Their Goal . . .

Language Abuse

The Real World, Get a Real Job, etc.   Used, in my experience, by dissatisfied people attempting to force others into bitter resignation.  "Real" in this context means such things as "brutally competitive," or a job with benefits, respect, and/or a decent salary -- but even then, I've never heard "get a real job" uttered with anything but contempt.  The misappropriation of the word "real" would be laughable, if it weren't sad -- with a fraction of awareness of the totality of existence, never mind potential, the embittered mistake psychological prisons for metaphysics.

(See also)

Always Been, Always Will Be   A claim to knowledge that isn't possible, and as above, always with the air of having been defeated.

Old Fashioned   Identifying with a generation or two back -- if you go past that you're just weird. 

You gotta do whatcha gotta do.  No way!  Really?

"They say . . ."   Who says?  How ignorant or cynical do you have to be to lump every "expert" together under a single term?

Do You Believe in God, UFO's, Marxism, Homeopathy . . . ?   Somehow, questions concerning the existence of certain things became conflated with questions of trust, even utility.

Metaphysical   This word has somehow been extended from philosophy by book hawkers to mean not only "pertaining to things 'beyond physics', such as magic and mysticism", but also, for some reason, phenomona such UFO's, crop circles, secret societies, and alternate histories/conspiracy theories.

All Natural   Unlike organic, "all natural" has no legal backbone.  Putting aside the phrase's possible total  uselessness for the moment,  products can be described as "all natural" but still violate the accepted use of the phrase.  There is an endemic and disgusting tendency to so promote products, featuring such man-made modifications as traits from traditional agriculture, transgenic technology ("GMO"), and manufactured pesticides, fungicides, herbicides, fertilizers.

Hambugger   Not pronouncing it HAM-burg-er is funny only if I am not about to eat one.

Be Afraid . . .

Be Very Kinda Sorta Afraid

Saturn Devouring His Son  (Goya)

 

The Very Thought of You?

"It's not you, it's the idea of you."

It's been said to me, and judging by it's appearance in pop culture, I'm guessing there is a good chance it's been said to (or by) you as well.  In my case, it was used to cushion a hit, probably to avoid an argument. It was offered as conciliatory, to say this breakup has nothing to do with me, per se, but some conceptual framework I was violating.

In some ways, I get it.  I represented a line to a past that wanted, even needed to be severed.  I was holding someone back.  And given my critical, even argumentative posture at the time, fueled with a certain clinginess, I can understand wanting to avoid setting off those mines.  But at the same time, I was extremely unsatisfyed by the "explanation."  It seemed avoidant, of more than just a confrontation with me.  Sometimes I wonder if she really knew why she ended the relationship, if the deeper reasons were hidden,  and "dangerous" to her.

I wonder if I will ever have a satisfying understanding of what went down, if I will ever know what was going through her head, and what "really happened."  And I wonder if those eight words ever tell the most important part of the story, or are satisfying, because even if it is the "idea of you", there is still the rest of you.

And the Winner Was . . .

The winner of the Librarius Interruptus Awards can now be named:  The Clarence Dillon Library, in Bedminster. 

My decision to never step foot in there again started with a guy talking to himself, incessantly.  He was distracting me, and I told him so, to which he responded "get used to it, I paid to use the equipment."  I refrained from debating exactly how one purchases the "right" to prevent other taxpayers from using the equipment. 

Instead, I took my case to a staff member, and somehow found myself in the director's office.  I explained the situation to him, and was shot down thusly:  "This is not a 'hush library.'"  In my mind, this is roughly like a hospital being described as "not a sanitized hospital." 

Mr. Director offered no precise formulation of his noise policy.  Instead, he "explained" that talking on cell phones and full-voice conversations are not allowed.  Apparently he doesn't spend much time in his own library.  And since someone too stupid to do his taxes without talking to himself trumps my desire to concentrate, deterring other patrons' use of the library is not strictly forbidden.

A "non-hush library" accomplishes what, exactly?          

This is Not an Idea

("Merci" to Mr. Magritte.)

The Librarius Interruptus Awards

The guy next to me chomps an apple, the lady behind me mutters to herself, harrumphing and sighing like a petulant child.  The guy across from me has his headphones so loud I can hear the frying . . . Just another day at the public library.

Of course, the problem isn't merely here.  On the roads, in stores and restaurants, movie theaters . . . every shared space I visit is degraded by people who seem to think no one else matters.  These incidents, outside the roads, are not necessarily dangerous or even any kind of problem, in and of themselves -- people make mistakes, zone out, and so on.  But I wonder about the sum.  For me, a few at the library, a few more at the bookstore, one or two at the supermarket -- day after day, all this distraction and life-as-obstacle course makes me want to bite people's heads off.

But I don't see a lot of people getting upset, so if they are, they're not showing it.  I flash dirty looks or make comments, because I simply can't function in certain ways with distraction . . . another cell phone rings, despite obvious signs everywhere that they are supposed to be turned off.  At least it wasn't answered.

I wonder how much can be chalked up to obliviousness, versus other natural proclivities, versus the annoying notion of  "it's just what people do . . .yeah it bothers me, but what can I do about it, so just go with the flow and be a dick."  I find it is hard, if not impossible, to adapt this way, because I can neither dull my sensitivity nor blithely ruin someone else's day, who hasn't ruined mine first.

I marvel at people who can preserve their concentration and depth of immersion in the face of . . . (someone cracks his knuckles) . . . is the problem that people like me cannot adapt, or are "they" simply a bunch of . . .


When I considering starting a blog, I had in mind anything but another forum for complaints.  Yet I look back, and the complaining starts with my second post.  Maybe that post is telling, that it was my misfortune or mistake to start blogging when I had no Internet access at home.  Or maybe it was the storm that set the cascade of rant in motion.

In any event, here it is a year later, and I am so disgusted with public libraries that I hope, ASAP, to never step foot in one again, or at least to never job hunt, read, or write in one.  I could do without using the restrooms too (post on this is coming soon.)

With all of this in mind, if that's possible, here is, without further delay (though I can't guarantee interruption), the first (and probably only) annual Monkey Shrines Librarius Interruptus Awards, for the worst libraries in Morris/Somerset Counties in which to do more than borrow . . .

