Blog
March 27, 2008
HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY:
Going to see a friend's improv show at the Upright Citizen's Brigade and hanging out with his funny cute young smart friends afterwards.
LOWLIGHT OF THE DAY:
Going to see a friend's improv show at the Upright Citizen's Brigade and having one of his funny cute young smart friends ask if I was his father.
ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE DAY:
Being last or next to last in both my NCAA pools. 13th of 14 in one and dead last in the other. The truth: There is nothing worse than being in the middle of the pack. Doing the worst is every bit as impressive an achievement as doing the best--as a reliable counterindicator is of every bit as much value as an oracle. To be 2 standard deviations from the mean (if even in the wrong direction) is a point of perverse pride. Or at least grounds for a transparently pathetic attempt at convincing myself of my enduring specialness.
I guess it's a good thing I didn't go to Vegas this year. (After 7 years, we are taking a hiatus this year. Late on the last Wednesday in March (i.e. now) is when I traditionally leave for the airport for the annual reunion. It feels strange not to be going this year. But somehow right. I'll spend the next few days losing money in the stock market instead.)
THEORY OF THE DAY:
A few friends and I were wondering why Coke tastes so much better in Paris. After some conjecture about different formulas, I came upon the following hypothesis. Coke tastes better in Paris than in NY for the same reason Orangina tastes better in New York that it does in Paris. One savors the associations of the iconic brand through the prism of cultural displacement. Coke in Europe tastes of the suddenly pure and mythic American experience. Orangina in New York is endowed with the charmed and slightly exotic aura of European travel. By some fascinating perceptual alchemy, the products' brand associations (their connotative baggage) enhance the actual experience of their consumption.
Or, of course, perhaps the water is different. Or there's more sugar.
CONFESSION OF THE DAY:
For personal reasons, Smiley faces make me sad.
MUSIC VIDEO IDEA OF THE DAY:
Dual videos for the song "Afternoon Delight" to appeal to different demographics (or at least different psychographics). In one, we hear "Oooohhh afternoon delight...." as a couple has a passionately amorous mid-day encounter. In the other, we hear the same lyrics as a man (played by yours truly) drifts off to a nice afternoon nap.
BEST MUSIC VIDEO EVER OF THE DAY:
Leonard Cohen singing "Tower of Song" accompanied by the humble supplicant Bono and his U2 companions. (This performance ends the documentary about Leonard Cohen "I'm Your Man").
MUSICAL LYRIC OF THE DAY: (From the abovementioned song.)
"The bridges are burning that we might have crossed/And I feel so close to everthing that we lost/We'll never, we'll never have to lose it again."
INTRA-PSYCHIC PHENOMENON OF THE DAY:
Having to be very careful not to misdial my friend's number--as it's very similar to my ex-girlfriend's number. Only one digit separating a quippy sports chat from a fall through a hole in the fabric of the world.
REVISION OF THE DAY:
Yes, the preceding is a slight exaggeration. The experiences are actually separated by 2 digits.
SUGGESTED BAND NAME OF THE DAY:
Helmet Dress
MID-WEEK WISH OF THE DAY:
For a day of simple dignity to appreciate--in all its perfect imperfection, in all it's gloriously infinite finitude--the simple dignity of day.
ASSOCIATED FRUSTRATION OF THE DAY:
The simple dignity of day
giving way
to the indignity
of the subway.
LFAQs of THE DAY:
In all of his not so subtle attacks on Obama (including the recent slimy innuendos about his lack of patriotism), has Bill Clinton been motivated primarily by marital loyalty or political envy? By love or ego? By wanting to see his wife succeed or by not wanting to see himself superceded? Well, I guess it's a less frequently asked question, because the answer is so obvious.
Can you be a wonk about anything other than politics and policy or does being a wonk in any other area turn you into a geek?
Which is greater: America's sense of exceptionalism or Eliot Spitzer's sense of exceptionalism?
Can't you just feel the absence of funk?
