Football Tickets

Him: I should go to church Sunday and beg for season tickets.
Me: It's "pray" not "beg for."
Him: Whatever, they both happen on your knees.

Yellow Gumballs

First paragraphs of the collection of short stories I came across today during lunch:

Sheila split open and the air was filled with gumballs. Yellow gumballs. That was awful for Stan, just awful. He had loved Sheila for a long time, fought for her, believed in their love until finally she had come around. They were about to kiss for the first time and then this: yellow gumballs.

Stan went to a group to try to accept that Sheila was gone. It was a group for people whose unrequited love had ended in some kind of surrealist moment. There is a group for everything in California.

That first sentence especially is perfect. It allows for your imagination to go crazy. Did the gumballs fly out of poor Sheila? Did they fall from the sky?

Can the rest of the book possibly be as good?

The Suburbs

I've listened to the new Arcade Fire album, The Suburbs, practically every day since it came out earlier this month. It's good but not especially hummable -- after it ends it kind of evaporates from my brain.  I wasn't quite connecting.

I've got one of the songs stuck in my head now, though, after stumbling across Arcade Fire's ridiculously cool website. With a little help from the interwebs and your own memories of your childhood, it generates an interactive music video for one of the songs. Nothing puts a tune in your head like a little nostalgia. Give it a try. You'll be humming all day.

Dream Boy

While skimming the Netflix new releases last week a movie title jumped out at me: Dream Boy. I wondered if it was based on the very first gay-themed novel I ever bought, and indeed it was. I remember my teenage self skulking around a Barnes & Noble with that book in my hands, working up the courage to bring it up to the cashier. Justdoit, justdoit, just do it, I probably thought back then, and I'm sure the cashier asked, "Just this today?" and I would've thought, "Just this? Just this?? Lady, this is everything."

It's an odd book to make into a movie in 2010, though, because it is an old-school gay story, from back when no happy endings were allowed. The high-school-age protagonist, Nathan, finds refuge from a lifetime of horrible parental abuse in Roy, the lovely neighbor boy who takes him under his wing and into his hunky arms. Nathan is played by Stephan Bender, known to me only (but well) as young Clark Kent in Superman Returns. Finally getting a smooch from Roy should elicit the same bliss that he showed in Superman when he discovered he could fly, but unfortunately Bender basically cowers through the entirety of Dream Boy. Nathan wears a constant slouch, as though he's perpetually fearing a smack in the head -- a posture that would be appropriate for Clark Kent, but around Roy, you want Nathan to become Superman, and he never does. That's not to say the acting is bad -- Bender seems fully committed, and the love scenes are particularly touching because Nathan is so desperate for tenderness. But still, he's too cute to never flash us a smile.

Or maybe it works. Being old-school gay, this story cannot allow Nathan to be happy with Roy, or even to survive. So yes, at the end of the book and the movie Nathan does indeed get beaten to death by a classmate with the broken arm of a chair. And maybe it's because Nathan was cowering through the whole movie, as though he knew this was coming, that this final outcome is affecting enough to keep me thinking about it days later. Nathan never had a chance. 

The novel was published in 1995 and takes place, I think, in the 1970s, but the movie is set in a timeless neverwhere. Roy drives a 1930s pick-up, but other cars are more modern. There are no computers or cellphones, but the clothes are reasonably current. Even Roy and Nathan seem from opposing eras -- Nathan is scarred and scared, while Roy is well adjusted. The jumbled setting could represent a time like today, where maybe there's marriage equality on the coasts and a young actor can play gay without committing career suicide, but for some kids living their own lives in Kentucky or Louisiana (where this book is set), that hardly matters. Still, when those boys and girls are pacing around a Barnes & Noble in 2010, the book they finally hand to the cashier is at least much more likely to have a happy ending.

