A Sport And A Pastime

Two excerpts from James Salter's A Sport And A Pastime:

Later on, about nine, there's the hotel where there's music in the bar and somebody at least, a few couples, sitting around. The three or four gilded youths of the town, too, slouched on the divans. I know them by sight. One is an angel, at least for betrayal. Beautiful face. Soft, dark hair. A mouth like spoiled fruit. Nothing amuses them--they don't talk until somebody leaves, and then they begin little, laughing cuts, sometimes calling over to the barman. The rest of the time they sit in boredom, polishing the gestures of contempt. The angel is taller than the rest, He has an expensive suit and a tie knotted loosely at the neck. Sometimes a sweater. Soft cuffs. I've seen him on the street. He's about seventeen, and he seems less dangerous in the daylight, merely a bad student or a boy already notorious for his vices. He's ready to start seductions. Perhaps he even says it's easy, and that women are simple to get. To believe is to make real, they say, A chill passes through me, I recognize in him a clear strain of assurance which has nothing to imitate, which springs forth intact. It feeds on its own reflection. He looks carefully at himself in the mirror, combing his hair. He inspects his teeth. The maid has let him undress her. She hates him, but she cannot make him go. I try to think of what he's said. He has an instinct for it. He is here to hunt them down, to discover the weaklings. I don't know what he feels--the assassin's joy.

*

She stoops with the match, inserts it, and the heater softly explodes. A blue flame rushes across the jets, then burns with a steady sound. There's no other light in the room but this, which reflects from the floor. She stands up again. She drops the burnt match on the table and begins to arrange clothing on the grill of the heater, pajamas, spreading them out so they can be warmed. Dean helps her a bit. The silk, if it's that, is quite cold. And there they stand in the roaring dark. In a fond, almost brotherly gesture, he puts his arms around her. They hardly know one another. She accepts it without a word, without a movement, and they wait in a pure silence, the faint sweetness of gas in the air. After a while she turns the pajamas over. Her back is towards him. In a single move she pulls off her sweater and then, reaching behind herself in that elbow-awkward way, unfastens her brassiere. Slowly he turns her around.

She leaves his kisses finally to stand against the wall, arms at her sides.

"Jeanne d'Arc," she says. The tremulous blue plays across her. Her features seem resigned.

He takes her by the arms. She turns her face to the light. He is her executioner, she says. The word thrills him. His knees tremble.

He puts her to bed in her warm pajamas. She is innocent, he decides. She smiles softly, the calm of a long convalescence in her face. Finally he turns to go, but at the door her voice stops him. Yes? Turn out the light, she says. He does. Like Lucifer, he creates darkness and he descends.

Pupsam

SELFKISS

(mild artistic nudity, possibly NSFW)

Here's the introduction from the first page, translated into English but still sounding so totally French:

***
The marvelous thing about a photo is that it captures a look, a gesture, an instant, a fleeting reality from which emotion springs. However, what is presented here does not exist, has never existed, and will never exist. But this technique puts us there, in front, like a tightrope walker on his rope, in an unstable balance between I believe it and I don't believe it.

These instants were invented by Pupsam. And yet, indeed, this is a record of real events (reportage), since long searches and deep internal journeys were necessary to arrive here:

Starting from one consenting individual, imagine together his encounter with himself (not another, but his double), to create a couple that will embrace each other, then trace their posture, the spark in their eyes, and finally the abandon to the other that is me, to make visible the impossible kiss, monstrously shameless. And so? moments that are desired, dreamed, hidden at the bottom of us, denied... taboo! Perhaps the fleeting reality from which trouble springs.

Louis Samaria

Buy Some Land

-A Grayspace Poster Gallery

-Poweriser

-Read A Book

"I trust those who follow rules they don't entirely believe more than I trust those who believe in rules they don't entirely follow."

