tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-95839132024-03-23T10:42:37.240-07:00a pile to step inUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger294125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-54395392304693456512011-11-16T14:40:00.001-08:002011-11-16T14:41:31.587-08:00don't say you weren't warned<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.webgrl.com/photogalleries/art/10thAnniversary/016_10thanniversary_alderbrook_kids_sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://www.webgrl.com/photogalleries/art/10thAnniversary/016_10thanniversary_alderbrook_kids_sign.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-44270511628859415802011-09-11T23:00:00.000-07:002011-09-14T16:52:49.347-07:00after the fall.<i>(ed. note: the 10th anniversary of 9/11 has seen a slew of reflections and tributes in all manner of media, many of them wrenchingly powerful. So. How to make your 9/11 piece stand out? By posting it on 9/12, that’s how.) </i><br />
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Ten Junes ago I fell off my skateboard and woke up three weeks later. Wait—“woke up” isn’t quite right. I was in a drug-induced coma for a week, then my brain swelling (suddenly, miraculously) reversed course, the doctors at Harborview were able to ease up on the drugs and ditch plans to cut away a section of my skull—which is very much a cut-your-losses maneuver—and then (I’m told) I became cognizant, conversational. But my brain’s ability to make memories didn’t come back online for another couple weeks, and when it did, I found myself amidst circumstances I would’ve described as surreal, if I’d had the cognitive ability to parse the idea of multiple realities. Which I did not.<br />
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When your brain is compelled to rewire itself, relearn how to designate something for long-term memory, get it to stick, some weird shit happens. My brain had no shortage of rewiring to do—muscle memory was completely wiped, for example; I had to relearn much the non-breathing/heartbeating stuff your muscles do without having to think about it. The first memory that stuck that summer is the story of my 5-step journey from hospital bed to bathroom, and I can recall how it felt: as though I’d come awake for the first time, everything new but simultaneously familiar, comfortable. I felt completely fine, thought I was fine (and would continue to. My ongoing impression was that, man, a week ago I was messed up, but thank god I’m all good now. A week later, same deal). I shrugged off my buddy Brian’s attempt to help me to the loo, stood up, told my legs to start walking, and instead began melting into the floor. Brian caught me and we eventually resumed the trip. It all took much longer than anticipated, which sucked, because I had a bowel movement melting into my jammies. The rest of that memory is mainly—well, Brian is a very good friend. Other early memories also involve loved ones being good to me. My family was amazing, my girlfriend Erin was amazing, and tons of folks dropped by to visit—even my old friend Laura, who would become the love of my life and eventually agree to marry me. One afternoon I was sitting up in bed, talking with my beautiful, dark-haired girlfriend, when I looked over and saw my beautiful, red-haired girlfriend in the doorway. Had … had I somehow managed to have two girlfriends at once? Yes I had. Yes! I had. And they were both good with it, talking affectionately to me, to each other, enjoying each other’s company, as simultaneous girlfriends so rarely do. Of course, the red-head was my ex from college, who'd flown up to visit. But I had no sense of timeline on which to affix memories of my past; everything existed in the same wobbly present tense. On wakeful nights alone, the floor quiet and dark, I would pad slowly around the recovery floor of the hospital, trying to find the lounge area with the mini fridge with the juice boxes (it kept moving). Some nights felt wakeful even when they weren’t—I’d never had lucid dreams before, but now I did, and a few of my most vivid, tactile early memories were actually dreams, as when I commenced my nightly juice-box search, wandered down a hallway onto an (imaginary) sky bridge over a (ditto) atrium space, looked down, and saw rows and rows of fatally ill kids in wheelchairs lined up in front of a stage, where ‘N Sync was getting ready to perform a Make-a-Wish-type benefit concert. Wouldn’t you know it, there was an empty chair smack in the middle of this sea of sickly children, so I went and sat down. Recall, this is 2001; ‘N Sync ruled the land with Justin Bieber-like ubiquity. I was 26 and white and male, which meant my gathered opinion of ‘N Sync was as a pop cultural atrocity, and in my pre-brain injury life I’d spoken of them only ironically, like referring to them as New Sync on the Block or whatever. But tonight was different. Tonight was about the children. These poor kids, dying before they got a chance to live—except for tonight, because ‘N Sync was here to give them the night of their lives. A night to take with them to heaven. When the show started, I found that I knew all the words to all the songs—<i>all</i> of them, not just “Bye Bye Bye” and “It’s Gonna Be Me” but songs I’d heard perhaps once, by extra-accident—and so stood and began to sing along, full-throatedly, while miming the top-half choreography happening onstage. A few songs in, Justin Timberlake pointed to me and beckoned me to come up with the band. Now, whether Justin did this because my talent was overwhelmingly apparent or because the loud, jazz-handed 6’9” dude surrounded by kids with cancer was too painful to watch, perhaps we’ll never know. What we do know is he didn’t regret it. I took stage right, fell in with the choreography, and began harmonizing in all the right places. This earned a few I’m-impressed sidelong glances from Justin, and eventually an invitation to take a vocal solo, which I accepted, dancing my way to front-center stage. I went off, the tiny invalids went nuts, end of dream. I spent the next day with a) multiple ‘N Sync songs I’d virtually never paid attention to running in my head, and b) the conviction that the concert had really happened. It was exponentially more tactile, more <i>real</i> than any other recent memory, and I wouldn’t talk myself out of it for weeks. As I said, weird shit.<br />
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On 9/11/01, I’d been out of the hospital as long as I’d been in. Evenings at my parents’ place were regularly passed much as they’d been those last few weeks in the recovery ward: watching baseball. The Seattle Mariners were my friends, were familiar faces, and they behaved as good friends should, by winning. Like, all the time. Me and a plate of snacks would retire to the upstairs TV room, put the game on, and routinely watch the M’s put the contest away in the first few innings. This began a week or so into August, when the team was 80-30, for a .727 winning percentage, which, in baseball of all sports, simply doesn’t happen—maybe for a few weeks, but not for a whole season, and certainly not for the Mariners.
In case you’re unfamiliar with the pro sports pathos in Seattle, here it is: all good things will end prematurely, and will be followed by a greater number of bad things. It’s that simple. All bright dots of winning will be attached to a long tail of losing. Ken Griffey Jr. will demand a trade in his prime. Randy Johnson, the Big Unit, will demand a trade shortly after. A-Rod will flee for Texas shortly after that. The NBA will have a lockout, and when it ends, Shawn Kemp, the most exciting dunker in the game, will show up fat and on coke. Kemp will be replaced by Vin Baker, who will be fat and alcoholic. Howard Shultz, aka Mr. Starbucks, aka Hometown Business Hero, will buy the Sonics. One five-year plan later, Howard Shultz, aka Mr. Starfucks, aka Judas with a Cappuccino, will sell the Sonics for $350 million to Oklahoma tycoons, who will move the team and take Kevin Durant with them. The 2001 Mariners will win 116 games. The 2002-2011 Mariners will redefine losing, will become the first team with a $100 million payroll to lose 100 games, will set the bar for all-time woeful offensive production—where “set the bar” means “put the bar on the ground, and nonetheless manage to trip on it.” That’s being a Seattle sports fan: every brief pleasure is followed by protracted pain.<br />
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The final critical piece of sports context is that I hate the New York Yankees. Why? Because fuck the Yankees, that’s why. Granted, we’re far away from New York, and far newer to baseball—it’s not like the Mariners traded Babe Ruth in his prime to the Yankees. But rest assured that if the Mariners had a) existed and b) had Babe Ruth on their roster, they would’ve traded Babe Ruth in his prime to the Yankees. The Seattle Mariners organization is more adept at rationalizing destructive decision-making than your most boozy family member and your most controlling family member put together, and has always been so. Out here, the Yankees are the most hated team in pro sports (although the Red Sox are doing their damnedest to catch up). Another significant factor in New York’s hatability is that Seattle plays in a division (the AL West) perennially lacking teams worth hating. Do you hate the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim? No you don’t. The Angels annoy you. But they’re too boring, too Disney to elicit actual sports <i>hate</i>, and so it is throughout the ranks of the AL West. The Yankees, meanwhile—and this bears repeating—are the fucking Yankees, and the summer of 2001 found them still riding a wave of successive World Series championships that made them roughly as welcome around the American League as Dr. Drew is in the Lohan household.<br />
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That said, in August and the first ten days of September 2001, I wasn’t worried about the Yankees, nor any other team. The Mariners were unbeatable in a series, and six times a week they provided a three-hour bright spot in my day. I loved them all, not just Ichiro and Boonie and Edgar and Buhner, but Paul Abbott and Aaron Sele and Dan Wilson and all the rest—they were all playing out of their minds, all playing their part in making the most improbable season ever happen to perhaps the most middling team in the history of America’s Pastime, and I felt deeply connected to them. A World Series championship felt inevitable, and man, when it got here, it would be overdue. Everybody felt this way. The rookie Ichiro was a wunderkind, his every at-bat a must-watch. He was so sharply different from any other player, which made him perfectly suited to be the face of the team that in a matter of months became the face of a city that prided itself on being different. Even in my Simple Jack-like state of mind, I understood—deeply—that the recovery from my traumatic brain injury was every bit as improbable as and a good bit more miraculous than the baseball season I was getting to witness. I’d fallen off my board and onto my head on a lonely road on southern Vashon Island, and subsequently God had reached down and said <i>not yet.</i> Aslan had licked my forehead, and by sheer grace here I was, dressing myself, laughing at jokes, improving by the day, none of which I was predicted by doctors to able to do. I knew in my bones that I’d continue to get better, just as I knew the M’s would keep winning. This was our time, theirs as much as mine.<br />
