Month / January 2004
Quickies
A Muslim cleric in India has offered a sizable reward to anyone who blackens the face of the exiled author Taslima Nasreen. The cleric reportedly has “seen The Jazz Singer too many times.”
Walter Mosley is interviewed about film adaptations.
Kenneth Pollack cannot deal with being wrong. So opines The Arizona Republic, of all outlets. I’d just like to say that I’m wrong on a regular basis, and that you might be too. But then you and I aren’t war hawks whose books and essays read like Rod Steiger on crystal meth.
Virgil Cross has published his first book. He’s also 97, making him the oldest literary debut in U.S. history.
The British government has abandoned its “dumbed down” Shakespeare test. The examination was criticized for being too easy. One sample question: “Who wrote Twelth Night? A. William Shakespeare. B. Zoe Trope. C. 50 Cent. D. Billy Barty.”
Bill Clinton on self-deprecating humor.
Not That the Blogosphere is Biased or Anything
This is perhaps the best review I’ve ever read in the New York Times. So What Do You Do, Laura Miller? That I’d like to see.
M&B
Nearing thirty, the body has incurred a modest gorbelly. This hasn’t gone unnoticed by the mind. Under current federal health standards, the body is teetering on the edge of “overweight.” Such was the case several months ago, and such is the case now.
The mind has reacted to this development with predictable results: utter panic. While the waistline has remained stable over the past two years, a strange form of guilt occupies the mind, a tough-talking drill instructor (generally applied to writing on a daily basis) often vetoed by fuck-it sentiments and other well-intentioned impulses of acceptance. But the conundrum remains. The mind, in some small way, has been seduced by the Western image models: the svelte, good-looking types capable of contorting their abdominal muscles much like a belly dancer. Or so the mind opines. The mind notes that Edward Norton looks damn silly with the developed chest. There’s also the receding hairline, but that’s another can of worms.
Clearly, much of the mind’s concerns involve a magical realism that the mind finds detestable at large. At the same time, if the abdominal muscles were tightened, then perhaps there wouldn’t be so much of a problem.
The potential, seen in John Stone’s fascinating and frightening animated documentations, has caused the mind to ponder a daily workout. The mind would like the body to lose weight, but does not want the body to resemble California’s current governor. The body, it should be noted, tries to walk to destinations whenever possible. It goes out of its way to avoid saturated fat, but a Brutus complex exists when the body’s visual unit spots bread and cheese. Both are foods to which the body is addicted. Both are bad for it, natch. Catch-22.
There are several possibilities: (1) The body can forego the cheese and the bread (and as a corollary, beer), though this would make for a life that reflects the Puritanical nature of the current political clime, and that seems counter to the mind’s contrarian instincts. (2) The body can exercise more, which would involve a lot of pain that the body would have to become accustomed to and would have the mind transmuting into an austere, nagging natterer to the body. (3) The mind can try out one of the many kooky exercise alternatives propounded by other unique minds. (4) Some combination of these points.
Regardless of these items, there remains the larger concern of where the body is heading. The mind is quite lovely, thank you very much. It is happy. It develops at an acceptable pace, commendable given the day job and the increased reading and writing and socializing. But the body has an altogether different concern. If weight has been gained, does it stand to reason that more weight will be gained? If so, then the question of how the body fights the onset of fat is one of great importance. When the mind considers the body’s receding hairline, there are two projected body types that the mind sees at the age of 40 or so. The mind, well aware of the sex appeal of Sean Connery and Patrick Stewart, recalling the sparks that attracted Billy Bob Thornton and Angelina Jolie, has no problem with the body’s head going bald and will not wear a toupee or toy with hair extensions. But should the body allow itself to go, the body runs the risk of transforming into a Jon Polito or Allen Garfield type. This may work wonders at an Elks Lodge meeting, where such body types run rampant, but then the mind does not anticipate the body wandering into congregations of this nature.