And the winner is:  the library in a town beginning with B, in Somerset County.  I would mention it by name, but unfortunately I need to be there sometimes.  Plus, I hope these Awards will be taken as more than finger-pointing, that these illustrations of library dysfunction will prompt questions, like What the Hell is Going on with This Culture, Not To Mention My Tax Money?

At our winner, one staff member snorts regularly.  This is very noticeable in a small library, as is staff talking constantly in full voice, which also makes attempts to silence patrons fruitless.  And once, a pair of pre-teens were sitting next to me, babbling and giggling.  One proceeded to become gaseously fruitful of ass, at which point I lost it.  A tirade of cuss-laden berating did not satisfy me, so I complained to a staff member.  I was told to sit elsewhere, as if I wasn't on my way to another seat already, and as if the library had no children's room in which to exile the flatulent, gibbering offenders.  In my world, these kids would have been thrown out of the library altogether.

The staff are pretty clueless when it comes to newpaper classifieds as well.  Most libraries keep them behind a desk, seperate from the newspaper, to avoid theft and vandalism.  I have pointed this out every time I can't find a classified, or discover a hole where some selfish prick has clipped an ad.  After a few responses reminiscent of deer in headlights, I switched to written "suggestions."  Eventually the policy was changed, but not all staff have been informed of the secret classifieds location, so sometimes I'm still out of luck. 

Finally, and this sealed the victory for the library in the town beginning with B, their Net connection is often painfully slow -- minutes for a page to load -- and filters are way too active.  I routinely cannot access such dangerous sites as craigslist and Yahoo!  And the computers are strung so close together, I feel like I'm on a chain gang.


Some of the problems plaguing our winner are common, such as patrons behaving like they are in their living rooms, and lazy, clueless and even rude staff.  Inertia approaching that of a small moon is likewise commonplace.  For these, and some more unique problems, our runners-up:

I haven't been to The Roxbury Library in awhile, so what I say may no longer apply.  But in 2008, every time I walked in, my eyes, nose and throat would itch, and I noted other patrons with the same problem.  Some sneezed.  I thought it might be a mold problem, and told the staff as much.  I was encouraged to take my complaint higher, and to bolster my case, was shown hundreds of dead insects in a cluster, seemingly related to the venting system. 

The computers at the Bridgewater branch of the Somerset County Library are, for me, useless.  Monitors are blurry even when "privacy screens" are removed, and functionality is extremely limited -- text in browsers cannot be made much less than gigantic, cut and paste is sometimes disabled, tabs are blocked, and filters are overly active.  And like our winner, computers are so close together, you best be chummy with your neighbor(s). 

And finally, Dishonorable Mentions to The Rockaway Township Library, for being disgusting, with nary an unstained chair, an occasional sighting of mouse droppings, and a pervasive unsavory odor; The Chester Library, for being the location of the post that "culminated" in these Awards; and The Randolph Library, for an incomprehensible bathroom sink, with a faucet set so close to the back of the basin as to make washing anything but fingers impossible.  And even that is a challenge, constant pressure with one hand required just to maintain a meager trickle.  The genius(es) responsible for the design, installation, OK, and continued existence of this piece of Dada should be forced to use it, preferably after reconstructing a bus engine.

The Motorhead Cure

With an apparent allergy feeling like a bug crawling behind my face, I caught this on TV.  For those three minutes, and only those, my nose cleared, and my eyes stopped itching.  Unfortunately, as the band did only the one song, and another version wasn't around,  I don't know what relieved my symptoms -- what combination of  "Ace of Spades", that particular performance of it, and that particular band on that particular night.  But the show's subsequent performance did not effect relief.

The Motorhead Cure may cause elevated heart rate, whiplash, and dancing with the devil.  Neck problems may result from imitations of Lemmy Kilmister.  Not responsible for gambling losses incurred as a result of The Motorhead Cure.

All Natural?

Once I was given a list,  "Natural Highs."  Things you might expect were on it, like chocolate, hugs, dogs . . . rollercoasters.

Metal cars careening on tracks are more natural than, say, fermented fruit? 

I'm still puzzled by this, years later.  It seems fine if your high is built, manufactured, cooked or otherwise tweedled by humans, as long as it's not crack.  It's OK to be fermented, distilled, and/or packaged, as long as you don't induce more than inocuous pleasure or moderate productivity.  And it's "safe" to alter your biochemistry/psyche with sound, light, people and even plants, unless they're on a Federal Schedule. 

Then it's unnatural.

What about running from a rabid dog?  That's pretty natural.

It should be so obvious as to not need saying, but natural does not equate with safe, nor does unnatural automatically imply unsafe.   And, what are we talking about, anyway?  Is unnatural simply a synonym for manmade?   If so, cross rollercoasters, chocolate, and hugs off the list!

If naturalness were really what lists like "Natural Highs" were about, it wouldn't be a list of purported "safe highs."  But what else could it be?  Can we put every high not made by people on it?  And ultimately, can people, as products of Nature, using raw materials from Nature, make anything that isn't natural? 

Unnatural connotes frightening, and in everyday speech it seems to refer to such.  Homsexuality is frequently termed "unnatural", but not because it actually is -- some animals are "gay."  The fact is, sexual relations with a person of the same gender just scares a lot of people.  And consider the fear surrounding "synthetic" objects.


I'm not sure the word "unnatural" has any meaning outside it's application to individuals -- when we say something is not in one's nature -- because the nature of Nature, well, encompasses all natures, doesn't it?  If you believe that God, angels, demons, and so forth exist extra-naturally, then unnatural has a meaning for you that it doesn't for me.  What you speak of is outside my conscious frame of reference, and I have yet to be convinced from the "outside"  that anything called "spiritual" is supernatural.

I would like to know something "above" the morally-dualized spectacle of Nature, but I don't see how, and that alone will be cause for questions if I meet the Eternal.  In the meantime, let's disentangle our categories.  Debates on homosexuality, food and drugs, religion . . . all of this is saturated with the intermingling of safety, naturalness, and morality, and the abuse of language is as annoying as those who exploit it, covering titanic fears of unseen forces.

Who They Actually Are

Another teenage lesbian is suing a rural Mississippi school district, this time over a policy banning young women from wearing tuxedos in senior yearbook portraits . . .

