La Catholique

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 01:36:18 -0700

I don't know why I watch "Weeds."

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 17:29:36 -0700

But that’s actually a topic for a different post, why I watch something I can’t stand.

What is bubbling forth from me right now is a visceral, teeth-gnashing hatred for the theme song, “Little Boxes.”

I grew up in a “Little Boxes” land. As a teenager and young adult, I had all the requisite contempt for the place where I grew up, the lack of culture, the brain-deadening sameness.

Then I got a job, got debt, got tired, got old and got the fuck over it.

Granted, I still don’t want to live in a Little Box. But that’s aesthetics, that’s taste, it’s not necessarily values or morality or anything that presumes one way of life is superior or inferior to another. It’s just a different set of choices.

I mean, sure, my job is often dealing with the kind of people the song Little Boxes is about, and I do get frustrated that so much of my waking life is spent talking to people who have a different lifestyle to mine, one that I can’t really relate to.

But I at least have the self-awareness to recognize that’s just my own form of tribalism, liking My Kind over The Other, and making the traits of The Other repugnant.

It doesn’t mean I am right, that God and Jesus and Buddha and everyone else came down with a notarized certificate indicating MY choice of not living in a Little Box is the Ultimate Correct Way and all those who live in Little Boxes are the heathen damned.

They’re just fucking people living their fucking lives.

And my own experience, having grown up in that kind of environment, having lots of friends who grew up in that kind of environment, is that while we did all go “to the university” we did not “all come out the same.” We’re leading pretty different lives on different continents. Sure, we have similar privileges based on our class and our education, but even the friends who chose to continue living in Little Boxes country aren’t mindless unthinking drones.

Are some people in those Boxes mindless unthinking drones? Sure, as are some of the people in the walk-up apartments in Manhattan or a favela in Brazil. There will always be people who base most of their choices on conformity, on sticking with what their neighbors and ancestors have chosen. And there will always be people who want something different. ALWAYS.

Little Boxes made of ticky tacky don’t create complacency. A…what would be the opposite? A mixed-use community, an urban environment, does not innoculate its inhabitants from complacency.

So the self-satisfied judgment of that song, the way it’s condemning all those people because they “all look just the same” WHILE IT’S JUDGING PEOPLE BASED ON HOW THEY LOOK is just so incredibly aggravating. Especially since the very first line contains the words “on a hillside.” You’re not even there! You’re THAT far away and you can tell all this about the hearts and minds of these people.

Their houses might be Little Boxes but you’re the one putting labels on them.

Words that are not onomatopoeic...

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 09:41:24 -0700

…but sort of feel like they are. Like they make the sound of the essence of the thing they label even if not the sound of the sound of the thing they label

Chicken (but for the food, not the animal)
Pencil
Pickle
Noodle

I am collecting scrap metal with which to build a space capsule.

Sat, 08 Aug 2009 12:31:00 -0700

Because it is becoming increasingly clear that this is no longer an occasional aberration but rather where the language is going now.

That is: “between ____ & I” or “from _____ & I” and all other varieties of following a preposition with “I” because people think somehow to say ”_____ & me” is incorrect even when it is the object of something.

And now, this monstrosity is becoming more common: “____ & I’s”

“I’s”?

“I’s”?!??!?!?!??

I can’t live on this planet any longer. I just can’t. I can’t stay here and be a party to the wholesale slaughter of something I love so dearly.

Adore

Thu, 06 Aug 2009 14:50:00 -0700

I don’t know quite why this is, but when someone says “I adore ____”, 9 times out of 10 it translates to “I love this and I am simultaneously giving myself a pat on the back for loving it.”

There is some kind of self-satisfaction with the slightest whiff of smugness just hardwired into that word at this point.

Driving around an ocean-front community, I am inspired to create a book of photography called...

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 20:08:00 -0700

Driving around an ocean-front community, I am inspired to create a book of photography called “Dick Move” that will be pictures of the kind of architectural monstrosity created by someone who wants a view but does not really have one from their property.

Cigarette smoking and sincere mullets are alive and well at the Days Inn in Ocean Shores, WA.

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 20:06:52 -0700

Cigarette smoking and sincere mullets are alive and well at the Days Inn in Ocean Shores, WA.

And speaking of language fashion...

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 09:31:00 -0700

…I cannot believe anyone is still using the “Blanky McBlankerson” construction as a punchline.

I really wish I could invent some kind of internet worm that would make every home page in the English-speaking world a list of tired, battered, exhausted, threadbare internet language trends and beg BEG people to stop using them.

Watching TV at the hotel, I learn that National Geographic is now referring to itself as “Nat...

