tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23057611628370390102024-03-05T02:45:42.134-05:00A Life Disported.My approach to the truth is kind of rhetorical.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger46125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-85596338654284274342014-11-11T01:49:00.000-05:002014-11-11T01:49:35.877-05:00Stay up late.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLSUU3ZqMsDPVAItURm1xmT5AjiHMLzaJwHGkQ-xZt8Ptl7ZpQm-nbhMAunpCMpjK0X9QMYdlFTgJFbiSns36dSWqFbeU5MInW1EYXOHzZzM9fqj50_nIjkVEcVX2CFjVMv20VQ986A_Gs/s1600/list.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLSUU3ZqMsDPVAItURm1xmT5AjiHMLzaJwHGkQ-xZt8Ptl7ZpQm-nbhMAunpCMpjK0X9QMYdlFTgJFbiSns36dSWqFbeU5MInW1EYXOHzZzM9fqj50_nIjkVEcVX2CFjVMv20VQ986A_Gs/s400/list.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Stay up late and do good in the world. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-289141499430539092014-09-26T22:08:00.000-04:002014-09-26T22:08:09.642-04:00Flowers at dinner.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYJzPklvGgrI2tu85vq3jUl8wua0LndLstqxJOgn1oTWa7KN67BXFduuIBRXzHHkzb-vwWSjeqP2inXIcylnYNda1pzj3wT5aNV-TdR-eWxflGm56stiPdJuRd0i4CiS__idyrReYGqi6q/s1600/Colorful_Phalaenopsis_Orchid_1__96801_zoom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYJzPklvGgrI2tu85vq3jUl8wua0LndLstqxJOgn1oTWa7KN67BXFduuIBRXzHHkzb-vwWSjeqP2inXIcylnYNda1pzj3wT5aNV-TdR-eWxflGm56stiPdJuRd0i4CiS__idyrReYGqi6q/s1600/Colorful_Phalaenopsis_Orchid_1__96801_zoom.jpg" height="320" width="320" /></a></div>
When you get invited to someone's house for dinner, or a party, a nice thing to do is bring flowers. An even nicer thing to do is bring a vase. Most florists carry vases, often clear glass and real simple.<br />
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A host is busy—hosting—and flowers in a wrapper require attention.<br />
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Pass the flowers to the host, kiss kiss, take them back and head to the kitchen faucet. Put the flowers in the vase and put the vase on the table with the booze.<br />
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Bonus: a surprisingly lovely gesture—housewarming, birthday, new job—is to bring an orchid. It turns out that basic orchids are widely available and cost something like $25, including small vase. No room goes unimproved by an orchid.<br />
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It also turns out that orchids are surprisingly low maintenance: one ice cube at the base of the stem, weekly. Isn't that delightful?<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-50720436826374070082013-05-03T17:36:00.001-04:002013-05-03T17:45:40.730-04:00TMFAD at SummerWorks.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"></span><br /></b></div>
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj90xC6nZPGqwNAibMMMJMgWAtKSqJJpjYZdat8bRX6JEF3X2YVzlVIMtXZu99dCefXrRujdQUkl9N0b34-eOD2q45MKKm07uDEgDeLRjH3uYA4Gga8q5qvMgGsx17__J_FOxZ7N26GPWUP/s1600/tmfad.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj90xC6nZPGqwNAibMMMJMgWAtKSqJJpjYZdat8bRX6JEF3X2YVzlVIMtXZu99dCefXrRujdQUkl9N0b34-eOD2q45MKKm07uDEgDeLRjH3uYA4Gga8q5qvMgGsx17__J_FOxZ7N26GPWUP/s400/tmfad.jpeg" width="400" /></a><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Title of work:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Tackle Me For A Dollar (“Tackle Me”). </span><br />
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Presented<span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[1]</span></b></span></span></span>
by:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Christopher Ryan
Graham (“CRG”) and Ann Margaret Oberst (“AMO”).</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Website:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> </span><span lang="EN-CA"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF60DVi8xZY"><span style="font-family: Garamond;">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF60DVi8xZY</span></a></span><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">. (This is a video of the first time we
ran Tackle Me. We made $35.)</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Project overview:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Tackle Me is pretty much what it sounds like. CRG
takes a big, homemade sign to an outdoor space, preferably a park, and gets
people to pay a dollar for the chance to tackle him. The experience raises all
sorts of interesting tensions, themes, issues, mores, social anxieties, and
personal neuroses, some of which are easier to summarize than others. The
former include:</span></div>
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<u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Playfulness
and violence as a continuum</span></u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">.
Tackle Me is a clear instance of humans playing at hurting each other. Any
sharp distinction between playfulness and violence—usually based on
intention—is called into question<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[2]</span></span></span></span></b>
by, at least, the uncertainty involved in amateur tackling.<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[3]</span></span></span></span></b>
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<u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Conceptual
versus practical understanding</span></u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">. Everyone knows <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">what</i> a
tackle is, but few people know <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">how</i> to
do it. I’m not sure people appreciate this is a real difference; that these are
different modes of understanding. Tackle Me forces people to reckon with this
difference, usually at the moment they ready themselves to charge and think: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Oh, shit…</i> </span></div>
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<u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Metaperception
and interpersonal relations</span></u><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">.
Tackle Me is great at forcing people to think about how their actions in the
world are mediated by what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">other people
think.</i><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><b><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[4]</span></span></span></b></span>
The point’s so banal it’s actually profound: few people recognize their sense
of self is radically integrated with various communities. (We <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">always already are</i>, type-thing.) Tackle
Me brings this home in a few ways, the clearest being that we don’t give
instructions about how to tackle. This forces tacklers to make (=recognize) all
kinds of assumptions about how CRG’ll react to getting hit.</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Length of work:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Entirely dependent on the work’s content: the harder
the tackles, the sooner CRG’ll get tired or sore and want to quit for the day. Although,
it’s probably a good idea to set a maximum time, like two hours, with the
proviso CRG may not last that long.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Interestingly,
this feature of Tackle Me calls attention to the role of the audience as gatekeepers
to artistic expression. This is one kind of audience participation that’s hard
to see but very real; also, felt much more acutely during Tackle Me than, say,
the audience having to show up at a stage production. This is all very <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">If a tree falls in the woods...</i> except
that with Tackle Me it’s the audience that cuts down the tree.<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[5]</span></span></span></span></b></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Stage of development:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Ready, except that we’ll need to borrow someone’s
video camera.</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Artists involved:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> CRG and AMO. We’re debating whether AMO should
offer to be tackled, whether anyone would go for that. </span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Intended audience:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Everyone (in the park). Curiously, the last time
we did this the participation rate for females was much higher than for males.
(We have some theories about why this is the case.<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[6]</span></span></span></span></b>)
All ages and abilities are welcome. One limitation we imposed was that you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">have</i> to tackle. Some people wanted to
give me a hug, but we declined this as being a different sort of project altogether.
</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Venue:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Outdoor space is best; we like parks. In addition
to increasing the number of potential participants, the absence of any barriers
to entry—like a theatre door, say—calls attention to the arbitrariness of
distinctions between participant, audience, and passer-by. (Think of buskers
and the onlookers that arc around at that ambiguous distance where spectation
is both guilt- and contribution-free.)</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Plans for further development:</span></b><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;"> Video evidence.</span></div>
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<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[1]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> It’s unclear whether this matters, but we didn’t create Tackle Me.
