**** Satori Floss Wand
Boston's dirty little secret is that it's a dirty little city. I can't walk one foot within stepping over a piece of litter, ranging from the innoculous cigarette butts and bottle caps to the obnoxious coffee cups and styrofoam takeout containers. I think that my mind has learned to regard litter as a naturally-occuring byproduct of the cityscape, like leaves in a forest or shells on a beach.
There are numerous environmental factors contributing to Boston's litter problem. For instance, Boston's streets evolved from literal cowpaths, and hence are narrow and twisted, leaving little room for trash receptacles. Boston is also windy, with a higher average wind speed than even Chicago, making it difficult to contain even properly-disposed trash. Most damning, the city of Boston is simply riddled with assholes.
Walking to the office this morning, I stood with a mass of pedestrians waiting to cross a side street along Atlantic Avenue. People looked impatiently from the "Don't Walk" sign to the oncoming cars, but everyone quelled the urge to flagrantly jaywalk across the street at the slightest break in traffic.
Suddenly, a flash of white arrayed from the tinted driver-side window of a large luxury-class passenger vehicle, and something clattered at my feet. I looked down to see a white plastic disposable dental floss wand tottering on the curb. A steady rage boiled as I ticked off the number of social sins associated with this floss wand. A person bought a plastic flossing wand so that they could floss their teeth while driving their oversized car and then toss it out the window at a crowd of pedestrians. And now, it's sitting in the street, where it will get blown and tossed for months until it meets its ultimate fate... in the harbor, in a landfill, in the throat of a yakking dog.
| Wednesday January 30 2008
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**** Rudy Failed
In a surprise move, Floridan voters displayed actual signs of intelligence in yesterday's Republican primary when they effectively ended Rudy Giuliani's delusions of Presidency by handing him a distant third-place finish (here).
Giuliani devoted a bulk of his campaign's time and resources to winning over the notoriously pliant voters in that notoriously pablum state, hoping to set off a chain-reaction of absolute lunacy across the Red States that would culminate in a Presidential victory.
But it seems even Florida wasn't impressed enough by Rudy's opportunistic exploitation of 9/11 to look past his severe moral failings and liberal leanings. Maybe, each time he shook a voter's hand, a foreboding flash of the Future as ruled by President Giuliani seared their brains: Giant scars of scorched Earth, plumes of smoke, piles of burned bodies, a global holocaust brought about by a bullying, hostile American President and a whore of a First Lady.
"I'm proud that we chose to stay positive and run a campaign of ideas....We ran a campaign that was uplifting," Giuliani said yesterday, pointedly using the past tense. I don't know if it was the uplifting positivity or the ideas that turned you off, Florida, but good job. (Extra points for staying off the Huckabee.)
**** Beverage Review: Starbucks Tall Skinny Mocha
Yesterday, in the throes of a dual craving for caffeine and calcium, I paid a rare visit to the Starbucks located off the lobby in my office building. This particular Starbucks attracts fanatical patrons who act as if they drink Kool-Aid rather than coffee. There is always a long, painful line of people wearing suits.
A Starbucks employee with a trendy buzzcut and a headset approaches two giggly young ladies who preceded me in line. This employee's job is to take drink orders from customers as they wait in line for the cashier. This speeds up service, lest some guy who is late for a meeting someday freaks out and kills everyone.
"That's a Grande Skim Sugar-free Extra Hot Caramel Macchiato and a Iced Venti Soy Tazo Chai," she said into her headset, and then moved onto me. "What will you be having today?"
I squinted at the menu like a lame Starbucks bumpkin and began piecing together random buzzwords that my eyes gleaned. "I'll have a latte... skinny... mocha... tall?" I said. "Tall skinny mocha!" she piped into her headset, then pointed me over to the cashier, who demanded $3.83, which seemed entirely reasonable.
I crowded into the small drink pick-up area, where an awkward ad-hoc assemblage of people stared glumly at the bottleneck: One grand old lady in an orange fur coat who ordered five drinks that all came out wrong. She spoke to the baristas as if they were someone else's servants. Then, stunned, "There's not a tray that can hold five cups?"
My Tall Skinny Mocha is of the new line of "skinny" drinks that boasts "sugar-free syrup, perfectly steamed nonfat milk, and a dash of foam"(here for press release). (Here is the famous letter to Starbucks brass from insubordinate barista, who points out that "skinny" is politically incorrect, and that the sudden change in terminology will cause "miscommunication between customers and partners, partners calling drinks and partners making drinks, and partners making drinks calling the drinks to the customers waiting to receive their drinks." In order words, total fucking chaos.)
