Orangeness 9: Infogarbage
The Internet is a vast ocean, spanning the whole globe, even where it is land. It is an ocean of electronic information, not water. There is a reason why moving from site to site is still called “surfing the Net.” Every time you turn on that computer and connect, you are exposing yourself to the endless circulation of metaphorical water and allegorical salt.
And, just like the real ocean, the Net-Ocean (fishing nets, that is, to snare you and your fellow creatures) has regions and seas, some clear and balmy, others polluted and full of harm. The bottom is lined with the shipwrecks of “dot-com” companies, start-ups, service providers, search engines, and the remains of once massive lords of the sea….Compuserve? Altavista? Geocities? Whale carcasses, all of them now.
There is now so much plastic and other pollution in the ocean that it has spun together to form artificial islands and a permanent layer of compacted material, harmful to fish and sea creatures. And the Ocean of Internet is going this way too, but the polluting material is not physical but informational. I call it “infogarbage,” and by now there is no place either in the ocean or on the Internet that has not been somehow compromised by it, even if it is tiny and hard to see.
Much blather, sometimes true blather, has been written about the “monetization” (lovely word, that) of the internet, and the frantic competition for people’s attention. The oil of the information age is attention, that “made-you-look-and-click” thing. See where I’m going with that metaphor. Oil, fossil fuel, is so essential that people will drill the bottom of the sea to get it. On the internet, monetized sites drill to the bottom of your brain and suck out the oil of your attention. Their sole ambition is to get people clicking on the site and sharing it on social media in international cascades of infogarbage, “going viral,” and thus showing that it is a suitable drilling platform for more attention, more ad space, more info garbage. And it’s cheap and can’t break and exude awful goo all over the shoreline.
What, you say, my time is my own, and if I want to click on celebrity facts or cat videos, why shouldn’t I? Yeah, don’t we all. But then I discovered that these obsessive little entertainments are provided by an enormous industry of spammy sites, which underlie the ubiquitous ads. Back in the ancient days just after the millennium, reams and reams of spam was delivered to us under a bubbling coating of word salad, shredded civilization aimed at defeating the spam filters which kept the pollution manageable. Now there is no need to elude the spam filters - we readers have BECOME spam, and we take it in every moment of our blenderized attention span. An enormous industry uses thousands and thousands of pseudo-informative sites to extract from us. You are a resource to be mined and exploited. If petroleum had consciousness, it would be you, bubbling up the pipe along with countless exploitation web sites.
They have names often compounded with “buzz” and “viral.” ViralRecall, BuzzBombed, BlitzLift, Lifescript, Bite the Buzz, Mindbuzz, PeekWorthy, ViralWorld, Mind Pause, Distractify, Viral Hog, Buzzify, PopnHop,Viral Recall, ViralIgniter, CoViral, Viral Scoop, Shareable, BoreBurn, Bored Panda, Boredom Therapy, DamnBored, Lifebuzz, SetViral, GuiltyFix, Flipopular, Viral Mega, and on and on. This protozoic proliferation of infogarbage sites is managed by a few “content management” companies such as “Taboola” or “Outbrain.” From these sources, massive rivers of info sludge pour into the Net Ocean. They deliver the basic output of tabloids from history: celebrity gossip and facts, grotesque freak shows, lurid crime stories, cute animals, sports, medical quackery, and of course, female cheesecake. Boobs, ass, and more boobs. The more you click, the more boobs you see. And eventually you will be set upon by malware, the hook under the bait.
You can see the evidence of these myriads of catch-you sites as “by-lines” under “sponsored posts” or even in supposedly legitimate “news” posts on Yahoo or CNN. You have probably seen and consumed material from millions of them. These sites can MAKE MONEY by renting ad space, and may be the basis of what is advertised as “how to make a fortune working only four hours a week.” Yes, if you create and manage 100 or 200 garbage sites, you’ll get royalties from the ads. Maybe only one dollar per site or 1/10 cent per click, but you’ve got a lot of them and it mounts up, so let’s create ViralBuzz and its permutations and go off to our warm beach in the Caribbean! More celebrity boobs, baby. What is notable about this industry is that it produces NOTHING. No craft, no food or drink, no helpful gadgets, no books or medicines or furniture…nothing except money.