It should also be noted that a fellow mind and body unit (hereinafter referred to as “M&B(Friend)”) suggested to the mind and body (hereinafter referred to as “M&B(Prime)”) in his early twenties that there would come a time where desirable mind and body units (hereinafter referred to as “M&B(Potential S.O.)”) would start noticing M&B(Prime)’s redeeming qualities. M&B(Friend) indicated that this would happen unexpectedly. And he was right. After what seemed an existential tundra of false alarms and failures and misunderstandings, M&B(Prime) has charmed a few M&B(Potential S.O.)s of late, flirting, engaging them in dialogues in which M&B(Prime) is able to bluff his way through thoughtful conversations with greater success than before, and is having a good time. Other M&B(Friend)s have suggested that M&B(Prime) is developing concerns that are unwarranted and unnecessary, and that the body is not nearly the portly carapace that the mind has framed it as. The gist is that the body is, while not the hottest stuff, pretty darn nifty when considered with the mind.
Nevertheless, there is the larger issue of the body’s potential corpulence, which can be expressed as follows:
Body(Corpulence)(Current) + Corpulence(Additional) = Body(Coruplence)(Redoubled)
Body(Corpulence)(Redoubled) = Mind(Panicked)
Mind(Panicked) = B&M(Prime)(Stressed Over Silly Reasons)
The mind, as has been suggested above, has wondered why this should matter so much. But then the mind sometimes jumps to conclusions.
At this point, B&M(Prime) likes who he is. But it is with these projected concerns that B&M(Prime) plans on joining a gym next month, possibly to run on a regular basis, if only to negate silly stress levels(potential).
Even so, the mind wonders if these things are overkill. An Abs of Steel DVD would look silly next to his Criterion Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. Nevertheless, knowledge is always welcome.
The Un-Ethicist #3
[EDITOR’S NOTE: Miguel Cohen has returned. He confesses that he was mistaken about the mad cow disease. All he was suffering from was a bad hangover.]
So let me get this straight, David. You have no problem when an investment firm loses property, but when it comes to images of the Robinsons sobbing under the shadow of a white picket fence, your heart bleeds? Who do you think you are? Some sort of hippie?
It’s not really about people at all, is it, David? It’s about your own personal prioritizing. Family over the individual, people over the investment firm. The individual who dares to live alone doesn’t gnaw at your conscience. Through lack of success (though not without effort) or out of choice, the individual who can’t get laid or find a soulmate and dares to own a home gets your goat. But the family — oh, I can see that tugs at your heartstrings. The greater the numbers (i.e., family unit of three or more over one individual), the more likely you will respond to entities getting screwed over in a deal.
What I don’t think you realize that we have afforded so many rights to partnerships and corporations that they have practically the same unalienable rights as the individual. They become families in their own way. Hypothetically, an “individual” entity can hook up with another entity at a bar and form a partnership. The paperwork and process is just that simple.
While an investment firm’s goal is to buy residential property and rent it out to people — sometimes roasting the renter alive, sometimes not — the overall purpose is to make money. Likewise, any “individual” or “family” is pining for the same. Buy low, sell high. Let the property value accumulate over the years. And then let out a husky laugh in your autumn years when you’re fat, bloated, wrinkled, and rolling naked in a bed of bills. The American Dream in a nutshell.
But what is the family but a closet corporation? A family may not get the same tax breaks as the richest 1%. Nonetheless, a case could be made that the current tax system is prejudicial against single people (and in fact many libertarians living in gated communities have made these arguments). If you look at the family as a business partnership, if you modify the language in a wedding announcement from “Mary Jane Wilson and Henry Stillman were married” to “Mary Jane Wilson and Henry Stillman announced their creative partnership,” does this help your conscience?
I worked my way through a prestigious university but, because of economic circumstances, never graduated, something that still leaves me ashamed. When colleagues ask, ”When did you graduate?” I often answer, ”I finished in 19xx,” creating the impression that I graduated. I don’t have to disclose my every failure, but I regret being deceptive. Should I make it clear that I did not graduate from Prestigious U.? D.A., REDWOOD CITY, CALIF.
First off, D.A., why even answer the question at all? If your colleagues truly respect you, and you’re sleeping with them, then they’ll respect you for who you are in the morning. If you’re not sleeping with them, then they’ll sniff your identity out, which is basically a needlessly diffident dude who can’t offer precise answers to the simplest questions. Your colleagues are hearing this “I finished” racket and, if they are smart, they are probably seeing a not so skillful toe-tapper.
If it means so much to you, then why not go back and get the degree? Better yet, if you feel it’s too late in life for you to do this, then join the ranks of great humans who never set foot in a college: George Bernard Shaw, William Shakespeare, G.K. Chesterton, too many to list.