The tall skinny mocha carries a discernible, genuine chocolate flavor, but where's the coffee? The chalky aftertaste turned me off, and halfway through, I put it aside and forgot about it. This morning I arrived at work to find the Starbucks cup still on my desk, cold remnants of the 4-dollar drink taunting me with its worthlessness.
**** Geepers
One of my favorite things about XC skiing at Great Glen Trails this past weekend (besides periodic snow tubing breaks and the cafeteria's classic cardboard molten-cheese pizza) was how they named their intricate maze of trail loops. While every XC ski center bestows colorful and whimsical names on their trails, Great Glen Trails translated each name into French on the wooden signs along the trails!
So, I was nordic skiing and learning French at the same time. It was like some kind of EuroNerd paradise.
For instance, the trail named "Whiplash" was also identified as "Coup du lapin." "Drifter" was "Errance." As we progressed, we discovered that some of the translation weren't literal. "Dancer" was "La Valse," which means Waltz. "Pipsqueak" was translated into the French as "the cute little trail."
But the best was "Geepers," translated as "Hoo-la-la." Incidentally, "hoo-la-la" is Mr. Pinault's favorite expression of woeful incredulity (not be confused with ooh-la-la, which is more upbeat.) Now, everytime he says this, I'm going to translate this in my head as "Geepers," and think him to be old-fashioned.
**** XXXC Ski
Sexy pants: the tight-fitting, spandexesque leggings that are worn by nordic skiers who desire speed. Sexy pants are not to be confused with sex pants, which are noises similar to the noises made by those wearing sexy pants while skiing uphill.
I had resisted XC skiing in sexy pants until I honed the skills to back up the inherent statement of ability that sexy pants make. Flailing novices don't attract too much attention on the trails, but a skier in sexy pants better stay upright, lest they become an object of mockery among the plodding lifelong nordic skiers who wear blue jeans with handmade gaiters.
My previous XC ski pants were baggy, and gave no hint of the shapely figure contained within. As you can imagine, Mr. Pinault was keen on getting me into a pair of sexy pants and out of the Grandma pants (terminology culled from underwear distinctions). While in France, we stopped at a ski shop, where I picked out these Quechua pants (pictured right). Sporting goods never felt so naughty.
Sexy pants are not all about looks, of course. Tight pants offer lightweight warmth and elicit better response from one's muscles, improving speed, technique, and comfort. This past weekend, at Great Glen Trails at the base of Mount Washington in New Hampshire (here), my performance was amazing. I was so fast that Mr. Pinault, who is usually far ahead of me, was perpetually lingering behind me. It could have only been the sexy pants (wink wink).
(Pictured below is Mr. Pinault, tubing at Great Glen Trails in his sexy pants).
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**** Consumer Pep Talk
Fears of a global recession are mounting, as economists point to evidence of a "rare decline in personal consumption" among American shoppers, who account for 70 pecent of the country's economic activity (here). The NYTimes presented hard economic data as well as heartbreaking antecdotes, such as a Manhattan travel consultant who "shops at luxury chains like Saks" and is "trimming costs where she can by bringing lunch to work from home, rather than eating out." It's stories like these that are making the world's financial markets as well as Cosi shareholders shudder in collective horror.
But more scary than the penny-pinching American shopper who chooses to cutback on spending because of energy costs, falling home prices and a volatile stock market is the penniless American shopper who simply has no more money to spend. They have exhausted their bank account, their credit options, and must wait for their next paycheck before they can once again roam Wal-Mart like a mindless zombie intent on object acquisition (here).
Luckily, President Bush's $145 billion emergency economic stimulus plan includes tax breaks that specifically seek to bolster American spending. Says George, "Americans could use this money as they see fit -- to help meet their monthly bills, cover higher costs at the gas pump, or pay for other basic necessities" (here). Or they can use it to go to Wal-Mart and buy some new hunting apparel, like that Realleaf Coverall Suit with leafy facemask and removable mesh gloves that was made in the USA and/or Imported (here). Sweet!
President Bush concluded by saying "I'm optimistic about our economic future, because Americans have shown time and again that they are the most industrious, creative, and enterprising people in the world." You betcha! No other country in the world can step up and fill this void of rampant consumption that present uncertainities has created. No other country takes such delight in spending money they don't have on things they don't need... from sea to shining sea!
| Wednesday January 23 2008
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**** I'm Unofficially Officially Married
So tonight... Mr. Pinault and I got married. I never thought that I'd be married on a freezing cold January weekday in my living room. At least it's quite hard to get stood up in one's living room.