SADNESS OF THE DAY:
I heard that a troubled brother of my father's wife had suddenly died. While I was not at all close with him, and, in fact, hadn't even seen him in about 15 years, I had asked after him recently during the dinner I had with my half-sister (his neice) on the occasion of what would have been my father's 80th birthday. I think I felt some slight connection with him (based on a little philosophical/emotional/mental misadventure in my early 20s that took me out of the orbit of my life for a time) as a partial outcast from the human community. Or at least as a sort of relatably interrupted narrative. He had been a normal seeming young man until a car he was driving crashed, killing his best friend. He blamed himself and never recovered from the trauma...or at least so I was told by his father when he and I spoke at my father's Memorial Service in June. In any event, for either physiological or psychological reasons, he was pretty much a strange marginal figure for the rest of his life--unable to hold down a job or enter the mainstream of human society. He had evidently been most at home in the company of canines and over the last dozen or so years, he had lived in a big house with dozens of dogs he'd adopted.
I was surprised by how shaken I was by the news of his passing. I think it was largely due to the fact that the call I received from my sister reporting the unfortunate news was hauntingly reminiscent of the call I got from her telling me that my father had died...and reawakened all the pain and disorientation of that sudden, shocking loss. I was also struck by the image of him being found face down on the floor of his house, surrounded by his dogs. It has really stuck with me.
While I have not always been that close with my father's wife, my heart goes out to her for the fact that, within the space of a year, she has lost her husband and her brother and will soon, no doubt, lose her aged (and now heartbroken) parents. Life is an amazingly brutal thing sometimes And perhaps nothing in it is so awe-inspiring as the reality of its ending. Body shots to the heart. Holes punctured in the imaginary sky.
Another death at the cusp of spring--at the threshold of the thawing season.
DESCRIPTIVE FRAGMENT OF THE DAY:
It was a glimpse of another way he might have gone through time.
RANDOM SINGLE SENTENCE PORTRAIT OF THE DAY:
He was better at describing experiences than at participating in them.
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March 21, 2008
POLITICAL COMMENT OF THE DAY: A few thoughts about Obama, Race and the Presidential race.
My overwhelming response to the Obama speech: Wow. Beautiful. Intelligent. Nuanced. Historic. The 800 pound gorilla in the national room is finally being addressed in a balanced, candid, non-recriminatory and eminently adult way by an individual uniquely positioned to do so. In terms of basic human truthfulness and the promise of a more enlightened and adult politics, this is an order of magnitude above what any of the other candidates is offering. And if America doesn't elect this guy, it is clearly not as great a country as it likes to believe that it is.
I think the highest praise I can pay the address is this: When I finished watching it, I really wanted to share it with everyone I loved and cared about--including my father. I wanted to call him and say “Dad, you should see this. It's really something.”
That said, a fear and a couple of minor but enduring nitpicks and quibbles.
The fear: That goodwill being a far more fragile thing than mistrust and fear, I couldn't help but be afraid that this message of nuanced hopefulness and collective responsibility could never survive the abuses, reductions and misrepresentations of our soundbite, spin-happy culture.
The nitpicks and quibbles: My biggest reservation about the speech (and the moment in all Obama's eloquent paeans that makes me cringe a little), is when -in the course of his inspirational appeals to the forces of unity prevailing over those of divisiveness --he alludes to the new common enemy of the corporations "who outsource our jobs to foreign countries." After being so refreshingly candid and eminently adult in acknowledging the complexities of the race issue, it just seems so disappointingly un-adult and cheaply manipulative to invoke American protectionism as a way of denying the difficult realities of globalism. I would have preferred that he not try to unite the races behind the common enemy of the outsourcing corporate villains--as this constitutes little more than a convenient displacement of the societal rage. The adult reality --and one almost as complex and nuanced as the reality of race in America--is that "outsourcing" is an irrevocable and vital part of new global economy in which we live. As McCain of all people has been candid enough to admit, those jobs are gone and they're not coming back. Nor, necessarily, should they. In the larger picture, every outsourced job is arguably just the flip side of an unacknowledged societal benefit. It is up to us as Americans to meet the challenge of the new century by retooling and retraining ourselves to accommodate these inevitable and irrevocable changes--just as it's up to us as Americans to grow up and face the challenges of being a multi-cultural, multi-racial society. (But that said: I can fully appreciate Obama's reasons for not asking us to be face such complex adult realities on all fronts. We all need our shelter and we all need our illusions. And by way of clarification: I do not deny that there are huge, systemic problems with our current corporate culture. I am merely taking issue with the attack on the corporate outsourcing of jobs.)