So we are back by the ocean. It’s clear, blue and sparkling, and the rum drinks with the fruit in them are on the table, and your laptop showing the output of your 700 info garbage grab-you sites is hidden under the pillows. That’s the same ocean you’re polluting, but in an informational way. In the world of information, there are no limits. It’s jaw-dropping and mind-blowing. You’ll never believe what can happen next.
Sunday, February 28, 2016
Sunday, February 14, 2016
Epic House Clearing
It’s been a while, we know that. My last “Orangeness” entry was in early October of last year, 2015. A week after that, my mother broke her hip in a fall at home. Twelve days later, despite attempts to repair it and rehabilitate her, my mother passed away aged 94.
Since then my life has been seriously disrupted since I am the only heir and executor of her estate, and she left a load of stuff behind which has to be taken care of. So in these months since then I haven’t had either the time or the energy to post to the Orange. But it’s 2016 now, and February, the dreariest month of our year, so I need to get back to what I like. A sip of orange juice if you might say, though orange juice reminds me of my late father who was rather unsavory in his addiction to orange juice.
Let me tell you about what was left to me in this epic passage of generations. Plenty of money, enough to pay a lot of taxes on, so I am now for the moment one of the greedy parasitic inheritors of unearned wealth. And a decrepit house in a Boston suburb, filled with 60 years of hoarded parental material, ranging from ancient decaying coats and clothes and shoes, to 60 years worth of financial statements and check stubs proving that my mother bought a bottle of milk in 1974. And my father’s piano, which a piano technician has proclaimed un-repairable. It sounds like an otherworldly dulcimer and I have recorded some untuned piano sounds to use in later ambient compositions. Last but not least there is the archive of my parents’ musical and artistic careers, which includes my father’s music and media recordings. With great effort on my part and Maggie, the archivist at Brandeis University, we were able to stash all of my father’s music material into the Brandeis Department of Music archive, where it can be accessed by anyone interested in the music of my old Dad.
Much more difficult to curate is the large collection of unsold art of my mother’s. My mother created a large amount of art with no intention of selling it. She just made it because she was compelled by talent to do so. Talent unfortunately does not mean money and in her day it was considered completely crass and low for an artist to market his - or especially her work. So my mother’s output is sitting slowly falling apart in the two back rooms of the rather small house. I have gotten a couple of them placed or promised to museums or collectors but the majority remains with the old house…and the mice.
Yeah, I haven’t mentioned the mice yet. Not computer mice, real rodents, in their numbers, infest the house. I heard them scampering in the ceiling and behind the furniture. I did not see one, which is good because if I had I would have immediately decamped to the less infested Hampton Inn. The mice were feeding on old birdseed left in the room behind other things we couldn’t see. Even when we removed the birdseed the mousies kept coming because they had left stashes in their nests which they built all around the house in hidden hoarded places. Now mouses are cute, right? Mickey and Minnie? Three Blind Mice? They are NOT cute. They are vermin. And what I didn’t know about mice is that they pee and poop all over where they go, for territory and path marking. And this mouse effluent stinks unbelievably - worse than a skunk, if you have ever smelled that. Mouse effluent is also transferable. In that it contaminates whatever touches it, which in turn contaminates whatever touches that, etc. etc. I have been spraying Febreze and other stink relievers and I still smell it more than a month afterward.
It was Christmas time and I was re-enacting the Battle Against the Mouse King, but I had no Nutcracker or Toy Soldier Army to combat them. My helpers set up traditional snap-traps baited with peanut butter and seemed to put a dent in their numbers, but what we really needed was a fierce cat who would rid the house of them gladly.
Work has been done. I need to de-clutter my own place, and every time I remove something, I either stupidly buy something new, or find more stuff. I’m like my mother. I have check stubs from 1987 in a big space-filling box. 1987, you are going to be history, if I can get to you. That’s almost mid-century, though I think my mother beat me in the long-term hoarding department.
The old living room still looks mostly as it was when my parents lived there, mid-60s style. But the antique dealers are at work. I am selling off furniture pieces one by one, though I can’t do that while I’m not there. I managed to get rid of the most well-known piece, the chair known as the “Womb Chair,” designed by the famous Finnish architect and crossword-puzzle fill in word Eero Saarinen. This chair is a famous mid-century modern design but I always disliked it. Once you got in it you couldn't get out. Sort of like being in a womb I guess. You would struggle to get your butt out of the deep back of the chair and then you would pop out wet and screaming to pick up your drink from the round cocktail table which my father built to go with all the other mid century stuff.