Most-Played Tracks On My iPod

I'm not sure how some of these came to be the most-played, but here they are:

1. Frog Chorus, Echoes of Nature (used to play it while falling asleep)
2. Little Red Riding Hood, Sam the Sham
3. I Melt With You, Modern English
4. Barely Legal, The Strokes
5. Please Play This Song on the Radio, NOFX (there are many NOFX songs I like more)
6. Don't Be Cruel, Elvis
7. Carol Brown, Flight of the Conchords
8. I Bet That You Look Good on the Dancefloor, Artic Monkeys
9. Song Against Sex, Neutral Milk Hotel
10. Supermassive Black Hole, Muse
12. Mack the Knife, Bobby Darin
12. The Hardest Button to Button, The White Stripes (Surpriesd this beat Ice Cream Soda)
13. Do What You Want, Bad Religion
14. Three Point One Four, The Bloodhound Gang (surprised other BHG didn't make the list too)
15. Judy Is A Punk, The Ramones (one of the rare songs that I wish was longer)
16. Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Queen (like this song, but have no idea how it made this list)
17. The Government Totally Sucks, Tenacious D
18. Move It On Over, George Thorogood
19. I'm Like Yeah, But She's All No, Mr. T Experience
20. A Boy Named Sue, Johnny Cash

Twilight: Career Suicide

Me: I'm reading about how they've finally landed a director for Breaking Dawn. Either they're paying him a shitload of money or he's looking to commit career suicide.
Maggie: Hahaha. You need to blog that line.

Why I like USA Today

#5 - Idol Chatter. I like their American Idol blogger. Sue me.

#4 - The run of Superman comics they published a while back, which was delightfully retro, and their bizarre fixation on cage-wrestling and ultimate fighting.

#3 - Their articles are longer and more in-depth than what I see on other news sites.

#2 - The goof-off stories are more easily discernible as such. On CNN.com, for example, headlines like "Alligator befriends turkey" and "Karzai threatens to join Taliban" are often literally side by side.

#1 - I've yet to detect any bias. Everyone knows MSNBC and the New York Times are left; Fox is crazy right; CNN is just plain crazy, but the headlines and editorial page of USA Today seem straight down the middle. In an age of frothy hyperpartisanship, that's refreshing.

Start the turntables!, Cont'd

I got an email from U2 today alerting me to a new remix album available... only on vinyl. I already own a couple of U2 records -- they're in frames on my wall, relics of an earlier, groovier time. I'm not about to run out and buy a turntable yet, but I do find myself craving this remix album. So big, so packed with tangible objects. Everything old is new again.

Start the turntables!

This month's Rolling Stone says that sale of records -- those big, grooved things made of vinyl -- has surged in the last couple years. While I didn't buy last month's claim that magazine subscriptions are up, I definitely believe record sales are. Last week when I paid a visit to Newbury Comics (to buy a CD) I was amazed how many records they sell now. There's always been a few on hand for the devotees, but suddenly the shelf-space devoted to records is starting to rival CDs.

Amazing, but maybe not surprising. The reason I went to an actual store to buy a CD is because lately it's dawned on me how much money I've sunk into albums that don't actually exist. Ninety-five percent of the albums I've bought over the last few years have been digital downloads, just magnetized dots on a harddrive. And that suddenly feels kind of shitty. It feels like I've only been getting half of what I used to get from buying CDs.

The whole premise of "digital" assumes that content (a story, a song) is the important experience and that the delivery system is irrelevant. It assumes that when you pay for music you're paying to hear a song rather than to own a CD (or a record). That when you pay for a novel you're paying to read a story rather than to own a book. And that may be true for fleeting things like magazines or news, things you consume and throw away. But it's not true for the types of media we define ourselves by and decorate our homes with. Digital has been a novelty because it's cheaper and easier, but I think we might be at the beginning of a backlash, as people realize that for all their collecting and all their money invested, they have nothing tangible to show for it.

Hence the records.

Graffiti in Rio

I'm writing a novel about a graffiti artist in Brazil so this story jumped out at me. Some people took advantage of maintenance scaffolding on the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio, and painted on his head.

It's a heck of a target, and if it'd been done by an artist, it'd be pretty cool... But this is pichacao, scribbles, a style frowned upon by actual graffiti artists, and as such, it's just a mess. Somewhere in a corner of my brain, Mateo Amaral is fuming.

Stop the presses!

