10K Day

Hey guys! It's my 10,000th day alive! On earth! (Thanks mom and dad!) Here's how I'ma celebrate:

• see 10,000 birds
• build the future with 10,000 Tuvaluans
• be one of Pennsylvania's 10,000 friends
• brand 10,000 lakes (not sure this is such a great idea, actually)
• synchronize myself with the 10,000 year clock
• visit the valley of 10,000 smokes
• interpret 10,000 dreams
• follow the path of 10,000 Greek mercenaries

Here's how you can celebrate: Learn more about the number 10,000. Find your own 10K Day. Come find me at Matchbox tonight. Be merry.

ghostwrite the whip

http://www.gensleron.com/cities/2012/3/15/what-will-it-take-to-make-navy-pier-a-real-place.html

Scenes from the Green Line

Coming through the Loop in one of those midday rush hours that sometimes hits the Green Line. Suddenly our car falls silent and we're listening to a father explain how birds can't burp, so they can't eat anything with air in it.

Sun falls in slants along the car and we wait, for a moment as rapt and open as his two girls.

"You mean like pop?" the older one asks. She's maybe seven? Children's ages are hard to pin down. She's wearing some kind of generic shirt with sparkly letters on front. Sagging striped leggings. The younger one balances, bloblike, on his lap.

"Yeah, just like that."

"They can't burp?" She's suspicious.

"Yeah, so no gas. Or else they'll die."

She gets quiet, folded into herself a little, hands clenched in her lap. We hold our breath. He goes on, careful, casually. "I had a bird once, a parrot. His name was George."

"George?” the eldest says.

“Mm-hmmm.”

“Well that's not a very birdlike name!”

"It's not?"

"I wouldn’t call it George. I would call it...Birdy!"

And there it was. In the decisiveness of her tone and the childishness of her answer and the way he pulled her in with one arm. Their entire future. We sort of relaxed our attention, turning back to books and ipods and city outside, knowing that he would never get tired of her. Never stop giving his tenderness and time, because she needed them. That between them there was this indelible love, because she was the same as him, an ambulatory part of him.

"Mbababaa," the littler one said.

The Writing Life

This is the kind I wants:

Ms. Szymborska lived most of her life in modest conditions in the old university city of Krakow, working for the magazine Zycie Literackie (Literary Life). She published a thin volume of her verse every few years.

That's it. A quiet life. Every day full of letters and thoughts that once in a great while bubble over onto the page.

This from the New York Times' obit of Wislawa Szymborska, a reclusive Polish poet who won the Nobel prize in 1996.  Below is the entirety of one of the poems quoted in their article. It's really kind of perfect.

Cat in an Empty Apartment

Dying--you wouldn't do that to a cat.

For what is a cat to do
in an empty apartment?
Climb up the walls?
Brush up against the furniture?
Nothing here seems changed,
and yet something has changed.
Nothing has been moved,
and yet there's more room.
And in the evenings the lamp is not on.

One hears footsteps on the stairs,
but they're not the same.
Neither is the hand
that puts a fish on the plate.

Something here isn't starting
at its usual time.
Something here isn't happening
as it should.
Somebody has been here and has been,
and then has suddenly disappeared
and now is stubbornly absent.
All the closets have been scanned
and all the shelves run through.
Slipping under the carpet and checking came to nothing.
The rule has even been broken and all the papers scattered.
What else is there to do?
Sleep and wait.

Just let him come back,
let him show up.
Then he'll find out
that you don't do that to a cat.
Going toward him
faking reluctance,
slowly,
on very offended paws.
And no jumping, purring at first.

“The question of repetition is very important. It is important because there is no such thing as repetition. There is always a slight variation. Somebody comes in and you tell the story over again. Every time you tell the story it is told slightly differently.”

-Gertrude Stein

Lately I've been thinking about repetition and its disproportionate power to amplify and modify the thing it's talking about, simply through its own insistence on itself. It's lovely that Stein was the one who said this, because her work reveals that, while linguistic content may be reduplicated, a reader's understanding of, interest in and emotional connection to that content exists in perpetual flux. The thing is, it's not just that the reader changes, but that the repetition changes them.

See also: blues music. See also: the Loops episode of Radiolab.

your new favorite emoticon

t(*-*t)



give it a second

It is Marvellous to Wake Up Together

It is marvellous to wake up together
At the same minute; marvellous to hear
The rain begin suddenly all over the roof,
To feel the air suddenly clear
As if electricity had passed through it
From a black mesh of wires in the sky.
All over the roof the rain hisses,
And below, the light falling of kisses.

An electrical storm is coming or moving away;
It is the prickling air that wakes us up.
If lighting struck the house now, it would run
From the four blue china balls on top
Down the roof and down the rods all around us,
And we imagine dreamily
How the whole house caught in a bird-cage of lightning
Would be quite delightful rather than frightening;

And from the same simplified point of view
Of night and lying flat on one's back
All things might change equally easily,
Since always to warn us there must be these black
Electrical wires dangling. Without surprise
The world might change to something quite different,
As the air changes or the lightning comes without our blinking,
Change as our kisses are changing without our thinking.

