Stuff I Liked This Week

I hadn’t give a lot of thought to the politics of animal conservation before I went on safari in Tanzania, though when the news came out about Cecil the lion being shot by Walter James Palmer, a dentist from Minneapolis, I did think about the economics of what seems to me a barbarous solution to a very complicated issue. This latest episode of Radio Lab, The Rhino Hunter, is probably the best reporting I’ve seen (heard?) on the topic.

[dropcap]B[/dropcap]ack in 2014, Corey Knowlton paid $350,000 for a hunting trip to Namibia to shoot and kill an endangered species.  He’s a professional hunter, who guides hunts all around the world, so going to Africa would be nothing new.  The target on the other hand would be. And so too, he quickly found, would be the attention.

This episode, producer Simon Adler follows Corey as he dodges death threats and prepares to pull the trigger.  Along the way we stop to talk with Namibian hunters and government officials, American activists, and someone who’s been here before – Kenya’s former Director of Wildlife, Richard Leakey.   All the while, we try to uncover what conservation really means in the 21st century. — The Rhino Hunter on Radio Lab

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I’m not gonna lie, the reason I went to the Laura Davidson PR dinner is because they hosted it at Sitka & Spruce, one of Seattle’s very best restaurants. It was a lovely meal, but the whole time I was there I felt like someone had kidnapped my city and brainwashed it into being San Francisco. Sitka & Spruce was once in a little strip mall next to a donut joint on Eastlake, now it’s in a lofty wooden food hall that I’m pretty sure used to be an auto shop. I’m revising a story for Ghosts of Seattle Past, maybe that’s why I couldn’t shake the feeling of being, well, haunted by the boarded up place on the corner that used to have crates of vintage sheet music upstairs, or the old Bauhaus Coffee, or … oh well. Never mind.

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I loved Paul Theroux when I was a young lass seeing the world; now that I’m an old lass seeing the world — and a much better read one — he’s lost some of his luster. I think he’s a misogynistic Luddite old crank, crankier even than I am, though I can still appreciate his skill as a writer. I thought this read about how we don’t need any more Paul Therouxs was smart and interesting and dammit, I’m probably going to have to read his new book, Deep South* because I’m making my first trip to the deep south — unless you have better recommendations for me, that is.

* Amazon affiliate link. If you buy, I get something and it doesn’t cost you any more money.

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]lthough Theroux’s opinions are more palatable to our modern liberal tastes, he shares with his Victorian predecessors a disinterest in changing those opinions. Theroux is never softened by his journeys. Visiting may alter his views on a place, but rarely does it change his perception of the world at large. —Travel Writing Doesn’t Need Any More Voices Like Paul Theroux’s

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I’ve been playing with Periscope, the app that allows you to stream live video to your followers. According to this page, I’ve broadcast 21 times and it’s been a very positive experience, allowing me to share the beautiful places around Seattle with people all over the world. Last week, I had my first negative experience during which people told me to “shut up” or “nobody cares.” This was rattling at first and then, kind of confusing. If people weren’t interested in what I was showing them, they had zero obligation to continue watching; why did they feel the need to shut me down?

I’m philosophical about it — if my internet is only 5% jerks, that’s pretty good. Also, I figure you can choose to have your creative experimentation silenced or you can carry on, you decide. It’s good to try new things and there’s something about the raw nature of unedited live video — and the conversation that results — that I find so very appealing. You lose, trolls. I’m going to keep playing with this new toy and see what happens.