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Baseball ground to a halt on September eleventh, you’ll remember. Games were cancelled. When play resumed, fans sang along to a string of patriotic anthems to begin every game, and there was a wholly new sense injected into the proceedings, that playing and watching baseball was a way to be together, find strength in numbers. There was a pervasive fear that any large number of people in one location was a possible target, and so just attending a game was a way to proclaim defiance, that we were alive, that we would not be defeated.<br />
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When the Mariners lost to the Yankees in the 2001 playoffs, it felt right. It didn’t feel great, didn’t make me happy, but you could feel the loss coming as the series went on, and when the last out had been made, the words I said to myself were simply <i>yes, good. </i>New York needed it, and more than anything else I did in the weeks following 9/11, more than waiting for hours and hours to give blood, standing patiently in line with hundreds of other folks hungry for a way to be of practical use, losing to New York made me feel that I was being helpful. By being there to experience the losing, I was letting New Yorkers experience winning. How’s that for a rationale? That Mariners baseball season—something I had zero impact on—was somehow the most I had to give, and, once surrendered, the giving felt good, a proper sacrifice; a prized animal slaughtered at the altar. The killing stroke stung, sure, but even as the blood ran I felt the conviction that it was right.<br />
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I had plans for this piece. Was going to send around different versions, each tailored for a specific audience, like <a href="http://www.grantland.com/">Grantland</a> (smart & sports savvy), <a href="http://www.theawl.com/">TheAwl</a> (smart & skeptical), <a href="http://www.mcsweeneys.net/">McSweeneys</a> (smartypants), etc., and see what happened. I’ve sat down to write a first draft about ten times in the last six weeks, but the words yielded by those efforts look nothing like a draft of anything except maybe a grocery list. No—a crazy dude’s grocery list. Let’s say a crazy dude starts a list of things to get at the grocery store. But he soon swerves into the broader topic of material things acquire, and then to nonmaterial things he desires—states of mind to achieve, experiences to experience—and from there it’s a short leap into the arena of things to accomplish before death, and this goes on for pages and pages, these fat run-ons with adorable bullet points in front of them, until the end result is a high-minded bucket list that also happens to say things like <i>almond milk</i> and <i>bananas</i>. That’s what the “first draft” of my essay about 9/11 looks like. So, now it’s <strike>Friday</strike> Sunday (<strike>9/9</strike> 9/11) <strike>afternoon</strike> night, rather retardedly too late for anything to come of this list of jumbled half-ideas, and you know what? The mental acuity that birthed this late baby is a chief characteristic of how I’ve changed post-TBI, how I haven’t managed to navigate life as I did before, how I steer the ship differently now. To be clear, there are other byproducts of my injury that are here to stay, that I just have to live with: I can’t smell. I sweat unholy amounts. I get headaches in waves. I struggle with addiction. I blow my fuse sometimes—all those are parts of me that didn’t use to exist, then one day they (or the promise of them) did. All got mention at some point of outpatient therapy. But the new trait that didn’t get brought up is also the one that’s caused the most bullshit—really it’s two traits, but it happens in combination, left jab right hook—and it took me a long time to identify. I’ve yet to find a succinct name for it, but here’s what happens: I overthink my plans directly on the heels of underthinking my responsibilities. I will naturally let shit slide—bills, even when I’ve got money to pay them; dishes, even when they keep me (read: my patient wife) from cooking; writing, even when I’ve got something good going—and then, instead of doubling back directly to fix the oversight, I’ll sit down and make a list of ways to change my life so as to prevent this type of thing from happening again. And when that’s done—hey, I’ve made a list! It looks good, too, really detailed in parts. Time for bed, and then in the morning nothing will be fixed, but I’ll have this list to ignore. That’s how the underdo/overplan combination works. On a daily scale, it prevents me from writing at the pace I want, as I’m forever forfeiting momentum. On a bigger-picture scale, it can be existentially discouraging, as it amounts to one of my faults being the way I assess my faults. Ten years later, I still catch myself wanting to go back, to have never been like this.<br />
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This weekend, the episode of This American Life, <i><a href="http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/445/ten-years-in">Ten Years In,</a></i> was a follow-up to an episode done in the wake of 9/11—they caught up with people they’d interviewed ten years ago, asked them what’s changed, what’s the same. Lynn Simpson was in the first tower to get hit, on the 89th floor where the power and lights went off at impact, and the smoke started filling in immediately. On the episode in the tragedy’s wake, she talked about how she was no longer living in New York City, and mentioned how she still had the clothes shoes and socks and hair clip she was wearing on 9/11; she hadn’t cleaned them, couldn’t bring herself to, but neither could she bring herself to throw them away. They were tied up in a plastic bag and sat in the corner of the room. <i>I just can’t quite let go of them. </i>Now? They’re in the little bag, but it lives on the top shelf of her closet. She just recently sold her apartment in NYC, after years of renting it out—she didn’t want to sell it, because she thought the time would come when she’d want to move back. <i>I fought selling that apartment. </i>But you can’t go back? asked Ira. <i>You can’t go back</i>, said Lynn. One day, something can happen, and it can change you permanently. <i>It’s very hard to admit that you’re not gonna be back to your old self, </i>she said. <i>You’ve changed. September 11th changed me. And no matter how much I try to convince myself into the fact that I’m gonna go back to it, I will get back, I will go back to the person I was, it’s not going to happen. And once I accepted that, it’s okay.</i><br />
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In the aftermath of my TBI, I had a hard time with emotional complexity—I didn’t have the ability to unpack my feelings, to sort through layers, and that made having a complicated emotional response fairly impossible. I could be sitting there failing to experience a moment of sadness (via conflict with a loved one, say) or joy (via my job as best man at Brian’s wedding, say), and honestly the best I could do was to recognize that the people around me had emotional things happening inside them that were a) important to them and b) not fully happening inside me. 9/11 marked the first time I felt my emotional response was on par with that of folks around me, because while paralyzing shock is intense, it’s also defined by its lack of complicated feeling; the emotion has been shocked out of you. The emotions eventually return, though when they do, they'll feel different. You’ll be different.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-19967111348158930702010-05-12T10:41:00.000-07:002010-05-12T10:47:33.383-07:00your life as an online student according to cheesy stock photos<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Fq0jtwIdEEo/S-rpruAa1MI/AAAAAAAAAvY/pvGxmI73PnU/s1600/man_handstand_outside_laptop.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 267px; height: 400px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Fq0jtwIdEEo/S-rpruAa1MI/AAAAAAAAAvY/pvGxmI73PnU/s400/man_handstand_outside_laptop.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5470441634688324802" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br />i encourage you--nay! <i>urge</i> you--to check out a piece i wrote for the blog i run at work that's being pimped today for traffic-getting reasons. the series was fun to write, and this mashup version is spiffed out.<br /><br /><a href="http://blog.earnmydegree.com/life-online-student-cheesy-stock-photos-greatest-hits/">your life as an online student according to cheesy stock photos | greatest hits<br /></a><a href="http://blog.earnmydegree.com/life-online-student-cheesy-stock-photos-greatest-hits/" target="_blank"><br /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-10749181738497409892010-01-27T12:00:00.000-08:002010-01-27T12:04:49.454-08:00new fake band: the cream enthusiasts.dude just left a comment on my last (and not very recent) blog post:<br /><br /><i>Hello! Just blogspotting. Great blog! I bookmarkd it.<br /><br />Happy blogging!<br /></i><br />and i was like, thanks, je<span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">z</span> cortazo! that's nice. i think i'll take a look at your <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/">travel & adventure blog</a>. and....it's hard for me to find words to describe his words. here's an eg:<o:p></o:p></p> <h2><span style=""><a href="http://www.kortazo.com/surfers-paradise.html" title="Permanent Link to Surfers Paradise">Surfers Paradise</a><o:p></o:p></span></h2> <p class="MsoNormal">With a name like Surfers Paradise, it alone stands to acumen that some of the best surfing in Australia can be begin here. In fact, some of the best surfing in the apple is amid on this aboriginal bank that not alone offers abundant cream but so abundant more. Surfers paradise is simple to get to if you are aerial into the Gold Bank area. You can biking to either The Gold Bank airport amid in Coolangatta or you can access in Brisbane and appoint a Gold Bank appoint car to drive down the bank till you ability Surfers Paradise. <o:p></o:p></p> <p>Once you ability Surfers Paradise, you will apprehend that this abode is heaven on earth, not alone for the cream enthusiasts, but aswell for anyone who wishes to accept a acceptable time. This is an ideal abode for vacation, for all sorts of humans – couples on their honeymoon, families with accouchement or bodies gluttonous a weekend getaway. There are abundant break options to fit altered budgets and with a Gold Bank car rental, the breadth is castigation for the taking!<o:p></o:p></p> <p>Surfing at Surfers Paradise is a continued lived attitude that allows both the adolescent and old to try out their new abilities or to brightness some of their best moves. If you are new to the action and are not absolutely acquainted of what needs to be done, you could either accept to insolate on the bank and watch the professionals do it or you could appoint an adviser to advise you the intricacies. Summer is aiguille division to cream in the area, but it's aswell the busiest. Often some of the best cream is begin in the off division amid the months of May to November if it may be a bit colder but the bank is beneath awash giving<span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"> </span>you added affairs to bolt that absolute wave.