 The ACLU lawyer says:

"It's unfair and unlawful to force students to conform to outdated notions about what boys and girls should look like without any regard to who they actually are as people."

Obviously, there are litigous and socially-ambitious advantages to framing the debate this way, but why are the journalists on board?  Why is there no questioning in the article of what a clothing mandate for yearbook photos could possibly accomplish?


Similarly ridiculous is the suspension of  a four-year-old, for having long hair, and the reasons given:

According to the district dress code, boys' hair must be kept out of the eyes and cannot extend below the bottom of earlobes or over the collar of a dress shirt. Fads [is it still 1968?] in hairstyles "designed to attract attention to the individual or to disrupt the orderly conduct of the classroom or campus is not permitted," the policy states.

Why, then, is there no mention of the boy's oh-so-trendy hairstyle causing havoc?

On its Web site, the district says its code is in place because "students who dress and groom themselves neatly, and in an acceptable and appropriate manner, are more likely to become constructive members of the society in which we live."

For this claim to have a rational basis, the terms "neatly," "acceptable," "appropriate", and "constructive" would have to be defined precisely enough to carry out a survey.  The survey would then have to follow the lives of very many people:  a group that corresponds to the criteria, and at least one control.  At the conclusion of this seventy-year-plus exercise, you might have something solid on which to hook your claim.   Otherwise, the statement reduces to "We don't like this kid's haircut, and we believe, on the basis of anecdotes and/or neurotic fixations, that it will be to his and society's misfortune."

This should be obvious to people working in education.  We should also expect knowledge of the state of relevant research.  This site says ". . . no long-term empirical studies have been conducted to assess the effectiveness of school uniforms or dress codes in improving student or school performance . . "   And according to this Policy Report, "research on the effects of dress code and school uniform policies is inconclusive and mixed." 


Perhaps the solution is to offer uniform and non-uniform options in public schools, universally.  This way, students retain choice, while allowing the experiment to continue.  Meanwhile, let's remain skeptical of a rally for appearance codes coming from a system obsessed with test scores, skewed heavily toward mechanical skills, that embraces warrantless searches.  If this trend toward drone manufacture continues, who a student "actually is" will be moot, appearance codes no more than dressing.

Royalty's Ass

In which the subjective value of opinions is proportional to ass origin.

I find film comment funny.  From experts on "down," it's so often confusion and folly.  Consider, for example, this proud declaration:  "I don't care about widescreen."   It was intoned as if a prod, trying to find out what team I was on.  Unfortunately for questioner, I'm on the team that wants to see original prints. 

Now, I'm not saying that cutting up a film willy-nilly amounts to a rectangular peg in a square hole, but . . . doesn't it?

It's a form of Dada, in a way, introducing a random change in a film after the artist is "done" with it.  Obviously it's not totally random, being a uniform squaring, but it is arbitrary.  And when the movie gets to TV, a cheap Pop Art ensues, a massacre by commercials, logos, and pop-up ads.  Is there absolutely no respect for the viewer, artists and crew?

And at this point, how far from the original film are we?  This object, slaved over by dozens if not hundreds of people, has been cropped, had random short films cut into it, and new elements have been placed in the frame.  On most channels, a logo stays on screen, like a tacky and undeserved signature.  Some go translucent . . . Newsflash:  I can still see it, so therefore I'm still struggling to avoid that part of the screen.  Who believes the lower right optional?  Why isn't it optional during commercials?

Often ads leap out at you, which is to say deliberately divert your attention from what you are watching.  Is the attitude of television viewers, overwhelmingly, not only  "I don't care about widescreen" but also "I really don't care what's on the screen as long as it's on?"   And I have to ask, if none of this stuff bothers you, if you can watch a film in it's original aspect and a Frankensteined TV version with equal pleasure, or a TV show shredded to ribbons by advertising -- how?  Would it be the same for you if you closed your eyes?


Another side of "I don't care about widescreen" is misplaced pride, about which I wonder:  even if one really doesn't care, where is the virtue?  I envy being so easily amused, but I don't see the moral victory. 

And so it goes, right "up" to the professionals, where an embarassing richness of silly statements and strange "victories"  make it difficult to pick a representative example.  But the fact that this more-or-less randomly chosen review excerpt is so telling is, itself, indicative:  

"Annie Hall contains more intellectual wit and cultural references than any other movie ever to win the Oscar for best picture . . ."

Did the reviewer count the cultural references in every best picture winner?   Is there an intellectual wit meter? 

". . .  and in winning the award in 1977 it edged out "Star Wars," an outcome unthinkable today.

Besides being a tautology, the clumsy implications -- that today a smart film could never beat a blockbuster, and thus that a blockbuster could never be smart -- are not "unthinkable" if one peruses the winners and nominees beginning with, say, 2001.

"The victory marked the beginning of Woody Allen's career as an important filmmaker (his earlier work was funny but slight) . . ."

So, an "important film" is the opposite of slight?   And, who does this guy think he is, dismissing seven films (and thus everyone who worked on them) with a single word?!

". . . and it signaled the end of the 1970s golden age of American movies.  With "Star Wars," the age of the blockbuster was upon us, and movies this quirky and idiosyncratic would find themselves shouldered aside by Hollywood's greed for mega-hits."

Again, the "best picture" winners and nominees tell a different story.  Plus, I see no preponderance of quirk and idiosyncrasy before Annie Hall, and the list includes blockbusters relative to their time.  Is 1977 a turning point by "virtue" of anything more than nostalgia?

Optimists, Pessimists, and Engineers

Sighted online, origin of the addendum unknown:

Optimists see the glass half full.  Pessimists see the glass half empty.  Engineers see that the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

Culinarus Interruptus

I'm considering taking an air horn to restaurants.  Not that I would ever use it -- that would be rude.  Yet, for some reason, other kinds of nonsensical, high-volume utterances are perfectly OK.  Why is it alright for others to ruin my meal with babbling noisemakers, but if I ruin theirs in return, I will be thrown out?  It doesn't seem fair.  Life's not fair.  Fuck you, I like restaurants.

What I'm thinking is this:  I'll just put the air horn on the table, on display, hoping the mere threat will urge people to take their screaming rugrats outside.  Maybe enough people will think I'm crazy enough to use the thing . . .

