Body-text fonts, pt. 46: Albertina

This’ll rankle people: “2026 World Cup ‘Pride Match’ to Feature Egypt and Iran” (BBC).

A 2026 World Cup fixture designated by organisers as an LGBTQ+ “Pride Match” will feature two countries where homosexuality is illegal. …

The plans were put in place before the teams involved in the fixture were selected or the draw for the 2026 World Cup was made.

The moral of this story is … [I leave it as an exercise for the reader].

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Re: the font.

In a not-too-wild alternate reality, universities decline less severely, and I obtain gainful employment. I teach classes and publish ten-page articles: some, in top journals; others, in Curaçaoan semi-annuals. Each article is repeatedly anthologized.

In time, I issue a pithy book. Then another. Then a third and a fourth. (I write bestselling mysteries on the side.)

I’m respected enough that it doesn’t matter with whom I publish the fourth academic book. Perhaps I choose Indiana, out of loyalty to the state; perhaps, a trade press (Norton? Penguin?). Perhaps I self-publish and do all the typesetting myself.

The first book, I publish in the “Cambridge Studies in Philosophy” series; the third, a dauntingly terse work, with “Princeton Monographs in Philosophy.”

What interests me tonight is the second book, issued, obligatorily, with Oxford. (“Obligatorily” because Oxford has just about cornered the market of the best academic books. The alternate reality isn’t so different that the major players have changed.)

The trouble with Oxford, as a publisher, is its meager font menu and tiny print size.

My Oxford font choice is Albertina for its long-tailed lowercase “y.”

(This specimen is from Barry Cunliffe’s By Steppe, Desert, and Ocean: The Birth of Eurasia, a lovely book that I got from the exchanging-box outside my library, for free.)

Some ex-residences

Forgive me for raking up old history, some of which I’ve surely blogged about before, but I have little else to discuss tonight. I must be getting on in years because I’m keen to list buildings I’ve lived in that have been torn down.

(1, 2) Mission houses, Las Palmas, Esmeraldas, Ecuador.

My boyhood home was the eastern house. As a baby, I briefly lived in the western house.

(3) Cottage on the property of Lakeview Church, Zion, Illinois.

My family lived in Zion from 1990 to 1991 (my third-grade year).

(4) Missionary Church Dorm, Quito, Ecuador.

My home during boarding-school years.

If I were asked to choose one former residence to live in forever, this would be it. My own Hogwarts.

It was torn down a few weeks ago.

(5) The Music Machine, River Park, South Bend, Indiana.

I lived in the tiny apartment above the office of the Music Machine, a DJ-ing business. I moved in when I married Karin. Less than a year later, the city forced us out and built a fire station on the land.

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I used Google Maps to try to find the house in Seattle’s U-District in which I rented a room for four months, in 2004 and 2005.

Ultimately, I can’t be sure of the address. It was a grungy building surrounded by gaudy fraternity houses. I leeched wireless Internet from one of those fraternities; the network was called “Sex Gods.” So, if I’m ever back in that neighborhood, I’ll know how to pinpoint my old location.

I did find this lovely 2013 article in the University of Washington’s student newspaper about my landlady, who rented to ex-cons, sex offenders, and others who needed a break. I was in neither of the first two categories, but she rented to me after she called my friends and they confirmed that I didn’t drink alcohol. (And it was good that she rented to me, because it was about the only room in Seattle I could have afforded.)

I lent her my mom’s parents’ missionary memoirs, and she read them.

That year and the next, when I moved back and forth across the continent, alone, to pursue fruitless but necessary studies, the Lord put me in touch with some remarkable people.

An old stomping ground

This article has a photo of my old job site: Bed Bath & Beyond in downtown Seattle.

It’s fitting that the article is about riding the bus. That’s what I did in Seattle, in 2004, when the transport system was not as efficient.

My parents are lending a car to Karin & me. I’m studying how to drive it. Alas. I’d hoped to go all my life without driving, like C.S. Lewis did. Later, I might permanently give up driving, in the manner of J.R.R. Tolkien, who saw Mordor encroaching all around him.

The LimeBike

As Borat says, “In my country, there is problem / And that problem is transport.”

Well, South Bend has joined in an experiment to make transport better, or, at least, more hip. It has adopted the LimeBike system.

Behold these young Seattleites riding LimeBikes.

The system works like this. Garish green bikes are planted all over the city. When you find one, you scan its QR code with your phone. This allows you to ride for up to 30 minutes.

$1 is charged to your tab.

Afterward, you leave the bike in any accessible, unobtrusive place (e.g., on the grass next to a public sidewalk).

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I strongly disapprove of car transport, and so you’d think I’d have high hopes for the LimeBike.

Alas, I don’t.

I don’t think the LimeBike ever will become popular enough to significantly change the transport system. South Benders will continue to drive.

If I recall correctly, that’s what’s happened in the Netherlands. For many years, the Dutch have had a generous bike-sharing system. And many Dutch do use it: cycling is an important part of their culture. But few Dutch commuters switch over from driving cars.

My conjecture is that no matter what country you go to, introducing more bikes won’t change the overall transport preferences.

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But suppose that LimeBikes were to become popular in South Bend, or were perceived to be popular. That would be dangerous, lest support be withdrawn from public bussing.

Mass transit is what really matters to poor people. No one too poor to own a car would wish to depend on some dumb bike. Especially not in snow or rain. And not in old age or illness or affliction.

For the occasional light errand, the LimeBike is OK. Though it isn’t cheaper than riding the bus, in some circumstances it’s more practical. But as a significant influence upon transit patterns, it’s less likely to help than to hurt.

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Also, the LimeBike reminds me of Dr. Seuss’s Pale Green Pants. I keep seeing it in strange places, as if it were following me.

This week, there’s been a LimeBike in my parking lot. Every day, the thing has moved a little closer to my building. Now it’s sitting on my front porch.

It creeps me out.

In Seattle, the LimeBike has taken to hanging from the trees.

And in South Bend, it keeps on appearing in the river, as if it were Ophelia.

Quitting

Yesterday was the last of a four-day weekend.

Tues–Fri, I’m putting in shifts at the high school and at IUSB. And then, no more shifts at the high school. I submitted my resignation last week.

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This is the third permanent job I’ve quit.

The first was at McDonald’s in the summer of 2000.

The other was at Bed Bath & Beyond, in Seattle, in 2004.

The annoying thing is that my employers always wish to know why I’m quitting. I’m always forced to re-live the anguish of my decision.

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In 2000, the reason I gave was that I was beginning my collegiate studies. It wasn’t the true reason. I took another job a couple of months later.

The McDonald’s people were wise to this, but they let it pass. They didn’t particularly care.

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In 2004, my stated reason – a true one – was that I intended to go to Ecuador to live (which I did, for about six months).

The BBB people cared about this because they needed to make sure that I wasn’t quitting because of some problem with the company. They really, really attend to detail over at BBB. (This explains why I never flourished there: the details that I had to attend to were, e.g., how this saucepan differed from that saucepan.)

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To the high school officials, I’ve explained that I need to finish writing my dissertation (also true).

Incidentally, I’m sorrier to leave. The details that I must attend to in this job are ones that I do have an eye for.

On the other hand, at the school, there’s a lot of griping about who should have gotten this or that position. Everybody seems to have an opinion about what everyone else ought to do and how much everyone else ought to be paid. Since these opinions are constantly proclaimed near the photocopier, where I spend a great deal of time, the job is intensely wearying to me.

And that, also, is the truth.