The idea came from a story that CRG heard at a storytelling show. What we’ll
create is the instance of our performance, sort of like a musician performing a
cover, I guess. </span><br />
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<span lang="EN-CA">Also, apologies if this kind of
subtextual pedantry is redundant to the Live Art Series panel: neither CRG nor
AMO has any real experience with this sort of thing—indeed, we’re keen to join
what we imagine to be an interesting community of folks—so we don’t know what’s
going to be obvious to you guys making the decision. (Although, we do think
this <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kind</i> of point is interesting as
an instance of the ‘thinking about thinking’ we’re hoping that Tackle Me
cultivates, as you’ll see if you keep reading beyond this FN.*)</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA">*…which further
reading AMO thinks is unlikely, while CRG—whom you’ve probably guessed is the
one doing the typing—is hopeful the Live Art Series panel will see the FNs as a
neat, textual representation of this very ‘thinking about thinking’, how humans
actually makes sense of and in the world.</span><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"></span></div>
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<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[2]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> The uptown term here is “problematized”, I think. </span></div>
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<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[3]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> A literal undercurrent here is the issue of trust: nothing prevents
a person from trying to get their money’s worth, as it were—basically, tackling
me really hard. The last time we ran Tackle Me there were two people with pro
tackling experience (male and female rugby players), both of whom let that be
known and intentionally curbed their enthusiasm. </span><br />
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<div id="ftn4" style="mso-element: footnote;">
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<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[4]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> More formally, it seems clear to us that, all else equal, what A
thinks B is thinking about A in respect of X is at least as important to A’s
conduct in respect of X as what A’s thinking about X directly. It’s maybe
simpler to do a formula: [illegible]. </span><br />
<span lang="EN-CA"></span><style>
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<div id="ftn5" style="mso-element: footnote;">
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[5]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> </span><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">(er… sort of.)</span><br />
</div>
</div>
<div id="ftn6" style="mso-element: footnote;">
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<b><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS 明朝"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">[6]</span></span></span></span></span></b><span lang="EN-CA"> There are about six pages of discussion here that CRG wanted to
append but AMO vetoed as, variously, sententious, prolix, otiose, lame,
obvious, and “We’re not having any more fucking formulas”. This FN’s a kind of
editorial compromise, then, wherein I’m allowed to say the difference in
male/female participation rates suggests a kind of paradox, at least for the
guys: the result of conflicting social norms of masculinity, on the one hand,
and civility (as like a subset of masculinity—like chivalry), on the other:
basically, that guys don’t participate for fear of, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and of not</i>, hurting me.</span></div>
</div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-63010784797860194372013-04-17T21:55:00.000-04:002013-04-17T21:55:24.841-04:00Men who straighten their hair.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8k3PyE9QrbDs0SceRU2pc5Fi4L5T46kXRRZWz0PDq_wWSTPkGsK9fsHnxUuTampwlM5zhspzmrtvWN_kEFHGkd-bmaPcCjdqZx42s_jEpGxi083CVIGDVempuhRpQ2Uxn-D4TbRlVwpb-/s1600/38247535869.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8k3PyE9QrbDs0SceRU2pc5Fi4L5T46kXRRZWz0PDq_wWSTPkGsK9fsHnxUuTampwlM5zhspzmrtvWN_kEFHGkd-bmaPcCjdqZx42s_jEpGxi083CVIGDVempuhRpQ2Uxn-D4TbRlVwpb-/s400/38247535869.jpeg" width="395" /></a></div>
See, the thing is, I'm not sure it's in your interest to give me a hard time about straightening my hair. You know what I'm talking about: to just assume that a person who straightens their hair is feminine, like that's some hallmark of femininity, hair-straightening.<br />
<br />
... <br />
<br />
I'm not saying you're saying that only girls who straighten their hair are girls. Why would you think I was saying that?<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
What I'm saying is that you're saying that the only people who straighten their hair are people who think they're female, so if I do it I must be less of a man than some other guy who doesn't straighten his hair.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
Why would you think I would think you thought I thought that's what you were saying?<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
No, the first thing.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
See, that's not helping either. I'm serious, you don't want to have all these people in the bar here thinking that a guy who straightens his hair is some sort of nancy.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
It's a British term for "effete man".<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
It means I'm putting that bit in quotations.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
I'm not saying that because you called me a nancy that you're also a nancy, like only a nancy would use the word "nancy".<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
It's not in your interest because now all these guys in the bar here are going to know you stepped outside with some hair-straightening nancy and had your life separated from your body. That's why. <b>[End.]</b></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-60556972966313896612013-03-27T13:01:00.001-04:002013-03-27T13:01:50.480-04:00Bangkok and other places.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyvJ5BTItD0RzLYbjRKTcET2BKuicTiQ0_6033HH5gIjTlQaUREvPePF_Kb1XDZMBZkQMT6qtVhX5qEhyysGf0jYGRtkFtOZbVtEQzMO9cfUp5OzJ8yIEGPOAkPcfi5sRNUexEckmHlpf2/s1600/wisdom.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="353" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyvJ5BTItD0RzLYbjRKTcET2BKuicTiQ0_6033HH5gIjTlQaUREvPePF_Kb1XDZMBZkQMT6qtVhX5qEhyysGf0jYGRtkFtOZbVtEQzMO9cfUp5OzJ8yIEGPOAkPcfi5sRNUexEckmHlpf2/s640/wisdom.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Truer words were never spoken, in a Bangkok bathroom, at least.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzx60wUOlDpXUQ6tvciUYTBdOJskHvwwyU53dzb-d77kd7vYl0qMXxEX7GcwzCYsWdKmbPx5RpZIy_RtoKEnHiZTPoBk9L1sBgNVFI8bz9ah72UBcnbGDUNhD7-s-ehieYOmcw693zAst8/s1600/yarn+one.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzx60wUOlDpXUQ6tvciUYTBdOJskHvwwyU53dzb-d77kd7vYl0qMXxEX7GcwzCYsWdKmbPx5RpZIy_RtoKEnHiZTPoBk9L1sBgNVFI8bz9ah72UBcnbGDUNhD7-s-ehieYOmcw693zAst8/s400/yarn+one.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Little bit of handmade yarn.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrLK3TgFL-l9gowBAltqL94t5PBnTFWlA1YGiJyDUtHi-vJLfkxtbabBBmEYeRPj_UMWXXWEqxKCOPF6yuO9EPV6m0xs0JzE1oeHOdqJbruNblxgjIyLZnPjt5e-JRSn-XvEkOeMal8VoJ/s1600/yarn+two.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrLK3TgFL-l9gowBAltqL94t5PBnTFWlA1YGiJyDUtHi-vJLfkxtbabBBmEYeRPj_UMWXXWEqxKCOPF6yuO9EPV6m0xs0JzE1oeHOdqJbruNblxgjIyLZnPjt5e-JRSn-XvEkOeMal8VoJ/s400/yarn+two.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Little bit more.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4AzAwiEgHA_CBPvaFkr_MWTzmwO0lciqSqs0N9uhbwmXByOnIZDlk0FmIdDrmjY_vXujAZnMLvTB4SRkQ182AM6Zc0S63I-cwyRsi4gfcrfQJmCD7Q7UDzx9atuihCYSzPL2HMOx8WMwE/s1600/yarn+three.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="368" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4AzAwiEgHA_CBPvaFkr_MWTzmwO0lciqSqs0N9uhbwmXByOnIZDlk0FmIdDrmjY_vXujAZnMLvTB4SRkQ182AM6Zc0S63I-cwyRsi4gfcrfQJmCD7Q7UDzx9atuihCYSzPL2HMOx8WMwE/s400/yarn+three.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Geez, I really liked this yarn.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfgBF5P8_fq0RnhpUpyl5Qqlnj2jVeZ0Di80-lQzzC6Wvh9l0Wfgt0AWpfGRWSuE1ArPr09QOZ8QiZ80B5t50AYXQBvhpHHIHIrQBSvFP5YyDnDfzD50caaXXxhOQIuVn-irDHpxNcS1rD/s1600/angkor+crg.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfgBF5P8_fq0RnhpUpyl5Qqlnj2jVeZ0Di80-lQzzC6Wvh9l0Wfgt0AWpfGRWSuE1ArPr09QOZ8QiZ80B5t50AYXQBvhpHHIHIrQBSvFP5YyDnDfzD50caaXXxhOQIuVn-irDHpxNcS1rD/s400/angkor+crg.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Angkor Wat in the background, CRG in the foreground.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSRgHB2AOkTcVDhgOFmgp3qleBcCInd3KM-zYqCNr0wbZLudPB1n-ZrB9QSriWglhTI9Kdk_vzK5G4J-Ug1Hf5H17OTSyefjHMRntWt7WZGXLFg6YCIvsg2O2pQRZe31cdcZ4QdSJYlfZp/s1600/angkor+thom.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSRgHB2AOkTcVDhgOFmgp3qleBcCInd3KM-zYqCNr0wbZLudPB1n-ZrB9QSriWglhTI9Kdk_vzK5G4J-Ug1Hf5H17OTSyefjHMRntWt7WZGXLFg6YCIvsg2O2pQRZe31cdcZ4QdSJYlfZp/s400/angkor+thom.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is like an average temple.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQHfw92Gm5ODF64DmC0S15HBEWyD0bVKEam8VAuC2-6alkUx_TJWdblSmeA1MG2tm6KPU8Un4aCFRIY6bHRKWaAQOTEodQCdW9l02EwiXYaxCMWSSJaTJ3pK8k55f_d5ejWB2usWp811Zb/s1600/angkor+detail.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQHfw92Gm5ODF64DmC0S15HBEWyD0bVKEam8VAuC2-6alkUx_TJWdblSmeA1MG2tm6KPU8Un4aCFRIY6bHRKWaAQOTEodQCdW9l02EwiXYaxCMWSSJaTJ3pK8k55f_d5ejWB2usWp811Zb/s400/angkor+detail.