And it turns out this poem doesn’t mean what we think it means, either

Well okay, sometimes it DOES make a difference

“The Road Less Travelled” is not about individualism.

The famous RobertFrost poem we’ve read wrong forever

The poem is praised as an ode of individuality, to not follow the pack even though the path may be more difficult.

Except Frost notes early in the poem that the two roads were “worn . . . really about the same.” There is no difference. It’s only later, when the narrator recounts this moment, that he says he took the road less traveled.

“This is the kind of claim we make when we want to comfort or blame ourselves by assuming that our current position is the product of our own choices (as opposed to what was chosen for us, or allotted to us by chance),” Orr writes.

“The poem isn’t a salute to can-do individualism,” he continues. “It’s a commentary on the self-deception we practice when constructing the story of our own lives.”

She should go to prison for her abuse of the English language alone

Georgia lawyer who boasted of  “having had the fortuity of being mentored by some of the finest criminal defense lawyers in Georgia” arrested for selling meth, cocaine to undercover cops.

 

Speaking of starter homes

Dew Drop Inn

24 Neil Lane, asking $579,000. It’s a 1920, 450 sq.ft. cottage in falling-down condition (broker describes it as “needs a little TLC” which is Realtorese for “wear a hard hat and watch for falling timbers”), but its zoning allows for a 4,000 sq.ft. replacement. Dundee and Eastern school districts, convenient to Riverside McDonald’s.

Cos Cob sale

7 Tulip Street

7 Tulip Street, $785,000. Decent house, good condition, good location. Owners paid $769,000 for it (on an original asking price of $958) in 2007, and did some nice renovating. The longer I stay in Portland, the more astonishing Greenwich starter-home prices seem – I’m going tp start sounding like Minnesota Peg if I don’t get back soon.

Land sale in Riverside

60 Lockwood Road, 0.87 acre in R-12 zone, asking $2.825 million. This used to be the Lamb property, on five acres, but a builder developer named Murphy bought it, developed all but this last parcel with the original house and pretty much did nothing with the house for the next fifty years.

Murphy gave his name to the local expression “Murphy houses” – cheap, built-on-a-slab houses crammed not evey square inch of whatever land he could buy. Not much of a legacy, I suppose, but most of those houses are still standing, monuments to 1960’s tract housing.

From the man who brought nukes to Iran, this

Aw, shucks, this means you like me – you really like me!

Administration sides with PLO in law suit brought by terrorism victims

In an unusual legal move, the Obama administration has taken the legal side of the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization in a federal court case that American terrorism victims’ families had already won.

Lawyers for the Justice and State Departments are arguing that the PA and PLO should not have to post a bond showing they can pay the massive damages during their appeal in U.S. federal court.

One of the families’ attorneys argued otherwise. “The State Department should stand on the side of the American terror victims and not on the side of the Palestinian suicide bombers,” said Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of the Israel Law Center.

The jury’s judgment against the Palestinian groups came in a case, Sokolow v. PLO, before Manhattan U.S. District Judge George Daniels in February and could involve penalties of more than $650 million, triple the amount of damages awarded by the jury under U.S. law, plus interest.

 

It’s not a banana and no, I am not glad to see you

To serve and protect
“He had a leg to stand on, but just one – that’s not enough,” says Officer Friendly.

12 San Francisco cops pin one-legged man on sidewalk after mistaking his crutches for weapons.

Abuse of power?

“Let’s see Tesei try to top this!”

ConnecticutLottery Commissioner and current Democrat candidate for Greenwich First Selectman Frank Farricker has announced the creation of a new lottery for student parking spaces at Greenwich High. “There’s no connection between this and my campaign whatsoever,” Farricker told FWIW, “and the supposed requirement that lottery entrants prove registration with the Democratic party is absurd – any proof of political involvement will satisfy the condition. Although,” he conceded, “we wouldn’t look askance at a student who demonstrated a commitment to social justice and economic equality for all people.”

And a price cut

“Not a fly-by”

2 Wyckham Hill, down to $3.195 from last September’s $3.995 million. Nice house, updated over the years, and just a straight shot to town down North Street. The listing insists that the property is “not impacted by Merritt Parkway” and I’m sure it wouldn’t say that if it weren’t true, but one of its supplied pictures provides a rather daunting view of the location of that road (a reader corrects me – that’s North Street on the left, not the Merritt, which is to the right, behind the trees). Still, 6,700 square feet on 4 acres – could be approaching good value.

Pending deal on the Banksville border

1020 North Street

1020 North Street, asking $845,000. It started off a year ago at $1.1 million. Owned by a realtor, who often overprice their own homes. As the Fountain family did, alas, with our other’s property. Sentiment distorts objectivity, is my guess.