Word Invocation

I am a wordphile who suffers from logorrhea, logomania, and verbal constipation. How can that be? Easy: I love words too much and sometimes am so overwhelmed by my passion for them that I swoon and hit the edge of the coffeetable, am struck linguistically impotent, become a raving idiot.

The innumerable word relationships possible; the infinite combinations of letters; coming face to face with lexicons that creak under the strain of generations of etymylogical maps and guideposts, previously charted territory just waiting to be revisited and explored: It's a little overwhelming. (And that is the opposite of hyperbole--is the word for that simply understatement? It seems there must be a grander word than that for it!)

My vocabulary is abysmal. There are so many nuances of precision that I miss as I lumber inelegantly toward understanding. I urge myself to be more promiscuous with my language and my search for word wisdom, handle language like the well-worn currency of several nations: I'd like a larger safe, I'd like a larger account, I'd like to move up to a vault-load of currencies I can be facile with.

That is my hope, and the above is my condition, so this is my invocation to Athena and Aphrodite together: Do not let my love control me, but help me to glide with it, accept its warm caress, and allow it to (Greek goddesses willing) lead me toward wisdom and ardent engagement in an intercourse whose fruit displays both mind and heart.

(So did I just betray a lesbian love fantasy here or what?)

Sundance Slave & Dancing Outlaw

My friend Erin is working Sundance for the second year in a row. She's keeping a photo-driven, well-written blog of it this year. A gifted raconteur who shares my love of Tom Waits, this Greek lady made a documentary about Graceland Too, the largest collection of Elvis memorabilia anywhere. The guy who runs it reminds me of Jesco White, the Dancing Outlaw. (Oooooh, if you haven't heard of him, have a look-see here, and then do a Google search for more.)

Meet Erin, the Original Broad:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/original_broad/

Subway Graffiti

This is why I got a cell phone with a camera in it.


http://www.geocities.com/sloecat/graffiti/graffiti.html

Robert Fisk and the Moron Terror

I can't believe I haven't talked about Robert Fisk here before. He's the Middle Eastern correspondent for The Independent, which I started counting on for actual news soon after Bush was "elected." That was about the time I realized that some sort of unspoken gag order was holding the tongues and pens of our illustrious newsgathering services. I was disappointed that when I read the New York Times I started to feel like I'd get more honest stuff from the Weekly World News. Bat Boy in any context is more credible than W. (henceforth to be known as the "Moron Terror") as leader of the free world. Now that's sad.

But, more about Robert Fisk. He wrote a fascinating book called Pity the Nation about the state of Lebanon since the Palestinian refugees had begun to flood in. It tells another side to the Palestine-Israel conflict that not a lot of people want to hear, and it's heartbreaking. In short, he's a rare journalist who isn't afraid to present what he sees and says some controversial things, but is a breath of fresh air. He lived in Beirut for years, now he's in Iraq. I think he's still in Baghdad. He's saying things about this war that many Americans and Britons have been thinking. From the very beginning.

He's my Graham Greene, Quiet American period.

Here's a collection of his articles:

http://www.robert-fisk.com/

Francis Bellamy

The Pledge of Allegiance of the United States of America was written by a fucking socialist! Francis Bellamy was the first cousin to Edward Bellamy, famous author of the utopian socialist narrative Looking Backward that I had to read (and enjoyed reading) in my history of social thought (or something along those lines) class in college. This is an interesting history, and pretty fascinating to read about considering the assault on our sense of self as Americans this administration is inflicting on us with its distortions and perversions of our laws and documents it is attempting to put through.


Oh, none of this whining needs reiteration. I just can't keep my mouth shut over the cauldron roiling in my gut over these people (because it's not just the president; he's probably the least of our concerns) who are trying to irrevocably take us back to the middle ages in social issues. But, take heart, self and all who feel the same, and read the original feelings behind the pledge. Because despite all my bitching and criticism (because this joint has never, ever been perfect or lived up to the promises it has romanced us into believing on paper--but that's what is so great: sometimes the love affair turns into a really great marriage), I love this country; it's the defiling of what I love about it that makes me feel like a bayonet is scratching at my back, right behind my heart.


http://history.vineyard.net/pledge.htm

Florrie Fisher and Mad Crunk

She's the inspiration for Amy Sedaris' character on Strangers with Candy, one of the best TV shows ever! This site is frickin' hilarious. You can hear the speeches the former "street whore" who smoked "sticks of marijuana" had given to high school students about staying away from drugs in the '70s. The best part is she's real! There was a documentary about her called The Trip Back. Transcript and MP3s(!) here:

http://home.earthlink.net/~thetripback/

I haven't been online in a while, that's why I haven't been putting any posts up. I had the week off for Memorial Day and had a lost weekend that lasted until the following week. How great is that? I feel renewed! It seems as though an entire month has passed instead of a week. Life is shifting in ways I'm not ready to explain here, but it's great. The soundtrack for it is Andre 3000's The Love Below. It's all I want to listen to. "Behold: A lady. I see you standing on the wa-hall. Clap, clap. You dee-serve it ah-hall." Sweet!

