saperlipopette

— It’s like we bring a new pair of eyes and ears, a new...

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:14:09 -0500

— It’s like we bring a new pair of eyes and ears, a new mind, an entirely different person, he opined, to anything we experience for a second time.

— Sure, sure; I hear you, she replied. I know what you mean, kind of. Except … Except there has to be some sort of common agency that passes from each person as it transforms into a new one, right? I mean, how else could we know we’re encountering something for a second time?

— An author asked me a question the other day, and now I’m putting it to you: “How long is it since you’ve seen the sun rise?”

— Melas Kholê Oh, how lonesome it is, to be that one from whom...

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:14:18 -0400

— Melas Kholê

Oh, how lonesome it is, to be that one from whom no person shall ever wish to receive a visit.

Thousands of years ago, it was even believed that my visitations, which were never held to be anything but maleficent, were occasioned in persons exhibiting an excess of black bile.

I’d imagine that those who currently practice medicine have long since been disabused of so preposterous an idea.

Yet, despite its being wholly misinformed, the notion of black bile’s relation to changes in the human temperament has been stuck with me from what seems like time immemorial.

But hey, it’s only a name, right? Well, I guess it must be, for if I become manifest in a given person, the unlucky soul will soon find himself incapacitated, despairing, wishing only that his old Self might return to him and rescue him from a state of anguish and torment so horrific that, until this moment, he’d never once in his life contemplated the possibility that such depths of misery might even exist.

Bits of information gleaned from Harper’s...

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 04:26:54 -0400

Bits of information gleaned from Harper’s “Index” and “Findings”:

— Number of states where it is currently legal for schools to use corporal punishment on disabled students : 20

— Chances that an American child currently held in an urban juvenile detention center has a mental illness : 2 in 3

— Last year that the U.S. divorce rate was as high as in 2008 : 1970

— Percentage of U.S. women today who are “always, frequently or sometimes” embarrassed by their feet : 57

— Percentage of all U.S. health-care spending that goes to treating conditions caused by obesity : 9

— Biologists concluded that dogs arose, 16,000 years ago, among several hundred tame wolves living south of the Yangtze River, and that these original dogs likely were bred to be eaten.

— East Asians, in observing the faces of Western Caucasians, frequently mistake disgust for anger.

— Circadian-rhythm disruption was reported among binge-drinking hamsters.

— Physicians were afraid to ask the mentally ill to stop smoking.

— … scientists found that lobsters are repelled by the stench of their own dead.

— Titus the Gorilla King died in Rwanda.

“To be or not… To be: That is the question!” —...

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 17:43:00 -0400

“To be or not… To be: That is the question!”

— Un philosophe français dont je ne peux pas me souvenir du nom.

— gpoyw — takin’ a walk with satchmo. — only somewhat...

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:47:47 -0400

— gpoyw

— takin’ a walk with satchmo.

— only somewhat gratuitous, since you can see neither one of our visages.

Miserable are those days on which one is resigned to the odious...

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 16:06:33 -0400

Miserable are those days on which one is resigned to the odious undertaking of searching for stimulation. For how can he seek in any other manner than a miserable one the zealous enthusiasm that should compel his search in the first place?

Everyone knows that the search is not about what you’re after but how you get to what you’re after.

But what if what you’re after is just the ability to once again enjoy being after something?

L’autre soir, je me suis trouvé en face d’un...

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 11:53:33 -0400

L’autre soir, je me suis trouvé en face d’un chat.

Mesdames et messieurs, je dois vous dire que ce chat-là,

Il me parlait! Il me parlait! Voilà ce qu’il m’a dit:

It will happen to you as well, my friend,

Your journey will turn into a calm and quiet,

Blithe and serene slink into senescence.

“The Depot Tavern was presided over by the head of a...

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:10:40 -0400

“The Depot Tavern was presided over by the head of a twelve-point buck, whose look of resignation implied understanding of the fact that his antlers would never again be shed or renewed, a fate tempered by a festoon of Christmas tree bulbs which were, momentarily, seasonal, though he wore them with great forbearance whatever the solstice.”

— The Recognitions

— Sometimes I hear people express frustration when for one...