- Elizabeth Bishop

rough drafts

Via Wikipedia:

Sexting is the act of sending sexually explicit messages or photographs, primarily between mobile phones.

A few potential alternatives:

• psexting: the act of sending psychologically explicit messages about your sexual subconscious
• nexting: the act of breaking up with someone explicitly, primarily between mobile phones
• hexting: the act of cursing someone explicitly, primarily between mobile phones
• flexting: the act of explicitly bragging about your musculature
• texmexting: the act of convincing someone to grab tacos with you later tonight
• lexting: the act of sending explicit legal advice, primarily between mobile phones
• kleenexting: the act of explicitly asking someone to pick up a few basic household necessities for the apartment, as long as they're out

The Adventure Calendar Has Returned !

That is all.

Home Chronicles

From the Wikipedia article on silva rerum:

In historical Poland it was written by members of the szlachta (Polish nobility) as a diary or memoir for the entire family, recording family traditions, among other matters; they were not intended for a wider audience of printing (although there were a few exceptions); some were also lent to friends of the family, who were allowed to add their comments to them. It was added to by many generations, and contained various information: diary-type entires on current events, memoirs, letters, political speeches, copies of legal documents, gossips, jokes and anecdotes, financial documents, economic information (price of grain, etc.), philosophical musings, poems, genealogical trees, advice (agricultural, medical, moral) for the descendants and others - the wealth of information in silva is staggering, they contain anything that their authors wished to record for future generations)

--Once, my rommates and I started a sort of intragenerational silva. It traveled the world with us for about a year before fizzling out. How illuminating it would be to read now. What a perfect time capsule of our brains working together for that year, thinking of each other, trying to provoke each other to laugh or ponder or create.

Spin-off diary ideas:
Couples' diary (a la the Hawthornes)
Family cookbook
Commonplace book (a la Lovecraft)

(via)

i started a youtube channel

so far only posting videos of brass bands.



http://www.youtube.com/user/StrictlyTits

asparagus pee

frankly, it's always delighted me. visceral proof of the body's digestive system at work. a sort of gross magic. but apparently some people don't make smelly pee? and some people do, but can't smell it? in brief:

"Asparagus contains a sulfur compound called mercaptan. It is also found in onions, garlic, rotten eggs, and in the secretions of skunks," they wrote. "The signature smell occurs when this substance is broken down in your digestive system. Not all people have the gene for the enzyme that breaks down mercaptan, so some of you can eat all the asparagus you want without stinking up the place. One study published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology found that only 46 percent of British people tested produced the odor while 100 percent of French people tested did."

yo, those are my people yo.

perhaps the greatest thing i've ever done

i did it last night.

yes that's right i guest-live-blogged for the world's pre-eminent videogames and booze pairing website, Videogames and Booze Dot Blogspot Dot Com.

Check out the coverage ex post facto here. Then peep the rest of the website as Ben's got a pretty good thing going over there. And then come back here because we miss you ever so much when you're gone.

lay.over

Image: Saul Steinberg

halfway between mardi gras and home, my flight got canceled. i write this from the giantest, fluffiest bed in memphis, tennessee, where i've already gorged on unlimited wi-fi and peed in their pool. twice. breakfast this morning is cold pizza because apparently nobody does continental breakfast anymore? also availed myself of a few piping hot showers, wherein i managed to scrub most of the grime of last week off my skin. t-shirt still smells like wet cigarette, though, and sweat and leftover glitter. you're welcome, future seat partner.

most of mardi gras was spent dancing to/marching with/screaming at the what cheer? brigade from providence, ri. similar to this, actually, but with 100% less sage francis.

what I missed on the internet while i was gone: the making of Pharcyde's 'Drop' (you know: that Spike Jonze joint with all the backwards?). Here we learn a) there are cool jobs for linguists (DUH.NO.DUH), b) there are cool jobs for linguists in hip hop, and c) goddammit Pharcyde what happened to our love? Seriously, was it something I said? I want you back! I'll do whatever it takes.

Biggie's last interview with the Source magazine, re-run.

You know how most articles about 'what teh innarnets is doing to our brainz' either focus on how it's ruining us or how it's turning us into uber-menschen? And how both takes are overly-facile, limited readings of a pretty complex, incompletely-understood process? This guy gets it closer to right. I especially enjoyed thinking about how our transition to online memory storage is similar to what happened when we first started inscribing things in books.

The Roots' Picnic drool-worthy lineup. June 4. Who's with me?

Currently digging Aleon Craft, dude doing future-hop out of Georgia. Sounds like he's circling the planet in a spaceship from Saturn, transmitting bizarre beats and made-you-blink lyrics directly to your brain.

"We think of artistic processes as male sexual processes. You ejaculate on the canvas (Jackson Pollack to Dash Snow). You write a book and then you bind and print it, the end. And then if you want to write another book the whole process starts over again from the beginning. But what if art is a female sexual process? If there is no refractory period? What if orgasm just leads to more orgasm? More spending? More paintings, more poems, more posts on a website? Every day there is five dollars and a sunset." ---Please start reading This Recording. You won't regret it.