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Angkor Wat, the world's largest religious building, is covered with bas-reliefs. Covered.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2xSeR5sU_zGxU-FEAvxsqKCijIjYHPMEZAzYkkUDKE1AMo3dR3cHzOAZITC2YSBXzjHWRUCzcXbbiMog80r_h66Uvk3GBO2vQ2A8-X1XoCLiNlirMf8vghBOUiQ3U8NW2pmdLlMdmBBwg/s1600/bantay.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2xSeR5sU_zGxU-FEAvxsqKCijIjYHPMEZAzYkkUDKE1AMo3dR3cHzOAZITC2YSBXzjHWRUCzcXbbiMog80r_h66Uvk3GBO2vQ2A8-X1XoCLiNlirMf8vghBOUiQ3U8NW2pmdLlMdmBBwg/s400/bantay.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Like all the Angkor temples, this is built by hand.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRbGHq3B5G6fiQvRJEDSo2TSV0YG8FJ89052S8b64jrz1-KZA_8hf95khajCtquRgea4WEv1MtBTujP2wXSVBrjXeP8PJD2LGoDpVtW7TA8J_2sHlAONXt-PGXwGvF-ooXuPhEC2qquh2Z/s1600/bantei+sri+wide.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRbGHq3B5G6fiQvRJEDSo2TSV0YG8FJ89052S8b64jrz1-KZA_8hf95khajCtquRgea4WEv1MtBTujP2wXSVBrjXeP8PJD2LGoDpVtW7TA8J_2sHlAONXt-PGXwGvF-ooXuPhEC2qquh2Z/s400/bantei+sri+wide.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This temple is covered with the bas-relief detailed below.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTvcgfjGa6OI2tJRiY11xzmMJk22qGSeMbfbplNoXJfdR2gIssHkmxwYBcHjuuHJ_ZHK3sAb8E2niho800wqsjmBc7kMIOWsLHYcNtO_25l0dGkvtYSlMmpMZpS9IWDL9nwGyRmvFeU9Aj/s1600/bantei+sri+detail.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTvcgfjGa6OI2tJRiY11xzmMJk22qGSeMbfbplNoXJfdR2gIssHkmxwYBcHjuuHJ_ZHK3sAb8E2niho800wqsjmBc7kMIOWsLHYcNtO_25l0dGkvtYSlMmpMZpS9IWDL9nwGyRmvFeU9Aj/s320/bantei+sri+detail.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is over 1,000 years old.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGgH35orb93cGEY6CZXYCHV-uFWe1920PBrrob7h_BgpyuyZp_j29TIJtvl1CXYDkyAfhY3e-9RymFeiRKBB_i2KAF3Guv5vLFKqsPajHHq3Yog8TSEs09MC2YlPywElc5_U7Vlx52AK6q/s1600/beach+house.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGgH35orb93cGEY6CZXYCHV-uFWe1920PBrrob7h_BgpyuyZp_j29TIJtvl1CXYDkyAfhY3e-9RymFeiRKBB_i2KAF3Guv5vLFKqsPajHHq3Yog8TSEs09MC2YlPywElc5_U7Vlx52AK6q/s400/beach+house.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I lived here for a week.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjxWgON5ESi9WhI1zAMCTqZ6fMuVGaQubM9EsqSWvo6Q16NxjDMrCZHZGNNJnx6KoDy6eBd30yTLJdqsXSTvv8X6OU8U36rm3mQZ8r3g-iZ5f2cwWF5nNK-0rQDM8CyLeQwhTqxj_49MtF/s1600/dragons.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjxWgON5ESi9WhI1zAMCTqZ6fMuVGaQubM9EsqSWvo6Q16NxjDMrCZHZGNNJnx6KoDy6eBd30yTLJdqsXSTvv8X6OU8U36rm3mQZ8r3g-iZ5f2cwWF5nNK-0rQDM8CyLeQwhTqxj_49MtF/s400/dragons.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There are lot of dragon statues guarding temples in Thailand.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxbufbeSaimt-cEsL_14dJzlazgw1QcRUZx910RcfYIHQbiQ4LI3EqpxkJpHAmbb_Kr6rTgbkRKxPZa3SV9vfOzXbxznXIIj5maOwhKGpjmmePk-1F4wHYlkWknZb78WF8LaZfV8r8mOL_/s1600/engines.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxbufbeSaimt-cEsL_14dJzlazgw1QcRUZx910RcfYIHQbiQ4LI3EqpxkJpHAmbb_Kr6rTgbkRKxPZa3SV9vfOzXbxznXIIj5maOwhKGpjmmePk-1F4wHYlkWknZb78WF8LaZfV8r8mOL_/s400/engines.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In Bangkok, this is the street that sells used engines.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIScP5Un1feFxqkSl6BxR4Ro9R1pu-c3KeEY37jANpeSF_CJV9z0gpnFAk3xv6Ew9aoFtIxcpfvHKxYr66QyznFBxflgXzXBPt8p5pk8QXu5np6P6Zk2RRA5402rEYLgq4HmYXMGSKBmZb/s1600/luang+namtha+sunset.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="164" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIScP5Un1feFxqkSl6BxR4Ro9R1pu-c3KeEY37jANpeSF_CJV9z0gpnFAk3xv6Ew9aoFtIxcpfvHKxYr66QyznFBxflgXzXBPt8p5pk8QXu5np6P6Zk2RRA5402rEYLgq4HmYXMGSKBmZb/s640/luang+namtha+sunset.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In Laos, there are good places like this to read.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7EFMJUg6nxYiD3kVgduhDTxkiIvTyQBXl8D2uV7gS27zvZfnrrlmCvzqbeMVmdgqJdNVIIvA-47-aG9gPUzq3uUfcvn43PK4g7PsNODkai9ADeowECRntSW6_j-xC39jIXIQqZ8FG6Y98/s1600/laos+road.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7EFMJUg6nxYiD3kVgduhDTxkiIvTyQBXl8D2uV7gS27zvZfnrrlmCvzqbeMVmdgqJdNVIIvA-47-aG9gPUzq3uUfcvn43PK4g7PsNODkai9ADeowECRntSW6_j-xC39jIXIQqZ8FG6Y98/s400/laos+road.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Also in Laos, sometimes you have to wait while construction crews finish the road you're driving along.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtiPwG_pRZIhWfIBfeHTS9PbDkokMrJ-FhicCxXHmJB5ctoxvot3_JrRtsOKJ9kCOS_l-8MJJS8SO6weVr5sO8NjGUyN8J8E52-EeFSiZtrNLSfZRXp0a_lS3igKqWT8xPQOX3fR9XCc9G/s1600/tah+prohm+crg.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtiPwG_pRZIhWfIBfeHTS9PbDkokMrJ-FhicCxXHmJB5ctoxvot3_JrRtsOKJ9kCOS_l-8MJJS8SO6weVr5sO8NjGUyN8J8E52-EeFSiZtrNLSfZRXp0a_lS3igKqWT8xPQOX3fR9XCc9G/s400/tah+prohm+crg.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Once again, CRG in the foreground. (Back at Angkor, by Tha Prohm.)</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja5d5PJxcafuKn4vwR0S3om9kJXdV5vM1UmM0cJwMDWNcB3Yvvk0hXR5D49yMccMjR-2PKmBMg8SWMlL-06IoSSaxXuJI_y5HtzdDfnX_60i_ykQxGQvzR70BoOQjn1K4IpcbDMzWtXG-p/s1600/tah+prohm+tree.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja5d5PJxcafuKn4vwR0S3om9kJXdV5vM1UmM0cJwMDWNcB3Yvvk0hXR5D49yMccMjR-2PKmBMg8SWMlL-06IoSSaxXuJI_y5HtzdDfnX_60i_ykQxGQvzR70BoOQjn1K4IpcbDMzWtXG-p/s400/tah+prohm+tree.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Have that, 1,000-year-old Khmer temple. UN-believable.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGWs93rOl3aSf-6wD8FT0zZx5Ye0lEAVUzUwk1FGWjukGeVhKPuNLC_eLPMY2gHN_e02DD8fvJUMozEVTlh8xbuO7HaIbJHbTnu5AD06CwYzTKApXnYSkMr0RMTVh8o5sVK5tn_HnTO_P-/s1600/team+picture.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="291" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGWs93rOl3aSf-6wD8FT0zZx5Ye0lEAVUzUwk1FGWjukGeVhKPuNLC_eLPMY2gHN_e02DD8fvJUMozEVTlh8xbuO7HaIbJHbTnu5AD06CwYzTKApXnYSkMr0RMTVh8o5sVK5tn_HnTO_P-/s400/team+picture.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In a Laos village.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7HHvbnb_R_M-97Unz5X6AmeiPXRctehbDJuOfYk1718MjoVmqdUO8bm56TR6n6VzL8XPcFhCwRm8hs2agGRNZewxd3Jb_vl8bMJ35hJlF0FLTSWZlaStIFxU-0y7opSF4lw1xk9oUReJp/s1600/mailbox.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7HHvbnb_R_M-97Unz5X6AmeiPXRctehbDJuOfYk1718MjoVmqdUO8bm56TR6n6VzL8XPcFhCwRm8hs2agGRNZewxd3Jb_vl8bMJ35hJlF0FLTSWZlaStIFxU-0y7opSF4lw1xk9oUReJp/s400/mailbox.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A reasonable worldview.<br />
<br />
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-270214831718716982013-03-22T17:58:00.001-04:002013-03-22T17:58:18.265-04:00Annals of curious legislation.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKd7-TSTShQlqX1Ys5pIhCzjBDOemsXEQTc_ogXBoRNO2Iyj7oZRrqA1CeV5aiHfd0qrshtw-TkbjSXG5mqPw9r_x2_CgsrlvBDFxtNnfdhwRk9R81msT-Qzobs1lZTzMqc1hsMPadtjUE/s1600/union_johnny14-2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKd7-TSTShQlqX1Ys5pIhCzjBDOemsXEQTc_ogXBoRNO2Iyj7oZRrqA1CeV5aiHfd0qrshtw-TkbjSXG5mqPw9r_x2_CgsrlvBDFxtNnfdhwRk9R81msT-Qzobs1lZTzMqc1hsMPadtjUE/s400/union_johnny14-2.jpeg" width="266" /></a></div>
<a href="http://www.canlii.org/en/mb/laws/stat/ccsm-c-u90/latest/ccsm-c-u90.html" target="_blank">The Use of Animals to Shield Unlawful Activities Act</a> (Manitoba).<br />
<br />
<i>No person who is committing an unlawful act on a property shall use an animal to protect that property</i>.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.canlii.org/en/ns/laws/stat/sns-2010-c-44/latest/sns-2010-c-44.html" target="_blank">Tanning Beds Act</a> (Nova Scotia)<br />
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<i>The purpose of this Act is to protect the health of Nova Scotians, and in particular young persons, by restricting their access to tanning equipment in tanning facilities in light of the risks associated with the use of tanning equipment.</i><br />
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<a href="http://www.canlii.org/en/ns/laws/stat/sns-2010-c-34/latest/sns-2010-c-34.html" target="_blank">Clothesline Act</a> (Nova Scotia)<br />
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<i>WHEREAS the use of clotheslines to dry clothes reduces energy consumption, greenhouse gas and mercury emissions; AND WHEREAS Nova Scotians should have the ability to utilize clotheslines outdoors.</i><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://canlii.ca/en/bc/laws/stat/sbc-2006-c-19/latest/sbc-2006-c-19.html" target="_blank">Apology Act</a> (most provinces)<br />
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<i>An apology made by or on behalf of a person in connection with any matter, (a) does not constitute an express or implied admission of fault or liability by the person in connection with that matter [...] and (d) must not be taken into account in any determination of fault or liability in connection with that matter.</i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-1813068540611128632013-01-23T13:48:00.000-05:002013-01-23T13:48:02.753-05:00"A Gatsby among municipalities."<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUTLUajOc79JPGcv1uu23N03nq9W4OE-_yebRiDDttTnATL86DZFKQeESSHj0Wsya68s7EVDU99uROM5nAAcT2O51DV_jNhYclA5FPTXM9OaJmRmf4Sp8Tld9w4ME2JJjCMYiNcqHrElpH/s1600/9781552452660_GreatIdeaWeb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUTLUajOc79JPGcv1uu23N03nq9W4OE-_yebRiDDttTnATL86DZFKQeESSHj0Wsya68s7EVDU99uROM5nAAcT2O51DV_jNhYclA5FPTXM9OaJmRmf4Sp8Tld9w4ME2JJjCMYiNcqHrElpH/s320/9781552452660_GreatIdeaWeb.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Edward Keenan's "Some Great Idea" (<a href="http://www.chbooks.com/catalogue/some-great-idea" target="_blank">Coach House, 2012</a>) is a highly readable, engaging and lucid primer to Toronto's post-amalgamation politics. Assembled from a decade of Keenan's writing about Toronto culture and politics, S.G.I. argues that the city's greatest political strength is its diversity, and the best way to exercise this strength is for all the city's voices to engage, engage, engage.</div>
