Wednesday, February 20, 2013

"We call the moment at which this ache first arises..."

Though I don't wholly share his views on the subjects, I thoroughly enjoyed Michael Chabon's recent essay in the NYRB on the films of Wes Anderson.  It opens as follows:  

The world is so big, so complicated, so replete with marvels and surprises that it takes years for most people to begin to notice that it is, also, irretrievably broken. We call this period of research “childhood.”
There follows a program of renewed inquiry, often involuntary, into the nature and effects of mortality, entropy, heartbreak, violence, failure, cowardice, duplicity, cruelty, and grief; the researcher learns their histories, and their bitter lessons, by heart. Along the way, he or she discovers that the world has been broken for as long as anyone can remember, and struggles to reconcile this fact with the ache of cosmic nostalgia that arises, from time to time, in the researcher’s heart: an intimation of vanished glory, of lost wholeness, a memory of the world unbroken. We call the moment at which this ache first arises “adolescence.” The feeling haunts people all their lives.
Everyone, sooner or later, gets a thorough schooling in brokenness. The question becomes: What to do with the pieces? Some people hunker down atop the local pile of ruins and make do, Bedouin tending their goats in the shade of shattered giants. Others set about breaking what remains of the world into bits ever smaller and more jagged, kicking through the rubble like kids running through piles of leaves. And some people, passing among the scattered pieces of that great overturned jigsaw puzzle, start to pick up a piece here, a piece there, with a vague yet irresistible notion that perhaps something might be done about putting the thing back together again.


Friday, February 15, 2013

On the Road Again

Today the wife and I are heading out for a weekend vacation to The Eternal City, The City of Lights, The Big Easy, The Big Apple, Las Vegas.  We got offered a bunch of free stuff to stay at the Wynn, so, there we will stay.  Among the freebies offered were tickets to "Le Reve", their (I think?) Cirque-du-Soleil esque in house show.  Report to follow, maybe.  We're also planning on revisiting Sage, one of the best restaurants in Vegas, and site of one of our top five meals ever.  Anyone who wants me to place some big money on the upcoming baseball/basketball/football season should send me a text.  Or, if you just want me to put 200$ on the roulette wheel--we can do that too.

Back on Monday.

Friday, February 8, 2013

Too Much Tuna

I've been thinking about this skit ever since I saw it. I think it may be the funniest thing I've seen in a year. Or is it? It seems to me to border on brilliant--I laugh just thinking about it--but I'm curious if anyone else will have that reaction.  Is it only my odd, odd sense of humor that this appeals to?

At the very minimum I predict my brother will like this.