While I don’t remember it, I clearly at some point agreed to receive a series of desultory magazines sent to my address. This selection of rags is quite random and sometimes I get a gem (Newsweek) and sometimes a giant question mark (Parenting). This is how I came to be a regular recipient of GQ, and unlike the back issues of Plane and Pilot and Better Homes & Gardens I actually enjoy reading this one. While I would more accurately consider myself a dude far more than I would gentlemen, I do occasionally like to roll a bit of civility and tact that one associates with the polished man.
It seems a bit contradictory that a schlep like me would trouble himself with even minor trappings of refinery, especially when considering that my second favorite pastime is to mercilessly attack pretension whenever I see it rear its carefully coiffed head. Amongst my favorite targets are the holy trinity of posers; arthouse blank verse poets, vainglorious fashonistas, and dickheads who claim to understand The Wall Street Journal. And absolutely nothing that trips my bullshitometer more than going into a coffee house just to see some hipster with a shiny belt buckle and nut-hugger jeans tucked into vintage hightops prattle off an unbelievably convoluted drink order that mentions soy twice.
I do, however, draw the distinction between pomposity and class. For even though I am just as likely to end the evening at seven eleven at four thirty in the morning calling the clerk ‘sacred brother’ while I try to explain the plotline to The Sopranos, I start the evening with the same routine. That routine includes carefully laying out and suiting up my nighttime survival kit; a pocket square, a lighter, a pen, some extra cash, and a good luck charm in addition to the usual carryon; mp3 player, cellphone, and sketch journal. Conspicuously absent from this list are condoms, and that is because for as often as they are needed I can just as easily jump into the red phone booth and sidestep into the alternate dimension where my bullshit actually constitutes charm. Most people aren’t aware that I am carrying these things but when the opportunity arises, and I am able to produce a handkerchief or silver plated zippo to a young lady in need, I hope it communicates that I am an interesting and subtly refined person. Of course it could just as easily be screaming “huge freaking anglophile and possibly homosexual”.
Being in the Midwest the term “gentlemen” or “refined” generally carries with it a negative connotation. I grew up and currently live in the shadow of the largest manufacturing and industrial complex in the northern hemisphere and as such the blue collars look upon those terms with great distain. Gentlemen are stuck up, they don’t work, they perfume their hands. Sometimes I imagine that when I say to my mill friends that I like to consider myself something of a gent, they look at me as if I suddenly transformed into a sixteenth century dandy with a tall powdered wig, laced cuffs, and a perfumed hankie that I hold in front of my mouth as I speak in a loud falsetto.
The truth is that I consider the term gentlemen to mean a man of culture and taste, and that is not something to be ashamed of. I like good wine, whiskey and beers, not because it is a vogue hobby, but because someone walked me through the processes of looking at and enjoying these things. They pointed out the differences and subtle character in each one in terms that I could understand and now when I drink them I experience new things that contribute significantly to my enjoyment. I like pop art because it is simply aesthetically pleasing, not because the hallowed pages of GQ informed me I should. I like these things even though I know for a fact I regularly engage in behavior that would be scoffed at by the gentlemen community as a whole. I don’t think gentlemen are supposed to own all three major video game consoles at any one time. And I am reasonably sure that most people who call themselves refined don’t have a cat that they claim watches over their sleeping form to make sure nobody sodomizes them in the night.
Like just “alternative”, “spiritual”, and a myriad of other monikers one could label themselves, I take what aspects of the term “gentlemen” that appeal to me and leave the rest to the hardcore. This salad bar approach has served me exceptionally well during the ongoing construction of Mr. Ebner because it allows me to dodge definition, and definition inherently contains limitations. Sure, sometimes I flip through GQ and let myself wonder how cool it would be to have that suit, umbrella, and haircut. But then I also consider that the possession of those things would also make me the consummate GQ guy, and that would make it impossible for me to also be the comic book guy or the guy teaching himself to juggle. My life would suck if I were just one thing.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Monday, September 28, 2009
The Match
It was longer ago than I care to admit that I was sat in a bar that doesn’t exist anymore across the table from a beautiful young lady whose name, literally, meant wisdom. Of course, when you first meet someone their names don’t mean as much because all you know of them are your immediate experiences garnered from that meeting. So for all intents and purposes, her name was apple martini & black hair and my name was dark beer & no lighter.
