tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3982801850249110362024-03-05T23:30:53.878-06:00Alphabet of Madness:The Language of the IconoclastJ. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.comBlogger487125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-70965186640580477182023-12-17T16:32:00.003-06:002023-12-17T16:32:56.880-06:00Mostly Fiction: Reading 12.17.2023<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Invisibles Omnibus – Grant Morrison<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The first thing I have to mention is the sheer physical heft
of the book. It’s hard to read in a normal way. It makes it hard to find the time
to sit down and read it because the only way I was able to read it with some
momentum and not want to put it down every few minutes was propped up on a desk
that I cleared of other stuff.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Content-wise, it was interesting. Morrison is a good writer,
and the individual stories are connected to some larger arcs and there is
payoff at the end, but it does feel like it takes a while for it to get there. He
weaves in stuff from the situationists and mentioned memes way earlier than I
had heard of them. Also, huge props to the series for including a trans
character in the nineties. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The other thing that was weird reading the story now is that
the Myan great cycle that hit the news at the end of 2012 is a plot point that
is important but for a reader now it was just a quaint thing in the past (or did
everything actually reset?).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Worth reading but I would recommend finding smaller versions
because of the dang size of the omnibus book. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Portable Door – Holt<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">At this point I have read a dozen books by Tom Holt. And I
like Tom Holt but I’m not an evangelist for him. I heard of him at some point
where I was asking for writers like Pratchett and his name came up and it was
good that he’d been fairly prolific so there are a number of books one can read
by him. But there’s something missing. Like all the ingredients are there but
like maybe it’s too British or something. I like it for the absurdist comic fantasy
that it is, and I will read more of the books, but maybe it was a detriment
that his work was compared to Pratchett because it is hard to stand in that
comparison. I’m still going to read the next one in this series, and well keep going
from there.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Red and the Black – Stendhal<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If there’s one thing that I learned from this book, is that
if you have women in your house, don’t invite Julien Sorel in. I had a
challenging time getting into this book, as the first parts where Julian is in the
provinces and then in seminary go a bit slow, but then once he’s in Paris, it picks
up. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I didn’t see his crime coming, but it does seem to be in
character because Stendhal makes this guy pretty loathsome to me. I don’t know
why it’s not obvious to the other characters in the book. I think it may be a
dramatic irony built in, but I am far enough removed from living in the context
of the book to not really know if I should be rooting for Sorel or not, or if
Stendhal likes his creation or not (or if that even matters).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m glad I read it because it is an important part of the
canon but also enjoyable on its own, no matter what you make of the central
character. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Nights at the Circus – Angela Carter<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Carter here creates a meditation on truth and storytelling,
as she tells the story of Sophie Fevvers and the journalist who is telling her
story, Jack Walser. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">We meet the characters in London and follow them across Europe
to Petersburg and then to Siberia. Sophie is part human and part swan, or is
she? Jack follows and falls in love with her, and they end up in a train accident
in Siberia and meeting an exiled piano teacher. It’s weird and really peaks after
the first third of the book where the characters have met in London and Sophie
is telling her back story. But it is also beautifully written so even though it
felt like it was spinning out and I was waiting for some resolution it was worth
reading.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Think Python – Downey<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I used this book as a supplement to a class I was taking in
Python. It was good as a supplement, but I do worry that it would not be
sufficient for someone who was only using this book or someone who had not had
a bit of a background in doing some programming stuff. The exercises are also
made for someone who has a decent understanding of math and personally I
stopped trying the exercises after the first few chapters because of that, as well
as having other problems that had been assigned to me for the course I was
taking. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Camp Damascus – Chuck Tingle<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had only known Tingle as the author of the seemingly silly
titled erotica but having followed him on social media for a while, I know the
person behind the façade is an interesting and thoughtful writer. So, I was interested
to see that he was making a more mainstream book. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Camp Damascus is a horror novel with a queer female teen protagonist
who seems to have some sort of autism spectrum disorder. She is in a family in
a town that is strongly centered on the titular camp that is run as a
conversion camp. It is not giving too much away to say that hijinks ensue. The
characters, especially the main one, are beautifully written and developed and
the action flows really well. If you were raised around or within the evangelical
movement, you might find that Tingle hits some notes perfectly. It feels almost
like a backhanded compliment to say that the book is really professionally
written and to note that I have already pre-ordered the next “serious” title,
but you really should read this book if you like religious themed teen horror. It’s
really well done and not even something that is in my normal wheelhouse. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Giants in the Earth – Rolvaag<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My wife’s family is from the northern plains – Scandinavian
immigrants to the Dakotas and Nebraska territories, and the story of their ancestor’s
descendants is broadly the story told here. Rolvaag tells the story of a group
of settlers and the dangers and trials they face trying to tame the empty
wilderness and make it their own. If you have ever driven through the plains,
you know the barrenness and emptiness of the landscape, but also, its wide-open
beauty as the land is just an open ocean all around you. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Our heroes face locusts and snowstorms and wandering cows,
as well as the natives (though I was surprised how little the people that the settlers
were displacing on the land came into the narrative) to make the land their
own. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The book made me think of how important the relationships
you build were in the settlement process. You only had your family and your
immediate community, and often you were on your own. The book it reminded me of
most was Steinbeck’s East of Eden, not just because of the settlement aspect of
it, but also there is the same sort of edge of misogyny in the female
characters. The main character’s is Per Hansa and his wife is drawn almost as if
she has clinical depression from the move to the prairie and Per Hansa doesn’t address
her needs – ignoring them to his detriment.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There’s also what felt like a weird lack of tragedy in the
book for a set of characters who are facing hardship – right up until the last
chapter (spoiler alert). It’s well-written and made me feel like I was part of
the settlers. I would call it an engrossing read. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-72507941637835248552023-10-28T10:28:00.003-05:002023-10-28T10:28:49.636-05:00Graphic Novels and Protests: Recent Reads 10.28.2023<p> <b>The Impending Blindness of Billie Scott</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I came to this based off of Thorogood’s newer text. It’s a
more straightforward narrative than that one. It’s good though. It’s about
friendship and mort importantly, the urgent need to create art. She’s certainly
an artist to watch as her career grows. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Monica<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This was an interesting book because in structure, it’s a
lot like the kind of graphic memoir that you can come across easily. But there
is also this supernatural thread that Clowes weaves throughout the narrative.
It’s beautifully weird, and then there’s this incredible payoff on the last
page. Totally worth your time and attention.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>If We Burn<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Bevins has a new book coming out,” I said to myself, “I’m
pre-ordering that no matter what it’s about.” That’s how good the Jakarta Method
was. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With “If We Burn,” Bevins moves into more recent history as
he explores the protests that swept the world in the 2010s, some of which he
was a part of, and interviewing other people who were firsthand witnesses. What
struck me most was how he described so many of them taking their cues from
recent past and contemporary movements. Protests in the social media age
developed a whole vocabulary of action and reaction from both the protesters
and authorities.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Also, of note is how he covers the emergence of leaderless
protests. They can express real dissatisfaction, but they can also have no real
(or shifting) demands or possible end states. They can also be co-opted as Bevins
shows how some of the protests in Brazil and Egypt evolved.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Overall, as someone who wants to see the world develop towards
a society of greater equity and citizen rights, the mood is somber. The protests
covered here were ineffective for the most part in creating any change that was
durable. Perhaps we need a new vocabulary or need to revisit old paradigms. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-25917210212683282672023-07-30T18:51:00.003-05:002023-07-30T18:51:59.445-05:00Recent Reads 7.30.2023<p> <b>On the Rocketeer: The Complete Adventures</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I got this because I have vague positive memories of the
movie, especially the gritty steam punk art deco vibe they had going on. I
barely remember the plot except for the rocket pack and German bad guys. I have
to say in reading it, it makes sense that the style is what I remember since neither
of the two main plot lines make a lot of sense and are full of holes and coincidences.
What’s more interesting to me is that the art is more cartoonish than I would
have thought based on the movie. The one thing of note is that the artist
really likes drawing the female form in sheer fabrics – that’s where he goes
for the “realism.” It’s an adventure comic studded with pinup girls.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Years ago, I read Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke
the World, by Liaquat Ahamed. Afte reading that, I was interested in finding a
good English language biography of Hjalmar Schacht because I was interested in
seeing how the German War Machine ticked at a financial level. I didn’t find it
then, but I came across this, and it was better than what I thought I wanted.
Tooze goes into great detail about the war and how much the need for materials
and food and hard currency really shaped the decisions the Nazi leadership were
making about the war effort. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">On a side note, reading this made me realize why reading
about WWII or the Civil War is so appealing. You already know the outlines, but
different histories just focus on different details. You know how it ends
though. The bad guys lost. It’s a great feeling and not something you can
guarantee with anything more contemporary. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On The Spy and the Traitor by Ben Macintyre.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is one of those books that I normally wouldn’t have
picked up, but I got it as a gift. I’m glad I read it though, as it was an
intriguing look at the cold war and the espionage on both sides. It’s mainly
the story of a KGB officer who moved up the ranks and spied for British intelligence.
There’s also a bit about Aldrich Ames, but that part is not as developed and he’s
not as interesting a character in the text. It’s a fast-paced read I couldn’t
put down and it was enjoyable. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Structurally, there are a couple of places in the book that
sort of give away the ending, which isn’t great since it is a thriller and if
you don’t know the case, you don’t know how it’s going to end. Weirdly, though
you’re in the spy world, there was something about it that felt both high and
low stakes to me. It was like everyone involved was children playing high
stakes games. The other thing is that the whole thing is biased to a western
reader – with Gordievsky being on the side of the good (327) – when things really
feel more ambiguous than that black and white reading. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Chantal Mouffe: Towards a Green Democratic Revolution<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Verso has been putting out some of these thin books that are
essays, and they are nice because they are a quick read in the afternoon. The
problem is that they have to really grab you to be memorable, and Mouffe’s text
did not do that for me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Nature’s Metropolis<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Look. There’s a lot of ways to do economic history. A lot of
them are bad. Many are good. But there’s only one Nature’s Metropolis. It’s the
story of Chicago. But it is more than that, it is the tale of the growth of the
Republic in the nineteenth century. You will learn more about grain and trees
and railroads than you thought you wanted to know and be thirsting for more.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On Managing & Using Information Systems: Pearlson et
al.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This was the textbook for an entry-level MIS class in my
data analytics course progression. Overall, I liked the text. The chapters were
well laid out with well developed examples of the chapters’ main ideas that
carried though the whole chapter. Each of the thirteen chapters could easily be
a course in itself, but in paring down each topic to the most pertinent
details, not much is lost in the legibility of the topic. The only thing I didn’t
like was partially structural with my course. There are case studies at the end
and the answers are hosted in various places online. My instructor used these
as discussion prompts and it was clear a quarter of my peers just copied the
answers and ran them through a remix software. <o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-73887310146437985142023-07-23T14:45:00.004-05:002023-07-23T14:45:58.295-05:00Read some comics 7.23.2023<p> <b>On The Plunge by Joe Hill et al</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Do you like the Thing? If you do, then you will like this
book. It owes a lot to John Carpenter’s The Thing. We have an isolated, cold
setting, and weird things happening in a way that’s claustrophobic and isolated.
