Herzog. I realize I haven't talked about the novel yet, not having formed words or opinions into full thought, and I won't do that here. What I will say is that all the revile, pissery, joy, exhaustion related to Bellow's masterwork is justly earned. It's also a grand example of a constructed from the solitary perch of anger and partial savagery vacillating to sweet. In other words, art.
Showing posts with label rants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rants. Show all posts
Friday, December 31, 2010
Saturday, December 4, 2010
The Thanksgiving recap, as seen through airports
Now that it's a week into its grave, my annual Thanksgiving trek to the desert is ripe for recapping.
First note: JFK has a Sammy Hagar bar. Beach bar and grill, I should say. The synopsis -- breakfast burritos and $15 bloody marys while the singer's head of gold-white tendrils leer on.
Second note: The Phoenix airport has that fresh "ripped-from-the-strip-mall" feeling, complete with the stark flair of early adult obesity that usually coincides. The bar there -- painted, sun-drained cacti stare down on the walls, reminding you (and maybe the city of Phoenix), that it is still a desert. Not that the green-lawn-and-pavement grid as viewed from above would suggest anything otherwise.
Third note: O'Hare is still a rat maze, especially when wandering unawares as to your connecting gate. Or terminal. But at least the bar had the decency to serve a hot dog so stuffed its entrails spilled to the counter top while being eaten. And they served Goose Island. Thank you, Skyscrapers, for being the type of seedy, low-rent place that I love. And in an airport.
Final notes:
And now, adieu.
First note: JFK has a Sammy Hagar bar. Beach bar and grill, I should say. The synopsis -- breakfast burritos and $15 bloody marys while the singer's head of gold-white tendrils leer on.
Second note: The Phoenix airport has that fresh "ripped-from-the-strip-mall" feeling, complete with the stark flair of early adult obesity that usually coincides. The bar there -- painted, sun-drained cacti stare down on the walls, reminding you (and maybe the city of Phoenix), that it is still a desert. Not that the green-lawn-and-pavement grid as viewed from above would suggest anything otherwise.
Third note: O'Hare is still a rat maze, especially when wandering unawares as to your connecting gate. Or terminal. But at least the bar had the decency to serve a hot dog so stuffed its entrails spilled to the counter top while being eaten. And they served Goose Island. Thank you, Skyscrapers, for being the type of seedy, low-rent place that I love. And in an airport.
Final notes:
- I remember when airline travel used to be fun. I was also about a foot shorter and 12.
- Wii Bowling might be the best diplomatic tool ever created. Or just a sheer blast.
- Shooting. It never leaves you, even through the invariable stumblings when you get all redneck-y with your Pa over the holidays. However -- who's in for this?
And now, adieu.
Friday, October 30, 2009
An Open Letter to Mr. Agassi
Dear Mr. Agassi,
So I understand you had a bit of a problem. A drug problem, with a particularly nasty dance partner. I guess the millions from tennis and shitty camera ads, a model wife, a long career doing something you love that typically has a shelf-life of about ten years tops, that didn't cut it. The swooning of a certain branch of the intelligentsia females who hold a particular sport in high-regards, usually playing it what with those skimpy skirts, and you, with your place in the throne of said competition, were anointed to make their hearts moisten and melt. But that wasn't enough.
No, when it all came down to it, you had to develop a drug habit. Now, this is not unheard of in your profession -- as athlete, but even as professional entertainer, what with the annals cutting back to everything from opium to mescalin to scips and what-have-you. In fact, this would be room for celebration in a lot of places, a comeback story, but really, and maybe this is the truest testament to bad decisions, it was the substance: Crystal Meth. Because really, your fame would have grown, you could have used it as something to showcase your further bravery (we can't all be Lance Armstrong, after all), but instead you picked up a drug that, for all intents and purposes, is left to the likes of truck stop whores in the most barren stretches of Oregon and Wyoming.
But I understand. Maybe you didn't know. Maybe you were unaware that there is a hierarchy to these things. A habit is a habit after all, but quite frankly the habit you chose could easily have been a boon, a statement, an altogether triumphal second (third?) career as university- or rally-lecturing shill. And it's all about the social acceptability.
