I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.

3AM Friday morning: MJ and I sat in the living room of our Morningside apartment listening to the the drummer of one of our favorite bands talk about his Christian upbringing while eating a bowl of Raisin Bran...

There is an inverse proportion of how awesome the Felice Brothers concert experience was to the shittyness of New Jersey Transit. The system (which has been forsaken by God) was a labyrinthine mess of pottage that forced us to constantly ask people for directions and reassurance that yes we were on the right bus, no I don't know what 'zone' I am in, yes we have never been to New Jersey in this method before, no, actually we don't plan on going back.



A kind man, (an Oceansider! Close to Long Beach!) helped us out and gave us his bus schedule. In the novel/TV reality series that is our lives, this would be the carefully penned moment of foreshadowing or the tilted camera zoom on the schedule that immediately cuts to a diary interview in a curtained room where I say to America, "I trusted that schedule. (Dramatic pause). We...we both did."

The venue, Mexicali, was a nice joint for music, absolutely. I would go there every weekend if giant tractors would unearth the place, crane it onto a flatbed, and haul it through the Lincoln Tunnel, up Broadway, all the way to a nice spot in Morningside Heights, preferably across the street from my apartment. Drinks at the bar, Mexican food, and a strange Jersey-esque scene. MJ put it bluntly when he turned to me and whispered, "What's with all the cougars?" Brilliant, but not his best line of the evening, which I will reveal soon.

Dancing, music, a talented, but extremely inebriated band that look way too young, and bashed the Avett Brothers like they were old crew rivals or something. Lots of country flannel, in a cool Brooklyn way, bereft of authenticity. They were too drunk to finish their hit song. Great show.



Then we waited in the cold for an hour for any kind of bus to take us home. None came. I resigned after 5 minutes while Michael simmered his anger which he unsuccessfullly tried to channel into calling NJ transit, then said his best line of the evening, "This is the part of me I don't like about myself." He was so serious we ended up laughing it off (with some hot chocolate from D&D, only the best) and then going back to the bar to try to drink it off. They were shutting down the bar, but we finagled two Tecates for 5 bucks and told the bartenders our sob story. The cab company MJ called told them it would be at least 100 bucks to get home. We started to consider seedy highway hotels, where there was sure to be a dead body in the empty pool- Jersey style. But I was determined.

The drummer looked nice, so I said thank you for the show and quickly added that we came all the way from New York and were stranded. He actually looked concerned. Good sign. This groupie/friend, Hilari (with an 'i') started talking to us and I in her drunken half-closed eyes, I saw a potential ride home. She was from a ranch in Texas and was wearing cowboy ankle boots with sparkly tights, high-waisted jeans, a denim jacket and a keffiyeh scarf. Texas meets Williamsburg. Austin, Texas saves the day. We started talking about Torchy's Tacos and before I knew it she was hugging me in the backseat of a 1990 BMW, where I was sitting on MJ's lap, with my chin grazing Hilari's very sparkly knee, and my forehead almost touching the bassist, named Christmas. The teetotaler drummer and a not-teetotaler journalist from Kew Gardens named Vladic were in the front. I remember the music was great, and we hit every borough but Staten Island, (but we had come from Jersey so I count that as the same.) In Brooklyn, MJ peed on the sidewalk next to Vladic and the band members, and we ended up in a loft where I met a kid from Binghamton (never fails in NYC). We dropped off Hilari and Christmas. They might not have known each other, but they had not stopped kissing in the car except for when Hilari, A. talked about her holiday tradition of tripping on psychedelic substances, or B. Gave us directions that invariably got us lost. (She ended up disappearing that night, leaving Christmas confused and alone in the Williamsburg loft.)

The drummer, David, looked around and I could tell he just felt uncomfortable. I can only describe him as the kid in the middle of a photograph from Christian Camp, where everyone is blond, tan, smiling, and hugging each other on a sunny lawn outside a contemporary Church building. He had this expression of discomfort, like someone just ripped him out of that picture and threw him into the bluish-gray fluorescent lighting of the loft, which at some point was definitely a sweatshop. We took him home, like somebody would a Golden Retriever and he slept on our couch after we shared some intense stories of our lives and religion.

