#288 In which our hero considers a birthday of some import.

There’s a tall thin man standing in the shadows
When he calls your name his voice is strong and clear
It’s a dark and smoky place, so you can’t quite see his face
He pulls you close and whispers in your ear

I turned 40 last year. Actually, since my birthday is in December, it was the end of 2008. I’ve been trying to organize my thoughts since then… and I’m not sure I’ve come to any sort of conclusions. Forty is a pretty significant age… by most reckonings, my life is half over. Then again, if I die at 65, like my father, I only have 25 years left. Either way, it’s pretty sobering to consider your mortality.

And he tells you he was born into some money
But it didn’t mean he had to sit around
And he knows a thing or two about the things that you should do
If you don’t want to take life lying down

What I’ve really been thinking about is what kind of mark I’ve made on the world to date. Have I made any sort of difference? What kind of legacy would I leave if I kicked off tomorrow? Have I done anything worth remembering?

First of all hang out a lot with Hemmingway
Spend some time fighting bulls in Spain
You should go three rounds with Archie Moore and Sugar Ray
It’s so damned scary you won’t mind the pain

I dunno. I look at my wife… I’m made her life happier. Not always, I suppose, but most of the time. We’ve been married for eight years, and they’ve all been happy. And we’re still in love. That’s more than a lot of people can say.

Be ringside at the rumble in the jungle
Make friends with Hunter S. and Jackie O.
And when they shoot poor Bobby down, you wrestle Sirhan to the ground
Love your friends and miss them when they go

And I look at my children. I’ve had a bigger impact on their brief lives than anyone else I’ve ever met. And they’re turning out great. So maybe I should be happy with that, that they’re growing up healthy and smart and funny. They’re supported and loved. Who know what the future holds, I’m guessing there will be a lot of yelling and hurt feelings in the preteen and teen years, and maybe beyond. But I do hope they always feel the love of their parents.

So, is that enough? That I’ve helped raised some good kids?

You should write a book or two and start a magazine
Even if it never makes a dime
You should swing out by your feet above the circus ring
At the very least throw parties all the time

I’m always reading about people who have made such a tremendous difference in the world by this age… hell, well before this age. Bill Gates was in his early 20s when he founded Microsoft. Steve Jobs was also in his early 20s when he founded Apple. Stephen King had published four novels by the time he was 30. Lee Clow was named Creative Director of Chiat/Day before he was 40.

And so on.

Enjoy yourself, do the things that matter
Cause there isn’t time and space to do it all
Love the things you try, drink a cocktail wear a tie
Show a little grace if you should fall

But I have enjoyed my life, almost without exception. And I’m the happiest I’ve ever been right now. Love my wife, love my kids. Have a hobby I enjoy a great deal, and, incidentally, I’ve made some significant achievements in said hobby. I don’t have a lot of friends, but have powerful relationships with those I do.

So why do I feel like there’s so much more I should have achieved by now?

Don’t live another day unless you make it count
There’s someone else that you’re supposed to be
There’s something deep inside of you that still wants out
And shame on you if you don’t set it free.


“A Talk with George” by Jonathan Coulton.

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#287 In which our hero discusses what he's been reading in the past year (part 2)

Cell by Stephen King (audio book)

When I was younger, I was a huge Stephen King fan. I read everything he put out. As I got older, I became a little tired of his writing (Will this Dark Tower saga ever end?) and then finally disgusted (Bag of Bones? More like Bag of Shit). So, it was with some reluctance that I picked this audio book off the shelf.

Shortly into it, I remembered why I so enjoyed King in the first place. And also why I grew to dislike him. The story treads very familiar ground (at times I felt like I was reading “The Stand Lite”) and King deals out all the old familiar tropes that he likes so well. But, his story telling is always engaging and there were a few truly suspenseful moments.

King also has a distinct style of dialogue… I find it hard to describe, but I immediately recognize it when I read it (or hear it, in this case). It’s not that his characters sound phony, and it’s not even that they speak in contrived sentences… it’s more like they speak a unique dialect based on old-fashioned movies. I found myself thinking, “that’s an odd way to express that” in many places. Perhaps that’s how King really talks. Again, it all felt very familiar.

A thing of note: the audio recording had clearly been re-edited at some point. There are odd passages when a jarringly different voice actor inserts a phrase here and there, sometimes even a single word. Distracting, to say the least.

The Garden of Last Days by Andre Dubus III (audio book)

I picked this up at the library after learning from the cover blurb that they guy also wrote “House of Sand and Fog.” I never read that book, but I heard good reviews about the movie, which starred Jennifer Connelly, and I have a serious thing for Jennifer Connelly so, in a round-about fashion, I was really attracted to this book.

Now, this isn’t a nice book. It’s not pornographic or gory or violent (even though there are elements of all of the above in it) but it does dive into great depths in the mind of a terrorist. A September 11th terrorist, to be exact. This is unsettling, to say the least.

That said, I enjoyed this book a great deal. I walked away feeling like I had a better understanding of terrorists and why they feel driven to do the things they do--not sympathy, mind you, but understanding.

I connected with the characters, even the “villains,” and enjoyed how they were intertwined in the plot. I was even rooting for the redneck fuck-up.

Now, as is my wont, I usually look up Amazon.com reviews of these books after I’m done reading them. I was surprised to read that a lot of people thought this novel was overly long, and plodded in places. I, in contrast, felt like it kept a quick pace, especially once the major tensions were established.

However, I suspect this is, again, the result of listening to the novel as an audio book and not actually reading the words on the printed page. I listen to these books exclusively in my car, so I’m only ever giving them part of my attention anyway (the majority part being not driving into another car). So, it’s possible that I tuned out for a moment during another description of Al-Qaeda training camps or the patrons of a strip club or whatnot. While I’ve fretted that I might be having a lesser experience with the work since I’m listening and not reading, in this case it may have actually improved the experience.

Regardless, I think this is a great book.

Just After Sunset by Stephen King (audio book)

As I wrote above, I was/am a big fan of Stephen King. I don’t slavishly follow his work any more, but I notice it when it comes out. That’s why I was so surprised to see this on the library shelf, a collection of short stories that I knew nothing about. So I picked it up.

I’ve always liked King’s short stories, and these were no different. I enjoyed them all, most notably Willa, N. and The Things They Left Behind. The last so struck me that I listened to it twice (I really enjoyed the voice actor in that one, too). After listening to this, I realized that I had already seen N. when it was adapted to (or maybe it was written specifically for) a series of animated shorts hosted on the Internet. As I write this, you can still find the episodes on YouTube.

Forever Summer by Ray Bradbury (audio book)

It’s been a while since I’ve read any Ray Bradbury, so it took me a minute to get into the swing of his rhythms again. Because Bradbury has a definite style, one I’ll call “American Hokey.” Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy his writing, but a lot of it has a wide-eyed, Norman Rockwell, gee-gosh-golly quality to it, especially when he’s writing kids. And about 65% of this novel is written from a 13-year-old’s perspective. Some sample dialog:

“Let’s get out of here, Doug. I got the willies!”
“The willies, heck! I got the heebie-jeebies!”

And while it’s incredibly corny, it’s also sweet. Since I was listening to an audio book instead of reading the printed word, this hokum come through even stronger, especially considering that the voice actor made the decision to give the protagonist’s 10-year-old brother a lisp. “You thure ‘bout that, Doug? That thure looks thuper thcary!”

When I started listening to audio books, I wondered if I was missing something by not actually reading the words and processing them myself. For most books I think it works out just fine, but this is one case where I think I would have gotten more out of it by reading it the traditional way.

One last thing. The entire novel was a nice coming to age, young vs. old, ah youth! tale that unfolds by comparing and contrasting a 75-year-old man and a 13-year-old boy. Then, in the final chapter, the old man has a conversation with his boner. Needless to say, I didn’t see that coming. Not only does he talk to his boner, it talks back. Tells him that he’s going away now, and won’t return. Then, the same boner suddenly appears on the 13-year-old, apparently for the first time. The results are unintentionally hilarious. Especially when the boy asks his new-found boner if he is his friend, and the boner replies, “the best you’ll ever have.” I laughed out loud in my car.