I've been doing research on elite private schools and the funniest thing about all of them is that they have the most hilariously random alumni. For example, here's who went to Northfield Mount Hermon, Uma Thurman's alma mater:

* William Ackerman '67, founder of Windham Hill Records
* S. Prestley Blake '34, founder of Friendly Ice Cream
* Natalie Cole '68—Grammy Award-winning vocalist
* Amy Domini '68, the "first lady of social investing"
* Lawrence Ferlinghetti '37, poet
* Lee de Forest 1893, controversial radio pioneer
* David Hartman '52, television host
* Laura Linney '82, actress
* James W. McLamore '43, founder of Burger King
* William G. Morgan 1893, inventor of volleyball
* DeWitt Wallace 1907, founder of Reader's Digest
* Willy Wolfe, founding member of the Symbionese Liberation Army

*

As with all mash-ups, your enjoyment of this will depend on your enjoyment of the source materials. Having said that, I like this Nelly / Lynard Skynard mash-up:

Sweet Home Country Grammar [direct link to mp3]

This "cover art" cracks me up, as well.

*

This New Yorker profile of Karl Lagerfeld achieves the seemingly contradictory goal of making the designer seem:

1. fascinating, admirable, even sympathetic; and
2. ten times crazier than we already suspected.

Seriously, there's a pull-quote in every paragraph.

*

My favorite new (to me) webcomic is definitely Cat And Girl. Here are some of my favorites:

New Memes For 2007
Marginalized Success
Throwing Money Away
Last Refuges Of Scoundrels
Monkeys Pirates Ninjas
Strummer's Law

Sixteen K

You may have read a news blip about how, for the first time ever, Jeopardy ended in a three way tie. (In fact, this wasn't true; it was, however, the first time that the three-way tie was a number greater than $0.)

All the stories took a "what are the chances?" tone, and they all quoted a phoney-baloney number of the odds being 1 in 25 million. But that would only be true if the bets were determined randomly...and they're not. In fact, the only thing left to chance was whether or not all three of them would get Final Jeopardy right. As for the tie itself...the current champion, Scott Weiss, THREW THE GAME.

Let me explain. Going into Final Jeopardy, Scott had $13,000. Both of his opponents had $8000. Scott knew that both of his opponents would bet it all because they'd be hoping that Scott and the other guy would both get the question wrong or wouldn't bet enough.

Therefore, the most his opponents could end up with at the end of the game was $16,000 (that is, double $8000). So, to win, all Scott had to bet was $3001, which would leave him with $16,001.

But Scott only bet $3000. Why?

1. A three-way tie for first is suh-weet.
2. On Monday, he'd face two opponents he already knew he could beat.

but mostly:

3. By all accounts, Scott is one of the nicest guys in the world. If he had won the game, his opponents would have each gotten the $2000 second-place prize. But a three-way tie meant that his opponents would also be champions and each of them would get to keep their $16,000.

It's a fascinating story that's being shamefully underreported. In its own way, there's almost something heroic about it: Scott could have walked away that day with $26,000, but he gave it up so that two strangers would each make an additional $14,000.


*

Scott's Friend:
http://www.yarnivore.com/francis/archives/001806.html


Scott Himself:
http://squonk-npl.livejournal.com/5120.html

Videos

I would like my music video to feature breakdancing...

... furries
... Transformers
... Citroens
... grieving widowers
... garbage

*

That last video is for "Singin' In The Rain," which I just learned was by Mint Royale. Weird. I've known that version of the song for a couple of years now, when it was first used in that VW Golf commercial featuring David "Elsewhere" Bernal. Bernal was also featured in a Heineken ad, both as himself and, digitally, as all the other dancers in the spot.

More Mint Royale:

Blue Song - If you're into British comedies, there are more than a few familiar faces in the video, and that's Captain Beefheart signing.

Don't Falter - Featuring the lead singer of Kenickie! I loved this song when it first came out, and I find the video to have an unforced sweetness about it.

Show Me - But this is by far my favorite Mint Royale track. Despite the fact that it sounds nothing at all like "Don't Falter," it's from the same album. Uh...was this really the video? Good job, guys.

Message to 12,000 AD

How do you warn people in the year 12,000 AD that there's nuclear waste buried in Yucca Mountain? And, more importantly, how do you do it without implying that there's actually awesome treasure inside?

That's the problem faced by Sandia National Laboratories in their report Expert Judgement on Markers to Deter Inadvertent Human Intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. link

Among their suggestions:

Three information rooms would archive detailed drawings of WIPP's chambers and the physics of its hazards on stone tablets. They would also provide a world map showing all other known waste repositories and a star chart to calculate the year the site was sealed.