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 09:24:00 -0700

Watching TV at the hotel, I learn that National Geographic is now referring to itself as “Nat Geo.” I am sure that this abbreviated form has been used before, but the way the announcer said it just made me imagine strategy meetings about appealing to younger viewers and this was one of the sad, pointless decisions made that actually seems to highlight the old-fashionedness of something like National Geographic rather than make it seem like a contemporary of omg and lol. (An old-fashionedness I like, btw.)

It reminds me of when I got a bunch of brightly-patterned Forenza shorts as back-to-school clothes and thought it would somehow make me seem cool. Instead I got to school, Lauren Bradley took one look and said, with the usual Mean Girl sneer, “Are those Vans shorts? Oh, no they’re Forenza.” My future seemed pretty clear at that moment, even though I stayed in denial about it.

jakelodwick: My only red X was because I forgot to tidy my...

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 09:21:50 -0700

jakelodwick:

My only red X was because I forgot to tidy my apartment for 5 minutes after waking up. The numbers that look red are actually orange, a color indicating I was “off” by a little.

I spent a little too much time on Business, Unpleasantries, and Reading. But now it’s 9:15pm and I don’t know what to do. I already did everything. Today was one of the most productive days of my life, and had some of the most relaxing moments I’ve had off-vacation in years.

“Unpleasantries” is an emotional category. It means, “things I never feel like doing in the moment”, such as making a dentist appointment or calling Verizon. These are candidates for procrastination, and if I don’t make a special category for them, they will never get done.

It’s all about limits. I can get neurotic with unlimited time — not just in general in my life, but in any moment. I love that everything I do has an impending cutoff. It doesn’t make me work harder, but smarter. “I shouldn’t be checking Tumblr” is a MUCH easier thing to admit during a 90-minute business sprint than a 7 hour shift.

Oh, and I credit some of this to Rob Mizell’s suggestion of pre-visualizing the day. In ten minutes I solved a lot of daunting problems, which were really just balls of anxiety that held no power whatsoever. The instant I brought them into my awareness they evaporated.

I’m looking forward to tomorrow. This is a computer program that I build on the weekend and takes a whole week to run. A good Monday is no guarantee of a good Tuesday, etc.

Good night.

Sometimes I remember my perspective from, say, a year ago, and when I do, I realize I was so...

Sat, 25 Jul 2009 11:05:42 -0700

Sometimes I remember my perspective from, say, a year ago, and when I do, I realize I was so incredibly stupid that I’m amazed I was able to function. Does this ever stop?

the older I get the more I look like a man who should be buying black market vodka in Czechoslovakia...

Fri, 24 Jul 2009 18:55:27 -0700

the older I get the more I look like a man who should be buying black market vodka in Czechoslovakia in 1983 and it’s just so depressing on a variety of levels, not least of which is I am not a dude.

The usual little insults

Fri, 24 Jul 2009 18:40:00 -0700

Listening to this week’s On The Media podcast. Usual hosts are off, it is instead being hosted by NPR sports guy Mike Pesca. So of course he does a few stories on the sports media.

One of which is the baseball writers selecting the baseball hall of fame players, and how they are handling that decision in the face of steriod use.

At one point, Pesca says that if a reported secret list of 100 steroid users becomes public in the future, and any of those users have been put into the hall of fame, how would the writers feel?

This was not said with the kind of seriousness used to discuss, say, the disputed FL results of 2000 elections.

But it was also not said with any kind of acknowledgement of the inherent frivolity of a) a hall of fame, b) a hall of fame for people who play a game for a living, c) a bunch of writers who write about a game selecting people for a hall of fame for people who play a game for a living, d) a bunch of writers who write about a game selecting people for a hall of fame for people who play a game for a living and who may or may not have injected themselves with drugs that make their penises smaller.

So here’s the thing: I don’t care about sports. It is the one topic in the universe that when I hear people talk about it, I feel no itchy need to go read some “Sports for Dummies.” Normally, any unfamiliar proper noun in an article or podcast sends me to an internet search, but I do not Wikipedia the names mentioned in sports-related human-interest stories. I have no idea who Poor Little Tink Tink is in real life and have, for me, a stunning complete lack of curiosity to find out.

That said, I hold no ill will or scorn towards people who DO care about sports. I think that’s totally cool.

I admire, in a dispassionate way, people who train their bodies and have that kind of discipline, and think being interested in it, like any hobby, is a nice way for people to focus on something besides themselves. Beyond that, I have no positive or negative moral judgment on either liking or being disinterested in sports.

These things are just things that exist that you like or don’t care about it and the world keeps on turning.

So as an outsider listening to this, it suddenly struck me that this would how comic it would inherently be to have anyone talking about FASHION with this level of seriousness on this kind of program. Not to say that there are not fashion awards and fashion shows, but the idea of a bunch of journalists wondering about the historic impact of some kind of “Best Of” list would have years down the road could only possibly play on a show like this as completely absurd.