I was living with two roommates at the time and private time became something of a valued rarity, so armed with eighteen cigarettes and a copy of Naked, I made for my favorite pub to find a few quiet moments to myself. I had no outward projection that night. I wasn’t sat at the bar striking up conversations nor was I wearing a vestige of kitsch to spark notice. That night was an argyle sweater and a cozy booth positioned strategically close to jukebox. The order of the evening was quiet detachment and light duty alcoholism.
When she asked me for a light I was still in Normandy meeting David Sedaris’s neighbors, and her voice forced me back to the present. She was beautiful in the way you think to describe the word. I wouldn’t say hot because I have always found the word largely carnal, but not cute either as it wouldn’t do justice to her figure. She had almond shaped eyes and olive tone skin which screamed Mediterranean. She had propped one elbow on the top of the opposite booth and the other held an unlit Marlboro light, which awoke me from my momentary stupor. I muttered “sure” and struck a wooden match from the box I had been using. The matches, I explained, where because I occasionally smoked cigars and was loath to use butane. But even as I said the words I couldn’t help but feel incredibly self conscious as a poser should feel. She graciously laughed it off and asked me if I was responsible for what was playing – Connection by Elastica – I said yes mainly because I couldn’t think of a better lie. She nodded her approval without breaking contact with the narrow and mischievous looking eyes that always drive me wild. At this point her name was beautiful twice and mine was suddenly aware he didn’t shave.
Instead of asking me if she could sit, she asked me what I was reading and helped herself to the opposite bench; I inwardly nodded at a rare assertiveness that comes from graceful confidence rather than conceit. She and I spoke of trashy novels and other guilty pleasures, and I couldn’t catch any glimpse of façade. I saw no crack in the persona she was presenting to me. This astoundingly honest and devilishly whimsical person sat across the table was completely legitimate. Normally I find people of a certain level of physical attractiveness develop a domineering personality that, more often than not, comes off as boorish. I think this is due to fact that their sense of humor or opinions must compete with their bodies for the same attention. She didn’t force her charms out ahead of her body, she simply let them emanate from somewhere behind it. It made me think of how often I try to project a more winsome version of myself whenever I meet new people by prattling off some prerecorded anecdotes or displaying a parlor trick. I suddenly became very envious of my aplomb new friend. Her name was Clive Cussler fan and my name was St. Elmo’s Fire.
She excused herself to go use the restroom and I let myself exhale for the first time in what seemed like days. I scanned the bar for a group of people that might be missing their friend but it was only the usual collection of off duty white collars and law students. I took a quick inventory of my drink and situation. I stuck one of her Marlboros in my mouth and in grabbing the matchbox I noticed that she wrote a personal message and her email address on it, probably when I went to refill our glasses. Luck of this magnitude had absolutely no precedent with me and I had no idea how to react to it. This was a plot to a tawdry movie starring a British male lead and an actress trying to broaden her appeal. Be it from damage or inborn condition, I have never been able to recognize the presence of love by any other means than the negative space left in its absence. The immediate and immense attraction I felt literally existed in a place outside of my experience set and the effect was frightening. She came back from the restroom and asked me what I was thinking about, I said “a scary movie.” Her name was email I was already writing in my head and my name was clearly dodged question.