One such room would stand in the center of the site. Another would be buried inside the berm, its only entrance a 2-foot hole to inhibit theft of the tablets, sealed with a 1,600-pound stone plug. The third room would be off site — perhaps inside the nearby Carlsbad Caverns.

Another solution discussed is coming up with toxic booby traps that, should an explorer get far enough, kills the interloper so that they don't inadvertantly destroy the planet.

And also lots and lots of pictographs. Anyway, I told you all that to tell you this: on the assumption that, 10 centuries from now, humans can still decipher English, they've also composed this rather poignant warning:

This place is not a place of honor. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here.

Nothing of value is here.

This place is a message...and part of a system of messages. Pay attention to it!

What is here is dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger.

The danger is in a particular location. It increases toward a center. The center of danger is here...of a particular size and shape, and below us.

The danger is still present, in your time, as it was in ours. The danger is to the body, and it can kill. The form of the danger is an emanation of energy.

The danger is unleashed only if you substantially disturb this place physically. This place is best shunned and left uninhabited.

Sending this message was important to us.

We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture.

Food Miles

The New York Times has their annual list of the year's buzzwords. Here are a few of my favorites:

Sanctimommy (see also)

Hummer House: an overly large single-family residence. Synonyms from earlier years are starter castle, faux chateau and McMansion.

[I'm so happy to have other ways of saying McMansion! - Johnny]

Internet courage: boldness of character that comes from the anonymity and distance inherent in Internet communication.

Katrina brain: forgetfulness, lack of concentration and failure to follow through on activities, characteristic of the post-traumatic stress of Hurricane Katrina.

[It's interesting that this, which is everyone's favorite excuse down here, has made it up to the New York Times...]

subzero: a size of clothing smaller than zero, same as size 00.

vice mail: voice-mail messages disguised as confidential stock tips left on the wrong answering machine, a form of the pump-and-dump scam. More info.

[I'd never heard of this, but holy shit what a great and evil idea.]

zeteophobia: a fear of career-planning. Coined by John Krumboltz, a Stanford University professor.

[What? What?]

*

One last shameful note: until reading that article, I hadn't realized that one of the reasons everyone cracked up about Bush calling himself "the decider" was that it isn't actually a word. How embarrassing for me.

Exposing Shallowness

Exposing Shallowness, by Theodore Dalrymple.

This article, an attack on the phenomenon of middle-class tattoos, has some very good, very incisive points. Unfortunately, the author comes across like a right-wing libertarian dickhead. No surprise: it ran in the New Criterion.

***
It is also no accident that some members of the middle classes should have adopted a typically proletarian form of bodily adornment as a badge not only of independence, but also of liberal virtue. A tattoo establishes them as tolerant, open-minded, and sympathetic towards those below them in the social scale: the highest virtues of which they can conceive. The tattoo thus appeals to the kind of modern bourgeois who believes that foulness of language is a token of purity of heart, or at least of sincerity. The tattoo, like the constant resort to the swearword, is an attack on bourgeois propriety, and as such a demonstration of largeness of heart and generosity of spirit.

Of course, this antinomianism (itself so tiresomely bourgeois) has a tinny ring. ... The fate of all people who imitate others to achieve authenticity is to live a lie.

Gender Constancy

Peggy Orenstein's NY Times story on modern girlhood, What's Wrong With Cinderella, is actually rather dull and obvious. But here are two interesting (and off-topic) tidbits from the article:

According to theories of gender constancy, until they're about 6 or 7, children don't realize that the sex they were born with is immutable. They believe that they have a choice: they can grow up to be either a mommy or a daddy.

*

Girls' obsession with [pink] may seem like something they're born with, like the ability to breathe or talk on the phone for hours on end. But according to Jo Paoletti, an associate professor of American studies at the University of Maryland, it ain't so. When colors were first introduced to the nursery in the early part of the 20th century, pink was considered the more masculine hue, a pastel version of red. Blue, with its intimations of the Virgin Mary, constancy and faithfulness, was thought to be dainty. Why or when that switched is not clear, but as late as the 1930s a significant percentage of adults in one national survey held to that split. Perhaps that's why so many early Disney heroines — Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Wendy, Alice-in-Wonderland — are swathed in varying shades of azure.