But why, you may wonder, am I so irate on this point?   I'm not just paying for food, but also paying for the space in which I enjoy it.  I don't go to "family restaurants," precisely because of the daycare center vibe, but somehow most every eatery has become "family friendly." 

But why, you ask, the air horn?  Most restaurant staff don't pay attention unless a child is screaming bloody murder, chronically -- all the intermittent gurgling and babbling stupidity at full blast is just fine.  It's a numbers game:  the family of four has a bigger tab than I, and, I'm assuming, there are just too many patrons with kids. So, censure is left to us, the bothered, who are paying the same price as to inconsiderate.  I've glared and coughed, even muttered in the general direction of annoying tots and their parents.  Sometimes it helps.  If not, you can only escalate to direct confrontation, but even that doesn't always work, and by that point your meal is pretty much shot anyway.

Thus, air horn.


You might wonder, don't you have any real problems?  Why, yes I do, which is one reason I would like some quiet time to enjoy a nice meal.  And I mean enjoy it, not simply let the food glide past my mouth en route to my gullet.  And besides, why should I be expected to put up with other people's children in areas which really aren't meant for them?  Why do so many seem to think themselves so important that everyone must partake of their offspring's full-volume inanity?  I realize some people are just numb or clueless, but their actions ruin the restaurant experience no less than the willfully self-centered.  And adult children who bully their kids into submission are even less appetizing.

If I were a lone curmudgeon, I would yield to a culture that seems to prefer senseless noise over taking the time (and effort) to appreciate.  But I don't think I'm in a minority -- I note the annoyance of other diners, in restaurants and online.  However, I do seem to be among the very few bothered enough say something.  And that makes me an asshole. 

But I think an asshole is someone who won't remove a distracting child from a public dining area devoted to a certain aesthetic.  I pick restaurants with food worth savoring, and one cannot savor in a monkey cage.  Plus, it's no good for you.

I considered approaching restaurant staff with an offer to pay for my food, but not to listen to the loudly babbling.  Of course I would be laughed at, at best, and as there are so few good restaurants in my area, I don't want to get myself banned.  The air horn seems the only rational option left . . .

Eye Candy 4

Lunatic Lander 1, Kris Kuksi

 

(Eric Lacombe)

60550   Jarosław Kubicki 

D&D as Art?

In what is surely a cosmic joke, I have thought more about fantasy role-playing games since I turned thirty.  But the character of thinking is not quite the same -- at least I can say that much.  I don't obsess over stats and manuals, nor attempt to create the ultimate character in some frenzy of misplaced alchemy (only to go on and greedily collect the treasures and kills to make said character a freaking god).

I don't even play much anymore, the drooling anticipation of the next marathon game a thing of the past.  Not that I would count on any of this as permanently in the past.  Periodically, I fantacize about playing the classics I never got to, or the game that has always been elusive, the complete adventures of a group of characters from novice to career's end.  Sometimes I even yearn to decorate my unpainted figurines.

Mine were never this good.

Most of my post-thirty D&D efforts have been directed at scenarios, which is to say more or less detailed sketches of adventures.   I've also devoted attention to designing my own mechanics, to facilitate a mode of play more plot and problem-solving based, with role-playing leaning toward the non-combatitive type.  I haven't been very successful in this regard, so mostly I just keep writing scenarios.

Writing "modules" has, for me, taken on a life of it's own, expanding it's ent-like tendrils beyond game preparation, becoming a hobby in it's own right.  I've even stumbled onto a principal component of active imagination, though I can't quite seem to find the missing parts that make the excercise psychologically productive. 

Mostly, I've got something like mythology without protagonists, though sometimes scenarios are written around specific "player characters."   I've got everything from sketches to fully finished adventures, nuclei if not bases of hundreds of hours of play.  And it's all one story, encompassing thousands of years on multiple worlds, with recurring characters and other motifs, interweaving plots and subplots.  In RPG parlance, it's a "megacampaign" (or "supercampaign"), a string of "campaigns," most of which encompass the adventuring career of a single group of characters. 

I've usually tried to leave open all but the most major of story arcs, and fates of most major characters.  In good DM form, I think enough can be reconfigured to accomodate the unanticipated moves of PC's, and a lot can feel open-ended even when it isn't -- a good DM is, after all, very often a trickster.


I don't know if all my modules are playable, so far has the excercise deviated from conception in those terms.  And this has made me ask, what else can this strange hobby be?   In addition to a potential psychological tool, my feeling that certain artistic processes and ways of thinking are at work has made me wonder, can this be art?

Gary Gygax would crush this line of inquiry:

Send anyone claiming that their RPG activity is an art form my way, and I'll gladly stick a pin in their head and deflate it just to have the satisfaction of the popping sound that makes….One might play a game artfully, but that makes neither the game nor its play art.

True enough, but I'm not so convinced that "RPG activity" cannot be art.  At the gaming table, it's theater, and even if it's bad theater, must it be so?  If the scenario is well written, the characters sufficiently developed, and the role-playing artful, well, why couldn't it be art?  I've never seen it happen, but if everyone at the table was a good actor and/or storyteller, why would the artistic potential be less than in other forms of semi-improvised theater?   I have felt something like music being created at the table, with participants riffing and playing off each other, via the characters they play, subject to the environment ("chart/score") they are in.  Why does the raw material need to be sound, or on a stage, to make art?

And scenario/world creation, minus players and mechanics, has the elements of a novel without protagonists:  characters, environments, plot and so on.  I consider many of Gygax's classic modules to be akin to pulp fantasy novels -- am I the only one who finds those fun to read?  I wouldn't call them art in a more strict sense, which perhaps explains Gygax's reticence, but what exactly did he think was missing from "RPG activity," prohibiting the leap from artful to art?  I see nothing fundamentally preventing this leap, and in the case of scenarios, if mechanics were harmoniously inserted into a well-written "module," with attention to design and conception, it could be an artful joy to read, with an inner coherence and beauty requiring no further actualization to become art.  


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1,007 Words on Monkeys, Religion, and Technology

Foot Fetish

["Foot Fetish"] is a luxury brand, creative and innovative by tradition. Founded on excellence in the art of footwear, the Company [their cap] now offers a wide range of high quality prestigious products . . .