At one point he paused and said, "You guys are so cool." Yes! America! Give me your poor, hungry, cold, lost youth that ends up through the clothes wringer that is this dirty beautiful city. I am the mother of New York. My apartment is warm, open, with an abundance of Raisin bran, good literature and hope. I feel better about Haiti. Kind of. My bosom is small, but I embrace you, Vagrants!

It's dirty 'cause it's French.

My first encounter with Charlotte Gainsbourg was through a 2006 film, La science des reves (The Science of Sleep), a film by Michael Gondry. I chose the film to watch on one of those nights in college where you just want to be alone and watch a film no one would ever want to watch with you. So I drove my car to Hollywood video probably after a snack pit-stop at Wegman's, and went straight to the foreign film section looking for something French and weird. (Last time I did that I ended up with a movie where a sister sleeps naked with her brother every night and watches him masturbate.*) La science des reves It also featured Gael Garcia Bernal, who I am infinitely attracted to, so I took it home but ended up falling in love with Charlotte Gainsbourg.

She plays Stephanie, that girl that I think I am when I walk around the streets listening to Air (Which is more than appropriate because she recorded an album with them.) Gael Garcia Bernal plays Stephan, the guy you stare at on the subway and invest an entire romantic background and unique past to, but if you ever actually talked to him you would be let down because he actually works for a Republican think tank and you only thought he was cool because he missed last week's hair cutting appointment in order to lobby for Scott Brown. That shaggy hair and slightly provocative beard scruff destroyed our weak attempts at health care.

I digress. Watch The Science of Sleep and try not to fall in love with Ms. Gainsbourg.

Cute. But then you dig a little deeper and hit the 1980s. A weird time for the U.S...imagine what it must have been like in France. I suppose it could be summed up in this one video featuring Charlotte as a young girl, and her FATHER, Serge. She is twelve years old.

WARNING: Do NOT watch this video with other people in the room, unless you are COMMITTED to creeping them out. Full commitment.



OK. I promised myself I wouldn't look up the translation because of pure fear. I don't want to be further creeped out. BUT I AM COMMITTED TO YOU. ALL THREE OF YOU THAT READ MY BLOG. (Hi Mom.)

OK here is a rough translation (my French isn't that good so help me out here Emily please.)

Citrus zest
Lemon incest
I love you I love you I love you
more than any other, Papa,
Naive like a fabric of Nierdoi Sseaurou (I have no idea what that is.)
Your kisses are so soft.
A love that (something) never together
Is most beautiful, rare, most disturbing
Purest more intoxicating
Exquisite draft
Delicious child
My flesh and my blood
Oh my baby.

Repeat again and again through the song, until the public is thoroughly creeped out, but not the French public, they just play it in their malls at Christmas time without thinking twice.

Quote from Wikipedia: "To date, the song is the 630th best-selling single of all time in France."

Godless country.

Back to the review- if you can get the past 7 minutes out of your head. The Charlotte Gainsbourg/Beck album, IRM, is awesome. According to Pitchfork (that has an infinitely better research team than 'Blues), IRM is french for MRI, the medical scanning device Gainsbourg probably needed a lot of after her water-skiing induced hemorrhage in 2007. I will only give it an A- because I got too enthusiastic too soon, which is never a good sign. Her raspy, whispery voice is nothing to pay concert tickets for, but it works so well with Beck's production, whose influence is unmistakable. If you ever wished Air was more marketable, IRM is the album for you! She sings mostly in English but switches to French for a couple songs, most notably, "Le Chat du Cafe des Artists." My favorite track might be the opening one, "His Master's Hands."



Here is the single, a Beckish duet that I would call abstract, bizarre, even eccentric if I hadn't just watched Lemon Incest about 500 times:








Word on the Bliss Street is that Charlotte Gainsbourg is the new Lady Gaga. You heard it first on the 'Blues.











*HA you are just DYING to know that name of that film aren't you?! How dirty. The Dreamers by Bernardo Bertolucci (2003).

PS. New Midlake album coming soon. Stay tuned.

Birth of a new meem.

It is good to know that people will read a blog post even if there are no pictures. Thank you Carla for sending me this AMAZING series: The Non-Motivational Speaker Series, which will take place in Brooklyn tomorrow night, Thursday January 28th.