The Justice of the Peace was a lovely middle-aged woman, with thick long hair, wonderful glasses, and a faded English accent. She read the traditional wedding vows, asking Mr. Pinault and I in turn if we took each other to be our lawful wedded spouses. Mr. Pinault said "Yes, I do." I said "I do." After quoting Mark Twain, she made her pronouncement:
I now pronounce you husband and wife. May your days be good and long upon this abundant, green earth.
Yes, we are now legally wed, but since we didn't gush our vows or exchange any rings, and since none of our family or friends were there to witness it or cheer us on, the marriage is only unofficially official. Hopefully, the wedding night will be surprisingly official for a Wednesday.
As I told (warned) Mr. Pinault, "Now you need a lawyer to get rid of me." To which he retorted, "All I need to get rid of you is to lose my job and develop a passion for Nascar." See, we're already an old married couple, and it's only been an hour.
**** Piano Pick
Tonight at the Boston Symphony Orchestra, I saw the most amazing thing. Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 23 featured renowned classical pianist Mitsuko Uchida, who according to her website (here) is "Japanese by birth, trained in Vienna... and is happy to call herself an Englishwoman." Uchida bounced on stage to great applause and sat at the formable glossy black Steinway. A wisp of a woman wearing loose, colorful crepe clothing, she looked very New Age and relaxed. The orchestra started playing, and Uchida bobbed her head in rhythm, smiling serenely as she waited for her cue. Uchida is most famous for her Mozart concertos, which are well-suited for her crisp, blithe style. The audience tensed in anticipation of Uchida's entrance into the animated melody. Uchida steadied herself on the stool, faced the keyboard, and then, to the collective horror of Symphony Hall, proceeded to pick her nose. Twice. It was truly the most amazing thing. Perhaps she was getting in touch with her inner Mozart. And then, she played.
**** Movie Reviews: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and Before the Devil Knows Your Dead 
Sometimes, I crave a movie that has been focus-tested by a studio to be as uplifting as possible. I want cinema to serve as an escape from reality's doldrums. I want romance, sexy sex, an obvious villain, and a sugary, fizzy, Hollywood happy ending that I'll forget about the next day.
By those standards, both The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (here for movie website) and Before the Devil Knows Your Dead (here for YouTube trailer) are horrible movies. Had I been craving meaningful misfortune that forces me to rethink my entire existence and that of humanity's to boot, well, then they are near-masterpieces.
I went into The Diving Bell and the Butterfly knowing only that it was a French film by the American director of Basquiat. I didn't know that it was filmed entirely in a hospital from the perspective of a man waking from a coma after a massive stroke that has paralyzed his body except for his left eye. This knowledge would have precluded me seeing the movie, as I am squeamish and easily upset by medical catastrophes. But Mr. Pinault convinced me to come along since "You can practice your French." Yeah, and I can also practice not fainting in crowded movie theaters.
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly was supposed to be inspiring: Live every day as if it were your last! Don't let anything get in the way of your passions! There are no limits to your imagination! But I left the cinema teary and inconsolable for the remainder of the evening. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly has won Golden Globes for Best Director and Best Foreign Language Film and is generally acknowledged to be the Best Movie Ever. It is also a serious, serious bummer.
When I heard Before the Devil Knows Your Dead was a heist-gone-bad movie starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke, and directed by Sidney Lumet (who directed one of my all-time favorite films Dog Day Afternoon), I was expecting light violence and slight goofiness. Instead, the movie started out bleak and got progressively bleaker, with mounting follies finally exploding in full-blown misanthropic tragedy.
Yes, it was a good movie, but only a Schadenfreude connoisseur could of enjoyed it.
**** The Perfect Lead
In many forms of written discourse, the opening line(s) are not as important as the body or the conclusion. Take this paragraph, for example. Total fribble - I'll make up for it later.
But in journalism, the lead paragraph of an article is make-or-break. It contains the who, what, when, where, why, and how of the news event. This formula allows readers to skim a newspaper and quickly decide if an item is of interest. After the lead, journalists tack on details in order of importance, to assist copy editors who must lob off content to physically layout the newspaper. Hence, most news articles start spastically and ramble to an abrupt, boring finish.
