One of the first posts I wrote for this blog was about passion. Not the carnal sort, mind you, but the passion that’s become a cliché on corporate websites and in training seminars and, of course, all over LinkedIn. A passion for accounting. A passion for petroleum economics. A passion for diesel engines.
You’d think that after all these years the fires of commercial passion would have been extinguished. But no: I’m still finding embers in the wild.
“PASSION FOR OAKLAND. PASSION FOR YOU.” Please, Autocom Nissan, let’s keep it discreet.
“Where Passion Meets Flavor.” Sometimes, Gee Whiz Since 1928, an apple is just an apple.
I’m going to give an uncharacteristic pass to “A Passion for Taschen,” a gallery show in Los Angeles last fall that celebrated the history of the Taschen publishing house. I admit I like the rhyme — I’d always wondered whether “Taschen” rhymed with “fashion” or “awash in” — and collectors really do go nuts over the fine-art photography that Taschen publishes and sells.
Then there’s Wild River Press in Bothell, Washington, which publishes “the finest fishing and hunting in print,” and whose titles include a series of “passion” books. In each case, the passion appears to be for stalking, snaring, and killing an animal.
I originally read the title of this two-volume set as “A Passion for Permits,” which struck me as an obsession too far, even for a career bureaucrat. But no, it turns out that permit is the name of a type of fish found in the western Atlantic; its name is an alteration of Spanish palometa, which is derived from Greek pālamus, a young tuna. See, I have a passion for etymology!
Another Wild River Press title. I’d had no idea that the grouse was “America’s premier game bird.” I’ve been accused of having a passion for grousing myself, so I should have known better.
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