Well, I've taken that into account. In fact, I've done something better. Below you'll find a list of the top drugs by social acceptability, with explainers as to why and how each could have affected your image. In fact, how you could have used them to advantage yourself and exactly the career choice you could have made.
So Mr. Agassi, for your perusal:
1) Weed. The Fountain of Youth doesn't exist. But this thing -- a former mainstay of college life now far removed from that environ -- has enabled children of all ages to maintain that sense of immaturity, slackerness, detachment. Best of all, it's apparently been found by the same people who promise all those helpful things on dietary supplements to be a veritable cure-all. Granted, the field is a bit crowded, what with Woody Harrelson and Willie Nelson taking all the spotlight glare, but don't let a couple of bloodshot eyes get in the way of the fact that you were number one in one arena, you can be number one in another. With the cache it has in the current arts community (and California, for that matter), could you imagine the cash in with the Rebel commercials (idea: play tennis, then smoke a spliff).
2) Prescription drugs. Now we're talking the proper, more age appropriate stuff. Vicodin, Percocet, Valium for god's sakes. Now, I don't want to get on my high horse, but I understand where you were at. A little older, a little paler and not so spry, but frankly this would have paved the way for exactly the new spokesperson. Let's face it: Prescription drugs are the new laudanum, and it's not just for women and feinting couches anymore. Yes, there is a bit more of a celebrity angle (think Brett Favre and Rush Limbaugh, among others), but those aside, you can most certainly get a few people interested in your life story with a few misplaced tears in a press conference and a trip to Betty Ford.
3) Cocaine. Teeth grinding and disintegrated nasal cavities aside, the juice behind power brokers and PR chicks can be your ticket to stardom. There's not too much to say here, but if it's good enough for Bernie Madoff, maybe it would have been a good enough choice for you. Besides, when somebody asks you how it all got started, you can respond with: "Five words: Now Sampras with the serve."
4) Alcohol. You know the drill, and being from Las Vegas I am almost positive you've seen it, you've seen the stories. Granted, the story has been a little bit done, but it's always good for a few sob stories and a quick day of reckoning from the more sociable of drinkers out there. Unfortunately, unless you're trying out for a role in Mad Men or a Bukowski novel, you might want to pass. The drug that has fueled many an Irish bout of black rage might not be the best choice, but it still has some points and is something many a person can identify with. My recommendation would be to put a contemporary spin on it: a $4 mil a day habit on this stuff. And really, who can cry about those bottles?
5) Nicotine. You know what I'm taking about: those filthy tar-drenched filters lining the gutter, padding an old coffee can, the clothes that smell like the inside of a defunct coal-furnace. The black lung, the morning cough, the twitches, headaches, and cravings, cravings, cravings. And after all that, I have a hard time recommending this one. Unfortunately, the drug of choice for near-on the twentieth century and the plant that built the American empire has really lost its luster as society moved to a post-industrial, less smelling of a chimney swoop day-in-day-out existence. With the effects being largely mild and fast, this could be a tough one to sell. However, if spinned properly, this could really work to your advantage: "I just needed a smoke while I driving with the baby on my lap" or "When those cravings hit, I couldn't help but break out a stick at the casket." This has its third rails, but with the proper massaging, could be quite lucrative.
6) Heroin. I know what you're thinking: I'm not sitting on a gritty novel in a loft somewhere in Edinburgh/San Francisco/Williamsburg. And you're right. I understand that's tough. And yes, the drug's limelight and heyday really was somewhere between the release of 1994'sPulp Fiction and 2000's Requiem for a Dream, but the drug really has a certain bohemian quality to it. You're a rebel, and it puts you in the same league as Billie Holiday, Miles Davis and Robert Downey Jr. Not bad company. And if all else fails, there's a spot on Celebrity Rehab waiting for you.