The Last Centurion by John Ringo (audio book)

I picked this up on a lark because the back blurb indicated it was about a pandemic plague that wiped up a large portion of life on earth. For some reason, I’m drawn to stories like this. That said, it turned out to be mostly a true war sort of tale, which doesn’t appeal to me. But, in the end, I liked this book… mostly.

The story is the first person account of a soldier who was on the front lines when the world-ending flu spread across the globe, and what he did to lead his men back home. I think I enjoyed it because I like engaging stories that reveal to me a part of the world I don’t know; in this case, the American military.

The author relates, in what seems to be a high degree of accuracy, how the military works, how they would respond to a disaster of this magnitude, etc., etc. He goes into great detail about military equipment and procedures and strategy and other things I am largely ignorant of. Hey kids, learning is fun!

However, the voice of the protagonist (i.e., the author) is painfully didactic at times, and just annoying. Some of the themes beaten over the head include: global warming is bullshit, city folks are stupid, farmers make the world go ‘round. And, y’know, whatever, that’s fine… it’s your book so you can have whatever point of view you want. But it just got tiring to hear him go on and on about how the “ants” (smart, salt-of-the-earth people like farmers who planned ahead) were superior to “grasshoppers” (soft, soiled city dwellers who had no commonsense and were caught with their pants down when the world collapsed). Yeah, we get it. You don’t have to go on for 10 pages detailing how the “tofu eaters” (a euphemism used ad nauseum for liberals) screwed things up.

I enjoyed most of this book, but the proselytizing became overbearing by the end, and I was glad to be done with it.

The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror (vol. 13) edited by Stephen James

I inadvertently read this book twice.

I bought this book years ago, started to read it, but never got the whole way through. I’m not sure why. So when I finally picked it up again, I just started from the beginning instead of trying to remember where I stopped.

However, it seemed like I was familiar with every story I read. I’ve come to the conclusion that I must have read everything save the last story or two. But, it wasn’t bad to read it again; most of the stories were entertaining.

However, the editor clearly has a different interpretation of what “horror” is from what I do; with few exceptions I didn’t think the stories were especially scary or suspenseful.

Out of all the stories the only ones that stick with me (as I write this months after the fact) is “Our Temporary Supervisor,” by Thomas Ligotti and “Shite Hawks” by Muriel Gray. These are also the only two that really got under my skin. So much so, that I think I’ll seek out some of their other work.

Dune by Frank Herbert (audio book)

Sometimes I’m in a big hurry in the library, so I grab the first audio book that seems interesting and get out. That’s why I ended up with Dune, even though I had read it years before (and the first couple sequels, I believe).

It’s fantastic writing, no-one will even dispute that. And I’m amazed that more than 40 years later, it has aged so well, remaining relevant and engaging as it ever was.

I was delighted when I started listening to it to find that it had a full cast of voices. Most audio books have one reader and, like ‘em or hate ‘em, you’re stuck with that voice for the next 10-20 hours. But, for reasons I cannot understand, only parts of this book used the full voice cast. You’d be listening to one section where Baron Harkonnen was voiced with evil glee from an actor with a deep baritone, the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen was acted out with wonderful treachery by an English actress, Paul was voiced by a young man… then in the next chapter, it was just the narrator, voicing all the parts again. It didn’t seem like there was any rhyme or reason to it; it’s not like specifically exciting or climatic events got the full cast. It made the audio book a little jarring, as the main narrator made some different acting choices than the main cast, as if they never spoke or compared notes on the characters. Odd.

Still an amazing story, though.

Tales from Jabba’s Palace edited by Kevin J. Anderson

A long time ago I read “Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina” and hated it. I enjoy the Star Wars universe, but I was annoyed with this book because nearly every character you see in the Cantina scene in the movie is represented in this book. And not one of them is there simply for a drink after work; everyone is achieving their destiny or some such bullshit.

This book (also gifted to me by the same guy who gave me “Glory Lane”) is along that same lines. However, for some reason changing the setting to Jabba’s palace made it more palatable for me. And maybe because most of the stories centered around one main conspiracy, I found it to be more cohesive. Not a terrible book; but not one I’d ever return to, either.

The Devil You Know by Mike Carey (audio book)

Another “this looks good, I need to get out of here” selection from the library. But I enjoyed this one immensely.

I love contemporary horror, and this book had that with a great helping of humor alongside it. Plus, the author/protagonist is English, and stories sent in England always sound so quirky to me. And the voice actor had a wonderfully engaging accent, too.

You can tell that I really enjoyed this book because after listening to the audio book, I went out and bought the actual paperback so I could see the words for myself.

The Forgotten Door by Alexander Key

This is a book I read probably when I was 13 or so. It really stuck with me, so much so that I was moved to look it up and buy it from Amazon a couple of years ago. It sat on my bookshelf until I finished my last (hard copy) book and was casting about for something else to read. So I read this.

I didn’t know at the time that Alexander Key also wrote “Escape to Witch Mountain.” But after re-reading this book, it doesn’t surprise me. It’s definitely an early adolescent book, a little heavy-handed with the morals at the end.

Fangland by John Marks (audio book)

Another book that I think I enjoyed more than I would have otherwise because I learned something from it; this time, how a televised news program operates.

The protagonist is a female field producer for “The Hour,” a thinly-veiled version of “60 Minutes.” The author clearly has some experience with the show or programs like this, and goes on at length about its internal operations.

At its heart it’s the story of a woman who encounters a modern day vampire, and the fall out of that encounter. It’s sufficiently scary in parts, and has several inventive twists on the tired old vampire mythos. It also has a surprising amount of sex and blood, with an ending that was both oddly off-putting and satisfying at the same time.

It’s told in first person, a narrative mode that has a soft spot in my heart. Several of the characters recount their version of the story, and although this can get tiresome, I thought the author handled it deftly enough. Even though he does lapse into straight third person for a couple scenes that just don’t work from a viewers perspective. Something I always hate--it seems like a cop-out. If you want to write in first person, you should tough out the tricky parts, too.

I Am Legend (and other stories) by Richard Matherson (audio book)

I had also read “I Am Legend” before, albeit in comic book form. I enjoyed it, even though it was severely dated in parts. And the science that Matherson works so hard to establish fall apart in the end (the vampire bacterium causes fangs to grow on the infected? Really?), but otherwise a good, satisfying story.

The audio book also included several short stories, some of which I had read/seen in one form or another in the past. They all tend to be the of Twilight Zone variety, i.e., build up the tension then introduce a twist ending. Not bad, and some quite good.

“I Am Legend” was read by one actor, who sounded great. Another actor read all the short stories and, frankly, some of his accents/inflections detracted from my enjoyment of the book. At least once his delivery was so convoluted that I couldn’t make out what he was saying.

The First Five Pages by Noah Lukeman

This is a book that The Scientist got me for my birthday. It's about improving your writing, from a professional agent's point of view. It's interesting, even if a lot of the advice seems pretty obvious to me. Then again, I like to think of myself as a capable writer, and a lot of the insight seems geared toward the very new writer. Still, it's all good review. I haven't finished it as of this writing... mostly because it's more textbook than absorbing read. But, I'll finish it here soon, probably over the Christmas break.

Ohio Oddities: A Guide to the Curious Attractions of the Buckeye State by Neil Zurcher

Another birthday present from my wife. I love weird roadside attractions like The World's Biggest Frying Pan or whatever, and this is full of them. It's not the kind of book I'd read cover to cover, but it has an honored place in the bathroom, and I'll definitely get through all of it in time.

Fray (volumes 1 “Busted” & 3 “Sex & Death”) edited by Derek Powazek

"The Fray" used to be my favorite website. It featured true stories about a variety of topics, with beautiful accompanying illustrations or photos. I read it for years, until the guy in charge, Derek Powazek, shut it down, saying that it had run it's course. That was years ago. Recently,
for no real reason, I looked it up again. Turns out that Powazek is still compiling personal stories, only now in the form of real, tangible books (I guess they're really more like magazines). Out of the three currently available, I bought two (they were on sale together).