It’s spooky And scary. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On Night Fever by Brubaker and Philips<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is an interesting story about identity and growing up
and trying to be someone you’re not. Or is it trying to be the person you
really are? The main character is on a business trip and assumes a new
identity, and it takes him to places he never know existed. There’s one element
in the story that is somewhat supernatural and I wanted to see it more developed
but it isn’t. So it’s the one weird thing that makes me wonder if the story isn’t
100% self contained to the volume or may be the seed for something more. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Nailbiter is developing (By Willimanson et al)<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The general premise of this story is that there is a town
that spawns serial killers. It feels a little goofy, but the first volume of
the series was enough for me to go get the next three volumes in the series and
read them in an afternoon. The titular character is a serial killer that bites
the nails off of his victims. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Volume two deepens the mystery and is a little more cinematic
than the previous volume. It starts to flesh out the story and develops characters
in the town.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Volume three is where we start to see hints at something
that is behind all the serial killers. Is it something supernatural or more
mundane? I don’t know yet.<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-70384826546266031212023-07-09T15:14:00.002-05:002023-07-09T15:14:16.560-05:00Recent Reads 7.9.2023<p> <b>Thoughts on Lugalia-Hollon and Cooper’s “The War on
Neighborhoods”</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is a Chicago based book, so I am a little biased in that
the streets and neighborhoods the authors cover are familiar streets. Chicago
is one of the nation’s most segregated cities, and some of the neighborhoods,
like Lawndale featured here, have vast disparities in all sorts of resident outcomes
compared to other neighborhoods. If you look at a map showing cancer rates or a
map showing shootings, you’ll see the same things. There are bad outcomes in
the south and west sides and comparably better outcomes in the north and a lot of
the southwest sides. This is largely racially coded as the only public
investment that goes into the neighborhoods are in policing and incarceration.
It’s a problem that has all sorts of policy decisions at its root and has continued
through to today. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Malm’s “Fighting in a World on Fire.”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is an interesting text because it is a children’s adaptation
of Malm’s book “How to Blow Up a Pipeline,” which is not something you see
every day. It’s a manifesto for ecoterrorism for kids. I know there’s a severe
problem with climate change, but I’m afraid this is a wrong path. It puts people
at great personal danger both in terms of in the act but also through the incredibly
overzealous charging from governments which exist to protect capital and the
status quo. You can try to be a Ghandhi or King, but you know what happened to
both of those men? The same thing that happened to numbers of others who have
names we don’t remember. However, I am torn because we do have these problems and
it doesn’t seem as if the current regime in power or the protest movements that
exist will move the needle before it is too late (is it already too late?). The
whole thing made me think of the Children of Kali, from Robinson’s Ministry for
the Future. There they seemed like a necessary evil – but that was fiction. I
often feel like the agglomeration of evidence for climate change will make its
existence and the need to do something quite obvious, but then I read the
comments and there are so many willfully disengaging with the truth or making
excuses for inaction. We do need large governmental and corporate action at the
global level, and any one individual feels powerless in the face of the existing
half measures. Malm and company understand that urgency, but ultimately, I don’t
know where best to channel that energy.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Fredrick Harry Pitts’ “Value.”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting with this text. I
think I wanted a more cut and dried history of value from labor theory of value
to the marginalists. That is more or less in here, but it felt like it got more
esoteric to me, and less grounded in exchange. I mean, there’s not a single equation
in the text, not a one. It’s a short text and was worthwhile but didn’t resolve
anything for me. Instead of a brief survey it is more a starting point of an
argument. Heck, the last paragraph begins with the idea that value is still up
for grabs (134), so there’s always something more to learn.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts om Nancy Fraser’s “Cannibal Capitalism”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is the first book I’ve read by Fraser, and I think I
read it at the right time. I had just read Delong’s “Slouching Towards Utopia,”
which was a decent history of the past 150 years but was too optimistic about
the future – especially in ignoring climate change. Fraser’s text was a good counterpoint
to that, in showing the challenges we face, and that the current political and economic
system that we have, and which delivered it, is not up to the task of solving
the problems it created. Will we be able to deliver on the promise of
reorganization before it is too late though? I am skeptical but would like to
be surprised. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On Robert Bevan’s “Monumental Lies”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is a good examination of the controversy about statues
and what they mean and how we should deal with them. The problem is that there
is a huge chunk in the middle that is more about architecture. This large section
felt like it should be part of a related but separate project – or maybe that’
more my USA-centric parochialism showing in that I am less concerned about the
legacy of fascist architecture in Italy than I am about the Confederate statues
in the US or the honoring of people who held other people as property (and got
rich from that trade). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-92170475730243044462023-07-03T16:41:00.004-05:002023-07-03T16:41:36.592-05:00Recent Reads 7.3.2023<p> <b>Thoughts on Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky Brothers</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I read Hard to be a God last year, and really liked it. I
read this one as a follow up and since it is more famous. The difference is
that Roadside Picnic is less plot driven. This one feels more like a making of
atmosphere as the reader gets deeper into understanding the Zone but never
really understanding it. In this it feels a lot like Lem’s Eden, where the
exploration is the point. It’s a work from a different tradition of science
fiction and it is incredibly interesting but a slower read. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Kerouac’s Desolation Angels<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Jack Kerouac climbed up a hill and then down it eighty pages
later. Then he spent time together with his friends and got drunk. There was a
time when this would have been more compelling to me, but there were too many
writing classes where I read so many things that were derivative of this sort
of thing that going back to the source doesn’t work for me. It reminded me that
when I read On the Road two decades ago, it didn’t really work for me then.
Like I need more work in the structure. At the very least this is the most
genuine realization of the exhortation to write what you know.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Mumbo Jumbo<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Man, I was about eighty pages of this one before I picked up
any sort of plot. It was interesting but I kept waiting for the thing to
cohere, but it never did for me. It was more like watching a slow strobe where
you would only get brief glimpses of the plot and try to figure out what was
going on in the periods of darkness.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Jean Toomer’s Cane.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This book came out in 1922, which would have been the same
year as the Wasteland and Ulysses and the author should be on the same tongues
as those that speak the names of Joyce and Eliot. But Toomer isn’t a forgotten
name from a hundred years ago. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The individual stories are well structured and beautifully
rendered, the problem with the text is that it jumps around a good bit and
there’s an issue with some thematic flow. It takes the reader from the Midwest
to the south and to DC and back. The whole thing shows just such incredible
skill and promise, and if you look at the publication cadence of the stories
and poems it shows just such an incredible output in the one year of 1922. And
it was the only book he published. What a loss for the culture.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on A Culture of Growth by Joel Mokyr<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">First off, whoever designed this book needed to increase the
font size a point or two. I’m getting older, but not that much older. In terms
of the book, Mokyr does string a nice thread from Bacon to the Enlightenment as
the source of the eternal question of why the industrial revolution happened
when and where it happened. Not 100% sure why solely in England and not the
rest of Europe, but the continent and the intellectual environment of the
Republic of Letters seems to have a good connection. I have not read any
criticism of the text, so I imagine that this is accepted as gospel truth in
the economic history community since the publication of the text. One thing
that I find really interesting is that at the end of the text he looks at China
in the same period and examines some factors that might have inhibited the
industrial revolution there, even though they had a technological lead. The
most crucial point is not that China (Or elsewhere in Asia or Africa) failed by
not grabbing onto the rocket of the industrial revolution, but that it was a
unique set of intellectual institutions that really helped grow the economy as
we know it. As a side note, it’s probably time to read McCloskey on similar
issues.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>On Wilhelm Reich’s The Mass Psychology of Fascism.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I don’t think I’m the right audience for this book. I’ve
long been skeptical of any sort of Freudian-based psychological framework (and
I do accept that the text is going on a hundred years old at this point).
However, Reich does seem to be convincing that there is a psychological basis
for fascism in all populations. I just don’t think there’s a good explanation
for why it rose up in Italy and Germany but didn’t really anywhere else embedded
in the text. So, there’s a few places you could find some good pull quotes, but
it doesn’t really work as a coherent whole for me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And then there’s the whole thing with Orgone energy in the
background of the whole thing. The edition I have is a third edition and he
says that this edit is after the discovery of this phenomenon, and it was
incorporated into the text. I am really curious about what the first or second
edition was like when it was more based on the psychological / class-based approach.
I have some friends who get a lot of Reich, but this just didn’t do it for me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Thoughts on Boys Weekend by Mattie Lubchansky<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There are a lot of books like this coming out now. There is
the protagonist who is going through a gender transition. There is a set of
friends meeting for a bachelor party. There is a near future sea-steading
utopia where laws don’t exist. There’s a cult recruiting at a conference in the
hotel where the characters are staying who might be working to unleash horrors
unknown that come from out of time and space. And it’s up to the protagonist to
bring all these threads together to a resolution. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Like I said, we all know the story. The thing is here that
Lubchansky (a well-known, national treasure) does it better than anyone else. I
don’t want to get too deep into spoilers, but there is a scene where the protagonist
hunts their own clone that is worth the price of admission. (Why Lubchansky
here is giving their approval to clone is beyond me, but I’m quite sure it’s a
direct endorsement of the sport.)<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> <o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-7708189571045973052023-05-14T15:13:00.003-05:002023-05-14T15:13:18.422-05:00Recent Reads 5.14.2023<p> <b>A few thoughts on Bea Wolf by Zach Weinersmith and Boulet</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is an adaptation (in part) of the Beowulf poem. The art
is cute, and the adaptation is adjusted to the battles children fight with
themselves and the specter of growing up. (I like the freedom, but who invented
work? They need to send that guy to the big rock candy mountain). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It is a quick read and I think it makes me want to go
re-read the original (in translation, of course). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A few thoughts on The Heavy Bright<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is a weird book. I couldn’t really grasp what was going
on or why. I get the pacifism and feminism and unity of all souls but there was
something missing. The world building was such that I would call it dreamlike
if I were being charitable but otherwise it was a miss for me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A Few Thoughts on Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Shandy is an amazing book. More than anything it made me
think of a late 1990s vibe with Seinfeld and David Foster Wallace. I can
imagine the discourse that must have grown up around it. It I about memory and
storytelling but also about nothing but also childbirth and siege warfare. I’m
glad I read it; it was worth it even if it took a while.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A few thoughts on Private Government by Elizabeth
Anderson.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The format of this book is really interesting. There are two
essays by Anderson about the structure of the market and then private
corporations and their control of their workers. Then there are a few response
essays by scholars of various fields and then her response to the respondents.
In one way, you can basically make the gist of her argument in the title. The
real drawback to the form is that her original essays don’t get into enough
depth. I was personally surprised that there were very few references to Marx.
The index only has three references, and the next listing is “masterless men”
which has even more than Marx. The other thing I don’t like is that that have
an economist as one of the respondents – good! But that economist is Tyler
Cowen – bad! It would have been better if they had found someone from the
academic mainstream because in my opinion, Cowan just kind of sucks. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A few thoughts on The Varieties of Religious Experience
by William James<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I read this more for historical relevance more than anything
else. I do like the thought behind it, finding the individual experience of
religious feeling and events. James was trying to bring some empiricism here,
and that is good. I kept thinking about how this could be done again with the
20<sup>th</sup> century fruitfully to see what has changed and what has stayed
the same. My big, big complaint is that the book focused almost entirely on the
west, and Christian experiences. There is but passing references to Islam,
Hindu, or Buddhist experiences. And with a 500-page book, they could have found
some room. A smaller complaint is the formatting of the text in this edition.
There’s a lot of references, which makes sense since James is quoting people
and getting their experience. But a lot of the quotes aren’t written as well as
the main body of the text James writes. And there are in text references and
then some that are dropped to the notes which are in like 4-point font and
really hard to read.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A few thoughts on Prisoners of the American Dream by Mike
Davis<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In this book, Davis reviews a lot of the class struggle in
America with amazing granularity of the 20<sup>th</sup> century through the
early 80s. The big takeaway from this is that the workplace has always been a
place of contention and struggle. I think leftists of my generation forget that
as we look back to the period that was often seen as a time of relative peace
as the economy was growing after the second world war, but there was always a
struggle. And there always will be!<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-26774950971033275862023-03-04T15:29:00.003-06:002023-03-04T15:29:49.044-06:00Three Sentence Reviews: Readings 3.4.2023<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Sentences on In the Shadow of the Poorhouse by
Michael B. Katz<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I really enjoyed this book as a history of American welfare.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One thing that you can really trace is this ebb and flow of
who is responsible for people and how they should be aided.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My main wish is that this were more up to date since it ends
right as Clinton ended “Welfare As We Know It”.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on State of Exception by Giorgio Agamben<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I was not even aware of Agamben until the pandemic, where
both his views on the pandemic and the concept behind this book came into
renewed importance in debates on the response to the pandemic.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The book is short and easy to read, but the chapters get
bogged down in references. So to read this, you need to go back to Schmitt and Benjamin
and maybe to Hobbes and more and more.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on They Call It Love by Alva Gotby<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have some mixed emotions about this book. It’s a short
book that builds to some interesting ideas about the abolition of the family and
the abolition of gender.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">However, there is something about how it is written that
makes it a slog to get through despite its brevity.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Slouching Towards Utopia by Brad
Delong<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I generally like Delong’s stuff, but he is often very prolix
so I was interested to seeing what he would do working as a sole author but
with an editor. Delong tries to do a lot here and you can tell he wanted to do
more; one paragraph has the entire Anschluss, and you could feel his restraint
on the page. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One big quibble for me is I don’t agree with him is with the
periodicity and choosing 2010 as some endpoint when it really felt more like a convenient
place to stop.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Spa by Erik Svetoft<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I picked this up because the blurb on the back name-checked
David Lynch but it could just as easily mentioned Cronenberg as a point of comparison.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The story acts in some sort of nightmare logic where there
are several threads that weave through the text but they never really resolve.