It looks like some cool speakers will be there. I however will be at the Felice Brothers concert (yay!) in Jersey (boo) with MJ (yay!).



The Felice Brothers remind me of two things: Long Beach and Neil Young. The latter from that cover they did with Bright Eyes of "Walk On." There isn't a good version on You Tube, so this other, Neil Young cover, will have to suffice.



Yes, that is hilarious. That would be Jimmy Fallon, impersonating Neil Young, impersonating Brett Farve, impersonating a crazy man who auditioned for American idol. This is one of those moments I would like to categorize as a Pop Culture Collision. Thank you Carla and MJ and Mike from Long Beach for making this post possible. I love you all.

A post without pictures.

There is a coworker of mine who actually aspires to be a motivational speaker. (I am going somewhere with this I promise.) When he asks me How am I feeling he means 100% my psyche, NOT my physical health. Most people follow up that question with, "You look pale!" OR, "Still digesting that double-red-star spicy Thai dish?" He asks, "Are you confused?" OR "Are you feeling more put together?" He talks philosophy 101 with me asking about the center or disconnecting from identity while I stretch my hamstrings in the Upper East Side athletic apparel store we work at. It passes the time. One day I am listening in the middle of one of those side stretches with my palms on the ground, really getting into that tight left inner thigh. Always tight. Since I was a young. Always tight. He reveals that he was LIKE ME until a couple of months ago. I ask what changed him? what was his revelation? He says, "Well, I read the Power of Now."

I can actually slow down a moment in my blog. This is awesome. OK so within two seconds...less...I red-beam laser my eyes toward him like its a 1960s Superman sitcom (or the 1990s...we can't forget the masterpiece that was and is "Lois and Clark: The Adventures of Superman." Waiting for Teri Hatcher to have intercourse with whoever played Superman was part of my sexual awakening). I then proceed to hide the x-ray look to one of cordial understanding appropriate to the workplace, "Yes I have heard of this book." Then I proceed to have a flashback:

I used to hate my mother's boyfriend (I am really going somewhere with this just hold on a minute). The details are a honeycomb I am not ready to get all sticky over. BUT one cardinal offense was when he tried to connect with me by suggesting I read the Power of Now. Why a 50+ year old man, going through a sea-change-of-a-divorce that involved my mother as some kind of black pawn (or Latina pawn) in some other family's drama, thought this was an appropriate way to reach out to a 19 year old girl in college is beyond my comprehension. I hated him for suggesting anything self-help. Ew. The kicker- get ready for this-

He offered it to me on tape.

The Power of Now on tape. I thought (I was 19) this was a white glove slapping my face. Literally, a duel. This was at a point in my life where I equated being genuine with reading a first edition of Notes From the Underground. No fuck that. The original manuscript. I was looking for true academic street-cred. And listening to the Power of Now on tape did not fit into the carefully constructed image I wanted to project. It still doesn't.

Where I am going is here: I can't sleep over the anxiety that I am not doing enough with my life at ay given moment. I am eating cereal when I could be perfecting my Spanish. I am obsessed with Anu Garg and my daily dosages of etymology when I should be creating. Utilizing. Proactive. Motivate. Power. Of. Now. I want to read the Russians, but in ORDER goddamnit. I want to have 5 careers lined up for me. I want responses from applications from jobs, schools, whatever. I want daily tasks that are easy to handle and make me feel good about myself. I want a trade. I want to always say ALWAYS say, "YES, YES I READ THAT." However, if I make a Things to Do list, then I can't sleep because I cannot fully understand the relationship I have with my father, mother, boyfriend, best friend, cousin, God. Then, if I realize there is nothing short of therapy for all of the above. Then. On a tertiary level, I can't sleep because I haven't done anything for Haiti. I donated 7 dollars. I only mention those 7 dollars because I am scared anyone who reads this (all three of you) will hate me.

In a perfect world there is a website... NO this has to go through standard mail. There exists a way to mail out an application (with stamps) and you AUTOMATICALLY get accepted (via acceptance letter). And then IN AN INSTANT your apartment bell buzzes and a deluge of friends and family walks in with GOOD WINE to congratulate you. It is always summer. The afternoon light is always coming in all pinkish-orange and highlighting your face like the end of a movie. Or that positive part that precipitates when shit starts to hit the fan.