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>tags:</i><a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/abode">Abode</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/acceptable-time">Acceptable Time</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/accouchement">Accouchement</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/acumen">Acumen</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/adolescent">Adolescent</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/adviser">Adviser</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/affluence">Affluence</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/aggregation">Aggregation</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/aswell">Aswell</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/breadth">Breadth</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/budgets">Budgets</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/castigation">Castigation</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/coolangatta">Coolangatta</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/enthusiasts">Enthusiasts</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/gold-bank">Gold Bank</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/heaven-on-earth">Heaven On Earth</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/surfboard">Surfboard</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/surfers-paradise">Surfers Paradise</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/surfing-in-australia">Surfing In Australia</a>, <a href="http://www.kortazo.com/tag/weekend-getaway">Weekend Getaway</a><o:p></o:p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-29673974659117912592009-12-23T15:57:00.000-08:002009-12-23T16:01:51.270-08:00koolaid is nice to have, too, but not required.<span style="font-family: arial;">having a cult is the same as having a picnic. pick a nice, out of the way spot. lay out some blankets. bring games--the best are ones with no boards or pieces. all the rules in your head. every item you spread out has a story. talk up your jam, your pickles. this is different, see, made with hands, with love, intimate, the way it was meant to be. ordained. poor people dying in their cafeterias, queued up with their empty plastic trays, the waiting dead. why waste your life. why creep along in your wagon with the engine idling, why have your skin bleached by pool water when there's a swimming hole just over there. these bisquits are my body--already buttered. this jam is my blood, preserved for you. take and eat. you can taste how right this is. most everybody can't, they're dulled to life. babylon is so boring that folks can't see they're in it. so they wait on hold to get their lashing, and soon enough scars cover all their senses...blind their tongues, amputate their eyes. not you, though. you're different, lucky--you're here with me now. we see the truth, feel the truth, eat the truth. we're having a picnic.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-33594732920979818262009-08-13T09:29:00.000-07:002009-08-13T10:21:01.357-07:00the voices in my head.<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">so. </span><a style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);" href="http://mcsweeneys.net/2009/8/13contest.html">mcsweeneys</a><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);"> had a contest for new columnists, and i entered it with what can properly if unfortunately be called </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">gusto. </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">i didn't win. of the 812 entries they received, they had 33 finalists, whom they notified of their finalism. i was not one of these. am i bitter about being a not-winner? it would hardly make sense to be; i not-win every day. i find mild comfort in the fact that none of the 7 winners proposed a fiction column---titles range from </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">conversations at a wartime cafe </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">to </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">bitchslap: a column about women and fighting. </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">i heart mcsweeneys, and will continue to, even though reading the columns i lost to will, for a time, cause me to hatefully deconstruct their writing. just for a time, though; after all, my first definite memory of my bride-to-be laura was her beating me in a 7th-grade halloween costume contest, and i had pretty much stopped resenting her by the middle of 12th grade. and now we're getting married! so that's positive. another positive way to look at it is that mcsweeneys was just easing me in, so that when they reject my novel sometime next year, i'll be predejected and ready to go. here, then, is the first full installment of my aborted column. (in .doc form it's all formatted properly like a screenplay; here it's approximated and hopefully still readable.)</span><span style="font-style: italic;"> <span style="font-style: italic;"></span><br /><br /></span><div style="text-align: center;"><span>THE VOICES IN MY HEAD LAND AN INDIE FILM </span><br /><span>THAT'S SET TO BLOW UP AT SUNDANCE.<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span><br /><span><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span><br /><span><span style="font-weight: bold;">Little Miss Conception</span></span><br /></div><span><br />CU the wan face of POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT. The camera PULLS BACK to reveal his surroundings.<br /><br />INT. MESSY LIVING ROOM – DAY<br /><br />He presses end on his phone and walks into the kitchen, also messy. Only the kitchen table is clean.<br /><br />In front of it squats ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA, pulling bottles of liquor from boxes on the floor.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />Man, I need a <span style="font-style: italic;">drink. </span>If it doesn’t relax me, I’ll have 10 or 12 more.<br /><br />From one of the boxes, he quietly removes a bottle.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span> (not looking up)<br />Don’t think of drinking ONE SINGLE FUCKING DROP from my special collection.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />I kill myself all day trying to get our number changed so the creditors can’t find us. They had me on hold four hours. But I waited.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />I’ve been waiting to throw a party like this for YEARS.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />Then call waiting keeps buzzing, saying private caller. But I pick up the pattern. The manager puts me on hold, 30 seconds pass, and <span style="font-style: italic;">boom! </span>there’s private caller.<br /><br />Pointlessly Persistent pours a tall glass of bourbon.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT </span>(cont’d)<br />The manager wanted me to play his little game. But guess what, bucko? I don’t play by the rules. So I <span style="font-style: italic;">took </span>that call.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />I will NOT let you fuck this up for me again.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />But it wasn’t him, it was a woman. One of us is apparently the father of her baby.<br /><br />PRINCIPLED IN THEORY has appeared in the kitchen behind Pointlessly Persistent.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />If we could all just think about this.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />Mom’s being deployed. Can’t take her daughter with her. Says she’s out of options.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Fatherhood: daily sacrifice for the sake of family.<br /><br />UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY may or may not have been standing there all along.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />Someone wants to give us a <span style="font-style: italic;">baby?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY </span>(cont’d)<br />I will work to identify every possible angle from which this can be evaluated.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />After you’ve hypothesized a bunch of ways to approach the problem, I’ll fixate on the one that’s futile and insulting. First, someone tell me how we got a lady named Marsha impregnated.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />Marsha … <span style="font-style: italic;">Marsha?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />Oh SHIT. Spill it, dude.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />Wow … we’re in California. That giant party with strobe lights hanging in the yard. Bathtub punch. Pumping music. Everyone <span style="font-style: italic;">sauced… </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />That was the best party since I pledged us to those frats back in college.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA </span>(cont’d)<br />I didn’t drink that nasty punch, so I was the last man standing. This chick Marsha was hanging on me, and…<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />And?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />What, okay? We all do things.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />What we all do is fail to put things over our penis, you dick.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Well, it happened. And now <span style="font-style: italic;">this </span>is happening. We have to get ready; we have to conceptualize.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />There’s no money to get on a plane and fly there. But we have the gas card. If we left now and drove nonstop, in shifts, there’s an attractively tiny chance we could make it before mommy ships out.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Whoa there, Turbo! Slow down.<br /><br />Suddenly, GAME FACE looms in the back door.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE</span><br />I smell crunch time.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />There’s an old fable called The Gerbil & the Fox’s Stocking. How about I read it aloud? Tonight we’ll meditate on it as we fall asleep, and in the morning we’ll see how the meaning of the story is relevant to…<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE</span><br />Nothing you say affects me. <span style="font-style: italic;">It’s Time To Do This.</span><br /><br />INT. MIDSIZE SPORTS UTILITY VEHICLE HYBRID – DAY<br /><br />Game Face drives, wearing large headphones. Principled In Theory rides shotgun. Unacknowledged Gay Affinity is in the middle back seat, folded in a kind of upright fetal position between the other two voices, both stretched out sleeping. In his hands is a CD.<br /><br />He leans stiffly forward, like he wants to be heard over the music. But there is no music.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />It’s kind of nice with everyone else out of it, just you and me. <span style="font-style: italic;">On the road. </span>Here, throw on this Bright Eyes record I brought along.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />I’m suddenly tired.<br /><br />Principled In Theory puts his head back and closes his eyes.<br /><br />EXT. HIGH PLAINS HIGHWAY – NIGHT<br /><br />The midsize SUV hybrid flies along the road, silent save for the hiss of the tires.<br /><br />INT. MIDSIZE SUV HYBRID – DAY<br /><br />Game Face drives, headphones on, hands at the 10-and-2 position on the wheel.<br /><br />Sound asleep in the back, Anal-Retentive In Just This One Area FARTS a slow sleepy-time fart.<br /><br />Principled In Theory fakes being asleep, left eye shut but right eye open.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE</span><br />Ventura fairgrounds, next exit.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Are we … is that the ocean? I can’t believe I slept the <span style="font-style: italic;">whole way! </span><br /><br />VENTURA COUNTY FAIR – DAY<br /><br />AERIAL SHOT of the fairgrounds. The camera ZOOMS in on the Ferris wheel, which is not moving. At the top of the wheel, four voices are squeezed into a car. They stare straight ahead, silent, bored.