The other nitpick: It seems somewhat unfortunate that it took this potentially explosive political controversy surrounding Rev. Wright for Obama to deliver this speech. In other words, it is highly unlikely that he ever would have addressed this critical matter in such candid, eloquent and powerful terms had it not become politically expedient--indeed necessary --to do so. But, again, a minor quibble that does not diminish my overall appreciation of the power and importance of the address or my appreciation of his compelling virtues as a candidate.
MUSICAL NOTE OF THE DAY:
When I heard that the drummer from ABBA had been found dead, my first response was "ABBA had a drummer?" I really wasn't trying to be funny (ok, well, maybe a little bit.) It was just that it was sort of like being told the drummer from Bread or from Enya had passed away. I love Abba--but in my mind's ear I can only hear the sweetly moving, deeply innocent melodies, never the rhythm or the beat. Oh wait: One exception: "Dancing Queen." And yet still--the beat and danceability of that song seem sustained by the synth/keyboard, bass and guitars--not the drum. Anyhow, it's obviously a sad thing--as all death is. But it really shouldn't prevent a reunion tour.
LFAQs OF THE DAY:
Which was the more important and uncomfortable topic candidly addressed by an African American politician this week: Race in America by Barak Obama or Adultery (or man's prediliction towards unfaithfulness) by David Paterson?
When did Kathleen Turner turn into Tony Curtis in a wig?
Did the beautiful young woman who said I looked like Burt Bachrach (an absurdity!) just say that because that was the oldest living person whose name she knew?
After trying (and happily failing) to commit actual suicide, is Owen Wilson's decision to star in Drillbit Taylor an attempt at committing career suicide?
Y'all???? When did that creep into every well educated northerner's vernacular?
CARTOON WITHOUT ILLUSTRATION OF THE DAY:
A sheep leader telling a herd of sheep: "Repeat after me: I am not a sheep."
OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
There is a joy that is inseparable from sadness and a sadness that is inseparable from joy.
JOURNO-POLITICO-COMEDIC OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
Heard Ben Karlin (Former head writer of the Onion, Executive Producer of "The Daily Show" and co-creator of "The Colbert Report") interviewed on NPR's "Sounds of Young America" this weekend. I was struck by his mystification about how at the peak of The Daily Show's popularity, journalists would always come up to him and express envy. "Wow, we wish we could do what you guys do!", they'd exclaim, like the Onion boys were the coolest kids in the class. But in reality, what were the Onion guys doing? They were simply digging up old clips of Cheney and Bush saying the exact opposite of what they were now saying. In other words, they were simply exposing the lies, hypocrisies and contradictions that were a matter of public record. And this was precisely what the cowed and abdicating journalists had convinced themselves they were not allowed to do. Really kind of amazing.
MY TWO FAVORITE FILM QUOTES OF THE DAY: (Or self portrait through two film quotes).
"I made a mistake...ok. I made a mistake!" -Sean Penn, shattered and alone at the end of "Sweet and Lowdown."
"I want to become immortal and then to die." --From Godard's "Contempt"
ABSURDITY OF THE DAY:
President Bush let his inner adventurer out while discussing the state of the war in Afghanistan with military and civilian personnel. While those in Afghanistan detailed the logistical and diplomatic problems via teleconference, the President took a much more whimsical approach to their mission. Via Reuters: "I must say, I'm a little envious," Bush said. "If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed."
"It must be exciting for you ... in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You're really making history, and thanks," Bush said.
Just like he felt about Vietnam at the time.