As I have stuff removed from the house in advance of selling it, I offered the chair to a local antique store specializing in mid-century modern housewares and furniture. It is supposed to be worth some money but there has been some deterioration over the years so maybe not so much. At least someone will buy it and it will find its way to a better home. I'm still looking for a home for the art, which is large and difficult to display, and also smells of mouse pee.
I guess you’re up to date now.
February 14, 2016.
Since then my life has been seriously disrupted since I am the only heir and executor of her estate, and she left a load of stuff behind which has to be taken care of. So in these months since then I haven’t had either the time or the energy to post to the Orange. But it’s 2016 now, and February, the dreariest month of our year, so I need to get back to what I like. A sip of orange juice if you might say, though orange juice reminds me of my late father who was rather unsavory in his addiction to orange juice.
Let me tell you about what was left to me in this epic passage of generations. Plenty of money, enough to pay a lot of taxes on, so I am now for the moment one of the greedy parasitic inheritors of unearned wealth. And a decrepit house in a Boston suburb, filled with 60 years of hoarded parental material, ranging from ancient decaying coats and clothes and shoes, to 60 years worth of financial statements and check stubs proving that my mother bought a bottle of milk in 1974. And my father’s piano, which a piano technician has proclaimed un-repairable. It sounds like an otherworldly dulcimer and I have recorded some untuned piano sounds to use in later ambient compositions. Last but not least there is the archive of my parents’ musical and artistic careers, which includes my father’s music and media recordings. With great effort on my part and Maggie, the archivist at Brandeis University, we were able to stash all of my father’s music material into the Brandeis Department of Music archive, where it can be accessed by anyone interested in the music of my old Dad.
Much more difficult to curate is the large collection of unsold art of my mother’s. My mother created a large amount of art with no intention of selling it. She just made it because she was compelled by talent to do so. Talent unfortunately does not mean money and in her day it was considered completely crass and low for an artist to market his - or especially her work. So my mother’s output is sitting slowly falling apart in the two back rooms of the rather small house. I have gotten a couple of them placed or promised to museums or collectors but the majority remains with the old house…and the mice.
Yeah, I haven’t mentioned the mice yet. Not computer mice, real rodents, in their numbers, infest the house. I heard them scampering in the ceiling and behind the furniture. I did not see one, which is good because if I had I would have immediately decamped to the less infested Hampton Inn. The mice were feeding on old birdseed left in the room behind other things we couldn’t see. Even when we removed the birdseed the mousies kept coming because they had left stashes in their nests which they built all around the house in hidden hoarded places. Now mouses are cute, right? Mickey and Minnie? Three Blind Mice? They are NOT cute. They are vermin. And what I didn’t know about mice is that they pee and poop all over where they go, for territory and path marking. And this mouse effluent stinks unbelievably - worse than a skunk, if you have ever smelled that. Mouse effluent is also transferable. In that it contaminates whatever touches it, which in turn contaminates whatever touches that, etc. etc. I have been spraying Febreze and other stink relievers and I still smell it more than a month afterward.
It was Christmas time and I was re-enacting the Battle Against the Mouse King, but I had no Nutcracker or Toy Soldier Army to combat them. My helpers set up traditional snap-traps baited with peanut butter and seemed to put a dent in their numbers, but what we really needed was a fierce cat who would rid the house of them gladly.
Work has been done. I need to de-clutter my own place, and every time I remove something, I either stupidly buy something new, or find more stuff. I’m like my mother. I have check stubs from 1987 in a big space-filling box. 1987, you are going to be history, if I can get to you. That’s almost mid-century, though I think my mother beat me in the long-term hoarding department.
The old living room still looks mostly as it was when my parents lived there, mid-60s style. But the antique dealers are at work. I am selling off furniture pieces one by one, though I can’t do that while I’m not there. I managed to get rid of the most well-known piece, the chair known as the “Womb Chair,” designed by the famous Finnish architect and crossword-puzzle fill in word Eero Saarinen. This chair is a famous mid-century modern design but I always disliked it. Once you got in it you couldn't get out. Sort of like being in a womb I guess. You would struggle to get your butt out of the deep back of the chair and then you would pop out wet and screaming to pick up your drink from the round cocktail table which my father built to go with all the other mid century stuff.