The modus to which journalists must operandi doesn't allow for much creativity, so when I see a lead paragraph that satisfies all of the traditional criteria while establishing itself as hard news and soft news and using compelling literary devices like active conditional second-person voice, well, I must applaud it. The following lead belongs in journalism textbooks:
Drive across Virginia with an outsized rubber replica of testicles dangling from your trailer hitch and you face a fine under a bill before the General Assembly (here).
****I am a Prophet
While continuing to comb my archives for nuggets of genius, I found this uncharacteristic post that I wrote about Britney Spears from June 26, 2004 (back when my writing was still flabby.) Sometimes, my omniscience surprises even me.
Britney Spears and her dancer boyfriend are engaged, Spears' publicist said. Is there anything Britney Spears won't do for attention? Her life is just this endless sad string of publicity stunts. It's so sad.
No additional details are available... but my money is on a quick and calamitous dissolve to this latest mockery to the institution of marriage.
****Flashback #3
I wrote "The Waitress" on May 21, 2005, and it's always stuck in my mind as one of my favorite pseudo-fictional pieces. The waitress is based on my roommate at the time. I wanted to write about how strange it was to live with someone whose career trajectory and ambitions were so utterly diverged from my own, but I didn't want to sound haughty, so I took myself completely out of the narrative.
I wonder, if my former roommate ever were to read this, would she see herself in it? Would the last line give her the same shivers that it gives me?
****The Waitress
She started waiting tables after dropping out of college, because that's what a year of pre-Psychology could do for her. An initial liability: She despised people as a concept. Her forehead was chronically knotted with silent rage as she poured beers, served food, delivered condiments, fumbled with plates, silverware, and napkins, and uttered pleasantries and small talk. But it was an uncomplicated relationship: Here's the food, here's the drink, leave the tip on the table and go someplace else.
She liked staying up late and sleeping while the insane people of the world bustled to and fro school, the office, the store. Blah. She'd see them when they sought escape over plates of fried food and pints of Irish stout. She played off her surliness as spunk and believed customers liked it, that it awakened latent memories of their mothers. Because after birth, except for the near-extinct June Cleaver types, most mothers grow resentful that they really only function as a food source.
Despite her unwillingness to indulge customers, and though she was not attractive, she would often cash in more tips than her friend Dora, a wispy doe-eyed blond, or Gina, a lean big-breasted brunette, both of whom smiled and bowed to every customer no matter how much of a jerk they were. She developed strong bonds with her co-workers and spent her non-working hours talking with them about work, either over the phone as she padded around her apartment in pajamas, or over meals at other restaurants. They'd bitch and speculate about customers and about each other, and she was good at this. She was a popular and feared person with whom to work.
She'd cash in her tips to the nearest twenty and collect huge wads of ones and bowls full of coins. Though she was chronically in debt to credit card companies, her family, and the IRS, she was comforted by possessing a large amount of petty money. Some days, she'd eschew her friends in order sit in her room and count her tips, sliding the one-dollar bills rapidly between her hands, then piling identical stacks of coins all over the bedspread of her twin-sized mattress with a wobbly frame that collapsed the last three times she had sex. She was really good at simple math.
She was a waitress, and that was life. It was her life, clattering in a jar like a handful of pennies.
****Robert Frost Beer Pong
A few weeks ago, at least 50 teenagers broke into a historic Vermont farmhouse where Robert Frost once lived and held a drunken gathering (here), causing an estimated $10,000 worth of damage and destroying many irreplacable artifacts. It was Frost himself who wrote "Good fences make good neighbors" (here). Perhaps this quaint adage warrants modernizing: "Good security cameras, survellience equipment, and attack dogs make good neighbors."
Robert Frost spent his summmers and falls at Homer Noble Farm in rural Ripton, Vermont and taught at nearby Middlebury College for over thirty years until his death in 1963. When Frost famously said "I go to school the youth to learn the future," surely he could not have foreseen the youth of the future playing beer pong in his living room.
At least 20 people have been charged and will receive citations to appear in court, "mostly for unlawful trespass and unlawful mischief" (here). Perhaps the criminals could curry favor with the judge by using Frost's own words to admit their guilt: "We took risks. We knew we took them. Things have come out against us. We have no cause for complaint."
| Wednesday January 16 2008
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****It's Not Easy Being Greengrocer
Mr. Pinault and I are preparing for our civil ceremony next week. The real marriage ceremonies aren't until September and October 2008, so we will be saving our sentiment until then. The civil ceremony will be just us sighing impatiently while the Justice of the Peace signs the marriage license so that Mr. Pinault can apply for his Green Card... which, as I've been telling him all along, is the card that you get when you marry a Green.