ART COMMENT OF THE DAY:
Saw the Cai Guo Qaing exhibit at the Guggenheim. Certainly the most compelling use (and transformation) of that iconic space I've ever seen. The central piece de resistance is the installation of a time elapsed car explosion. We see the car at the base of the museum and then in 8 subsequent stages of twisting suspended elevation as if in the wake of a bombing. There is also a stunning piece comprised of a pack of wolves running so hard that they elevate off the ground. As we ascend the spiral rotunda, we follow them as they continue to "run" through the air until they suddenly smash into an invisible (plexiglass) wall and pile-up in mangled and distended fashion on the ground.
A couple of striking things about the show: One is, that while it's one of the coolest art experiences you'll ever see, you never even remotely feel like he's showing off. He truly feels like he's in the grip of larger concerns. History, movement, violence, beauty etc.
Another interesting thing is the way that, in these exercises in carefully aestheticized violence, the beauty is somewhat abstracted from the destruction. For example, in both of the works described above, there is an elision of the moment of actual impact. The car is catapulted through the air, but is never mangled or misshapen by the implied explosion. And when it finally comes to rest at the top of the museum--after vaulting over the wall at the top of the spiralling ramp--it is in perfect mint-condition, ready to be driven away. SImilarly while the wolves are seen piled up in agony after the moment of terrible impact, we never see them crushed grotesquely against the plexiglass. They are already turning as they collide--already protected from the worst of it.
The imaginary reworking of the trauma; abstracting the beauty of the violence from its terrible effect.
STRANGE COINCIDENCE OF THE DAY:
No sooner did I write the description of the wolves running into the glass wall than I read that that poor ABBA drummer died in a freak accident after smashing into a glass door.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DAY:
Everything felt tampered with. Like someone had come in and subtly rearranged everything in his innermost room. Or perhaps had just picked up each thing and returned it to its exact same position--changing everything and nothing in the process.
RANDOM SINGLE SENTENCE PORTRAIT OF THE DAY:
He fought like a girl, but he cried like a man.
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Posted on 3/21/2008
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March 13, 2008
A FEW FINAL THOUGHTS ABOUT CLIENT 9:
Yes, it’s a classic tale of one man's lust, arrogance, hypocrisy, hubris, eros and thanatos. But let’s not forget that this was not a victimless crime. Not only did he humiliate his wife, his children and his party, but he really inconvenienced the hell out of clients 1-8!
It is truly ironic that Spitzer was so hell bent on bringing down illegal operations that he inadvertently brought down the one he was supporting!
Indeed, how crazy that it was an investigation into his conduct that led to the demise of the prostitution ring rather than the other way around!! More plainly put: The prostitution ring got in trouble because of the politician John instead of the politician John getting in trouble because of the prostitution ring.
I don’t know if you noticed, but Cialis had ads during almost every commercial break during the coverage of the breaking story—making it the most inadvertently apt media buy I’ve seen in a long time.
Watching David Boies, Alan Dershowitz, Mark Green and David Margolick on Charlie Rose talking about the case, I couldn’t help but wondering how many of them were silently thinking: "Damn. $6000 an hour!!! I’m one of the top lawyers in America and I only get a fraction of that." Indeed, as I learned from someone I know who works for Boies, the pre-eminent defense attorney bills just under $1000 an hour. So in effect, while he was getting $1000 an hour to keep AIG’s Hank Greenburg from getting screwed by Spitzer, this comely courtesan Kristin was getting paid six times that much per hour precisely to let him screw her.
LFAQs:
Will Eliot consort with the whores more or less frequently now that he’s out of the public eye?
Is Governor David A. Paterson also color blind?
FIVE COMMON MISINTERPRETATIONS OF ROTFL:
Really Overwhelming This Freaking Life
/>Ridiculous Old Terribly Failed Loser
Right on the Fallen Leaves.
Randy Old Tyrant Farts Loudly
Rich Ornery Turd Finally Leaps
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March 11, 2008
NEW FEATURE OF THE DAY: THE TEDDY VEGAS CELEBRITY RESEMBLANCE TRIANGULATION SERVICE.