I finished the first (Busted) and am halfway through the second. I'm enjoying them... but they're really reinforced that true stories aren't always great stories. Most of these are well written, but seem to peter out in the end. Because that's the way real life works, I suppose: you have an interesting experience, but rarely does it conclude in a dynamic, exciting and satisfying fashion, like it does in fiction. The books are filled with beautiful illustrations as well.

And that is it! The last couple of books on the list will get me into 2010, where I'll start a new list.

And, if you're keeping score, that's 12 books and 11 audio books that I've consumed in 2009.

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#286 In which our hero discusses what he's been reading in the past year (part 1)

Some time around the beginning of this year I started writing down everything I read. Well, not everything, just novels and collections of short stories. This is something I had been meaning to do for a couple years, mostly to figure out how many books I read a year. Because this question comes up from time to time, and I really have no idea.

Once I started on the list, I figured I might as well write a little review of what I thought about the book, too.

You’ll notice that around March I discovered audio books. It’s not like I didn’t know about them before, I just never bothered to check any out of the library. But, being that I have a 40 minute commute twice a day, five days a week, it gave me something to do other than listen to the news.

Holy crap, I wish I had started listening to audio books years ago. As you’ll see, I’ve been tearing them up.

Also, I suppose I should include SPOILER ALERT because I'm not taking any pains to conceal the plot. I'm just writing about what I thought, which may include the ending. Be ye warned.

So, here’s my ear-end wrap-up of what I’ve been reading.

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

I was out with some friends, and the topic of great sci-fi literature came up. This book was mentioned and several people around the table enthusiastically agreed that it was a great one. So I picked it up.

While I enjoyed it, this book left me with the same feeling that I’ve experienced with a lot of old (circa 60-70s) sci-fi. That the story wasn’t the point, that it was only there to set up a bigger and (in the author’s mind) more important thing. In this book, the preface by the author even states that his real reason for writing the book was to introduce the idea of Ender being a “speaker for the dead.”

And that’s all well and good, but it left me feeling that the bulk of the manuscript was hurried, like Card wanted to get to what he considered the good stuff and the bulk of the story was just in the way. And when we do get to the “good stuff,” it seems like it comes out of the blue, like a tacked on ending. The entire book is about Ender being a war strategy prodigy, and the twist ending (which I saw coming a mile away) in which he successfully defeats the aliens. This battle at the end, which seems like it should have been the big climax, felt anti-climatic. Mostly because that wasn’t the author’s idea of the climax, it was the last 20 or so somewhat rambling pages about what Ender did after the war. And the whole “Ender fought against the aliens so much that he formed a kind of psychic bond with them” was a huge WTF? moment for me.

Enjoyable old-school sci-fi, but not the best I’ve ever read and not, despite what was said around that pub table, one of the greats of the genre.

Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill

And enjoyable horror story. It read to me like it was written by a younger and more in touch with the times Stephen King. Which isn’t surprising, I suppose, since Joe Hill is the pen name of Stephen King’s son.

Some of the early ghost-in-the-house stuff was really pretty unnerving (which is the point) but I was less impressed with the second half and climax. Very nice coda to the story, however.

Soon I will be Invincible by Austin Grossman

As a comic book geek I was instantly drawn to this story. I had read a favorable review and stuck it on my Amazon wish list (this is SOP for me… any book that sounds interesting goes on my wish list immediately or I tend to forget about them. This way I can review my list when I’m looking for something new to read or, even better, sometimes one or more of these books magically appear at my birthday or Christmas).

As I write, the concept (superheroes/villains in the real world) appealed to me, but I’m afraid it was better in the abstract than in the reading. It was good, don’t get me wrong, and I tore through it… but it seemed that I had read better executions of this concept before, most notably “Astro City” and “Ex Machina” (both real live comic books, not novels, so maybe the comparison isn’t really fair).

But, the ending did catch me off guard--which it shouldn’t have since the author played fair with comic book logic--and I found it very satisfying.

No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy

I have been reluctant to pick books from the “Literature” section of the store before, since I’ve found that this label often translates to mean “inaccessible.” I enjoy reading, but I don’t want to labor to finish a book. That’s why I’ll probably never read Moby Dick… even though it’s a classic, etc., the bits and pieces I’ve read of it are dense, and it takes some doing to get through them. No thanks.

But I was pleased to find that Cormac McCarthy, despite being labeled “America’s Greatest Living Author,” writes in a clear, straightforward manner. It’s not without art, but his prose never feels like it’s in danger of collapsing under it’s own weight.

My one beef, though, is how he eschews proper punctuation, especially the “quotes” mark. This made it hard to follow some of the he said/she said dialog in the book. This complaint comes from a deep part of my brain, which says that if I have to follow proper punctuation in my writing, he should have to, too.

However, this punctuation omission is mostly forgiven because the dialog is so damn strong. There’s nothing that takes me out of the narrative faster than ham-fisted, fake-sounding dialog. McCarthy’s dialog rings true to me in every instance; it sounds like read people talking. I really love it.

That said, this was an odd book. The first hundred pages unfold at a rapid clip, and it sets all the characters on what seems to be a well-used and understood path. The resourceful everyman will defeat the overwhelming obstacle of the psychotic hitman, perhaps with the winking approval of the weary sheriff, and emerge with a few more scars, wiser for the experience.

But that’s not where the book goes. Not even close.

Instead the everyman dies, well before the end, and does so “off camera.” His death is senseless and, to me at least, unexpected. I went back to make sure I hadn’t accidentally skipped a chapter.

Then, as things are wrapping up, the psycho killer shows up at the dead man’s house to kill his wife, who’s been innocent of any wrong-doing in the entire novel. And after he kills her, he gets away. Not without injury, but still, he’s never caught. In fact, the killer is actually rewarded in the end, moving on to bigger and better clients. It is the complete opposite of what you’d expect to happen.

And finally, the grizzled old sheriff who took on the case is left with no resolution, to final fulfillment, no “it was all worth it” moment. He just fades away, his soul disquiet.

I was so surprised by the ending of this novel that I immediately went out and rented the movie. Surely, I thought, the movie doesn’t end on such a downer. They must have Hollywoodized the ending to make it more digestible to a mainstream audience.

Nope.

Even the movie ends quietly, without any real revelations, no neat tied-with-a-bow conclusions. I really respect the film makers for that (but then again, it was made by the Coen brothers, and they’re phenomenal).

I think what I liked best, in both novel and movie, is that it all rings true. Unlike most novels, where the author jumps through considerable hoops to make the good guy win in the end, that doesn’t happen in real life. The good guy can do all the right things, and still lose. The bad guy can be really bad, but still get away scott-free.

Glory Lane by Alan Dean Foster

This book was in the unfortunate position of being the first one I read after No Country for Old Men, a great book. It is also in the unfortunate position of being a shitty book.

Now, I’ve read a lot of Alan Dean Foster, he was a mainstay of my early teen years. I like his stuff. But this book was just a turd, start to finish.

I probably most enjoy the dialog in the books I read. Again, this book suffered from the fact that I had just finished No Country for Old Men, which had great, realistic, telling dialog. This piece of crap had that overly-clever, look-how-cool-this-character-is dialog. For example, here’s a bit from the main protagonist (a spike-haired punk rocker) as he tries to hit on a cute girl working behind the counter at a bowling alley.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“Well now, that’s a leading question, isn’t it? I mean, it presupposes that I need help and that you could be of some assistance to me without even knowing what my problem is. Fascinating concept. You aren’t by any chance telepathic, are you?”

Ugh. And here’s a bit where he’s about to be thrown out of the same bowling alley by the owner.

“We don’t want your kind in here.”

“My kind?” [He] tensed as he glanced diffidently at the big hand, but didn’t otherwise react to the touch. “What kind might that be?”

“Bums. Jerks. Punks.”

