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What We Talk About When We Talk About Wallace
Posted 10:55 PM, Mar 31, 2005 |
A reader asked me what turned me off, basically, of David Foster Wallace. I mean, it’s no coincidence that the site background is clouds similar to the cover of Infinite Jest, and that Year of Glad is lifted directly from the book. My email address and alias for the site both refer to Hal, who is the main character of IJ.
My history with Wallace is long, relatively speaking. I first read an IJ review in Entertainment Weekly, I think, when I was a senior in high school. The review was positive, but I was more intrigued by the fact that it was a long book, that it took a certain will for the reviewer to read it, that it would provide, to me, a sense of accomplishment on its completion. (It did provide such a sense, and still does, and that sense of accomplishment is important enough that I’ve let Gravity’s Rainbow kick my ass several times since then, and even once, a while ago, made it to page 12 of Ulysses, all in search of that same sense of accomplishment. Instead, crushing defeat, but anyway.)
When I was a senior in high school, we had to read 1,000 pages of “quality literature” every six weeks. We could read whatever we wanted under that vague, tattered umbrella, and I thought it would be terrific to just read one book for six weeks and have that count for my whole requirement. And so I borrowed $30 from a French horn player after a high school basketball game, went to Barnes & Noble, and bought the book. I repaid the horn player the next day.
And so I carried IJ around for six weeks, more or less, dwarfing my calculus textbook in both size and substance. And so I read IJ, and if you’ve read it and liked it, put your experience here:
If you’ve never read it, well, I can’t explain. Believe me, I tried, and am still trying, to explain what it’s about, let alone what makes it great, over and over again and have never been successful. So I can’t help you.
(And if you’ve read it and didn’t like it, well, opinions are like assholes, I guess.)
But so then I was in love with David Foster Wallace. I reread it when I was a freshman in college. Then I called him on the telephone, in his office at the University of Illinois-Champaign, and talked to him for a few minutes. I’d love to say he was bookish, or uncomfortable, or erudite, but really he was just a voice on the telephone that could have been anyone. But anyway, so we spoke and I ended up sending him my first edition IJ to sign, along with a few pages of a story I was working on. He sent the book back promptly and, as he told me on the phone, took a little longer with the story.
He didn’t like the story, and since then, I’ve hated the man, despised him.
No, I’m kidding. He didn’t like the story, though, that part is true. He edited the first page of it, gave me comments, gave me constructive criticism and a charity compliment (“Cool.”), but he mailed it back. I still have it here. If I had a scanner, maybe I’d show it to you. “Keep practicing. We all have to.” And then he drew a smiley face, but at a cockeyed, three-quarter perspective. (I have it in front of me – I was never such a fan as to remember every word.) So how, as an aspiring writer, can that not make someone your favorite writer?
I was on the Wallace email list for a while. I took part in some of a group reading of IJ, even going so far as to make a website with the groups comments hyperlinked. The project sort of fell apart, but that’s beside the point, perhaps.
I wrote a paper on postmodernism and IJ in college. I read it again since then, too. So I guess I’ve read it four times, and it’s been equally good each time, maybe even better each time. Hard to say. I’ve convinced one friend to read it entirely, and another to start it. He’s still working on it.
At this point in the story, I love David Foster Wallace. He’s my favorite. I’m almost ready to go by a bandanna. But then things began to go south, slowly, like a migration of Airstreams to Arizona.
I’m not sure that anything turned me off of Wallace. I think my relationship with him was skewed by my enjoyment of IJ. That was sort of translated into an affection for all things Wallace, and A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again really just cemented that affection. But, as I was discussing with someone the other day who asked what Wallace she should read, I realized that most of his other stuff isn’t that good.
The Broom of the System was entertaining, but the philosophy was mostly out of my reach, so I know I missed a lot. So maybe that’s my fault, not Wallace’s, but it’s my opinion, so that’s too damn bad.
The Girl With Curious Hair (short stories) had its moments in the same way that I’ll occasionally laugh at something on Everybody Loves Raymond – that doesn’t make it a good show.
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (more short stories) was better, but burdened and ultimately buried under Wallace’s antics and literary tricks.
Oblivion remains mostly unread on my nightstand, where it’s sat since I picked it up on the day it came out. I’ve avoided it in favor of Jonathan Lethem, The Devil in the White City, Jon Stewart, and a bunch of other books you can read from the sidebar.
Wallace, in my head, just posed as my favorite author. Really, Infinite Jest is my favorite book of all time, but those are, or should be, two separate things. My favorite actor can be in a movie that isn’t my favorite movie. My favorite film isn’t directed by my favorite director. It’s apples and oranges.