Forty seven minutes after meeting her, her friend finally arrived. Her friend turned out to be a six foot tall man with a military haircut. She introduced him as her boyfriend and mercifully a momentary spike in the ambient room noise drowned out his name. He held out his hand with genuine warmth and - remembering now -I like to think that I returned the gesture. We were all still standing as he told the story of how they had met which, predictably, was a chance encounter in shop three years earlier. He punctuated the story with the words “I knew this was the girl that I was going to try my best to marry.” Her look lingered on him with unabashed affection. Never being one to miss my cue I flagged down a waitress and ordered another appletini and two neat scotches. We all shared a wordless minute while the drinks came, but when they did I proposed a toast to their nuptials and good health. I made a lighthearted comment that fish and third wheels stink after three minutes and began to gather my effects. She said that I couldn’t go – “You’re my light!” “It’s cool,” I told her “I left the matches.”
It was very recently I was sitting in a bar on the corner of Lincolnway and Napoleon Street across the table from two girls who where telling me that I should abandon my anachronistic notions of romanticism. The one with blue eyes said that sort of thing doesn’t really exist. I told her I would rather be lonely than cynical.
I would have used this story as evidence but I knew I would be incapable presenting it with the intended effect. That night seemed surreal to me because it was, but by the time I had heard my songs play and closed my tab the world went right back to making sense. We lived a brief fiction, true, but it’s the fiction I would attempt to make the story of my life. Her name was new watermark and my name became refuse to settle for less.
This is the reason I name all the beautiful and important things in my life Sophia.
I was living with two roommates at the time and private time became something of a valued rarity, so armed with eighteen cigarettes and a copy of Naked, I made for my favorite pub to find a few quiet moments to myself. I had no outward projection that night. I wasn’t sat at the bar striking up conversations nor was I wearing a vestige of kitsch to spark notice. That night was an argyle sweater and a cozy booth positioned strategically close to jukebox. The order of the evening was quiet detachment and light duty alcoholism.
When she asked me for a light I was still in Normandy meeting David Sedaris’s neighbors, and her voice forced me back to the present. She was beautiful in the way you think to describe the word. I wouldn’t say hot because I have always found the word largely carnal, but not cute either as it wouldn’t do justice to her figure. She had almond shaped eyes and olive tone skin which screamed Mediterranean. She had propped one elbow on the top of the opposite booth and the other held an unlit Marlboro light, which awoke me from my momentary stupor. I muttered “sure” and struck a wooden match from the box I had been using. The matches, I explained, where because I occasionally smoked cigars and was loath to use butane. But even as I said the words I couldn’t help but feel incredibly self conscious as a poser should feel. She graciously laughed it off and asked me if I was responsible for what was playing – Connection by Elastica – I said yes mainly because I couldn’t think of a better lie. She nodded her approval without breaking contact with the narrow and mischievous looking eyes that always drive me wild. At this point her name was beautiful twice and mine was suddenly aware he didn’t shave.
Instead of asking me if she could sit, she asked me what I was reading and helped herself to the opposite bench; I inwardly nodded at a rare assertiveness that comes from graceful confidence rather than conceit. She and I spoke of trashy novels and other guilty pleasures, and I couldn’t catch any glimpse of façade. I saw no crack in the persona she was presenting to me. This astoundingly honest and devilishly whimsical person sat across the table was completely legitimate. Normally I find people of a certain level of physical attractiveness develop a domineering personality that, more often than not, comes off as boorish. I think this is due to fact that their sense of humor or opinions must compete with their bodies for the same attention. She didn’t force her charms out ahead of her body, she simply let them emanate from somewhere behind it. It made me think of how often I try to project a more winsome version of myself whenever I meet new people by prattling off some prerecorded anecdotes or displaying a parlor trick. I suddenly became very envious of my aplomb new friend. Her name was Clive Cussler fan and my name was St. Elmo’s Fire.
She excused herself to go use the restroom and I let myself exhale for the first time in what seemed like days. I scanned the bar for a group of people that might be missing their friend but it was only the usual collection of off duty white collars and law students. I took a quick inventory of my drink and situation. I stuck one of her Marlboros in my mouth and in grabbing the matchbox I noticed that she wrote a personal message and her email address on it, probably when I went to refill our glasses. Luck of this magnitude had absolutely no precedent with me and I had no idea how to react to it. This was a plot to a tawdry movie starring a British male lead and an actress trying to broaden her appeal. Be it from damage or inborn condition, I have never been able to recognize the presence of love by any other means than the negative space left in its absence. The immediate and immense attraction I felt literally existed in a place outside of my experience set and the effect was frightening. She came back from the restroom and asked me what I was thinking about, I said “a scary movie.” Her name was email I was already writing in my head and my name was clearly dodged question.
