We're All Together, Simulacra

Words

Sat, 25 Aug 2012 15:47:35 -0700

insouciant, paroxysm, fetor, propinquity, eponym, denude, piquant, cadre, freegan

"The only remotely comparable experience in Walter’s life had been the first time he’d..."

Sat, 25 Aug 2012 14:20:00 -0700

“The only remotely comparable experience in Walter’s life had been the first time he’d masturbated, in Room 6 of the Whispering Pines, following the friendly instructions (“Use Vaseline”) provided by his cousin Leif. He’d been fourteen, and the pleasure had so dwarfed all previous known pleasures, and the outcome had been so cataclysmic and astonishing, that he’d felt like a sci-fi hero wrenched four-dimensionally from an aged planet to a fresh one. And Patty’s manuscript was similarly compelling and transformative. His reading of it seemed, like that first masturbation, to last a single instant. He stood up once, early on, to lock his office door, and then he was reading the last page, and it was exactly 10:12 a.m., and the sun beating on his office windows was a different sun from the one he’d always known. It was a yellowy, mean star in some strange, forsaken corner of the galaxy, and his own head was no less altered by the interstellar distance he’d traversed.”

- Freedom by Jonathan Franzen

Words

Thu, 23 Aug 2012 21:02:38 -0700

invidious, petropolitical, hoi polloi, comportment, gainsay

The Nice Man's Anger

Thu, 23 Aug 2012 11:15:52 -0700

Although Lalitha was a fast and somewhat reckless driver, Walter had come to prefer the anxiety of being her passenger to the judgmental anger that consumed him when he was at the wheel—the seemingly inescapable sense that, of all the drivers on the road, only he was traveling at exactly the right speed, only he was striking an appropriate balance between too punctiliously obeying traffic rules and too dangerously flouting them. In the last two years, he’d spent a lot of angry hours on the roads of West Virginia, tailgating the idiotic slowpokes and then slowing down himself to punish the rude tailgaters, ruthlessly defending the inner lane of interstates from assholes trying to pass him on the right, passing on the right himself when some fool or cellphone yakker or sanctimonious speed-limit enforcer clogged the inner lane, obsessively profiling and psychoanalyzing the drivers who refused to use their turn signals (almost always youngish men for whom the use of blinkers was apparently an affront to their masculinity, the compromised state of which was already manifest in the compensatory gigantism of their pickups and SUVs), experiencing murderous hatred of the lane-violating coal-truck drivers who caused fatal accidents literally once a week in West Virginia, impotently blaming the corrupt state legislators who refused to lower the coal-truck weight limit below 110,000 pounds despite bounteous evidence of the havoc they wreaked, muttering “Unbelievable! Unbelievable!” when a driver ahead of him braked for a green light and then accelerated through yellow and left him stranded at red, boiling while he waited afullminuteat intersections with no cross traffic visiblefor miles, and painfully swallowing, for Lalitha’s sake, the invective he yearned to vent when stymied by a driver refusing to make a legal right turn on red: “Hello? Get a clue? The world consists of more than just you! Other people have reality! Learn to drive! Hello?” Better the adrenaline rush of Lalitha’s flooring the gas to pass uphill-struggling trucks than the stress on his cerebral arteries of taking the wheel himself and remaining stuck behind those trucks. This way, he could look out at the gray matchstick Appalachian woods and the mining-ravaged ridges and direct his anger at problems more worthy of it.

From under What is Covering

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 17:02:00 -0700

Stick me in the bed of roses
and dig, dig me
up later
when the wind at your ears
cools to the rhythm
of the painstaking chain-gang
inside.

Need

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 01:09:23 -0700

Just time,
and it alone.

Binge

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 11:26:09 -0800

Had a 16-hour studying binge yesterday from 10AM to 4AM (sans 2-3:30 for class). I’m a little more than tired.

Some Light DFW Reading

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 00:06:50 -0800

Triptych n.

A picture or relief carving on three panels, typically hinged together vertically and used as an altarpiece.
A set of three associated artistic, literary, or musical works intended to be appreciated together.

Pablumize v.
To dumb down.

Unalloyed adj.

(of metal) Not alloyed; pure: “unalloyed copper”.
(chiefly of emotions) Complete and unreserved

Anaclitic adj.
Relating to or characterized by a strong emotional dependence on another or others.

Gestalt n.
An organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts.

Obverse n.
The side of a coin or medal bearing the head or principal design

Detente n.
The easing of tensions or strained relations (especially between nations).

Syncretic adj.
Relating to a historical tendency for a language to reduce its use of inflections; “modern English is a syncretic language”.

Spirant n./adj.
(of a consonant) Uttered with a continuous expulsion of breath.

Cognoscente n.
A connoisseur; a discerning expert.