Of course, after next week, I'll no longer be a Green. I considered briefly keeping my name - Green is actually a terrific last name - but there were no other compelling reasons to keep it.
Many women fear that they will lose their identity, but I got this here web site to keep me rooted. That's right, I may give up my name, but I'm keeping the domain! Other women want to carry on their heritage. Well, I'm very fond of my last name, but I'm hardly the last Green out there. And some women have professional reasons for keeping their name. Well, I'm just not that successful.
Hyphenating my name was never an option, for a very good reason that I will explain with help of an antecdote:
In Middle School, I had a history teacher named Mr. Todd who was fond of taking roll every day by rapidly reading our last names from an alphabetical list. We had 3 seconds to yelp "Here!" lest Mr. Todd be forced to repeat the name while raising his eyes to confirm the absence of the student in question.
Yes, it was very Ferris Bueller?... Bueller?... except Mr. Todd had a lot more piss and vinegar. It was like Fitzgerald! (here) Grady! (here) Green! (here) Grosser! (here) And one day, Mr. Todd stopped the roll call - an unprecedented occurrence - and said "Green Grosser, har, har, har. You two should get married, har har har. Then you could be Meredith Green-Grosser."
For a seventh-grade girl who suffered public mortification on a daily basis, it was as if he had very suddenly pulled down my pants. Everyone laughed except for me and the unfortunate Grosser boy who had already suffered undue hardship due to his name.
And I decided right then and there never to hyphenate my name. Because then, Green becomes an adjective.
****Candy Review: Jolt Gum
I discovered Jolt Caffeine Energy Gum (here) while in a checkout line at KMart. Pride forces me to clarify that I am not a frequent KMart shopper, and I'm opposed to these types of ginormous big-box stores, partly out of environmental and societal concerns, and partly out of snobbery. But last Saturday, we happened to be driving in Somerville and I spied the KMart Garden Center. Hoping to score some cheap plant containers, I urged Mr. Pinault to pull over.
It's been at least 12 years since I've been in a KMart, and Mr. Pinault is a complete KMart virgin. As we walked through the parking lot, I teased Mr. Pinault - "Omigod, I can't believe you're going to KMart!" - but I shut up the moment we entered the vast, cavernous store. An intricate maze of towering shelves fanned out before us, inviting us into a labryinth of cheap Chinese imports. Abject people milled through the aisles, leaning on their steel-caged carriages, their eyes dully darting from product to product to product. A hush filled the store, and it was louder than any audible noise could be. We had entered a capitalist purgatory.
We discovered that the Garden Center was currently functioning as a "75% off" clearance area for Christmas decorations. At least 20 mostly Hispanic women sorted through giant bins and queued for the electronic price checker to check the discount on snowflake napkin rings and Nativity scene lamb figurines.
On the way out, we decided to buy some laundry detergent. All 3 checkout lines were mobbed by people with absolutely full carriages. The cashier would slowly seize one item, scan it, then place it in an individual plastic bag. Every so often, the customer would question the price of an item and decide they didn't want it. The cashier would then have to void the item, a process that required a manager to type a code onto the register's touchscreen. Nobody seemed impatient or in a rush; I guess it's either this or Saturday afternoon television.
My attention wandered to the crammed candy display, where I spotted Jolt Caffeine Energy gum (2 pieces equals 1 cup of coffee! With ginseng and guarana!) I was intruigued enough to buy the gum. When we finally made it out of KMart, I popped two pieces in my mouth. The taste was pretty gross, but I chewed. After about five minutes, I discerned a rush of caffeine. I inexplicably wanted to cry, so I spit out the gum and drank some water until my heart calmed down. Jolt Gum made me feel like KMart makes me feel: Anxious, slightly ill, and upset that such a thing exists.
****Flashback #2
I'm still combing through this web site's archives in search of posts for my planned Best-of feature (see yesterday). I'm only about 20% done, but this process is proving to be most enlightening.
My first realization was: Holy crap, I've written a lot of words for little recognition and no money!
Luckily, my second realization mitigated this outrage: My writing style is honed and toned to the bone (I just made that up, and then Googled it to certify its originality. Proof positive!)
You know those Before & After pictures of people who've lost hundreds of pounds? In 2003, my writing weighed 400 pounds. It was sluggish, lethargic, and couldn't scale a single flight of stairs without panting. Here's a post, in its entirety, from October 13, 2003:
Happy Columbus Day. Of course, it would be a much happier Columbus Day if I didn't have work. It's like I'm freaking Bob Cratchit. At least the commute is smooth and I don't have to deal with the Tuesday morning after a three day weekend. Those are brutal.