Self-Help Yourself

There is this scene in Apollo 13 where a group of physicists back in Huston are asked to make a filter by fitting a table's worth of tubes and shiny science-thingys into a small box. They look at the box with furrowed brows, knowing that the task is almost impossible, they stare catatonic and daunted by where to begin. The brilliant minds eventually fit everything into the box, relay the message to space, and Tom Hanks survives.

I actually found the clip on Youtube and will defend the internet for as long as I live:


I was taking with coworkers about Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist and this other book about mice called Who Moved My Cheese. A genre of books and audio tapes all meant to inspire and show us what we already knew but we just couldn't see until we saw ourselves as animals. It is biblical and Aesopical and proverbial. And I just contributed Apollo 13 to this trope. However, I'm going with it. I can't pinpoint when, but along the way people told me I could legit go to the moon if I wanted and I believed them. I was probably 5 or 7 or a senior in high school. I want to write to all the authority figures and public service announcements from my youth and demand to know where my goddamned lunar landing is. And, in order to survive the trip back to earth, I have to fit into a round hole when I am actually square.

(Here we arrive at some of the holes in this metaphor. For example wouldn't it be more appropriate for me to the the round peg in a square hole, because of the connotations that square and round have? I am definitely not square. Also, what is my role? Am I one of the scientists or am I an astronaut? Are the scientists representing aspects of my personality and logic working together to let the 'outside' me survive? Like something out of Jung? Or perhaps it is me working with other people to try to get this life thing worked out together. Like something out of Public Television and Sesame Street. Who is on my team? Definitely Lauren and Jill. We need a villian. My Mom is the coordinator that keeps calling. Boys? Should I invite boys?)

Here I am, holding shiny 1960s NASA junk, considering self-help books. Trying to appreciate things around me and let go of it all at the same time. Opposition. Yoga. Buddhism. Loss. Elizabeth Bishop. One Art.

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

--Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.




We can find inspiration in the most quiet of places.

FUERZA AWESOME

Go.
See.
Fuerza Bruta.


I have noticed from my selection of movies (I only go to the theaters if there are 3D glasses involved) that I continue to surround myself with visually stimulating events. Fuerza Bruta was like taking 10 Avatars in IMAX 3D and compressing them into a tiny DNA strain, splicing the strain and mixing it with the DNA of psychotropic mushrooms, then growing this Avatar-mushroom (its fluorescent blue and shimmers!), then sprinkling the mushroom onto a cupcake from Billy's Bakery and eating it. THAT WAS FUERZA BRUTA.

I don't want to describe it because I believe everyone should go into it unaware, but ready to get wet. I wished I had brought a change of clothes. But I can describe the emotion of it: It was inspirational. I am not sure what I was inspired to do though, maybe revert back to the imagination games of my childhood?

The Wonder Wheel

I pack my agenda book with enough events to keep the strip on my MetroCard warm. It's unrelated to making my blog more interesting. I leave that to Youtube videos and pictures of burlesque dancers. Some of the most interesting moments of my life don't make onto the 'blues. I suppose then, the superfluous amount of ridiculous things I fit into my week is simply a side effect of living in New York City, like guttural "a" vowels.

I went to the Barnes and Noble on 86th St. (Lexington Ave) to listen to Richard Price talk about Harlem and writing. He shadows drug dealers, cops, and gangsters and immerses himself in communities he then writes about. Of course someone asks the question, "How much of it is real?" To which he gives an expectantly vague answer: (NOT verbatim, "Everything is made up, the scenes, the people, but I just try to get the beat, the musical tone of the language." The audience, or maybe just me, want to pinpoint that moment when an author starts writing fiction that you actually call fiction. When someone who writes becomes a writer. But I learned that this moment is just primordial mush, or sorcery. Not even the eloquence of Price himself could explain it, except that his life on the street and his life writing the book are two different worlds that somehow must communicate. John Irving creates within his characters that are writers (they show up in every novel) this innate, unstoppable compulsion. Example: He did so-and-so because he was a writer. Price talked about inventing the identity before actually putting anything on paper. He was "the writer." All this time, I am trying to prove something to the world, when I could just be making shit up? Suddenly I am on the boardwalk of Coney Island asking people where the Wonder Wheel is.


