Freudian Slip

“We strongly believe that, given its size, its history, the region that it’s in and the threats that are leveled against us — against it, that Israel has unique security requirements,” Mr. Obama said, briefly correcting himself in midsentence. “It’s got to be able to respond to threats or any combination of threats in the region.”

The Comatose Blagojevich

This is probably the worst defense I've ever heard:

'''You have to be comatose not to figure out how to get a dollar out of $52 billion,' Adam said, referring to the Illinois state budget. 'But who didn't? Him!' he said indicating his client."

Sorry, Robert Gibbs.

“Sometimes it feels like we walk and chew gum and juggle on a unicycle all at the same time. I get that.”

Either President Obama is sometimes doing the impossible, or using mixed metaphors does not preclude you from being the press secretary for the White House. (I'm thinking it's the latter.)

Sorry, Mr. Gibbs, but I fail to see how the president can (metaphorically) walk while being on a unicycle.

I don't get that.

Paranoia

Michael Oren ends his Op-Ed piece in the New York Times as follows:

"The real peace activists are those who support our vision of a two-state solution, not those supporting the terrorists bent on destroying it."

This is an obvious either/or fallacy: either you are for peace on Israel's terms (my interpretation of the use of "our vision...etc"), or you are supporting terrorism (if not a terrorist yourself). Mr. Oren goes even further because he also defines what it means to be a "peace activist" with the inclusion of the adjective "real"--anyone claiming to be a peace activist who does not agree with Israel's terms for peace is a pretender or a fake. Mr. Oren's statement does not include--in fact it eliminates--a multitude of other possible ways for peace in the region.

Ending the article in this way belies a paranoia on the part of Israel (if I can assume that the Israeli Embassador to the United States can speak on behalf of a nation). Whether or not this paranoia can be justified is an entirely different matter, and I cannot possibly argue that here. But Mr. Oren's statement does separate the entire world into two groups: those that support Israel, and those that are bent on its destruction.

The world is not as simple as that, Mr. Oren.

Insanity.

"But it [addiction to the internet] seems to be an affliction of modern life. In one extreme example in South Korea reported by the media, a couple allegedly neglected their three-month-old daughter, who died of malnutrition, because they were on the computer for up to 12 hours a day raising a virtual child."

Worst Rejection Letter Ever.

Re: FT Inst - English Composition
Division: Humanities
ID# 13129

Thank you for your interest in applying for the above referenced position. There were many fine candidates; however, after a careful review of application materials submitted, the screening committee selected other candidates for further consideration.

We encourage you to apply for future openings for which you may qualify and wish you the best of success in fulfilling your career objectives.

It doesn't say I am a fine candidate, nor does it say the school in question chose better qualified candidates "for further consideration." The letter merely states facts, and then suggests I try again. Considering how I applied for this position in January, and that I will be going to school in the fall, I don't think I will.

