He kind of has a point.

I'm reading Hemingway's short stories now. I like them more than not, and I liked "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber," tedious glorification of machismo notwithstanding. Still, this summation of the story by Frank O'Connor--found on its wikipedia page--cracks me up:

Francis runs away from a lion, which is what most sensible men would do if faced by a lion, and his wife promptly cuckolds him with the English manager of their big-game hunting expedition. As we all know, good wives admire nothing in a husband except his capacity to deal with lions, so we can sympathize with the poor woman in her trouble. But next day Macomber, faced with a buffalo, suddenly becomes a man of superb courage, and his wife, recognizing that[...] for the future she must be a virtuous wife, blows his head off. [...] To say that the psychology of this story is childish would be to waste good words. As farce it ranks with "Ten Nights in a Bar Room" or any other Victorian morality you can think of. Clearly, it is the working out of a personal problem that for the vast majority of men and women has no validity whatever.

I don't know that I totally agree with this, but it's nonetheless a palpable hit. Well played, old man.

Fun with student evaluations

Worst teacher I've ever had in my life. Doesn't explain stories well & assignments are extremely confusing and wierd [sic]. He doesn't give any points for grammar. Swore/used foul language in class. Offended me. Made me dislike a subject I used to have passion for.

...so I take it that's a 'no,' then?

He is the absolute worst teacher I have had. He's confusing, makes no sense and I don't think he should be teaching. He doesn't know how to grade. Overall he sucks.

What can you do? ON THE OTHER HAND:

I thought he made the class less awful than others.

SO THERE!

And if one may toot one's own horn for a moment:

I felt very challenged when it came time to write my papers. Mr. Moses made me think in ways I've never thought in, and introduced me to a completely different style of authors and writing in this course. This is what you go to college for.

and

Opened my mind way beyond my expectations for the class.

Suck it, haters!

All the things I don't like are responsible for the Holocaust.

This here Signet Classics edition of Winesburg, Ohio has an introductory piece by Irving Howe. And why not? The copyright page tells us that this introduction is from 1993, which must make it one of the last things Howe ever wrote. Fair enough! Howe was certainly a Noted Scholar!

But apparently that wasn't putting asses in seats with sufficient zest, because there is also an AFTERWARD, dating from 2005, this by noted hack Dean Koontz. Shit, I thought, when seeing that this was the case. Am I going to have to revise my opinion of the guy upwards? I hate having my preconceived notions disturbed! Egads!

Not so much, it turns out. In substance, it isn't much; in fact, bits of factual information appear to have been cribbed from the introduction to make Koontz look more knowledgeable. This could be an unfounded supposition, but that's how it appears to me. Also, he quotes from one of his own novels. I wasn't perhaps as impressed as some are with Anderson, but that's still some pretty impressive chutzpah.

The main theme is "Oh noes! Teh modernist ideals iz destroying our morals!" Darwin, Nietzsche, and Marx are all cited, and it culminates in this sentence, which is positively Goldbergian in its historically-deficient, willfully clueless, pseudo-intellectualism:

Anderson died in 1941, as the more bitter fruits of Darwinism, Marxism, and Freudianism were realized in the Third Reich, a regime founded on eugenics, evolutionary ethics, racism, a belief that the human mind is driven by animal self-interest, and faith in the absolute righteousness of the state.

Historical comprehension FAIL (I have to admit, though, even from the perspective of the wingnut negaverse, I find it impossible to fathom what "Freudianism" has to do with anything). Hardly surprising, though--I mean, the man donated money to Mitt Romney. How bright could he possibly be?

Why Boom's marketing strategy seems HIGHLY dubious.

"Kids! Ever wondered what would happen when all the superheroes of the Disney comics universe star in an epic clash against all the super villains with the fate of the world at stake?"

Now okay okay, looking at this from a purely pragmatic standpoint, Disney DID have some popular cartoons in the eighties and nineties--Ducktales, Tailspin, Darkwing Duck, Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers--that might still have some name recognition, while also sort of vaguely hearkening back to the golden days when Walt Disney's Comics and Stories strode o'er the land like a mighty colossus. But:



Double-you tee eff? Now, there HAVE been superhero versions of Donald and Goofy (deep sigh), although these guys don't look like they, and in any case, I don't think they get much play outside of Italy (those wacky Italians--no wonder they keep electing Berlusconi). But the philosophy here seems to have been "mechanically stick regular characters in generic superhero outfits, creating characters that nobody's heard of and nobody cares about. Super Gladstone? Super...is that supposed to be Gus Goose in the back? Super Mysterious Nose'n'Eyebrows Dude? And SUPER GODDAMN FETHRY? I think it's safe to say that no child in the US today has ever heard of even regular Fethry. Let's face it: YOU haven't (and trust me--you're better off). Why should they? And even if they DO know the character from being one of the three or four kids to have read Gemstone's WDC, is it even remotely possible to imagine that they would want to see a superhero version of him? Why, truly, would they be interested in any of this nonsense?