Uxorious adj.
Having or showing an excessive or submissive fondness for one’s wife.

Mordant adj.
(esp. of humor) Having or showing a sharp or critical quality; biting.

Weltschmerz n.
A feeling of melancholy and world-weariness

Solmization n.
The act, practice, or system of using syllables to denote the tones of a musical scale.

Involution n.

The shrinkage of an organ in old age or when inactive, e.g., of the uterus after childbirth.

2. A function, transformation, or operator that is equal to its inverse, i.e., which gives the identity when applied to itself.

Decoct v.
To extract the essence of by boiling.

Bolus n. A small rounded mass of a substance, esp. of chewed food at the moment of swallowing. A...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:19:19 -0800

Bolus n.

A small rounded mass of a substance, esp. of chewed food at the moment of swallowing.
A type of large pill used in veterinary medicine.

New Books

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:08:07 -0800

I just finished A Visit From the Goon Squad and am now reading Super Sad True Love Story.

Holy shit I love literature.

Push

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:00:17 -0800

The feeling of falling behind; collapsing under my own weight. Periods lose their meaning as semicolons fatten and swell.

Get it together. Get it together.

To You, The Assclown

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 15:56:21 -0800

It’s one thing to be critiqued about the wanton use of multisyllabic words, but when they’re used with precision and skill, sans thesaurus, then the argument falls flat.

I should not have to apologize for using multisyllabic words that you do not understand. Instead, you should veil the pride you have for your ignorance you dense and tactless troglodyte.

What kind of repugnant and self-absorbed asshole throws out a disclaimer before stating, “These words are too big!”

Your imagination and intellect are too small. Deflate some of that sybaritic ego to make room for learning you consummate dolt.

Nike

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:58:14 -0800

activity weeps at the feet
of lethargy and its perpetual yawn,

will the crown to the other’s head
to weave the clock back just one more thread

No

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:55:21 -0800

who are you to gaze at me—
trippingly across a font
turned brackish by molting swans

Cryptomnesia n.Occurs when a forgotten memory returns without it being recognized as such by the...

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:54:00 -0800

Cryptomnesia n.
Occurs when a forgotten memory returns without it being recognized as such by the subject who believes it is something new and original—a type of memory bias.

Panoply n.
A complete or impressive collection of things.

Pastepot n.
A small container for paste.

Sine qua non n.
An essential condition.

“Most artists are brought to their vocation when their own nascent gifts are awakened by the work of a master. That is to say, most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one’s voice isn’t just an emptying and purifying of oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. Inspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.”

Lethem in The Ecstasy of Influence

Vertiginous adj.

Causing vertigo, esp. by being extremely high or steep.
Relating to or affected by vertigo.

Melange n.
Odds and ends; an assortment of things.

Logosphere n.
The interpretation of words’ meanings based on language and context.

Imago n.
1. The fully developed adult stage of an insect.
2. An idealized mental image of someone, especially a parent, that influences a person’s behavior.

Ingenue n.An actress who specializes in playing the role of an artless, innocent young girl. Ennui...

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:57:08 -0800

Ingenue n.
An actress who specializes in playing the role of an artless, innocent young girl.

Ennui n.
Listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement.

Blithe adj.
Showing a casual and cheerful indifference considered to be callous or improper

Slough n.
A swamp.

Non sequitur n.
A conclusion or statement that does not logically follow from the previous argument or statement.

Equable adj.
(of a person) not easily disturbed or angered; calm and even-tempered

"…the progression of his hair, dark to white, a horizon of years."

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:34:53 -0800

“…the progression of his hair, dark to white, a horizon of years.”

- Jonathan Lethem’s You Don’t Love Me Yet

You Don't Love Me Yet - Lethem

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 15:34:23 -0800

Ambit n.
The scope, extent, or bounds of something: “within the ambit of federal law.”

Whorl n.
1. A coil or ring, in particular:
[Zoology] each of the turns or convolutions in the shell of a gastropod or ammonoid mollusk

Against the Wind

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 01:43:11 -0800

sand the edge of your blade—
its twelve inches of measured hope
will fall to chance and its singular purpose

We're All Together, Simulacra

Words

"The only remotely comparable experience in Walter’s life had been the first time he’d..."

Words

The Nice Man's Anger

From under What is Covering

Need

Binge

More DFW Reading

Some Light DFW Reading

Bolus n. A small rounded mass of a substance, esp. of chewed food at the moment of swallowing. A...

New Books

Push

To You, The Assclown

Nike

No

Cryptomnesia n.Occurs when a forgotten memory returns without it being recognized as such by the...

Ingenue n.An actress who specializes in playing the role of an artless, innocent young girl. Ennui...

"…the progression of his hair, dark to white, a horizon of years."

You Don't Love Me Yet - Lethem

Against the Wind