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />Well I’m red in the face. I CANNOT BELIEVE I claimed to prefer the beer garden over this shitstorm of action.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />We’re early. What do you want? We go to the beer garden, get all kinds of drunk in time to meet a baby? No. So rides it is.<br /><br />Anal-Retentive In Just This One Area pulls a bottle of rye whisky from under his sweatshirt, takes a pull, and passes it across Principled In Theory to Pointlessly Persistent, who swigs and passes it to Game Face.<br /><br />Game Face takes a pull, CRACKS his neck.<br /><br />The car rocks and SHUDDERS as the Ferris wheel resumes motion.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE</span><br />It’s game time.<br /><br />The camera HOLDS as the car recedes from the frame.<br /><br />The next car emerges into the frame. Unacknowledged Gay Affinity rides alone.<br /><br />VENTURA COUNTY FAIR – NIGHT<br /><br />OVERHEAD SHOT of a grid of glass bottles.<br /><br />A rubber ring lands around the neck of one bottle. Another ring finds the neck of the bottle below it, and another below that.<br /><br />A CARNIVAL WORKER sets an enormous purple squirrel on the counter.<br /><br />Game Face SLAPS down tickets to play a fresh round.<br /><br />CU Principled In Theory – the camera PULLS BACK to show him straddling the head of a polar bear, beer in hand, smoking.<br /><br />Behind him stands Unacknowledged Gay Affinity. Cradled in his arm is a teddy bear wearing a bonnet and onesie.<br /><br />Littered around them is a colony of stuffed prize animals, some posed in mating positions.<br /><br />A YOUNG GIRL runs over and picks up a pink doggie. She hugs it. She approaches Principled in Theory, who bends down to hear what she has to say.<br /><br />Principled in Theory nods and whispers to her with a smile. The Young Girl pulls a wad of bills from her pocket, counts off five dollars, hands it over. She runs off with the dog.<br /><br />Principled in Theory pockets the cash and takes a drag off his cigarette.<br /><br />Five phones RING at once.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALL TOGETHER</span><br />Yeah.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />Is there a father in the house?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Perhaps. Who are you?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />I’m the father. Of the mother.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Where is the mother?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />I was sent as emissary. There’s too much heat at the ring-a-bottle. Head south to the sani-tent.<br /><br />Principled In Theory strides confidently forward and then stops cold.<br /><br />Unacknowledged Gay Affinity steps up behind him.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />Keep moving.<br /><br />He puts both hands in Principled In Theory’s back and leans him into forward motion.<br /><br />ALAN ALDA stands next to a porta-potty painted like a circus tent.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />Those fellas at the ring-a-bottle, they’re with you?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />We live together.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />Unfortunate.<br /><br />Alan Alda points over their shoulders.<br /><br />REVERSE ANGLE SHOT of Anal-Retentive In Just This One Area, who pauses dry-humping the giant purple squirrel in order to swig more whisky.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA </span>(cont’d)<br />That right there is less future PTA, more future AA.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />If you’re the grandfather … how come you don’t take her?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />I don't chew my cabbage twice.<br /><br />Alan Alda could be smiling or maybe frowning.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />We didn’t ask to have this baby, okay? But now that we’re here, it’s like I was <span style="font-style: italic;">born </span>to have this baby.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />I’m not one to get my undies in a twist over a technicality, but there is no baby per se. Tanya’s five years old.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Five!? That can’t be … no, no, can that be … it can.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />Can and is. Time flies when you’re charging your estranged daughter five dollars for a stuffed toy you don’t even want.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />What the F! That <span style="font-style: italic;">was her!?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />That looked bad. But if you’ll lend me your ear for as long as I want, I’ll rationalize it for you.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />I’m too old for this. I’m supposed to be taking a cruise, not custody of a child.<br /><br />Unacknowledged Gay Affinity hurls the teddy bear baby at Alan Alda, STRIKING him in the crotch.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA </span><br />Ow!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />You’re putting us through this so you can take a <span style="font-style: italic;">cruise? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />A whole year long! Clear around the globe.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY </span>(yelling)<br />Hypocrite! None of these assholes want to be a dad! But I do! And now you’re going to reject me because of them when you’re no better – a freaking cruise!<br /><br />The other voices materialize in the near background.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />My job is simple. I’m here to estimate –<br /><br />Unacknowledged Gay Affinity runs and leaps onto Alan Alda like a stripper mounting the pole. They fall to the ground.<br /><br />Unacknowledged Gay Affinity seizes the teddy bear baby and BEATS Alan Alda around the head and neck with it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UNACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY </span>(more yelling)<br />Selfish! Selfish!<br /><br />The other voices CHEER him on.<br /><br />But the beating continues. They come forward, each grab a limb, and pry him off Alan Alda. They POUND his back and LAUGH.<br /><br />Arms around his shoulders, they escort him away.<br /><br />Principled In Theory hesitates, then turns and trots back to Alan Alda.<br /><br />He offers a hand and pulls Alan Alda to a sitting position.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ALAN ALDA</span><br />Where am I.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />At the fair about to go find your granddaughter and take her home. It’s the right thing to do. The negative environmental impact of cruise ships cannot be endorsed.<br /><br />The camera PULLS BACK and BACK to an AERIAL SHOT of the fairgrounds, lights ablaze.<br /><br />INT. MESSY LIVING ROOM – EVENING.<br /><br />Four voices sit on the long couch, conversing.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">POINTLESSLY PERSISTENT</span><br />…So maybe you’re not really gay?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SEMI-ACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />Oh I’m <span style="font-style: italic;">gay. </span>I’m also outnumbered. Every day is another day of four-on-one…<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE </span><br />You cannot stop the dribble penetration.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SEMI-ACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />Sure! Let’s go with the sports analogy. I’m <span style="font-style: italic;">always </span>on defense – I never get to touch the ball slash balls. But maybe now that you act like you accept me, I won’t have to spend so much time hiding out.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRINCIPLED IN THEORY</span><br />Every voice shall be heard.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SEMI-ACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />I can redecorate – I can cook! I’ve always dreamed of being a chef…<br /><br />Anal-Retentive In Just This One Area enters from the kitchen bearing two serving trays.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />Gentlemen and lady-man, dinner be served.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SEMI-ACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />Yay! What’re we having?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">ANAL-RETENTIVE IN JUST THIS ONE AREA</span><br />Courvoisier and corndogs.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SEMI-ACKNOWLEDGED GAY AFFINITY</span><br />You’re <span style="font-style: italic;">joking.</span><br /><br />Game Face picks up the TV remote and turns up the volume. He bites into his corndog.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">GAME FACE</span><br />Game’s on.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-34992275959375692022009-07-28T14:54:00.000-07:002009-07-28T15:09:25.144-07:00i'm mixing business with rage.<a href="http://www.soop.ca/bootie/top10/Overdub%20-%20Mixed%20Farm%20%28Beck%20VS%20Rage%20Against%20The%20Machine%29.mp3">all right / turn it up now.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-36733773505260044322009-06-11T12:24:00.000-07:002009-06-11T12:47:43.142-07:00goddammit baby you know i ain't lyin' to you i'm only gonna tell you one tiiiiimeahhhyeah.made the rounds a while back, but this isn't my first late-to-the-rodeo: <a href="http://www.thetyser.com/">the david lee roth soundboard.</a><br /><br />it's so much fun i don't even know what to do with myself.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">UPDATE: </span>now i know what to do with myself! litter my workout mix with the <a href="http://www.mikebrittain.com/blog/2009/01/16/david-lee-roth-ringtones/">mp3 versions.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-23047671937761267972009-06-09T16:05:00.000-07:002009-06-09T16:13:17.501-07:00one of those things where it's like, fuck, i almost had this idea a while back.but it's just splendidly done.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.believermag.com/issues/200906/?read=article_hely"><span class="title2txt">SHORT TAKES ON BOOKS THAT DON’T EXIST.</span></a><br /><br />eg,<br /><br /><b>Workshop</b><br /><i>by Nick Lowey</i><br />MFA students writing—and failing to write—form the subject of Lowey’s debut, a collection of linked stories that mines the liminal space between earnest frustration and the grinding tedium of endless failure. Other writers have trod this turf with less success, but Lowey displays an enviable judiciousness and a keen eye: a box of cheap wine is described as “a store-brand Lethe, a vermillion river of solace and forgetting.”Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-75408491828738728282009-06-04T12:17:00.000-07:002009-06-04T12:19:06.030-07:00make shaking your baby guilt AND injury free.<object width="480" height="430"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="movie" value="http://www.theonion.com/content/themes/common/assets/onn_embed/embedded_player.swf?image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theonion.com%2Fcontent%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FBABY_ORB_article.jpg&videoid=95414&title=New%20BabySafe%20Ball%20Makes%20Shaking%20Your%20Infant%20Guilt%20And%20Injury%20Free"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.theonion.com/content/themes/common/assets/onn_embed/embedded_player.