I’m sorry I’ve been so grudging in dumping stuff here. Partly, it’s mental constipation. I have four interlinked essays that I’ve been mulling over for an eternity, and they’ve become so intertwined with everything that I am considering right now that I’ve been apprehensive about pre-empting any of them by blogging a single smaller thought.
Which isn’t the way to do things on blogs, of course. I should just dump material here willy-nilly, and tidy it up later. Tidy it up, and sell it, too.
I say all this, because I’ve just made a set of resolutions to myself for the next three months. One of them involves blogging daily, which I felt I should warn you about. But to understand them all, I’d have to explain that I’ve just gorged myself with a great deal of Ben Franklinabilia, and it has, as ever, made me very excited and determined. And I’ve never adequately explained to anyone why reading about Franklin would make me behave in such a way, except in a very long essay. Which you haven’t read because I haven’t written it. Yet.
Perhaps blogging daily will help. But I suspect Paul Ford’s extract from Franklin’s autobiography and this anecdote might help more. If all else fails, lean hard on your links.