a list of common and uncommon collocations, encountered in my reading of the last couple of weeks

measures for the prevention of accidents
men of worth
invariably declined
extensive insights
chains of association
restless capital
prevailing sense
neurotic restlessness
disorganized capitalism

primary ghost
resident specter
unplanned sadness
violin curves of the church
ragged claws
the republic of translation
practiced insomniac
subliminal recesses
linguistically biodegradable
ontological heart condition
the shadow of God
the hidden world
uncertain step
tempting comestibles

Things we like IX, or, why I'm willing to stick it out till the apocalypse

1) Edward Gorey’s AMAZING ENVELOPES;

2) The sensation of not having died in a plane crash;

3) When aforementioned yet still relatively obscure Hungarian authors try to suddenly go all hipster on you (“I’m sure I could name ten new rock groups from 2011 that you haven’t even heard of”), and you can retort (at least in your head), “With all due respect, Mr. Krasznahorkai, two erotic gay photographers from Berlin introduced me to Joan as Police Woman in 2007 when we [my friend and I] were circumstantially obligated to share a group train ticket with them,” and not be exaggerating. 

4) Charlie Chaplin AND Buster Keaton IN THE SAME FILM. 

4) The beautiful things Robert Downey, Jr.’s hair must be doing under that hat:

Paris: la belle, la bête, et le what now?

Amazing things about Paris:

1) WARM BAGUETTES: The best things ever. Somehow I’ve had incredible luck for three days running, and have never yet walked home with a less-than-piping-hot baguette.

2) Chocolate éclairs: OH. MON. DIEU. The best things ever, after warm baguettes. Didn’t realize they were chocolate when I bought them — I mean, they had chocolate on top, of course — but they had chocolate mousse inside, and I bit into one and almost died right then and there of happiness.

3) Daily life in Paris can be rather complicated and difficult, which means that even tiny victories (e.g. food) can be celebrated all out of proportion. Perfect example: learned today that my super-fancy, cutting-edge contact lens solution is available here, albeit it for €18/ginormous bottle. Danced all the way home.

Less-than-amazing things about Paris:

1) The national telecom company blacklist, which I have inexplicably found myself on. (Now, true, I have had fantasies about getting into some sort of political trouble in a foreign country, but I was hoping to be able to say something more along the lines of, “Ah, Liechtenstein! Yes, I was once deported from Liechtenstein,” and less, “I was blacklisted by every phone company in France for a while.”) After paying an exorbitant fee, I have freed myself from this blacklist, but only after “twelve to fifteen days” of processing time. Because they who control the blacklist don’t have computers, I guess, and so need to inform each other of my acquittal by carrier pigeon.

2) Not nearly enough executive transvestites hanging around with mice, cats, and monkeys.

Incredibly weird things about Paris: there’s only a need for one: Marie Antoinette’s dulcimer-playing android. Android, as in Data, only in the eighteenth century.

geometry, currency, holography; or, everything is so much more real in winter!

Out of the illiteracy of summer (to which not all are susceptible, but I most certainly am), comes other, more volatile, obsessions. If I were in 18th century France, this might mean seduction and heresy, but here in the boonies, where our egos are kept in check by the lightning and alien rock formations, summer obsessions take on an altogether more inhuman character. At the moment, I cannot relinquish thoughts of:

1. Crystals- quite literally the ordering of flows. the science of how you get something geometrical to emerge from something which is not is clear, but this doesn't make the act of finding a crystal in the dirt any less astounding. The experience always has an extra-terrestrial tinge to it, as does everything, really, which reminds you that the earth is first and foremost a geological entity. Björk and Gondry, are, as usual, extremely adept at capturing this sublime strangeness.

2. Money- not the accumulation of it, but its endless, irrational coming and going. My current line of work puts me smack-dab in the middle of infinite arbitrary exchanges, and I have tried to explain to Madeleine time after time how hypnotic this becomes. I wonder, really, if this, and not the promise of reward, is what drives gamblers. For this reason I have also developed an unhealthy interest in the 2-dollar bill, which is rare enough these days that it seems to create jams and blockages whenever used as legal tender. This summer I have received two, a suitably clunky number.