Speechwright II

All right it’s 9:40 a.m. on September 15, 2009. I just recorded this dream and I realize that the stupid thing was on hold, so I didn’t get any of it. So I’m going to try again and record it. I think this would be a good story idea. So it’s three friends on the train: one is in military get-up, like 16^th—17^th Century British military get-up, like long overcoat, white like pantaloons and black boots, brown hair, really long nose, this guy is holding a newspaper and reading an article about two brothers that killed themselves over this fortune at this one station that I guess we’re heading to. And it’s me and another guy, the other guy that’s not holding the paper that’s not me, I have no visual on him, I guess I can fill him up later when I write—he’s just not there, really, I can’t get a visual. But we’re sitting like in the cabin of this train, and it’s kind of like an old train, maybe it’s set like in Victorian times, or maybe just for the surrealistic effect I can just put it—um I probably won’t supply a year. But anyway, um… So we get to this station after the trip, and the station is like a bizarre like circus kind of station. There’s lots of Victorian dressed people, women in large hoop-skirts and dresses and lots of feathers and lots of horses, grey, blue, different colored horses, white, um and there’s like rails, like train lines, like those kind of rails, but there’re horses on it like pulling people, and it’s just like practically standing room only. Me and my two friends are walking around, and it’s kind of—the vision’s on me, like I can hardly see my two friends in this part of the dream. So we’re just walking around in a circle in this station. It’s like a covered—it’s indoors, like dark, like artificially lit, and we’ve been going around like the perimeter of this station and just like seeing all of this bizarre Victorian circus-like stuff. Just lots of horses, so many horses, and just people, and my friend holding the newspaper comments—I think it was him—I can’t remember who—but somebody mentions that like all the food has been eaten. And there was like large like plates and bowls that are around the edges or something that just have been completely devoured of food—like meats and stuff like that were once there and it’s just gone. Everything has been eaten. And there are all these people just like on horseback that are just parading around, and we make like a circle around—we make three circles, I think I may have mentioned this already—we make three circles, and suddenly like the train station kind of like opens up---it’s almost like a garage door how it opens up, like this large portion just suddenly just lifts, and there’s green, like lush green land, and blue skies, and like all these people make this exodus out from this train station out into these fields. And so that’s the, it looks like we’re going to follow them, and I’m kind of following them, but my two friends they make a sharp left before they actually leave the train station. So I’m following, I kind of step outside and then I turn and realize that they’re kind of over there so I kind of follow them. So I follow them out through another doorway that’s open off to the left of this large opening, it’s not too far. But like it’s just kind of a door way, and it opens off onto this landing. The landing’s like probably twice the size of my room or something like that—it’s kind of big, but it’s not too big. And it looks like, at first it looks like the landing is like completely solid wood and me and my friend the friend that doesn’t have the newspaper he’s we kind of step of towards the edge of the landing and look off to where the people are going, like these large kind of like a carnival or festival or picnic—some party going off beyond in the distance, like white tents and stuff are there. And um so, so we’re kind of busy doing that, and I guess the dream switches to third person now because even though I can see it it’s like I’m not there. It’s a really weird experience. But so I’m kind of doing that with my companion while this guy gets—Oh wait before I do that—I definitely have to clear this up in writing. But before I do that, like before I follow my companion who immediately does what I just described, I kind of like look over the edge of the landing that’s part of the cover of the train station, like this abandoned part of the train station, and I see two guys in the shape of a 69: one’s like holding a gun to other guy’s foot, and the other guy’s holding another gun to the other guy’s foot, so it’s like, kind of like this weird circle with holding guns um or they’re kind of rotting. The guns are like blunderbusses, they’re like really old like pistols, um and the guys are just they’re rotting. They’re not complete skeletons yet, but they are in the process of decomposing. And the pistols—the blunderbusses—are like rusted, and it’s just that weird circle. And they’re kind of indented into the soft, brown earth of the train station. I turn around and I say well this has got to be the spot because the image that I saw is in the photo of the newspaper in the newspaper article, I remember that from the train station, I have to remember to put that in writing. So I see that and the guy gets really excited, and he’s like searching—the guy with the newspaper was searching for the spot based on what the newspaper was saying, he’s kind of like flipping back and forth so he finds the spot. He starts cutting with some kind of knife or something like that, he starts cutting. It was like wood before but it’s kind of like he’s cutting through cardboard. It kind of weird it switches to like cardboard and there’s this green design like um the part that he’s cutting, it’s kind, it’s hard to describe, it’s circular like a like in comics those um the voice bubbles, it’s kind of shaped like that. And there’s like some woman or something, it could be an ad for fruit, but it’s green and it covers the spot liberally. So what happens is he cuts through that part and so he’s cutting through that part, and he cuts like a shoebox size piece through this cardboard woodish type surface on the landing, and me and the other guy is looking out to the fair during this time. And he’s cutting out, and he’s screaming he’s found it, and it’s difficult for him but he like kind of pulls out the box which is like kind of the same size—I don’t know he can’t peel back the top of it for some reason. The top is like stuck on it. But he kind of like somehow pulls out the box from underneath like he’s pulling out from a slit, but he actually cut a hole. It’s kind of weird. I might have to fix that. But he pulls out the gold. It’s a box. It’s like a shoebox size box. This whole time he’s like screaming like ridiculously, he’s found it nobody else has found it and he like opens up the box like kind of tears it open, which the box seems to also be made out of this weak kind of wood or cardboard, and he pulls it out and there’s like gold bars, but it’s not like the Fort Knox bars that you get, but like they look like chocolate bars, basically. They wrapped around in white like See’s candy, but the edges are gold like, it’s like a chocolate bar with gold filling or something. I don’t know that’s kind of what it looks like. And he’s like pulling out—what’s he doing? He’s like lifting them up, and the gold is like staining his hands, and it’s kind of like a reddish brown like chocolate would stain. Maybe it’s chocolate, I don’t know. But um he’s pulling it out, and it’s staining his hands but it’s not losing shape, it’s kind of weird, like they’re marked—like marked bills would do. And he’s holding them and he’s screaming to us that he’s found the treasure nobody else has found it, this was largely been ignored, it was y’know, it’s y’know, there’s nothing, nobody wanted this, or I don’t know. He’s just excited, he’s ecstatic, his face is completely in the throes of like ecstasy, he’s found something, he’s become rich. Whatever it is, he’s just completely lost in this, and he’s just screaming to us. We don’t seem to hear him and we’re still on the landing, so and it’s just me and that other guy—the nondescript guy—just looking out onto this field, and um then he, then what happens is, like for some reason I turn around for and I turn and there’s nobody there on the landing where like, he was kind of at our backs obviously, and when I turn around he’s not there, and I say, I turn to my friend and I’m like where did ______ go? He had a name, and I said a name in my dream, I just can’t remember what that name was. I said where ______ go? And the guy kind of like shrugs and looks completely disinterested—still don’t get a visual on his face even though I’m talking to him, and he kind of like turns and looks off into the fair and stuff, and I sort of do the same. And the dream kind of ends, with that guy and he’s inside the part, he’s inside the landing, and he’s holding that gold, and his eyes are kind of closed, and his face is kind of in bliss, but it’s kind of dark with some kind of weird inner light for the omniscient third that I can see. But he’s trapped inside and the part that he has cut in—the shoebox size part—has been sealed up, but with a like blank, clean cardboard so you could still see the edges of the um fruit around it, like the fruit design or whatever that was like the green edges are still around it and the design isn’t complete. It’s like if you had a cloth with a design, cut it out, cut out a portion of it, and then sown something white—it’s like the design isn’t complete but it’s still around it. That’s kind of how it is. So it’s something noticeable but me and my friend don’t notice or don’t care or whatever, and that’s kind of like how the dream is, he’s trapped inside with the gold and the thing has been sealed up fresh, and that was the dream. So obviously I have to fix some things when I listen to this again later, hopefully I caught everything. I think I might have said it a little faster than I did the first time, um, but, um I hope I can remember the kind of like the feel of especially like the circus at the station, and I’ll just supply I kind of missed like the names, and that’s it. I hope you can turn this into a story, Omer. That’s… end of tape.