You mean I can become prestigious just by putting something on my feet, maybe even by simply owning such a thing?  It's like Dorothy's ruby slippers!

In the United States the Company operates 42 of its own retail stores and also distributes its products through high end wholesale distribution channels.  We are currently looking for a Part-Time Stock Associate for our boutique.  Major job duties include representing the product professionally . . . 

"Hello, my name is Rudolfo, and I represent this open toed, size 8 and 1/2 sandal."

 Candidates should be organized, team oriented, enthusiastic, and flexible with scheduling.

You really gotta love working there, gotta love shoes probably, and be willing to work any damn shift they give you.  But it's OK -- it's all for the shoes.

Prior stockroom experience with luxury products required. 

Why isn't the ad for a Part-Time Luxury Stock Associate?  And if they want experience, why this: 

. . .  exceptional customer service, receiving, opening, and unpacking cartons of merchandise, checking invoice/packing slip against items received. Maintaining an orderly stock room and tracking merchandise on computer system in order to facilitate sales and an accurate inventory, and acquiring necessary product knowledge to credibly understand product assortment.

Er, if you've already been a Luxury Stock Associate, wouldn't you know awhat the job entails?   Wouldn't anyone who didn't say, live their entire life in the jungle, know what a Stock Associate does?

Please fax your resume.

You would have me go and find one of those archaic machines, and pay to send my documents, when there is this email thing? 


Now, I don't mean to say there aren't people who would love working at Foot Fetish, even if they don't particularly care about shoes.  And my point is not to highlight one Company, but to underscore that this sort of overblown idiocy is commonplace in the classifieds.  Particularly, why have objects been raised to the level where people are expected to "represent" them?   Perhaps the author of the ad meant representing the Company -- God, I hope so.  But if not, why is it necessary to move beyond quality, aesthetic shoes delivered promptly and courteously?  Why has Foot Fetish seemingly left the qualities inherent in the products?  Why is it necessary to turn shoes, and the Company that make them, into numinous objects?

Does Foot Fetish and it's customers really hate themselves that much?

I'm no so naive as to not know that inbuing things, especially expensive objects, with illusory value is common practice.  One might even call it standard advertising procedure.  My point is to say that it's wrong, and stupid, and symptomatic of a seriously ill culture. 

The Brain Trainers

I had an interview with a company looking for "Brain Trainers" -- improving cognitive function through exercises.  Their ad said they were looking for smart people.  Some people think I'm smart.  I think I'm smart, except for the numerous ways in which I am not.  But I thought I was smart in a Brain Trainer sort of way.

I was told there would be a video and short interview.  There was a video, but then came a battery of tests.  Had I been told this, I would have showed up prepared.  As it was, I was kind of tired but saw that as no reason to cancel an appointment for a "video and short interview."  Still, I seemed to do very well on their tests and was surprised to find out I didn't make the cut.  When I inquired as to why they were not interested, I was told that hiring criteria are not shared.

Now, there were twenty people at that interview.  As far as I know, none of them were hired, as a new ad came out days after my interview.  That means twenty people wasted an hour of their lives, plus getting to the interview and back.

I realize that hiring decisions can be based, not trivially, on "vibes" which can only be picked up in person.   But was this one of those times?   Or did it all have to do with the tests, which for some reason need to be administered as a surprise?  

Or was it all about The Secret Criteria?

What could possibly be the point of secret hiring criteria?   Isn't it better for people to know as much as possible what is expected beforehand, so they don't waste their time on something they don't have a chance of getting?  And if the idea is not to share your idea with competitors for free, wouldn't it be better to patent your marvelous Criteria, maybe sell it?

This is why job hunting in America is usually ridiculous -- full of rudeness and silly games.  And there is something vaguely unsettling about this instance, in a Talosian sort of way.  There were no aliens involved, as far as I know, but the Brain Trainers' methods are based in academic psychology.  Looking back on the experience,  I definately felt a culture of narcissistic disregard.

Road Rage

I used to like driving, back when turn signals weren't optional, and the passing lane was used for, you know, passing.  Those were glory days, when "road rage" might have meant being angry at pavement, and honking at someone for cutting you off didn't earn a second insult (such as fuck you, by finger and lips.)

But am I romanticizing?  Have drivers always had their minds half off the road, even before cell phones?  Has law enforcement always committed, habitually, the violations they are supposed to ticket?

Certainly I was more naive once, unaware that the number of accidents in the US is six million a year, with two million injured and forty thousand dead.  I was certainly, blissfully unaware of how many of those accidents could be caused by one's own car.  But according to this, "most [accidents] are caused by excessive speed or aggressive driver behavior."  You mean it's not the gas guzzling, view blocking, football-field-stopping-distance SUV's?  Not the oblivious fools slowing way down because they don't know where they're going?

I could believe that most accidents involve excessive speed or aggressive driver behavior, but that's not the same thing as cause.  I have been involved in four traffic incidents in my life, and by far the most prominent factor was lack of driver attention.  I'm certainly not saying people shouldn't slow down and lighten up, but these seem like special cases of attention on something other than driving, which is to say what you are doing, what others are doing, laws, safety, and good sense.

How about this:  make driving your priority on the road, not your destination or emotions, nor secondary pursuits.

And while we're at it, could we design automatic headlights that come on in the dark?


Gas stations used to make more sense too, or at least seemed more pleasant.  One might have gotten one's windshield cleaned, perhaps even directions or a map.  One certainly wouldn't get attitude, at least not regularly.

And once, if I am not waxing nostalgic, incompetence was uncommon.  I was first clued into the decline of this phenomenon, vis a vis gas stations, when trouble arose some miles after having oil put in my car (oil checks used to be standard too, remember?)  A horrid metallic sound rattled from under the hood, and my "oil" warning light, er, alighted.  I pulled over and popped the hood, to an engine covered in oil -- the oil cap was several inches from where it was supposed to be, resting on the engine block where the "attendant" left it.  I had to pay to have the engine power-washed, and was lucky to escape without serious damage.

