While authors of upcoming discussions are on my mind, I should also mention that Zadie Smith has a short story in this week's The New Yorker: "Hanwell Senior."

To be perfectly honest, I don't get it—mostly because the entire piece seems to be summed up in an aside appearing at the end of the second section. So as not to give it all away, the paragraph that threw me begins with:

Note: I have reconstituted Hanwell’s thoughts for you, as seem likely to me, and as sound nicest. In the novel "Middlemarch," we find the old adage of a man’s charity growing in direct proportion to its distance from his own door.

However, rather than myself or Zadie Smith, my lack of clarity may be the fault of Microsoft. After having several technical problems with Internet Explorer 6 this morning, I finally bit the bullet and downloaded version 7. I'm having some trouble with ClearType. Despite trying each setting in the tuner, every web page looks blurry. (Oh, the irony!)

Maybe I'll read "Hanwell Senior" again in a few days when my vision has adjusted.

Update: I spent most of the day yesterday being disappointed with ClearType and making mental notes about uninstalling it. With reluctance, I turned the computer on this morning and was instantly amazed at the readability of everything on the screen. Holy cow! It looks just like type in a book.