Things Are Happening.

Oh blog, let me count the ways I have been neglecting thee:

1. I have not published anything on you.

That's it. This is not to say that I have been doing nothing since the last time I posted, because I have been somewhat busy.

First of all, I have been working for the last week of February and the first two weeks of March. I am such a regular there that everyone at work wonders why I am not hired there full time. I only nod and smile, or shrug my shoulders at the suggestion. Being a temp is not fun.

On the Ides of March, I finished that previous exercise started in September of last year. I am not sure if I would like to post the full story here, but I think I should post my recording of the dream, if only to elucidate my previous post on language. I shall try to do that soon.

I also have had issues with my car. Last week, on my way to work, something had happened as I passed through the gate leading out of my community. I drove through the gate and heard a snap; I looked over to discover that the side view mirror on the passenger side had been broken off, and was literally hanging by a thread (of wires). I got that fixed two days ago, but I have been struggling with the homeowners association to figure out if the accident was my fault or if the gate had closed on me. The homeowners association said they would check the cameras and get back to me... they have not yet. Oh well, what the hell.

Lastly, and the probably the biggest news, I have been accepted by the University of Tulsa for their doctoral program in English. I am set to go visit the campus at the end of March. This comes as a huge relief (though almost undoubtedly I shall complain in the future) given that I have spent two years struggling to find work or get into school. The only other school I applied to was the University of Miami, and I have not yet heard from them. In all likelihood I will go to Tulsa this fall, but I have until April 15 to decide.

So blog, please do not be upset that I have been neglecting you: things are happening.

Another Exercise

I'm almost done with that other exercise (my dream story), but in the meantime I present to you an exercise assigned by a friend in New Jersey. The limit was 500 words, and the theme was "empty glasses." In twenty minutes, this is what I came up with (strangely enough it is exactly 500 words):

The Empty Glass

The empty glass stood there like an accusation. It must have held something once. There was a multitude of possibilities of what the glass held, why it held it, for whom, and when it was once filled. The permutations were mind-boggling. And thus it accused him, he who was staring at the glass and thinking of the possibilities.

What if it hadn’t held anything? The thought made him smile one of those shy, sly smiles that only can be seen in the eyes at the right angle when the light was just perfect. Not too dark; not too light. If the glass had held nothing, as it was holding now, then there wouldn’t be a problem, would there? There was no plot, no story, just a stasis that was as endless as the possibilities of what the glass should have held had it held anything.