7) Hallucinogenics. While the stories you could tell would be interesting -- and who doesn't like day-to-day life looking like Pole Position on the Colecovision? -- its luster has long since rubbed off and is now really more of a curio and frankly a point of sadness mixed with indifference for everyone around. Although it still has the white vote, I'd recommend a pass on this.
8) MDMA, Ecstacy, Speed, etc. While this might get you a bit of attention and an invite to Blackrock City, in general the respectability of this is passed even among the youths, who have sine moved on to item 2. I'd suggest a pass on this as well, if only because it's still considered too recreational to merit anything but scorn.
9) Crack. Now, I have heard an account from a friend of mine, who has gone a bit native among the savages, that in fact this is a substance that best codifies and embodies that sensation of love. Cheap, dirty, alley sex with a cuddle session afterwards, like we all wished we had while we were still suckling. Unfortunately, it's also a dirty, cheap version of number 3, and as Whitney Houston proved a quick grounds to obscurity and Republicanism. Bobby Brown aside.
10) Crystal Methamphetamine. See comments in the intro. The drug of desert trailer parks and places with bar closings of ten p.m.
So in summation, Mr. Agassi, I hope this has been informative for when the sequel to the memoir is published. While I can't condone the use of any of these substances, cashing in on them can be an entirely different matter, if the particular substance has been chosen properly.
Now if you will excuse me, I have to go back to my bourbon.
Sincerely,
-Geof
So I understand you had a bit of a problem. A drug problem, with a particularly nasty dance partner. I guess the millions from tennis and shitty camera ads, a model wife, a long career doing something you love that typically has a shelf-life of about ten years tops, that didn't cut it. The swooning of a certain branch of the intelligentsia females who hold a particular sport in high-regards, usually playing it what with those skimpy skirts, and you, with your place in the throne of said competition, were anointed to make their hearts moisten and melt. But that wasn't enough.
No, when it all came down to it, you had to develop a drug habit. Now, this is not unheard of in your profession -- as athlete, but even as professional entertainer, what with the annals cutting back to everything from opium to mescalin to scips and what-have-you. In fact, this would be room for celebration in a lot of places, a comeback story, but really, and maybe this is the truest testament to bad decisions, it was the substance: Crystal Meth. Because really, your fame would have grown, you could have used it as something to showcase your further bravery (we can't all be Lance Armstrong, after all), but instead you picked up a drug that, for all intents and purposes, is left to the likes of truck stop whores in the most barren stretches of Oregon and Wyoming.
But I understand. Maybe you didn't know. Maybe you were unaware that there is a hierarchy to these things. A habit is a habit after all, but quite frankly the habit you chose could easily have been a boon, a statement, an altogether triumphal second (third?) career as university- or rally-lecturing shill. And it's all about the social acceptability.
Well, I've taken that into account. In fact, I've done something better. Below you'll find a list of the top drugs by social acceptability, with explainers as to why and how each could have affected your image. In fact, how you could have used them to advantage yourself and exactly the career choice you could have made.
So Mr. Agassi, for your perusal:
1) Weed. The Fountain of Youth doesn't exist. But this thing -- a former mainstay of college life now far removed from that environ -- has enabled children of all ages to maintain that sense of immaturity, slackerness, detachment. Best of all, it's apparently been found by the same people who promise all those helpful things on dietary supplements to be a veritable cure-all. Granted, the field is a bit crowded, what with Woody Harrelson and Willie Nelson taking all the spotlight glare, but don't let a couple of bloodshot eyes get in the way of the fact that you were number one in one arena, you can be number one in another. With the cache it has in the current arts community (and California, for that matter), could you imagine the cash in with the Rebel commercials (idea: play tennis, then smoke a spliff).
2) Prescription drugs. Now we're talking the proper, more age appropriate stuff. Vicodin, Percocet, Valium for god's sakes. Now, I don't want to get on my high horse, but I understand where you were at. A little older, a little paler and not so spry, but frankly this would have paved the way for exactly the new spokesperson. Let's face it: Prescription drugs are the new laudanum, and it's not just for women and feinting couches anymore. Yes, there is a bit more of a celebrity angle (think Brett Favre and Rush Limbaugh, among others), but those aside, you can most certainly get a few people interested in your life story with a few misplaced tears in a press conference and a trip to Betty Ford.