My dream job is to be the editor of an independent, moderately successful magazine similar in content to Rolling Stone, but with the focus on books rather than music. Our noble, unattainable goal each issue would be to lift young writers to rock-star status. Printing would be done on-site in the basement of the office, on presses run, like the starship Enterprise, by a harried Scotsman who coaxes every last drop out of the decrepit machines. The result would be a modest living, a lifetime supply of free books, and the sweet smell of ink on my hands at the end of the day.

Unfortunately it's not 1985, and print is kaput.

I'm subscribed to exactly one magazine, the above-mentioned Rolling Stone -- and in fact my subscription expired last fall but they've continued sending it to me, perhaps because there's not a lot of difference between "free" and what they charge for a one-year subscription.

Often by the time each issue arrives I've already read the articles on the Rolling Stone website, but it's fun getting mail.

On page 2 of the issue I got yesterday I found this ad, done in partnership by a bunch of magazines, which reads, in part:

Barely noticed amidst the thunderous Internet clamor is the simple fact that magazine readership has risen over the past five years. ... Think of it this way: during the 12-year life of Google, magazine readership actually increased 11 percent. ... What it proves, once again, is that a new medium doesn't necessarily displace an existing one. ... Just as TV didn't kill movies. An established medium can continue to flourish...

My first thought was Ouch. My second thought was that I don't believe that magazine readership can possibly be up, and I wonder what numbers they massaged to get that result. Third was a feeling of discomfort -- the ad makes me squirm. If you have to join forces with competitors and take out an ad to assure the world you're still relevant, then you're not.

There are some things I'll never accept. I'll never accept the idea that reading a novel on a screen is superior to a paperback book, humankind's greatest invention. Screens and magazines, though, were made for each other. I think rather than sputtering about the continued relevance of print magazines, these organizations should spend their time trying to come up with a business model that will let them make money on the Web, something that apparently no publication has figured out how to do yet.  Maybe someone whose dream job actually matches the calendar year will lead the way.

See you in Machu Picchu

Just so you know, the ancient city in Peru has reopened to tourists after being closed due to heavy rains.

Machu Picchu, rediscovered by the outside world after U.S. explorer Hiram Bingham's 1911 visit, is one of South America's top tourism attractions.

I like the wording of that, and the ease with which it shucks off the Euro-centric, nothing-was-here-till-we-found it perspective. (As a sidenote, I know USA Today, where this article is from, is considered the McDonald's of news, but sheesh, it really does have the best articles.)

I want to go re-re-discover Machu Picchu. South America is tops on my list of places to visit. It has such a vibrant mix of things I would really love to see, and things I'm captivated by the horror of. I just finished an excellent book called The Lost City of Z, a nonfiction account of a journalist attempting to discover (no "re-" necessary) what happened to a famous English explorer who was lost in the Amazonian jungle in the 1930s while searching for the fabled city of El Dorado. The Amazon, aka the "green hell," full of poisonous plants and 30-foot snakes and hostile Indians and maggots that burrow under your skin, makes me think, "Oh my goodness, I wouldn't last a minute there," and then, "I want to go."

A lot of Brazil, about which I've been reading for a book I'm writing, is like that too: the herky-jerk of the awesome and the terrifying. For example, in Rio you've got the incredible beaches and the eye-popping vista of the hilltop Christ -- and down the street the drug cabals are taking down police helicopters with anti-aircraft missiles.

I guess you just have to know where to go.

Romance Novel Delusions

Me: I am feeling creatively antsy. And financially anxious. I should crank out a romance novel. Those sell well.
Brother: Totally. You can photoshop my face on someone else's body for the cover.

LCiN Refresh

Presto change-o.

Ricky's Thesaurus

I am proud to say that I am a fortunate homosexual man. I am very blessed to be who I am.

Oh Ricky Martin. Not exactly a surprise, but good for you.

I don't get the adjectives that people have started including in these admissions, though. Ricky is a fortunate homosexual. Neil Patrick Harris (the best thing to spring out of the gay community since Pop Tarts) was a content gay man.