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Keenan's currently a senior editor at <a href="http://www.thegridto.com/" target="_blank">The Grid</a> and also writes/has written for Eye Weekly (what The Grid used to be called), <a href="http://spacing.ca/" target="_blank">Spacing</a>, <a href="http://www.yongestreetmedia.ca/" target="_blank">Yonge Street</a>, and other city-based publications. If you follow Keenan then a lot of this book will be familiar; parts are lifted verbatim from stuff he's previously published, a corpus stitched together into four long-ish essays. The book offers a potted history of Toronto's self-identity and then maps this (loosely) onto the city's three post-amalgamation mayors: Mel Lastman, David Miller and Rob Ford. The map reads as follows:</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Lastman blustered through the chaos of the post-amalgamation identity crisis; Miller began projecting a self-confident identity onto the new city; and Ford declined to accept that identity in favour of something scrappier and less ambitious.</blockquote>
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The book's best line is clipped for this review's title, and fairly summarizes the problem - circumstances - Keenan's trying to decoct; <i>viz</i>, how Toronto manages to have any kind of civic identity given its history, especially recently, of extreme municipal narratives. Keenan's argument is that the city favours - and suffers - perpetual re-imagination, and that this is the only sensible way for so many different kinds of people to get along and prosper.</div>
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Keenan wears his politics on his sleeve: he's a Jane Jacobs disciple, loves David Miller and loathes Mike Harris (whom Keenan calls "a villain in the modern story of Toronto"). This matters, the obtrusiveness of his bias, because S.G.I.'s nowhere near long enough to be editorially balanced. (I read its 171 pages in an afternoon.) It also underlies the book's most and least compelling arguments.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
The most interesting part of S.G.I. investigates the difference between Ford Nation and everyone else (the latter, basically, people who live downtown and struggle to understand Ford's popularity). Keenan's claim is that the relevant binary here isn't urban vs sub-, middle class vs upper, folks vs elites - or, more uncomfortably, immigrants vs nationals, minorities vs whites - even though each of these has some explanatory force. Rather, the critical opposition is taxpayer vs citizen, a shorthand for two very different stories of civic engagement. </div>
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Whereas "citizens" view themselves as active participants in government, interacting with neighbors and local businesses, having a stake in their local community, "taxpayers" view themselves as isolated from the larger city. A taxpayer's major form of civic interaction is their property tax cheque, which they send far away, literally, then wait to see visible improvements back where they live. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Keenan's primary example is Woburn, the community where he grew up, around the intersection of Markham Road and Lawrence Avenue. Woburn is one of Toronto's "inner suburbs", where roughly 70% of the city's residents live, and is best characterized as a non-community: Keenan notes, "if you ask people who live near Markham and Lawrence what life in Woburn is like, they will not recognize that you are talking about their home." Wide roadways, heavy traffic, strip malls with copious parking, bungalows and high-rise apartment towers. Keenan says his parents still live near Markham and Lawrence, but "near in the sense that people in Scarborough mean it", meaning 2km away. And so:</div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
[I]f the city services in your area are thin on the ground, parks far away, transit inconvenient and unreliable, you might reasonably think the government is not working for you. If you live in a place like Woburn, where residents say a lack of any sense of 'community' or 'neighborhood' is one of its defining characteristics, talk of empowering residents... might just seem wacky and out of touch.</blockquote>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
It's no coincidence that "wacky and out of touch" is also what a lot of people living downtown - outside Ford Nation - think about Rob Ford. Keenan's argument is that the best way to understand Ford's popularity, at least initially, is to understand his appeal to "taxpayers" as directly oppositely David Miller's appeal to "citizens"; a sort of retrenching of the city's <i>entire</i> identity, a very loud shout from the upper decks that <i>We're still here.</i> The challenge for Toronto's next mayor will be, as it's always been, to reconcile the extremes of post-amalgamation Toronto living.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Speaking of which, maybe the least compelling argument in S.G.I. is Keenan's take on Rob Ford's conflict of interest trial. Keenan's description of the proceedings is close to riveting: I was physically uncomfortable reading excerpts from Ford's testimony where he (=Ford) claims to have made statements<i> without understanding what he was saying at the time</i>. While it's no surprise Keenan's pleased with Ford's subsequent removal from office (currently pending appeal), what is surprising is Keenan's view of this result as being a victory for citizenship: </div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The court case began when a private citizen named Paul Magder found a pro-bono lawyer and filed a complaint about Ford's behaviour with the courts. A citizen was inspired to activism by the actions of a mayor. And that citizen changed the course of the city. If I were imagining the story, I could not have written a better ending.</blockquote>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
At the level of first principles, Ford's removal from office via court process is terrible for democracy. Both the Mayor and his brother, Councillor Doug Ford, have been relentless in pointing-up the court case as undemocratic, and they're right: everyone can vote, but not everyone can understand, let alone afford access to judicial process. (Keenan elides any real description of Madger's lawyer, Clayton Ruby, one of the city's wealthiest criminal attorneys, and elsewhere in S.G.I. states that both Madger and Ruby were recruited to the case by another complainant, Adam Chaleff-Freudenthaler.) On a practical level, though, what's really strange is that Keenan totally fails to appreciate how conflict of interest lawsuits - and other kinds of legal action - are now an established tool in Toronto politics. Rest assured, the residents of Ford Nation are taking notes on this new approach to evicting the next incarnation of David Miller. Madger's victory, if upheld on appeal, is almost certainly and entirely Pyrrhic.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The reason many elected officials are immune from prosecution is that having to defend allegations is a major distraction <i>for everyone:</i> the official, other officeholders, the press, voters. And, again, it's a mode of civic engagement only available to a very small group of savvy, well-funded citizens, which is why most processes for removing elected officials are handled by other elected officials. (Like impeachment.) For someone exceptionally keen on the power of civic engagement, on bringing <i>all</i> of Toronto's diverse voices to the table, Keenan's view on the Ford trial is kind of incoherent.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Still, there's no doubt S.G.I. is useful and stimulating. It's also worth reiterating the book's readability, because that's not the first thing I think of when I hear "primer on Toronto's post-amalgamation politics". Keenan writes like the good journalist that he is, and if you disagree with him, at least you'll never wonder why.</div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-46691297921896735852012-12-18T13:45:00.000-05:002012-12-18T13:45:28.347-05:00The Next Big Thing<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div>
Thank you to the lovely and talented <a href="http://amystuart.ca/">Amy Stuart</a> for linking me into this chain. It’s always fun to answer
questions on stuff you’re writing… a good way to pretend it exists
outside of your own head/computer.<br />
<br />
<b>1. What is the working title of your book?</b><br />
<br />
<i>How to grow your heart.</i><br />
<br />
<b>2. </b><b>Where did the idea for the book come from?</b></div>
<div>
<br />
It's a weird sort of fictional memoir, I guess. Trying to capture how memory and understanding work through imagination, projection. How this is both magical and terribly lonely. The work involved in knowing anyone ends up being mostly trust and faith, exactly as hard as maintaining certain kinds of religious beliefs - like transubstantiation, the existence of GOD - that are, these beliefs, impossibly real.<br />
<br />
All of that's a long way of saying the idea for the book grew out of my experience living with someone who turned out to have a serious eating disorder. Trying to figure out how to empathize, help, understand, cope, deal, maintain basic sanity while watching someone trying to kill themselves, slowly, still.<br />
<br />
<b>3. What genre does it fall under?</b><br />
<br />
Fictional memoir? Is there such a thing?<br />
<br />
<b>4. Which actors would you choose to play the characters in a movie version?</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Amanda - Keira Knightly from the film adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's <i>Never Let Me Go</i> (about orphans raised to have their organs harvested)<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Brother - Tom Waits, when he was younger.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of the book?</b></div>