And though that misshap was potentially serious, it fails to be as annoying as a second example of gas stations gone wild, at the Shell on Route 10 in Whippany.  The oaf on duty, after trying to smash the nozzle into my tank, proceeded to turn it upside down.  Before I could react, it fell out, spilling gas onto my car and breaking my "gas door."  I would say that that this guy was not properly trained, but who in fuck needs to be trained to pump gas?  I've done it, as most everyone does who is not in New Jersey -- it's doesn't require a class.

He might have been zonked on fumes, maybe just stupid.  At least one of these seemed the case when I approached him, not wanting to pay for filling up pavement, and desiring restitution for my broken "gas door."   He denied causing damage, claiming the door was broken when I arrived.  I became furious, but there was no point.  The idiot's command of English was, ah, minimal, and in any case he just stood there shaking his head and repeating "no my fault."

I went to the police, who informed me that I had no options.  I admit to wanting the cop to accompany me back to the gas station, to threaten my way to a fixed "gas door" -- but that wasn't happening, because it's against the law, unlike being an inconsiderate idiot jerk-off.

Chimp's Escape

Incredulous is probably not what you would feel; disoriented probably, bewildered perhaps, possibly humiliated, most likely scared.  But had it happened before, at least the worst part, with long and agonizing aftermath -- then you might be incredulous.


I wound up the emergency room partly because of what I learned, and partly because I wasn't completely sure it was the end (of me).  I was met by disinterested intake staff, and shown to a nurse who confused disregard with professional detachment.  She asked me what happened, and I explained that I had blacked out, waking up on a tiled bathroom floor.  I was concerned that I had a head injury, but could not be sure, because there were no signs.

Therein lay the seeds of incredulity, and not even being sure I actually had hit my head was a tease.  Was it impossible that I had cushioned the blow on the way down by landing on my arms, say? 


Eight years ago I suffered a concussion, with several months of Post Concussion Syndrome and concomitant effects of the giant anxiety attack that led to the injury.  I had a CAT scan, which I do not trust at all as being safe -- we are assured that the equivalent of a year's worth of background radiation carries minimal risk, but where is the proof?

I saw a neurologist a few times, a doddering old specialist with little patience for questions.  I had no primary care doctor for a referral, and had little time to make a choice.  What do I know of neurologists?  So I did the best I could, and payed him his hefty fee for an initial workup and some follow-ups, which amounted to a diagnosis of a condition for which time is the only cure, with some trinkets like B-12 and a neckpad for symptoms.

My biggest fear in all of this was seizures, a possible consequence of head injury.  According to what I had read, it appeared that for five years I had double the risk than the general population.  My neuro basically concerred, though this was based partially on an EEG (the test where eletrodes are glued to your head, and strobes are flashed at you).  The general consensus of the medical community appeared to be that this test had no value whatever for Post Traumatic Epilepsy, but when I asked the neuro why he ordered it, he asserted the EEG's utility.  When pressed for details, he replied, "it's useful."  Oh, OK.


Somehow I managed not to snuff myself, and endeavored to make the five years really count.  I failed miserably, but was still pretty stoked on the five year anniversary.  So, you begin to see why this latest apparent head injury is cause for incredulity.  This is partly what's going through my head as the surly intake nurse takes my BP, and leaves both the arm wrap and finger harness on long after she had taken the reading.  Another was why are you leaving these constricting things on me for so long?  Bitch!!

She balked when I asked her to remove the apparatus, and kept writing and asking more questions.  She asked how I had blacked out, and I told her it was embarassing, does she really need to know?  Can't I save it for the doctor?

Apparently not, so I told her I was dehydrated from several hours of intestinal difficulties, and the dizzy component of a panic attack overwhelmed my dehydrated constitution.  She failed to recognize how humbling it is to wake up on the floor with one's pants around one's waist, knowing the general trajectory you took, but none of the specifics.  She, of course, had no way of knowing my gnawing concerns over another five years -- not that she would have cared.

She did nothing with the information, unless you count escorting me to a stretcher in a hallway.  She walked away before I could ask what I was waiting for, and for how long.  After many awful minutes (I'm dehydrated and still feeling reverberations of panic), I inquired as to what was happening, and why I am in a hallway.  I'm then shown to a private room, next to several other empty rooms.  Why was I put in the hallway?!!

~

The doctor, a somewhat puzzling Chinese man, came in and asked me what happened, whereupon I relayed the tale of cramping, crapping, freaking, fainting, and waking.  He was more concerned about the blackout than the fall, even though I told him I knew exactly what caused me to pass out, and that I was more concerned with the fall.  He ordered three tests, two of which were to pinpoint the cause of the blackout, despite my telling him that I have no insurance so why the fuck should I pay for tests to figure out what isn't a mystery.  You aren't listening, inscrutible asshole.

Apparently he did not believe I had experienced the dual psychic/physical eruption that led to the blackout, several times over many years, and that a psychiatric professional confirmed my suspicion that it is essentially an emotional event.  I should mention that the feeling of disintegration that accompanies the psychic/physical event is so painful as to put it up with head injuries on the "I never want to experience this again" list.  That the two occurred on the same morning was, for me, an incredulity cocktail of nearly suicidal potency.


My thorough five minute exam ended, and I waited for another year's worth of radiation. 

Later, back in my room, some sort of assistant came to see me.  I told her about my "exam", which included none of the procedures performed by my neurologist years earlier.  She humored me, tossing me a few token tests, none of which included examining my actual head.  She urged me to get the tests to pinpoint the cause of the blackout.  Oh, they didn't tell you, I KNOW WHAT CAUSED THE BLACKOUT.  I humored her on the blood test, mostly because I didn't know I would be charged additionally ($65) for it.  The test came back perfectly normal.

I was paid a visit by some kind of forms lady, with many to sign.  Never mind reading them, that's not important -- never mind that I probably couldn't make sense of them even if I wasn't delirious.  And never mind running off to the restroom before you soil yourself.  SIGN THE PAPERS!!

Why is this bitch allowed to work in a fucking hospital?


My CAT came back clean, and I was sent home, whereupon I began planning my death.  I saw another hopeless neurologist (I really know how to pick 'em), who at least did some proper testing, and waited for the bills to arrive.