Use of adjectives is a relatively new thing. Ellen's coming-out was short and sweet: "I'm gay." (Even if she did say it over a loudspeaker.) It makes me wonder what other famous homos would've said if they'd come out in this age of adjectives...

Ellen: I'm a talkshow-hosting, American-Idol-judging gay woman.
Elton John: I'm a polka-dot-loving, big-glasses-wearing gay rocket-man.
Rosie O'Donnell: Bwaahhh!
Sir Ian McKellan: I'm a wizard-playing homosexual gentleman. Tea?

Twilight: Team Jacob

Taylor Lautner won Favorite Actor at the Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards yesterday.

BREAKING NEWS: He won the same award at the Ladies Who Could Be His Mom's Choice Awards and the Homos Pushing Thirty's Choice Awards!

Nathan's Hot Dog Contest

This is not seasonally relevant, but I was organizing my journals in preparation to move and I found an article I clipped from the 4th of July weekend papers in 2008. It's a summary of the annual Coney Island Nathan's hot dog-eating contest and it is hilarious.

Here is my favorite part:

Staring into the weiner abyss, the pair found the pluck to continue, devouring the beef and buns with renewed gusto, before Chestnut finally prevailed to chants of "USA!"

When it was over, Kobayashi was left holding a soggy mush of bun in his hand, and Chestnut had achieved nearly mythical status in the annual event held by Nathan's Famous since 1916.

It was a frankfurter photo finish.

Twilight: Purchasing New Moon

Saturday, March 20. The warmest day of the year so far. Ben and Maggie set out from their homes for one purpose: to locate New Moon on DVD and get out of the store with it while drawing as little attention to their quest as possible.

Ben: I possess New Moon.
Maggie: Me too! As of 20 minutes ago. I wish they didn't have the display in the front of the store.
Ben: I strolled by the display and grabbed a disc and then walked a few aisles over to read the features. I opted for the 2-disc special edition.
Maggie: I went back and forth between Best Buy and Barnes and Noble three times trying to decide which had the best price for which version.
Ben: There was a 3-disc version, but I thought: Let's maintain some dignity here.
Maggie: I tried to get an aisle with a female cashier to no avail.
Ben: I bought enough other things to make New Moon look like a spur-of-the-moment grab.

Message Rock #5

Mini Snow Towers

Someone stacked chunks of snow into lots of little towers around the Boston Public Library. I wonder how much time they spent and if they did it at night or during the day when people could watch.

Things like this make me happy.

R.I.P. J.D., Cont'd

Here's a great article in the Boston Globe about Salinger, the "recluse."

...to his neighbors in Cornish and surrounding rural towns, he was hardly a hermit. To them, Salinger was simply another small-town resident who valued his privacy, and anyone who knew what he looked like could see he got around.

The tall, angular writer with his recognizable shock of white hair could be seen over the years striding through downtown Hanover, some 14 miles north, where he would duck into the Dartmouth Bookstore on Main Street. On an overcast day, passersby might spot him in the Windsor Diner, across the Connecticut River in Vermont, his profile defined by lights inside as he sat in a window booth overlooking Route 5.

He was such a regular at the fund-raising roast beef suppers at First Congregational Church in nearby Hartland, Vt., that when his health failed and he became too frail to attend, his wife drove over to pick up a take-out order from the basement fellowship hall.

I never knew he was married until I read his obit. I didn't think he was capable of any kind of social interaction. I pictured him as living in a New Hampshire cave, dressed in burlap, eating sticks, wearing a long beard with birds nesting in it. Obviously there was no malice in that image -- I'm a big fan, after all -- but those are the images that sprang up when I thought "recluse."

It makes me realize our attention-craving culture, where people "send up" their children in balloons, crash White House events, make out with strangers just to get on TV, simply doesn't have a vocabulary to describe someone who would, at the height of his fame, walk away from the spotlight and never seek it again. I don't have any desire for fame myself and yet in my mind there was still no option between "famous" and "insane" -- if Salinger shunned fame, clearly there must've been something wrong with him, right? He must've been mentally ill or something. Unhinged. An eater of sticks.

But apparently not.