No. The glass held something. He was sure of it. He couldn’t succumb to this overwhelming urge to reduce everything to some kind of inductive nihilism that, once it was injected into the mind like some kind of cocaine laced heroine, was as addictive and necessary as the air itself, as the water that was only just one possibility of what was once held in that air-filled vacuum that stared at him back, accused him totally, made him cringe at all the infinitudes he ever read about—the worlds within words within worlds. Everything. Everything and nothing was in that glass now, and everything and nothing was in that glass once. He stopped his eyesmile.

Was there residue? Prima facie there were no apparent markings that could indicate what, if anything, the glass had held. There were no water marks, no evaporated soda residue, no faint whiff of dried up vodka. He could easily—the empty glass was within reach—lift the glass and inspect it closely to ensure the accuracy of his initial observations, but there was something sacrosanct about the glass, as if it had become some kind of dead idol in a temple of long ago where the glass would hold the libations for gods that no one worshipped anymore nor cared about nor thought even existed. The glass had become an artifact.

But why? Why was he here staring at the glass, staring at the base of it to see if there were water marks on the oaken unvarnished desk which propped up the glass as Atlas propped up the globe in ether-filled space? The possibilities here were infinite. There were more explanations than he wanted to enumerate, and they were all as empty to him as the glass was void of liquid. But there was the gas. Surely air filled the glass now. It existed. But some things, he suddenly felt in the back of his spine as if it had been injected there, existed and yet were empty. This epiphany shot up to his mind and emptied it of everything that he was thinking about.

The glass accused him.

More Thoughts on Writing

Writing used to be an art. I do not mean "writing" the idea, but "writing" the physical act. Scribes and scriveners, illuminated manuscripts and calligraphy: writing was done with such care and precision that every word mattered, down to each letter. It was a painstaking and expensive process; a single mistake and the whole page had to be redone.

This attitude is completely gone now. The computer has made writing easier, so much so that I doubt anyone enjoys the act of putting pen to paper, let alone the curves of a letter. With this ease comes a lax attitude towards a word's appearance, which transforms (quite easily) to a carelessness for the word, which would then lead to an ambivalence to the idea which the word represents.

Of course, that series does not necessarily logically follow. I simply notice this trend. Simply because a writer cares about the appearance of a letter or word does not entail that he cares any more for the idea behind the word than one who is not so focused on appearances. Many scribes and copyists did not know the languages they were writing in and therefore did not have the slightest idea of what they were reproducing. So caring for the looks of a word does not always mean an interest in language, but it still means something.

The writer's interest in the font and style of individual letters and words belies the social condition the writer is in: those that read would like to look at beautifully written language because they want the written word to physically reflect the ideas the words represented. That is the attitude I am most concerned about, and it is one that I believe is obsolete. There is no effort in making language look beautiful because it is so easy to make it look consistent and nice. I do not know of anyone that concerns himself with which font to use, or has a favorite font or style of writing. I do not know if calligraphy is even offered in school anymore. Words are merely tools now, tools that convey messages or one's meaning without making the reader stop to think about the words themselves. Even in fiction, where writing (the idea) is at its highest form of art, the word is simply a unit to produce an effect, emotion, thought, or (dare I say it?) a lesson. The actual words themselves--their appearance and style--is inconsequential. These are simply cast off as aesthetic choices, with no function beyond the form.

This is not to say that I am against the ease and consistency of typing from computers. The printed word is easier to read than handwriting (but handwriting used to be beautiful when it was the most convenient form of communication), and, for writing professors and publishers, it must be a huge relief to have something consistent and legible. But the trade-off to this ease is that it is now extremely difficult to put your stamp on the English language. Your choice of how you want your writing to look is relegated to what font selection is available. That, in a way, is a sad loss.

I note this not for any desire to go back to those medieval days where secluded monks spent hours upon hours copying books and illuminating manuscripts, but simply for my select readers to think about the looks of things, and whether the appearance should reflect what is beyond its face. We should do so because--and these thoughts sometimes occur to me--I believe that an attention to detail demonstrates an attention to the general. This is not always true, but if you can show that you care that much for something, then you must care about the larger picture. It is difficult to have a clean room if you do not know how to organize it or do not know what to do with the trash.

Again, these are just thoughts, things that float around in my head that are imperfect, wishful, and not necessarily useful.

Happy holidays.