“Ah. Now there you have me, sir. I will admit to the third. As for the preceding pair I’m afraid you’re way off base, but then I can see that you didn’t quite complete your graduate degree in sociology so I suppose we need to make some allowances.”

While this is painful to read, I also found it nostalgic. Because this is the kind of stuff I loved to read when I was 14 or so. I imagined that kids older and cooler than me (which wasn’t really saying much) really did talk like this, and I wanted to grow up to be as cool as they are. Now, I see that it’s just bullshit writing, with no ring of truth to it. This nostalgia is the only thing that kept be reading… that and the fact that the book was given to me by a friend.

20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill (audio book)

While I wasn’t blown away by Heart-Shaped Box, I enjoyed it enough to try some more of Joe Hill’s stuff.

Am I ever glad I did.

This collection of short stories is really amazing. I found it far more enjoyable than his novel-length work (but, to be fair, I’ve only read one of his novels). I enjoyed some of the stories more than others, of course, but I don’t think there was a clunker in the lot. And a couple, most notably “Abraham’s Boys,” “In the Rundown” and “Last Breath” were really remarkable. These three in particular are creepy, emotional, moving and really got under my skin.

But the standout, in my mind, was “Pop Art.” The concept is so ludicrous it shouldn’t work, but shortly into it my skepticism was completely gone and I was wholly into the story. I’m a sucker for stories like these anyway, but I haven’t been so moved by a story since, perhaps fittingly, Stephen King’s “The Body.”

It’s worth noting that this isn’t a collection of horror stories per se, in fact, many of them are rather sweet (or, at least, bitter-sweet). I find this collection even more impressive since Hill is so often working outside his chosen genre.

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk (audio book)

Wacky. That’s what this book was. Soaked with sex and wacky. I may have learned a little about the porn industry, but it’s difficult to determine what is factual, and what is just made-up bullshit. I suspect that a lot of what I thought was too crazy to be true probably IS true. I guess this was a fun book but, honestly, it’s so demeaning and misogynistic at it’s core that it’s difficult to get past it. Like all of Palahniuk’s stuff, not for everyone.

Twisted Little Vein by Warren Ellis

I’m a big fan of Warren Ellis. I’ve read several of his comics, and thought some of them (most notably “Transmetropolitan” and “Planetary”) were amazingly nuanced and insightful works of art. That’s why I was so disappointed in this, his first prose novel.

The over-arching theme--that America has slipped so far into depravity that many of the formally marginalized acts by the sick and twisted are now mainstream--is gleefully hammered over your head time and time again with great ham-shaped mitts.

And much of the writing simply does not work. I wouldn’t have expected there to be so much dissonance between a comic page and a novel page, but there is. In the comics you can slip in some outrageous act in the background, and it doesn’t interrupt the flow of the narrative. But in a novel, when that same outrageous act is described in detail, I found the entire novel coming to a crashing halt. It doesn’t help that the book is set in modern day, providing the additional hardship of limiting the amount of disbelief I was willing to suspend. So when, say, the Secretary of State mysteriously visits the protagonist and injects himself with monkey feces to get high… I’m sorta not buying it.

Probably most damning is that this book pales compared to Transmet, which is much better and was written nearly a decade earlier. Many of the same themes are explored, but being that Transmet is set in the future, Ellis’ tendency to invent outrageous drugs/sex acts/etc. (Bowel Disruptor, anyone?) adds to the setting, unlike his novel, in which they detract (e.g., Godzilla bukkake porn – ugh).

It’s sad, because Ellis is a great writer, but he seems hell-bent in this book to push the Mad Englishman persona he has so skillfully developed as a personal brand. I suspect that his secret ambition is to have Twisted Little Vein shelved at the local Borders with Naked Lunch, Still Life with Woodpecker, Fear and Loathing in Los Vegas and other works that appeal to college kids and pretentious douchebags. Sadly, they’d be better off heading over to the comic book section to see his good writing.

To be continued.

###

#285 In which our hero recounts his quest for the perfect man bag (part 4)

The first thing I put together was the handle. I really wasn't sure how this would turn out, and I looked at it as a bellwether of the entire project. It's constructed of two pieces of leather, but the way its assembled I ended up sewing through three layers. It went surprisingly well.

I was super happy with the results. It looked, I dare say, professional. I showed it off to The Scientist and my children, all of whom were much less impressed than I. After the handle, I began to feel confident that the entire satchel was going to end up looking pretty close to what I had in my head.

Because that's the painful part... I've worked on lots of leather projects where the end result fell well short of the image I had in my head. The projects weren't bad, per se, just not what I was hoping for.

The handle done, I started on the main body. First I sewed both gussets to the center divider piece. 


Also, I forgot to mention, at some point I decided to cut down the width of one of the gussets. I was afraid the bag would be too thick (girthy) and would look more like a piece of luggage than a briefcase. This ended up being a good decision, as my laptop fits perfectly snug in the smaller pocket.

After that, I sewed on the front of the bag.


You can see in the photo above both gussets sewn to the center divider. The front buckles are also sewn on, as they share a seam with the bottom of the bag. That done, I started on the back piece.

This was a little tricky because I'm sewing through three pieces of leather (the gusset, the back piece, and the back pocket). It's not the sewing part that was hard, it was making sure all the holes lined up correctly. 

Remember when I wrote that I was a little laissez faire with the measuring part? This is where it went wrong. Somehow I made the back pocket piece about half an inch wider than the back piece. If I just forced all the holes to line up, there would be an unattractive bulge with that pocket. It would clearly have to be trimmed. 

In this, I got really lucky. The pocket piece overhung the pack piece by half an inch, and my seam allowance was a quarter of an inch. This meant that I could trim a quarter of an inch off, and the already punched holes wouldn't show, I could punch new holes and everything would line up just about perfectly. 

At this point there was also a problem with the gusset and the main body lining up right. This was a much more serious problem. I'm still not sure what went wrong. And to make it right, it was a brute force fix. I basically cut a wedge in the bag, pulled the edges together and pulled really tight on the thread. Again, I got really lucky. It's virtually invisible from the outside. You can definitely feel it on the inside, but it's low enough in the bag that you can't see it unless you really stick you head in it and go looking for it. 

Then, I ran into another problem. 

Like I wrote before, I had used a belt blank to fashion the shoulder strap. By my rough estimates it was just the right length. But when I actually attached the bag to the strap, it hung too low, almost to my knees. 

I was afraid that cutting the strap and adding a buckle would make it too short. But, other than cutting off the buckle on the end and refashioning that entire thing, a buckle in the middle of the strap was all I could do. And it was the easiest fix. So:




It actually turned out really well. There was plenty of length left for it to hang right. And I had always imagined it with a buckle on the strap anyway.

I added the handle assembly to the bag, and it was done!



Well, almost done. I went to Things Remembered and got a brass plaque with my name engraved on it a couple days later. Once that was riveted on, then I was really done.

The the photo above, you can see the two-tone affect from the straps finished with gum trag. I didn't like it at first, but have since grown really fond of the look. As it ages and gets all the little nicks and scuffs that come with use, it'll look even better. 

Of course, as the person who made it, I see all the mistakes. But even so, it's really good looking, I have to admit. And it should last a lifetime. Even if it starts to fall apart, I know how to fix it. 

The best part (other than being able to tell people, "Yep, I made this") is that I paid considerably less than the $800 it was selling for in the Filson catalog. I have maybe $200 worth of materials in it, but that includes leather I didn't use and can use for other projects, plus some left over hardware (D-rings come in packs of a dozen, for example). Plus my time, of course. 

So, after years of searching for the perfect mag bag, I finally made one myself.

###

#284 In which our hero recounts his quest for the perfect man bag (part 3)

First up: cut out the big pieces. This is always the most nerve-wracking part, for me, at least. Math is my enemy, so I end up checking and re-checking my measurements half a dozen times. And since I'm very much of the "eh, close enough" school, this sometimes bites me in the ass (as it did at a later point in this project). 

But, after some trepidation, I had the major parts cut out.