3) Cocaine. Teeth grinding and disintegrated nasal cavities aside, the juice behind power brokers and PR chicks can be your ticket to stardom. There's not too much to say here, but if it's good enough for Bernie Madoff, maybe it would have been a good enough choice for you. Besides, when somebody asks you how it all got started, you can respond with: "Five words: Now Sampras with the serve."
4) Alcohol. You know the drill, and being from Las Vegas I am almost positive you've seen it, you've seen the stories. Granted, the story has been a little bit done, but it's always good for a few sob stories and a quick day of reckoning from the more sociable of drinkers out there. Unfortunately, unless you're trying out for a role in Mad Men or a Bukowski novel, you might want to pass. The drug that has fueled many an Irish bout of black rage might not be the best choice, but it still has some points and is something many a person can identify with. My recommendation would be to put a contemporary spin on it: a $4 mil a day habit on this stuff. And really, who can cry about those bottles?
5) Nicotine. You know what I'm taking about: those filthy tar-drenched filters lining the gutter, padding an old coffee can, the clothes that smell like the inside of a defunct coal-furnace. The black lung, the morning cough, the twitches, headaches, and cravings, cravings, cravings. And after all that, I have a hard time recommending this one. Unfortunately, the drug of choice for near-on the twentieth century and the plant that built the American empire has really lost its luster as society moved to a post-industrial, less smelling of a chimney swoop day-in-day-out existence. With the effects being largely mild and fast, this could be a tough one to sell. However, if spinned properly, this could really work to your advantage: "I just needed a smoke while I driving with the baby on my lap" or "When those cravings hit, I couldn't help but break out a stick at the casket." This has its third rails, but with the proper massaging, could be quite lucrative.
6) Heroin. I know what you're thinking: I'm not sitting on a gritty novel in a loft somewhere in Edinburgh/San Francisco/Williamsburg. And you're right. I understand that's tough. And yes, the drug's limelight and heyday really was somewhere between the release of 1994'sPulp Fiction and 2000's Requiem for a Dream, but the drug really has a certain bohemian quality to it. You're a rebel, and it puts you in the same league as Billie Holiday, Miles Davis and Robert Downey Jr. Not bad company. And if all else fails, there's a spot on Celebrity Rehab waiting for you.
7) Hallucinogenics. While the stories you could tell would be interesting -- and who doesn't like day-to-day life looking like Pole Position on the Colecovision? -- its luster has long since rubbed off and is now really more of a curio and frankly a point of sadness mixed with indifference for everyone around. Although it still has the white vote, I'd recommend a pass on this.
8) MDMA, Ecstacy, Speed, etc. While this might get you a bit of attention and an invite to Blackrock City, in general the respectability of this is passed even among the youths, who have sine moved on to item 2. I'd suggest a pass on this as well, if only because it's still considered too recreational to merit anything but scorn.
9) Crack. Now, I have heard an account from a friend of mine, who has gone a bit native among the savages, that in fact this is a substance that best codifies and embodies that sensation of love. Cheap, dirty, alley sex with a cuddle session afterwards, like we all wished we had while we were still suckling. Unfortunately, it's also a dirty, cheap version of number 3, and as Whitney Houston proved a quick grounds to obscurity and Republicanism. Bobby Brown aside.
10) Crystal Methamphetamine. See comments in the intro. The drug of desert trailer parks and places with bar closings of ten p.m.
So in summation, Mr. Agassi, I hope this has been informative for when the sequel to the memoir is published. While I can't condone the use of any of these substances, cashing in on them can be an entirely different matter, if the particular substance has been chosen properly.
Now if you will excuse me, I have to go back to my bourbon.
Sincerely,
-Geof
Friday, October 16, 2009
Insomnia ruminations
As should be gathered by the title and the fruitlessness of my melatonin, I can't sleep and am officially annoyed by this. Again. It's turning into an old story. So you get a blog post in return.