The art goes very well with that nightmare theme in a complementary manner. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by
Kate Beaton<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><o:p> </o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In Ducks, the author Kate Beaton writes her memoir of
spending two years working in the extractive industry to pay off her student
loans when she would rather be working towards her artistic dreams.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The story and the art work well together, a straightforward
telling of her time in this place that was extractive and exploitative on
several levels.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The worst part is in her having to deal with this heavily
masculinized space and the story is in part about the sexual violence she (and
her female peers) faced not just on the jobsite but in life in general.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Schmitt’s Political Theology<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This book is one of the only books that is basically an
explication of its first sentence.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I came to this text from reading Giorgio Agamben, and now it
has made me want to go read Hobbes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thinking about the Schmittian world makes me long for the
embrace of a Kantian world with a defined and defended constitution.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Bors et al’s Justice Warriors<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I bought this because I am a huge Matt Bors fan, and I was
not disappointed in seeing how Bors and his teammates create a world and a
narrative within it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One of the fun things about this text is in the crowd scenes
and seeing the detail and care that went into these throwaway background jokes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Just because the main characters are police, doesn’t make
them the good guys.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">T<b>hree Sentences on Harvey’s Spaces of Global Capitalism<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This text feels more like an introduction to Harvey’s thinking
on geographic spaces and development that a fully fleshed-out theory.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When Harvey isn’t talking directly about Marx part of me is
like a fan of a band’s particular album: “It was good, but they didn’t play the
hits”.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In spite of this being a newer book, the collection is a
couple of essays that may feel dated but remain eternally relevant.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Lazarov’s ACAB Yearning<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There is a harnessed yet incandescent rage in these poems.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Lazarov admirably melds poetry with his activism. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The best and most memorable lines would trigger a website’s
auto-moderation so that the text would not post (see June 7 2020). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Debord’s Society of the Spectacle<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I read about the Situationists, and they sounded
interesting, so I went to Debord’s text.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Unfortunately, I don’t think I got much out of it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The version I have has no introduction so I lack context and
the individual sections read more like linked koans than a building argument.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Three Sentences on Rankine’s Citizen<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Citizen is a powerful poetic document of racism in America.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It stands as true now as it was written and as true now as
it was in 1863.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The struggle for the powerless against the powerless is an ongoing
battle but one that must be fought with all arrows in our quiver. <o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-18054089353309253512023-02-02T13:24:00.004-06:002023-02-02T13:24:28.996-06:00Cycles : For CJM<div style="box-sizing: inherit; color: #292929; font-family: sohne, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: -0.003em; line-height: 32px; margin: 2em 0px -0.46em; text-align: left; word-break: break-word;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #292929; font-family: sohne, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: -0.003em;">A week turns<br /></span>into a month turns<br />Into memories coming back<br />When the commercials remind you<figure class="zk zl zm zn wy zo pr ps paragraph-image" style="box-sizing: inherit; clear: both; margin: 56px auto 0px;"><figcaption class="zv zw wq pr ps zx zy vx b bv bw hj" data-selectable-paragraph="" style="box-sizing: inherit; color: #757575; font-family: fell, Georgia, Cambria, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 10px; max-width: 728px; text-align: center;"><br /></figcaption></figure>And yet<br />The cycles of the seasons<br />Make the calendar a talisman —<br />The most hopeful day<br />Is December twenty-second.<br />The second shortest day<br />But the first in months</div><div style="box-sizing: inherit; color: #292929; font-family: sohne, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: -0.003em; line-height: 32px; margin: 2em 0px -0.46em; text-align: left; word-break: break-word;"><br />Longer than the last<br />That reminder<br />That things get better<br />If only a little every day.</div><div class="wg wh wi wj wk y" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: inherit; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.8); font-family: medium-content-sans-serif-font, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, "Open Sans", "Helvetica Neue", sans-serif; 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height: auto; max-width: 100%; vertical-align: middle; width: 680px;" width="700" /></picture></div></div></figure></div></div></section></div></div></article></div></div></div>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-77499716604263221732022-06-21T15:24:00.005-05:002022-06-21T15:24:56.397-05:00Let Me Down Softly: Pynchon's "Bleeding Edge"<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I had this thing pre-ordered. I was excited for a new Pynchon.
And then I got a few pages in and gave up for whatever reason. That was a
decade ago now.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I did pick it back up and went back at it. There’s not a lot
of payoff. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">It’s weird. If you like Pynchon, it has all the things you like.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"></p><p style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHdyjhaypaPcFUaEXpIQxVWFpym0LpzaRCx9XT33LBTSnp5P2zmKcJE3D3YnES6-HaS76Uet5pbQ3ckGhEO4lQ9iwyFUmnEPaMRcsVkvBEP9wRRjoSMEhlRO-5LTYEsgA-j3dzUJvoCtZUT-Crk2DNwO-4sX87POXiEmHRKuHRi7PthqIDhsWeFRqT/s1280/WIN_20220621_14_57_17_Pro.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHdyjhaypaPcFUaEXpIQxVWFpym0LpzaRCx9XT33LBTSnp5P2zmKcJE3D3YnES6-HaS76Uet5pbQ3ckGhEO4lQ9iwyFUmnEPaMRcsVkvBEP9wRRjoSMEhlRO-5LTYEsgA-j3dzUJvoCtZUT-Crk2DNwO-4sX87POXiEmHRKuHRi7PthqIDhsWeFRqT/w400-h225/WIN_20220621_14_57_17_Pro.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br /></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">There’s plenty of paranoia.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">You got your bad puns.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">You got your songs (someone needs to make an album of his
songs if no one has done it yet).<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">There’s people with weird names.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">But I didn’t care about any of the characters, except maybe
the protagonist and then only a little.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I spent the book waiting on some plot action, knowing that
this was his “9/11” book.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">And 9/11 happens, on page 316 of a 477-page book and for the
most part it could have not happened. The characters are in New York, and they
are affected by the event, but it stays in the background.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Maybe that is the whole point, that 9/11 stays in the
background? It was kind of disappointing. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Oh, and the last thing is that a lot of the characters and
plot revolves around the dot com bubble and bust from a New York vantage. It
rang false. It kept reminding me of Wolfe’s “I Am Charlotte Simmons” which is
not the comparisons you want your te</span>xt to fish out from the reader.<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-22396816961547521462022-05-31T10:17:00.003-05:002022-05-31T10:17:17.813-05:00Five Years Sober<p><span style="font-size: medium;"> Some time today or yesterday or tomorrow marks the fifth
anniversary of the last time I had a drink.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">It was Memorial Day weekend. Anita was out of town. I’d gone
to a concert and a baseball game that weekend, but I was relaxing at home, and
I went to the fridge at about quarter after midnight for just one more before I
went to bed for the night because I had to work the next day.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">And then the next weekend I didn’t buy any more beer and
then the next weekend and the weekend after next to a point where if I did buy
some it would have made Anita sad, so I decided against it. Of course, it was
more than that. I had a long history of bad, self-destructive decisions I made
while drinking and it isn’t good for your health even if you say to yourself, you
can moderate it. And I couldn’t really moderate it. Five years ago, I had been
drinking more to sooth work stress and political stress and it was just time to
stop. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">I liked being drunk though and sometimes I still miss it in
a way I don’t miss smoking (even though there is still the occasional craving
for a cigarette fifteen years out). The difference is that I kept smoking because
not smoking made me feel bad, but I liked drinking, so I drank to feel good –
it helped level out the anxiety. Thankfully, I wasn’t at the point of physical
dependence on alcohol. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">I don’t miss the hangovers though – the dehydration and feelings
of dread as your brain chemistry reset or the piecing together of the night
before to make sure you didn’t do or say anything the night before.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">Quitting drinking was surprisingly easy for me in terms of physical
cravings. I wasn’t expecting that based on how hard it was for me to quit
smoking. The hard part was making the decision to quit and keeping that
decision every day. It was easy because it was something I wanted to do, and I
had people around me that supported me.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">You have those people too. Even if you have those cravings that
are so bad you can feel it in your teeth, you are surrounded by people who care
about you and want to see you make the healthy choices for your best self.</span><o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-41035722773502197022021-09-02T15:32:00.003-05:002021-09-02T15:32:12.705-05:00Here’s the difference <p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">George Floyd never signed up.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">George didn’t want to serve<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">For county or college tuition<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">He wanted to live his life<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Like those kids who lost their lives <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Cut down in their prime<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Like George Floyd<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Maybe they cried for their mothers<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Like George Floyd<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But Big George didn’t sign on the dotted line<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There were no benefits, no VA<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">George was born into a warzone<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Born in America, covered in Black Skin<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-75568206932599916972021-08-28T13:09:00.004-05:002021-08-28T13:09:18.782-05:00Read Some More Books<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Revenge of the Real: Politics for a Post-Pandemic World<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Benjamin Bratton</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I really like the Verso Book Club, which is where I got this
from. They send out books every month and it forces me to read more than I
normally would and outside of my normal interests.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This book was an interesting short little thing, arguing in
my reading for a large conception of the social – against the atomized person
and thinking of us all as part of a system. I think it works but my main
critique is that it exits in a weird middle ground. Part of me wanted to see it
expanded. Then there’s another part that wanted it tightened up. For example,
there’s a whole chapter against Giorgio Agamben. When I was reading it, I was
like “Why is there a whole chapter about this guy I’ve never heard about?”. And
it seems like the whole issue was on me, since reading this book I have seen at
least a dozen references to Agamben. Again, thanks to the Verso Book club for
expanding my theoretical horizons. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>East of Eden<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p><b> </b></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>John Steinbeck</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve been on a bit of a Steinbeck kick since the pandemic
started. I reread Grapes of Wrath at the beginning because I was worried about
the economy crashing. In that reading I found a much better book than what I remembered
from being forced to read it as a high school student. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Grapes of Wrath may be his most famous book, if because it
is the bigger book of his that gets pushed by those high school students. I
think that is an oversight, as East of Eden is the better book, I think. I
guess that it doesn’t get taught because a good part of it centers on a house of
ill repute.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But also – it does take a while to get going. Steinbeck here
is writing a broad and epic sweep and must build the setting and the characters
and then put them together. He does it so well though. There are places where he
creates a character with such depth and complexity, and he does it in just a
paragraph or two. It’s something that you can see and point out how well he
does it but impossible to really saw just why it works. It’s just genius at
work.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">He also, in these pages, creates one of the most hate-able
female characters ever put to the page. He just captures this psychopathy so
well you must wonder who in Steinbeck’s biography he modeled from to create this
character. Who hurt you, John? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, this book just builds, grows, and has an incredible
momentum right up until the end, an end that just gob smacks you. In my opinion
it is one of the top dozen or so novels I have read. It’s amazing and you
should read it. <o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-59287048254717032772021-08-27T10:59:00.004-05:002021-08-27T10:59:20.395-05:00Read Some Books<p><b> </b><b>Independence Day:</b></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I say to myself periodically I should read more from the
past, to get a better sense of the literary world’s shifts and ebbs. Since I
went to school 20 years ago now the 90s were in the recent past. There wasn’t a
lot of classes that hit on anything really later than the 80s except for the
couple of classes I took that were deliberately focused on more contemporary
lit.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That is to say I didn’t read Richard Ford, ever. The cover I
have notes that this book won a Pulitzer. The blurb on the back calls the main
character “one of the most unforgettable characters in American fiction”.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The problem is that it is not a good book. I was reading
this, thinking of the parties that people had feting Ford and the people with
professional jealousies looking at him and thinking that their work was just as
good. Ford must have lapped up the praise!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Here’s my critique as an angry high school reader: Nothing
Happens.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I kept waiting for something to happen. And then a minor
thing does like on page 400 of a 450-page book. But its low stakes. I had to force
myself to read the last 30 pages just for my own mental checklists.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A book doesn’t have to have things happen to be interesting.