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" wmode="transparent" width="480" height="430" flashvars="image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theonion.com%2Fcontent%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FBABY_ORB_article.jpg&videoid=95414&title=New%20BabySafe%20Ball%20Makes%20Shaking%20Your%20Infant%20Guilt%20And%20Injury%20Free"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://www.theonion.com/content/video/new_babysafe_ball_makes_shaking?utm_source=videoembed">New BabySafe Ball Makes Shaking Your Infant Guilt And Injury Free</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-86778040999609496942009-06-03T14:45:00.000-07:002009-06-03T14:49:03.784-07:00the gospel according to pattie laburger.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://19.media.tumblr.com/i2dw5nf19jtv7e31PPgmhGh3o1_r1_500.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 382px;" src="http://19.media.tumblr.com/i2dw5nf19jtv7e31PPgmhGh3o1_r1_500.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://thisiswhyyourefat.com/">Pattie LaBurger</a> : a triple bacon cheeseburger with deep fried patties as buns.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-20709729594165539052009-06-02T13:27:00.000-07:002009-06-02T13:30:21.408-07:00staring at the swim team gets you killed by a gang of dancing ninja men who know how to twirl. spin around, ninja.<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/lj-x9ygQEGA&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/lj-x9ygQEGA&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">[via dipshit]</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-48647442280484432172009-05-27T10:27:00.000-07:002009-05-27T10:38:58.521-07:00dear fat kid : a paragraph from the bit i happen to be revising today.<span style="font-family: Georgia;">In the absence of another party to keep [Gail, ie Mother] near sense, her taut emotional state stays linear, while any line of reason becomes a waver—a scribble of thought that runs in frantic circles and off the side of the page. And she, I don’t think, is ever the wiser. Example (from voicemail #3): <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">“And if you don't want to call and at least just tell us that you are <i style="">all right</i>, well. There's nothing I can do about that. But it's painful. Here I am burning up with worry and you can't even pick up the phone. I know you have been unhappy here lately. But we are not the happiest either, you know, and you don’t see us de<i style="">serting </i>you<i style="">. </i>I'm so <i style="">sad</i>, Hal. All I want is to <i style="">help </i>you. And if you are off with your fat-friend somewhere, if that's all this is and you can't pick up the phone to call—I don't know but it will be <i style="">very hard </i>to <i style="">forgive </i>you. But I will, because forgiveness is important. Just like trust is important. And right now you have not shown that you really deserve our trust. What's the word I'm looking for? Not <i style="">flaky,</i> but close to that. Flighty! There. You have just flighted and flitted away, like a little bird. Like a sparrow. Do you remember, as a boy, when the sparrows would come every spring and build a nest up under the peak of the barn roof? And the little chicklings would hatch and you’d jump up and down and beg to go out and look at them. We'd go out day after day and nothing would happen, just Mommy coming and going with mouthfuls of worms for the family. But one day the day would come! We'd get to see those little baby sparrows <i style="">fly </i>for the <i style="">very first </i>time!<span style=""> </span>And it was always so great to watch them teeter and totter through the air. So exciting. And then summer would be here, and we'd pack up our basket and go down to the harbor. We would eat, and you would walk along the drift logs and play with the other boys who were there on the summer days. I'd bring my knitting. Sometimes that one bigger older boy would come down there, and I knew you didn't really like him but he had a new bike that was big and cool and so you’d let him boss you around. What on earth was that boy's name? ... Clarence! Ooo-oh, I <i style="">did</i> <i style="">not like </i>that Clarence, with his pudgy face. But you'd play with him anyway, no matter what I thought, and I wouldn't show it but inside I'd get so <i style="">frustrated </i>with you for not seeing…”<i style=""><o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">This is just a sample, a finger-snack drawn at random from the voicemail platter I had set before me. I’m not really complaining, though I am confused; my policy of avoidance coping, hitherto unblemished, is becoming entirely counterproductive. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-5578722977182368672009-05-21T10:56:00.000-07:002009-05-21T11:13:46.702-07:00ron mexico finishes his sentence.<div style="text-align: center;">funny thing, this morning. the espn.com sports ticker has the headline <a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=4191857">vick arrives home to finish rest of sentence</a>, and usually the sports media makes a big hullabaloo about vick-related stuff. but here the article read simply,<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://playersbehavingbadly.com/sitebuilder/images/Ron_Mexico_2-227x153.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 227px; height: 153px;" src="http://playersbehavingbadly.com/sitebuilder/images/Ron_Mexico_2-227x153.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"...and that's why i'm fucked, motherfuckers. fuck you." </span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-35886485768027763512009-05-20T08:43:00.000-07:002009-05-20T08:51:53.490-07:00freedarko works a hookup.this is neat: all the figures in this bit (save for the 2 that are related to adidas products) are elements from the freedarko book's <span style="font-style:italic;">periodic table of style.</span> <br /><br /><object width="380"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/l4DquRpfmeg&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/l4DquRpfmeg&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="380"></embed></object><br /><br />also, derrick rose is nifty.<br /><br /><object width="380" ><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/SLroyBNeeb4&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/SLroyBNeeb4&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="380"></embed></object>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-45608818046189107572009-05-15T11:31:00.000-07:002009-05-15T11:38:23.749-07:00also: i wrote the company newsletter entry about our new softball team.<span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-family: Latha;">The Seattle RAT (Radio, Advertising & Television) Softball League started the 2009 season with one expansion team, the <b>EDDY LeadDawgs.</b> Contrary to expectations set by all notable Seattle sports trends [failure, extinction, expensive failure, ungodly failure], the LeadDawgs rolled onto the opening day field with bats blazing, trouncing their opponent <b>21-4</b> … and needing just 4 ½ innings to so! In the context of the <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Seattle</st1:place></st1:city> sports scene, the LeadDawgs are Episode IV: A New Hope. Get on the bandwagon now before it gets crowed.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-2841804695110575962009-05-15T10:58:00.000-07:002009-05-15T11:07:49.104-07:00dear fat kid, random paragraph - our narrator hiding in a closet after breaking an antique at a fancy party.<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">Important stuff is always being overheard by people hiding in closets. Also, critical things are regularly being </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 102);">seen</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102);"> from inside closets. I’m here to tell you that is bullshit. Book and movie characters reliably witness wives cheating, powerful fathers having their drink poisoned, and they do this while hiding in the closet with the door open just a crack. Know what you can see through a crack in the closet door? A thin slice of world courtesy of a viewing angle 10 degrees off the wall to your right. You can see down the dim hall and out the open doorway of the library, the courtyard palms backlit by the glowing windows on the far side. You can’t see anything that’s happening in the main part of the library. It’s very frustrating. I couldn’t see who was in the library any better than I could back through the coats and find myself in a snowy world of fauns and witches, because that’s another fallacy: you jump in a closet or wardrobe in a seldom-used room well off the main part of the house, and it’s chock-full of old furs and greatcoats for you to disappear into? No it’s not. What it’s full of is about a million empty triangles of wire and wood hanging a millimeter apart, waiting for you to twitch against them and cause a bunch of noise, such that you crouch down uncomfortably on your haunches, try to spy the action happening nowhere near your crack, nothing is happening, you’re not even doing a good job listening to what’s being said because you’re so uncomfortable crouching there with your knees together, and you end up holding your breath while doing a such an easy-now job of shifting to a sitting position that, were you being filmed, it’d be the boringest slow-motion shot on record—you’re conscious of this even as it’s happening, the soundtrack in your head an army of cellos with bows dragged across the strings in noteless misery—and by the time your butt’s on the floor there are multiple voices talking at once. One of these, the raised-in-anger one, belongs to Perry Ledhard, but who knows about the others. Hell, though, this is okay, this is better. Even though the door crack is behind your head now, you can at least listen comfortably. Then from the doorway of the library—i.e. behind you—new voices speak, male and female. You’re fucking kidding me. You recognize the calm male voice from earlier but can’t put a face to it; you were quasi-introduced to a lot of people tonight.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-91670993684632952372009-05-08T09:32:00.000-07:002009-05-08T09:35:56.448-07:00the hard friend in your pants will look up into the sky.found this via kottke, but it's too good for me to hide under a bushel. no! i'm gonna let it pants.<br /><br />to wit: <a href="http://www.biancolo.com/articles/spam-in-your-pants">a big equipment in your pants brings big fruits for hot chicks to pick up.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-68298878463092822262009-05-07T15:12:00.000-07:002009-08-19T09:19:18.651-07:00the new lincoln-douglas.<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">today found me having a bold and unnecessary political tit-a-tit with a dude i don't know in the comments section of a fb video my friend sullivan posted from back when she worked on the obama campaign. was it pointless? yes. but it made me feel good inside, like, for several years there i lost the ability to picture myself substantively agreeing with those in power, and likewise i couldn't imagine republicanites whining about how no one listens to them; but now here we are, and i tell ya it's satisfying to hear a well-spoken republican unable to construct a noncircular argument. </span><br /><br /><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1715519" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586"> Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1715519"><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035845f3bc31e41087876" class="comment_actual_text">Thank God. We're now on the road to socialism. Thanks guys. Way to go. After our government owns the banks, GM, and Chrysler, and takes more and more of our money by taxing us to death, won't you be happier? Please...if you're intelligent...attend and support as many TEA parties as you can. And, please, if we're still able to Vote in 2012, elect a President that doesn't have a far leftist-progressive agenda.