Category Archives: Arts & culture

A new year’s toast

Today I was reading one of those horrible year-end reviews articles in the Boston Globe, and in the long list of people who died in 2008, I saw the name of Alain Robbe-Grillet, the French novelist.

Somehow back in 1989, I no longer remember how or why, I read Robbe-Grillet’s novel Jalousie. The novel mostly consists of very precisely-described scenes, often things half-seen through the wooden slats of the jalousie windows of a banana plantation in a French colony somewhere in the tropics; and through these descriptions, written landscapes and still-lives as it were, Robbe-Grillet revealed one man’s intense jealousy towards his wife’s friendship with another man.

It was the right book at the right time for me. I saw that you could write precisely and carefully about one thing, while you were really telling your reader something else altogether. I learned that some things can only be precisely described in this oblique manner.

Later, I tried to read some of Robbe-Grillet’s other books. They were dry and pointless, sometimes to the point of being silly. I have never tried to go back and re-read Jalousie, for fear that I would find that it, too, is a dry, pointless, and silly book — I would rather remember it as the right book at the right time, that taught me exactly what I then needed to learn about writing. So even though I will never read his novels again, here’s a new year’s toast to Alain Robbe-Grillet (b. August 18, 1922, d. February 18, 2008).

The year in review

There was good news and bad news in 2008.

First, lots of bad news:

The economy: From my perspective, it was already going downhill last January. I knew something was up when the minister’s discretionary fund at church was out of money, more people were asking me for money, and no one could afford to donate any more money. In September, Wall Street and the media finally woke up to the fact that our economy has been driven by predatory lending and Ponzi schemes for the past decade, and suddenly we were in a “global financial crisis.” The Dow Jones industrial average fell 34% in 2008, the biggest one-year drop since 1931.

War: The war in Iraq went nowhere. The much-vaunted surge didn’t seem to change anything except that the federal government was spending even more money over there, and the few people who were willing to be soldiers were going over for their fourth or fifth deployment. No improvement, just a slow ongoing decline. Blessed would the peacemakers be, if we had any peacemakers.

Climate: Summer was hot, hotter than ever. Yeah, I know that global warming is “just a theory” and “not really based on facts.” Even if it is true (and it is indeed a well-proven theory), we’re supposed to be calling it global climate change. Well, the result of global climate change here in New England is that it was hot last summer, and it is freakishly warm this winter.

But also quite a bit of good news:

Green technology: “On October 3, President Bush signed into law the Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 that included the hoped-for 8-year extention of the solar investment tax credit. The act also lifted the $2,000 cap on the tax credit for residential systems, granting both commercial and residential systems eligibility for a 30% tax credit…. The law will encourage rapid growth for the solar industry….” (Distributed Energy: The Journal of Energy Efficiency and Reliability, November/December, 2008, p. 50.) The lousy economy is driving us to become more energy-efficient, and to develop renewable energy sources.

Green religion: One of the more interesting things to come out of the presidential campaign was that about half the Christian evangelicals are now promoting what they call “Creation care.” It’s a little weird that they can’t bring themselves to say “ecotheology” or “environmentalism,” but at least they’re headed in the right direction, and are starting to catch up with liberal and moderate religious groups.

Personal: This marked year 19 with Carol, which is better than I can express. I have wonderful extended family, great friends, and a job that I love. I know 2008 was a tough year for many people, but from my selfish point of view it was a great year.

The president: Obama is no saint, by world standards he is pretty conservative, he has far too many ties to the corporate puppet-masters, but — he is Not-George-Bush. And as for George Bush, the shoe incident sums it up for me:

Yup. At great personal cost, Muntadar al-Zaidi became an instant folk-hero by summing up what many people around the world think about George Bush. (Image courtesy Dependable Renegade.)

Muppets take on TSA

The new Muppets Christmas special is up on Hulu.com. While it’s not one of the best features the Muppets have done, the scene at airport security ranks up with some of their best sketches:– Fozzy Bear tells a stupid joke (“What brings toys to baby sharks?”), but it is against Federal law to tell bad jokes in airport security, so Fozzy gets jumped by half a dozen security guards. Meanwhile, Gonzo — ah, why spoil it for you, go watch it yourself.

More on shoes

Update on yesterday’s post:

Today the BBC reports: “An Iraqi official was quoted by the Associated Press as saying that the journalist was being interrogated to determine whether anybody paid him to throw his shoes at President Bush.” Given the stated policies of the current U.S. administration, the word “interrogated” could mean what the rest of the world would call torture.

The BBC also reports that the man’s name is Muntadar al-Zaidi, and they give an English translation of what he shouted at Bush: “This is a farewell kiss, you dog… This is from the widows, the orphans, and those who were killed in Iraq.”

Special take-home quiz: Who is on the moral high ground here, George Bush or Muntadar al-Zaidi, and why? Ten bonus points for citing verses from both the Koran and the New Testament.

Update: Leona’s selling T-shirts (see comments).

Shoes?!?…

At 19:16 GMT (i.e., 2:16 p.m. EST, less than 3 hours ago), the BBC Web site reported that an Iraqi threw shoes at George W. Bush. Shoes? Yes, shoes….

An Iraqi journalist was wrestled to the floor by security guards after he called Mr Bush “a dog” and threw his footwear, just missing the president.