I started blogging to practice writing. But I just talk about these events and use NYC as a crutch to substitute my lack of true creativity. There is a bridge somewhere between reality and a fictionalized representation of it, I am still digging in my pockets for change so I can pay the toll.

I need to find a corner in this godforsaken city where I can score some plot.

The Lord's Day

I want to start out by saying Sunday is the Lord's Day.

I contemplated going to church because I felt as though I was missing an element of spirituality in my life. I was toying with the idea of either a religious ceremony or a free yoga class at Sukha in Brooklyn.

Instead I ended up singing Bohemian Rhapsody in Union Square with no pants on. Part of Improv Everywhere's 2010 No Pants Subway Ride. We all met at the Great Hill in Central Park and took the 1 train to Times Square and transferred to the Yellow Line to Union Square.


List of Challenges to taking your pants off in public:
1. It is cold.
2. It is really REALLY hard not to laugh. Especially when you turn around and your significant other is in tiny briefs reading about World Religions.
3. People keep asking you why you aren't wearing any pants. (I always responded in a bitchy tone, "I'm just hot.")
4. There are young children in public places and on the subway. I am pretty convinced I was a young boy's first experience with crotch. His father and mother gave me the legit evil eye. I am doomed for life.
5. Trying to find people in Union Square when everyone is pantless. Praying that you DON'T bump into an ex-coworker, ex-boss, ex-lover, ex-anything.
6. Realizing you are probably on the news, you tube, facebook, blogs, etc...without pants.
7. You can't suck in your thighs.
8. The awkwardness that ensues when the moment is over that I can only compare to when MJ proposed to me and after 15 minutes of adrenaline and ecstatic joy, it's kind of like, "OK what now?" MJ and I got ice cream. The no pants group went to the bar and got drunk.
8. Getting a drink at the bar filled with hundreds of no-pantsers and one scared and highly annoyed bartender.
9. Putting pants back on.

The Crocodile Lounge on 14th between 1st and 2nd is a great bar. We got 3 dollar Yuenglings, then a ticket that gets you a free personal pizza. A really good pizza, fresh out the oven. Anyone who tried to enter the bar immediately was bludgeoned with the chant, "Take off your pants!" I noticed that older men who innocently were just trying to watch some football were more than happy to take off their pants. Younger, hip people were more likely to turn around and find a more subdued bar. I know they were just wearing dirty underwear. Or thongs.

Lauren and I decided that no pants was not enough. We wanted more. So we went to Chow Bar on W4th Street and the corner of W10th St and saw a burlesque show. It was our first show, the kid we brought with us (we met him without his pants on in the bar), had been to ones before, and we sat at a table with a fellow dancer friend from India, and one of the performer's husband. This was one of the best experiences of my life. Huge eyelashes, tassels and pasties, cheese costumes, gorilla suits, and giant feather fans. I was enamored with all the glamor. Hazel Honeysuckle, the wife our fellow diner, is pictured here. To see another of her amazing acts, check out Sci-Fi Burlesque in Astoria on January 23rd at Hell Gate Social.

I should have been at Yoga. I should have gone to church. But sometimes in this cold weather, you have to stare at naked flesh to keep you warm.

Stuff Happening in New York that is Preferably Free, But Most Likey Not

The strongest critique of my bloq (that I give myself because the extent of my readership include people like my Mom who will basically says, "That's nice" to about anything I do) is lack of structure and consistency. There are some that might argue that is my greatest critique as a functioning member of society. So, I will try to devote a post a week to, "Stuff Happening in New York that is Preferably Free, But Most Likey Not."

Dance/Yoga/Fitness: If you are in Brooklyn on Saturday afternoons, Get Your Dance On is a very special dance party at the Brooklyn Bowl. No shoes, no talking, just dancing to a DJ from 4-7 pm sans hangover, drugs, and late night/early morning cab rides home. This is just about the dancin'.