Thoughts:
1) The slate gabfest plugged an article which I cannot find, but sounds freaking great: The breakdown of all sounds considered's top albums list. Which, long story short and to further prove my disdain, simply reminds me of the middlebrow banality of the entire NPR franchise. Half the time I think Congress would be doing the country a favor if they followed through on the cutting of the damned funding, if only for the fact that people might actually experience
2) I made a batch of chili last night, which should have turned out delicious and actually was quite tasty, but the damned thing smells like someone upchucked in the frakkin soup. Now, I don't know if this is a bad beer experiment or what, but it's overall quite annoying. Which leads to point three:
3) The fridge in the apartment here is actually not working. Seriously. The freezer is absolutely fine, but the fridge? It's noticeably cooler in the kitchen than there. And we've had the windows shut in this nor'easter.
4) I need some more coffee right now. But I need sleep even more. Enjoy this, enjoy the nothingness of this post, nihilism sucks, creation ex nihilo is a lie (but the truth isn't that compelling, either). Later, kids.
One last thing, and yes, I know this is a postscript but I'm still sleep-optional at this point:
Saturday, October 10, 2009
To Whittle this Down to One
I've had a lot come across my plate the last few days that seem blog-worthy. Or rather, rant-worthy and I need to talk about it: The implicit racism of Barbara Walters (or the denial of such underlying racism from Whoopi Goldberg), the fuck-you-in-the-face-W-Bush granting of the Nobel to Obama, the rise and codification of the vocal level "squee," the reminder to my San Francisco denizens that you don't mess with the Chinese woman on the bus.
No, what really got my attention was this:
Now, I know what you're thinking: it's about the cheesecake. And taken into account along with the prostitute story from earlier, that's understandable. But that's not it. Okay, a little bit, but not much.
See, I view this picture -- and mind you, we ran this at work -- I view this picture, and the eternal flipping rolodex that is my fractured memory system remembers a book: Ballard's Crash. Sex, car crashes, removable prosthetics. Beautiful shit. But no, that wasn't the full end of it: From Crash to "Good Country People." Preachers, hollowed-out Bibles containing condoms and whiskey, a hayloft, another prosthetic. And if this is what Hulga looked like, then I can suddenly go to sleep (well, pre-sleep) content.
Thank you, ESPN The Magazine, for re-invigorating this fine, fine work.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
The questionnaire
So I'm not sending this out about anyone, mainly as a rumination of my dating life in SF. Because it's sucked, and partially it's my fault, partially it's because of the calibre of women I've met. Which ultimately gets back to me.
This is a joking questionnaire that came up awhile back, talking about my terrible luck with women. About how I seem to meet the crazies. Now, I'm not going to say they're all crazy, but essentially that's the pattern I've been in and probably promote.
Without further ado, here's the questionnaire, to see if you're suitable for dating. The Geoffery Metz. This might be long.
1) Have we ever gotten along on a superficial level when first meeting? (+1 pt)
1a) Was it in a bar? (+5 pts.)
1b) Did we meet online? (-1 pt.)
2) Has your need for travel ever superseded plans for musical or dramatic performance? (+3 pts.)
2a) Was the performer your friend? (+5 pts)
3) Are you a fan of David Sedaris? (+5 pts.)
4) Have you ever seen Brick? (+1 pt.)
4a) Without me forcing you? (+5 pts.)
4b) Stood me up when I suggested we see it in the theater? (+10 pts.)
5) Are you a fan of David Lynch? (-1 pt.)
6) Have you ever engaged regular in one of the following drugs (+1 pt. each answer):
a) Cocaine
b) Anti-depressant
c) Tobacco
d) Crystal Meth
e) Beer Breakfast
[Note: add two points if you engaged in any of (a)-(d) on a regular basis. For (e), only add a point if this was before work.]
7) Which one of these regions strikes you as the best region for wine:
a) Napa (+5 pts.)
b) Sonoma (+2 pts.)
c) Spain (+2 pts.)
d) France (+3 pts., but really, who drinks French wine?)
e) Italy (+1 pt.)
f) Australia (+3 pts.)