There are four pieces that make up the bag, sewn together with two gussets (that's the two long strips in the foreground). I also cut out all the little fiddly bits of leather: straps for the front, straps to hold the buckles and the parts of the handle. I had a pre-cut length of leather for a belt, but I decided to use that as the shoulder strap.

When you're sewing thick leather, it's not like sewing cloth. You use a dull needle (actually, a pair of dull needles) called harness needles and push them through holes that have already been punched in the leather. There are a couple handy tools I have to help get the holes evenly placed from the edge and evenly spaced apart. But there's no shortcut in the actual punching of holes part. 

I punched somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,300 holes. One at a time, with the awl shown. It's tedious, and probably the worst part of a project like this. 

Next: dying.

I dyed all the pieces before assembling them to keep it simple. It's easier to get an even coat of dye of a flat piece of leather compared to something already assembled. What you see above is after three or five applications of dye (Fiebling's Professional Oil Dye, Dark Brown, if you care). The leather really soaked it up, and it took six coats before it looked even and not splotchy. And it still wasn't the rich, dark brown I was hoping for. Different leather's take dye differently, so you really never know how it's going to look until it's in the leather. The back pocket is cut from a different hide, and turned out a little darker than the rest. 

This caused me a little consternation at first. I really liked the color of the Filson satchel, and had hoped to match it as closely as possible. But the leather just wasn't getting there. So I moved on to the next step: finishing the edges.

I don't have any photos of this part of the process, maybe because it's fairly labor intense. And it is also one of the most important. Nicely finished edges really make a project look professional.

Here's the thing: if you've ever picked up a solid leather belt (not one of those crappy ones with two thin pieces of leather sewn together over a cardboard core) or a nicely-crafted bridle, you can run your hand along it and it feels great. What you're reacting to, if you were conscious of it or not, are the edges. When you cut heavier leathers you end up with a squared-off edge, which feels sharp and uncomfortable in your hand. If you round over this edge it feels much nicer.

My process of finishing an edge is to first use a tool called, fittingly enough, an edger. This takes off some of the sharpness of the edge. Next I use fine grit sandpaper to smooth off the remaining edges and give it a rounded profile. The sandpaper leaves it with an almost furry appearance at this point. To give it that nice, slick surface, I use a product called Gum Tragacanth. It's designed for this purpose and, apparently, it's used in confections, too. I had no idea. But you dab a little on the edge, rub it briskly with a piece of canvas, and it leaves a smooth, slick edge. 

It also darkens the leather. I wasn't careful enough when I was finishing the edges of the straps and got some of it on the surface of the strap. This left an unattractive blotch of darker leather. To hide my carelessness, I just finished the entire surface of the straps with the gum trag, making them a uniform color.

Now, this darker color was closer to what I had hoped the body of the bag would become. I toyed with the idea of slathering gum trag over everything, hoping it would result in the color I wanted. But, two things stopped me: 1., gum trag also softens leather, and as I've talked about before, I didn't want a floppy bag; and 2., it's not a water repellent. So I only did the straps this way. This decision payed off big-time later.

After dying the leather and finishing the edges, I had to figure out how to finish the leather (that is, treat it to be water repellent). The obvious choice is a commercial sealer that would protect it 100% from water. But I've used these acrylic sealers before, and while they work great, they can leave the leather looking a little plastic-y. Then I considered beeswax, which is supposed to leave a really nice, deep luster. But I've never worked with beeswax as a sealer, and I didn't want this to be my first experiment with it. I also briefly considered shoe polish.

I ended up just oiling it with linseed oil. Linseed oil is also supposed to soften leather, but in my experience it doesnt have much affect on thicker leather like the kind I was using. It'll work itself out of the leather eventually, and I'll have to re-oil it every now and again, but that's fine. I'm hoping that the oil will also darken the leather over time.

With everything dyed, sealed and edged, all that was left was to actually put the thing together.

To be continued.

###

#283 In which our hero recounts his quest for the perfect man bag (part 2)

The first step is creating this bag was getting the pattern right. The Filson catalog only had the one picture of the satchel, I didn't even know what the back of the thing looked like, let alone how the insides were assembled. So there were details I needed to work out. And, honestly, I still wasn't sure if I could even pull it off.

But, since we live in an age of wonders, I went online and found exactly what I was searching for: this forum includes a post by "TidyBeard," who bought an actual Filson Field Satchel. Most helpful to me, he took pictures of nearly every conceivable angle and posted them. 

This not only gave me what I needed to draft a pattern, it also confirmed something I suspected all along: the craftsmanship on this bag wasn't that impressive. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that Filson's bag isn't well-crafted, because it is. It's just that it is a straightforward, rugged construction—by design. Take a look at this:

Ignore that this is a woman's purse. See how fine the stitching is, especially down the center? And see how there's a sort of yoke around the opening in the top? Construction-wise, there's a lot going on with this bag. That's craftsmanship well beyond my abilities. 

But the Filson bag has big, bold stitches. I can do that. The photos I found online also allowed me to figure out the pattern... which wasn't complicated. It's basically three rectangles of leather sewn together with two gussets. Add a couple straps and buckles, and you have yourself the perfect man bag!

I drafted a pattern out of plain paper, very roughly. Like I said, there were no confusing parts, so it didn't take much time. Actually, the majority of my time was spent figuring out the dimensions. Thanks to TidyBeard, I had a handle on the dimensions of the actual bag, but I made mine slightly larger, so my laptop could fit easily inside it. 

Next was a trip to the leather store.

I brought all my pattern pieces so I could make sure I got a big enough hide. If you're not familiar, leather typically comes in three sizes: the entire hide (basically all of the usable leather off a cow in one piece), a side (half a cow) or double shoulders (pretty much just what it sounds like). Double shoulders tend to be the finest leather, but they are also the most expensive (and more to the point, they typically aren't big enough to yield the size pieces I needed). I didn't need an entire hide, so I looked at the sides. 

A little more background. The thickness of leather is measured, oddly enough, in ounces. One ounce equals about 1/64 of an inch. Since leather is a natural product, it's not completely consistent across the entire hide... the leather is thicker in some spots, thinner in others. Therefore leather is usually sold in a range, i.e., a "6-7 oz. side." To give you some reference, belt leather is generally about 7-8 oz., or roughly 1/8" thick. 

The leather used in the Filson bag is really thick. In the catalog it's described as "genuine bridle leather,"which really doesn't mean anything. "Bridle leather" is more a descriptor of how it can be used, not it's weight. But, looking at the catalog and online photos, I'd guess it's about a 10 oz. leather. 

So I went into the leather store with a 9-10 oz. side in mind. But, talking to the owner convinced me that this was overkill, that I could use a lighter weight leather and still get a very rugged bag with plenty of body. Plus, he had some 6-7 oz. leather on sale. I bought a side of that, plus a side of 4 oz. leather to use for the gussets (they are designed to collapse or fold in on themselves, so they needed to be lighter than the main body). I also bought some of the brass hardware I'd need, namely D-rings and buckles; and a bottle of dye. 

I took all this stuff home, and there it sat in the basement. For months.

Every once in a while I'd bring up that website and look at all the photos of that great Filson bag. I'd think about tackling the project, then the mood would pass. 

It was a pretty big project, using rather expensive materials. I didn't want to jump into it and screw it up. And I wanted to make sure I had enough time to invest in doing it right. 

Finally, I took a week of vacation time I needed to burn. I didn't have any plans, other than a few around-the-house errands, so I decided to tackle the construction of the bag.

Once The Scientist was off to work and the kids were deposited at school, I trundled down to the basement and got to work.

To be continued.

###

#282 In which our hero recounts his quest for the perfect man bag (part 1)

I have a long history with man bags.

It started in college where, like everyone else, I had a backpack to hump around my books. I believe it was the same backpack I used in high school. Some of the backpacks I see today are really cool with ergonomic strap placement and multiple zippered pockets and WiFi and God knows what else... but the bag I used was a plain old blue nylon backpack.