The other problem is that Frank Bascombe is boring. We spend the whole book in
his head, and I have no idea how there are three other books with this
character at the center. I’ll never read them to find out. And none of the other
characters are interesting either. He’s a real estate agent dealing with uninteresting
clients. The love interest is a cypher. The ex-wife maybe has some depth, but
we don’t see much of her. The only character with a real spark is his son,
Paul. Center the book around him and make it half the length and maybe it
works.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But as is, it doesn’t work. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">However, here’s the paradoxical thing, the book feels
technically well written. It’s like a model for an MFA class for structure and sentence-level
elegance! Even with that, it’s not a good book. You don’t need to read this one.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTrQTRTm9kiYyPSt1NQoEX0BIs_wE37rIEV4_DGJ3b-Hsq-LtpxObxjsgmLoAzaFsbmfS-btMgX2c8PQJztbCmf8OHZh48N2XqK4qb_pcLDfhpm_PawGcvtTX2OnkwY9DvMLNszZzmWro/s1920/WIN_20210827_10_02_55_Pro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTrQTRTm9kiYyPSt1NQoEX0BIs_wE37rIEV4_DGJ3b-Hsq-LtpxObxjsgmLoAzaFsbmfS-btMgX2c8PQJztbCmf8OHZh48N2XqK4qb_pcLDfhpm_PawGcvtTX2OnkwY9DvMLNszZzmWro/w400-h225/WIN_20210827_10_02_55_Pro.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Capote in Kansas:</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When I pulled this off the shelf, I figured it was tied in
with one of the movies about Capote that came out a while back. But it’s not. It
is an independent graphic novel take on Truman Capote writing “In Cold Blood”.
What’s interesting is that the book has one of the victims of the crime as a
character who Capote talks to as he’s trying to figure out how to tell the story
of the Clutter family, who was killed. There’s also some speculation about
Capote and his feelings towards one of the killers that makes the book push the
edge of nonfiction. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Overall, it works even with the supernatural element (though
I must admit that I thought the character was alive for most of the time she was
in scenes and then once I realized what was going on I had to reevaluate
things). It does make me wonder in the bigger picture we are fascinated with
the story of Capote’s writing of the book. Is there any other text that gets similar
treatment in the culture? I can’t think of one offhand. I should also note that
I did like the art, a strong use of the black and white to aid in the storytelling.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Grande Odalisque:</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I liked this book. It was sexy and fun and read like the storyboard
for an action movie that I totally would watch if it was on Netflix or Amazon
Prime. Who doesn’t like female French art thieves? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-14420005098254780132021-04-11T15:30:00.003-05:002021-04-11T15:30:26.298-05:00Three Reviews, 4.11.2021<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>Tomorrow sex will be good again by Angel</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m a member of the Verso book club where the publisher
sends you a book every month. It’s cool and I like supporting independent
publishers.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have enjoyed most of the texts that I’ve chosen from the
list.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This one didn’t really do it for me. It’s a thin hardback I
read over a couple of days and then the next day I really couldn’t articulate
what I read – It wasn’t bad so I’m not mad that I read it, but it also wasn’t
good, so I have warm memories of it. At best it was forgettable, and I feel bad
since I might not be the direct audience, but I do consider myself a feminist
ally. So, this is just my incredibly subjective opinion, and your mileage may
differ. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Money: A Suicide Note by Amis</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had this book on my shelf for years and I recently picked
it up because I was looking for something different. The first book I read from
Amis was Time’s Arrow, and I loved it so much I went and bought a handful of
this other books, but it seemed like Time’s Arrow was just a one off and I didn’t
seem to like the other things I tried to read.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I did finish this one though. And I have to say I think it
is the worst book I ever finished that I read on my own. I usually don’t have a
problem putting books down if I don’t like them,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>but I kept chugging on this one and I don’t
know why exactly. Amis does some stylistic things here that I would normally
like- the main character is the narrator, and he breaks the fourth wall, there
is a secondary character who is a writer named “Martin Amis”. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The problem is that the main character is one of the
unredeemable creatures. I think Amis was going for a Catcher in the Rye /
Confederacy of Dunces thing, but it doesn’t hit. John Self, the main character
is an 80s guy doing horrible 80s things in New York and London, and for me it
isn’t interesting. He’s horrible but I don’t care about him in that I don’t
want him to succeed or fail. That’s not great when the book is so character
driven. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br clear="all" style="mso-special-character: line-break; page-break-before: always;" />
</span>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Years of Rice and Salt by Robinson</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is an interesting book. Before I read it, the only
thing I knew was the premise – that it was an alternate history positing what
would happen if the black death had been more fatal. Perfect pandemic reading.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thoughts: I was expecting it to be more focused on the empty
European continent that it was. Shows how Eurocentric I am.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The individual stories are impressive. Robinson had to do
this larger world building, but then get more specific about not only the
culture but how they might have changed as there was greater divergence in the
world as it is and the world as he dreamed it. This does make it a bit hard to
read, as you get used to one set of characters and the situation and then it
moves on.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There is in the world he builds a parallel to the actual
world, so there are equivalents to Newton and Einstein and Columbus, but they
have different names and native tongues. Were I drafting a paper on this book,
that might be the thing I focus on. Is Robinson positing some sort of teleology
in technological development? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Ultimately as a novel it doesn’t really work because it’s
not building to anything narratively, it just cycles and fades. But it’s hard
to complain because that’s really history, right? One dang thing after another.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There is one story that centers around a kid who is captured
and made into a eunuch and that was very troubling and hard to read part. But
it did make me do more research on eunuchs, a thing I was not expecting
happening from reading this text.<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-67646169563146275852021-04-11T15:11:00.002-05:002021-04-11T15:11:13.326-05:00Learning New Patterns: No More Belly RubsThis is a follow up post to<a href="https://alphabetofmadness.blogspot.com/2021/03/saying-goodbye-to-barney.html" target="_blank"> my journal </a> detailing the week I knew when we would have to say goodby to my beloved dog Barney. I wanted to make sure that I documented my thoughts and emotions so I could remember the details. I haven't had the emotional strength to go re-read it so it might be a little raw.<div><a href="https://alphabetofmadness.blogspot.com/2021/03/saying-goodbye-to-barney.html"></a><div><br /></div><div><span id="docs-internal-guid-51248511-7fff-c3e4-816b-8e8841d16d4e"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">####</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Wrote up the above and posted it after a walk. Watching more movies and being sad when people post in sympathy. Looked over to his bed a couple times, the subconscious checking on him that I've gotten used to over the years. So worn out. Such great grief because of all the joy he brought.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Going through the nightly routine without him broke me. No letting him out or giving him treats. No pushing the table back so he could get up in the couch. I'm not sure if he was on the couch last night though. Went to give him his morning belly rubs and he was on his bed. So I moved Mort so I could sit next to him and he let me pet him for a while before moving back to the door. One of the harder things as he aged was that he snuggled less. I think it was part of his declining eyesight and hearing. Or the loss of padding as he became more skin and bone. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Can’t sleep. Tired but the minute I try to fall asleep I start with this wave of grief. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##3/26/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Today is the first morning without any belly rubs.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I would love to have things to do as a distraction but the pandemic makes that next to impossible.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Even though I know he won't be there, I keep looking at his favorite spots just to check on him. Turning my head only to remember.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Here's the screenshot of the last walk I took with him and then the walk on Monday where I knew it was time. Poor guy, he loved his walks.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 447px; overflow: hidden; width: 212px;"><img height="447" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/Qn1Q5glQPFdMI4FHLVX01J7deDgiT9neLjHnDAwwHfdIiBzmqQXGuMlgMOxHUSBrFG47UVJP3h-fQMsftSpeaAYx38ehuvpTyaMWWXjrQ1JG3SwvIVOKLJrPvxVcHEQRL9HSQ7TH" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="212" /></span></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I started this trying to savor every minute I was left. But now that he's gone there is just grief. Grief feels le ss momentous or notable. I'm sad and it's hard to say exactly why I'm sad. I can think of memories just like the very first time I brought him home I drove home from Uncle John's house in Kansas City and I had them in the back of the truck but he kept trying to smell outside cuz I had the window down a bit and he would get right up behind me and make it hard to drive.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I was trying to find his breeder to just ride a thank you now until how much I love them. But all I can remember is that they were an Airedale breeder near or outside Sedalia Missouri. And I googled it and I can't be sure if the people that looks like it might be or actually them. I can't find any stuff in any of my email either my Gmail account or my old Yahoo stuff. I don't know if Dad called me about it and we talked but you definitely didn't email.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I keep doing this thing where I walk into the living room and I subconsciously look at the couch or his bed to check on him like I always do, and then there's a split second before I remember and catch what I'm doing consciously and it breaks my heart every f****** time.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I did pick up his collar and smell it pretty deeply It still smells like him has his oils. That made me sad too.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If anything breaks me, it is these acts of remembering. Looking at the time and seeing it's 9:13 and thinking I should let him out. And then thinking about this and mindlessly filling up the cat food bowl and looking over at the dog bowl to see if he needs anything. And then that brief moment before remembering.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##3/27/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thinking about grief last night. When I was a little kid I had a hobby horse and something happened to it that the head got ruined. I don't remember the horse or the act of destruction, but I remember the sorrow I had over the loss. My mom tried to make it better. She made me a new hobby horse, this time with a blue head. It wasn't the same. I eventually got another "brown headed horsie" as I called it as I cried and wailed. In how people experience an perform grief I have always been vocal. Now I try to hold it back, not out of masculine ideals but consideration for the person sitting next to me.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Grief never ends. I still cry for those I lost a half a lifetime ago or more. It just becomes less surprising and more familiar. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fewer random breakdowns today. Picked up the last few pellets of food from his last meal he didn't eat. Doing chores. Normal things I'd relate with him. Still looking for him, but more knowing he's gone. Anita picked up his ashes and brought him home. It's nice to have him here. But hard.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Keeping busy helps, but at the between times when not doing things hurts. Lets the mind drift.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">#3/28/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I was really hoping to get to sleep last night without crying myself to sleep. Maybe tonight it will happen.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I have these posts on facebook and it's nice but everytime I get a notification because someone has left kind words it makes me sad again.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fewer breakdowns today. Washing dishes, cooking eggs, doing the nightly chores. Normal things that we would have done together. Anita cleaned the house and picked up some of his things - his food and water bowl, the yoga mats we had for padding his walk. Told her I wasn't ready to move the beds yet. Will do some sort of ceremony in the near future but not ready to think about that. Trying to keep busy and the mind occupied.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##3/29/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mostly successful in not crying myself to sleep last night. The grief is still there but I'm learning to wear it. Just resting on my shoulders. It's this shirt that everyone wears, a sadness that accumulates through every loss and we're defined in part by how we wear it. I saw someone posting on twitter saying that the tradition of mourning clothes makes sense in that you are newly wearing new grief but you don't want to explain it to people. I think I could talk about Barney for about 30 seconds right now without breaking down.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The whole thing just reopened newer wounds from Dad's death. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Not sure what kind of ceremony to do. There's a sense of finality there I'm not ready for yet. I walked down the steps looking for him at the bottom of the steps and on the couch and on the bed. Hoping he'd somehow be there.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Did notice that Anita tossed those three pellets I set aside. Makes sense, since I didn't say anything. But felt more loss. Wasn't sure what I would do with them but that they were still there symbolized a bridge to when he was alive. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Took a picture of the bag the other day, and it's just sitting there.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 832px; overflow: hidden; width: 624px;"><img height="832" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/GdlvCOxQYXdfi2LuGcfzNSqkTSaqDpZ9MjpmJRm82EhDqk_e7GUd2BIihj81z_BNcKhNEbt9Oy-osXaj3iKlS1xUx2-2yTgCDKA-nyUKMiwZG6jR6LbHDCW4y7nGHDCwuReIR-9e" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="624" /></span></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Very tasteful, and they use the same empty collar imagining that I used earlier.