meanwhile, in timespace warping

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60ºF, sun: dogchildren are frolicking in the backyard and by frolicking I mean that Kirby is trying to get his sisters to play with him and they're growling and lunging at his face. This is the way.

I've somehow managed to convince myself for the last three weeks that Labor Day weekend was two weeks away; clearly, school starting tends to warp my sense of time, which has a weird habit, here at least, of seeming to stand still and then move ahead in scattershot fashion to the next stalling out – even the local rooster can't get his schedule straight.

I think I'm going to let myself buy an electronic drumset (amazing how small and cheap they’ve gotten since I started playing 30 years ago) to start playing again without terrifying the dogs. Having fun with the warmup exercises and my little practice pad: first time playing not for a grade or as a fuck you or as an occasional job but for fun – with traditional grip, which I was never allowed to do in my more formal training – in longer than I care to remember.

AMUSING OURSELVES TO DEATH (Postman, 1985)

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(read: 20220817->22; my complete reading list, from 2013 to the present, lives here)

"Television is the command center in subtler ways as well. Our use of other media... is largely orchestrated by television. Through it we learn what telephone system to use, what movies to see, what books, records and magazines to buy, what radio programs to listn to. Television arranges our communications environment for us in ways that no other medium has the power to do... the world as given to us through television seems natural, not bizarre. For the loss of the sense of the strange is a sign of adjustment, and the extent to which we have adjusted is a measure of the extent to which we have been changed." 

While these are only two examples, replace "television" with "the internet" in both and the proof that Postman is just as relevant today as he was in 1985 is unavoidable. Better, I think, to let Postman speak for himself, given that, a.) I agree with 99% of what he says – we are, indeed, far more in Huxley’s future than in Orwell’s – and that, b.) compiling these fractured thoughts into a coherent “review” for want of better phrase is, for me, the end of processing: what Postman offers and requires is a continual processing.

"The problem, in any case, does not reside in *what* people watch. The problem is in *that* we watch. The solution must be found in *how* we watch. For I believe it may fairly be said that we have yet to learn what television is."

And we’re still trying to figure it – and the internet – out.

percolate / collate

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57ºF, sun: Wednesdays are my off-days from the MainFictionThing: give my brain some percolation time, let things merge, transform; get the inbox wrangled, books and reads processed / TSR preppings and writings for this space.

Truth of pod-prep: Every time I do it, I worry I don't have enough questions. Every time I collate all the fragments and shards assembled over the month(s) of prep and reading, I see that I'll do just fine and that it'll be a matter of cutting things out and of being able to go with the flow: the latter is probably the main thing – for me, at least, I have to have a deep knowledge of the subject matter (not as much as the guest, obviously) in order to go with said flow during the recording and lend each interview the combo of "in the moment" and timelessness I try to add to each (I rarely, for instance, discuss current events - though they may come up as an aside.)

Still on the "to-process/review stack": SUPERMAN'S METROPOLIS. Might have a thing about Postman's AMUSING OURSELVES TO DEATH coming later, but it won't be a "reviewy review": better to let Postman speak for himself and for our times from 1985.

this is what i write when i haven’t slept

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Woke up in the middle of a horrid night – though I probably slept more than I think – to find that I somehow managed to kick all of the covers loose and bring the bottom of the sheet up to my head; if I talked in my sleep, I'm sure I had interesting things to say, probably far more interesting than in my waking hours. Bright side: I'm still married. Not-so: my capacity to be brilliant is even more nonexistent than normal; might be in negative brilliance territory and no I don't have a clue as to what made it so horrid a night of sleep / send help, DARPA-level coffee / caffeine infusion: I am contributing nothing to this conversation with myself and need to learn to nap.

Scott Walker on PRESS (A) TO START

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Scott Walker – a hell of a writer, a hell of a friend, and someone whose advice has always steered me in a direction I hadn’t considered while keeping my whatever-it-is that makes me me intact – was kind enough to share a few words about the first issue of PRESS (A) TO START:

"Weaver's ability to turn a phrase and zig when you expect him to zag is on full display in the debut issue of PRESS (A): With a confident, unflinching determination, this first installment explores decades of time in a search for closure that can never be but must nevertheless be pursued: Weaver's willingness to unapologetically and poetically chew right down to the bone of the trauma of losing his mother - and the conflicting emotions that loss triggered - has yielded an autobiographical work authentically heartbreaking and surprisingly soul satisfying. Just like the relationship of a mother and a son.

–Scott Walker, author of the LITTLE YOKAI series

PRESS (A) TO START is a twice-a-year, print-only premium (though also imperfect, raw, and free) zine produced exclusively for MacroParentheticals subscribers. The first issue, LAST CHRISTMAS IN JULY – A COWARD’S EXORCISM, is now available. You can sign up here to subscribe.

a comics neophyte once more

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Yesterday I read an actual physical single issue comic for the first time in at least 10 years (the antique mall find of SUPERMAN'S METROPOLIS, review forthcoming; quick version: loved it – have to get the other two volumes in the trilogy) and now I'm considering, because there are no local shops in this cultural wasteland, getting a pull list together via Midtown – or some other delivery service; if you've got a recommendation, let me know – and reading them again. Only problem: no clue what I'll read or where to start (recs welcome here too)– I feel like a comics neophyte again (even though I wrote a book on them ten years ago) but that, to me, represents the strength of the medium: constant, perpetual change – not always for the better – but change nonetheless.