<div>
<br />
A young girl lives with anorexia through the eyes of her bewildered, floundering brother. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>6. Will the book be self-published or represented by an agency?</b></div>
<br />
Out of my hands. <br />
<br />
<div>
<b>7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?</b></div>
<div>
<br />
Still in progress. Parts of an earlier, long-ish thing were salvaged, all that was fruitful from a year of work. Taking a break at the moment, gathering strength, resolve, purpose, motivational calories.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>8. What other books would you compare yours to?</b><br />
<br />
No idea. I just borrowed Rick Moody's memoir, from the library, thinking it may be a good template. I'm hoping to do something incredibly sad that doesn't read like a funeral dirge. Suggestions welcome.<b> </b></div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
<b>9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?</b></div>
<div>
<br />
My life.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>10. What else about your book might pique a reader’s interest?</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I've never read anything about what anorexia looks like, what it's like to live with someone who's self-denying. Only what it's like to be the person s.-d.-ing, which first-person accounts seem to have legitimacy that other-person accounts lack. That's my gut reaction, anyway, like who am I to write about this other person's suffering. This raises anxiety about experience appropriation, how pain and suffering are objective and subjective - <i>respectively</i> - and what that means for having any kind of meaningful relationship with anyone, ever.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Now, go read:</b></div>
<div>
<a href="http://www.juliemcarthur.com/"></a><br />
<a href="http://www.kathrynmockler.com/">Kathryn Mockler</a></div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-2389463795477812632012-12-10T15:17:00.002-05:002012-12-10T15:17:58.138-05:00Vows to my prostate.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ-fOd8x0yY9vp5rtdo3JHyWlvWMhXSNGy_ftnD2Hn76DsLmypmrO27_JOJyDnj7dVjg5pO6RDnd-eIRPvqn_AIABTZh-jckWvJZjQlULE3QwMbk_JeYJ5QA5jrYU1axSPYxzPjnZSaBtZ/s1600/Prostatelead.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ-fOd8x0yY9vp5rtdo3JHyWlvWMhXSNGy_ftnD2Hn76DsLmypmrO27_JOJyDnj7dVjg5pO6RDnd-eIRPvqn_AIABTZh-jckWvJZjQlULE3QwMbk_JeYJ5QA5jrYU1axSPYxzPjnZSaBtZ/s400/Prostatelead.jpg" width="208" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">My doctor says
you’re shaped like a walnut but I think you’re shaped like a heart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I’ve loved you
since we first met, eighth grade, I was straddling a fence in the schoolyard,
balanced on my perineum and the pressure suddenly exquisite. You made my whole
body sigh, including the muscles in my pelvic floor that control bladder
release. I wore proudly your love’s yellow stain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">My beloved
prostate, from the Greek <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">prostates</i>,
literally “one who stands before”, “protector”, “guardian”. Divine exocrine
gland, male G-spot, the second-most sensitive part of my body. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">In our teenage
years we were precocious. Too excited for our own good, the girls who called us
“Quick draw”. Ours was the shotgun approach to intercourse, one pump and it’s
ready to fire but lo how we’ve grown together. Practiced patience, resolve,
thousands of Kegel exercises. Now we can run coital marathons, 90 euphoric
seconds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I love you
because you’re the gateway to my urethra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I love you
because your secretions account for 50-70 percent of my seminal volume; also
100 percent of its colour, that lustrous Mother of Pearl or sometimes Corn
Silk, like white with a tinge of summer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I love you
because your secretions help make my sperm more alkaline, to neutralize acidity
in the vaginal tract.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I love you
because you’ve never once complained there’s no acidity in a fucking condom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I love you
because when it gets cold you stay the same size, and because no one cares how
big or small you are, especially how small. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">My dearest
prostate, no amount of facial hair could ever express my love for you, my deep
and abiding affection. For you alone I would consider the “other” kind of
threesome.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Garamond; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As for these unworthy vows: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">amare et sapere vix deo conceditur</i>. (“Even a god struggles to love
and be wise at the same time.”)</span></div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-63530453925880031752012-11-26T13:57:00.004-05:002012-11-26T13:57:40.811-05:00Project day-maker: My dear friend.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgix2J92ma400LdBv2h3w06Y6gArJVfuy2QfUQbl8uAR1qHmGUGaamI6pXmFLDQ_wzBP-YBb4wl5NEBnbnwBM5_udJYNWRbEGQOgPDvoqGZS9FsvhXaLm0T_dJA6uUjTMmwFK7R92XJIUTG/s1600/DSC07122.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgix2J92ma400LdBv2h3w06Y6gArJVfuy2QfUQbl8uAR1qHmGUGaamI6pXmFLDQ_wzBP-YBb4wl5NEBnbnwBM5_udJYNWRbEGQOgPDvoqGZS9FsvhXaLm0T_dJA6uUjTMmwFK7R92XJIUTG/s400/DSC07122.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Send someone a hand-written note, just to say 'hello'.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-3348621171379492792012-11-23T13:37:00.001-05:002012-11-23T13:37:56.491-05:00Project day-maker: I just called...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5xzfr1WKWwnRhzbXQq4PSqfYyOd2OLMnvBwc-1RD6CguI3FC5ilvcAmoIuPhLXBvvzfa06c22ULfxKOBRud37H5RPbjpc2Is07oreMB__WA679FPIb3sHtgB4qhuJYDDsS3c3GLJszzk5/s1600/tumblr_m29q7aXSwN1rqnraoo1_1280.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5xzfr1WKWwnRhzbXQq4PSqfYyOd2OLMnvBwc-1RD6CguI3FC5ilvcAmoIuPhLXBvvzfa06c22ULfxKOBRud37H5RPbjpc2Is07oreMB__WA679FPIb3sHtgB4qhuJYDDsS3c3GLJszzk5/s400/tumblr_m29q7aXSwN1rqnraoo1_1280.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Call someone you love just to tell them.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-81303556549065265132012-11-22T11:43:00.003-05:002012-11-22T11:43:31.988-05:00Final exam.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDq0zKKDi5p-Efez2l4cMavFHHtSy2pYokidBitGqHMqa3sfx4aov-epRT1jxQAjUuBTsJ4WI5aJBQWFsXRaClljbk8xtMVYiH1Ou7qjWjpzss3_ZoGv28peUOvxg2jR-tm7jioLQuZ2gD/s1600/23252.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDq0zKKDi5p-Efez2l4cMavFHHtSy2pYokidBitGqHMqa3sfx4aov-epRT1jxQAjUuBTsJ4WI5aJBQWFsXRaClljbk8xtMVYiH1Ou7qjWjpzss3_ZoGv28peUOvxg2jR-tm7jioLQuZ2gD/s320/23252.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This story takes the form of a law school examination question. First I will read you the fact scenario, followed by a series of questions designed to test your understanding of the legal issues at play.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />Please listen carefully. There will be no repetition. <br /><br />Here we go: <br /><br />There is a doctor. One day this huge woman comes into his surgery. A spewing volcano of skin, stomach and ass, and she’s got this problem with… you guessed it her ass. Which is just catastrophically big. So she bends over the table and the doctor takes a look and she’s got this sort of fungus or pus going on down there. Like around her anus. Which apparently is pretty common because the doctor right away knows what it is, it’s ass gonorrhoea. So the doctor gets out this little gardening tool thing used for specimens (the technical term for which is <i>speculum</i> - it’s sort of a pair of blunted flattened scissors that you hold like a gun and it separates things and takes a sample at the same time) and he pushes apart her ass cheeks and uses the speculum to take a sample of the ass gonorrhoea. Standard procedure. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
So now he’s got this gardening tool implement with about an inch of pale yellow pustular… well not shit but you know, discharge, the ass gonorrhoea, and he’s turning around to put the specimen in the little plastic bag they send to the lab when his hand slips off the woman’s tectonic ass and he pitches forward and braces his hand against the examination table, which causes his other arm to hit the nearby instrument table, with his elbow, which knocks the hand that’s holding the speculum backwards towards his face, and because he’s simultaneously pitching forward the sample end of the speculum goes right into his mouth. <br /><br />Now the doctor plays it cool and just takes it out of his mouth and throws it away and goes to brush his teeth and take another sample. Remember the patient’s facing the wall and so has no idea what’s happened. But the nurse helping the doctor is so disgusted that she starts to vomit into the garbage can by the examination room’s door. Braces her hands on either side of the can’s rim and heaves up the Big Spit. And because the can is pretty low to the ground the nurse doesn’t have her head all the way in the can but rather a foot or so above and you can see everything she’s bringing up like untreated sewage - which basically that’s what it is, when you think about it - and the patient of course sees and not to mention <i>smells</i> this and <i>freaks</i> out and unfortunately happens to have chronic stomach problems, on account of being so hideously obese, plus she’s bent awkwardly over the examination table in a kind of snowman jack-knife thing that’s putting all kinds of pressure on her intestines large and small, and her ass is there giving a whole new meaning to the phrase <i>moon shot</i>, and she lets out a belch that makes the fillings in the doctor’s teeth rattle. Then she herself starts vomiting all over the wall and the examination table and all of this just makes the doctor even more desirous of being able to go brush his teeth. His wife refuses to kiss him for like a month afterwards. <br /><br /><b>Question one: </b>Can the patient sue the doctor for physical and emotional distress? In the course of your answer pay particular attention to the issue of causation; specifically, can the doctor argue that it was not his own malpractice that caused the patient’s distress - <i>i.e.