Forty seven minutes after meeting her, her friend finally arrived. Her friend turned out to be a six foot tall man with a military haircut. She introduced him as her boyfriend and mercifully a momentary spike in the ambient room noise drowned out his name. He held out his hand with genuine warmth and - remembering now -I like to think that I returned the gesture. We were all still standing as he told the story of how they had met which, predictably, was a chance encounter in shop three years earlier. He punctuated the story with the words “I knew this was the girl that I was going to try my best to marry.” Her look lingered on him with unabashed affection. Never being one to miss my cue I flagged down a waitress and ordered another appletini and two neat scotches. We all shared a wordless minute while the drinks came, but when they did I proposed a toast to their nuptials and good health. I made a lighthearted comment that fish and third wheels stink after three minutes and began to gather my effects. She said that I couldn’t go – “You’re my light!” “It’s cool,” I told her “I left the matches.”
It was very recently I was sitting in a bar on the corner of Lincolnway and Napoleon Street across the table from two girls who where telling me that I should abandon my anachronistic notions of romanticism. The one with blue eyes said that sort of thing doesn’t really exist. I told her I would rather be lonely than cynical.
I would have used this story as evidence but I knew I would be incapable presenting it with the intended effect. That night seemed surreal to me because it was, but by the time I had heard my songs play and closed my tab the world went right back to making sense. We lived a brief fiction, true, but it’s the fiction I would attempt to make the story of my life. Her name was new watermark and my name became refuse to settle for less.
This is the reason I name all the beautiful and important things in my life Sophia.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
The Solver
Of the 5,176,349 –estimated- questions I am asked/decisions I am expected to make each and every day, I think I can maybe answer confidently 3… tops. It’s not that I am indecisive, far from it, actually I am the guy you love to stand behind at Starbucks because my order is memorized and the instructions clear with the correct change out and at the ready. No, my inability to arrive to satisfactory conclusions is due largely to the fact that I am in a leadership role without being a natural born leader.
Whenever I am pulled away from a project I am working on to answer a question that should have been deflected due to either its’ preposterous nature (such as asking if we serve a food that doesn’t exist. Re: Alaskan Crawfish) or one in which the answer is inherent in the question itself (“Does our CD player play laser discs?”) my blood pressure spikes a little. By mid morning my diastolic has hit such a fever pitch I try to refocus the energy into thoughts that kill.
A big part of what I do is preparing food that will be sold at a casual dining café. In the course of my duties I have found that any douche bag can sprinkle Ms. Dash on a steak and call it ‘seasoned’. But if you are the kind of douche bag that actually takes the time to grind toasted peppercorns in a mortar and pestle in order to release the natural oils that allow whatever spice blend its added to cling to brisket more completely during the curing process, then you are a douche bag that takes barbecue seriously. I am just such a douche bag. So it is common practice for me to layout the proper ingredients and utensils that I will need, cue up a playlist, crack my knuckles and bow before my honored prey. I then enter a trance in which my eyes glass over and the world becomes a neat series of ordered steps that when followed with care and precision produces end products any red blooded carnivore can truly be proud of. Anything that breaks me from my reverie is sure to be met with at best mild annoyance and at worst something hot and/or sharp thrown with deadly accuracy.
Homicidal misanthropy may not be the best quality for someone in a role of a decision maker, yet it’s the position I have somehow Forrest Gumpped my way into. This sitcom set up has inspired me to explore the nature of authority and its fickle mistress, responsibility.