The total was over $4,000, but  $2,500 was credited back to me as a self-payer.  The bulk of it was hospital fees, partly because I was listed as "Acuity 4" -- 5 is the worst, where you arrive a bloody mess, but I don't know how a guy with loose bowels and panic disorder is a 4, especially when the determination was based on a five-minute exam and a clean CAT.  I pointed this out to the hospital, whence it was explained that a potential head injury is "Acuity 4" -- apparently my head injury was taken seriously for billing purposes, just not as an actual physical problem.  I was reclassified as "Acuity 3."

And Dr. Inscrutible Chinese Man, he charged me almost $500 for his intensive workup.  Oh, sorry, he had to read the CAT too, and confer with the radiologist.  So he made only $50 a minute, not $100.

All of these costs may be insignificant, if my state assistance comes through, and in any event a call to the head of the ER halved my physician fee.  So maybe I'll get out of this paying something like the value of what was actually offerred.


6/22/10  

The State took care of the hospital fee (gee, it's kind of like socialized medicine, except only for the incomeless.  Does that make any sense?).  The radiologist has agreed to go along with the State, so I'm left with the $250 physician fee.  I am grateful for the help, but must admit that even if owed nothing, I still would feel uneasy. 

Guitar II: Figuring and Writing

This template was created with a broad range of styles in mind, and aspects are applicable to other instruments.

The Blocks are not rigid, and progress may be nonlinear and variable in time.  If Block 1 helped you, you are welcome to send thanks, including in money form.  The value of Block 1 might be, on average, $170. 


Block 2

After playing other people's music, learned from outside sources, you might be interested in figuring stuff out "by ear", or writing some of your own music.  You will need to understand how the guitar is laid out, how jumping around and chord forms associate to sounds.  Intervals and basic diatonic theory (below) are for everybody, and pentatonics with additions are basic to styles with a blues-influx.

If you want to create "parts" and/or solos, in other words if you want to be a "guitar player", you might start paying more attention to rhythm.  Half a notion of time signature is helpful, the part that denotes grouping of pulses.  Connect the dots to feel time more continuously.

Guitar players need something to play on, such as single notes, combinations of notes, and percussive sounds.  "Lead players" need more, such as various phrasing notions and "special effects" like harmonics.  Turning/incorperating things into exercises can be helpful.


(The middle one even sits like a guitarist.)


If you want to sing with your guitar, you will need to pay more attention to melody.  Roughly, any musical "story" is melodic, and is commonly carried out via changes in pitch, rhythm, and duration.  This is somewhat akin to be song-sensitive -- setting up various relationships between yourself and the song, which is to say the chords, primary melodies, and lyrics.

Your part in an arrangement is created by the interaction between you and all the other stuff.  In something purely improvised, this interaction is more variable.  But as you perhaps found out in Block 1, even when you know every sound you're going to make in advance, it still comes out different every time.


INTERVAL PROGRAM

Here are twelve principle intervals, with applications.  Each interval is one fret greater distance than the last, and as an exercise, figure out and play intervals on adjacent strings.  It may be helpful to learn the numbering and fingering for the major scale first, as this will greatly simplify locating intervals and understanding their names. 

Half Step/Flat 2nd.

A one fret move, in either direction.  String twelve of them together to form (a/the) chromatic scale.


Whole Step/2nd.

String these together to form the whole tone scale.   Neither this nor the chromatic scale may be of immediate use to you, but memorizing the sounds of the intervals will be.


Flat/Minor 3rd.
 
Moves from a pitch to one a flat 3rd away is ultra common is blues-related music, especially if you tweak the leading note a bit sharp before descending, or the upper pitch when ascending.

Form sequences of minor thirds to create diminished arpeggios.


(Major) 3rd.

With major and minor 3rds, you can form triads.  You met the diminished triad above, formed by stacking a minor third atop another.  If you put the minor 3rd on top of a major 3rd, it's called a major triad.  Switch that to get a minor triad, and stick a major 3rd on top of another and form the augmented triad.


(Perfect) 4th. 

Strike two notes on adjacent strings at the same time to create double stops, of which 4ths form a type of "power chord."


Flat 5th (Sharp Fourth). 

Useful for such things as summoning the devil, and bebop. 


(Perfect) 5th.

As a double stop, these are the most common "power chords."


Flat/Minor 6th.

In case you lost count, we're up to an interval of eight half-steps/frets, and with this interval it becomes especially useful to extend the double stop concept to strings with one (silent) in between.

Note that the flat/minor 6 is an inversion of a major 3rd.


(Major) 6th.

Learn the major and minor 6ths in different keys as double stops, for a widely useful device, most common in blues, country, and rock directly derived from those sources.

Note that the major 6th is the inversion of a minor 3rd.


Flat/Dominant 7th. 

Not much in use as a double stop, but added atop a major, minor, or diminished triad, you get the recipe for the dominant 7th, minor 7th, and diminished seventh/half-diminished arpeggios.  Unless you play the simplest of pop music, you will need these.

Note that adding the flat 7th to a triad is like sticking another 3rd atop the two below.


Major 7th.

Also not in wide currency as a double stop, but beloved as the makings of the major 7th and major/minor 7th arpeggios.  You get these by adding major 7ths to major and minor triads, and as with the flat 7th, adding the major 7th to a triad is another 3rd atop 3rds.


Octave

Full circle, in terms of letter name and in some way I think nobody truly understands -- octaves sound "alike", even though they are clearly not the same pitch.  They are super important to fretboard navigation, starting with the 12th fret as the octave of the open strings, and locations of octaves for strings with one in between them.

If this sort of thing interests you, you might move on to comparing intervals via their relationship to the octave above and below a given pitch, as was done with the 6ths.


If you can learn the sound of each interval and associate them tightly to fretboard jump/configurations, you will be able to instantly play melodies and riffs, both the ones in your head and in the songs you are figuring out, and improvisation becomes possible.  Conceptual/physical knowledge of intervals allows you to do with a guitar what you do naturally with your voice, and makes building chords and understanding their names much easier.  

 If this all seems very abstract to you, go on to Block 3 (forthcoming).

Four Views on Offense

A radio show recently posed the question:  how should public art be funded during a recession?  It was framed in terms of prods to fund the "hits", until there is money for the risky exhibits. 