3. The secret behind our pixelated reality! If only tabloids would run this kind of story. Come winter, doubtless, I will find this completely ridiculous and untenable. But, for now, I am a hologram.

By contrast

There are things that make me ashamed of America, like this inane and infuriating piece about why the world would be safer with more guns; and things that make me proud, like Roy Harris’ Symphony No. 3, parts I and II.

There are delightful examples of graphic design with minimal fuss, like these posters by Christian Jackson for children’s stories:

And examples of graphic design with minimal soul power, like this collection of default profile pictures. I want to know: why there are multiple hipsters and robots (not to mention the wailing baby), and (more importantly), why the defaults always seem to be male. Oh, that robot is a woman, you say? My mistake.

Aaaaaand: most exciting (but not necessarily obvious) list of books ever; most outrageously obvious scientific finding ever.

Things we like VIII

1) Superhero movies!! At least the ones that don’t suck, like Captain America (and unlike Thor, though it pains me to say it, as someone who considers Norse mythology her comfort literature and worships Branagh’s Henry V). Am also now super-excited for The Avengers next summer, since it will apparently involve inter-dimensional travel, eyepatches, requisite mad scientists, and, most importantly, more Tony Stark.

2) The way that manatees a) walk along the sea floor with their flippers and b) sleep. Also, whenever they aren’t eating up to 10% of their body weight, they’re sleeping. I would make an excellent manatee.

3) The Once and Future King by T.H. White. I’ve probably started this book five or six times in my life, always loved starting it, but never got around to actually finishing it. This time am utterly resolved. Currently 100 pages in and adoring it.

4) Proper nouns that sound like adjectives (why are they inevitably British?): e.g. Cavendish; Standish.

Things we like VII

1) Ataraxia, which is absolutely not my current state, and which therefore seems like a worthy goal;

2) English words of Anglo-Saxon descent:

3*) the fact that most anagrams of my name have to do with destruction and disease: Malady Rued, Lauded Army, Mauled Yard, Dreamy Dual.

* doesn’t really deserve to be included in “things we like”; would do better in “things we find amusing and mildly disturbing”

4) this incredibly sad letter from Marilyn Monroe to her psychiatrist, Dr. Ralph Greenson;

5) Leonard Bernstein’s birthday card to Aaron Copland, 1967:

Dear A:

It’s two days before your birthday, but I’m already thinking hard and tenderly about you; and this note is your birthday present carrying with it such abiding love as I rarely if ever get to express to you in our occasional meetings. I don’t know if you’re aware of what you mean, have meant for 30 years, to me and my music and so many of my attitudes to life and to people. I suppose if there’s one person on earth who is at the center of my life it’s you; and day after day I recognize in my living your presence, your laugh, your peculiar mixture of intensity and calm. . . . I hope you live forever.

A long strong hug —

Lenny

kinds of freedom

I’m slightly in shock and don’t really know how to respond to this news about bin Laden — for one thing, I found about it from friends’ Facebook statuses, and that alone kind of freaked me out — and then there were the exhumed 9/11 memories to be dealt with —and then there was the fact that even though bin Laden was (to borrow a phrase from Eddie Izzard) a mass-murdering fuckhead, my country still assassinated somebody, and I can’t really accept the equation of that to “justice being served.”

So between feeling deeply confused about all that and anxiety about my show opening this week (The Odd Couple — do come see it, if you’re in the area!), I slept terribly and feel rather out of it, and am compelled to make lists.

Things that make me feel human:

1) I don’t care how many mediocre films Woody Allen has made, he is still my hero forever just for this scene: a minute and a half of Manhattan.

2) Mozart probably didn’t know this, but he wrote Don Giovanni for Cecilia Bartoli: Batti, Batti, O Bel Masetto.

3) Ai Weiwei (whose name [Ài; 艾] is a homophone for ‘love’ [ài; 愛]) is fighting for freedom of speech in China, has been censored and harassed by the government for years, and is now being held in custody for undefined “economic crimes.” Here is his TED video.

