Journal
The field journal
Deep subjects, plain language. And somewhere in every piece, a cartoon that lets the topic breathe. Feel free to look only at those.
The Place I Haven’t Been in Forty Years
I haven’t set foot in a McDonald’s in forty years, and I always gave that a big reason. Ritzer’s McDonaldization, two brothers whose name was bought, an overpriced hamburger in 1980s Ankara — and a boycott put on trial. What came out was not what I expected.
Read → Fourth pieceThe Man Whose Name Was Stolen
Epicurus’s name is a restaurant sign today; the man himself lived on barley bread. How did the word “pleasure” change hands over two thousand years, what was his quarrel with the Stoics — and how did a friend with a single set of clothes explain all of it to me in one sentence?
Read → Third pieceIt All Started with a Plate of Pasta
Where did slow living actually come from? Not a philosophy, but Carlo Petrini's plate of pasta as he raged at a 1986 Rome McDonald's. The birth of Slow Food, Cittaslow and that famous snail — all born out of a conversation.
Read → Second pieceFirst Stop: The Stoics
The first group I ran into while researching slow living was the Stoics. Who were they, what did they hold, with which concrete examples — what do critics say, and where do I land?
Read → First pieceRemembering How to Breathe in a World Doing a Billion Operations a Second
What happens when someone who makes a living from technology realises he can't keep up with the pace of AI? Confessions of a dinosaur in a footrace against fibre-optic cables — and the art of pulling the machine's plug.
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The journal is filling up, slowly. No hurry, you know.