</div></div></div></div><br /><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a><span class="comment_meta_data"><br /></span></div><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035845f420b8042499047" class="comment_actual_text">are you...your taxes are going up, mr whitman? mine just went down last month. please be careful; i'm worried you're going to choke on your rhetoric.<br /><br /><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1723510" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1723510"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586"> Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> <div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035846003bf4e88581297" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">When there's over 9 trillion dollars in debt, someone is going to have to pay for it plus interest! Our kids will still be paying off this debt 20 years from now. So yes, someone will have to pay for it. I'm sure that someone will include myself and other entrepreneurs who are really the backbone of our economy. The more that we're taxed, the <span class="text_exposed_show">less we have to spend. That's just simple economics. If you make a 100k a year, and 35k has to go to pay taxes to the Fed, that's a net of only 65k.<br /><br />As a small business owner, factor in having to pay for family health insurance at $650 / month, and other overhead expensives, and you can quickly see that ANY tax increase will kill the business. I've known for a long time that when they talk about taxes, it's not just about the Fed tax, it's about State, County, and Local taxes as well. Not to mention license plate fees, city stickers, toll roads, and all the taxes we pay for things like gasoline, electricity, and even telephone taxes.</span></div></div></div></div><br /><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> <div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a03584601c0f5311978711" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against paying taxes for a strong defense, infrastructure, and some services. However, I am against wasteful spending in congress of our hard earned tax dollars. And at this point, our economy is so fragile, I doubt that many Americans can absorb an increase in their taxes without creating a financial burden <span class="text_exposed_hide"><span class="text_exposed_link"><a onclick="'CSS.addClass($("></a></span></span><span class="text_exposed_show">that they simply cannot afford. At some point, a small businessman (such as myself) would have to consider whether it's better to just close up shop and get a 45k / year job instead.<br /></span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620"><br /></a><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a0358460264e8d54533627" class="comment_actual_text">that's all well said. i just don't get why you'd want to wreck your argument by tying it to "elect a President that doesn't have a far leftist-progressive agenda"? last dude added $4.97 trillion to our debt, which is, you know, about half. not counting billions of dubloons pilfered from the social security surplus (every president has done that since the surplus was implemented under reagan, but still, it's money we're obligated to pay ourselves later).<br /><br /><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1724217"><div class="comment_actions"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> </div><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a03584602ab51732679151" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">I'd have to say that as a republican, I was very disappointed by some Bush policies. First and foremost was immigration and not closing the border. 2nd was spending. Of course, wars cost a lot of money. I won't debate whether we needed to go to war in Iraq, but Bush did take the fight to the terrorists and protected us against another attack <span class="text_exposed_hide"><span class="text_exposed_link"><a onclick="'CSS.addClass($("></a></span></span><span class="text_exposed_show">for 7 years. I'm sure that will be his lasting legacy. However, that said, the whole "blame Bush for everything" is getting very old and tired. And soon, that won't wash anymore, even with Obama supporters. At some point, Mr. Obama will be held accountable for his failures, just as other President's have been held accountable for theirs. Also, let's not forget that it was a Democratic-controlled congress for the last 2 years of his Presidency that helped spend all that money.<br /></span><br /><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1724341" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1724341"><div class="comment_actions"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> </div><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035846037eb6601643447" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">But here's the real point. If you disagree with the previous administration's spending policies, then you must disagree EVEN MORE with the current President's (and Congress') policies. Two wrongs don't make a right. This out of control spending frenzy can only lead to the downfall of our economy. If you wanted to really stimulate the economy,<span class="text_exposed_hide"><span class="text_exposed_link"><a onclick="'CSS.addClass($("></a></span></span><span class="text_exposed_show"> then take that 800 billion dollars and cut a check to every American citizen! Roughly that's $4,000 per person or probably $16,000 per household. That surely beats spending all that money on pet pork projects. Every American family balances their own budget. Shouldn't we expect Congress to do the same? Remember, THEY work for US, it's not the other way around.<br /></span></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1724512"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620"><br /></a><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a></div><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035846044048775754230" class="comment_actual_text">that's some nice footwork. you're not disillusioned with your party? 5 trillion dollars in 8yrs. half. your party cut taxes, increased spending. i get that the drum you like to beat is taxes. i see what you dislike but see nothing to like.</div></div></div></div></div><br /></div></div><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1724996"><div class="comment_actions"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> </div><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035846048023310195080" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">It's not footwork, it's the truth. No, I'm not "disillusioned" with the Republican party...not at all. I know that most liberals want to believe that most conservatives are disillusioned by their party, but quite to the contrary, we are more dedicated and supportive of the party than ever before. It's not just about taxes...believe me, there are <span class="text_exposed_show">many, many issues that we conservatives will be bringing to the forefront before the next election. And it's not just the snare drum that we'll be hitting, it's the double-kick bass, symbols, and toms, all in unison.<br /></span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620"><br /></a><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a><br />you may well be more dedicated, but there's less of you.<br /><br /><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a035b97d5e5f8a63686973" class="comment_actual_text">that's a lot of percussion parts to hit in unison. regardless, with a fully outfitted drumset of lower taxes for the top and pricy wars and the sanctity of marriage and trimmed-down social services and deregulated markets, you and the r's will be in good shape. oh, wait.<br /></div></div><br /><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div> <div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a03618533a7d2702074285" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">It's a difficult situation. The media bias and political correctness have engrained in many minds across this country that anyone who attempts to have a thoughtful debate on politics, whether at work, at a bar, or at the dinner table, is looked upon with scorn and contempt. Recently, while trying to have a political debate with an acquaintance in<span class="text_exposed_hide"> </span><span class="text_exposed_show">a quite informal setting (at a bar), his final statement to me was to call me a racist because I didn't like Obama. Yes, I was actually called a racist just because I spout conservative values. I welcome any open discussion on politics. However, what I see many times is that many liberals have closed their minds. They simply refuse to listen to other points of view. And when confronted with a common sense approach to the issues, they often use the old tactic of diversion. They point to Bush. They change the subject. They simply refuse to LISTEN.<br /></span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620"><br /></a><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a0365e2c63667312422783" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">i'm not changing the subject; if anything i'm staying the subject. when you make the case that taxes are too high and my response is to say that your guy doubled our debt, that's not diversion, dude, that's me inquiring how you maintain support for a party that put us on an untenable track, got beat, and has yet to offer a mildly new idea about how<span class="text_exposed_hide"> </span><span class="text_exposed_show">to go forward. if r's need to sulk a while longer and try to figure things out, fine; but if you insist on snarling while licking your wounds you'll only bite yourself in the foot.</span></div></div></div></div><br /><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1726077" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"><br /></span></div><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1726077"><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a03685282dd68793843077" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">I believe that America is good and is a symbol of hope and freedom in a troubled world.<br /><br />I believe that the American Family is the backbone of our nation.<br /><br />I believe in having a strong national defense.<span class="text_exposed_hide"><span class="text_exposed_link"><a onclick="'CSS.addClass($("></a></span></span><span class="text_exposed_show"><br /><br />I believe that if you break the law, you pay the price. The term "illegal" means illegal. Just because it has the world "alien" after it, doesn't mean that they're not here ILLEGALLY. I believe in a good education for our American citizens--those who came here legally.<br /><br />I believe in a secure border for the protection of our citizens. There's nothing wrong with LEGAL immigration, to be sure, and unless you're native american, we are all here as a result of generations of LEGAL immigrants to this country.<br /><br />I believe that the government works for me. They answer to me, I don't answer to them.