Things we like V: undeniable trends [aka the year in review]

1. An analysis of my reading habits in 2010:

Books that I read, cover to cover: approximately 30.

Books that I spent a good deal of time reading, but either started and didn’t finish, or read only lengthy excerpts of: approximately 25.

2. Norwegian men of the year (to qualify one must be named Edvard): Munch and Grieg.

3. Apichatpong Weerasethakul (one of my new favorite people) and his film, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives. The film won the Palme d’Or at Cannes and, praise the Queen!, was showing in London, where I finally saw it and became entirely enamored. There is a v. nice summary of Uncle Boonmee here, though I also highly recommend putting the original Thai title into Google translate:

4. The difference between the real and the surreal, more specifically: my increasing inability to distinguish them. There is reality TV, for one thing, which shouldn’t be real but is, and then obviously wax people who are not made of wax, and women laughing alone with salad.

5. Hedonism, which often takes the form of a search for the perfect chocolate muffin (found, at long last, on Charing Cross Road). As we were snacking on the street, my friend whom I was with declared, “This is the best muffin in the entire world. I like that I can be v. hedonistic around you.”

6. Commemorating instances of cosmic unfairness and/or explaining medieval literature by writing limericks.

7. Ai Weiwei, his ethics, and his beautiful beautiful sunflower seeds.

8. Quantum entanglement, which sounds, like most things, better in German: Quantenverschränkung.

Things we like III

1) This beautiful and inspiring TED talk by Zainab Salbi on Women, wartime and the dream of peace. Salbi grew up in war-torn Iraq and is the founder of Women for Women International, which works to help women in post-war zones rebuild their lives and communities. She’s a passionate and eloquent speaker, and she quotes Rumi, so of course I love her.

2) Fereshteh Najafi, who is like an Iranian Paul Klee. I particularly like her series Tara, The Princess, and Searching for Free Human. The image below (her most Klee-esque) is from Tara.

3) Wikipedia! For two reasons: 1) for having audio samples of Finnish, an absolutely wonderful language that unfortunately I don’t speak at all; 2) for having long been my source for accidental poetry and unexpected syntax, most recently in the message from writer Kartika: “I started writing Wikipedia to take away the sad feeling I had whenever I searched for a general and important article that didn’t exist yet in my language.”

4) The fact that Jim Carrey and I are entirely agreed on what constitutes a dream come true.

Santa Fe, or where we saw the future catastrophe of the social in the geology

Nearly a month ago now, Madeleine and I journeyed to Santa Fe searching for epiphanies, free donkeys, unparalleled breakfast burritos, and work. We were only successful on one front (I'll let you puzzle out which), which presented somewhat of an obstacle to writing. How, after all, do you convey the feeling of a failed quest without failing in the writing of it?

We prayed to Bertha, our über-androgynous patron saint (frozen, photographically, in 1893, and placed on our dashboard)- but to no avail. Traditional prose would not help us, not when we had canyons like Mars, wild horses, mirages with which to contend! At last, however, we found that a list, a modest enumeration of the portions of the trip which resonated uncomfortably with our (collective) state of mind, kept most of the angst at bay. The original text is as follows:

a list, a list that never stops, not even when it appears to:

1. trees that emit a cheesy garbage smell
2. light-up maps of africa
3. v. accommodating drivers.
4. black sheep that become white with age (proof that one cannot always remain a black sheep, despite one's best attempts to)
5. a convergence of chalk farms
6. women who claim to be six months pregnant, but who probably aren't
7. day old pastries (sweet for 99¢, savory for $1…maybe)
8. oil men (slick) who search and rescue (stick)
9. soup from china (maybe?)
10. vicarious eating
11. cartography
12. Yellow mustache's woman
13. apartments that are far too big for the six bugs that inhabit them
13. a foot in need of surgery (in albuquerque)
14. dissatisfaction
15. five distinct editions of Augustine's Confessions
16. murdered plums
17. upstairs jails
18. "art in public places"