Send me a picture of someone and I'll name three celebrities with some relevant dimension of physical similitude. For example, take Eliot Spitzer's wife.
The sides of that scalene of similitude would be:
Jennifer Aniston
Edie Falco
Jennifer Aniston's mother.
CLIENT 9 COMMENTARY OF THE DAY:
Well, I guess there were some impulses the Governor just couldn't govern. (Come to think of it: Why does that always seem to be the case with Governors?)
Now there are lots of people in the NY State government who want to write NY State's number one John (even if only #9 client) a Dear John letter.
My basic observation: I guess the only difference between self-righteous, moralizing Democrats and self-righteous, moralizing Republicans is that the former get caught with straight prostitutes and the latter with gay prostitutes.
I read that Spitzer stated, "I have disappointed and failed to live up to the standard I expected of myself."
What was not reported was that he continued:
"As a long practicing attorney, and a former Attorney General, I was intimately familiar with these kinds of operations and with the investigations into them. How could I have failed to foresee the possibility of wiretapping? Not to have foreseen that possibility and not to have insisted on direct person to person contact in purchasing the services of high class sex workers was simply…well, it was simply inexcusable. And for that I will never be able to forgive myself."
SAY WHAAAA??????? MOMENT OF THE DAY:
Just read the following headline "Cheney going to Mideast to push for peace." Wait a minute? Is it April Fools Day already? No? Hmmm. I haven't read the New Testament lately, but is that one of the signs of the Apocalypse? I mean Cheney only goes places to push for war, right? Yup, I just checked out the Bible. In order for the Second Coming to take place, the 12 tribes have to return to Israel and Cheney has to go to Jerusalem to push for peace. Wow. Put your affairs in order folks.
POLITICAL OBSERVATIONS OF THE DAY:
1)
Noam Chomsky and the Neo-Cons are just opposite sides of the same fundamental error. To wit, the need to clearly separate light from darkness. To valorize one thing through the denigration of the other. In the Neo-Con vision, America is the source of all global good. In Chomsky's case, by a far too facile inversion, America is the source of all global evil. It really doesn't make for very enlightened or interesting discourse. I wish I were still 22 years old and believed in the grand teleology of Hegelian Dialectics--in which case I could imagine this to be some vital moment of thesis and antithesis awaiting, through the glorious alchemy of determinate negation, the decisive moment of sublation (Aufhebung) and synthesis. As it is, I just see it as a pretty boring non dialogue. Forty miles of bad pavement on the road to nowhere.
2)
Hillary. The audacity of audacity.
To offer the candidate who's ahead of you in both the polls and the delegate count the honor of serving as your VP? Baby's got chutzpah. Or at least a deficit of shame. It's particularly ironic since she's been claiming as the cornerstone of her campaign that Obama is simply neither ready or qualified for the job.
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
There is --particularly when you're young--a liberating power to the recognition of universal narcissism. It makes you less self conscious to realize that while you're busy worrying about how you're coming across in a social situation , the other people are really focusing on how they're coming across and barely noticing you. There is a freedom and power in this awareness.
VIDEO IDEAS OF THE DAY:
a)
Video Idea: A stand-up comedian is making dick-ish, guy jokes about his ex girlfriend and then jthe truth of their break up actually hits him and h just breaks down crying.
b)
People literally holding their or someone else's heads up to the Zombie's song (originally The Argent Song) "Hold your head up...woah...Hold your head up...woah...Hold your head up...woah...Hold your head up!" The heads could be attached or not attached. But if they are not attached to a body, it could be pretty creepy.
LFAQs of the DAY:
Does Bush still believe he can win the war?
Does OJ still believe he will find the killer?
Does Hillary still believe she found her voice in New Hampshire?
Who was Client 10...and is he feeling a little neglected right now?
Was the market rallying today on the Fed move or was it just Spitzer-based schadenfreude?
Who are you voting for: the crazy old guy, the muslim terrorist or the castrating bitch? (Oh wait: This is for LESS frequently asked questions. Sorry.)