Alvin Ailey Extention is also introducing a Saturday morning Masala Bhangra class from 10:35-11:35 so you can go and experience what I am always talking about. Stay tuned for the next workout video, staring me as background dancer number 3. This week I'll be taking the 11:30 West African class to let loose.

BEings/Flexicurve Dance Companies are performing for free at City Center Studios 130 West 56th Street, fourth floor. 10 pm. Lots of skinny rolling around to Tom Waits and other weird sounds.

10 Dollar Dance: Danspance, Stam-Pede (this looks awesome) at Symphony Space Sunday@ 3pm.

Theatre: Under the Radar (part of NY Public Theater) is having a free performing arts show running Saturday/9th through Tuesday/12th called This Fable is Intended for You: A Work-Energy Principle. It is about people finding connections in Lower Manhattan. It also requires a trip to Lower Manhattan, the World Financial Center Winter Garden. Check out all of the performances though. I'm going to see Chautauqua! because MJ is a religious studies fanatic, but there were others that look sick (and cheap), including an interpretation of Murakami's Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, a guy with puppets, and the beautiful Martha Graham Company dancers.

Music: I WOULD LOVE to see The Fishtank Ensemble perform. Gypsy flamenco jazz music. Right up my alley. There are a few free shows this weekend. I want to shoot for Sunday night 10pm at Kafana, very mysteriously exciting.

Etcetera: Want to see me pantless? Do the Improv Everywhere No Pants Subway Ride with me tomorrow!


Richard Price discusses Lush Life at the Upper East Side Barnes and Noble (86th and Lex) this Monday night 7 pm. I will be there. I did a book review on Lush Life on this blog. Do you think he read it?

2666, Water for Elephants, and All the Pretty Horses

I should be writing individual posts about all of these, but I just started reading Bodega Dreams and I really want to escape into the rabbit hole and crawl out into East Harlem.

The Payoff Scale: A inadequate tool to measure how good I subjectively think a work is based on a delicate balance between entertainment and erudite snobbyness. Kind of like a book that makes your brain sweat but then hands you a cold beer in gratitude of your labors. A 1 on the Payoff Scale could be an entertaining read without a shred of intellect, or it could by pages of brilliant crafted literature that the reader has to re-read 8 times in searching desperately for a shred of plot. In the number 10 parade marches the Moby Dicks, Grapes of Wraths, and Hundred Years of Solitudes. Books that are hard to get through. Damn Hard. But entertainment and literary stimulation converge to make... a good, intelligent read. Fighting through language and metaphor actually PAYS OFF. Anything below an 8 you might forget the characters' names. Anything below a 6 you might forget certain events but can piece together a back-flap summary. Anything below a 4 you take a few moments to try to remember if you actually read the book or not. 2 or 1 requires a letter to the author/editor/publishing house, asking for a refund. If not a financial one, then a compensation for the time wasted and the energy drained in turning pages. According to this ridiculous (but useful to me right now) article: The Da Vinci Code burns 885 calories. Therefore Dan Brown owes me a Big Mac with Medium French Fries. But I'm a veg, so he owes me 30 seven and a half inch carrots.

2666, Roberto Bolaño
I read 2666. I want this on my tombstone. Not only because its a long book, (I've read long books before without feeling like I just climbed Everest without an oxygen tank and no Sherpa carrying my shit and providing me with spiritual guidance) but because a large puñado of the book deals with the Juarez murders. (Shame on you if you don't know about this yet...like me...a year ago.) Wait I'm sorry. Did I say "deal?" Did I just grossly misrepresent Bolaño intentions? Or intimate some kind of subtle trope, equivocation? He describes the discovery of each woman/girl/woman and the condition of their body in such graphic detail that I had to put the book down for a couple of months. Details like dogs chewing on their torn nipples had me crying on the 1 train, upsetting all the sensitive Upper West Siders. It took me 5 months and a bunch of comics and bestsellers before I could cross the 2666 finish line. It was worth it.