</i>, his accidentally taking a mouthful of ass gonorrhoea - but rather the nurse’s reaction to his malpractice, and that but for the nurse’s vomiting the patient would not have suffered any harm? Alternatively, can the doctor argue that the patient’s pre-existing conditions - her morbid obesity and chronic stomach problems - were the real cause of her adverse reaction, and he can’t be responsible for illnesses he doesn’t cause? <br /><br /><b>Question two:</b> Can the nurse sue the doctor for physical and emotional distress? In the course of your answer please specifically consider whether the nurse’s status qua nurse requires her to be especially desensitized to medical grotesquery, which would make her reaction to the doctor’s venereal mishap unreasonable and so prevent her winning any lawsuit. <br /><br /> <b>Question three:</b> Can the doctor sue the nurse and patient for the damage done to his surgery by their respective vomiting? In the course of your answer be sure to address your analysis of multiparty causation in question one - <i>e.g.</i>, if you argued that the patient could not sue the doctor because the nurse’s vomiting supervened the doctor’s eating ass gonorrhoea as the cause of the patient’s injury, does that mean the doctor is similarly prevented from suing the patient? - as well as your analysis of the nurse’s professional capacity in question two - <i>e.g.</i>, if the nurse can sue the doctor for emotional and physical distress, can the doctor nevertheless sue the nurse for the property damage caused thereby? <br /><br /> <b>Question four:</b> Assuming the doctor can sue the nurse and patient for the damage to his surgery, can he also sue for loss of consortium? [<i><b>NB.</b></i> Loss of consortium derives from the Latin phrase <i>per quod servitium et consortium amisit</i>, which translates as “in consequence of which he lost her society and services.” In this case, the doctor’s loss of consortium is the monetary value of his wife refusing romantic attention for a month after he ate his patient’s clap.] In your answer be sure to discuss any defenses available to the nurse and patient, including whether they should be responsible if the doctor goes home and blabs every detail of his day to his wife, or for his wife’s hypersensitivity to the few particles of <i>Neisseria gonorrhoeae</i> that plausibly remained in the doctor’s mouth after multiple tooth brushings. <br /><br />You have 60 minutes to complete your answer. Good luck. </div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-83552152811558259682012-11-21T15:59:00.002-05:002012-11-21T15:59:53.592-05:00Project day-maker: beautiful.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjqErEjfGhF-AKFg_TEL1jkmS3XPLTzhrD9TW2BQOZSgHWa26I8f1GAdn7SojQShzYb6egX6v0TB4zBYPWskM5MGp3A-G0NXSm9WLsicrJj_I7L5nRBQYE6yIYSCIC9TClJ1OHQLYKjPNo/s1600/Ngr3W-xJlj.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjqErEjfGhF-AKFg_TEL1jkmS3XPLTzhrD9TW2BQOZSgHWa26I8f1GAdn7SojQShzYb6egX6v0TB4zBYPWskM5MGp3A-G0NXSm9WLsicrJj_I7L5nRBQYE6yIYSCIC9TClJ1OHQLYKjPNo/s320/Ngr3W-xJlj.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Today, when you see someone you think is beautiful, tell them.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-89211530383019827022012-11-20T18:44:00.002-05:002012-11-20T18:44:58.593-05:00Project day-maker: flowers.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKwOsScVuWZzHA4Gm_VZEV_vOZaOodW9LH6KMi1P7hlw670QBsYcotOElc3dtxziAlAmeil9urkfB8uThqvaP64BjDWA70nd9cywlDK9G7_s4FNyj4RPAqkKDcv0OkYGVlMZ5uE8fpSpRM/s1600/(via+hoanbee,+ruffians%29.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKwOsScVuWZzHA4Gm_VZEV_vOZaOodW9LH6KMi1P7hlw670QBsYcotOElc3dtxziAlAmeil9urkfB8uThqvaP64BjDWA70nd9cywlDK9G7_s4FNyj4RPAqkKDcv0OkYGVlMZ5uE8fpSpRM/s400/(via+hoanbee,+ruffians%29.jpeg" width="305" /></a></div>
<br />
Buy a corner store bouquet and give away the flowers to people you pass on the way to school or work.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-69703761085079158222012-10-28T14:39:00.001-04:002012-10-28T14:39:21.793-04:00Craft fair.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMSmjO6Za_J5ZrthXSHkjJh0mUSiTFu8Fv2VmIkEqdIOPmy-NYMpxV9VSevmCLmpR3dGK7e4dQ6zdu1s2zCGW9BMTZwHNtib-hBrzlKfx34VftOFmlR0RqpIbumgnmsyPZBGp1cUGi5Yna/s1600/Arts-and-crafts-big1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="321" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMSmjO6Za_J5ZrthXSHkjJh0mUSiTFu8Fv2VmIkEqdIOPmy-NYMpxV9VSevmCLmpR3dGK7e4dQ6zdu1s2zCGW9BMTZwHNtib-hBrzlKfx34VftOFmlR0RqpIbumgnmsyPZBGp1cUGi5Yna/s400/Arts-and-crafts-big1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Arts and crafts and money.</span></b><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<i><span style="font-size: large;">When “small batch” equals big dollars and one-person companies are
supported by corporate-size websites, is “hand-made” what we think it
is? A report from North America’s largest consumer craft fair, where the
competition for puppet dollars is intense.</span></i><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">The Morning News, 10 May 2012.</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.themorningnews.org/article/arts-and-crafts-and-money"><span style="font-size: large;">Here.</span></a> </div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-37107153232319054782012-10-28T14:36:00.000-04:002012-10-28T14:36:03.837-04:00Volcano boarding.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR5NcgOvNhp0My7AxeAMy_Td3DEp9qU-oRXOMtWLuYa1ETnKoJaNIJs2lz4qrv05qcu3X3vx7CvGXT5G5sAajCCBcqMhmXx5dUq2kTrYD4TdCxPp4EV_Sq4wSWIDgLmD4JcuW-0iJLQaVu/s1600/Diary-of-a-feat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR5NcgOvNhp0My7AxeAMy_Td3DEp9qU-oRXOMtWLuYa1ETnKoJaNIJs2lz4qrv05qcu3X3vx7CvGXT5G5sAajCCBcqMhmXx5dUq2kTrYD4TdCxPp4EV_Sq4wSWIDgLmD4JcuW-0iJLQaVu/s400/Diary-of-a-feat.jpg" width="336" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Diary of a post-adrenaline junky.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Some decisions are best made heedlessly, based on the chance for an epic
story—and some people think like that all the time. A report on what
it’s like to slide down a volcano on a piece of sheet metal at 55 mph.</i></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">The Morning News, 16 February 2012.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.themorningnews.org/article/diary-of-a-post-adrenaline-junkie">Here.</a> </span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-19634220907311090422012-10-28T14:33:00.001-04:002012-10-28T14:33:23.156-04:00Orchestra conducting.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">When the crescendo is the least of your problems.</span></b><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>After practicing with his iPod—and feeling pretty good, actually—a
novice discovers the extreme fear of conducting a professional
orchestra.</i></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">The Morning News, 8 February, 2011.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i> </i></span><br />
<a href="http://www.themorningnews.org/article/when-the-crescendo-is-the-least-of-your-worries"><span style="font-size: large;">Her<span id="goog_1796279258"></span><span id="goog_1796279259"></span>e.</span></a><i><br /></i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-81909139589475244662012-10-28T14:29:00.001-04:002012-10-28T14:29:37.737-04:00Lewis H. Lapham<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Nothing is off the record, because I'm not coming back. </b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>After 26 years writing </i><i>Harper’s Notebook, Lewis Lapham talks about history, essays, and modern journalists.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">The Morning News, 30 November, 2010.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.themorningnews.org/article/nothing-is-off-the-record-because-im-not-coming-back" target="_blank">Click here</a>. </span><br />
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<div style="text-align: right;">
Image: Jason Polan.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-4343352519206421002012-10-15T15:25:00.000-04:002012-10-28T14:21:33.081-04:00Letter to the Editor<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Letters,</span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">The Walrus</span></i><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">19 Duncan Street, Suite 101,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Toronto, Ontario, M5H 3H1.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">17 August 2012</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">RE: John MacFarlane’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Editor’s Note</i>, September 2012 Issue.</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Dear Editors,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Buried deep in
the back of David Foster Wallace’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Infinite
Jest</i>, endnote 269, is a character sketch of pro football punter Orin
Incandenza by his former roommate, the reclusive hypochondriac Marlon Bain.