Because in general, outside the fashion world, fashion people are made out to be totally ridiculous when being equally serious about what they care about. And why is that?

I mean, what are these two things but just some things human beings do? Sports is (are?) human beings disciplining their bodies and competing with and against each other in games of strength, agility and other physical attributes. Fashion is human beings meeting a basic need, expressing themselves through a particular form, working in creative collaboration with other human beings, and often personally developing a particular skill or craft.

And I realize this is not particularly deep or illuminating, but listening to this, this struck me - the disparity between how interest in sports is portrayed (reverence, noble, even obsessiveness is given a sort of chuckling pass) and interest in fashion is portrayed (height of meaningless frivolity, shallowness, uselessness, idiocy) - and I JUST GOT THE USUAL AMOUNT OF MAD.

"his mastery of gesture"

Wed, 22 Jul 2009 22:01:42 -0700

from the wikipedia on Baryshnikov.

For the past two weeks I have been completely obsessed with watching and re-watching Katt Williams’ routines. It’s not even the content of the jokes, it’s the way he uses his body and his voice, it feels like music and dance.

Tonight on TBTL, a segment on hit songs from flop movies brought up “Say You Say Me” from “White Nights,” a favorite from childhood. I watched the below clip and a clip of “Push Comes to Shove,” a video I watched quite a lot as a kid. (My sister was in ballet.)

Read the wikipedia, see that phrase, lightbulb.

I feel like this is what I need to develop as a writer. Always the explaining with me, the detail. They have their place, and you don’t throw out one thing just because you get a wild hair about another.

But the gesture, right, the gesture!

I have always loved cartoons, how much action is conveyed with the fewest of pen lines. This is what I am responding to in Katt Williams and Baryshnikov. The gesture! Something to think about/work on.

Video

Wed, 22 Jul 2009 21:27:47 -0700

Adding to the list: "full of win/suck" and ALL permutations of FAIL.

Wed, 22 Jul 2009 10:49:23 -0700

Adding to the list: "full of win/suck" and ALL permutations of FAIL.

Video

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 00:52:18 -0700

". All trees aspire to bigness. Bigness is their gaudium—the characteristic pleasure of a..."

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:59:00 -0700

“

All trees aspire to bigness. Bigness is their gaudium—the characteristic pleasure of a particular form of life. Chenjerai Hove writes: “I used to watch cattle chewing lazily under the shade of the musuma trees, chewing as if to show me that I was not able to enjoy what they enjoyed.” When we see a big tree, we see this enjoyment, this gaudium. Little trees do not have this effect; their lives are small and stupid. The lure of big trees is that they are heavy with life and are deep in thought.

”

- Charles Mudede

the uniform lack of interest in what I produce isn’t going to stop me from producing it

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 16:21:07 -0700

the uniform lack of interest in what I produce isn’t going to stop me from producing it

Other than the secret blog (and the other secret blog)...

Thu, 04 Jun 2009 00:43:00 -0700

…I generally try to keep my Andy Rooney internet griping to a minimum because you know rantings, ramblings, musings.

But sometimes I simply cannot contain the righteous indignation and now is one of those times. Here are some things I could do without. The first two are related.

1. Usage of fonts that look like how people wrote on denim binders in the 1980’s.

2. The current commercial ubiquity of the musical equivalent of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl.

Why? Why would I care? Why on earth would anyone care? Twee-ification, that’s why, Buddy. It’s just so g-d twee out there lately and sometimes it just makes me want to chew tobacco.

Also when you are clearly the target market for something, but the marketers don’t get you, you can feel it. There is a palpable disingenuousness to it, the manipulating hand is pushing a little too hard.

But it’s not just forced tweeness that is bugging me. On the opposite end of the spectrum:

3. Kneejerk vulgarity lauded as style. I first started really noticing this when I saw Anthony Bourdain last summer. Now don’t get me wrong, I like Bourdain and I like food people, but the way the audience tittered everytime he said a swear! made me wonder if they’d been locked in an isolation tank with only NPR piped in the rest of the time.

Anyway, after the Bourdain show, yada yada yada Baader-Meinhof, I’m seeing this more and more. ”Fuck” as an ipso facto punchline. (And not just where one expects it, i.e., lowest common denominator culture, where, actually, sometimes it DOES work as an actual ipso facto punchline in that context. No, I am referring specifically to people who should care about words falling prey to the same troglodytic syndrome.)

And while tweeness annoys me, nothing drives me to an immediate homicidal rage like self-satisfied laziness in writing, and nothing drives me to an immediate multiple-homicidal rage like laziness in writing being rewarded. It’s rather Salieri of me, I realize, but I promise it annoys me even when I see it in a writer who has less of a following than I do.