QUOTE OF THE DAY:
"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position."
-Geraldine Ferraro
What does this even mean? Is she trying to say he has an advantage because, as we all know from our history, black men always enjoy an advantage in national electoral campaigns?
I guess she's implying that if Hillary were a man, she wouldn't be in this position either.
It's not only incomprehensibly crass and stupid: it's sort of just plain incomprehensible.
Anyhow, I guess she's now in a lot of hot water. And I guess all we can say is:
Geraldine: If you were a smart person, you wouldn't be in this position.
PEEVE OF THE DAY:
In the course of a 15 minute meeting, I endured the following malopropisms, neologisms and solecisms. Ok. Make that the following linguistic turds:
"Transcends" was used to mean "pervades."
"Infer" was used to mean "imply."
"Imply" was used to mean "infer."
"Supposably" was invented to mean "supposedly."
"Subsidence" was invented to mean "subsistence."
And no one seemed to care or mind.
Am I just a fussy little scold or is this unacceptable? (I guess I should have put that as an LFAQ--but whatever.)
BAND NAME OF THE DAY:
Sartorial Mullet.
RANDOM SINGLE SENTENCE PORTRAIT OF THE DAY:
He was a miracle of syllabic inefficiency.
PHENOMENON OF THE DAY:
Staring into the empty abyss of the past. The once native land you've been forever cast out of.
NOTE FROM THE JOURNAL OF MOURNING OF THE DAY:
March 8, 2008. I am trying to clear my mind of lingering fantasy hoops roster management questions (was i wrong to drop Foye for Noah?, Gooden for Kendrick Perkins? Should i give up on Ilgauskas returning in time for the fantasy playoffs and pick up Andray Blatche or Anderson Varejao in his stead?) and begin a proper meditation on my father's life on the occasion of what would have been his 80th birthday. I am avoiding and I know it. As I accept the pain that must accompany that path of reflection, the Foyes, Noahs and Goodens of the world scatter to the wind. I turn on the Jonathan Schwartz show on NPR and listen to a full playlist of Sinatra, Mel Torme, George Shearing and Tony Bennet--The vocalists of my father's adolescence and youung adulthood. The voices he simply loved. (and is there any love more simple and true than the love one has for one's songs?) I think about what I would have wanted to do with my father today in celebration of his 80th were he still around to be feted and I immediately know it would involve an outing to hear live music. For his 75th, we took him to hear one of his favorite lounge singers--Mary Cleere Haran--at the Oak Room in the Alginquin. We were given the front, central table-- and I can still see the look of deep pleasure he had surrounded by his family and being serenaded by the enchanting chanteuse...who singled him out for some flirtatious intersong banter. He was a man in his element. He loved music. And he loved to be surrounded by the people he loved. What I wouldn't do to give him an experience like that once again. While the passage of time and the rehearsal of the story of his passing has made the wound of his absence somewhat less raw, it is still almost inconceivable to me that he is not here to call and sing happy birthday to today. That he is not here to be helped into a jazz club to be dined, feted and serenaded once again. His face, his expression of warmth and gratitude and pleasure are all so vivid to me. So heart warmingly, heart breakingly vivid.
As I think about him on the occasion of his 80th (and first to be celebrated in absentia), I reflect on what gifts he has bestowed upon me. One, is certainly a love of music. But I am also appreciative for his having taught me (by example) the value of generosity, humor and warmth. I think he would have been touched and delighted to know that I have been celebrating this day by listening to his favorite radio show and will be celebrating it later by having dinner in his honor and memory with my half sister. I think it would warm his heart to know that even though we are very different people travellling in very different orbits, we have stayed involved in one anothers' lives. And it would warm his heart to know that though I haven't had red meat in ages, I will be honoring his big day by donning the shearling coat that he left me and eating his favorite dinner: Steak with "a little side salad. " And maybe some chocolate cake or a hot fudge sundae for dessert. I will chew my food carefully and slowly and imagine him doing so himself on his two or three remaining teeth. And I will make sure to enjoy every bite of it as if it might be my last. For if there is one thing his shockingly sudden passing has taught me (in a felt in the bones, entirely non-theoretical way), it is that it always truly might be.