</span></div></div></div></div><br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span> Thank you, Mark, for proving my point. The subject isn't JUST taxes. The subject is many issues. Now, you hope to drag me into your continued discussion on taxes and debt. But again, two wrongs don't make a right. If Bush did these things (please factor into your calculations that Bush had 9/11 to deal with and fighting a war on two fronts), <span class="text_exposed_show">and you didn't like that, then how could you like the fact that your guy along with the Democratic congress has passed the largest spending bill ever, as well as the largest budget?<br /><br />Change for the sake of change is not good enough. Stop lying to yourself that we have no new ideas. What's wrong with the principals that our country was founded on? It's worked for over 200 years. Now the progressives want to come in and destroy everything we've worked, fought, and died for in this country.<br /><br /></span><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1726421" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a><span class="comment_meta_data"> </span></div><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1726421"><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a036dc2b55406b72604290" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">Understand that I don't think along party lines. I don't vote for someone or something just because they're in my party. My convictions, beliefs, and principles guide my rational when I vote. However, that said, there is NOTHING in the progressive democratic party that I believe in. So, let's be honest, say there's an issue in the democratic <span class="text_exposed_hide"><span class="text_exposed_link"></span></span><span class="text_exposed_show">party that YOU don't agree with. Would you still vote that way, anyway? Would you still vote for THAT democrat even if you didn't agree with their stance on a certain issue?<br /><br />Let's get one thing straight here...the democratic party has given in to the far left wing agenda, and most certainly is moving towards a 100% government controlled society. The repulican party is currently being accused of "moving too far to the right". How rediculous! We're just holding on to our convictions whilst the left-wing media tries to destroy the party by convincing America that it no longer represents us. That is a lie.</span></div></div></div></div><br /><a onclick="'remove_feed_comment_dialog(" class="x_to_hide" title="Click here to remove this comment"> </a><a href="http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=591348620">Mark Huntsman</a><div id="comment_37868554839_37868554839_1726445" class="ufi_section"><div class="comment_content" id="comment_box_37868554839_37868554839_1726445"><div class="comment_text"><div id="text_expose_id_4a036cf0e635f6004527414" class="comment_actual_text text_exposed">i believe it's been a long time since i constructed i statements, and it sounds almost fun.<br /><br />i remember the last time i did it, shortly afer college, when i wanted to pump myself up enough to break up with my girlfriend.<br /><br />i was kind of a pansy. self-esteem was an issue.<span class="text_exposed_show"><br /><br />i recall that once we got into the conversation, they didn't help at all, and because i was unwilling to drop the one that would have settled the matter<br /><br />--i don't love you anymore--<br /><br />i got bound up in this drawn-out disintegration process that only gradually made me despise myself enough to end it and move away.<br /><br />i'd say you don't have to be like the 23yo me. your party mocks the possibility of empathy in government; you remain with it even as it compassionlessly kills your credibility.<br /><br />find a new girlfriend.<br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show"><br /></span><div class="comment_actions"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/s.php?k=100000080&id=1240435586">Dominic J. Whitham</a></div>Ahhh...personal attacks. Confirmation that the liberal debator has been beat. Thank you. Find a new girlfriend? I've been happily MARRIED for 16 years.<br /></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-74412721499434559172009-05-06T11:21:00.000-07:002009-05-06T11:26:02.918-07:00'cos sheep are benign and on the young we will benign.last week laura and danielle and i went to see the live episode of this american life that got beamed into theaters across the country. one of the visual shorts was a bit by chris ware starring quimby the mouse...<br /><br /><object width="400" height="225"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=4412391&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" /><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=4412391&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="225"></embed></object><p><a href="http://vimeo.com/4412391">Quimby The Mouse</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user1675063">This American Life</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-11560951347538257172009-04-30T10:50:00.000-07:002009-04-30T11:39:58.685-07:00..let my cameron gooo-o...i have metafilter bookmarked but often find that "meta" = "wading through a shitpile of nonsense." which, you know, is what i have a blog for in the first place. but kottke.org referenced this, and <a href="http://metatalk.metafilter.com/17671/Bueller#641748">it's so good.</a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Fq0jtwIdEEo/SfnmytxhRuI/AAAAAAAAApw/_DpatqaXoq4/s1600-h/caduceus-shirt.jpg"><img style="padding: 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 250px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Fq0jtwIdEEo/SfnmytxhRuI/AAAAAAAAApw/_DpatqaXoq4/s400/caduceus-shirt.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5330545392924837602" align="left" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">My favorite thought-piece about Ferris Bueller is the "Fight Club" theory, in which Ferris Bueller, the person, is just a figment of Cameron's imagination, like Tyler Durden, and Sloane is the girl Cameron secretly loves.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">One day while he's lying sick in bed, Cameron lets "Ferris" steal his father's car and take the day off, and as Cameron wanders around the city, all of his interactions with Ferris and Sloane, and all the impossible hijinks, are all just played out in his head. This is part of the reason why the "three" characters can see so much of Chicago in less than one day -- Cameron is alone, just imagining it all.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">It isn't until he destroys the front of the car in a fugue state does he finally get a grip and decide to confront his father, after which he imagines a final, impossible escape for Ferris and a storybook happy ending for Sloane ("He's gonna marry me!"), the girl that Cameron knows he can never have.</span><br /><br />now listen to <a href="http://www.idiotsavant.com/bueller/ill_go.wav">cameron arguing with himself</a> and then invite me over for a weekend viewing. i'll wear my cameron caduceus shirt.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-72757959508619436152009-04-29T09:52:00.000-07:002009-04-29T09:55:30.685-07:00i'm new.a freaking gem sent to me by coworker karl: <span style="font-style:italic;">This guy takes sample sound & video from youtube and splices them together to make new music. He has a collection of 7 or 8 that he’s done, all really entertaining, that I thought I would share with ya’ll to get those creative juices flowing.</span> all things are connected. <br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/EsBfj6khrG4&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/EsBfj6khrG4&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-74035283101346296852009-04-22T10:46:00.000-07:002009-04-22T11:54:13.169-07:00irony.<span style="font-style: italic;">[here's a paper i wrote almost exactly 3ya for grad school; last evening, drinking beer in the fading sun with dalton and hughes, the cajoned genius of colbert's white house press dinner came up, and i may have said i once had something to say about it. post-beer, i'm like...eh. but here.]</span><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/05/03/us/colbert.600.1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 600px; height: 318px;" src="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/05/03/us/colbert.600.1.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><p></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" >of yogurts and statesmen.</span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><br /><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ></span><o:p></o:p></b></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">“Ladies and gentlemen,” announced Stephen Colbert during his monologue at the White House Correspondents Dinner, “I believe it’s yogurt. But I refuse to believe it’s not butter. Most of all, I believe in this president.” Juxtaposition has a lot of power, but it’s inert—it’s display power. The meaning is arrayed on the shelf in front of you, sometimes beautifully, but you’re who has to decid you need it and put it in your cart.. But the presidency was not at a low point, he continued. “I believe it is just a lull before a comeback. I mean, it’s like the movie <i style="">Rocky.” </i>Colbert looked at President Bush, seated to his right up at the podium, then out at the room full of stiff-faced media reporters who looked, as a whole, like a gathering cloud, a dark, not-laughing cloud. “All right,” continued Colbert. “The president in this case is Rocky Balboa and Apollo Creed is—everything else in the world. It’s the tenth round. He’s bloodied. His corner man, Mick, who in this case I guess would be the vice president, he’s yelling, ‘Cut me, Dick, cut me!’ and every time he falls everyone says, ‘Stay down! Stay down!’ Does he stay down? No. Like Rocky, he gets back up, and in the end he—actually, he loses in the first movie.” The auditorium was urgently quiet, like the opening moments of a retirees’ Bingo game. “Okay. Doesn’t matter. The point is it is the heart-warming story of a man who was repeatedly punched in the face.” I sat in front of my TV laughing, and as the cameras panned over the stony faces, I stood up, did a little dance, and sat back down. Whether the president and the body of reporters were unable to see the irony or they refused to see it, the net effect was the same: Colbert’s true meaning was lost to them. (With two notable exceptions: Judge Antonin Scalia laughed uproariously when Colbert came after him, leading me to wonder if a lifetime appointment doesn’t necessarily deepen one’s affection for irony; and the face of Laura Bush, which, behind a very fine veneer of mild disdain, was positively <i style="">hateful</i>.) What’s interesting is how the collective reaction—nonplussed, antsy, aloof—was key to my own enjoyment of the moment. It’s like my seeing that the audience didn’t get Colbert’s speech was the <i style="">point</i> of Colbert’s speech.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><br /></span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" >internal motion.</span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><br /></span></b></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">In his classic <i style="">A Dictionary of Modern English Usage</i>,<i style=""> </i>H.W. Fowler offers this definition: <i style="">Irony is a form of utterance that postulates a double audience, consisting of one party that hearing shall hear and shall not understand, and another party that, when more is meant than meets the ear, is aware, both of that ‘more’ and of the outsider’s incomprehension.