Omigod, how flabby is that writing? But I wrote every day, and pound by pound, my writing slimmed down to a svelte 140 pounds. It's confident, energetic, and enjoying life. From March 20, 2006, here's a review of the men's fragrance Voyage by Nautica:
Though the name implies adventure and exploration, this generic marine scent is strictly for a routine day at office. If you close your eyes and let the odor waft deep into your nostril, you can pretend you're on a 46 foot cruising yacht, the sea water misting onto your Helly Hanson offshore jacket while you gaze at the expansive ocean in Yves Saint Laurent Aviator sunglasses and nurse a Smirnoff Lime and Cola. But open your eyes. You're staring at an Excel spreadsheet while the guy in the next cubicle clips his fingernails and munches on peanut M and Ms, and you smell like generic aspirational tedium.
Yes, it took a lot of hard work, but my writing finally feels confident and sexy in a swimsuit.
**** Flashback
I'm spending most of my alloted writing time on a major redesign of this site and its vast archives. I'm abolishing all HTML frames and using CSS. More interestingly, I'm compiling a categorized "Best of" section, to dislodge the nuggets of genius from all the gruff. I want to make it so people who randomly stumble on my site don't have to guess that there's a gem of a post on December 6, 2005, when I wrote the following certifiable "Best of"...
****Music Review: That Unhinged Subway Musician who Plays the Recorder
I haven't gone out to see live music in almost a month. I blame: Starting times that conspire against the presence of diligent working stiffs, my aversion to consume alcohol in order to endure a stage show that may or may not be boring and semi-competent, and how, when watching fresh-faced college kids perform their hearts out, I can't help but imagine them in ten years as broken corporate flunkies, still hanging onto their past rock and roll glories as proof that the Man doesn't really own their soul, he's just leasing it until a nest egg is amassed that allows them to return to their true life's passion of music... but then marriage happens, kids follow, and ambition fades into realization that life is over.
Luckily, the streets and subways of Boston and Cambridge provide many random encounters with live music. Myself, I don't enjoy a musician until I've seen them a few times to get a sense of their repertoire, of what they're all about. I particularly dig a killer blues guitarist at Park Street station, and a classical flutist at Harvard Square station. There's also the near-constant oud player in Harvard Square who sounds, at least, exotic.
But on a purely cerebral level, no one can compete with the crazy subway musician who plays the recorder.
The first time I saw him about four years ago, I was taken aback. Most people are. Here's a gaunt, older black man, dressed shabbily, blowing into a plastic recorder, swaying and bobbing his head almost drunkenly. His playing style is agitated, filled with squeaks, honks, and jarring articulation. His songs ramble without discernable melodies or patterns. Occasionally he'll engage in a self-contained "call and response," and pause his piping to shout a stanza of words in native but incomprehensible English. You'd think he was a homeless guy who found a plastic recorder and wandered into a T station, except his subway musician permit lays by his feet.
"O my God! That guy is, like, trying to play a recorder!" a college girl once screamed to her friends, and they all pointed and heaved laughter. I couldn't hate their insensitivity, because that was my first reaction, albeit "on the inside."
The recorder has a long, rich history, but today is chiefly used to introduce instrumental music to young children. It's a cheap, primitive instrument that can be readily played by anyone, except the kids with unfortunate craniofacial deformities and the hyperactive boy whose brain is telling him to blow hard and repeatedly until the music teacher takes it away. After several years of learning musical fundamentals on the recorder, most of us choose fun instruments that make pretty sounds. But a few diehards vow to master the humble recorder. Witness the American Recorder Society, an organization of devoted merry pipers.
After seeing this subway musician over the years, I suspect that he is on a whole other level, musically. I'm not saying he's a recorder virtuosi who specializes in neo-baroque fingering or anything like that, but his style is actually quite advanced. His frequent use of over blowing produces strange harmonics. His staccato notes, although dissonant, have amazing range. His breath control causes pronounced tremolos and vibrato. He has mastered his phraseology, and it is totally original and confoundingly irritating. Gotta give him some respect, too. People stare openly at him, willing him to stop. "I'll shove that thing up your ass, you crazy eff!" a man once shouted, and the piper yelled back in his incomprehensive English, no doubt asserting his right to rock.