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Remembering the other day when I broke down about Cheetoes, since he loved the puffs. They were pretty much the last human food he got, since we pulled back on all other human food when he started having digestion issues a couple of years ago. We also still gave him eggs, but only if they weren’t cooked in bacon grease or over seasoned. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How do people without dogs pick up the food they drop? It’s literally something I haven’t thought of for a long time. Those crumbs maybe were the last human food he got that was varied. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mom and Dad always kept more than one dog at a time. I can see the benefit because I want another pupper to hug right now. The cats aren’t cutting it. It was the same thing when Casey died, just alone in the basement.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pet death is something you know is going to happen the day you get them. And with Barney it was something I started facing two years ago when he was having issues with both his ears and the coughing. We cleared that up, but I came to terms with the idea that we might not. And it was something that became real last September when he had the episode at the groomer. I really thought I was going to lose him then. Luckily we had another six months where I got to pet him and tell him I loved him and snuggle with him. But it doesn’t really make it any easier.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I am still sad.Going to get a clicker to count how many times I cried. Going to get a curio cabinet to keep all the mementoes of the dead as they accumulate. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Just a huge part of me doesn’t want to be alone upstairs. His ghost is here in the basement too, where he used to move between the couch and his bed and the closet, but it has been a while since I found him in the closet. Maybe the floor was too hard for him or the concrete too cold. Did turn and look for him on the couch. But it already seems to be happening a bit less.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m really glad that I get to see Bear, the neighbor’s dog. He’s a friendly and playful boy who also likes belly rubs, but it’s not the same.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Received a couple of sympathy cards today. It was incredibly thoughtful, and way more than I would do. Of course it did made me sad again.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As long as I keep my mind busy, I'm good. Apparently I can't do the pet chores without crying though.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##3/30/3021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Still sad. Crying less. Managed not to cry myself to sleep last night. Keeping busy is the key. Just wish things were open so we could have gone somewhere.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Glad I had those days off!</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Those idle moments of reflection are what break me.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Called Bear “Barney” when I was over there today. That made me sad. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##3/31/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Woke up to go pee and started thinking about him. Wasn’t able to fall back asleep.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I miss my stinky buddy, my smelly teddy bear.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The difference between sadness and depression is that sadness is active. It takes a lot of energy to be sad.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I haven't had any dreams about him. On one hand this is good since it means I haven't woken up sad. But in the other hand it means I haven't seen him again, even in dreamland.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I feel a responsibility to mourn. His passing will be noted by so few. My tears are a vindication that his life on this earth mattered.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I really need to stop mindlessly looking at the couch when I enter the living room.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I had thought that I was somewhat mentally prepared for all of this. I think there’s some sorts of things that you can imagine and get yourself ready for, like the decision to put him down and the moment in the vet’s office, but what I was not ready for was the absence. You can’t prep for that.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thinking about my mom. There’s been several things in the last year or two that would have sucked without the pandemic. My grandma died in august of 2019 and my dad died in February of 2020. My mom lost her mom and her life companion, love of her life, father of her children in the span of half a year. And then the pandemic hit. Still working through all that.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I had known that Barney’s end was coming. I was in denial but we had talked through it. Knowing that a decision would be made eventually. But someone had to make it. It was when we were walking that Monday that I knew. I got home and sat down on the couch and was waiting for anita as she worked late. I asked for a hug and she asked what was wrong and I nodded towards Barney and she asked what’s wrong and I said “I think it’s time”. That was all I needed to say but it was the first time I vocalized it. I knew that I would have to be the one that made the decision finally but saying it broke my heart. And I have no doubt that it was the kind and compassionate thing to do (especially as it seemed that last week was even harder than normal for him as he was panting more and having more trouble getting up and down) but good damn that was hard. And it’s something you know is coming the minute you bring a puppy home. This pain is worth all the joy he brought for over fourteen years. But it’s a lot of pain right now.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/1/2021</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It doesn’t stop hurting, you just get more used to it. I was thinking I was ok since I didn’t cry myself to sleep last night nor did I wake up crying so I was a bit steady. Then I realized that right now about a quarter to eleven would be around the time we put him to sleep a week ago. Still sad. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ok, I was not ready to go back and re-read some of the things I had written yet.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How has it already been a week? It feels like limbo. I moved his beds into the closet that we call Lynn’s Room. He used to like to go in there to lay down. I think it was quiet and dark and the ground helped him cool down. I think the ground got too hard for him since it had been a while since he went back there. I wanted to have them stop reminding me of him and making me cry every time I glanced over automatically but didn’t want to throw them out just yet. Trying to defamiliarize the place a bit. But now where there was some life there’s just the empty space.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Going to bed tonight as anita was brushing her teeth downstairs, I was thinking to myself it hadn't been a bad day, only broke down crying like four or five times. And that set me off, so now we're at five or six. It just comes over me but doesn't usually linger as long. Anita comes to pet me to make me feel better. </span></p><br /><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/2/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Like four good cries? It's about relearning life with fewer footsteps in the house. Actually watching food I drop. Not singling out a slice of ham as a treat. And so much silence, the unprepared and impossible silence. Keeping busy so my mind doesn't wander. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/3/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Still can’t really sit alone in the living room. Want to rearrange the furniture a bit so the spot where his bed was isn’t such a blank empty space that makes me sad every time I look at it. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Still doing the thing where I subconsciously work around like he’s still alive. In two minutes after showering I walked out and popped my head in the living room only to make myself mad and then on the way down the stairs thought to myself I should check on him before I go to the basement. Just bums me out, man.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I just miss my doggy.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/4/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Was doing so good. But near the end of the day, taking out the kitty litter looking at the big yard and thinking about what a big yard we have and no one to run around in it. And then getting ready for bed. Tears come from the habits I associate with him. And that is it from now on. When those memories come like with Dad and Marc and Tamra and Allison, living through our memories. Even the happy memories tinged with sadness. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/6/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Every day is a little bit better. I’m getting used to the new normal, but still sad when I think about things. Pets are just so much a part of your life from the first belly rub in the morning to the last little pet on the head at night. It sucks when that part is wrenched out of you. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/7/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The tears still come but they’re less overwhelming. It’s just this absence that has descended over the house and in my soul. Not much more original to say. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##4/11/2021</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Still crying a bit every day. The other day I decided it was time to try to donate his food and just the thought of it made me sad and I asked Anita to do it instead. Glad not to have that visual reminder in the house and hopeful some other dog and their family will benefit.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thought about the resistance his collar gave as I pulled the loop and clipped in his leash as we got ready to go out the door for a walk. Dreamed about the jingle of his tags. Or was I awake?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is these transitions, the times when I would normally check on him where he is and how he is doing that still happen, leaving the room or coming in or going to bed. I know he’s gone but the habits are still learning.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">##</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 468px; overflow: hidden; width: 624px;"><img height="468" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/j5e2FiWEZe88wECJlatSXrlP-MDV74x5-PWRuvSbX9KTsFcIT4qQ-Q6n-5JfytCki1pkEOyoQNPxws3YsfRr0ygSaq3L5DrjtlxP5Uctxf0pkWBwPptIBNSSEyXFcLbnTsjt2-HZ" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="624" /></span></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’ve been thinking about this photo a lot recently. Every time I go outside I see our big yard. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I still remember looking for places eight and a half years ago. We didn’t have a lot of money so a lot of the places all had something wrong, since most were short sales or foreclosures. The moment we walked out the back door I looked over and saw the garage and based on what we had seen at other houses I immediately assumed that it was the garage for the neighbor and I asked our relator and he said it was part of the property. In my mind that was when I decided that this was the best place we’d seen. The inside was a little run down but you can fix that up, you can’t make more land. And it was that nice big yard so Barney could have a place to run around. Even though he was always a more indoors dog, he had the chance to go out and chase the bunnies until they got too fast him. He’d go out in the year and when he was ready to come back in he’d walk not in a direct line to the door but would find the closest sidewalk so he wouldn’t have to walk on the grass too much.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Losing him has been hard but it has been made easier by all the kind words from friends and family - cards and letters and donations! Everyone is just too kind.. Barney was a part of my life for so long It’s hard to unlearn those patterns that were ingrained in our way of being. One day we’ll have another furry friend to run around in that yard, but he’ll always be my buddy.</span></p><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span></div></div>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-30191047369695718092021-03-25T15:24:00.002-05:002021-03-25T15:28:15.723-05:00Saying Goodbye to Barney<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face="Arial, sans-serif">Today - I mourn. I lost my best friend. It was his end, but he
lived a long life full of love. Anita and I loved him as deeply and strongly as
we could, and he loved us. This isn’t the first time I have lost a pet I adore,
and it won’t be the last. Knowing his suffering is gone makes it a little
easier, but it’s not easy. Loving a pet is an intensely personal act. That bond
created becomes a silent dance as you grow into each other’s habits, know where
to scratch and they know the sound of your steps as you come to the door.
Barney had many friends and if you ever met him you were one of them. As I
mourn, I also want to celebrate that love shared between people and their furry
friends. Give your friend a pet or a squeeze and tell them you love them. And
then give them an extra from us.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-U-X15hbSYLOOJDtDyK3i9E1FzJA6DeS3K8ZhdOusPTRSLYsV9oi0T9i_TW6BzKNzrwtlPVTYuiI89560L-9rUpVOJ2pL7FSrnO69Depo4fnKe_-gqJZpJdsMKCmAGnOABmh1wcN9vUw/s605/stinky.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="596" data-original-width="605" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-U-X15hbSYLOOJDtDyK3i9E1FzJA6DeS3K8ZhdOusPTRSLYsV9oi0T9i_TW6BzKNzrwtlPVTYuiI89560L-9rUpVOJ2pL7FSrnO69Depo4fnKe_-gqJZpJdsMKCmAGnOABmh1wcN9vUw/s320/stinky.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Barnabe Riche in Brighter Days</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face="Arial, sans-serif"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Below are notes I took for the last several days, so these moments
don’t get forgotten as the ones you have love and lost live on in our
memories. </span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" /></span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">#3/23/2021<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Yesterday evening Anita and I had a hard conversation where we decided
that Barney's age and infirmities had caught up to him and the cumulative
effect is that he can't really function and is uncomfortable most of his waking
day. So, we're going to be looking to put him to sleep. I love him very much
and this breaks my heart. One of the great tragedies of life is how short our
pets live. He's been in decline for years but the last few weeks we've had a
couple things that really illustrated to us that it is time to say goodbye.
Needless to say, I am a mess and not being very productive workwise right now.
I think I'll need a couple of days off but I'm not sure of the timeline right
now.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My family had a lot of dogs growing up, but I only had a few that
I considered my dog, and somehow, they all died too young. I've been blessed
I've been able to have Barney for over 14 years, but I still selfishly want him
to live forever.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4uitp4FFC-dqyEAjz3gsXtaT0dBrHnpIEivUdT3YZTr59Ua1KbdkBvpuYvi-oSzrqgiLghp55zUQLvDzsO-KWY1Gn6o_teMYPTW8-T6OIpuDO_EdJalG_Qo9o1F4tFN90X0O2y6ow8TA/s904/b3.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="904" data-original-width="678" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4uitp4FFC-dqyEAjz3gsXtaT0dBrHnpIEivUdT3YZTr59Ua1KbdkBvpuYvi-oSzrqgiLghp55zUQLvDzsO-KWY1Gn6o_teMYPTW8-T6OIpuDO_EdJalG_Qo9o1F4tFN90X0O2y6ow8TA/s320/b3.jpg" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Couch Terrier</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Can ignore pooping in the house and feel sad that he has trouble
getting up and down, but when he falls walking more than once, something is up.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ve cried a lot so far, and it was just on making the decision.