Bain describes Orin as a near-pathological liar, a serial seducer of mothers with
young children that he (=O.) contrives to fall madly in love with him, to the
point where they (=the mothers w/ children) forget all about their brood; much
the same way that O. feels his own mother serially philanders and apportions
her attention. Orin goes so far as to deploy a series of numbered seduction
strategies, selling each married woman a different version of himself, which
Bain says demonstrates how “there can be such a thing as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sincerity with a motive</i>.” Then there’s a long and kind of funny
anecdote before Bain recapitulates as follows: “It is not that Orin Incandenza
is a liar, but that I think he has come to regard the truth as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">constructed</i> instead of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">reported</i>.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">This same
distinction underwrites John MacFarlane’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Editor’s
Note</i> in the September issue of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Walrus</i> magazine. Mr MacFarlane writes about the difference between
advertisers and journalists, which cohabit a magazine’s pages but for very
different reasons: advertisers have something to sell, while journalists have
something to say. Mr MacFarlane puts it thusly:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Garamond; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“Journalists, including me, often feel conflicted
about advertising: grateful because it helps pay the bills (including
salaries), and because financial sustainability is an editor’s best friend;
when a magazine is solvent, its owners tend to leave its editors alone. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Grateful, then, but wary, because
advertising is always self-interested, which is what distinguishes it from
journalism.</i> [Emphasis added.] This is also why journalists sometimes
dismiss it as irrelevant or, worse, dishonest. Yet what could be more honest than
the shoemaker’s desire to have people buy his or her shoes? Seen in this way,
the marketing of products is a natural consequence of the making of them, and
in a consumer society it’s hardly irrelevant, and only dishonest when it’s,
well, dishonest — that is, when it makes false claims.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">I submit to
you that the prenominate gloss is not only wrong but insidious and bad, and
just plain hard to believe given Mr MacFarlane’s editorial mantle. The fact is
that journalists sell stories: writers ‘pitch’ stories to editors, editors pick
the most interesting of these, and then work with the writer to get the story
into print. Along the way there are hundreds of ‘editorial decisions’,
arguments over usage and pitch and tone and angle and what to quote and what to
cut. The overriding aim is to tell the story in a way that interests readers.
To get more readers to turn more pages, some of which pages, of course, carry
advertising.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">For Mr
MacFarlane to suggest that journalists are not self-interested, and that this
is what distinguishes them from advertisers - people who sell things - is
literally ridiculous: silly to the point of being surreal, reckless, cavalier, wilfully
blind, and then almost unbelievable when he ends his <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Editor’s Note</i> with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Walrus’s </i>own sales pitch: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Garamond; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“Like the shoemaker, we at <i>The Walrus</i> want to
sell what we make to as many people as possible, and so we advertise the
magazine’s virtues wherever and whenever we can. Is this self-interested? Yes.
Irrelevant? Not if it puts the magazine into the hands of more readers.
Dishonest? Our ads claim <i>The Walrus</i> is fearless, witty, thoughtful, and
Canadian. You tell me.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Mr
MacFarlane’s argument is the same as Marlon Bain’s: that some people regard the
truth as something to construct, while others regard the truth as something to
report. Mr MacFarlane puts advertisers in the constructed camp and journalists
- at least journalists at <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Walrus</i>
- in the reported camp. (This is what makes advertisements <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><u>for</u></i> <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Walrus </i>different
from advertisements <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><u>in</u></i> <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Walrus</i>.) The problem is that the
distinction is completely false; it’s a non-distinction, mistaking a difference
in degree for a difference in kind. So-called ‘reported’ truth is every bit as
constructed as plain old advertising: a journalist can only talk to so many
people, put the camera in so many places, run down so many leads, ask so many
questions. The process is even more constrained by word counts and page limits:
subtle distinctions that require lots of space to develop and explain rarely
win out over points that are more straightforward, pithy, exciting, salacious,
surprising. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">A more
intuitive way to make the foregoing points is maybe this: the reason there are
many different magazines and newspapers is that there are many, many different
ways to tell the same story. In fact, there are as many ways as there are storytellers,
and each journalist can be only one of these. To suggest that even some journalists
tell better stories than others - do more reporting than constructing - is to
mistake journalists for prophets. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">There will
always be more to say than pages on which to print; the map is not the
territory, and my world, at least, does not unfold in neat, clear, narrative
arcs. The most obvious things are often the easiest to overlook but also, in
many cases, the most important: in this case, that without readers there would
be no writers, even at <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Walrus</i>. For
Mr MacFarlane to suggest otherwise is, with great respect, simply false
advertising.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">Yours,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-CA" style="font-family: Garamond;">As ever,</span></div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-51061326933742514172012-09-12T15:46:00.000-04:002012-09-12T15:46:06.524-04:00Tonight, Raconteurs, 7.30pm.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Hyacinth will be there! And yours truly, and others, telling stories. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">No One Writes To The Colonel, 7.30pm.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Boom.</span></div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-22220895318586912692012-08-25T18:33:00.000-04:002012-08-25T18:33:38.884-04:00Tackle Me For A Dollar.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-11898146380194603192012-07-10T12:19:00.000-04:002012-07-10T12:19:33.847-04:00Diary of a serial onanist.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">Your FB profile; pretty girls you're FB friends with; weight loss ads (the After images); the Sears catalog; music videos; covers of Harlequin romance novels; ads for gym memberships; yearbooks (mine and my younger sister's); aerobics shows; a picture of my mother when she was in university, one time, while drunk.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-3978575609944276792012-07-06T10:57:00.000-04:002012-07-06T10:57:23.762-04:00My life on the corner of a table.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-4409667555983011522012-06-01T19:44:00.000-04:002013-04-18T17:53:53.777-04:00Look homeward angels, west of Bathurst, and fall in love with me.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">Gossamer blouses, threadbare cotton, all the body’s shade. Cut-off shorts, lacquered and frayed, trailing white and bias, twin smiles. Breasts tan and untethered, shaped like kinds of fruit. Languid bodies, imagined easy love. Breeze tickles hems, flutters hearts, quivers knees. Oblique, close, poignant, deep and silly and sadly unalone. </span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2305761162837039010.post-13997604307075745342012-05-25T13:47:00.003-04:002012-05-28T10:08:38.681-04:00Nothing else for it, I guess. (Part final.)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Evening Karp, evening Mitch.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Evening Tate, nice to see you.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Tate always a pleasure.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Thank you kind sirs very much indeed. I couldn’t help overhearing what y’all were saying just this past while, from where I was sitting over by the pinball machine – which machine is broken again Mitch, by the way, and just ate three of my best quarters.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Which quarters I’ll be more than happy to refund Tate, thanks for letting me know about the machine.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘I would be most grateful for that Mitch, thank you. But so as I couldn’t help but overhear what y’all were saying, and seeing as I’m the only one of us three here so far as I know who’s an actual father, well I thought you might welcome the benefit of my experience being brought to bear on some of the questions y’all are considering here this evening.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘That would be fine Tate, am I right Karp?’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Indeed Tate, bear away with the first hand experience.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well now Karp let me say that I have a huge amount of appreciation and respect for the anxieties you’re expressing here re potentially starting a family, primarily because they are very similar to, albeit unpacked much more thoroughly than, the anxieties I was feeling at about this juncture in my own life, that is to say in my own pre-parental thought process. In other words I can tell you straight shooting that what you’re feeling is perfectly normal and healthy, but of course not for those reasons banal or trite, because even though just about every thinking man’s going to have similar thoughts when he’s trying to decide whether to try to conceive, that doesn’t mean that the individual instances of those thoughts and feelings are any less poignant or real or at all easy to bear.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘That’s well said Tate and much appreciated.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Thank you Karp, thank you very much.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Tate I’m just going to <i>ibid</i> Karp on this one, pretty much.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br />‘To which I will <i>ibid</i> myself Mitch, <i>mutatis mutandis</i>.