongest, the hardest to conquer - because only the possession of a heroine will give him the sense of an achievement, not the possession of a brainless slut."

a little harsh on the "brainless slut" part - but sort of interesting when we think about people we're attracted to

sorry if this bores you, i just had to share, and am sitting at home reading alone, so obvi blitz [e-mail] comes to the rescue.

anywaysssssss happppy new years!

___________________________________

But since I've never read Atlas Shrugged, I'm left wondering: who is "he" in this quote?

Grey's Quote

"What separates us from animals is that we can think, feel, dream, and love. We evolve."

Some actual words of wisdom

"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not... genius will not... education alone will not. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."

- Ray Kroc, Founder of McDonalds

Higher Education

"I feel older, but not wiser."

-- The protagonist in An Education

JBKO

"To transcend the ordinariness that Jackie so feared in youth meant feasting on a diet of discipline and restraint."

- excerpt from my friend Christine J's book What Would Jackie Do?

I've always thought that being condemned to - or worse, resigning to - ordinariness would be a horrible fate.

"Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels."

- Kate Moss

It's a bit out of context, but noteworthy nonetheless.

It's fun to do bad things

... how have I never seen this before??

Anna in the Tropics

"I have another answer to your question. Alcohol is prohibited in this country because alcohol is like literature. Literature brings out the best and worst part of ourselves. If you're angry it brings out your anger. If you are sad, it brings out your sadness. And some of us are... Let's just say, not very happy."

"Yes, we deserve a little drink. We work hard enough. We deserve all that life offers us, and life is made of little moments. Little moments as small as violet petals. Little moments I could save in a jar and keep forever, like now talking to you."

"In his letter he was going to write everything he'd been meaning to tell her."

- Anna in the Tropics

Fences

a play by August Wilson
Winner of the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Drama

some excerpts that resonated with me:

_______

Lyons, Troy's 34-year old musician son, asks to borrow $10 (again). Troy works as a garbage collector and chastises Lyons for not having a real job.

TROY: I told you I know some people down there. I can get you on the rubbish if you want to work. I told you that the last time you came by here asking me for something.
LYONS: Naw, Pop... thanks. That ain't for me. I don't wanna be carrying nobody's rubbish. I don't wanna be punching nobody's time clock.
TROY: What's the matter, you too good to carry people's rubbish? Where you think that ten dollars you talking about come from? I'm just supposed to haul people's rubbish and give my money to you cause you too lazy to work. You too lazy to work and wanna know why you ain't got what I got.
...
LYONS: You and me is two different people, Pop.

_____

Cory, Troy's second seventeen-year-old son, struggles against Troy to continue to play football and potentially get recruited for college while Troy, who loves baseball but was never able to play professionally before the Jackie Robinson era, insists that Cory quit football to continue working at the A&P.

CORY: How come you ain't never liked me?
...
TROY: Like you? I go out of here every morning... bust my butt... putting up with them crackers every day... cause I like you? You about the biggest fool I ever saw.
(Pause.)
It's my job. It's my responsibility! You understand that? A man got to take care of his family. You live in my house... sleep you behind on my bedclothes... fill you belly up with my food... cause you my son. You my flesh and blood. Not 'cause I like you! Cause it's my duty to take care of you. I owe a responsibility to you! Let's get this straight right here... before it go along any further... I ain't got to like you. Mr. Rand don't give me my money come payday cause he likes me. He give me cause he owe me. I done give you everything I had to give you. I gave you your life! Me and your mama worked that out between us. And liking your black ass wasn't part of the bargain. Don't you try and go through life worrying about if somebody like you or not. You best be making sure they doing right by you. You understand what I'm saying, boy?
CORY: Yessir.
TROY: Then get the hell out of my face, and get on down to that A&P.

____

Rose, Troy's second wife and mother of Cory, after overhearing the previous conversation:

ROSE: Times have changed from when you was young, Troy. People change. The world's changing around you and you can't even see it.
TROY: (Slow, methodical.) Woman... I do the best I can do. I come in here every Friday. I carry a sack of potatoes and a bucket of lard. You all line up at the door with your hands out. I give you the lint from my pockets. I give you my sweat and my blood. I ain't got no tears. I done spent them. We go upstairs in that room at night... and I fall down on you and try to blast a hole into forever. I get up Monday morning... find my lunch on the table. I go out. I make my way. Find my strength to carry me through to the next Friday.
(Pause.)
That's all I got, Rose. That's all I got to give. I can't give nothing else.

____

Troy drunkenly confronts Cory for trying to walk around him on the steps of the porch without saying "Excuse me."

TROY: You just gonna walk over top of me?
CORY: I live here too!
TROY: (Advancing toward him.) You just gonna walk over top of me in my own house?
CORY: I ain't scared of you.
...
CORY: I ain't got to say excuse me to you. You don't count around here no more.
TROY: Oh, I see... I don't count around here no more. You ain't got to say excuse me to your daddy. All of a sudden you done got so grown that your daddy don't count around here no more... Around here in his own house and yard that he done paid for with the sweat of his brow. You done got so grown to where you gonna take over. You gonna take over my house. Is that right? ...

____

Seven years later, Cory returns on the date of Troy's funeral. He is a Corporal in the Marines.

ROSE: You just like him. You got him in you good.
CORY: Don't tell me that, Mama.
ROSE: You Troy Maxson all over again.
CORY: I don't want to be Troy Maxson. I want to be me.

___

Did Cory ever go to College?