As I have stuff removed from the house in advance of selling it, I offered the chair to a local antique store specializing in mid-century modern housewares and furniture. It is supposed to be worth some money but there has been some deterioration over the years so maybe not so much. At least someone will buy it and it will find its way to a better home. I'm still looking for a home for the art, which is large and difficult to display, and also smells of mouse pee.
I guess you’re up to date now.
February 14, 2016.
Tuesday, October 6, 2015
The Pope on the Pot
I took the Pope into the bathroom with me a week ago, when he was touring the Mid-Atlantic States region. It was sort of an audience, but not arranged by his protocol directors. The Pope went into the bathroom because he was on the cover of TIME magazine that week. As we all know, we want to take reading material into the bathroom when we, uh, plan on spending some time there rather than making a quick papal visit. We would like this to be quality time, but that quality depends on the diet, productivity and output of the sitter.
So I look at the kindly visage of the Holy Father, and I cannot quite shake the notion that he is looking back at me, even though his eyes aren’t directly focused on me. It’s like all those magical media items in the “Harry Potter” movies, where not only do pictures and prints move and make noise, but they interact with you personally. No! Don’t let the Pope see me on the pot! I’m so embarrassed. I put my hand over the Pope’s printed face. To use a more religiously appropriate situation, like an Orthodox ikon this picture is a “window to the soul.” Pope Francis’s image, clad in clean white tissue, made smoother by the work of holy Photoshop, is a transparency. Would I take an Orthodox ikon into the loo? Would I take a lavishly illustrated cooking magazine into the place where the post-digested remains of its recipes ends up?
I have always had the primitive notion that things have consciousness. Depiction is communication. It is listening to me. And as our culture and technology get closer and closer to Harry Potter’s magical world (Internet connection for your dishwasher! For your underwear!) we will reach a point where the Pope could give us a blessing in our private quarters, and really mean it. If things have consciousness, can you insult them? I once said “Go away!” to “Siri,” the robotic voice of my iPhone, and she answered back, “What did I do to offend you?” I hurt a robot’s feelings! I know of people who take their Kindles and iPads into the W.C. with them, endangering their pristine shining screens with the splash of ritual pollution.
I fold up the magazine. TIME is out of time and I will have to attempt another devotional session, helped by more prunes and an apology to Siri. Yes, sorry….I’m TOO POPED TO POOP!
So I look at the kindly visage of the Holy Father, and I cannot quite shake the notion that he is looking back at me, even though his eyes aren’t directly focused on me. It’s like all those magical media items in the “Harry Potter” movies, where not only do pictures and prints move and make noise, but they interact with you personally. No! Don’t let the Pope see me on the pot! I’m so embarrassed. I put my hand over the Pope’s printed face. To use a more religiously appropriate situation, like an Orthodox ikon this picture is a “window to the soul.” Pope Francis’s image, clad in clean white tissue, made smoother by the work of holy Photoshop, is a transparency. Would I take an Orthodox ikon into the loo? Would I take a lavishly illustrated cooking magazine into the place where the post-digested remains of its recipes ends up?
I have always had the primitive notion that things have consciousness. Depiction is communication. It is listening to me. And as our culture and technology get closer and closer to Harry Potter’s magical world (Internet connection for your dishwasher! For your underwear!) we will reach a point where the Pope could give us a blessing in our private quarters, and really mean it. If things have consciousness, can you insult them? I once said “Go away!” to “Siri,” the robotic voice of my iPhone, and she answered back, “What did I do to offend you?” I hurt a robot’s feelings! I know of people who take their Kindles and iPads into the W.C. with them, endangering their pristine shining screens with the splash of ritual pollution.
I fold up the magazine. TIME is out of time and I will have to attempt another devotional session, helped by more prunes and an apology to Siri. Yes, sorry….I’m TOO POPED TO POOP!
Monday, September 28, 2015
Food Rave
You've heard Rants here. A Rant is a complaint, delivering negative feelings. A Rave is the opposite of a Rant: it's an enthusiastic declaration of positive appreciation. So here's a Rave, this one about the foods I love.