And this served me well for the first couple years of school. Then I came across an army gas mask bag at the Army-Navy store near campus. It was made of heavy, well worn canvas. I thought it was really cool.

And yes, I drew a unicorn on it with a black Sharpie. I hoped it would look like a cool military emblem, but it's clearly more Hello Kitten then Semper Fi. Regardless, I hauled around a lot of books in it.

After I graduated college, I didn't really have a need for a book bag any more. I worked in a restaurant for a while, then got a job at The Columbus Dispatch newspaper. There was nothing to carry to and from work, other than my lunch, and I just carried that in a plastic bag.

After I left that job and moved to Cleveland, I was suddenly in need of a bag again. I was taking the train to work every day, and carried with me the newspaper, a book, my lunch and any work I may have taken home with me.

So I found a new bag.

I got this from The Fray, a website that used to be something very different than it is today. When they offered an interesting messenger bag via CafePress (a brand-spanking new online service at the time) I bought one.

This bag carried dozens of books and hundreds of newspapers on my daily commute. I loved how obnoxiously bright and yellow it was. It also saw me through a couple layoffs and one firing. Presumably unrelated to my choice of bags.

I was still carrying this bag when I came to the agency where I'm working today. However, by this time I was more serious about my career, and I was starting to think that I would be better off with a more professional-looking accessory. So I bought this:

I was hot for hemp at the time (not like that!) so I was really happy when I found an all-natural hemp messenger bag (this one was from Ecolution). This is the bag I've been using for the last two years and it's been great. Well, for the most part. My only complaint is that the bag is a little bit... floppy.

And, now that I look at it again, it sorta looks like a woman's purse. 

So, even though I liked my hemp bag, I continued to search for something better: the perfect man bag. Much like I had been enamoured with hemp, later I decided that canvas was the way to go. So I searched around on the Internet and found this:

Cool bag, but just as floppy as my hemp one. I was becoming clear that I just wasn't going to be happy unless I found a bag with some body to it. Thinking back to my college days, I tried another military bag:

It, too, was made of a canvas too thin to hold its shape. This was also a reminder to pay better attention to dimensions when ordering online. This bag, even if it was heavy enough, is too small to carry everything I need it to carry.

So I continued to search. And did you know that there are numerous websites which have hundreds of bags from which to choose? I wasn'tsurprised, but I was a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of styles.

However, most of the messenger style bags which I favored where made of nylon, which just didn't appeal. That said, a quick google search for "canvas messenger bags" gave a lot of results. But, I was now gun shy of ordering a canvas bag in fear of it being too thin and floppy yet again.

I also half-heartedly looked at leather bags. Most of the leather ones just didn't do it for me... most were of a thin leather that wasn't as rugged-looking as I would like (and again, many  looked more like a purse than a manly-man's bag).

Then I found it.

I was flipping though the Filson catalog one day. Filson is an outdoor clothing outfitter, kinda like L.L. Bean on steroids. My one brother-in-law favors their clothes so I've seen them up close... their "tin cloth" material seems durable enough to damn near stop a bullet. But, unbeknownst to me, they also manufacturer other stuff besides clothing, including footwear, luggage, hats... and leather goods. Including this:

The Filson Leather Field Satchel.

I feel in love with this thing as soon as I saw it. It was everything I was looking for in a bag: sturdy, cool-looking, professional in appearance... it had it all.

It also had an impressive price tag: $795. Seven HUNDRED and ninety-five dollars.

I know to a lot of people that price might seem a little steep, but not outrageous. Well, I'm here to tell you, it IS outrageous.

Because here's the thing: I have done some leathercraft over the years, and I know that even the finest leather materials don't come close to justifying that kind of cost. And I didn't believe that there was an unreasonable amount of labor in it, either.

I suppose, like anything else, if you don't know what goes into making something, then you can only assume that the given price is a fair one. Looking at this bag you might assume that $795 (plus shipping) is the going price and that's all there is to it. But I knew better and there was no way in hell that I was going to pay that much money.

Then I really stopped and studied it. And I came to a realization:

I could MAKE this bag myself.

To be continued.

***

BEAT REPEAT

History Repeats

In 1856, United States senator and noted abolitionist Charles Sumner delivered a fiery three-hour speech on the senate floor in which he condemned slavery and those content to see the practice continued. He was particularly unkind to fellow senator Andrew Butler.

Two days later, while Sumner wrote letters at his desk in the empty Senate Chamber, Preston Brooks, a congressman from South Carolina and Andrew Butler’s nephew, approached Sumner. Brooks is reported to have said, “Mr. Sumner, I have read your speech twice over carefully. It is a libel on South Carolina, and Mr. Butler, who is a relative of mine.” And then he began to savagely beat Sumner with his metal-capped walking stick.

Sumner was unable to rise from his desk to defend himself, as it was bolted to the floor. He was finally able to tear the desk from the floorboards and, blood pouring down his face, stagger into the aisle to collapse. Brooks continued to beat him until his cane broke, at which point he quietly left the chamber and the unconscious Sumner.

Tensions were high in America at this time, it being less than five years away from the beginning of the Civil War. This division was perhaps no better illustrated than by the aftermath of the attack.

While Northerners were horrified, Brooks was heralded as a hero in the South. In an editorial, The Richmond Enquirer declared, “We consider the act good in conception, better in execution, and best of all in consequences. These vulgar abolitionists in the Senate must be lashed into submission.”

The House moved to expel Brooks, but the vote fell short. Back home, Brooks was sent dozens of new canes, at least one of which was accompanied by a note which read, “Hit him again.”

This all occurred more than a century ago, and it’s easy to think of it as ancient history. We, as a nation, are much more advanced today, right?

I’m not so sure.

Flash forward to September 9th, 2009. In a joint session of congress, president Barack Obama discusses his tumultuous health care reform plan. In the middle of the president’s remarks, congressman Joe Wilson (who, like Preston Brooks before him, represents South Carolina) jabs a finger at the president and shouts “You lie!”

This outburst is not only against congressional rules, it is a nearly unthinkable breach of decorum.

Unthinkable, that is, at any other time.

While our nation isn’t facing a civil war, we are divided by an ideological rift that seems nearly as severe. The public “discussion” of health care reform has become anything but. The discourse has coarsened to the point that it’s become scary. Protesters carry signs portraying Obama as Hitler; a supporter of the administration had a finger bitten off during a scuffle; and some protestors have arrived at events openly carrying guns.

And while no-one has yet sent Joe Wilson a new cane in the mail, he did receive more than $1 million in new campaign donations in the days following the outburst. On September 15, the House approved a "resolution of disapproval" against Wilson, on a near party-line 240-179 vote… in other words, most of Wilson’s fellow Republicans didn’t see the need to register disapproval at what he did.

The parallels are unmistakable. More than 150 years ago, this sort of furious name-calling and righteous anger let to the most divisive and bloody period in our nation’s history.

I wonder what the next three and a half years will bring?

###

#275 In which our hero keeps his eye on an odd office in his building.

The building I work in used to be a big warehouse. At some point it was refurbished and transformed into offices. But they cut away the floors in the center of the building, leaving a really cool open atrium kind of space. Some of the offices have windows that face into the atrium.

There’s also a breezeway from the parking lot across the canal, which is where I park. I walk across the breezeway every day, past an office that has a row of windows looking out into the atrium. But by the way they’re positioned, they’re also looking into the walkway. So anyone sitting in that office is pretty much at eye level for people walking in to work.

This is going somewhere, so stick with me.

So, this one office space was vacant for a long time (there’s also an office on the opposite side, but the tenants of that space were smart enough to install blinds, which they never open). One day when I was walking in, I saw that a business has moved into the space; architects, judging from the rolls and rolls of blueprints.

The space is basically one big open room, with a conference room (which also has a window opening to the atrium) and a couple small offices with doors on the far side. There also appears to be a small waiting area and reception desk, but I can’t really see that from the walkway.

The new tenants moved eight or so big wood desks into the space, abutting them back to back, like an office environment from the 50s. I thought it was interesting, and looked forward to seeing people sitting in those desks, staring across at each other, sketching architectural renderings longhand and smoking Lucky Strikes.