8) Are you a Capricorn or Aries? (5 pts. for either)
9) Are we separated by more than a subway trip (i.e., a trip on a plane, train, automobile)
a) Yes (-10 pts)
b) No (+2 pts.)
10) Have I ever called you when you're drunk?
a) Yes (+5 pts.)
b) No (-2 pts.)
Bonus question: Have you ever been a cheerleader? (+2 pts.)
Add up the score. The closer to 52 means I've probably dated you and it was a short affair with a lot of chemistry at the top. The farther away, we'd probably be awesome together but will never meet.
Friday, February 20, 2009
The Teachings of Donnie B.
Here's an amazing argument in the most recent copy of the New Yorker, taken from an article about Donald Barthelme's place in the postmodernist canon:
This was courtesy of Louis Menand, and it blew my fucking mind. Not for the observation of it, which is a trivial distinction. What mindfucked me was the way it put so succinctly an essential complaint I have had with a mood permeating the circles I've been around.
What does this really mean? Essentially, Warhol's soup cans brought the world to its logical summation. It's kitsch. Cultural criticism mistaken as artistic relevance. It's not constructive but nihilistic. And that's not the world want to live in. It's a dead outlook.
If art is not striving to find at least the odd, the weird dissonances associated with everyday life and find some type of tether between them, then all it really is is a pretty little trifle. We don't feel it, we don't need it. It isn't essential in the way that food, fucking and -- for some -- religion is. Maybe for all -- I've always held that Modernists biggest failure was the path they took to make art the new religion, and therefore as essential as Sunday Mass was to the 1300s.
With its push to emphasis on titillation and the superficial, the contemporary era essentially pulled high art and art in general to the levels of porn, minus the stache or what have you. It's all superficial -- and not even satisfactorially animalistic -- fucking. It's not attempting to be anything else.
So here's my ultimate manifesto:
If you're looking at a piece of street art, ask the fundamental question "So what?" With any gallery opening or new track of music: "So what?" Any film: "So what?" What else did the work bring to the table? What was this looking to do to me or change or mold or push or punch or spit on me?
Not everything is going to be effective here, but shit if you're not going to find -- if the artist is taking his audience seriously and not just completely absorbed in his- or herself -- that incrementally you have changed. Your life, whatever. Your outlook, your world view has been altered in such a way that you eventually look at yourself and say "I can't go back now." Even if it's not apparent what the "what" is, there's still a "what" that has already happened. And it's unsettling, in a good way.
Faithful readers, I promise not to talk your head off in the next one. I'll find some toilet humor for next time.
What killed that distinction [between high and commercial art] wasn't defining pop art up [to the level of high art]. It was defining high art down. It was the recognition that serious art, too, is produced and consumed in a marketplace. The point of [Andy] Warhol's Campbell's soup-can paintings was not that a soup can is like a work of art. It was that a work of art is like a soup can: they are both commodities.
This was courtesy of Louis Menand, and it blew my fucking mind. Not for the observation of it, which is a trivial distinction. What mindfucked me was the way it put so succinctly an essential complaint I have had with a mood permeating the circles I've been around.
What does this really mean? Essentially, Warhol's soup cans brought the world to its logical summation. It's kitsch. Cultural criticism mistaken as artistic relevance. It's not constructive but nihilistic. And that's not the world want to live in. It's a dead outlook.
If art is not striving to find at least the odd, the weird dissonances associated with everyday life and find some type of tether between them, then all it really is is a pretty little trifle. We don't feel it, we don't need it. It isn't essential in the way that food, fucking and -- for some -- religion is. Maybe for all -- I've always held that Modernists biggest failure was the path they took to make art the new religion, and therefore as essential as Sunday Mass was to the 1300s.
With its push to emphasis on titillation and the superficial, the contemporary era essentially pulled high art and art in general to the levels of porn, minus the stache or what have you. It's all superficial -- and not even satisfactorially animalistic -- fucking. It's not attempting to be anything else.
