Day 3 Year 2
Take a stroll down easy street, U.S.A.
The deluge of words and pictures about Ukraine poured out over the internet to commemorate the one-year anniversary sucked out a lot of energy, so I went back to alright. for a head check1.
Sheer bad luck led me this docudrama. I could not bring myself to watch it to the end (which might explain my memory lapses from 1988 and 1989).
I hadn’t realized at the time that I was part of a diabolical conspiracy.
To a country where the abacus is still a standard calculating tool, where photocopying machines are registered with the state, where the label on the soft drink bottle is almost always cockeyed, the omnipresence and precision of technology in American life is a matter of wonder.
From Bill Keller’s reportage2.
Spring is next week, so I will get the bicycle in shape over the weekend. Walking is fun, but it’s much more fun to cruise around Kyiv and environs in a Fat Boy Baddy. It’s the ultimate urban ride.
Elegantly aggressive style.
Forward-thinking features.
Traffic-slaying performance.
Magnitogorsk Journal; Russians Take a Stroll Down Easy Street, U.S.A. (The New York Times, August 12, 1988)