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I am holding a little slab of pure deliciousness. It is Orange, of course, but it is not a citrus orange. It is a dried apricot, known as a “slab” because during the drying process the fruit piece settles into a flat puddle of sticky sweetness. You have to forcibly remove the slabs from me or else I eat the whole package contents and get a wicked bellyache. Same with prunes and other items of dried delectability.
I’ve talked about foods I hate (any green vegetable), now I’ll talk about foods I love. Start with appetizers. The “appetizer” word just makes me feel good thinking about it. It is not an “app” that you load on your smartphone, despite how hipster menu-makers describe it. It is a collection of nodules of happy flavor that you and your friends devour first. Whenever I hear the word “jalapeño” in any food description, I know I’m in the right place. The time-honored thing to say when you get a plate of appetizers, especially nacho jalapeño appetizers is, “It’s a whole meal on its own!” Which of course is more than true, but you’ve already eaten it and are going on to the main course. Take a swig of your micro craft draft brew and continue.
Meat! Let’s meat up! There is no food more satisfying for me than meat. I am a confirmed carnivore. I tried being a vegetarian for 6 weeks one year and by the fourth week I was ready to slaughter the next Whole Foods customer I saw. I will never do that again (not slaughtering the customer, that is purely theoretical my friends!). You can prepare meat however you want it, and I will slink up to it on silent paws, waiting for my share. But it’s not just meat that occupies my plate ‘o’ plenty. I will eat potatoes done any old way, even though I hear that a potato comes from a plant. The secret is….cheese.
Cheese! Wonderful fermented curdled crumbly slimy moldy essence of the primal whiteness of dairy! I will eat any food over which cheese has been applied, even tofu. Bleu cheese looks like zombie remains, smells like a swamp, and I adore it. Brie is covered by white fungus: More please. See how the Cheese melts its way through everything I love to eat! I am never without it, except while traveling, when I cannot keep it cool on the road.
We are therefore building to a display of gourmand logic, built upon not those dreary food pyramid groups but on the feastable moment of my favorite treat foods. What has cheese, meat, starch, fried stuff, and peppers all at once, in one magnificent oozing cylinder? The CHEESESTEAK of course. Let me meditate upon this a while. It is a serious matter.
I simply won’t mention dessert. That is for another posting, another time.
I am holding a large container in my hands. It is my Offering to the Gods of Snack. (Or Slack, if you prefer.) It contains mixed dried fruit, almonds and cashews, and a few bits of milk chocolate. It is something I can always eat, as long as I don’t eat too much of it. (See above.) It looks like an old-time lottery or Bingo container from which tokens were picked. I hold the cover down and shake the container vigorously. Then I place it on the Kitchen Table and reach within. Behold, I have won the lottery. I have selected a PRUNE!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am holding a little slab of pure deliciousness. It is Orange, of course, but it is not a citrus orange. It is a dried apricot, known as a “slab” because during the drying process the fruit piece settles into a flat puddle of sticky sweetness. You have to forcibly remove the slabs from me or else I eat the whole package contents and get a wicked bellyache. Same with prunes and other items of dried delectability.
I’ve talked about foods I hate (any green vegetable), now I’ll talk about foods I love. Start with appetizers. The “appetizer” word just makes me feel good thinking about it. It is not an “app” that you load on your smartphone, despite how hipster menu-makers describe it. It is a collection of nodules of happy flavor that you and your friends devour first. Whenever I hear the word “jalapeño” in any food description, I know I’m in the right place. The time-honored thing to say when you get a plate of appetizers, especially nacho jalapeño appetizers is, “It’s a whole meal on its own!” Which of course is more than true, but you’ve already eaten it and are going on to the main course. Take a swig of your micro craft draft brew and continue.
Meat! Let’s meat up! There is no food more satisfying for me than meat. I am a confirmed carnivore. I tried being a vegetarian for 6 weeks one year and by the fourth week I was ready to slaughter the next Whole Foods customer I saw. I will never do that again (not slaughtering the customer, that is purely theoretical my friends!). You can prepare meat however you want it, and I will slink up to it on silent paws, waiting for my share. But it’s not just meat that occupies my plate ‘o’ plenty. I will eat potatoes done any old way, even though I hear that a potato comes from a plant. The secret is….cheese.