The first thing that came to mind is just how haphazardly fate seems to assign authority. Sometimes the one with the biggest hat is the best qualified, sometimes they inherited the hat, and sometimes they are wearing it only because it looks like they should. This scatter plot of causality is on full display and in living color all around us. I once worked for a guy that I thought was incapable of communicating in any method save the mind numbingly inefficient tongue of execu-speak. Even at fifteen, I found myself imagining the Rube Goldberg –esq bureaucratic apparatus that would intentionally put this person in a position of authority. Roughly at the same time we had another supervisor who was confident in his decisions and arrived to them quickly then communicated them concisely – a natural born leader. It wasn’t until years later that I was able to tell that miniboss B actually arrived to a shitload of erroneous conclusions and was simply putting on a show. As a consequence, he remained in the lowly position, impressing only high school summer help. I also found out that Execu-speak went through a vigorous training system that required years of dedication and his method of management left such an impact on me that I find myself emulating some of the same style 1.5 decades later.
So the second thing that came to my mind is the fact that I am a very poor judge of who should be wearing hats.
Whenever I am pulled away from a project I am working on to answer a question that should have been deflected due to either its’ preposterous nature (such as asking if we serve a food that doesn’t exist. Re: Alaskan Crawfish) or one in which the answer is inherent in the question itself (“Does our CD player play laser discs?”) my blood pressure spikes a little. By mid morning my diastolic has hit such a fever pitch I try to refocus the energy into thoughts that kill.
A big part of what I do is preparing food that will be sold at a casual dining café. In the course of my duties I have found that any douche bag can sprinkle Ms. Dash on a steak and call it ‘seasoned’. But if you are the kind of douche bag that actually takes the time to grind toasted peppercorns in a mortar and pestle in order to release the natural oils that allow whatever spice blend its added to cling to brisket more completely during the curing process, then you are a douche bag that takes barbecue seriously. I am just such a douche bag. So it is common practice for me to layout the proper ingredients and utensils that I will need, cue up a playlist, crack my knuckles and bow before my honored prey. I then enter a trance in which my eyes glass over and the world becomes a neat series of ordered steps that when followed with care and precision produces end products any red blooded carnivore can truly be proud of. Anything that breaks me from my reverie is sure to be met with at best mild annoyance and at worst something hot and/or sharp thrown with deadly accuracy.
Homicidal misanthropy may not be the best quality for someone in a role of a decision maker, yet it’s the position I have somehow Forrest Gumpped my way into. This sitcom set up has inspired me to explore the nature of authority and its fickle mistress, responsibility.
The first thing that came to mind is just how haphazardly fate seems to assign authority. Sometimes the one with the biggest hat is the best qualified, sometimes they inherited the hat, and sometimes they are wearing it only because it looks like they should. This scatter plot of causality is on full display and in living color all around us. I once worked for a guy that I thought was incapable of communicating in any method save the mind numbingly inefficient tongue of execu-speak. Even at fifteen, I found myself imagining the Rube Goldberg –esq bureaucratic apparatus that would intentionally put this person in a position of authority. Roughly at the same time we had another supervisor who was confident in his decisions and arrived to them quickly then communicated them concisely – a natural born leader. It wasn’t until years later that I was able to tell that miniboss B actually arrived to a shitload of erroneous conclusions and was simply putting on a show. As a consequence, he remained in the lowly position, impressing only high school summer help. I also found out that Execu-speak went through a vigorous training system that required years of dedication and his method of management left such an impact on me that I find myself emulating some of the same style 1.5 decades later.
So the second thing that came to my mind is the fact that I am a very poor judge of who should be wearing hats.
Friday, September 25, 2009
The Workout
Due to a few complications with the fairer sex, some disillusionment at work, and a particularly obstinate portion of Halo 3’s singe player campaign, I have been experiencing quite a bit of frustration recently. When this happens the coping mechanism that I usually employ involves whiskey in a restorative practice I call “working out my issues with Dr. Glenmerangie”, but every now and again I find that it can be very therapeutic to simply go to the gym and lift heavy shit for a while.