Sometimes I like to play "If I Were A Genius Writer Which Genius Writer Would I Be?" Steinbeck is my favorite but I wouldn't be him -- he was too adventurous, too curious, diving into the nitty-gritty to report on WWII in Europe, going on his U.S.-long road-trip with no company but his dog and the people he met along the way. I wouldn't be Steinbeck. And what I know of Updike, I wouldn't be Updike -- he was too country-club, too cocktail-party.

I never would've thought it a couple days ago, but huh, I'd be Salinger.

R.I.P. J.D.

“I hope to hell that when I do die somebody has the sense to just dump me in the river or something. Anything except sticking me in a goddam cemetary. People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach on Sunday, and all that crap. Who wants flowers when you’re dead? Nobody." - J.D. Salinger

He talks like Holden. Haha. Or, should I say, Holden talks like him.

Hair today, gone tomorrow

I saw this photo on the New Yorker website:


My goodness, why do some men do this to their heads? I'm referring, of course, to the aggressive shaving of the sideburns. There needs to be some sideburns, fellas, at least enough to hook around the front of the ear, like reverse glasses. Otherwise, what's to keep the hair from sliding off and tumbling down your back? The sideburns hold your hair in place!

Os Gemeos of the Day

Courtroom Drama, Cont'd

I'm disheartened that last week the Supreme Court weirdly got all up in the District Court's grill and reversed the judge's decision to televise the Prop 8 trial. In this the Supremes sided with the anti-gay side, who feared their witnesses would be intimidated if their faces were made public while they spewed their bigotry on the witness stand. That doesn't seem to bode well.

On the other hand, if this is where we are now, if it's the pro-gays who want to be televised and the anti-gays who are afraid to show their faces, we're getting somewhere!

The New Yorker has a good day-by-day blog of trial news.

Happy Blogiversary!

LCiN is four years old today.

Courtroom Drama, Cont'd

Plaintiffs' witness Zing of the Day:

10:33 AM: Thompson — Isn’t it true that people voted for Prop 8 based upon their sincere moral values?

C: Many people opposed desegregation and interracial marriage based upon their sincere moral values.

Courtroom Drama

I'm reading through a liveblog transcript of the The Trial. In some ways it's one of the most interesting things I've ever read, and I'm agog at the level at which the judge is peering into this. It's even left me with a bewildered feeling and I've just realized why: I've gotten so accustomed to listening to politicians, to bullshit talking heads on Sunday morning news shows, spewing dumbed-down bullet-point sound-bites, appealing to Americans' lowest, basest instincts (death panels! the system worked!)... that thoughtful, philosophical, complex discussion on important topics causes a double-take. You mean we can actually, in a public forum, have a discussion about the nature of human identity and love and the role of the state? Wha-wha-what? Why don't we do this more often?

So it begins...

I never thought I'd have so much personally invested in the success of the man who argued George W. Bush into the White House, but that's the case today as superstar Republican lawyer Ted Olson begins a string of trials that will take same-sex marriage to the U.S. Supreme Court for the first time.

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around it. At first I suspected Olson was some kind of double-agent who would purposely blow the case and thus close off the Supreme Court as an avenue for gay rights potentially for decades. I feel better about him now, especially after reading his piece in Newsweek, but still, for the record, I think he's crazy. I can't see how he can possibly win. As I understand it, if he does win, every same-sex marriage ban in every state will in one fell swoop be struck down as violating the U.S. Constitution, and same-sex marriage will be legalized everywhere. And if he loses there will be precedent, and the Court doesn't overturn precedent lightly. Those stakes are incredible. Man, this is going to be nerve-wracking beyond belief.

Mr. Olson, if you're reading this: Win, and we'll forget all about that Bush thing, OK?

Too soon?

Him: We should go as Ennis and Jack from Brokeback Mountain next Halloween.
Me: Oh great. Who's going to go as the dead one?
Him: I'll go as Jake Gyllenhaal any day. Wait -- the dead character or the dead actor?

My Darling Brother #2

Me: I feel like my hair is my only positive physical feature. Without that, I'd have nothing.
Him: Right, I mean, let's not even get started on that nose of yours.