.....aaaaannnd if you're in Chicago this Sunday, check out my friend Becket's show. i'll be there. so will becket. 'nuff said.

2010: a good year for words

these were my favorites!

The (Diblos) Notebook, James Merrill

A friend lent me this book and made me promise to return it when I was done. Instead, I moved to Chicago. hahahaha take THAT, friend! Merrill is first and foremost a poet. It shows. Done in the style of a novelist's notebook, Merrill uses telegraphic jottings, real-life reminiscences, crossed-out paragraphs, lists and fragments to create his story. Together, these impressions create a tale all the more complete for its shattered telling.

Travels in Siberia, Ian Frazier

Maybe it's cheating to include this one since I'm not finished with it yet. But so far it's really good!! Frazier shares his obsession with, and travels in, the Russian continent. He also remixes a fair amount of Siberian history without coming across too droney. I'm confused, though. Why is it taking me so long to finish this book? I've seriously been at it for weeks. Maybe Frazier wants to replicate the experience of traveling in Siberia through his prose?? If so: I'm onto you, you sneaky fuck.

Fun Home, Alison Bechdel

Sometimes, halfway through a book, you realize you're reading too quickly. You don't want it to end, so you start to slooowwwww dooowwwnnn. Lingering on every word. Pausing between sentences to stare out the window. Setting the book aside for hours. Wandering around your house. Resisting its gravitational pull. This was like that for me.

Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice, Mark J. Plotkin, Ph.D.

Some notes from my envelope bookmark: "Alkaloids in plants manifest as bitterness. This astringency clues people in to a compound's medicinal and poisonous properties." "Often the only difference between a medicine and a poison is dosage." "Medieval witches used broomsticks to apply alkaloid-rich substances to body parts with high concentrations of nerve endings and blood vessels. People who said that witches 'flew' were probably referring obliquely to them tripping." "A Tirio shaman: 'At night I slept underwater and made love to the spirit of the river.'" You probably already know if this shit sounds cool to you.

belated

      My birthday began with the water-

Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name   

      Above the farms and the white horses

                  And I rose   

            In rainy autumn

And walked abroad in a shower of all my days.

-from Dylan Thomas' Poem in October

I

Bookmarked: "Drawing, for many people, is that phantom skill they remember having in elementary school, when they drew with great relish and abandon." - from Line by Line, the New York Times' new how-to drawing blog.

Tibetan butter tea, the most elusive tea of all.


Image:  Make a comic book from a single sheet of paper.

“I took a deep breath and listened to the old bray of my heart. I am. I am. I am.” - Sylvia Plath

The Apiary Corp. published a literary magazine! If you're in Philadelphia next weekend, stop by Light + Honey, our multi-arts magazine release party.

Back

Hopefully to resume regular-ish posting over the next couple of days.

Tonight I board a plane for the jungles of the southern hemisphere. Panthers and zip lines and dolphins, oh my! As if this larger-than-life magical fantasy trip isn't enough, my return from Peru finds me thrown into a car headed for the Great Taste of the Midwest, the region's largest beer festival. Then, if I'm lucky, a quick side-trip to the House on the Rock. Summer 2010, here I come!

See you soon,
Tianasaurus

update

Just when we'd built up some steam here at Smoking Z, I had to go and break schedule. I'm not angry at myself so much as disappointed. And posting's only going to get more erratic for the foreseeable future. I got a job with the Census (yesssssss) and have learned that, besides confidentiality and data stewardship, one of their main tenants of belief is apparently limited Internet access. My office employs more than 30 people but I only counted 9 computers when I came for training last Friday. Don't worry. I have a plan. I'll keep compulsively saving links and articles for your perusing pleasure and will try to disgorge them at least once a week. Smoking Zora: now available in concentrate!

On Monday the health care reform bill had me super jazzed. The anti-choice executive order attached to it? Not so much.

Also impressed by Google finally taking a stand against government censorship in China.

Didn't know anything about Margaret Moth, the CNN camerawoman who died recently, but she sure does sound like a bad-ass lady.


What I wouldn't give to be a lector for a living. Typesetter could be cool too: a list of now-obsolete jobs.

"What one rarely sees is a reconfiguration of liberal premises to put women’s rights, interests, needs, and priorities at the center. Indeed, the rise of conservative Christianity has caused far too many liberals to dream that benign neglect of women’s rights (reproductive rights especially), gay rights, and church/state separation would make possible some grand economic-progressive alliance for a new New Deal." How liberalism has failed women.

Here's a neat trick: tell this guy the last five books you read and he'll suggest your next.

Thirteen ways of looking at Liz Lemon.

This guy reviewing The Carter claims he used to hang out with Lil Wayne and, like all of us, is saddened by what he sees in Wayne's future.


Image: Part of a collection celebrating World Water Day, March 22.