He indulges in the arcane world of academia with its ostentatious business write-offs and bookish love affairs. Very entertaining. There's also some of the most amazing WWII writing (this means a lot coming from me). It is from the point of view from Nazi, less interested in Third Reich ideals, and more into sex. A lot of sex. There is nothing better than an exciting sex scene that is so bookishly well written, you feel completely artless in loving every second of it. Somehow, because it's artistic, God won't smite you as hard. Things come together in an ending that just takes off. Takes off. You will understand when you read it. Actually, please read it, so we can get coffee and talk about it in approximately four-five months. It was a book that elicited audible gasps, laughs, tears, and actual "Oh no!"s. Bolaño writes it all as if he was there first hand. The highlight is when he writes about writing itself. Any writer/artist who has milked obsession over failure and doubt, should read this immediately.
Payoff Scale: 9.5

Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
The characters lack depth or change. If Jacob Jakowski was trying to grow from a boy to a man, I missed it. His morality rivals Jesus Christ's and becomes unbelievable. There is no questioning who is good or bad, Circus owner- BAD. Ringleader- BAD. Dwarf Clown- GOOD. Elephant- GOOD. Actually the elephant is the most dynamic character in the novel, it should have been from her POV.
There are some surface level race relations that go nowhere. "If you're a performer, you take shots at working men. If you're a working man, you take shots at Poles, if you're a Pole you take shots at Jews." Aside from sounding like water-downed Steinbeck, all I could think of is, "Can't we all just get along?!" The description of the circus itself is written as if the author had never been to the circus. (She hadn't, I checked.) And Gruen achieved my pet peeve, when I can hear an author's voice through the words and I then picture said author on his or her Macbook in a Starbucks using a thesaurus. It is particularly bad when I can picture what latte he/she is drinking. Gruen was drinking a Peppermint Mocha.
I am exaggerating. But the book was a disappointment. I give it a 3 on the scale. Maybe a 4 because I liked the elephant.
Payoff Scale: 3.5

All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy
If I wasn't on a 14 hour plane ride from Kuwait to JFK, I may not have given this book a chance. In the style of a Western, it has terse dialogue and slow moving introductory prose. The landscape descriptions were beautifully written but nothing was happening. There was A LOT about horses. Reading the book initially gave me the feeling of riding a horse in the midday sun of the Tex/Mex border. So good job with that. But I thought seriously about trading in the book for a Jim Thompson novel, similar style but at least you know in a few pages, someone is going to get shot.

I am glad I finished. As the novel developed, it still lacked a thrilling plot, but there was some beautiful language that required both underlining AND dogearing. Especially when Doña Alfonsa speaks: "If fate is the law then is fate also subject to that law? At some point we cannot escape naming responsibility. It's in our nature. Sometimes I think we are all like that myopic coiner at his press, taking the blind slugs one by one from the tray, all of us bent so jealously at our work, determined that not even chaos be outside of our making." I couldn't figure out where I knew that voice. Ah yes, it is quite definitely an homage to Addie in As I Lay Dying. Oh my, McCarthy's entire style is an homage to Faulkner.

I realized that this is common knowledge in the literary world that I was not privy to while flying above the Atlantic sans Interweb. Google "McCarthy Faulkner" and you'll see what I mean. To enjoy this book make sure you're in the mood for a slow read that hypnotizes you with beautiful language and American folk philosophy such as, "My daddy used to tell me not to chew on somethin that was eatin you."
Payoff scale: 7.5

The Philadelphia Mummers

New Year's Day, I was waking down 9th street in Philadelphia with MJ and Lauren (http://laurenreadyjetgo.blogspot.com) waiting for a table at Sabrina's Cafe to open up. We were benignly admiring the cheese shops when an intoxicated (I presume) homeless man started shouting at us, "Y'all are nowhere NEAR them Mummers! Them Mummers is back that way."

What I thought was an inebriated slur was actually one of Philadelphia's great cultural traditions. MJ could only describe the Mummers parade as, "a bunch of guys that dress up in sparkly costumes." Lauren and I had one of those moments where you admit you've never seen Karate Kid or you ask who Wilt Chamberlain is. But I don't think we are alone. I am pretty sure unless you are associated with South-East Pennsylvania, or are really into strange American customs, Mummers is probably a mystery.

When we got to Broad St, there were a bunch of men and a handful of women dressed in colorful sequins, feathers, headpieces, and makeup. They looked like Marti Gras participants only there was no sex factor, more like creepy 19th century carnival meets Brazilian Carnaval. They were all smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee with their saxophone or banjo hanging limp and forgotten around their neck. It was awesome.