Much to the surprise of those who know me by my frequent and often back to back appearances at the local icehouses, I am a fully paid member of a local gym and have been for the past three years. What should come as absolutely no surprise to anyone is that I only went for about five months, and have only maintained my membership because canceling adds air of finality to an ongoing shame. Sometimes I will make overtures towards going back to the fitness club; buying a new pair of workout pants or do some online research on various exercises. But then I discover that there is absolutely nothing more comfortable to nap in than workout pants and I can’t sit at a computer for too long without googling something naughty.
I’m never even motivated to go to the gym as a matter of health. The last thing I did solely for the benefit of my physical well being was to quit smoking and all that served to do was balloon me from 147 to 188 pounds. I literally gained twenty percent of my previous “unhealthy” weight and arranged in into unsightly gut rolls around my abdomen. There also seems to be a knowledge set that goes along with regular workouts. Whenever I am at the club I see people following their pre described motions with a fluidity and confidence honed from years of habitual workouts. For me, going to the gym is not unlike sex; I don’t do it frequently, I am never at it long enough to do any good, I’m pretty sure my form is awkward, and I have no idea if I am using this particular machine correctly, but through it all I am always proud of myself for making the attempt.
A strange perversity exists in the fact that I would go to a gym because I am displeased with my body, only to find that the place is lined with mirrors. Workout music is also a key factor in the exercise experience and it is the mirror phenomenon that has led me to identify one of my favorite songs as strangely appropriate to the situation. As evident of the fact that I am the occasional butt of a cosmic joke, sometimes when I am gracelessly operating a machine that has oddly placed pads and an alien looking pulley system a member of the Men’s Swedish Olympic biathlon team with blonde hair and 0% body fat will stand right next to me in the reflection and begin to work a weight stack that I thought was only there for show. Little does Bjorn Borg know that in my ears, my seemingly innocuous ipod is piping in Depeche Mode, and David Gahan is currently reminding me that “I think that God’s got a sick sense of humor.”
There is, however, something vastly different about using exercise as a form of exorcism. Whenever life has me bound into my tight little ball of nerves, it almost invariably involves the things in my world in which I have the least amount of control. In these cases there is nothing I can do to immediately rectify my situation and so I slip into the familiar pattern of insomnia, mild depression, and frequent viewings of Dr. No. The alternative, I have found, is simply to make your body feel as worked up as your mind until the whole of your person acquires a blissful, spent feeling that makes your bed your bestess friend in the whole wide world. The beauty of this approach to exercise is that you pay no attention to the lasting benefits of whatever workout you are doing. The goal is simply exhaustion. Let the fitness aficionados wonder why you are military pressing the squat machine in a reverse lotus position or cast side long glances as you push the entire nautilus machine in circles around the weight room, just as long as you end up feeling absolutely depleted you have done your bit. Now all that’s left to do is go home and collapse in a sweaty mess on your bedcovers and smile at the fact that your bodies cry for sleep is louder than your brains protests about shit you can’t solve.
Much to the surprise of those who know me by my frequent and often back to back appearances at the local icehouses, I am a fully paid member of a local gym and have been for the past three years. What should come as absolutely no surprise to anyone is that I only went for about five months, and have only maintained my membership because canceling adds air of finality to an ongoing shame. Sometimes I will make overtures towards going back to the fitness club; buying a new pair of workout pants or do some online research on various exercises. But then I discover that there is absolutely nothing more comfortable to nap in than workout pants and I can’t sit at a computer for too long without googling something naughty.
I’m never even motivated to go to the gym as a matter of health. The last thing I did solely for the benefit of my physical well being was to quit smoking and all that served to do was balloon me from 147 to 188 pounds. I literally gained twenty percent of my previous “unhealthy” weight and arranged in into unsightly gut rolls around my abdomen. There also seems to be a knowledge set that goes along with regular workouts. Whenever I am at the club I see people following their pre described motions with a fluidity and confidence honed from years of habitual workouts. For me, going to the gym is not unlike sex; I don’t do it frequently, I am never at it long enough to do any good, I’m pretty sure my form is awkward, and I have no idea if I am using this particular machine correctly, but through it all I am always proud of myself for making the attempt.