So here's my ultimate manifesto:
If you're looking at a piece of street art, ask the fundamental question "So what?" With any gallery opening or new track of music: "So what?" Any film: "So what?" What else did the work bring to the table? What was this looking to do to me or change or mold or push or punch or spit on me?
Not everything is going to be effective here, but shit if you're not going to find -- if the artist is taking his audience seriously and not just completely absorbed in his- or herself -- that incrementally you have changed. Your life, whatever. Your outlook, your world view has been altered in such a way that you eventually look at yourself and say "I can't go back now." Even if it's not apparent what the "what" is, there's still a "what" that has already happened. And it's unsettling, in a good way.
Faithful readers, I promise not to talk your head off in the next one. I'll find some toilet humor for next time.
Monday, February 16, 2009
And now a note from your friendly neighborhood tenderloin resident
I get home last night, and granted I'm a bit tipsy as a result of a Valentine's Day that was mercilessly locked in singleness. Stumble through the apartment, jump on the computer and make a pizza. Go to the window for a quick smoke.
So as a point of reference, I live across from the Phoenix Hotel. Literally I overlook the parking lot and have an angle on four of the rooms that face it. Of course you had the regular emotional outcrying, the drunken aborted near-blows, the dealers staying clear because it's in their best interest to just stand by and laugh. And one room, a spotlight shining out, I do a double-take when I realize there's a couple going at it doggy-style.
Of course I do the natural thing and grab my binoculars. I size them up.
I have to throw in caveat upon caveat here. I am not a pervert (at least, not this type). I respect people's privacy and have no problem looking the other way if I happen to catch a glimpse of something that was meant to be a private event, private gesture or private otherwise.
But please, people. I'm also a red-blooded male, as well as a study of human nature and necessity, and it's not like it isn't obvious that there is a full set of apartments right within eyeshot. If you're in a city, close your fucking drapes! I don't care if you're twenty stories up, pull the fucking drapes. Now I'm on the fourth floor, the phoenix is only two stories, and here are these two people going at it. If they're going to be that fearless, I'm not going to give a shit.
After about four minutes, they got the hint.
So how was it? Mechanical. I got the impression watching them that, for all the seeming enjoyment and energy, there was no connection. It was fucking, and not even animal fucking. These two people either had never met before or, if they had, don't know a thing about each other.
That, and in spite of the fact the woman still had her dental floss on -- merely pulled aside for the activity -- she was completely uninteresting.
So as a point of reference, I live across from the Phoenix Hotel. Literally I overlook the parking lot and have an angle on four of the rooms that face it. Of course you had the regular emotional outcrying, the drunken aborted near-blows, the dealers staying clear because it's in their best interest to just stand by and laugh. And one room, a spotlight shining out, I do a double-take when I realize there's a couple going at it doggy-style.
Of course I do the natural thing and grab my binoculars. I size them up.
I have to throw in caveat upon caveat here. I am not a pervert (at least, not this type). I respect people's privacy and have no problem looking the other way if I happen to catch a glimpse of something that was meant to be a private event, private gesture or private otherwise.
But please, people. I'm also a red-blooded male, as well as a study of human nature and necessity, and it's not like it isn't obvious that there is a full set of apartments right within eyeshot. If you're in a city, close your fucking drapes! I don't care if you're twenty stories up, pull the fucking drapes. Now I'm on the fourth floor, the phoenix is only two stories, and here are these two people going at it. If they're going to be that fearless, I'm not going to give a shit.
After about four minutes, they got the hint.
So how was it? Mechanical. I got the impression watching them that, for all the seeming enjoyment and energy, there was no connection. It was fucking, and not even animal fucking. These two people either had never met before or, if they had, don't know a thing about each other.
That, and in spite of the fact the woman still had her dental floss on -- merely pulled aside for the activity -- she was completely uninteresting.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
A&P
I had a very short relationship with John Updike. I know, a great man of American letters, he was marvelously productive career. But I never read the novels, not the Rabbits or the Witches or really anything else save a few short stories. And maybe this explains my relatively messed up outlook on the world literature, but essentially I do end up getting a lot of my general judgments through my relationship to shorts. Whatever. I will shamelessly stick to that, understanding that the the bulk of the reading world holds writers more to their novelistic achievements versus work in the shorter, more direct and hybridized form. (quick bit of gm/sf lit theory: because of the limitations of style, the weight of each word in a short more often approaches the rules of poetry, but I'm digressing and not caring much.)