Cheese! Wonderful fermented curdled crumbly slimy moldy essence of the primal whiteness of dairy! I will eat any food over which cheese has been applied, even tofu. Bleu cheese looks like zombie remains, smells like a swamp, and I adore it. Brie is covered by white fungus: More please. See how the Cheese melts its way through everything I love to eat! I am never without it, except while traveling, when I cannot keep it cool on the road.
We are therefore building to a display of gourmand logic, built upon not those dreary food pyramid groups but on the feastable moment of my favorite treat foods. What has cheese, meat, starch, fried stuff, and peppers all at once, in one magnificent oozing cylinder? The CHEESESTEAK of course. Let me meditate upon this a while. It is a serious matter.
I simply won’t mention dessert. That is for another posting, another time.
I am holding a large container in my hands. It is my Offering to the Gods of Snack. (Or Slack, if you prefer.) It contains mixed dried fruit, almonds and cashews, and a few bits of milk chocolate. It is something I can always eat, as long as I don’t eat too much of it. (See above.) It looks like an old-time lottery or Bingo container from which tokens were picked. I hold the cover down and shake the container vigorously. Then I place it on the Kitchen Table and reach within. Behold, I have won the lottery. I have selected a PRUNE!
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Jaw-dropping Internet fail! You won't believe what I...
I had a major internet failure. For some reason my connection to the Almighty was interrupted and I had no access to anything in the Cloud of Unknowing. I am ashamed to say that I went into a panic because important work and artistic resources were marooned there with no way to get to them. I am old enough to remember life without the Internet and made plans to resume writing letters, making telephone calls, and shipping art originals to clients. Finally I fled to Starbucks where I knew that the coffeeshop wi-fi would provide me with the caffeinated communion I needed. Yes, they get us one way and another too, with coffee and cookies as well as mainline disinformation injections.
Trudging home from Starbucks I called one of my trusted friends, the net expert who set up my home system in the first place, and begged him for help. He walked me through the protocols for re-setting my router and modem, and lo and behold, with his bidding the Cloud parted and my steady diet of celebrity breasts, cute cats, and Republican propaganda returned to tempt me with lists of "digestive destroyers" and celebrities who are religious. There was no cause for this whole kerfuffle; certainly my internet provider has an endless supply of plausible deniability. Perhaps, as my expert said, a random power surge confused my connector gadgets, sending them scurrying under the bed rather than face the fiberoptic whiplash.
But now they are sitting there flickering away with their eerie greenish rows of glowing eyeballs, delivering videos of more cute furry creatures that can rip your face off. I want my celebrity sharks, my lurid crimes, and the Pope, all sharing the same screen!. And why not an earthquake or two as well.
Trudging home from Starbucks I called one of my trusted friends, the net expert who set up my home system in the first place, and begged him for help. He walked me through the protocols for re-setting my router and modem, and lo and behold, with his bidding the Cloud parted and my steady diet of celebrity breasts, cute cats, and Republican propaganda returned to tempt me with lists of "digestive destroyers" and celebrities who are religious. There was no cause for this whole kerfuffle; certainly my internet provider has an endless supply of plausible deniability. Perhaps, as my expert said, a random power surge confused my connector gadgets, sending them scurrying under the bed rather than face the fiberoptic whiplash.
But now they are sitting there flickering away with their eerie greenish rows of glowing eyeballs, delivering videos of more cute furry creatures that can rip your face off. I want my celebrity sharks, my lurid crimes, and the Pope, all sharing the same screen!. And why not an earthquake or two as well.
Saturday, September 19, 2015
The American Parking Lot
THE AMERICAN PARKING LOT
The parking lot where I shop for groceries is like a large inclined chessboard crowded with huge chunky pieces that weigh tons. Inside each of these pieces is angry, frustrated chess player who can’t get out. They got on the board, but now they can’t find a space. Time to run the Parking Lot Game, also known as “Is that green pepper really that necessary?” The Parking Lot was built about 30 years ago, when cars were boring little boxes, a design transition from the enormous flat wheeled platters of the ‘50s and ‘60s. Now, the lot is filled with our version of cars as TANKS. Yes, our cars want to look like they could go to war, and the Parking Lot is one of our battlefields.