I send off a quick e-mail to the scattered members of his remaining family: My brother, my half-sister, my step-mother:
" Just wanted to invite you to join me in singing a virtual electronic round of song on this festive but solemn day:
One-two, a one-two-three-four....
Happy birthday to you.
Happy birthday to you.
Happy birthday dear Dad... (or, for Carla: Dear Al...)
Happy birthday to you!!!!!
We love and miss you and we wish you were here to celebrate this day with us."
I sing it out loud and start to cry at the "Dear Dad" part.
The word "Dad". It just struck me that I will never be able to use it again in the mode of address. It is a word or at least a particular usage of a word that has been forever retired from my lexicon. I hang it now in the hall of fame of words as I close my eyes to blow out the birthday candle in my mind.
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March 07, 2008
POLITICAL COMMENT OF THE DAY:
When I hear those Wall Street Republicans talk about the upcoming election, I often want to say to them what the Francis McDormand character said to the psycho-killer she's apprehended after finding him feeding his accomplice into the wood chipper in "Fargo": "Jeez. Don't you people realize there's more to life than a little bit of money?"
ELECTION NOTES: (After the Ohio and Texas Primaries)
Hillary. So cheesy in delivering her applause lines. Sometimes delightfully cheesy, sometimes annoyingly cheesy. But always, always cheesy. It's as if she subordinates the content of the line to its vaguely impressive rhetorical structure. It's like "Wow...it's so fun that words can do this!! And that I'm up here basking in my glory while I'm speaking them!"
I was also struck by how shamelessly and cyncically she has coopted all of the language that has resonated during the political season. In other words, all of Obama's themes and terms. Hope. Change. Yes We Will! Etc. Etc. Etc. And it is as if she has done so without any pangs of conscience or sense of inner fraudulence; as if THAT's what she's been saying all along!! It sort of mirrors the seamless way she switches positions (or at least changes her emphasis and perspective on the positions...that is, the story she tells about her track record and her positions) whenever political expediency demands it. Really sort of amazing. But I guess at the end of the day she IS a politician.
Amy Poehler has now eclipsed Oprah as the most politically influential woman in American.
I mean, who would have though that she (via SNL) would have more of an impact on the Democratic primaries than Bill Maher, Bill O'Reilly, Charlie Rose, John McLaughlin etc. etc. combined?
If Mike Hucakbee proved one thing during this election cycle it's this: You don’t need a lot of money to lose a national election.
LFAQs:
When I saw the guy stealing a full bottle of Tabasco sauce from Chipotle was I outraged because I was morally offended or because I was a shareholder?
I just read that after years of escalating popularity, golf is suddenly on the wane as an American pastime. My question: Are Americans quitting golf because they are tired of OJ accosting them on the course and asking as part of his tireless ongoing investigation: “Did you kill my wife??”
Listening to Obama, I couldn't help but thinking: Great orator. Great candidate., But don't these guys ever get tired of hearing their own speeches? Of telling their own stories? Of endlessly, if eloquently, repeating themselves?
BELATED OSCAR QUIBBLES OF THE DAY:
Daniel Day Lewis. Great but ultimately over-rated performance. Too grand. Too broad. Too clearly performed with an eye towards Oscar-ish immortality. Would have preferred a modicum of restraint. To have seen him not cross the line into self-caricature. Also felt that Javier Bardem's performance was over-rated. Although I have to confess that I only saw him in the trailers (Skipped the movie as I'd read the book and don't like to have my original imaginings contaminated by or replaced with a specific cinematic envisioning of the text. Sort of the same reason I don't like music videos). But I would never let anything as minor as a failure to see a performance keep me from judging it!