These are comic book characters--in some cases fairly obscure comic book characters--remade, in a fanfiction-y kind of way, as superheroes. It seems as though this can only be meant to appeal to established fans hungry for novelty. It certainly doesn't seem as though it would draw new fans in. And yet, that's what Boom is trying to achieve. I don't see how this is possibly going to work.

Exciting special offer!

Everyone knows about the twelve labors of Hercules--but what many people DON'T know is that there were originally many more than twelve labors. Many of them were cut for reasons of space or because of negative focus tests--but this new edition, painstakingly reconstructed from the original proofs, restores the text as completely as possible! See what you missed out, on including such fantastic segments as:

--Hercules conquers the pine martens!
--Hercules does a totally sweet 720!
--Hercules saves Helsinki from the scourge of littering!
--Hercules teaches little Billy Harrington that you don't need to use bad language to have fun!
--Hercules plays Final Fantasy V until the clock maxes out at 99:59!
--Hercules Tricks or Treats for UNICEF!
--Hercules explores Iowa's rich cultural heritage!
--And MANY more!

This new edition is valued at over a thousand dollars, but it's YOURS for only twelve monthly installments of $39.99! For that price YOU CAN'T AFFORD NOT TO OWN IT! Impress your friends! Terrify your enemies! Kill your classics professors!

Happy One-Month-'Til-Inherent-Vice Day!

Yeah, I guess there's also some sort of other national holiday going on, but One-Month-'Til-Inherent-Vice Day kind of overshadows it, you have to admit.

There actually aren't many countries in the world I'd want to live in on a permanent basis. Overall, humans have not been particularly good at not making the lives of other humans into living hells. Sure, we're getting BETTER, but we're taking our sweet goddamn time. Maybe we'll ultimately get somewhere if we don't wipe ourselves out in a big ol' environmental catastrophuck, or use up all our resources and more firmly commit ourselves to the nasty, poor, brutish and short lifestyle, but I don't know how likely that is.

So sure, the US has a whole helluva goddamn lot of problems, but compared to most places, it still has a lot to recommend it, by our degraded standards. So I'll make the most patriotic statement I can make: if I can't be a Western/Northern European, or a Canadian, or a New Zealander--I'm glad to be an American. Fuck yeah...?

UPDATE: I do realize that part of the reason why I would want to live one place and not another is my cultural outlook and upbringing--ie, if I had grown up in Egypt, say, I would probably be a lot more okay with the things that, in this reality, make me not want to live in Egypt. But I think my main point stands. If it doesn't, feel free to knock it over.

New Chick Tract, yo.

I kinda like it.



Yes, this happens ALL THE TIME. Actually, there might be an interesting novel or short story in this, slightly modified.

Help us, Osama bin Laden--you're our only hope!

You may or may not have seen this fucking appalling video that's been circulating.



"Man, I sure hope they kill a lot of people so we have the excuse we need to kill even MORE people!"

I think the most telling part is where Scheuer says that this much longed-for attack will cause us (who's "us," paleface?) to demand that the government protect us "effectively, consistently, and with as much violence as necessary." Not as much force as necessary, or as much military action--as much violence. Most pundits would use a less brutal-sounding word, in order to at least create the illusion of not being bloodthirsty psychopaths. Not Scheuer. He jumps straight to results (carnage--clearly the money shot in his twisted little mind) without stopping at means (military strikes) first. That little slip reveals a lot about his id--and it's really ugly stuff.

It's worth emphasizing again and again: we are living in a country where maniacs like this are considered a legitimate part of our political discourse.

You've also gotta love Beck's response: "Which is why I was thinking [I'm not sure "thinking" is the right word here, Glenn], if I were [bin Laden], that would be the LAST thing I would do right now." So if I'm following the logic here, we need terrorists to attack us to make us attack them to protect ourselves. But those fiendish terrorists are clever devils--instead of attacking us, they won't attack us, and thus prevent us from taking the proper measures to protect ourselves from the attacks that won't be coming because they won't attack us so as to ensure that we don't take the proper measures against the attacks that aren't coming.

And if you think that sentence was convoluted, imagine what it must be like to live in Glenn Beck's head.