Anyway, my first taste of Updike was in a non-counting English course on Short fiction back at the University of Delaware. The story: "A&P." Funny enough, it's online, so read it and enjoy:
http://www.tiger-town.com/whatnot/updike/
So of that generation, what's left? Vonnegut is long dead. Bellow passed, probably swatting the Grim Reaper in the nose on the way out. Stanley Elkin -- whose A Poetics for Bullies stands as one of my favorite shorts, period -- has been relegated to obscurity. Philip Roth now seems intent on only writing about the inevitable, to varying (mostly bad) degrees of success.
Well, in some ways it's about time. I would comment more, but the entire damned generation in some ways, while hitting a lot of the realistic flaneur notes (Thanks, James Wood), ultimately created a body of work that never punched me in the gut, with the few noted exceptions. That's my $0.02, but frankly for all its histrionics a lot of it felt flat. Whatever. A pure stylist can be decent but is ultimately lacking in emotional heft, a champion of the people dates him- or herself the second the words are put to page, a culture-specific icon can ultimately only go so far as the confines of cultural experience will allow: everything else will seem alien and somehow lack the all-important cultural punch to an Auslander of that culture. It's still going on, and at some point it's all navel-gazey, anyyway.
Okay, that was a tangential rant, my apologies if you all started to zone out there. My last image of Updike: on Charlie Rose a few weeks back, he was describing what it was like to revisit the Witches of Eastwick for his most recent title. And it was almost sad to watch somebody who I'd held in some esteem try to talk about lesbianism, etc. on a talk show. He sounded like a cross between a dirty old man and the prudish schoolnun. It's a weird combo, but he pulled it off. (btw, sorry about not being able to embed -- here's a link to the clip:
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/9495)
So I lost my train of thought after that one. Guess I shouldn't be so surprised -- I've probably bored the shit out of all you all anyway. Time for more coffee.
Anyway, my first taste of Updike was in a non-counting English course on Short fiction back at the University of Delaware. The story: "A&P." Funny enough, it's online, so read it and enjoy:
http://www.tiger-town.com/whatnot/updike/
So of that generation, what's left? Vonnegut is long dead. Bellow passed, probably swatting the Grim Reaper in the nose on the way out. Stanley Elkin -- whose A Poetics for Bullies stands as one of my favorite shorts, period -- has been relegated to obscurity. Philip Roth now seems intent on only writing about the inevitable, to varying (mostly bad) degrees of success.
Well, in some ways it's about time. I would comment more, but the entire damned generation in some ways, while hitting a lot of the realistic flaneur notes (Thanks, James Wood), ultimately created a body of work that never punched me in the gut, with the few noted exceptions. That's my $0.02, but frankly for all its histrionics a lot of it felt flat. Whatever. A pure stylist can be decent but is ultimately lacking in emotional heft, a champion of the people dates him- or herself the second the words are put to page, a culture-specific icon can ultimately only go so far as the confines of cultural experience will allow: everything else will seem alien and somehow lack the all-important cultural punch to an Auslander of that culture. It's still going on, and at some point it's all navel-gazey, anyyway.
Okay, that was a tangential rant, my apologies if you all started to zone out there. My last image of Updike: on Charlie Rose a few weeks back, he was describing what it was like to revisit the Witches of Eastwick for his most recent title. And it was almost sad to watch somebody who I'd held in some esteem try to talk about lesbianism, etc. on a talk show. He sounded like a cross between a dirty old man and the prudish schoolnun. It's a weird combo, but he pulled it off. (btw, sorry about not being able to embed -- here's a link to the clip:
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/9495)
So I lost my train of thought after that one. Guess I shouldn't be so surprised -- I've probably bored the shit out of all you all anyway. Time for more coffee.
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