The hardest was when I remembered that he was a gift from Dad, and that was a
connection there. And also, when crying about him made me think of all my other
dogs. </span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It is partly selfish. Cleaning up poop daily and waking up in the
middle of the night isn’t fun.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqpNOcQZdyXnXPPaRKf_hfKtGgTEOGHfAD239M877ZHbwCOJ_lyaz4MBalknROg3QolP2JbDEas2BvEYkD2o4-ceupWg11n5B9xbThuM9yWXoZN4qvTYc_23NVZDRyqpIWQPMzzPcaolw/s1174/b4.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="880" data-original-width="1174" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqpNOcQZdyXnXPPaRKf_hfKtGgTEOGHfAD239M877ZHbwCOJ_lyaz4MBalknROg3QolP2JbDEas2BvEYkD2o4-ceupWg11n5B9xbThuM9yWXoZN4qvTYc_23NVZDRyqpIWQPMzzPcaolw/w320-h240/b4.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">One last Treat</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span><br /></span></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But I think I really understand people who are ok with the death
of those who they love and who have suffered. Being around Barney and watching
his decline has been a bit of a denial, pretending that the constellation of
things wrong with him really aren’t wrong with him but also knowing that if a
healthy dog woke up like he is now we’d be wigged out. The decline is slow
enough you don’t notice it. The real hard thing is that you can’t talk to your
dog to really get his consent. </span></span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I want to be there with him when passes, but I also really don’t
want to.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He’s my buddy and it breaks my heart how much I love him.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I wonder what he’s thinking as we pet him more and cry. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">##3/24/2021<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anita as I was leaning on her Tuesday night and starting to cry:
“Are you getting sad again?”<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I think this is one of the things made harder by covid. We called
the vet and first got their voicemail. And then we called and talked to a
receptionist, and the vet on duty was busy. I don’t think we’ve seen one of his
normal vets for a year and a half since the pandemic started right before his
normal checkup date. He has seen a vet, but the only time we got face to face
was with the tired woman at Countryside and that was really focused on the
emergency situation. So, we called and got the voicemail, and then we called
and got a receptionist who left a message and then this morning we did the same
thing, hoping for a call back. I’m exhausted. And sad. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But in a way it sucks because we’re just looking for permission to
do the thing, we already decided needs done. If I think it’s time, dude, it
must be time. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I remember thinking along the lines of “When the time comes, I’ll
be ok since he’s lived a long full life.” Well, I was wrong there. I’ve been
mentally preparing for losing him for a couple of years, but I am still not
ready. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He’s been such a good dog.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We just talked to the vet and Merrick isn’t allowing people in the
office. The countryside vet will allow people to come in, so we’re going there.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span> <br /></span></o:p></span><span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I wanted to snuggle with him on the couch, but I think it agitates
him and makes him uncomfortable. You see these stories about people taking
their dog out and do the things they like to do, but the reason we’re at the
point where we are is that he doesn’t like doing the things he used to like to
do. At times laying down is a chore. </span></span></span><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPKElFJCBKw2Jx1p9javMjxlOLYzu1EJihCm1JoPM4Y2OpKQu_mRVvGK56fl4cw3mT0Xw8ZezVIqZcDYlnl5z9CgFsJrk6wPxNGi2PlrmAqD5py8G3nGqiNdWfS9t7gzqs_mp_Wcpi060/s937/b1.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="937" data-original-width="703" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPKElFJCBKw2Jx1p9javMjxlOLYzu1EJihCm1JoPM4Y2OpKQu_mRVvGK56fl4cw3mT0Xw8ZezVIqZcDYlnl5z9CgFsJrk6wPxNGi2PlrmAqD5py8G3nGqiNdWfS9t7gzqs_mp_Wcpi060/s320/b1.jpg" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Photoshoot</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tried chilling upstairs, but I think he may be reading me, weirded
out that I’m acting weird.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Took him for his last walk today. He stumbled a couple of times
but not as bad as he did on Monday. Interesting juxtaposition in that the
weather is a spring day. The lawns are greening. The bulbs in people’s gardens
are coming up, but I’m walking in the neighborhood with him one last time and
I’m the only one in the neighborhood who knows it.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I have been lucky that I’ve been around him for the last year.
I’ve gotten to be with him more, And I bet that’s actually helped extend his
life.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I owe it to Anita for being the strong one, but It’s also got to
be a burden on her, always being the strong one. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Now he’s laying calmly at my feet, in a spot he never lays in.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And he farted himself awake and went over to his bed.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What’s weird is that on Monday, after cleaning up poop, I noticed
the Nature’s Miracle cleaner was running low. I put a new bottle in my cart,
but I didn’t buy it when normally I have no issue making purchases. What did I
know then, before the walk? Compare this to last week. I bought a big bag of
food and several boxes of treats. I guess the thought was there can be nothing
wrong with him if I have a bunch of food. I literally just opened the food the
other day. That’s a sunk cost. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It's incredibly hard to go through the motions of the day knowing
that they will be the last time I do these acts with him. Habits, a nightly
dance furrows plowed year after year.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And today and yesterday there have been no major poop accidents.
Haven't had to clean the floor. But today his mobility has been worse. Falling
on the floor in the back, needing help up. But he didn't fall on the walk. But
stumbled.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Fuck. I don't want to go to bed because it brings the morning.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It's weird how focused I was on his last few age milestones.
Fourteen. Fourteen and a half. If he made one, he could make the next.
Subdivide that to days and hours. If he made it through this minute, we can be
assured of his survival for the next. But those minutes draw few. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Perhaps this can be a bookend for the long year that started with
dad dying last February. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">##3/25/2021</span></span><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXCgmNq6eMzHceDXuQ8ClWbjEDHSLTfOGFk7ixJulum2guV22ZRgNnOiI0czdEOkdtAFeHO_b26ON42_z7V5_X1nk2xG0WgiCqPo7LuGHabHjBJjGghT-GdBxbIM4DOXmYM98MQ1-3Ww4/s880/b5.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="880" data-original-width="660" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXCgmNq6eMzHceDXuQ8ClWbjEDHSLTfOGFk7ixJulum2guV22ZRgNnOiI0czdEOkdtAFeHO_b26ON42_z7V5_X1nk2xG0WgiCqPo7LuGHabHjBJjGghT-GdBxbIM4DOXmYM98MQ1-3Ww4/s320/b5.jpg" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">To everything a season</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A weird thing I've noticed when I woke up yesterday. I've had
songs that they were getting stuck in my head. And I think my subconscious was
picking songs trying to mentally help and soothe me. For whatever reason
Tuesday's Gone and Freebird. And then last night after I woke up to let him out
when he was moving around, the song that got stuck in my head was 1999 by
Prince. Specifically, the line the life is but a party the party aren't meant
to last. </span></span></p><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Also, the Byrds, Turn Turn Turn.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I guess today is the day and there's no denying that.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Was petting him as he was laying on the ground, but I was too much
for him, so he got up and moved. I just want to hug him and tell him I love him,
but it will agitate him and he's laying down so peacefully in his spot by the
door. I've told him I love him a million times in his life so at least there's
no regrets there. Still, it has been one of the hardest weeks of my life, just
overwhelmed by grief at times. Stuck here in the interregnum between having
made the decision and acting on it. Keep thinking about the end of the Stranger
as Meursault faces his death.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Robot wife in the other room doing work stuff when I'm giving him
his last treat, taking him out. Stumbled again getting up and then again up the
stairs. I worry about him every time, but I really don't want him to get hurt
now. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I joke but she's very strong or at least good at pretending to be
strong.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The process at the vet was nice. We pulled up and were right in
and had an opportunity to say goodbye. I've been imagining the moment for days,
so it wasn't as bad as I was worried about. Still incredibly hard but I didn't
pass out. After they sedated him, they hit him with the drug. It was the first
time he really seemed relaxed for a while. I lay next to him on the ground
until I started hurting and pet his head one more time. Anita had his collar as
we were leaving, and I heard his tags jingle which made me look back until I
realized what was happening.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The house is quiet. <br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I went to pick up some things and went to grab the bottle we
filled his water bowl with. Instead of taking it to the sink I mindlessly
poured some water in the bowl. It took a second before I realized what I was
doing and then I broke down. I imagine that will be the first of many times
something similar happens.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-size: medium;">Tried to do some comfort activities. Went to Culver's. Watching Half
Baked. Still so silent in the house.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></p><p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: medium; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXXyPFVQElP2M_s_3BzhAIsvIiAo5GC7wwzPzva_m-8msVn50RxKJDQB76wE8JKjBKdw8llebgzGBYN4jbq_R1YVj1qEpSf6uXNKNj3kFdSmXdELkIjEAlA7nt0w9tJ__ZuDxeb-Pk4aY/s1174/end+of+watch.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img border="0" data-original-height="880" data-original-width="1174" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXXyPFVQElP2M_s_3BzhAIsvIiAo5GC7wwzPzva_m-8msVn50RxKJDQB76wE8JKjBKdw8llebgzGBYN4jbq_R1YVj1qEpSf6uXNKNj3kFdSmXdELkIjEAlA7nt0w9tJ__ZuDxeb-Pk4aY/w400-h300/end+of+watch.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">9/15/2006 - 3/25/2021</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></span><p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-39119361346302657972021-03-01T11:37:00.004-06:002021-03-01T11:37:52.945-06:00 Cycles <p><span style="font-size: medium;">I don’t believe in reincarnation</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">But if anything is a vote in its favor</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">It is the feeling that when I met you</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">We had know each other before</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">A love so instant and deep </span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Had to have echoes from past lives</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">A cycle infinite, going back </span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">To the Dawn of time.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">If there’s any consolation</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Of the certainty of death</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">It is the small chance of this truth</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Being real, and knowing</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">That in some future life we </span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Will be able to find each other, </span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Our souls seeking across the firmament</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Each step grinding the earth </span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Creating the geography of the land</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">And meeting, able to fall in love</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">One more time, again and again</span></p><div><br /></div>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-3311559928141818032021-02-12T16:36:00.007-06:002021-02-12T16:36:48.673-06:00Three Reviews: The Plague; Cement; Lower Ed<p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">Lower Ed - Tressie McMillan Cottom</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Lower Ed is a Powerhouse of a
book. Professor Tressie McMillan Cottom does an excellent job looking at the
privatized education system in America. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: medium;">It reminds me of my own time
working as a student trying to get a certificate. I ran into people who had
both been students and as professors and there's a certain type of student I
really feel as if they're the ones being preyed upon by the system. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black;">She covers it as well but there
is a subset of ambitious African American women from backgrounds that aren't
tied into the traditional education system that see these kinds of schools as
the way up and out. It's a little distressing both of my own experience and in
the reading to see those ambitions as realized only to see them as coming to
fruition with degrees that don't have a lot of worth in the wider society
either on the job market or the academic market. I can’t imagine spending the
time and money investing in a degree that was worthless. Oh, wait, too late.
It's a formal accusation about the schools and about the opportunities that you
get on the other side of Education. It's a terrific book but it's heartbreaking.</span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 107%;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 107%;"><o:p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">Cement - Fyodor Vasilievich Gladkov</span></b></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">I first came across Cement because I was looking
to read something that was representative of socialist realism. And this book
was held up as perhaps the best exemplar of that genre. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">It is the story of a man who comes back to his
hometown after the Russian Revolution fighting in the Army and he finds that
everything has changed. The social structure has changed. His wife has changed.
