Frank, the great haircutter who's the only person I entrust with the job of making my daffy hair look presentable, soon got into the spirit of the adventure despite his good taste and common sense, amusing himself along the way by giving me a lopsided Mohawk.

The job was soon done and it was on to the superfun stage of surprising Polly. No photographic record of her reaction, sadly. I really need to become a more resourceful snapshooter.

Once we'd left the accusations of craziness and threats of divorce stage behind, off we went for a walk through the Village. Whoa: the sun was pounding on my scalp. Talk about an unfamiliar sensation.

Yet the chilly day was also taking its toll. I now had first-person insight into why so many bald guys favor the ski-caps-and-hoodies look.

So I'm now enjoying presenting a whole new Ray to the world.

I like to think of my new image as "a heterosexual version of Michel Foucault." Polly tells me I remind her more of "a graphic designer employed by Apple." I like the way that both of them imply "visionary, and unquestionably kinky."

The biggest surprise about doing a baldy? The fact that strangers don't find it bizarre. As far as they're concerned, you're just being normal. Weird.

As our Book Club selection for November 2009, Polly and I read Charles Willeford's Miami-set crime novel about four not-very-admirable swinger/bachelor buddies. Yes yes yes, we've fallen a little behind schedule. Wanna make something of it? Willeford wrote the book sometime in the 1970s; editors at the time found it "too depressing." It was finally published, five years after Willeford's death, in 1993.

Polly: "Wicked-smart and cynical -- I loved it!"

Ray: "A willful, oddball, sleazy joy."

Bonus Links

• Wikipedia's very informative entry on Willeford
• Dennis McMillan has created an excellent Charles Willeford website
• I haven't yet caught up with Monte Hellman's "Cockfighter," which is based on a Willeford script, but I did enjoy George Armitage's "Miami Blues," an adaptation of one of Willeford's Hoke Mosley novels.

Polly and I read Leonardo Sciascia's 1961 Sicilian crime novel as our Book Club selection for October 2009. OK, so I'm a little late getting around to putting up this posting. In the 1950s and early '60s, the Mafia's existence in Sicily was firmly denied. Sciascia's novel is famous not just for affirming the Mafia's existence, but for demonstrating how Sicilian culture generally was entwined with the organization.

Polly: "Important, I guess, but I didn't find it very involving."

Ray: "Impressive as a New York Review-style act of moral writerly courage, but not very involving as fiction."

Bonus Links

• Wikipedia's entry on Leonardo Sciascia
• Wikipedia's entry on the novel
• The New York Review publishes a number of Sciascia titles
• Vincenzo Salerno makes the case for Sciascia's importance
• For those who can manage Italian: The Leonardo Sciascia website

Bonus Links

• I interviewed Roger Scruton
• Roger Scruton's website
• Roger Scruton's book about beauty

Why? Because, although the envelope's pitch was talking to me as though I needed to renew, I'd never in fact never been a subscriber. So on what basis was it screaming at me that my last issue had arrived? And what was it hoping to accomplish?

The answer was revealed in the packet's contents:

In other words, if I've got this right, what the Kiplinger Letter's packet was saying to me was: Subscribe now, or we'll stop sending you free issues.

Conditions in the media business must be even more awful than I thought they were.

Because I’ve become fascinated by the Paleo/Primal/Evolutionary eating and fitness worlds, a few months ago I started doing some weightlifting.

Don’t be impressed, I’m talking baby stuff: beginning exercises with very modest weights. I’m very careful and cautious in my approach, because the few times in the past that I’ve tried pushing weights around I always managed to hurt myself well before I developed any kind of strength. And what’s the point of pain?

This time, though, I’m semi-enjoying weightlifting. In one sense I find it what I always found it to be: dumb, literal, and a little depressing. As an activity that’s immediately fun and rewarding, weightlifting (for me, of course) can’t compare to yoga or Gyrotonic, both of which have poetic and philosophical components and both of which leave me feeling tingly and cheerful.

Pushing weights around, by comparison, tiring one muscle group out and then the next ... It’s so damn methodical and unimaginative. After I’m done with my weights routine I feel plodding and a little stupid, and my spirit feels a little crushed.

All that said ... Now that I’ve persisted for a few months I’m starting to enjoy some payoffs too. Although I’m a long way from developing any real strength -- I suspect that I’m biochemically unable to achieve much of anything beyond modest toning -- let alone making any visible improvements in my looks, I notice that I’m standing a little straighter and taller, and that I occupy space a little more confidently and assertively than I’m usually prone to. Though my spirit isn’t soaring the way it does when I do yoga regularly, I’m nonetheless taking my time and finding myself able to drop into the moment semi at will.

And how lovely it is to manage a few everyday strength challenges more capably than I have in years. F’rinstance: I lug groceries around a little more easily. And I’ve experienced a huge improvement in my ability to get up and down -- onto and off of stairs, beds, and floors.

Kids: You have no idea what a challenge getting up and down starts to become in middle age.

Benefits -- I like ‘em. Maybe there’s something to be said for dumb, methodical and literal after all.

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Edward Fischer's Teaching Company lecture series is more of an introduction to the academic field of anthropology than it is to the facts of different cultures. Plus it zooms off into naive politics. Listening to it reminded me of taking anthro classes back in the '70s, and I don't mean that as a compliment. One of my least-happy Teaching Company experiences.

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A Brief History Of The World by Peter N. Stearns

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Another of my least favorite Teaching Company courses: dry, academic, and about as un-vivid as a lecture series can be. I love overviews and introductions, and have always wanted to go through a good intro to world history. But this one bored me to distraction. Biggest of many failings: Prof. Stearns is far more interested in justifying the academic discipline of "World History" than he is in telling us about world history.

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Another entry in my record of dud spaces.

Here's an open area with grass and trees around the base of a high-rise apartment building. Despite the appeal of the greenery, the reality is that the space isn't used, or even much enjoyed by passersby.

That's probably because the space hasn't been created as a something -- as a small park, or as a playground, for instance. Instead, it's just what has been left behind as the building has been pulled back from the sidewalk. We're left not with airy life, but with stray, random emptiness.

Which, as dead space often does, attracts throwaways. Do you suppose the development's designers included the green garbage bins in their original drawings?