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 20:15:07 -0400

— Sometimes I hear people express frustration when for one reason or another they end up “settling” for something, as though whatever is being settled for were, by virtue of the fact that it’s being settled for, beneath that person, not good enough for him, holding him back or away from the richer/better version of that by which he has unfortunately allowed himself to be mired down.

— Yeah I hear people talk about this every now and again. I think people in this situation like to retain the idea that something perfect will still always be out there, waiting for them, even if they may wind up being too lazy to actually go find it; so what they do, they convince themselves that they’re acting sensibly by choosing to stick with what they’ve got, which also allows them to feel as though they’re exercising complete freedom of choice and at the same time leaves intact that notion that there still exists for them a potentially realizable ideal situation that they’ve just consciously given up in favor a simpler, stabler, and more conventional one.

Zach, I would just like to tell you that I found our dialogue both enjoyable and informative. —Je...

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 13:42:24 -0400

Zach, I would just like to tell you that I found our dialogue both enjoyable and informative.

—Je vous prie d’agréer, M. Nedlog, l’assurance de mes sentiments respectueux.

Bien amicalement, Benjamin.

“Insulting Dinosaur’s is like insulting Jesus” —My...

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:27:00 -0400

“Insulting Dinosaur’s is like insulting Jesus”

—My best friend Zach

I am posting this because… well, it’s just a plain-old funny line when seen by itself.

Although Zach, since (remember this is what you told me) there’s no way Jesus could be sacred to you (but, I must say, I heartily applaud your capitalizing the letter “J” despite your utter lack of religious conviction—GRAMMAR is, and will always be, more important than anything or anyone! REMEMBER THAT!), it’s as if, in that statement, you were insulting Dinosaur yourself. Based on the many conversations in which we’ve been engaged throughout the years, I think I can safely claim that you don’t care all that much for Jesus; so, I would’ve assumed that you’d have found the comparison itself offensive.

Anyway, Jesus, whether he was a man or a God or a man who was the son of a God, would probably have been a huge fan of Dinosaur (His favorite would be the one in Rochester, NY).

I woke up this morning and thought to myself: “I have so...

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:41:50 -0400

I woke up this morning and thought to myself: “I have so much to do—I have this, that, the thing out East, and the thing out West, things uptown, downtown, and all around town.” The funny thing, though, is that I never get so far as to worry about anything specific, which is both good and bad—good, because at least I’m not actually worrying about all those things I’m worried that I’m worrying about! This is also why my worrying is bad; it has no object (other than itself, that is).

So what I do then, to put it plain and simple, is worry about worrying.

I’ll try to work on it.

I also don’t like having TO DO SO MANY THINGS, day in, day out. Nowadays people will give you the stink eye if you tell ‘em you like relaxing at home with a book or movie. Well, maybe they won’t give you the stink eye if they’re of the polite sort.

I don’t mind hanging out with friends; I love it!

But I don’t know why people in NYC always want to meet at bars: they are WAY too loud (why the hell should I meet with someone inside of one of the many thousands of rooms in this city in which conditions have been perfectly constructed such that conversation inside them is all but impossible).

Nowadays I can’t relax when I try to. I choose certain times of the day during which I plan to take a break from work and just sit around for a while. It’s not long after I’ve sat down, however, before I’m back on my feet, pacing back and forth, worrying about the different ways one can relax, whether the one I’ve chosen will actually provide repose, and finally I start fretting over the fact that I’m not relaxing yet, because there are so many choices and my indecision is detracting from my R&R time. I can understand without difficulty the irony of relaxation’s stressing me out, but I’m still too agitated to appreciate it.

Dawn was nigh. He sat staring into the magnificent celestial sea...

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 12:43:00 -0400

Dawn was nigh. He sat staring into the magnificent celestial sea retreating above him, following with his gaze the night’s mechanized seafarers’ final fantastic flights across their beloved ocean, and thought to himself: “What business have I, or any of my friends, in the sky?”

— Sometimes I find myself thinking about all those times when I...

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 17:35:01 -0400

— Sometimes I find myself thinking about all those times when I find myself thinking about other times when I all I could do was think about other times I was thinking. This is what happens when I have nothing important to think about. I do the same thing when I worry—when I worry, it’s never actually about anything important. For example, if I am obliged to speak in public I will get nervous. First because I have to speak in front of people, and that just makes me nervous. But then I start getting nervous that I will get nervous when the time for speaking arrives. This doesn’t make sense; if I’m nervous about getting nervous, then I’m already nervous, right? So then I worry about getting nervous about getting nervous about being nervous.

