Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

His Majesty’s Presence

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I love America. The first words of The Godfather, and three words also deep within my heart. In spite of my distaste for many of its inhabitants (present company excluded), the ideals of this nation are dear to me, and, as on every 4th of July, I read the entire Declaration of Independence with a lump in my throat.

I, too, would like to share with you this magnificent clip from John Adams, in which Paul Giamatti’s character meets King George to try to mend the obvious rift between the newborn U.S. and Britain. It is an extraordinary scene, and I’ve read that this is one of the very few instances where every single word was written down, and those words are precisely presented here:

Devil in the Details

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My family collectively watches about zero hours of television every year, with one notable exception: the show Silicon Valley. I’ve only seen bits and pieces of it, but my son watches it obsessively, which I frankly consider a great education in the culture of this lunatic asylum. Someone put together an incredibly detailed analysis of its opening titles, and it’s fascinating just how much trouble the creative team went into making references that 95% of folks would miss. Check it out: