Today I played Ohio by Over the Rhine and Love and Theft by Bob Dylan.

The first list is Tuesday last’s playlist. The second is for today.

• The Afghan Whigs, Gentlemen, “If I Were Going”, “Gentleman”, “Debonair”
• The Ellen James Society, reluctantly we, “god in heaven”
• The Mysteries of Life, Keep a Secret, “Alibi”
• Johhny Cash, American Recordings, “Oh Bury me Not”
• The Velvet Underground, White Light/ White Heat, “Guess I’m Falling In Love”
• Sonic Youth, experimental jet set, trash and no star, “Tokyo Eye”
• Tori Amos, Under the Pink, “Cornflake Girl”
• Toad the Wet Sprocket, Fear, “Before You Were Born”
• Morrissey, Your Arsenal, “We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful”
• Lightning Hopkins, Cadillac Man, “Stool Pigeon Blues”
• Tom Petty, Wildflowers, “Don’t Fade On Me”
• The Sugarcubes, Life’s Too Good, “Cowboy”
• Radiohead, Pablo Honey, “Thinking About You”
• Smashing Pumpkins, Adore, “Tear”
• Moby, Play: The B-Sides, “Memory Gospel”
• Sade, Lovers Rock, “Immigrant”
• The Cure, Disintegration, “Love Song”
• Bjork, Debut, “The Anchor Song”
• Pavement, Twerror Twilight, “Major Leagues”
• The Pixies, Doolittle, “There Goes My Gun”
• Joy Division, Substance, “From Safety to Where”, “Novelty”
• Propellerhead, Decksanddrumsandrockandroll, “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”
• Revolvers, Locket Love, “Devotional”
• Liars, they threw us all in a trench and stuck a monument on top, “Grown men don’t fall in the river just like that”
• Opeth, Blackwater Park, “Dirge For November”

• The Nina Hagen Band, P.S. C.H.
• Tom Waits, Swordfishtrombone

Twenty-six hours, twenty-two minutes until H-hour. Tomorrow is the day of days.

I finished Jack Beatty’s biography of Peter Drucker and moved on into The End of Economic Man. When I write something comprehensive of my thoughts on Drucker, remind me to include a paragraph touching on a point in the chapter “God Does Not Need a Managerial Consultant.” In the latter half of that chapter, Drucker is said to be key in the foundation of the “megachurch,” which he advocates as the only route for the church to fulfill its social obligations. I contest that, but there was an interesting, though possibly irrelevant, point in an earlier chapter, which stated that in order to relieve the government of its $77 billion welfare/social aid programs “every one of the 250,000 religious congregations (Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, or otherwise) that exist in this country would have to raise an additional $300,000 per year in all future years…” This is not a quote from Drucker, but from Rebecca Blank - Beatty uses it as a response to Drucker’s view on the reprivatization of government functions in light of our new “knowledge society.” Anyway, I am really just writing that now so that I don’t forget it when I want to write a larger review. It’s a teaser, folks.

Also, I began The City of God. I’m through Book One, which is excellent in its rebuttal of suicide and sinning to prevent sin. It also provides some Roman history, of which I have had too little since my high school Latin classes. In my first Latin class, we translated many chapters of Confessions. I did not learn much grammar that way, but it was far more intellectually stimulating than writing “tu es un magnus bovus” or “semper ubi tonitrus ubi” (I was in the NRA and very much enamored with the prospect of being a concealed carrier when I ‘got legal.’). The Latin teacher for my second year did a fine job, but who can compare a grammar book to Confessions. I suppose if I had stuck with Latin for all four years, rather than running off to shop class, yearbook, or newspaper, then I could have translated the Gaullic Wars, like my friend Stephen did for Latin 3, but it’s good to have options.

Peter Leithart now has a blog. As does Alastair Roberts.

And if anyone lynches Nathanael, I shall never write again. Ever.