Truth

"The world doesn’t owe me a living, and if the world doesn’t want to buy my books, that’s my problem.”-William Vollman

From the same article's first paragraph, a nonsensical remark: "Inside he runs a one-man assembly line."

The Origin of Applause

See, back in the olden days, and due in a large part to poor hygiene, there were rampant insect problems. During performances, musical and otherwise, it was considered rude to slap or scratch the many flies, ticks, fleas, etc that were constantly biting the audience, see? So, the moment the last note sounded, there was always a massive cascade of relieved audience members slapping and rising from their seats to kill all of the bugs that had been feasting on them for the duration of the performance.

And that is how applause began.

Fact

At Harold's Chicken Shack on 53rd, there's a sign posted:

"No returns after seven days."

I forgot to tell you about the sparrow

On the way home from work last night, I saw a sparrow sitting on a bicycle. When I approached, it did a singular thing: nothing at all. Singular because I am accustomed to the flight (in two senses of the word) of small creatures at my approach.

So the sparrow neither fled nor flew and so I very naturally stopped walking and dug about in my parcels and pockets for a bit of rice to offer him or her and when I found it, I remembered that the rice was heavily spiced and that I should do what I could to make it more palatable to this singular creature and so I chewed it a bit and sucked the pepper from it and then I wadded it up and placed it right under the sparrow's beak.

The sparrow was unmoved. So I extended a finger and stroked his (or her) little sparrow skullcap.

The sparrow moved, but only a bit, and only to express annoyance. And so I sat down on the sidewalk and I stared at it, the sparrow, for a bit.

Until a German woman on a bicycle asked what I was doing and if I would move so that she could lock up her bicycle and so I pointed out to her that the sparrow was unconcerned by our presence and then I poked it in the beak (softly) and she (zee German) said to me, "Well, maybe it's waiting to die."

Which, oddly, hadn't occurred to me, though I had supposed that maybe low blood sugar was to blame which I had already tried to rectify with the rice and I explained that to zee German and she said that maybe it was too late for rice and we left that sparrow there to die on its bicycle while she went off to park her bicycle and I joined Bridget on a trip to Dairy Queen.

On the way to work this morning, I stopped to look for the sparrow, but all I found was the rice on the bicycle.

From Paris Review via the LA Times

"No, no, no. I think nobody on earth writes down. Garbage though they turn out, Hollywood writers aren’t writing down. That is their best. If you’re going to write, don’t pretend to write down. It’s going to be the best you can do, and it’s the fact that it’s the best you can do that kills you. I want so much to write well, though I know I don’t, and that I didn’t make it. But during and at the end of my life, I will adore those who have." -Dorothy Parker

Another note about technology

I haven't the slightest idea how to remove the lint from my sodding dryer.

Further note: at work today, it fell on me to attempt to repair our wireless network. Not exactly a success, but I did accurately diagnose the problem. Boss says, "I didn't know that you were also a tech guy." I respond, "Only in present company am I a tech guy."

Only in a bookstore, friends.

New to me

Remember when Skype was new to me? Well, I've only once or twice successfully used it because I only know one or two people who actually have it. And one of them is my dad.

I have, however, acquired a laptop with a camera and reasonably accurate mic. I have also successfully Gmail video chatted with at least two people. At most, four and a half.

I give the range because I don't remember, however, I am certain that I assured each of my fellow chatters that it was my first. Video chat. Suddenly, I understand the pressure faced by young girls everywhere.

Also, the half was Jessica. Not that she's half of a person, but we were kind of in the same room when we chatted. Not so cool, am I?

Oh.

Black/White Market

You know what would be great? An end to all stores, everywhere. Instead, a sort of black market-styled marketplace in which you have to know who to go to for what. Imagine how much more engaging that would be and the capacity such a model has to convey a sense of knowledge and status to people. Also intriguing would be the idea that everyone would have nicknames that described their trade, but in a round-about way (everything should be round-about); for instance: Shirtless Joe would sell pants. Why? Because he doesn't sell shirts. You're going to have to trust me here, I guess, when I tell you that Bald Mike is the barber and Smooth Mike sells razors and Natalie No-Pants sells skirts and, well, you're just going to have to trust me when I tell you that Flap-Foot Fran doesn't sell shoelaces, but does sell flip-flops. And maybe her feet flop, too.

For shoelaces, I am not sure where you go. Also, I'm not at all sure why I thought this was a good idea.

Publishing advice from Richard Nash

“Make a lot of friends. Go to a lot of parties. Reach out, on- and offline. Be part of the communities that Soft Skull publishes into, and keep accepting unsolicited manuscripts because the people who send unsolicited manuscripts are your readers.”

I'm not sure I'll ever have the endurance for this shit.

Lovely

In a speech last year in Berlin, Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner paid tribute to the war children, the first time a French government had officially done so, calling them “the offspring of damned women and fathers whose memory has been assassinated.” Sixty years after the fact, he said, “they ask for their misery, their lives, their identity to be recognized.”
-From NY TIMES

Goodnight.

Last night, Agreeable Dave and I had an agreeable time; this morning was less agreeable and this afternoon was spent on the living room rug, asleep. Which was agreeable because it leaves me alert now to do this and, maybe later, that.

And despite being unable (hampered as I am by stupidity) to keep reasonable hours, I work. As I will tomorrow and the next day and for every foreseeable day of the next fifty or so years. And once I realized that life doesn't get much better, it seemed much better than it had before. Even in the midst of the constant dissolution of human relations and the realization that satisfaction is unwon and unwinnable, even in the tall grass of confusion and the liquid haze of early morning, none of this is so bad that needs to be flushed, razed, or burned. None of this is as bad as that.

And in an apartment that resembles a stage set for some kind of urban domestic bliss--though currently strewn with Agreeable empties and sadly lacking my better third and any kind of non-rice food--I can feel somewhat sweaty and somewhat pleased to have a cold cocktail and a good book and the promise of peace when Jessica comes home tomorrow. Because I will take out the garbage.

I am obliged now, to go and read and to feel urbane in a way you can only buy.

Goodnight.

From Ghosts by César Aira

. . .it is possible to imagine an art in which the limitations of reality would be minimized, in which the made and the unmade would be indistinct, an art that would be instantaneously real, without ghosts. And perhaps that art exists, under the name literature."

What a neat guy he was and what a neat and dead guy he is.

The Fog of War remains the best movie I have ever snuck into. Eh, Olgz?