I saw him the other day at the Central Square station after a lengthy absence. I tried like hell to groove on his music, to no avail, but still appreciated his strange mastery. And at least he'll never sell-out and get all commercial, or turn into a corporate flunky who forsakes his art in pursuit of a shallow existence. This guy is hard-core recorder.
**** Do Not Adjust Your Internet
I spent a nice chunk of time today, spiffying up my website with some sweet new tools (thanks, en!) The growth of links to my archives that was formerly on the right-hand frame was downright unseemly, so I moved them to a new page (accessible by clicking Archives at the top). It's the electronic equivalent of getting my upper lip waxed.
**** Snowballs in Hell
Bombs aren't the only things dropping from the sky in Baghdad. Friday morning, residents in Iraq's capital were stunned to see snowflakes, which is such a unique event that many residents refer to the snow as a type of rain ("the sky is raining snow" - here). You know how the Eskimos reportedly have over a 1000 words for snow (or nine, here)? Apparently, the Iraqis have one: Rain.
The appearance of snow filled many Iraqis with delight and optimism. Oh, how lovely to see the snow drifting through the air. It's a message from God. It's a sign that every little thing is gonna be alright. Hallelujah, it's raining snow! Hell has frozen over! W00t!
**** Mmmmm, Bridezilla
A friend emailed me this picture of a bride in Texas whose wedding cake is a full-size likeness of herself (here). Wow. The pure bridal narcissism. Isn't there at least a little plastic groom, perhaps perched on her massive cake shoulder, or baked inside of her like a king cake?
While I wouldn't mind having a 68-inch tall cake (my love of cake is legendary) at my wedding, there would be something Kafkaesque about watching people eating a giant cake me.
**** Ode to W00T
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year for 2007 is W00t (here). This is woefully old news because W00t was crowned way back in December 2007 (here), but by now, you've probably forgotten what "w00t" means (it's defined as an interjection for "expressing joy.")
I had no idea what w00t meant before reading the announcement. I had never seen the word, since it is only ever used "in competitive online gaming forums as part of what is known as l33t...the exclamation is also known to be an acronym for 'we owned the other team.'" Ah, 133t. That is, Leet. Once a slang used by hackers to communicate quickly, Leet has evolved into a full-blown corruption of English - the cool language of a generation. It proudly disregards proper capitalization, spelling, punctuation, and grammar. It employs a limited vocabulary that often follows intuition. In other words, d00d, l33t sux0r.
Merriam Webster president John Morse applauded W00t's selection, saying it blends "whimsy and technology." No. It blends the infinite degradation of language with online gaming. And Merriam-Webster's condoning of W00t shows that they're willing to compromise their prestige as Noah Webster's lexicographical heirs for a marketing effort to appear hip and impress people who obviously aren't reading dictionaries anyway.
Sometimes I am so flummoxed by humanity's asininity, that I feel like it's time to head to the elephants' graveyard (here).
**** Limerick
My only New Year's resolution is to write more poetry. Real poetry, with meter and rhyme and structure. Not that bullshit free verse poetry.
I will experiment with various poetic forms. I want to do sonnet, haiku, ghazal, sestina. I want to be well-versed in this most useless of arts.
I was inspired by an article called "Poetry Stand" in The American Scholar (here), in which the author discusses how he lead a group of teenaged poets to set up a poetry stand ("like a country lemonade stand, except that people would be coming for poems.") This required the students to learn all sorts of poetic forms to prepare for the types of poems that they might be asked to write. Lo and behold, one man asked for a villanelle about monkeys ("It seemed to me he was trying to stump them by requesting an intricate and difficult form on an inconsequential topic") and the teenaged poet instantly obliged. This humbled and inspired me.
I'm starting off with an easy one: Limericks. Wikipedia defines a limerick (here) as "a five-line poem with a strict form. Limericks are frequently witty or humorous, and sometimes obscene with humorous intent.
A limerick has five lines, with three metrical feet in the first, second and fifth lines and two metrical feet in the third and fourth lines. The rhyme scheme is usually AABBA." So here is my limerick.
There is a nice young man from France
Who enjoys wine, football, and dance.
And if you say please,
He'll put down the cheese,
And oblige to take off his pants.
**** Primary Fatigue
Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those others that have been tried. -- Winston Churchill
With the 2008 Presidential primaries (finally) beginning, I get the feeling that only the most rabid political animals are not sick to death of this election. Can't we just cut to the chase and skip the primaries? Does anyone need until November to decide? Aren't we just inviting the emergence of wack-job Third Party candidates to further confuse the political process with their vanity candidancies? Isn't this whole prolonged election process just a scheme to sell newspapers, magazines, and advertisements?