We walked toward City Hall where all the action is and just saw scores of big brawny men that looked right out of a Teamster Local, all dressed in sequins and makeup. They were drunk and smoking cigarettes, the crowd was drunk and smoking cigarettes, the children watching will in a few years be drunk and smoking cigarettes. Open container law suspended. No barricades, just people hanging out in sweaters, on lawn chairs.

None of us had iPhones. So we were left with an antiquated feeling of wonder.

The name comes from the Mummers Play tradition of Great Britain and Ireland, popular in the 19th and early 20th century. They are a kind of fantastic morality play involving a magic cure, St. George as a hero, and cheap, ribald laughs. One of the first Philly settlers, the Swedes brought the New Years tradition of firing guns and reciting verse while traveling from house to house. Comedy and song in exchange for cakes and ale. The parade became an official city event in 1900. Today participants include social clubs in South Philadelphia, mainly located on "two" street. Why they can't say second street I don't know.

They are split into 5 categories:
Comics: Drunk men dressed up as clowns performing and dancing. Seriously, I think drunkenness is mandatory. I'm not sure.

Wench Brigade: Hardcore traditional mummers, no bands, just bawd. Lots of tiny frilly umbrellas.

Fancies: The most elaborate costumes, often defying the basic weight-bearing laws of physics and the basic pride-carrying laws of dignity.

String Bands: Think hundreds of men in pink lipstick picking banjos. Full on orchestras, none of them allowed to be professional musicians. I suppose Pennsylvania might be the only place in the North East that can boast so many voluntary banjo players...that will dress in drag...with serious faces on. Awesome.

The Mummers of Yesteryear:



Mummers facts (according to Wikipedia and their official site):
1. Over 395,000 dollars are awarded in prizes, which by no means covers the expenses of the costumes. It costs about 25,000 dollars to outfit an entire band. Union dues probably go to making them.

2. A big tradition was black face. They stopped that somewhere in the 1960s. Kind of. Apparently they still do it.

3. African Americans used to have their own divisions and actively participate. This mysteriously ended in 1929 and I didn't see a single black participant in 2010. Evidence that they may still be banned today.

4. The theme song was composed by an African American: James A. Bland's Oh! Dem Golden Slippers

5. Mummers comes from the German word mumme which means disguise or mask.

3. Women were not allowed to participate until 1970.

Great Mummers quotes:
"I wish you No. 2." ~ official Mummer greeting.

"Lots of broken marriages because of string bands."~Member of the Italo-American Bocce Social club of Philadelphia.

"I guess you just have to be born a Mummer" ~Women on SEPTA after the parade.

"Can ya at least help me up?" ~Mummer who drunkenly fell over into a flower bed on Broad St. at 1 pm. I took a picture of him.

Repent and Resolve

Excuses why I have not updated my blog in a month:

1. I almost lost my job for mentioning a certain candidate on a certain political campaign in writing. Whoops.

2. Grad school applications sucked the life out of me, leaving me a paper shell of my former self. And not a cute, romantic origami paper shell, but more like crumpled up old newspaper found in a trash can, that once housed an oily fish and chips order from a dirty boardwalk vendor in Coney Island circa 1982.

3. Travel to India, where I wanted to catalogue my experiences but contracted some kind of disease and ended up in the hospital for three days.

4. The holidays.

5. Overall self-doubt encroaching on self loathing and the lack of confidence that ensues stymieing any attempts to write or have direction. (See Excuse #2 for further explanation. My personal statementsat first sounded to much like my blog posts and I had to "formalize" myself. That took work and commitment. And some major selling out. Worse than a 90s grunge band.)


6. The inherent human quality for procrastinating and leaving projects unresolved that must have a biological root in our brains. The cure is probably Adderall.

RESOLUTION

In between running a marathon and learning French on my resolution list is BLOG TRIWEEKLY. Today I had to write something to grease my wheels, but Sunday evening/Monday morning, will begin the SCHEDULED, ROUTINE TRIWEEKLY BLISS STREET BLUES SPECTACULAR. It still has no direction, but I like to think it symbolized the disconnection and chaos of our times.