Here's my point: The role is too easy. The character as written (in the book) is a haunting abstraction made flesh. He does not conform to any notion of naturalistic representation. The lines as written are so extreme that virtually any performance of them--virtually any intepretation of them--virtually any incarnation of them--virtually any mere mouthing of them--would be haunting and unforgettable. You could have a dweeb simply reciting the lines with a lisp and it'd be chilling. You could have Wallace Shawn or Jim Carey do it. It doesn't matter. The very IDEA of this character is what haunts you...and the very concept that this idea (this infinitely amoral abstraction) can be made flesh. Or maybe it's just the haircut. Anyhow, rant over. Maybe someday I'll see the movie and disagree with my categorical a priori judgement. But I doubt it.
CONCEPT OF THE DAY:
Celebrity Death match OCD contests. One person's compulsive tic at a war to the death with another's. Repeated door lock checking versus compulsive desktop organization. Duelling dish washer loading systems. etc.
FACTOID AND RELATED OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
Just read that 1 in 99 American adults are now in prison. And the amazing thing is, neither Dick Cheney nor OJ Simpson is among them.
CHIASMUS OF THE DAY:
A man and woman. The man laughs during the day and cries in his dreams. The woman cries during the day and laughs in her dreams. A camera videotapes them sleeping side by side.
CONCEPT OF THE DAY:
Metro-Asexual. (But I guess that's a redundancy.) If Metro-Asexuals had a tag line it'd be "Come check out our shiny new armpits!!"
OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
For some, the gift store card advice is "Dare to be Remarkable." for others the more useful and relevant message would be "Dare to be Unremarkable." (A corrolary to Freud's maxim that the goal of Psycho-Analysis was "to turn extraordinary suffering into ordinary misery.")
ONIONESQUE (SHALLOT-LIKE) HEADLINE OF THE DAY:
Man wins fantasy league. Loses reality girlfriend.
WHAT I LEARNED TODAY:
a)
That to "subitize" means to instantly judge the number of items in a group.. As in three or four things apprehended as the gestalt or totality of "threeness" or "fourness". It comes from the Latin "Subitus" which means "sudden." And sudden has always been one of my favorite words. (As a corollary: "A sudden sky" has always been one of my favorite phrases.)
b)
That the numbers we use are Arabic numerals. This might be publiciczed to help counter anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment in our country. Although now that I think about it, doing so would probably simply strengthen anti-math sentiment.
c)
Anne Frank was a babe! I saw a photo of her in which she looks a little like Natalie Portman.
OBSERVATION:
Struck by the persistence and fixity of topography and by its strange mutability in dreams. I am thinking of certain early childhood landscapes and the way they provide ur-templates for the unconscious life.
DIGNIFIED AND DIGNIFYING MEDIA PHENOMENON OF THE DAY:
The eloquent silent tribute to the Iraqi war dead on The Jim Lehrer Nightly News Hour.
METS/PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:
I've always taken it as axiomatic (an article of faith) that where Yankees fans were agressive-aggressive, Mets fans were passive aggressive. This also extended to the nature of the respective organizations. In any event, I got further confirmation of this hypothesis the other day. A guy I know has had a pair of Mets season tickets for a number of years. This year, he found out they were boosting the price substantially and were not giving him the location upgrade they'd promised him last year after he'd already pre-paid for the --oops--playoffs. He was quietly and sulkingly unhappy about it. His wife --a no nonsense producer type kept telling him to call and complain but he seemed more comfortable not calling and complaining. Finally, she got sick of his moping and made an incensed call in their behalf--vehemently complaining about the situation and demanding something be done about it. The organization, entirely unfamiliar with such direct and confrontational behavior, simply didn;t know what hit them and instantly succumbed. The result: A pair of field level season tickets right behind home ...for the same price they'd been paying for mezzanine or loge seats half way down the left field line. The key: She is only a Mets fan through marriage. By temperment and background, she's really a Yankees fan. The woman knows how to kick some ass. So attention, Mets fans. Get yourself a Yankee fan spouse!
RANDOM SINGLE SENTENCE PORTRAIT OF THE DAY:
His mojo was last seen on the side of a milk carton.
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Posted on 3/7/2008
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