Ah, I'm sorry. Perhaps you came to my website to take refuge from politics, hoping that I'm still high on my recent trip to France to prattle about anything else. Well, too bad, because my babbling can traverse multiple subjects at once.
When I was in France, the subject of the US Presidential race came up more than once. French people are keen on keeping up on international affairs. In fact, it's a Gallic badge of honor to be able to convincingly bitch, moan, and pillor any elected politician on Earth.
America wasn't founded so that we could all be better. America was founded so we could all be anything we damn well please. -- P.J. O'Rourke
The French are a tactful, private people who do not share the American proclivity to be open about every detail of their life, so I was not asked directly about which candidate I supported, nor did I readily come out and declare it. Instead, I rolled my eyes when any Republican was mentioned and amused everyone by explaining what a Huckabee is. After ten minutes of polite evasion, I finally came clean: "Hillary's great, but when Barack Obama speaks, he reminds me of John F. Kennedy. There's never been an American president like him in my lifetime. I don't know how I could not support Obama."
The floodgates were open, and that fiery French passion for contention poured forth. "You do not like Hillary's ideas about universal health care? You not want to see a woman as President? You do not like Bill Clinton? You do not think she is capable and experienced?"
The problem is, I would say "yes, yes, yes, and yes" to all of Hillary's advantages. Like most Democrats, I do like Hillary, and I wouldn't be upset if she was elected. Hillary's a peach, but I guess it all comes back to that political cliche: Change. And not that batshit insane Guliani kind of change.
Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt
**** Working from Work
Lingering jet lag nudges me awake at 6:00am, an hour before my alarm is due. I lay in bed and finish reading Veronica by Mary Gaitskill (here on Amazon), which I had abandoned before my trip with only six pages left unread - too few to justify carrying it across the Atlantic Ocean. The story had begun with puissance, but ended with a tacit whimper, a lovely acquiescence in a book about vulnerability and death. I murmur the last line while in the shower: I will be full of gratitude and joy.
I head out the door feeling dainty in my lightweight office clothes and sneakers, my stomach nimbly digesting yogurt and fruit. I walk quickly on the bike path to the subway. How comforting to be back on the Red Line, catching up with world affairs in The New York Times, nestled in a crowd of grim-faced commuters while the conductor repeats at each stop "This is a Braintree train" in a fatalistic Bostonian drone.
Returning to work was easier than I anticipated. I forgot that no one else worked very hard last week, and therefore the mental images of entering the office to have my limbs ripped off by documentation-hungry jackals who have been laying in wait since I left never came to fruit. Instead, I spent a good hour going through emails, half of which were entitled "Working from Home." I blinked when I came to one from a coworker that said "Working from Work." "Hi, I'm working from work, and I'm the only one in the office, so I thought I'd say Hi" the message said.
Working from work. The day in the office flew by, and I glided along with it, buoyed by the restorative powers of my past week in France. "How was France?" people asked, and I grew shy. No matter what I say, I feel like I'm bleating: "Oh, you know, France was France. How I adore that certain je ne sais quoi, and how unfortunate that I have to be back here, in the United States, among all you cultural heathens."
I am self-conscious when I talk about France or how I'm marrying a Frenchman. Americans associate France with sophistication and seduction, and French women with femininity and fashion, yet I'm this beast of practical shoes and comfortable pants. When I go to France, I sweat in the snow for 6 hours straight then gorge on peasant food. It would be more appropriate if I were marrying a Russian.
**** Ski, Sex, and Raclette
Last week in France, in a gift shop in Montchavin, I came across a T-shirt that was emblazoned with the words "Ski, Sex and Tartiflette" (tartiflette being a cheese and potato dish popular in the Alps among calorie-craving skiers - here). The T-shirt had road-sign styled graphics depicting each of the three aforementioned activities, with the "sex" illustration being particularly sophomoric.
I was this close to surrendering 20 Euros for this prime piece of macho tourist fodder, but it didn't feel right, because during our vacation, we didn't have any... tartiflette, that is. We were too busy eating fondue and raclette (pictured right with Mr. Pinault).
I sort of regret not buying the Ski, Sex, and Tartiflette T-shirt, or at least taking a picture of it. Luckily, I have lots of pictures of similar activities with which to remember New Years 2008, though none of tartiflette or sex. Actually, it's just skiing.
Click here to see skiing photos from my week in the French Alps.
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