I
Among twenty posts,
The only moving thing
Was the Hitler meme.
II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
With three Disqus personae.
III
The litblog whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a big part of the procrastination.
IV
A man and a litblog
Are one.
A man and a woman and a litblog
Are a VIDA pie chart.
V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of turning on the computer
Or the beauty of turning it off,
The moment you hit send
Or just after.
[Matchup #39 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Daily Facebook Food Updates
As I write this comparison I am eating a burrito composed of Eden Organic Black Beans (no salt added), Seapoint Farms Veggie Blends with Edamame (the wonder veggie), Sunripe sweet grape tomatoes, and Sabra brand, all natural spicy guacamole; the burrito is topped with diced red onions, Polly-O shredded low-moisture part-skim mozzarella (an excellent source of calcium), and Cholula Chili Lime flavor hot sauce, and while enjoying it very much, I admit that my meal is tainted by a somewhat wistful wish that I had a liberal dollop or sour cream or perhaps even crème fresh with which to adorn one of the two large whole wheat tortillas given to me, gratis, by Rock, the Korean owner/operator of the grocery on the first floor of my building in downtown Manhattan’s Financial District. I feel I should explain that my wistfulness is perhaps due primarily to the fact that I’ve only recently returned from a vacation in Tulum, Mexico—an important vacation for a variety of reasons not relevant here—wherein I was continually treated to vast quantities of high quality, though often quite simple, Mexican food, made from fresh local (though doubtless not “organic”) ingredients, and prepared with dutiful attention and care by people whose sincere smiles smashed through my preconceived notions about the disdain and disgruntled attitudes my presence might inspire in the local population. READ MORE >
Richard Russo offered an opinion on Amazon’s ill-advised price comparison promotion. Farhard Manjoo thinks bookstores are difficult to use (?) and just hates having to get book recommendations from a human being instead of an algorithm. He simply cannot understand why everything is so much cheaper at Amazon. I am not anti-Amazon but this guy is being willfully ignorant. Amazon is pretty open about their willingness to operate at staggering losses to undercut competitors. By Manjoo’s thinking, booksellers should probably just give books away for free to compete, to benefit the greater good of affordability and convenience.
[Matchup #38 in Tournament of Bookshit]
NaNoWriMo
Central question: Can everyone be a writer?
Slogan: Thirty days and nights of literary abandon!
Duration: One month (but up to 1/12th of a person’s life if they get trapped in some hellish circle of annual NaNoWriMo’s.)
Overall effect on literature: High probability of resulting in shitty novel.
Contains a pronounced pseudo-acronym
Likelihood of sanity loss: High, but momentary READ MORE >
[Matchup #37 in Tournament of Bookshit]
‘everybody has a story’
Right off I’ll bypass the obvious sphincter analogy here and instead say: I’m willing to embrace this everybody-has-a-story-notion as a hypothetical. At an abstract level, it speaks to the unlimited potential for human creativity, the idea that if we turn inward long enough and well enough we can eventually locate and activate that nascent Shakespeare hidden in all of us. Okay, pretty trippy, but sure. It all reminds me of that psychedelic scene from the gnostic gospel of St. Thomas when Jesus turns to his disciples and says: “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” Of course it’s not the easiest of orders if what you’re attempting to bring forth is serious literature or great art. With stakes like that suddenly self-destruction seems not only possible, but plausible, maybe even inevitable. This, I suppose, is why it seems like so many of our best scribes are bad livers with bad livers. In saecula saeculorum. READ MORE >
A lot of people—or, in truth, absolutely no people—have been asking me what my Top 50 Black Metal Albums of 2011 are.
So, here they are. I love all 50 equally, and do not have them numbered. If you can think of any that deserve honorable mention, anything I have forgotten, leave the name in the comments section and I will maybe tell you why I didn’t include them, or apologize because I should’ve included them.
Verg by Necrolocust
Vreg by Locustcorpse
Turgal by Trugla
Groluck by Stunefier READ MORE >
[Matchup #36 in Tournament of Bookshit]
I know what you’re thinking: clearly the answer is “Having an opinion about MFA rankings.”
But we have to work with what’s given us which means other possible solutions (“Garamond,” and “Fetishizing experimentation while hating on those who fetishize narrative” among them) are left unavailable as is information seemingly vital to out trial. Do these online literary journals actually have sub-editors? Are these bowties pre-tied? Is this a wedding? If the editor-and-chief marries a sub-editor does the sub-editor move up in rank? Does the rank require a uniform? Does the uniform require a bowtie?
Clearly the answer is “Writing a Story That Uses the Word Pus.” READ MORE >