The soles of shoes are considered the ultimate insult in Arab culture….

In the middle of the news conference with Mr Maliki, a reporter stood up and shouted “this is a goodbye kiss from the Iraqi people, dog,” before hurtling his shoes at Mr Bush, narrowly missing him….

Correspondents called it a symbolic incident. Iraqis threw shoes and used them to beat Saddam Hussein’s statue in Baghdad after his overthrow….

Link to story and video.

What a wildly improbable story, and what an interesting example of political theatre. I guess peace rallies on the Mall in Washington are just too Old School, so nowadays the really cool protesters throw shoes.

I shouldn’t be so flippant. That journalist is dead meat, and is probably having the crap beaten out of him even as I write this. Watch the video — security is going easy on him because there are cameras watching, but they are not being nice to him — wait until there aren’t any cameras trained on them.

Two conversations

Today I happened to run into someone who is in the helping professions, and our conversation quickly turned to the state of the economy. “It’s getting bad,” he said, “and it’s going to get worse.” We both admitted that we’re feeling the pressures in our jobs — it feels like there’s an increased demand for everyone in the helping professions, while at the same time given the economic situation we’re all worried about funding cuts (not so much cuts in our salaries, but cuts in programs we manage or depend on).

Almost immediately after that conversation, I happened to be talking to someone else who said she has noticed that people are becoming less polite and less courteous. It feels, she said, as if people are a little on edge. Or maybe, I said, as if they’re angry. Yes, angry, she said. This economic mess we’re in is enough to make anyone angry.

Just because I’ve had these two conversations doesn’t mean my feelings have a firm basis in reality. So tell me what you think: Is the economic situation getting to people? Are you noticing a diminishment in politeness? If you’re in the helping professions, are you feeling a little more stressed than usual?

If you meet the Buddha on the street, kill him!

The British comedy troupe Monty Python was admired for its movie “The Life of Brian,” an iconoclastic biopic of Jesus that ends with a song and dance number on crucifixes. Alas, Monty Python is no more, but what if they had taken on other major religious figures? Some of you may remember Monty Python’s famous “Penguin on the Television Set” skit, which begins with the characters listening to a radio drama called “The Death of Mary, Queen of Scots.” I have adapted that radio drama into an iconoclastic take on the Zen Buddhist dictum: “If you meet the Buddha on the street, kill him!”

Announcer: And now the BBC is proud to present a brand new radio drama series, “The Death of Siddhartha Gotama, the Buddha.”

[music: fade up and out]
[sound effect: door opening and closing]

Voice One: [deep gruff man’s voice] You are Siddhartha Gotama, the Buddha?

Voice Two: [high reedy man’s voice] I am!

Voice One: Take that, Siddhartha Gotama, the Buddha!!

[sound effects for 60 sec.: sound of a heavy blow on the word “that,” followed by sound of violent blows, crunching noises, smashing noises, things being broken.]
[Throughout all this, we hear Voice Two grunting and screaming in pain.]

Announcer: We will return to the new radio drama production “The Death of Siddhartha Gotama, the Buddha,” in just a moment.

[music: fade up and out]
[sound effects: saw cutting, with other violent sounds as before, with Voice Two screaming.]
[Then: sudden silence.]

Voice One: I think he’s dead.

[beat]

Voice Two: No, I’m not!

[sound effects: violent sounds and screaming start again, suddenly stop]

Voice Two: Hah! Missed me! It’s not so easy to stop the endless cycle of rebirth! Aauugh!!

[sound effects: violent sounds and screaming again]
[music: fade up over sound effects, then down and continue under Announcer…]

Announcer: That was episode one of “The Death of Siddhartha Gotama, the Buddha,” adapted for radio by Hugo Smof Gernsback. Tune in next week for the dramatic conclusion.

A good day to stay home

We left Carol’s parents’ house quite late and headed down Interstate 495. It was ten thirty so traffic was light. We drove along smoothly, listening to the news from Mumbai. Suddenly brake lights flashed red in front of us. Cars around us began slowing down. Ahead of us I could see stopped traffic. “What is it?” Carol said. “Must be an accident,” I said, moving over to the middle lane of the highway. We could see blue lights of a police car. But when we got closer, we saw that it wasn’t an accident. Cars were waiting to get onto an exit ramp, and I remembered I had seen one of those flashing traffic signs with a message about parking for the outlet malls. “It’s people going to the outlet malls, the ones that are going to open at midnight,” I said. “That’s crazy,” said Carol, “and look at all the traffic jam on the other side of the highway!” It was even worse on the northbound side.

Starting at midnight (right about now) it’s Black Friday, the day when retail stores supposedly make enough money to finally put them in the black for the year, the day when millions of crazed Americans drive around spending lots of money to buy Christmas presents. As for me, I’ll be staying home.

“Palin pardon amid turkey butchery”

…is the headline of this BBC news story. I think the Brits obsess on Sarah Palin because she’s got the same last name as Michael Palin of Monty Python fame, and having two adbsurdist public figures (one intentionally absurd, the other not) is too good a coincidence for them to waste. Speaking of absurd, click the link above to see a photo of Sarah Palin smiling vapidly while behind her stands a man holding a bloody turkey carcass. There’s something almost metaphorical about that image… if I could just figure out the metaphor….