And he and the rest of the village must come together and get a cement factory
back up and running. They must fight not just local reactionaries but also the
bureaucracy of the Soviet system. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: black;">As story in the translation, it's not that bad, but
it is more of interest as a historical text than it is just a fun book you're
going to sit and read. The other thing of note is that it makes me think of the
contemporaries of this text. It was written in the twenties and at the
same time <span style="background: white;">Mikhail Bulgakov</span> was writing
Master and Margarita and Heart of a Dog -- much more interesting modernism
influenced text than this is. So at least that time artistically you were able
to have a very separate threads representative in Soviet literature. Overall, I
would say it is worth a read but again as the representative text of the genre.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 107%;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 107%;"><o:p><span style="font-size: large;"><b>The Plague - Albert Camus</b></span></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">I first read The Plague about 2002 it was in my
French literature in translation class and it was the first time I'd read
Camus. There was something about his work that really attracted me, and I think
The Plague is really a representative sample of his work. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">It's beautifully written but there is a sense of
isolation and loneliness even when the characters have a relationship with
people -- we're still isolated. And The Plague is set in this Algerian
city and the people are having to learn to fend for themselves as they’re
locked out from the outside society. I think when I read it 20 years ago
it was read as the metaphor for life under Nazi occupation. I returned to it early
in the most recent pandemic reading it in March of 2020. Reading it then felt
as if there weren't direct parallels because there was still some simple
life where you could go outside and be with people just a little bit. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">But I keep going back to this text in my mind
because that sense of isolation that has become more real over time. And
the parallels to the world of the text and the current time have multiplied: we
see the people who try to break the quarantine those who've gotten rich despite
the lockdowns and we see people have gone about their lives and learn to live
with the plague as everybody suffers. As in real life in the book there is just
widespread trauma for all the characters. What I want to see is the parallel is
that in The Plague there is an ending where the gates open but even then, the
people of the city are still wary and that's where I think we're at right about
now. The gates may open soon but there won’t be the one day that we all get to
celebrate but must try to recreate normalcy even though there is no return to
normal, “the plague was bound to leave traces in people’s hearts” (280). Early
on in March it didn't feel as if it mapped onto our experience, but I keep
mentally going back to this book because of that sense of isolation that
he captured so well. It's a classic and Camus is a fantastic writer. I of
course recommend this book, but it is bit of a drag on the soul. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-66433706017449715122021-02-11T16:03:00.003-06:002021-02-11T16:03:33.594-06:00Never Trust an English Woman: On Passage to India<p><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Okay today we're talking about EM Forster's A Passage to India. It
is a classic of modernist era British literature, but I think it's something
like a secondary or tertiary classic. I only say that because in undergraduate
and then graduate school reading specifically in that period was never assigned
as a text. I think there may be a couple reasons for this. The first is that it
was released in 1924 and even though it was released two years after Ulysses it
has a feeling it's a little bit more Edwardian or late Victorian. I can't
really pinpoint exactly why I say that, but I think it lacks a bit of an
interiority of the characters. It's more pulled back high levels you don't get
them their inner life as much. I think the other reason it might not be a full
canon material is that it takes place in India. There seems to be some sort of
reluctance to include these texts that are part of the diaspora, the empire
writ large if it's not overly critical of the Empire. I don't know if this is
some post-colonial canonization lack.</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></o:p></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLMv6LALlBr8oXDROF8aJC_EDuu6M-C1sTNq-MClZa_q3sW9huydf8Nbp-KBvk8e_7UBxxRbiHpNegxvkMiAyLUEXd65ulsjSxO4jSGxw1EvCKaOJbET6eMyQCkxTgicY-Hc762ODB_fs/s1920/WIN_20210211_15_40_37_Pro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLMv6LALlBr8oXDROF8aJC_EDuu6M-C1sTNq-MClZa_q3sW9huydf8Nbp-KBvk8e_7UBxxRbiHpNegxvkMiAyLUEXd65ulsjSxO4jSGxw1EvCKaOJbET6eMyQCkxTgicY-Hc762ODB_fs/w400-h225/WIN_20210211_15_40_37_Pro.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /> </span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The thing is it's a surprisingly delightful book. It's hard to
read but it's hard to read in the way that it is like Richard Wright's Native
Son is hard to read -- it's hard to read that there's great Injustice in
those Clash of civilizations. India is tricky to understand anyway because
right now it is one of the largest Muslim countries if you just take an
absolute count of all the people in the nation that are Muslim. I think it has
the second highest after Indonesia. But India itself is so big that they're
only 18 or 20% of the total population now. And prior to British colonization
there was a huge Clash because the minority Muslim Mughals had been in charge
for a while. And then you have a very rigid caste system in the Hindu side of
the Indian subcontinent that I'm not even well-versed enough to speak
about. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So, you have this entire mélange of the height of the British Raj,
you have Muslim Indian and Hindu Indians all together and the basic plot is one
of a big misunderstanding. You're reading and you get this dramatic irony that
hovers over the key plot event in the second half is kind of this unraveling.
Spoiler alert: there is an assault or an attempted rape it's not clear that an
English woman accuses an Indian of partaking. But the thing is we see the scene
from the accused’s perspective, and we know that the fact of the matter is that
she's making it up. And the entire middle of the book you're reading is this
character who I really like just is getting railroaded. I don't want to get too
deep into it but thankfully it's not too much Injustice just enough to know
that hey colonialism is bad. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The only thing that I really could talk against this book is that
there is an entire third section that seems a little superfluous after the
events and I'm sure there's criticism on it if you wanted to pull apart about
why it matters and why it's necessary to the text but as a reader my first real
Forester it just didn't really seem like it was necessary overall. I really
enjoyed it and I would recommend reading A Passage to India if you were a fan
of fiction about colonialism. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-87283482006203714622021-02-04T12:36:00.003-06:002021-02-04T12:36:26.380-06:00Vaccine Pledge 2021<iframe frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/Vc6DF5I6kPQ" width="480"></iframe><div><br /></div><div>Took my medicine like a good boy. </div>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-21833948744511825682021-01-26T17:30:00.001-06:002021-01-26T17:30:07.297-06:00On China Mieville's "The City and The City"<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Today I'm looking at the City and the City by China Mieville. This
is a science fiction book that came out a little over a decade ago. I want to
like this author's works mainly because he's a comrade. I first read him a
couple of years back when he did that version of the Russian Revolution called
October. It was a historical novel that was like Ten Days that Shook the world
but was better than Ten Days that Shook the World. Since then, I've read a
couple of his books, This Census Taker and Three Moments of an explosion and
Neither were particularly memorable.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFG5VvYIJGZwoZJ0QJZ-hwZgrcRPTcPOHq_bG2PEURPC6J0Tp-BiHbhK-7u4SklXjn_PREg6q_9qucZW8vKo7bqU3bn5pLm-DnznS4lE4YwdxKlk9nxzSbqIKtIz2TqjGK6aXQ9KVAk44/s1920/WIN_20210126_17_15_58_Pro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Just Vibing" border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFG5VvYIJGZwoZJ0QJZ-hwZgrcRPTcPOHq_bG2PEURPC6J0Tp-BiHbhK-7u4SklXjn_PREg6q_9qucZW8vKo7bqU3bn5pLm-DnznS4lE4YwdxKlk9nxzSbqIKtIz2TqjGK6aXQ9KVAk44/w400-h225/WIN_20210126_17_15_58_Pro.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /> <p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p><br /></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> This book is a New York Times bestseller and one that you go
to and it's supposed to be one of his better ones. If you read the blurbs and
just try to get a sense of what's that about you really might not know. The
basic premise is that there are two cities that exist independently but in the
same geographical space. The people who live in those cities are trained from
their youth to ignore what's going on right next to him if they get the signals
and the cues that it is from one of them the other City. The thing is that it
just didn't really work for me. It was about page 74 and I realized that I was
getting most of the World building for this aspect that I was going to get as a
reader. I just said I don't believe it. Now here's the thing, everything else
is good enough that despite me not believing the world building and the central
premise I still want to keep reading. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There's a murder mystery and that very Central thing plays huge
role in it. What it really got me thinking was what this two-city thing really
represented. Was it some geographical political commentary, which I think is a
reading that is the end of the easiest to do because it seems like it's right
there for analysis? There's also the possibility that isn't there a bigger
metaphysical thing. I kept asking myself are these people already dead
are they in purgatory I don't know. The problem with that is there are
people that come in from outside and visit the cities. And then they leave
again so that might not be the best reading. Overall, I did read it and I
enjoyed it, but I just tried really had to not think about that central thing
of the setting because the minute I started thinking of the central premise it
didn't work so just kind of was that thing if you ignore the man behind the
curtain it's okay but like that curtain just really lamp shaded. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-81406821043028295482021-01-26T17:04:00.007-06:002021-01-26T17:05:52.349-06:00Solutions and Other Problems is a pretty amazing book and I think you should read it. <p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Today I want to talk about Solutions and Other Problems, the
newest book by Allie Brosh. She is the author of the number one New York Times
bestselling book Hyperbole and a Half. I first pre-ordered the book
sometime in 2016 and I didn't even know it was coming back out because
Amazon did something to my listing on the pre-order and they created another
listing so that I know it was released until too late.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho2bBlr_jtvC8-DJhf0Gi3xhLmgOMKisp-Ym0ukTOk0DD0xfaS7giU_zEtiNEWQV1JrUY-uUJyTBMzCwz0sgoZkwSYakZog5J8dhHrOEnMM4wxJ7yQcITAAuOd6OLgF6L3ZdAT1fxM0k8/s1920/WIN_20210125_16_11_25_Pro.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="This is me actually reading the book" border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho2bBlr_jtvC8-DJhf0Gi3xhLmgOMKisp-Ym0ukTOk0DD0xfaS7giU_zEtiNEWQV1JrUY-uUJyTBMzCwz0sgoZkwSYakZog5J8dhHrOEnMM4wxJ7yQcITAAuOd6OLgF6L3ZdAT1fxM0k8/w400-h225/WIN_20210125_16_11_25_Pro.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /> </span><span face="Arial, sans-serif">There are a couple of things to know about the book. The first is
that it is printed on a thick stock and there's a lot of paper that is heavy.
The other thing to note is that a lot of the stories are very very funny. I
would be reading them, and I would be laughing and my wife, who goes to sleep
earlier I do would be next to me in bed and she'll be mad because I was
laughing out loud at the stories. She actually told me I wasn’t allowed
to read in bed because of that. But it is not just funny stories that are
intermingled with all sorts of personal tragedy from the author, they really
kind of go together with the funny parts and highlight both the tragedy and
comedy of life it's a pretty amazing book and I think you should read it.</span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><br /><p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-40608324829628206392021-01-10T16:28:00.005-06:002021-01-10T16:28:33.041-06:00Recent Reads : 1/10/2021<p> <b>War Fever</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What Roberts and Smith are trying to do here is tie together
three separate strands – Baseball, WWI, and suppression of dissent.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The book itself is very well written, I sped through it in a
day when I normally take a bit longer to read.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The thing that ties the book together is a common character around
Boston in 1918. All three strands work on their own, with full arcs, but I don’t
think it was fully successful showing how these are coherent pieces of an
overlapping story. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The other thing is that since it takes place in 1918, I was
expecting the so called “Spanish” flu epidemic to be more prominent. It does
get mention but not as much as I was expecting.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Feminist International<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Gago blends together both an internationalist theory with
praxis that she and her comrades are doing on the ground in Argentina. It was actually
a really appropriate time for me to be reading it, as legal abortion was passed
in the country as I was reading it. One thing that really hit home was thinking
about the strike or any action as a process, and not a one-time event. Not sure
if I have seen anything, I was reading really have such immediate real-world
impact as I <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>was in the process of
reading. It’s a little hard to read since it is theory heavy and was written in
translation but interesting, nonetheless.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Automation and the Future of Work<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have written myself on the importance of UBI even though
it doesn’t change the social relationships of capitalism. Benanav comes in and
tells me that the reason I personally am an advocate of UBI, that technology will
make a bunch of people redundant is a wrong way to look at the evolution of the
economy (which has been slowing down). For him, the focus should be on the utopian
possibilities of the people – not a world where we solidify market exchange. A short
book, but an important read. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Leopard<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have been consciously trying to expand my reading to more
global literatures and came across this book which is one of the best sellers
of Italian literature of the 20<sup>th</sup> century. In it we read of the
decline of the nobles in Sicily as the birth of the Italian nation as a coherent
whole comes into being. There’s not much action in terms of the plot, but it is
a lovely psychological text, one that reads like a long elegy for a lost world.