An Exhaltation of Larks

I've been working at Entertainment Weekly this week, and they have a wonderful library of all things lexicographic. The sweetest and most fascinating book I've discovered thus far is An Exaltation of Larks by James Lipton. This book has gathered all of the collective nouns used to describe congregations of any stripe you can imagine, called "terms of venery." (A noun that means both the art of hunting and of pursuing sexual pleasure. Also means the act of intercourse and the hunted game itself.)

Here are a few of my favorites (birds seem to have the best):


A Passel of Brats

A Tissue of Lies

An Unkindness of Ravens

A Murder of Crows

A True Love of Turtledoves

A Cowardice of Curs

A Stud of Mares

A Sloth of Bears

A Singular of Boars (my Chinese zodiac sign)

A Mutation of Thrushes

A Charm of Finches (the Gold variety of which is Iowa's state bird)

Probably more to come....

Pantsburg!

Here's the something nice I promised.

That's the name of my band. Without the exclamation mark. We recently played our first show. Here's a link to some photos and a nice little story about the other bands we played with and all that:


http://opsound.org/opsound/events/opmixparty2.html

And here's a picture, if I can figure out how to post it!

If pic doesn't appear, try this link:
http://www.geocities.com/sloecat/pantsburg/band.html

"Failure is not an option"

This was said by the Bush administration about our policy in Iraq. My feelings are mirrored by an editorial I heard on WNYC: "The war in Iraq is already lost." (I'll have to branch out from quoting WNYC, lest I become repetitive.) The day we went in there with no real purpose stated is the day failure showed its face. It makes me sad and it disgusts me.

I mostly feel this way, I suppose, because my uncle fought in Vietnam, and the government does next to nothing for those who are killed or tortured for it and its idea of "freedom" or "democracy" or "terrorism" or "weapons of mass destruction" or whatever convenient fable is on hand—based upon my uncle's experience, anyway. He was a grunt, was a victim of Agent Orange, told me that his platoon would receive government-issue packs of marijuana cigarettes, since they all knew how bad it was and there was nothing they could do about it. Anyway, I just pray for a swift end to this horror.

By the way, has any more been discovered about Nicholas Berg and the details leading to his death? That is one of the most horrific stories I've ever heard, but I feel like it needs to be talked about as much as possible to remind people of what an inhumane and truly evil thing war is. (Reminder about who Nick Berg is for those who are bad with names: He's the man who was decapitated in the al Qaeda/Iraqi video. His head was sawed off as he begged for mercy. That's barbarism. That's what happens in war. It turns people into deranged beasts.)

I apologize for the gloom, but that's where my head's at when I hear the news. I'll post something nice sometime—really, I will.

The reason I'm here

is named MJ from Test-Run Librarian http://testrunlibrarian.blogspot.com/. She's a pal of mine from New Orleans. A good one. She's all rock and roll and smarts.

That's my shout-out. She's the only thing I really like about Florida. : O

BHL

Um...hi. I've never done this before. A blog, that is. I barely have enough discipline to clean my house or do my laundry in a regular fashion. But this seems like it could be a cool thing to do while I'm working and there's nothing coming in.

What's been interesting to me lately? NPR. There's a fantastic show on WNYC hosted by Brian Lehrer in the morning that everyone should listen to at least a few times if they can. (Brian has his own blog! Check it out.)

This morning Brian was talking to Bernard Henri-Levy, who was speaking with great candor about the war in Iraq (I love how people are finally starting to do that!) and the deluded concept of war in the western worldview—how we see it as cause for heroism, courage, etc. He's been in war zones that get little to no attention in the west, places like Sri Lanka, Sudan. Leave it to the French to be the only ones to be unafraid to tell it like it is, and say so with passion. On the show, he sort of lost control in a tirade about how out of touch people who romanticize war are and how sick the constant killing really is and called those who start these wars "bastards"! It was exciting to hear. Yay, BHL!

One of his books:

Who Killed Daniel Pearl?

http://www.semcoop.com/detail/0971865949

Wow. Here's a totally different perspective from the Guardian: Bernard Henri-Levy as media whore:

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,6903,977498,00.html

Any way you slice it, fascinating guy.

PS: My other fascination of late: revisiting the book On Writing Well by William Zinsser.