“—We have to follow Emerson’s advice to treat people as though they were real, because, perhaps they are… “

—W.G.

I am convinced I’ve seen it before. This image, which in...

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 15:59:36 -0400

I am convinced I’ve seen it before. This image, which in the nighttime assumes a strange, oneiric air. Although many a manifestation has proven me to be mistaken in yesteryear.

Many have likely already seen this photo, but, since it’s...

Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:33:58 -0400

Many have likely already seen this photo, but, since it’s so astounding, I thought it might be a nice to post it again, lest anyone remain still in the dark about the phenomenon that is thumb man.

“—The sky is a roof, with windows in it for rain to fall...

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 13:59:56 -0400

“—The sky is a roof, with windows in it for rain to fall through. People live up there, you see. And if you climb up high enough you can visit them.”

—WG

(Janáček, Sonata for Violin and Piano, IV. Adagio.)

From Harper’s “Index” and...

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 13:54:45 -0400

From Harper’s “Index” and “Findings”—

— Chance a U.S. household that owns a Prius also owns an SUV : 1 in 3

— Average number of calories by which Americans underestimate the total in a hamburger and fries : 463

— Minimum number of Americans named either John or Jane Doe : 212

— Number of spam emails sent for every one that receives a response : 12,414,000

— Estimated number of U.S. adults who believe the media did not adequately cover Michael Jackson’s death : 6,500,000

— [M]ale orchid bees stick out their legs to remain stable in high winds, and…bumblebees stay aloft through brute force.

— Invasive wasps were eating pheasants in Hawaii. “You see them flying with their balls of meat,” said an entomologist of the wasps.

— Engineers created a “95 percent accurate” thought-controlled wheelchair, a tongue-controlled wheelchair, and a dune buggy for the blind.

— Bathwater may be bad for babies.

“Taste changes, he went on in an irritating monotone....

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 11:14:44 -0400

“Taste changes, he went on in an irritating monotone. —Most forgeries last only a few generations, because they’re so carefully done in the taste of the period, a forged Rembrandt, for instance, confirms everything that that period sees in Rembrandt. Taste and style change, and the forgery is painfully obvious, dated, because the new period has discovered Rembrandt all over again, and of course discovered him to be quite different.”

—W.G.

We spoke the other day about blank moments—we all experience...

Fri, 11 Sep 2009 13:28:28 -0400

We spoke the other day about blank moments—we all experience them, at some point or another, usually more than once if we’re lucky. He told me that he’d spent a lot of time thinking, speaking, and writing about these ecstatic moments during which he almost feels as if his self or his sense of integrity had evaporated. Though that’s really not the best way to put it, he said, since I can only feel the loss of something if I’m conscious that it’s gone. — That’s not the feeling, no, far from it; that’s just what I feel after the fact, he went on.

—Sometimes, when I’m reading a book, I get the sense that whatever it is that elicits the feeling in me is lying dormant somewhere in the text. But, usually, once I’m aware that I’m chasing after it, that feeling, it starts to recede even quicker. It’s kind of like a fog on the road that’s always a few feet in front of you and no matter how fast you try to drive up to it it stays in front of you, teasing you like the carrot in those cartoons that hang from a stick, tied to a dog’s head; the dog chases after it, and maybe he even knows it’s useless to do so, but he still does it.

—Whenever I actually feel it though, I know that IT is grabbing me, and not the other way around; I’m never the one in control, it comes and goes whenever it feels like it. I can usually tell when it’s coming; but at this point, when it’s inchoate, and… almost wraithlike, if that makes sense, I have to be very careful about not accidentally chasing it off. I know that if I start think about it it’ll dissolve on the spot; so I try not to think about it—the hardest part is not thinking about trying not to think about it. But once it finally hits, I don’t worry anymore, I can’t worry—not even about worrying that I’m going to worry. Once it’s percolated through me entirely, I just stop thinking; not necessarily because I’m unable to think… I guess it’s because I feel so completely full, literally and figuratively, that there’s no reason to think… no reason to worry, wonder, or speculate about anything.