After commercial break a new question swept the topic away, because no one called in.  But maybe that's not surprising -- recall some "art controversies" from the last two decades:  Robert Mapplethorpe, The Last Temptation of Christ, The Holy Virgin Mary, and My Sweet Lord.   One thing they all share is the offending of people enough to care, not just about funding but the very existence of art.


I.

I have no answer as to whether anyone should view, let alone fund bullwhips in asses, or alternative takes on Saviors and kin.   How could I, when I have no sense of the "utility vs. danger" of such art? 

It is, of course, possible that no one should be making such things, that they represent some kind of abomination, perhaps with the capability of spreading.  But how is an organizer or funding agent supposed to know?   Even after an event has already been seen, is it possible to seperate what has merely offended versus what has caused actual harm?

Could an artist be doing his job to suggest that Jesus had (sex), or that an icon could be fashioned from porn and elephant shmear?  I think so, inasmuch as you are being challenged to view something against contrast.  You may not like the chocolate Jesus, even less idea of a savior mounting his good lady wife, but who says an artist's job is to make something you like?

The subject of a 1913 scandal, in New York.

A recent exhibit at a library featured twenty or so framed white rectangles, a description of a famous event in the center of each.  According to the artist's statement, he is trying to get people to see how images of events are conjured in one's mind despite not being at an event.

The exhibit is annoying (like I'm not at an event) and so I would veto it if something else were available.  And guess what, most people I ask about the exhibit don't much care, which I take to mean the exhibit is not "offensive" or otherwise radiant enough.

So, should it have been funded?  Should it exist?  One way you might find out is by measuring the exhibit's ripples through culture.  You could poll exhibit viewers to get some idea, and some of the offended will offer their views, but how can you really know what havoc or good your art has wrought?  

Art funding is (hopefully inspired) guesswork, exhibit design an art all its own. 

The artist behind the library exhibit is a successful advertising man.  His field, more than art funding or curatorship, believes it must steer clear of offending people to accomplish it's ends.  Yet advertising is (IMHO) usually ugly, and in full public view.

(Not to say the installation was ugly -- it wasn't so much an ad as an attempt to question perception.)

Does anyone really believe a steady diet of advertising is harmless?  Can chronic glorification of competitiveness via manipulative emptiness possibly be a bad thing?  

Of course it isn't just advertising that makes public spaces a jumble of nonsense.  Those ugly billboards stand near bland, even malformed architecture, and commercials only add to the insult of much radio, TV, and Internet content.  We are assaulted daily by vacuousness, ugliness, and stupidity from many sources, even if we try to avoid it.

Yet some people are worried about a rendering of Mary, cloistered in a gallery, or a Jesus made from chocolate?   It always gets me that such things upset people more than, say, war, starvation, and disease.  Maybe this is testament to the power of "the arts", but it seems more like a certain Creator's twisted sense of humor. 


Consistently, the "offended" in art scandals appear to lack the capacity for self-reflection, and the "offenders" appear to believe that what they put out into the world is somehow selectively, magically interactive, producing only good or neutral effects.  Wow, "the arts" really are special!

I think (hope) most people, not completely self-absorbed, believe art is neither harmless nor The Antichrist. 

So, I sympathize with everyone involved in art scandals, but believe nothing approaches the destructiveness of what is outside the galleries.  Complain and bitch as you will about "the arts", and I certainly do enough of it,  but I think we are trying to control things that are much larger and/or more personal.

Sermon on the Mounted

I have since learned that the preacher was insulted.  She who came to me unannounced, presumed to know my "problem" and how to fix it-- she was insulted.

Then I got a birthday card, wherein her apology is clothed in the message that in her heart lies a trump card.

But Happy Birthday anyway!


It was the usual story.  I am made in god's image, my primordial ancestors given idyllic splendor with a condition -- don't eat the fruit of the Tree.  Then came the embodiment of Evil, as a snake, and the stupid woman was seduced to eat.

As I result, I am bad.  I am broken, and sinful, and my only chance to be reunited with something called god is through "the heart," specifically through another thing named "Jesus."

This was told to me as if it was news.              

           

Normally I don't stick around for this stuff, but I made an exception because the preacher was likable, and perceptive.  Plus, I was trapped -- and that is the most bothersome part of the message.

I came home that night after a day of moving boxes and job hunting.  I did not want visitors, but I'm not living in my own space, and so could not overtly complain.  A bubbly middle-aged woman shows up, unannounced, and immediately takes an abnormally strong interest in me -- I was set up.

First came the ice breaker, later the question:  do I have five minutes to spare, to look at a drawing?  And then I knew -- here it comes.


I was shown in pictorial form what I narrated above, the story of the Fall and the proposed solution.  Five minutes became half an hour as I attempted to understand what this preacher had to offer, and (especially) why she had come.

Eventually I lost patience, and the response to my charges of condescension and judgment was surprising. The preacher stated she is so happy with this God-thing in her "heart"  that she is bursting, and so must share.  But without an appointment?  When what was clearly expected was for me to sit attentively and listen, and agree, instead of having a conversation?

In other words, it was about her, not me.


Beyond the pretense and conniving that set up the meeting, I do not feel I was subjected to a self-lie, at least not a conscious one.  This was not some spaced out, starry-eyed "born again" . . . or was it?

She did repeat things an awful lot, as if my rejection was a matter of incomprehension.  Allow me to elucidate what I was trying to say that night.

The "Fall of Man" story makes sense to me on this level:  at some point consciousness became able to process "good versus evil," and has been working out the ramifications ever since.  One of them is the tension between accepting and dominating inclinations, which include knowing.

I can accept that I have inherited the consequences of duality -- clearly.  I can even accept the idea of alienation from "God", but what do you mean by that?

And there exchange goes on forever, trying to delineate exactly what that word is supposed to represent. And that's the problem, because "god", understood in such venerable terms as the "ultimate source" or "uncaused cause", has no qualities.  It's Mysticism 101:  all attempts to label and discuss are pointers, at best.

So, what is that we were really talking about?  What am I alienated from? 

What was she alienated from?

c. 1470

Postscript:  The preacher and her husband have since taken me out to lunch for my birthday, and gave me a Christmas present as well. This is all very nice, but I still don't know what it's about.

Eye Candy 3

 

Thoth and Seti, Abydos, Egypt.