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Decisive Driving (Recycled)
Posted 7:33 AM, Mar 30, 2005 |
When your driving instructor told you to practice “defensive driving,” I believe what he actually meant was “decisive driving.” Indecision is the place where accidents happen.
If you’re going to merge, do it. Don’t waver, inch slowly into the next lane, and then veer back into your own lane when you see the person in front of you tap their brakes. Get going! Get over there. If the guy in front of you taps his brakes, no worries. Just slam on your brakes. That’s what they’re there for. Use them, and use them decisively!
When you’re entering a highway or freeway, the on-ramp is designed for one thing: getting up to speed. Don’t go 30 mph while worrying you may not be able to merge and you need to be ready to stop. Go 65 mph, be decisive, and get in there. You’ll find a spot. Think positive.
While you’re on the freeway, don’t go the minimum speed limit (40 mph). Go the maximum speed limit. I’ve heard people say, “Well, that’s the speed limit, you don’t have to go that fast.” Yes, you do. Well, you can also go faster. Again, this is decision time. Either decide to go the speed limit, or decide to go faster. I decide to go faster. If and when you decide to go faster than the speed limit, once again, it’s all or nothing. When going faster, you may as well go a lot faster.
The Heisenberg Principle says that for certain subatomic particles, it’s impossible to know both a particle’s precise location and momentum at the same time. You can know where it is, but you can’t know how fast it’s going, or you know exactly how fast it’s going but you can’t quite pinpoint its location. Let’s apply this concept to your average automobile:
Imagine going through a four-way, uncontrolled intersection. You can putter through at 25 mph, looking alarmingly in all directions for oncoming traffic. Here, the car’s position and momentum is easy to pinpoint precisely. Consider that your car is really a small particle in the scope of the automotive world.
Now, imagine the same intersection, but imagine yourself going through it at, say, 55 mph. You don’t have to look in any direction because your position will be impossible to predict. This imprecision makes it really difficult for other cars to crash into you.
To complete this argument, consider the following: how many times have you seen two electrons smash into each other? In fact, the government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars building things like atom-smashers just to make particles crash into each other. You think somebody’s going to hit you going through an intersection at 55 mph? Time to go back to quantum physics for you, pal.
Just last night, I was driving on Interstate 94W and there was a car on the side of the freeway, abandoned, no hazard lights on, nothing. Granted, it was in a construction zone and so the space on the shoulder was slightly reduced, but there was still plenty of space for two cars to fit past the abandoned one. However, traffic slowed to a near-crawl as I drove along at about 10 mph. I wondered what the hold-up was, and assumed, rightfully so, that it was something that didn’t really require the current speed. When I got there, a car was edging around the shouldered car. I hit the gas and made a point of going past the shouldered car at the same time as the other auto was passing it. Plenty of room. It just takes a firm decision to do it.
Next time you’re in your car, practice decisive driving. Make your moves early, often, and swiftly. Don’t wait to guess what other people are going to do, because they’re waiting and guessing, too. Show them what you’re going to do by doing it quickly and in their faces. They will turn their radio down, look at their significant others, and say, quietly, “Boy, I wish I could drive like that fellow there.” You know what? They can. They just have to decide.
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Who Said What?
Posted 10:34 AM, Mar 28, 2005 |
When people quote movies, they should say which character said this-or-that, not the name of the actor. It seems foolish to write things like, “Bullshit, John!” and attribute it to Jack Lemmon. He would never have said anything like that on his own.
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Solid. Pun.
Posted 10:57 AM, Mar 24, 2005 |
Oh, things have been so busy. I had many things to tell you, dear reader, but most of them have been forgotten in the business of this week. I will try to recap here:
1) I was at Grumpy’s on Monday night and went into the men’s bathroom, which features a long urinal trough and then a toilet just… just… just there, right in the corner, with no stall or anything. Some drunk guy was in the process of using it when I came in and started going to the bathroom. He proceeded to pronounce me “solid,” along with the two other guys that came in while I was in there. “Man, you guys are solid. You’re over there, pissing, and I’m just sitting here, taking a shit. Solid.” Indeed.
2) I was telling some people about my two uncles. They’re fraternal twins. For a long period of time, they didn’t talk to one another - a few years, from what I understand. I don’t know what the issue was, but anyway, so I was telling this story, and, “[So] now they talk to one another, I mean, not all the time, but more than they did, relatively speaking.”
This “relatively speaking” is the greatest pun ever. It’s the kind of joke that you get once, and then you get it again, a joke so nice it makes you laugh twice. In the interest of full disclosure (again), it wasn’t intentional.
3) Well, I did have more to tell you, but most of it is gone or completely irrelevant now, not that most of what I’m writing isn’t. That is to say, completely irrelevant.