But no people ever came.

Days, then weeks went by, and I never once saw a person in the office. I supposed it was possible that they were out in the field, overseeing construction or something, and only occasionally came to the office. Maybe after 5pm, when I was already speeding north.

So I took note of one desk in particular, which had a fat, loosely rolled blueprint atop two small, tightly rolled blueprints. I watched to see if they ever moved.

Every day, as I walked in, I took note of the blueprints: one fat on top of two tight. No lights were ever on in the office, no signs of people having been there. And the blueprints never moved.

Now, it wasn’t like the place was just a storage area, there were desks with chairs, a big conference table in the conference room, staplers and the like… clearly people were meant to work there.

But no-one ever did.

This went on for months and months. One day I took a side-trip around the corner to look at their front door. It had the company name stenciled on it, and they were commercial architects, as I suspected. There were no lights on, and I wasn’t brave enough to try the door.

Almost there.

Then one day, I came walking across the breezeway as normal to find a work crew in the office. They were hauling out all the big 50s-era desks and replacing them with modern-style cubicles. On my way out I saw that they must have installed a dozen of these cloth-lined cubies, each with its own desk, overhead drawers, chair and computer.

And still, no people working there.

I found this all more than passing odd. I asked a couple of people at work about it, but they were as clueless as me.

Then! One day, I came to work and saw a woman working! She was sitting in one of the cubies, with her computer and chair positioned so that she was looking out the window. She had brought in a picture to hang on the wall, and some deck doo-dads to personalize her space. It looked like she was going to be there for a while.

And now we get to the part that bugs me.

Every morning when I come to work, if she’s already there working, I’ll glance over at her, and she’ll look up over her computer screen, and she’s give me a dirty look, as if to say, “What are YOU looking at?”

She is literally the only person in an office FULL of cubicles, all but three of which do not face this window, and run no risk of having the occupant accidentally make eye contact with another human. If you’re so annoyed that I’m peeking in on your own private work world… then move. Anywhere. Or just turn your computer so that it’s not facing the window. It’s really that easy!

The odd thing is, I still haven’t seen anyone else there. Just this one woman with the miniature stop sign and photos of (presumably) her children on her desk.

Maybe I’ll get a sheet of paper and write a little sign to hold up next time I pass:

GET SOME BLINDS

###

#270 In which our hero invites Oprah Winfrey to go fuck herself.

On Google! News this morning I saw this headline: “Oprah apologizes for slamming author James Frey.”

If you don’t remember, James Frey is the guy who wrote “A Million Little Pieces” which was purportedly his wholly true autobiography; but later it came out that the author had altered some events, and completely made up some others.

There was a bit of hoopla when this information came out. And honestly, I understand none of it. I mean, I never read the book, but apparently it was good enough that people got something out of it, and well-written enough to shoot up to the top of the best seller charts (and, of course, Oprah had a lot to do with that).

But, apparently, the people who read it, and were moved by it, suddenly found all of their enjoyment negated by the fact that it was, in part, fabricated. Stories came out that they felt “betrayed” and “mislead” and other bullshit that seemed completely overblown for a book. I mean, these people weren’t duped out of the last penny of their retirement money… they spent $20 on a book which—up until the instant they learned about the made-up parts—they really enjoyed reading. Nevertheless, many of these disgruntled readers demanded their money back and—unbelievably—got it!

Now, I’ve read my share of shitty books. Some of these books were by respected authors, people who had written other books that I enjoyed. But never once did it cross my mind to demand my money back from the retailer because the “reading experience” didn’t live up to my expectations.

So I had no respect or sympathy for these dillrods who wanted some sort of retribution for reading this book. And Oprah Winfrey was at the front of the fucking bus when it came to seeking revenge.

She named “A Million Little Pieces” to her book club, which naturally catapulted it to mega-best seller status. And, to a degree, I get why she was so pissed. She talked him up, fawned over him, related how inspirational and moving the book was… and then she found out that some of BS she was spouting was based on, well, BS.

It’s her reputation on the line, and so she should protect it. But Jesus, she raked this guy over the coals. She had him on her show so she could spout venom at him and humiliate him on a national stage. For an HOUR. She was relentless in tearing him down. I felt bad for the guy; he took his lumps like a bad puppy and did little to defend himself.

Shortly after the televised beat-down, Stephen King wrote an editorial in Entertainment Weekly that I found very interesting. You can read it in its entirely here, but the part that jumped out to me was this:

“The amazing thing is that anyone—including Oprah—believed any of Frey's stories once they realized he was trying to manage good sobriety without much help, because this is a trick very few druggies and alcoholics can manage … Substance abusers lie about everything, and usually do an awesome job of it.”

King, as a recovering addict and alcoholic himself, writes with an insight that Oprah could never have. So, should Oprah have suspected ahead of time that Frey’s book just might be embellished a bit? I dunno… most non-cynical people tend to assume the best, I guess.

But I do think that when you start up the massive book-selling machine that is the Oprah Winfrey Book Club, and you pluck books out of the rank and file of mere mortals and invite them into the halcyon company of the gods (especially those books written by admitted drug addicts and liars) that you just might get burned every once in a while.

But Oprah was pissed and wasn’t shy about letting people know about it. And his guy suffered considerable fall-out. Lost his publishing deal. Had to give back millions of dollars. Was branded a fake and liar. And, let us not forget, that the part about him being a recovering addict was absolutely true… having your world crumble around you like that cannot be good for your sobriety.

And honestly, I’m willing to give Oprah her you-fuck-with-me-I’ll-fuck-with-you moment. But now, she’s going public with an apology SIX years after the fact? That reeks of hypocrisy and disingenuousness.

Let’s break it down for a moment: Oprah was angry because she took James Frey at face value… that he had a hard battle with drugs and alcohol and, through amazing force of will, emerged on the other side better and healthier. She really believed that he could stand as a shining example of what people can achieve if they put their mind to it. But then it turned out that it wasn’t (all) true.

Now, let’s go back to 1988, when Oprah revealed her amazing weight loss on her show. I don’t watch The Oprah Winfrey Show, but this event was all over the place, you could hardly miss it (wheelbarrow full of fat and all). Oprah had a long and difficult battle with her weight and, through amazing force of will, emerged on the other side better and healthier. Not only had she lost the weight, she was now committed to a healthier lifestyle that would keep the weight off. She stood as a shining example of what people can achieve if they only put their mind to it.

Only, she gained the weight back, didn’t she?

Where are the people demanding their money back for show tickets? Where are the outraged women who thought, just like Oprah, that they could lose the weight, only to find out that their example had stumbled? Where the hell is Oprah’s public lambasting for saying one thing, then doing another?

As far as Frey goes, he’s taking the high ground. He’s quoted as saying, “It was a nice surprise to hear from her, and I really appreciated the call and the sentiment.” What he didn’t say was what he was probably thinking: “But, y’know, I’m still a little pissed about her aggressively dismantling my career and life six years ago.”

I’m waiting for her to do an hour long special in which instead of the gentle platitudes about how she “let down her fans” with her yo-yoing weight loss and gain, she really tears into herself and says how she has lied and mislead everyone about her commitment to a healthy lifestyle.

THAT is an Oprah Winfrey show I’d tune in for.

***

PAIN GAIN

The Scientist was in an accident last week.

Nothing serious; she was stopped at a red light at the guy behind her slid on the ice and rear-ended her. He was only going five miles per hour or so, and other than a smashed-in bumper there was no damage to her car.

She was on the phone with me when it happened. Ironically, she was saying, “Be careful on the drive home. It’s snowing and EEEEK! I just got hit!” She called the cops and they waited around for the police report. Apparently Mr. Sorry-I-Just-Smashed-You-Bumper was in a hurry to leave, and said that since they had exchanged information there was no reason for him to stay. My wife, who is wise, begged to disagree, and made him stick around.

Being that he wasn’t driving his own car and he had bare-bones GEICO insurance, we’re happy that we have a police report.