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Right so Karp as I was saying, I know precisely where you’re coming from, but let me tell you where you’re going. It’s hard to explain, but once you have a child and see that little person smiling up at you despite his or her perfect vulnerability and dependence – which BTW [<i>sic</i>] Karp if you think you’re taking a risk feelings-wise by having a child, try imagining your baby trusting you with their <i>survival</i> without even knowing what ‘trust’ or ‘survival’ even means, i.e. [<i>sic</i>] without even knowing what they (your child) don’t know…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…but so you’re standing there holding something in your arms that is <i>of you</i> and <i>by you</i> and my goodness gracious Karp it’s a whole new world. Your capacity for love and understanding and patience and regard for the goodness in all others - not just your baby - increases enormously, exponentially, in fact basically almost immediately you’re looking around for the nearest logarithmic function in order to express on a more manageable scale the rate of increase in your capacity to love all things. It’s literally the best feeling you could possibly imagine having.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘That does sound pretty good Karp, I have to say.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘I hear you Mitch, it certainly does sound that way.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘And another thing Karp, that I definitely didn’t see coming, was about all those things I thought I wanted to do in my life before the baby, which until I held the little guy in my arms the thought of him struck me as not so much a line in the sand but a crevasse into which my future was sure to fall, forever, but it hasn’t turned out that way. I just don’t think about myself first and foremost anymore Karp. One of the most important things my child has taught me – it’s worth hearing that again, that my <i>child</i> has taught <i>me</i> – just by being his own little perfect and adorable self, is that the key to happiness in the world is not necessarily fulfilling every one of my own personal desires. The work of a father is it’s own reward, Karp, and your child will be there every day to remind you of that blessed and beautiful fact.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Tate that was exquisitely shared brother. Standing-O.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Thank you Mitch, but I’m going to have to give most of the credit here to young Brackett, who in a very real way has taught me most of what I know that’s worth knowing, I now know.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well now Tate let me first acknowledge just how beautiful and appreciated your sharing was, truly, notwithstanding what anyone here might think of it in terms of its effect on the sentiments and conclusions heretofore expressed and elaborated. That was just wonderful openness you demonstrated and I am truly grateful for everything you’ve said here this evening.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"></span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLkmT_smxPZTXJTcg5oGLfPXQHnzSp-Ysqoxky1kEqf92sL3NMsNsGEP2HH8i9hu4TzIabbAk0DLG3snUzPXdBbJynmCLdPs6fWxDaNhJAesAYhU-W0IpBjr0lTeZyulwi6AbNIzHLyXlD/s1600/imaage+one" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLkmT_smxPZTXJTcg5oGLfPXQHnzSp-Ysqoxky1kEqf92sL3NMsNsGEP2HH8i9hu4TzIabbAk0DLG3snUzPXdBbJynmCLdPs6fWxDaNhJAesAYhU-W0IpBjr0lTeZyulwi6AbNIzHLyXlD/s400/imaage+one" width="400" /></a><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br />‘Karp you’ve got to be kidding me if you’re going to come back here with a rebuttal, although I certainly do respect and acknowledge whatever feelings you may have to express in that regard.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Mitch you have not misinterpreted the gist of my prefatory remarks there.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Because see now Tate while I have no doubt as to the veracity and verisimilitude of your description of your feelings about the mental and emotional revelations and even paradigm shifts Brought To You By Young Brackett, it occurs to me that you have no reason to tell us, or more importantly yourself, any different.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Karp I hear you brother and I’m respecting your difference of opinion here, fully and truly, but I am also having a bit of difficulty understanding just what is the content of that different opinion. Would you mind terribly elaborating there upon?’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Not at all Tate and thank you for your acknowledgment. When you said before that one of the keys to happiness turns out <i>not</i> to be fulfilling every one of your desires, I think what you really meant to say, or at least all you really could say, is that what you desire <i>changes</i> after you have a child. In other words, once you’re a father you don’t have any reason to dwell on all the things that might have been, or that you could have accomplished, with the time and resources you’re now committed to devoting to young Brackett. It’s just undeniable that the opportunity cost of having a child is stupendous…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well I hear you there Karp and I’m sorry to interrupt but I have to say that’s the sort of thing only a person who’s never had a child would say, because you really can’t appreciate how the concept of ‘opportunity cost’ just doesn’t apply when you’re a parent; that’s how beautiful and amazing it is to hold your own child in your arms. You’ll see what I mean when you get there. Everything else pales in comparison.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well see now actually Tate you’re kind of making my point for me, by which I mean the intensity of your feelings just there, and your earlier use of phrases like ‘a whole new world’ and ‘happier than you could ever imagine being’, basically describing something like a state of rapture w/r/t [<i>sic</i>] how it feels to become a father, well Tate I hate to say this but that’s just what you’d expect from a guy who just said toodle-oo to the next fifteen or twenty years of his life. I mean you’ve got to be terrified you made the wrong decision, and even more terrified that that first-order terror is going to undermine or in some way sabotage your obligations to young Brackett, and thus guarantee what it is you were terrified of in the first place. Because remember, no matter how you slice it, young Brackett never asked you to bring him into the world, but you did, and now he’s here and it’s your responsibility to give him the best chance at life you can.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well you’re right about that at least Karp, that any such slicing would be to no avail.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘I’m afraid that no avail applies to more than just the slicing, Tate, because as Mitch and I’ve just been discussing, as a father you inevitably encounter a disheartening set of circumstances: whether to (1) raise a child with near-perfect emotional acuity and practice, in which case say goodbye to any hope of genuine or meaningful recognition or reciprocation of affection from your own child, or (2) you can let your child decide for themselves whether to (a) go for honesty and respect vis a vis their own and other’s emotional needs and expressions of same, or (b) some version of the opposite course, all versions of which are to varying degrees hideous and morally ablated, which means you risk unleashing some horrible emotional terror onto everyone else in the world, an outcome that seems almost certain in the absence of a strict and medieval-type course of childhood training and development (in which case see (1)) given how just about everyone in the world seems to operate on some emotionally degraded level.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well you know Karp I must say I’ve never thought of it quite like that, and while your schematic description was both creative and helpful I could still use a bit of an upshot, if you don’t mind terribly.’ </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘That’s kind of you to say Tate and it would be my pleasure. The upshot here is that having a child puts you as a parent in the horrible situation of being, as it were, stuck between a rock and a hard place whilst precariously balanced atop a sharp steel spike (i.e. [<i>sic</i>] emotional automaton vs. potential guerrilla narcissist, whilst trying not to let your now-realized fear of just this kind of hideous predicament cause you to bear any kind of grudge or resentment towards the at least in this case wholly innocent young Brackett), in which case it’s only natural to close your eyes and hope for all you’re worth – or more likely <i>just decide</i> – that children really are a paradigm shift, and there’s no better feeling in the world than what you’re about to experience, and so no matter what you think you’ve given up or lost it just pales in comparison to What Dreams May Surely Come, which dreams most certainly do not include rocks or hard places or pointy implements of hardened alloy.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Well now…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘Indeed…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘And plus further, don’t be surprised that all the other parents you meet at day care or first grade lemonade sales or neo-natal yoga or whatever all tell you the same story, and you trade superlatives in describing how special you feel to Be A Parent, no matter how difficult some days or weeks might be, because obviously Tate all those people have the same skewed incentives that you do, are facing the same terrible certainty that only gets more terrible and more certain the more they think about it, and don’t kid yourself about the tacit but very real pressure to conform in the collective myopia, and the Antarctic wilderness that’s waiting for anyone who breaks with the tribe’s folklore and suggests having a child is not ultimately if sometimes irregularly Bliss on Tap.’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br />‘…’ </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><br /><br /> ‘So basically Tate what I’m saying, and really with all due respect and appreciation for your sharing of your feelings and your earnest and sincere desire to contribute to our collective understanding here this evening, is that the only chance to really think clearly about what it might be like to have a child, and whether it’s actually the worst or at least something far from the best decision a person could ever make, is sometime before conception, <b>[FN9]</b></span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"> because after that, well, there’s nothing else for it, I guess.’ </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">***</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"><b>[FN9]</b> Just not even going there. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">[End.] </span>
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com