</i> This definition is sharp as a knife and broad as hell, at the same time, for it makes stipulations about both the broadcast end and the reception end of the form. We have the term “ironic intent” to remark that the success of an irony depends entirely on how it is received; the audience could be either unable or unwilling to take the two levels of meaning, and without that dual reception, it’s not irony.<span style=""> </span>It might still be deft, or sarcastic or waggish, but it’s not ironic. At the other end, the broadcast end, irony has motion right out of the gate—it <i style="">postulates</i>. So right away we’re in grammatically paradoxical territory, because irony is a noun yet it has a verb’s motion. It thinks. Perceiving that underlying sense of motion is vital, literally, for if irony as a form has motion, then it has life. It has what, some years ago, philosophers called “intentionality,” which refers to the state of being aware of the contents of your own mind. Since I am not a behaviorist, I’ll quote one: <i style="">Intentionality can be conceived of as a hierarchically organized series of belief-states. In this scheme of things, computers are zero-order intentional entities: they are not aware of the contents of their ‘minds’… Having a belief about someone else’s beliefs (or intentions) constitutes a second order of intentionality … Jane </i>believes<i style=""> that Sally </i>thinks <i style="">her ball is under the cushion. Jane has two belief states in mind (her own and Sally’s).</i> (from <i style="">The Human Story, </i>Robin Dunbar) Irony, then, involves a third order of intentionality: Stephen <i style="">postulates</i> that Mark will <i style="">perceive </i>that George does not <i style="">understand. </i>So irony has intent (at least in art. The modern human condition is itself meta-ironic, which opens the door for Fowler’s definition as an argument for God; but that’s a paper for another class) and this intent is complex, for it anticipates the reaction of a second party and the subsequent reaction of a third.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><br /></span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" >almost like democracy.</span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><br /></span></b></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">More than this, though, it’s the last part of Fowler’s definition that understands how everyone’s so good at recognizing irony yet bad at defining it. The two things it postulates—that one party <i style="">shall hear and shall not understand</i> while the other gets both <i style="">that “more” </i>and the <i style="">outsider’s incomprehension—</i>depend on one party’s immediate-and-no-further reception and on the other’s willingness to unpack things—to perceive rather than just receive. That irony requires <i style="">layers</i> of audience is how I’m able to know it; for when I look over and see the unfortunate first audience, I recognize that I’ve the opportunity to be a member of the lucky second group, even before I’ve begun to unpack the layers of meaning. So, then: irony involves my receiving, understanding, and making a value judgment on it. But I have to do less than that for it to <i style="">feel</i> ironic to me, because a) seeing that someone else doesn’t get it is always easier than getting it for myself, and b) once I’ve seen that another person doesn’t understand, it’s tempting to stop right there, because already I feel smarter than somebody else. I’m in the club. </p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;"><br /></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">Think of middle school for five seconds. If you have a smile on your face, it’s because you’re thinking of how you’re not there now. Five seconds is all it takes to remember that all you need to feel you belong to a group is evidence of someone who doesn’t. The same goes for war—all Roosevelt and Stalin needed to get them to hang out was that dick Hitler. And the same goes for brand identity—in his essay <i style="">E Unam Pluribus,</i> David Foster Wallace recalls a commercial featuring a guy who cleverly sells Pepsi to an impulsive crowd to illustrate the ubiquity of irony in TV commercials: It creates in me the sense that all these people don’t get it, but I <i style="">do. </i>All I have to get is that someone else doesn’t, and I’m connected. I’m in the club. Like middle school, when social psychology first begins to spread its many-feathered wings, the first level of ironic perception hinges on understanding nothing more complex than that someone else does not understand. However, like college, a nuanced perception of irony may require some flat-out work to reach, but once there you can hang out with your study group and tell stories about the days when you were friends with Stalin and Pepsi.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><br /></span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" >your neighbor as yourself.</span></b></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><br /><b style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:14;" ><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style=""> </span>I have a local friend at the local pub. (By which I mean that, at the pub just down the street from my house, there is a 30something dude who is reliably seated at one particular corner of the bar, and that he often calls me over to chat and catch up about things that are, to the untrained ear, not at all different from the things about which we have recently caught up.) Last week I sat down to talk and have a beer with him and his girlfriend. Conversation went something like this. “I tell you man, the acid Leo sold me yesterday was almost as wild as that gnarly ecstasy I was rolling on last time I saw you.” A pause. “But it was last weekend that was the real trip—I scored an enormous stash of mushrooms, they cost a lot but I got a discount ‘cos I bought a <i style="">bunch</i>.” As he continued in this vein, I raised my eyebrows and looked down the bar at the girlfriend, who I knew to be a regular drinker but one who categorically refused to use drugs. She stared off at the neon and nodded in that absent, you’ll-know-I’ve-heard-something-new-when-I-stop-nodding kind of way. The other choice topic that night was my friend’s work as a sort of rogue auto mechanic. His work had been spotty, but recently he’d had a vision—he spoke excitedly of getting his business license and building a clientele, were it not for the prohibitively expensive start-up costs. As he continued to talk about his dreams of a business and his inability to get the money together, he became increasingly frustrated by what he felt was the catch-22 of the situation. This was not self-wallowing despondency; he was legitimately unable to see how he could move forward. I’d been a willing ear for half an hour at this point, and did not expect to play any other role, so when he asked what I thought I was almost surprised. So I said what came to mind. “It sounds like the drugs are really working out for you.” He looked at me with a blank sort of disconnect, though past him I caught the face of his girl: She flashed a little half-smile at me, and she winked. I cocked an eyebrow in return and, feeling I had accomplished some small thing, I wished them well and left for home.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style=""> </span><br /></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="text-indent: 0in; line-height: normal;">It’s interesting how, in the literary world, the grandest, most full-body irony inspires in its readers a sense of belonging not so dissimilar from that produced by the middle-school, Pepsi-Generation ironies which David Foster Wallace so articulately cautions against. <i style="">Oedipus Rex</i> is not a work I first encountered and personally aligned myself with—as I did with <i style="">To Kill a Mockingbird </i>or <i style="">The Catcher in the Rye </i>or <i style="">The Breakfast Club</i>—yet it holds in it something so profound and human that it nonetheless became a meaningful reference point for me when I read it at age 15 and remains so now at 30. It’s a means both of personally understanding and of talking about hubris and frailty as pitfalls we all must cross over—it doesn’t offer answers, but of course it doesn’t, it’s a tragedy, and tragedies can’t provide answers because nobody wants to see a play called <i style="">7 Ways to Win Friends and Still Have Life Run Incestuously, Murderously Off the Track.</i> What <i style="">Oedipus Rex </i>is is a framework, for individual understanding, yes, but also for connecting, for discussing with you what I’ve just seen or read and us feeling closer as a result. And, <i style="">Oedipus Rex </i>is an irony.</p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;"><br /></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">Fiction has the luxury of imaginary characters that can abandon their imaginary infants and sleep with imaginary mothers. An author can aspire that his audience will perceive an irony and take something good or profound from it, but even a Faulkner-sized ego needn’t concern itself with the future well being of characters it created. When my local bar friend had asked me for my take on his predicament, he’d not been interested in the power-point of my opinion. I’d had only about a sentence to work with; I looked at him, his girlfriend, then him again, and what presented itself was an irony. In retrospect I’m almost proud of it—it was perhaps the best thing I could’ve said. Fowler’s definition is dead-on but, too, it leaves out that there’s a personal motivation behind the creation of any given irony. Even with a teensy, in-the-moment one like in my conversation at the bar, there’s a fourth order of intentionality that cycles back to the irony’s creator: Mark <i style="">hopes</i> that Girlfriend will <i style="">feel </i>less alone in her<i style=""> perception</i> that Local Friend does not <i style="">understand.</i> Likewise, Stephen <i style="">hoped</i> that Mark would be <i style="">comforted</i> by evidence that he’s not alone in <i style="">perceiving </i>that George does not <i style="">understand. </i>Of course, an ironist’s aspirations for the sum effect could be negative instead of positive, but either way there <i style="">is</i> a hope there, and that intentionality drives the creation of any irony. Without that fourth order of connective intent, the other three drift apart somewhat, and we end up not sure that the creator’s true meaning is different from the literal. Which, in Colbert’s case, would consign him to the unenviable task of “giv[ing] people the truth, unfiltered by rational argument.”</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-14541562280725946292009-04-21T10:41:00.000-07:002009-04-21T10:43:59.277-07:00I'M VERY HAPPY TO BE HERE.<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/FMJhBnJgy2c&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/FMJhBnJgy2c&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />and, since we're here, please give it up for my band sexual chocolate. SEXUAL CHOCOLATE!!<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/jWEHETqjWRs&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/jWEHETqjWRs&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9583913.post-58390446865028036672009-04-17T15:07:00.000-07:002009-04-17T15:08:29.256-07:00be on the lookout for an eastern european male with bad teeth who may have access to an ape.<a href="http://blog.earnmydegree.com/heroes-of-the-job-criminal-justice-edition-csi-miami/">i'm just sayin'.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0