After the initial “Holy shit! I just paid this car off!” it’s all seemed to turn out okay. His insurance company is paying to have The Scientist’s truck repaired. They’re paying for the rental car she’ll be driving while that happens. And they’re paying the cost for her chiropractor visits.

About that. She felt fine the day of the accident, but her neck started to hurt the day after. She was able to get in to see her guy right away. He took x-rays and told her she has minor whiplash. He’ll see her twice a week for about a month; after which he thinks she’ll be fine.

In discussing the accident, most people ask, “Are you going to sue?” This isn’t something that we had really considered. But, it seems, everyone else has. Including the two lawyers who sent nice letters to my wife the day after the accident. Helpful sorts. Even The Scientist’s doctor said he has connections with a lawyer who could help her if she wanted to sue. “You could probably get a couple thousand dollars for pain and suffering.”

Now, we could certainly use a couple thousand dollars. And my wife is in pain. Not a huge, debilitating amount of pain, but her neck hurts her. But we’re not going to sue.

It just feels like an underhanded thing to do. I mean, the insurance agency should pay for damages, including doctor visits--and they are. That’s what you have insurance for. And if this guy who hit her didn’t have insurance, then maybe we would sue him directly to recoup these costs. But for “pain and suffering”?

I’ve heard that litigation is the new lottery. In other words, more people think they have a chance of making some big money by suing than by playing the Pick5. And that just seems shitty. I mean, if you’re really hurt and can’t work, that’s one thing. But a fender-bender and sore neck? Not the same thing.

I bet the insurance company wouldn’t blink at a $2K settlement. The lawyer would get $700 or so, and we’d pocket enough to put a big dent in our credit card bills.

But we just don’t want to feed into that system.

I don’t want to come across as holier-than-thou, but we’re all grown-ups, right? The guy had insurance. He wasn’t driving recklessly. It’s early in winter, so I can even forgive him for not recognizing an icy patch. My wife will recover. To abuse the system by suing--even when most other people might do it--isn’t something we’d do. I suppose it’s not a dishonest thing to do, but it certainly doesn’t feel honest.

Maybe you think we’re dumb for not cashing in on an easy paycheck. And maybe we are. But if we sued this guy, it just wouldn’t feel right.

Then again, two grand could go a long way toward easing that sting.

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#261 In which our hero pushes his luck a little too far.

Had a gout attack on Wednesday night.

I haven’t had one in a while, but this one is a dozy. My big toe on my right foot is kinda messed up, I have a bunion or something going on there. Every doctor I’ve ever been to about this thing asks if I broke my toe at some point. I’m starting to think that maybe I did, and just never realized it. Like I got a hairline fracture that I mistook for a bad bashing, or something like that.

So when I half woke up at 4am, I tried to convince myself that the pain in my toe was just me sleeping on it weird. But, after 10 minutes of denial, I finally got out of bed and hobbled over to the bathroom to take my pills.

I take two kinds of medication for gout flare-ups: Indomethacin (an anti-inflammatory) and Colchicine (for pain and to reduce swelling). The Colchincine is specifically to elevate the symptoms of gout and seems to work pretty well. The drawback is that it messes up my guts to a huge degree. In fact, on the side of the bottle the instructions are, and I quote: “Take 1 tablet by mouth every two hours until loose stool.” In other words, when you start to crap your brains out, stop.

I’ve been taking these drugs for a couple years now and the pooping, which crampy and sucky, is generally a sign that the worse is over.

So I start taking my drugs every two hours, like instructed. I keep this up all day long, and the horrible bathroom dash doesn’t happen. But I know it’s coming.

The Scientist and I pick up the kids that evening and decide to go out for dinner. In the back of my head I’m thinking that this might not be the best idea. But I haven’t even had gas all day, and my fucking toe still hurt so I figure I deserved to treat myself.

My guts felt a little questionable going in, but I was hoping that it was just hunger pains. And by the end of the meal, that seemed to be the case. I had a nice steak, mashed potatoes and veggies, and felt pretty good. My toe still hurt, of course, but my belly was happy.

I was feeling so good, that I ordered a cup of coffee when The Scientist and the girls had ice cream for dessert. I even had three or four spoonfuls of Macey’s sundae when she couldn’t finish it.

As it turned out, those were two very poor decisions.

I had thought that the coffee would speed things along and, frankly, I was tired of waiting for the explosion, so I thought I’d give it a little push. As we were leaving the restaurant I felt a slight percolating in my guts, but nothing to worry about.

The Scientist took Macey in her car, and I took Lily in mine. It’s only about a 15-20 minute drive from the Applebee’s down the street; but five minutes in I realized I was in a race with the devil.

The “slight percolating” turned into something much more dire. I started to sweat. I loosened my belt. I squeaked out a little gas, before I became too afraid to roll those dice.

And the entire trip Lily wanted to chat with me. “Daddy, guess what? Guess what?” “What, honey?” I moaned. “That house had snow on the roof! Why’s there snow on the roof? But not the street? How’d you get the snow off the street? What’s that thing? What’s that thing over there?”

I’m staring straight ahead and clenching for all I’m worth, and just trying to keep a pleasant, even tone with my five-year-old. I want to say, “Holy shit, can you pipe down for 10 minutes? If I lose my concentration here neither of us is going to be happy!”

I drive at an unadvisable pace down the side streets to my neighborhood, and pull into the garage just as The Scientist is getting out of her car. “You’re going to have to get Lily out of the car! I have trouble coming!” I shout as I fumble for my door keys.

Luckily, I manage to sprint up to the bathroom in time. The results are horrible, and I’ll not burden you with any description. I had to return twice more, but by bedtime I was clean as a whistle.

And this morning? My damn toe hurts just as bad. I’ve started the drugs again. Let the race begin.

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CHEAT FEAT

On the way to work this morning I heard a commercial for a website called “Ashley Madison.” It’s a hook-up site for married people. I’m no prude, and I guess I’m not surprised that such a thing exists, but I was floored to hear it on the radio.

Dating sites are one thing, but one that caters to people wanting to have an affair? That’s more than a little creepy.

So, naturally, I had to check out the site.

First thing that hit me was the tagline: “Life is short. Have an affair.” I’m like no shit? This is appealing to people? Clearly, I’m not the target audience.

The whole thing bugs me. Oddly enough, I’d be considerably less offended if a married man went on a traditional dating service or Craig’s list or something similar and pretended to be single.

And it’s not like I’ve never cheated on a girlfriend before, ‘cuz I have. And it’s not like I’m not open to personal ads, even though I’ve never done anything like that. Well, I take that back: there was a brief, dark period in my life where I dabbled in AOL personals (ugh, I know) and even got a few responses… but I never followed up and certainly never went out on any dates. I was single at the time, for what it’s worth.

Anyway, I dug around a little on the site; mostly to see if anywhere it mentioned that having an affair is most likely illegal in your state and we’re not liable if you get caught and lose half your stuff. The TERMS OF USE did include this:

In your use of our Service, you agree to act responsibly in a manner demonstrating the exercise of good judgment. For example and without limitation, you agree not to: (a) violate any applicable law or regulation…

Let me stop you there, because hey? Having an affair isn’t generally thought of as exercising good judgment. Also, isn’t adultery illegal? That would be violating an “applicable law,” right?

But, eh, what do I know? Maybe having an affair is the best thing that could happen to some couples.

I also enjoyed this portion of their FAQ (answering “I'm planning on meeting someone. What should I remember?”)

Try and tell at least two people where you're going to be, the name of the person you're meeting, what they look like and when you expect to be home. You can provide this information without revealing the purpose of your meeting.

Hey, Bob? I’m going to be meeting a blond-haired woman, 5’3”, at the Starbucks on the corner of Green and Cedar this Saturday at 7:30pm. What? Oh, no reason, just wanted to let you know. In case I, y’know, go missing or something.

There’s even a money back guarantee if you don’t hook up! Apparently you may not be able to guarantee the stability of your marriage, but you CAN guarantee your chances of having an affair.

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