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Absolute Power
Posted 2:12 PM, Mar 21, 2005 |
Also, and here, I’m totally fucking serious, when I turn on my blinker to go into the lane you’re in, but you’re way back there and not in my way, that is not a license for you to fucking speed up, you stupid asshole.
If you speed up and I get into your lane and then you tailgate me, I will hate you and your children forever.
If you speed up so I cannot get into your lane, I will wish eternal damnation on you and then speed up and pass you and get in your lane anyway, and then slow down just to show you how much of a soulless dick you really are.
I’m totally not even fucking joking, you stupid ass.
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End of Conversation
Posted 10:18 AM, Mar 21, 2005 |
On Monday mornings at work, I spend a little time talking to people about their weekends, basketball, and whatever else is going on. Typically, the conversations are initiated by me in an effort to be friendly. The following is a typical exchange:
Me: Hey, how was your weekend?
Them: Fine; how was yours?
Me: Good, thanks. Did you catch that basketball game on Sunday?
Them: Yeah, it was quite a game.
Me: It sure was.
And that’s about it. I don’t like to end conversations with the lame “Take it easy,” “Have a good one,” or even “Talk to you later, sucker.” Most of the time I just walk away, which is way better.
All in all, I’m tired of people exchanging pleasantries. Don’t ask me how it’s going unless you actually care. I care, so I ask. Most people don’t really care. When people ask me how I’m doing in the future, I’m going to start telling them how I’m really doing. Nobody will care.
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Kinky Solved
Posted 9:17 AM, Mar 16, 2005 |
A while back I was trying to figure out who told me that Kinky Friedman was their favorite author. Well, that mystery is officially solved. I noticed a Kinky Friedman book on a co-worker’s desk and then remembered when she told me about Friedman.
My detective skills: 1, complete and utter confusion: infinity - 1.
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Full Disclosure
Posted 10:01 AM, Mar 15, 2005 |
In the interest of full disclosure, I have a confession to make:
In the fall of 1999, I, too, used anabolic steroids and had human growth hormone injected into my ass.
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Back + Updates
Posted 9:56 AM, Mar 13, 2005 |
So I’ve mostly returned to the land of the living. My cold is almost gone and I’m feeling much better. Things should slowly return to normal around here.
In no particular order:
1) My brother and sister-in-law had a baby girl on Tuesday, making me officially an uncle.
2) I completed my taxes today.
3) After missing work for 2 days, I had 72 emails and 6 phone messages to take care of on Friday, even though I still felt like shit. It’s not good when a person feels like they can’t afford to miss work, not because of money, but because of obligation. Most people should not feel that obligated; certainly not people that get paid what I pay. My money should obligate me to very little.
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Ill
Posted 7:22 AM, Mar 10, 2005 |
I’m sick, yesterday, today, who knows about tomorrow, but I’m certainly not up for writing much for you to read.
I hope you are not sick because it is no fun.
Also, lastly, do not ever say, “I don’t care if I get sick,” because that is like inviting the devil into your house, you foolish heathen.
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Off-Site
Posted 8:14 AM, Mar 7, 2005 |
I’ll try to get some more news or something interesting up here sometime soon. In the meantime, here’s this. I’ll talk to all of you later.
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Cosby!
Posted 9:17 AM, Mar 3, 2005 |
My love of The Cosby Show makes this a must-read.
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Two Shows
Posted 12:56 PM, Mar 2, 2005 |
So Iron and Wine is playing here in Minneapolis at First Avenue on April 22nd. Should be a good show, very laid back, nice acoustic guitar stuff.
So M. Ward is playing here in Minneapolis at the Turf Club on… April 22nd. Should be a good show, very laid back, nice acoustic guitar stuff.
The Iron and Wine show is slated to start at 6pm, and the M. Ward show is slated to start at 8pm. There are opening bands listed for both. I wonder if it’s possible to:
a) make it to both shows, and
b) get too much of a good thing.
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New Job Title
Posted 9:12 AM, Mar 2, 2005 |
(Senior) Corporate Lubricant.
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Bathrooms
Posted 12:26 PM, Mar 1, 2005 |
Man, if there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s Oprah. But if there was another thing, it’d be that lame joke where people say, “If there’s one thing… if there was another thing…,” and so on.
But if there were a third thing, it would be guys who spit in the urinals in the bathroom. Don’t ask me why this bothers me. It’s not like they’re making the urinal any dirtier than it already is, all cigarette butts and gum and, well, urine. But I don’t approve. And obviously it’s not like I see them do it - I just hear them and it makes me want to slap their dicks out of their hands and throw them out of the bathroom.
Boy, I’m fired up today.
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