A 9/11 story I didn’t recall seeing before: Fighter pilot, a Purdue alumna, was prepared to sacrifice her life on 9/11. They took off unarmed. If they intercepted the third airliner, she would crash her F-16 into the cockpit, her fellow into the tail.

7 hours on the road today. I’ve never been into Audible or other spoken books, but the Audible version of C.S. Lewis That Hideous Strength is giving me fresh appreciation for this favorite.

Damon Linker’s reflections on this anniversary are worth your time, especially the second one:

1. September 11 After a Quarter Century—1
2. September 11 After a Quarter Century—2

Which 21st-century experience lingers more, and why, and how - and, I guess, where (to avoid American provincialism)?

1. 9/11
2. Covid

Just something to ponder. 300 characters can only pose the question.

I don’t think my jaw can withstand dropping to the floor any more.

TIL the term “ferial cooking” because I’m reading Robert Farrar Capon, The Supper of the Lamb: A Culinary Reflection. 📚Don’t ask me yet what I think of it; I’ll have no helpful answer. (I barely started it a few years back, quitting, baffled. Took it up again lately.)

A periodic reminder to myself (from Fr. Stephen Freeman):

1. First, live as though in the coming of Jesus Christ, the Kingdom of God has been inaugurated into the world and the outcome of history has already been determined. (Quit worrying)
2. Second, love people as the very image of God and resist the temptation to improve them.
3. Third, refuse to make economics the basis of your life. Your job is not even of secondary importance.
4. Fourth, quit arguing about politics as though the political realm were the answer to the world’s problems. It gives it power that is not legitimate and enables a project that is anti-God.
5. Fifth, learn to love your enemies. God did not place them in the world for us to fix or eliminate. If possible, refrain from violence.
6. Sixth, raise the taking of human life to a matter of prime importance and refuse to accept violence as a means to peace. Every single life is a vast and irreplaceable treasure.
7. Seventh, cultivate contentment rather than pleasure. It will help you consume less and free you from slavery to your economic masters.
8. Eighth, as much as possible, think small. You are not in charge of the world. Love what is local, at hand, personal, intimate, unique, and natural. It’s a preference that matters.
9. Ninth, learn another language. Very few things are better at teaching you about who you are not.
10. Tenth, be thankful for everything, remembering that the world we live in and everything in it belongs to God.

From the score (17-8, USA over Italy late in the first quarter) you’d think this was a rout. But Italy is ferocious, and really skilled, on defense. (TNT, live as a write).

I have missed David Brooks on the NYT Opinion pages, and I’m at least mildly excited about his new Atlantic podcast, The Permanent Questions

I have a very bright, very well-travelled Orthodox Texan cyberfriend who has taken to illustrating his contrarian opinion pieces with custom artwork. No idea if he finds them or generates them.

Today’s illustration and the contrariness it accompanies.

TIL: I have over 50,000 documents in Readwise.

I should pay more attention when Readwise announces a major upgrade. Its Ghostreader appears to centralize functionality I’ve been cobbling together from hither and yon. I don’t know when it was introduced, but today was my discovery day.

The End Is Near for the American Bar Association | Josh Blackman.

I cannot vouch that Team Trump’s law school accreditation plan will be the death of the ABA, but I can vouch for Josh Blackman’s claim that it became a left-wing advocacy group. I wasn’t a member and participated in few programs.

I haven’t professed the Republican Party’s ever-devolving versions of America since 2005, yet I remain on a jillion shrill Republican email lists.

The question du jour is how many of them must I unsubscribe from before they all get the picture: not one of them is getting one dime from me?

Uh-oh! Dyson is gonna disrupt the electric toothbrush market now.

I saved to Instapaper Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Whimsy and Kitsch Built This Powerful Women’s Voting Bloc for later detailed reading, but right out of the gate, it irritated me by categorically claiming that “Christian women” gobble this stuff up. Not all flavors of Christian women did or do, m’am.

Freddie deBoer took my breath away today. Sorry to Bother You.

The coincidence of the deaths of Dolly Parton and Wendell Berry presents a fine opportunity to reflect on virtue, so different were they in how they presented to the world.

Fall’s Eve – Tipsy Teetotaler ن

Ouch! I can imagine this nightmare: An Actual SCOTUS Nightmare

Socrates Meets a Street Preacher

Michigan statute (MCL §168.931(1)(e)) is an extraordinary criminal law:

A priest, pastor, curate, or other officer of a religious society shall not for the purpose of influencing a voter at an election, impose or threaten to impose upon the voter a penalty of excommunication, dismissal, or expulsion, or command or advise the voter, under pain of religious disapproval.

Violation is a misdemeanor. Really. This is not the Onion.

With David Brooks and Ross Douthat gone, I’ve lost a lot of enthusiasm for the New York Times Opinion page.

Shedding my inner Eeyore for a moment, I, not a gee-whiz space exploration fan, am kinda excited by this: The Roman telescope is about to take planet-hunting to the next level | Nature

Why was I not told?

I didn’t really expect to get Social Security Retirement benefits. Reality has exceeded expectation.

But I don’t know how the nation is going to deal with this: The Social Security benefit cliff is here. Washington is struggling to wake up. - POLITICO

Washington giveth, Washington taketh away.

One of my wife’s besties, an 80-year-old Evangelical retired English teacher, has never read C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce. Tomorrow, when they meet for their weekly coffee, we lend her our only paper copy (though I read it often enough to have added a Kindle version).