Maybe a world that is not too far away, lamented by the author but not entirely
regretted in its absence? It is interesting that it was written looking back
after the fascist turn in Italy – I would expect that someone with a better
grasp on the history of the era would be able to see deeper than I can now.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Long Live the Post Horn<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is a book that is basically about a PR rep and her team
working on passing language in a parliamentary party’s platform committee speaking
against an EU directive to privatize the postal service. I kept kind of waiting
for it to be about something else and the who main plot to become a subplot, but
that didn’t happen. And it was actually good in spite of that esoteric subject
matter. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Libra<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This book is DeLillo’s take on the Kennedy assassination. DeLillo
is the exemplar of what I think of as peak 80s male fiction. It took Hemingway
and Fitzgerald and distilled that through the chaos of the sixties and Thompson
and Mailer etc. and created their own brand. It is good but is kind of cold and
antiseptic – I’m old enough that it was the hallmark of “serious” literature when
I was young but feels dated and stilted like some sort of baby MFA student is
trying to be too serious about things. You get that here. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The thing is that you know how this book is pretty much
going to go if you have a sense of the details around the assignation and Oswald’s
life. DeLillo does manage to make it interesting, as it becomes a psychological
portrait not only of Oswalt but of his relationships with his mother and his
wife. Weirdly, I feel a real kinship and sympathy for the person that DeLillo
creates as Lee Harvey. He’s a bit of a patsy and he wants to make the world
better but more than anything he is just a smart kid lost in his own world. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Fated Sky<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had really enjoyed the first book of this series, so I turned
around and bought and read the next one fairly quickly. Where the first book is
about the ramping up of the space program and the journey to the moon, this one
is focused on the trip to Mars.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Now, I’m still kind of doubting that if the events of the first
book happened, where a meteor hits and the worry is a runaway greenhouse effect,
the proper thing to do would be to invent a space program and off world colonies.
It just doesn’t seem like it would scale, and the use of resources would be
better focused on earth. I think I’m not the only person with that kind of
criticism, as Kowal puts a group of people with just such a critique in the
book. The other off thing is that the first book was all about the alternate history
of the 50s and the rise of feminism in that world, that there are both a gay
subplot and a trans subplot (one that I totally missed until the author explicitly
pointed out in the afterward) that would be a bit ahead of their time in our
timeline.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That out of the way, Kowal is a good storyteller and is able
to create tension and drama around the trip to Mars, and I can’t wait to read
the next book in the series. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Dog Soldiers<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">About 20 years ago, I was a student at a state university,
majoring in creative writing. Since me and my peers were not really experiencing
in life, much of what we wrote if it was not from life it was aping the pop
culture at the time. There were a lot of bad stories about getting high and killing
people. It was so bad I once drafted a poem I called “Workshop” with the lines “I
have read / <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>enough poems / about kittens
/ and drug use”. I couldn’t help but think of that period in my life as I was
reading this book.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The basic plot of the book is a journalist in Vietnam buys
some drugs and tries to ship them back to the United States. Things do not go
as he planned, and chaos ensues. People get high and people get shot; some
people die. It was like reading all those workshop stories but with one
difference – Stone is a heck of a writer. This is like Tarantino before he ever
thought of Reservoir dogs. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The only thing that really got to me was that the amount of
drugs, and the dollar amount (even with inflation) seemed crazy low to me as I was
reading the book. People go through a lot of effort to get the guy’s drugs from
him and it feels like there’s a relatively low payoff for the whole thing.
There were a lot of people involved and it just feels like overkill.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Japan Sinks<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I feel like this should be a more well-known book. Komatsu works
through the implications of what would happen to Japan if they knew that the
islands are sinking, and how the people would react to it. It is a beautiful speculation
of mass psychology and the disparate reactions of individuals in the face of crisis.
The blurbs talk about its importance in the face of the earthquake and tsunami
a decade ago, but the better analogy for me is how we deal with a more slow –
moving crisis, that of climate change. It was this growing tsunami of change
that was hovering over me as I read the text, and it shook me to the bones. I
don’t think we’re going to do well with that as Miami sinks and New Orleans disappears.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>One Day I Will Write about this Place<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As part of my project to read more global literatures, I
reached out to one of my African connections about what to read on Africa. Now,
of course I know that there is no one African literature as there are fifty
plus countries with a complicated history of colonization, but I am glad that my
friend pointed out Wainaina’s text. What this memoir allows is the reader to
see the post-colonial continent on a broad scope through the eyes of one young
man – he grew up in Kenya and lived for a time in South Africa and we get to
see a visit to west Africa and then we see America though his eyes as he moves
here to teach writing. What the reader sees is a set of vibrant and distinct
cultures, plural – a helpful reminder not to essentialize a whole continent to
the savannah in Tanzania. I think Wainaina’s story is a tragedy of a small scale
though, as he never really finds a place that seems like home to him. Kenya is
home, Uganda is the homeland of his mother, America is some sort of promised
land with a failed promise, but he’s never at a place where he can be himself. Not
sure how much of this is him or how much of it is the fake borders the
colonialists drew (or does that give the dead too much agency over the living).
<o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-398280185024911036.post-70089594184954541452020-11-17T10:10:00.001-06:002020-11-17T10:10:05.662-06:00Recent Books Read<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>Bleak House<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had been thinking to myself I need to brush up on some
nineteenth century British literature to fill a hole in my own reading history.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I reached out to a friend and asked what the best Dickens
was to him, and he said Bleak House.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, I bought the book, and it is a big brick of a book,
almost a thousand pages.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I learned some things. Like I have joked in the past that
Dickens got paid by the word and you can tell. I do not think that it is really
a joke. I just think the expectations about what a book looks like are
different. I still remember in high school keeping a reading journal for myself
reading a Tale of Two Cities because there was so much going on. I think that
instead of thinking of something like Bleak House as a novel it’s more like a
TV show now, where it is episodic and driven by that kind of arc even if now we
talk about them as novels. Like the Soprano’s or something.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I also joked that the thing was very character driven, but
not in a good way. The writer of the afterward notes that there is 48
characters, and you feel it. The first half of the book is basically a
character introduction and twenty pages of focus on them and then a new
character. There is not a lot of narrative momentum, and if I were editing this
for adaptation to film, there’s dozens of characters who could go out the door.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Because there is really nothing that happens. People die and
get married and have disfiguring illness, but it is not until page 483 that
something of note really happen. And then it feels incidental to the plot. The
whole overarching thing holding the book together kinds of resolves weirdly and
unsatisfactorily. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The weird thing is that overall, it is not bad. It just does
not cohere in a big picture, so it took me forever to read. But I did read it,
so it was good enough I wanted to keep carrying through with it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Calculating Stars<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My library does this yearly one book celebration where the
community reads a book in parallel and invites the author to talk about the
book. I missed participating in it this year because I was reading something
else, but I am sad I missed out on speaking to the author because I really
liked the book.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Calculating Stars is an alternate history where the
space race still happens but for a slightly different reason. There was a big
meteor that hit the Atlantic Ocean and it went from going to ice age to runaway
global warming. The goal in the book is to build up the space program for off
world habitation as fast as possible. It is a fun pro-feminist text that
parallels real life examples in the female astronauts that did not get their
moments of glory because the best of the best forgot half of the people.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The only real plot point that really doesn’t feel organic is
the idea that people would use resources to build up for space colonization,
especially at the scale that would be needed in the case of a planet killing
impact. It does feel right in how people are able to go about their lives as
the world around them is changing – nicely done but not too heavy handed. I
would recommend this book and I am excited to read the next book in the series.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Runaway Horses<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">About eight years ago one of my friends told me I needed to
read this book; it was one of the best books he had ever read. So, I bought it
and put it on my shelf until recently.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With all the craziness that has been going on in the world,
I have been turning to fiction to try to escape it all. So, I picked this off
my shelf without really knowing what the plot would be. Let me tell you, if I
had known it was about the fanaticism of a group of young men in the runup to
the second world war in Japan, I might have not picked it up. It hit a little
close to home as we are in the aftermath of the 2020 election and have
nationalists in the streets.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I must give credit to both Mishima and his translator, since
even with too timely subject matter, it is a beautiful book and amazing
psychological portrait of both the leader of the young men and those in his
orbit. There’s a weird structural bit where there’s a book that is important
for the formation of the young men’s ideology that Mishima includes as full
text in the novel that kind of interrupts the flow, but it is important for the
plot.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One thing that I did not know at all was that this book is
the second in a four-part series. It works pretty well as a stand-alone book,
but there are some references to the previous text that stick out and it would
work better and thought I was able to piece together context clues I think it
would make more sense if I had read it first. I have ordered the book and plan
on reading it as much to fill in the gap as I enjoyed this book and like’s
Mishima’s style. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>A Little History of Religion<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I received this as a birthday gift this year. Though it
would not be something I normally would buy for myself, as a definite atheist, it
is not bad to have a look back and see what you are missing out on.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This book is a good survey. It hits on a lot of world
religions and takes them on their own terms for the most part. The only real
problem is structural in its purpose of being a survey, right there in the
title is that it does not go into enough depth. I would say that it is also a
little Eurocentric and too focused on Christianity as being at the center of
the story. This is a quick read, and it is something I would recommend for a precocious
preteen who wants to learn about the world’s religions. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Solaris<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had not read it and the only real association I had in my
mind was that it was a Gorge Clooney movie from a while back and the movie was
not sold as one of those science fiction movies that make you think. Which is
weird because it was not that long after the Matrix blew up the multiplexes and
our minds.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Solaris is a planet that is being studied by scientist
because it is a weird planet. It orbits a twin star system, and it can maintain
a steady orbit somehow and there is an ocean of goo and it seems like this goo
itself might be sentient. The readers get to see the arc of one visitor, Kris
Kelvin, as he has his own encounter with the planet. The whole thing is a mind
trip and Lem builds out this whole edifice, not just of the planet and the
setting, but what amounts to several generations of what the various scientists
have done in trying to understand what Solaris is and what its existence means to
humankind. The book is a monumental act of worldbuilding. But as a book it
leaves something missing in terms of plot. Because you read all this and you
are waiting for something to happen as a reader in the 21<sup>st</sup> century,
but it is more psychological. No wonder the people who made it into the George
Clooney movie focused on him in the marketing material. Well, him and the
attractive woman. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Great Believers<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I cannot remember who recommended this to me, but I should
find out who it was and thank them.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Great Believers is an amazing and heartbreaking story of
a group of men coming of age in the 80s in gay Chicago. I must admit that a
part of the enjoyment was recognizing areas and bars mentioned in the text, but
the pull of the book is much more than that. Makkai really puts you there,
living in a different sort off plague that hits close to home here in 2020. It
broke my heart, several times, even though with the subject matter you know it
is going to find your gut and just punch you in there. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Lathe of Heaven<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have been working on an academic project about science
fiction and this book kept coming up as one of these foundational books in
terms of science fiction that makes you really think – science fiction but also
philosophy. It is in the same ballpark as Solaris or the Foundation Books.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In the book, the main character is in trouble because he has
been taking drugs. But the reason he has been taking drugs is that the dreams
he has sometimes reshape reality, he does not know what to do with that. So, he
goes to a doctor and instead of trying to cure him, the doctor tries to plant suggestions
in the main character’s mind so that his dreams will improve the world. The
result is that each thing he tries to do ends up with some sort of ironic side
effect. For example, to create peace on earth, an alien threat is created. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Ultimately, it is a quick and fin read but it falls in the
same sort of trap that Asimov and Lem fall into – once you create this world,
just what do you do with the people you have living in it. This is so much so
that references to the book hit at the idea created in the text and not the
plot of the text itself. <o:p></o:p></p>J. Edgar Mihelichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08735224229199089531noreply@blogger.com0