The basic family car unit here in the USA is the SUV, and with the attitude of the frustrated driver within, the true designation is “F.U.V.” which you may be rude enough to figure out…Of course I nicely view that “F” as standing for Futility, that is, “Sport Futility Vehicle.” So you rush along the shrunken alleyways between the rows of family armored personnel carriers looking for a space to put your own conveyance and LOOK THERE’S A SPACE! Here comes the face off. Someone else, at an equal distance, has their eye on that space too. But knock it off, Volvo jockey, I was here first, by at least two seconds. So I am now faced with the geometric problem of fitting a large rectangle into a smaller rectangle which leaves enough room for me to squeeze out of my car without crushing a limb or two. Which means I have to do a 27-point turn, backing up, and back, and up, and back, and up, and watch those parking lot lines on the pavement, they’re there for a reason. You get one foot (that’s 12 inches) on either side of your car which you have somehow managed to leverage in between the Lexus and the Acura wagons. Here we go! Don’t hit any of those giant baby carriages, black armored tanks in which somewhere is a baby, hidden away with the rocket launcher.
I squirm butt-first out of my car, flat against my neighbor, and I go to the market for my healthy, organic, everything-except-the-price low supplies. I drag my recyclable paper bags to the back of my own sportless vehicle. Then I squirm in again, kind of like a fancy wine cork opener. Open the door and it touches the shiny finish of that BMW HOPE THEY DIDN’T SEE ME did I make a mark on their German trophy wagon? Try to back out. Oh Gawd what if I hit the Explorer next to me? The secret about these expensive FUV’s is that they are surprisingly fragile. They are not made of steel. No flaming blast furnace created the chassis or armor of this would-be safari bomber. Its body parts and bumpers are made of plastic. Even if you bump it just a little bit, the plastic can lose its paint coating and crack. Where are those charging rhinos when you need them? At least they’re, like, natural, right? So it’s time to exit. But wait, there’s something in the way. You can’t see it, and you can’t hear it. It slinks along silently until you’ve nearly crushed it, or if you’re walking, it has nearly crushed you. Yes, it’s the Creeping PRIUS. Electricity and gas in an unnerving combination….saved for another later rant. Escaped! Escaped from the Parking Lot of Chaos! But oh no…I forgot to buy the toilet paper!
The parking lot where I shop for groceries is like a large inclined chessboard crowded with huge chunky pieces that weigh tons. Inside each of these pieces is angry, frustrated chess player who can’t get out. They got on the board, but now they can’t find a space. Time to run the Parking Lot Game, also known as “Is that green pepper really that necessary?” The Parking Lot was built about 30 years ago, when cars were boring little boxes, a design transition from the enormous flat wheeled platters of the ‘50s and ‘60s. Now, the lot is filled with our version of cars as TANKS. Yes, our cars want to look like they could go to war, and the Parking Lot is one of our battlefields.
The basic family car unit here in the USA is the SUV, and with the attitude of the frustrated driver within, the true designation is “F.U.V.” which you may be rude enough to figure out…Of course I nicely view that “F” as standing for Futility, that is, “Sport Futility Vehicle.” So you rush along the shrunken alleyways between the rows of family armored personnel carriers looking for a space to put your own conveyance and LOOK THERE’S A SPACE! Here comes the face off. Someone else, at an equal distance, has their eye on that space too. But knock it off, Volvo jockey, I was here first, by at least two seconds. So I am now faced with the geometric problem of fitting a large rectangle into a smaller rectangle which leaves enough room for me to squeeze out of my car without crushing a limb or two. Which means I have to do a 27-point turn, backing up, and back, and up, and back, and up, and watch those parking lot lines on the pavement, they’re there for a reason. You get one foot (that’s 12 inches) on either side of your car which you have somehow managed to leverage in between the Lexus and the Acura wagons. Here we go! Don’t hit any of those giant baby carriages, black armored tanks in which somewhere is a baby, hidden away with the rocket launcher.