A strange perversity exists in the fact that I would go to a gym because I am displeased with my body, only to find that the place is lined with mirrors. Workout music is also a key factor in the exercise experience and it is the mirror phenomenon that has led me to identify one of my favorite songs as strangely appropriate to the situation. As evident of the fact that I am the occasional butt of a cosmic joke, sometimes when I am gracelessly operating a machine that has oddly placed pads and an alien looking pulley system a member of the Men’s Swedish Olympic biathlon team with blonde hair and 0% body fat will stand right next to me in the reflection and begin to work a weight stack that I thought was only there for show. Little does Bjorn Borg know that in my ears, my seemingly innocuous ipod is piping in Depeche Mode, and David Gahan is currently reminding me that “I think that God’s got a sick sense of humor.”
There is, however, something vastly different about using exercise as a form of exorcism. Whenever life has me bound into my tight little ball of nerves, it almost invariably involves the things in my world in which I have the least amount of control. In these cases there is nothing I can do to immediately rectify my situation and so I slip into the familiar pattern of insomnia, mild depression, and frequent viewings of Dr. No. The alternative, I have found, is simply to make your body feel as worked up as your mind until the whole of your person acquires a blissful, spent feeling that makes your bed your bestess friend in the whole wide world. The beauty of this approach to exercise is that you pay no attention to the lasting benefits of whatever workout you are doing. The goal is simply exhaustion. Let the fitness aficionados wonder why you are military pressing the squat machine in a reverse lotus position or cast side long glances as you push the entire nautilus machine in circles around the weight room, just as long as you end up feeling absolutely depleted you have done your bit. Now all that’s left to do is go home and collapse in a sweaty mess on your bedcovers and smile at the fact that your bodies cry for sleep is louder than your brains protests about shit you can’t solve.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
The Kickoff
I have been sitting at this computer for hours. The project at the onset was to write three thirty second radio commercials for the café and produce two full page color ads for the local rags. So far I have arranged the margins in illustrator. I have spent the remainder of my morning arranging playlists, tweeting, emailing, and fruitlessly instant messaging people to try to start a conversation about anything. When I found myself actually thinking “I really should update my myspace page” I knew my boredom hit the kind of terminal velocity that is generally reserved for carpet shopping.
Tool once cautioned us in their 1998 opus “Stinkfist” that “Boredom’s not a burden anyone should bear.” Of course that song is an invitation to jamming fingers up some dude’s ass. Now I have been very very bored in my life, and not once had I considered that the cure to that boredom had anything to do with convincing someone to let me go wrist-deep up their dirt button. I don’t even know how to start that conversation let alone close that deal. I think I can be charming at times but I am nowhere near that convincing. That requires stores of personality that simply cannot be filled by my personal well, which is fed by aquifers of video games and regular visits or urban dictionary. Bottom line, if Maynard James Keenan was singing the truth I am shit (PUN!) out of luck.
But this is a toxic kind of boredom. This is the kind of boredom that actually makes you dumber. It is exactly this kind of boredom that has directly contributed to the creation, proliferation, and sensational success of Tyler Perry movies. I am going to admit that I have never actually seen one but I will say that based on what I have been able to determine from the box art and titles alone I will avoid them like a chancre. I place them in a special category right alongside Larry the Cable Guy movies in that they celebrate all the worse things about modern American culture and attempt to make the unacceptable behavior of some the standard of decency by lowing the collective bar rather than challenge us to live up to the lofty standards set forth by our more civilized past. Then I shut myself in my mantuary like Don Cantankerous Judgmental McCranky, draw the blinds and laugh at socially damaging movies of entirely different genres. I mean, come on. The dude abides.