Sports Illustrated goes around the bend

So let's cut to the chase. The story is this: it's a college softball game. The batter whacks a home run, her first ever. Hurrah! But she somehow misses first base, and as she's turning around to touch it, she tears a ligament, and now she can't run. And she's disqualified if any of her teammates help her. Shit! So a player from the other team, Mallory Holtman, enlists the help of a teammate, and they help her around the bases. In spite of the fact that Holtman's team needs to win this game to go on to the championships!

Okay, fine, decent thing to do, good sportswomanship, and all that. But, um...

I don't usually read Sports Illustrated, but it was sitting around, so I read this article, which is where I found out about the incident. And it's truly one of the most bizarre things I've ever read.

Let's be clear: this is not just an ephemeral, feel-good story. This is the most hardcore, insanely, searingly, heartwarming thing you will ever encounter in your entire blighted existence. Mallory Holtman is like Jesus, Buddha, the Dali Lama, and St Francis of Assisi all rolled into one, only four hundred times awesomer.

"The story of an athlete's singular gesture continues to inspire," the opening blurb says. "Careful, though, it will make you cry." To drive home the point, the main article opens with...well, I don't think I can do justice to the gaspingly breathless tone of the piece merely by describing it:

The gift moved by wire and satellite, leaving a saltwater trail. It came from a field on the edge of the Cascade Mountains and traveled around the world. The gift was a story. It began with a hanging curveball and ended with a strange, slow procession. It gave gooseflesh to a phys-ed teacher in Pennsylvania, made a market researcher in Texas weak in the knees, put a lump in the throat of a crusty old man in Minnesota. It convinced a cynic in Connecticut that all was not lost.

It goes on in that vein. I hear it caused a lifetime paraplegic to walk for the first time. And a woman emerged from a twenty-year coma. Also.

We were five years and 4,000 dead soldiers into Iraq. The story jolted us back to sanity, people said, and restored our faith, and reminded us that goodness and decency and honor still exist.

Really. "People" said that, did they? I guess I have to accept that people did indeed say that, as the article is sprinkled with hyperbolic letters people wrote to Holtman (who is, with a certain unconscious sexism, referred to as "Mallory" throughout the piece)--including, hilariously, one from a guy who relates how a Little League team he was coaching got screwed over because, in hitting a home run, one of his players missed the base, and now he's going to passive aggressively send the news along to the opposing coach. With true love and brotherhood!

The whole article is just determined--so determined that its motives look vaguely suspicious--that you will think this is the greatest sacrifice that one human being could possibly make. It culminates thusly:

Some will say that only a woman would have done what Mallory did, that a baseball player in the same situation would have left his opponent in the dust. Some will say that only an amateur would have done what Mallory did, and only a player from a Division II college or lower, because in Division I and professional sports the purity of competition is tainted by money. There will be plenty of debate, except on one point. Almost all of us who hear Mallory's story will search the high meadows of our souls for hope that we would have done the same thing, or that we will, if we are ever given the chance.

Um. Yes. Could we step back from the ledge for a moment? When I'm hypothetically wondering whether I could display the moral courage of heroic individuals, I generally think of people like John Brown, Rosa Luxemburg, or Kurt Gerstein. I know "having perspective" is generally viewed as an Unamerican thing to do, but come fucking on. "The high meadows of our souls?" Really? Christ, people, what this amounts to is a team giving up a run in a softball game. It ain't quite the crucifixion.

You really want an answer? Okay, fine. Yeah, in the same situation, I probably would have done the same thing, had I thought of it. "Had you thought of it?" Yeah. Because it might not have occurred to me. And it might not have occurred to me because--hate to throw cold water on the proceedings, but--this incident is simply not a big deal. I am thoroughly baffled that--on the evidence of this article--people are positively building a cult of personality out of it. Is our society really that morally impoverished? Or do we take sports so seriously that the idea of anyone willingly making any kind of sacrifice therein is in fact crucifixion-level? Regardless, if we're really this starved for transcendence, then it's clear that we really are the most spiritually impoverished nation on the globe. Not that that would be a terribly shocking revelation.

I don't want to belittle Holtman's achievement but--wait a second, that's the point of this entire post! What am I saying?!? To reiterate: it was a nice thing to do, but it's not anything more. The fact that we feel the need to lionize it isn't exactly a condemnation of our culture, but it sure does show that our values are deeply irrational.

Duck Comics: "The 'Colossalest Surpise' Quiz Show"

Admit it--you thought I'd given up on this. I'm not offended. It would have been the only logical conclusion.

Actually, it's at least partially because I bogged down in my effort to write an entry on "Old California." It's a fascinating story, in large part because it's the least characteristic thing Barks ever wrote, and it deserves a thoughtful, thorough entry--but I think I may have to rethink my usual MO for that one, since the entry was just spinning out of control.