I squirm butt-first out of my car, flat against my neighbor, and I go to the market for my healthy, organic, everything-except-the-price low supplies. I drag my recyclable paper bags to the back of my own sportless vehicle. Then I squirm in again, kind of like a fancy wine cork opener. Open the door and it touches the shiny finish of that BMW HOPE THEY DIDN’T SEE ME did I make a mark on their German trophy wagon? Try to back out. Oh Gawd what if I hit the Explorer next to me? The secret about these expensive FUV’s is that they are surprisingly fragile. They are not made of steel. No flaming blast furnace created the chassis or armor of this would-be safari bomber. Its body parts and bumpers are made of plastic. Even if you bump it just a little bit, the plastic can lose its paint coating and crack. Where are those charging rhinos when you need them? At least they’re, like, natural, right? So it’s time to exit. But wait, there’s something in the way. You can’t see it, and you can’t hear it. It slinks along silently until you’ve nearly crushed it, or if you’re walking, it has nearly crushed you. Yes, it’s the Creeping PRIUS. Electricity and gas in an unnerving combination….saved for another later rant. Escaped! Escaped from the Parking Lot of Chaos! But oh no…I forgot to buy the toilet paper!
Sunday, September 13, 2015
Night People
Night People
Goodnight, sweet people of the day, hard workers while the sun is up, obedient to Nature and how the world is run. Sunlight and a few moments of twilight, a well-deserved dinner, and goodnight as you sink into your soft bed and pleasant dreams.
It’s our turn now. We are the night people and we work in darkness.
We work in darkness where you don’t see us, but we are there when the terrors and beasts of the night come after you: First responders, police, firefighters, soldiers and sailors near and far, people used to the darkness.
We work in darkness caring for day people stranded injured or sick on the dark shore: nurses, doctors on call, emergency room personnel. We haul and roll out the boxes of goods to re-stock the shelves that you emptied. We clean things that you soiled.
We maintain through the dark night of the technological soul the electricity and gas that keep you warm or cool, keeps your food in safety, keeps the water pure. We are there underneath day’s happy home, like secret animals burrowing in the dirt.
But that is easy. Easy to praise a nurse or a firefighter. Easy to praise the people who are required to work through the night, for one noble cause or another. Saving lives is obvious. Good enough.
Who populates the night? Who works in shadows? Once again, the underworld of transgressors and thieves, prostitutes and dealers, makes it easy to separate your sunny self. Bad people work in shadows.
Still too easy. We work in shadows. Your breakfast is our dinner, without the pleasantries. Our pillows are lit with morning light. Our clock settings would appall you…Ohmygod he goes to bed at 9 AM!! Wakes up at 3 PM! What a lazy bum! Or weird, like a vampire or an owl fleeing the light of reason.
Meet the night shift: At restaurants and gas stations and convenience stores open 24/7. Security guards and watchmen. Entertainers and gamers and casino workers. The casinos and the gamerooms never close. The computer programmer trying to make a deadline. The sysadmin waiting for trouble. The night clerk at that luxury hotel where you sleep soundly. The technicians at communication centers, telephones, television stations, power plants. The truck driver on the big road, the engineer on the night train, the prison guard. You may not know these people are there, you may even dislike them, but they are on the job, and you wouldn’t do it even if someone paid you.
But the worst are those “creative” types. There they are, drawing on that comic book page, writing a chapter of a mystery novel, composing a piece of music that may never be heard. Why are they up doing that stuff at 3 AM? Or even 6 AM? A “good” writer will keep 9 to 5 hours like a “good” worker, right? What justification do these low-earning parasites have for working after midnight? Because their day job keeps them occupied during the “real” workday, someone might sensibly say. But some of them don’t even have day jobs. It’s one deadline, one contract, one gig after the next. And they CHOOSE to work through the quiet night and into the harsh morning light. Perverse and unhealthy.
The sky is turning a sickly shade of greenish blue. The chapter remains unfinished, the frame as yet unfilled, the color unmixed, the notes unharmonized. Here comes that mean old sun. Hide, night friends, don’t let the grinning burning sun see you, until your time mercifully returns.
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This “Night People” rant was inspired by a piece by the great American humorist Jean Shepherd (1921-1999) published in MAD magazine in April 1957. It was illustrated by the brilliant artist and cartoonist Wally Wood. The article was titled “The Night People vs. “Creeping Meatballism””. In it, Shepherd riffed on the absurdities of his day, whether silly car designs (now treasured collectors’ items!) inane advertising, or deceptive product packaging. It was not about the literal “night people” who work through the night, but about conformity and lack of imagination which “night people” rebelled against and “day people” dumbly accepted. I am writing about a more literal, real night world. There are plenty more absurdities for many a night’s orange rant.
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