Doubt the destructive power of boredom? Look no further than The Godfather Part III. We had two movies that were absolutely amazing and can, and have been, watched time and time and time and time again and shown to my three year old nephew as exemplar of how real men resolve confrontation. Then Frances Ford Coppola got bored. Now we have to reconcile the fact that Michael became a wuss by forgiving Annie Hall and pining for her, not to mention the god awful Sofia Coppola cousin-lovin’ subplot. In the span of two hours they had forever stained the otherwise pristine escutcheon of The Godfather into something resembling a story arc from The Bold and the Beautiful. It felt like they dug up Mario Puzo’s corpse and raped it over and over again with fire.
Boredom is your brains way of saying STIMULATE ME. So it is curious that when you sit on your stool in front of your desk and complain in high pitched falsetto that you are indeed bored, people invariably suggest that you do something that is also boring. “Well if you are so bored, why don’t you clean your desk?” Because that doesn’t solve the freaking problem now does it? That activity wouldn’t alter the situation away from boredom. It would simply change the activity that is causing the boredom. If people where really interested in making the act of desk cleaning a tempo changing activity they would suggest it when you are in the middle of something fun and exciting. Whoo! This activity sure is fun! And exciting! How about we get rid of those catalogues you don’t look at and clear away the old coffee mugs?!
Maybe I should take up blogging.
Tool once cautioned us in their 1998 opus “Stinkfist” that “Boredom’s not a burden anyone should bear.” Of course that song is an invitation to jamming fingers up some dude’s ass. Now I have been very very bored in my life, and not once had I considered that the cure to that boredom had anything to do with convincing someone to let me go wrist-deep up their dirt button. I don’t even know how to start that conversation let alone close that deal. I think I can be charming at times but I am nowhere near that convincing. That requires stores of personality that simply cannot be filled by my personal well, which is fed by aquifers of video games and regular visits or urban dictionary. Bottom line, if Maynard James Keenan was singing the truth I am shit (PUN!) out of luck.
But this is a toxic kind of boredom. This is the kind of boredom that actually makes you dumber. It is exactly this kind of boredom that has directly contributed to the creation, proliferation, and sensational success of Tyler Perry movies. I am going to admit that I have never actually seen one but I will say that based on what I have been able to determine from the box art and titles alone I will avoid them like a chancre. I place them in a special category right alongside Larry the Cable Guy movies in that they celebrate all the worse things about modern American culture and attempt to make the unacceptable behavior of some the standard of decency by lowing the collective bar rather than challenge us to live up to the lofty standards set forth by our more civilized past. Then I shut myself in my mantuary like Don Cantankerous Judgmental McCranky, draw the blinds and laugh at socially damaging movies of entirely different genres. I mean, come on. The dude abides.
Doubt the destructive power of boredom? Look no further than The Godfather Part III. We had two movies that were absolutely amazing and can, and have been, watched time and time and time and time again and shown to my three year old nephew as exemplar of how real men resolve confrontation. Then Frances Ford Coppola got bored. Now we have to reconcile the fact that Michael became a wuss by forgiving Annie Hall and pining for her, not to mention the god awful Sofia Coppola cousin-lovin’ subplot. In the span of two hours they had forever stained the otherwise pristine escutcheon of The Godfather into something resembling a story arc from The Bold and the Beautiful. It felt like they dug up Mario Puzo’s corpse and raped it over and over again with fire.
Boredom is your brains way of saying STIMULATE ME. So it is curious that when you sit on your stool in front of your desk and complain in high pitched falsetto that you are indeed bored, people invariably suggest that you do something that is also boring. “Well if you are so bored, why don’t you clean your desk?” Because that doesn’t solve the freaking problem now does it? That activity wouldn’t alter the situation away from boredom. It would simply change the activity that is causing the boredom. If people where really interested in making the act of desk cleaning a tempo changing activity they would suggest it when you are in the middle of something fun and exciting. Whoo! This activity sure is fun! And exciting! How about we get rid of those catalogues you don’t look at and clear away the old coffee mugs?!
Maybe I should take up blogging.
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