Lots of STUFF!

 

I am so busy. I haven't even had any time to go golfing.

The second installment of my new column, Ice Cream for Bedwetters, is up here at Medium - a look at the work of Bernie Wrightson. The first one, a discussion of Logan, can be found here. 

I keep updating the Patreon! So far my "weekly" podcast Tegan Reads Wookieepedia is coming out twice weekly - I pass the savings on to you. And remember, I wouldn't be uploading these podcasts anywhere else for two months - exclusive for Patreon subscribers. (They will eventually be uploaded elsewhere, which is one reason why I'm producing so many of them up front.) I also just ordered a new mic, so the dodgy sound quality on the early episodes is being remedied. 

I believe there is still a free episode up here for sample. 

Patreon subscribers also receive a political essay every week, which I creatively titled "Letters." I know, I know . . . Letter #4.5 is a very special piece that is also, conveniently, free to sample here. And here's a sample of the free sample: 

I am tired often. I sleep poorly. I sleep naked on the cast iron grating of my cell. In the summer I burn and in the winter I freeze but I am fresh. Now I travel in my plane across the globe. My cell is hoisted into the back of a customized jet. I retreat for rest and ablution. Once I served Exxon Mobile and in that capacity I enacted the will of the Lord. I fought the good fight for the United States of America, as I still do. I am a shepherd of men and captain of industry, but only because I emerge new into the blinking heat of the noonday sun each day, scoured of human frailty and consumed by holy fire. 

 

If you'd like to support me and my work but don't want the commitment of a monthly withdrawal - I know the feeling! - I have set up a cash.me account you can use as a virtual tip jar here. 

Let's see, what else have I been up to  . . . oh yeah, don't forget to check out the most recent chapters of my book. The most recent chapter is a three part epic about - well, everything. Check out part one here, or skip to part three here (it's designed to be read separately). 

Remember when I didn't do anything for months on end? Apparently not a problem anymore. 

Oh, one more thing . . . what's this? Looks exciting! I wonder what it could be . . .

Let's Talk About What We Talk About When We Talk About Teaching Let's Talk About Love

Although this essay is Part Three of “Let’s Talk About . . .”,
“A Time To Be So Small” was designed to be read separately.
If you're new you may skip to the "Extra Credit.

Part Eight of an ongoing series.

Catch up with the first and second parts of the essay.

Catch up with Part One of the series.

Please consider joining my Patreon – now with subscriber exclusives!

Part Three – A Time To Be So Small

To you.

Obama has staked his candidacy on union—on bringing together two halves of America that are profoundly divided, and by associating himself with Lincoln—and he knows what both of those things mean. He calls America’s founding a “grand compromise”: compromise, for him, is not an eroding of principle for the sake of getting something done but a principle in itself—the certainty of uncertainty, the fundament of union. (MacFarquhar)

It was early. My wife left for work ten minutes earlier. I was trying to fall back asleep when the phone rang. It was her. The manager of the station had just interrupted programming and come on air to announce that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center.

We lived in a barren suburb of Tulsa named Owasso and volunteered at a college radio station over the hill in Claremore. It was a dance music show, the main attraction of which was my wife’s DJing. After she lost her job in Tulsa and had to get contract work out of town – first in Norman, and later in Memphis – I took over the show, Saturday nights from 10PM-3AM. I was left alone in Owasso for weeks and months at a time, working a part-time job at the Kohl’s next to the Wal-Mart, an early morning receiving shift that involved processing and distributing merchandise throughout the stockroom and floor. Oklahoma can be a very lonely place. I took to wandering the all-night Wal-Mart early Sunday mornings, doing grocery shopping for the following week on my way home from the station.

I didn’t think anything of it at first. Odd, sure. Probably a small private plane, some kind of air traffic mistake. I put the phone down and rolled over.

Another five minutes and the phone rang again. “You should turn on the TV.” 

Let's Talk About What We Talk About When We Talk About Teaching Let's Talk About Love

Part Seven of an ongoing series.  
Catch up with the previous section of this essay here. 
Catch up with Part One of the series here.

If you like my writing, please consider a donation to my Patreon.

Part Two - Slow Decay

With thanks to Matthew Perpetua, although he probably doesn't remember why

In Chapter 12, Wilson states that “there’s so much cultural capital invested in the muscular aesthetic judgment: we restrict our approval to what we can love, and sever ties with any less certain constituencies.” This is one of the overarching ideas of Wilson’s book, and of this class in general. When Wilson says we invest “cultural capital” in our aesthetic judgment (taste), he is saying we put a great deal of ourselves into what we choose to like: what we like is a function of the person we want to be, as well as a project of the kind of people we don’t want to be. Do you think he’s right? Explain your answer.

A good drummer elevates a mediocre band, and a great drummer transforms good musicians into something more. R.E.M. will serve as example. 1983’s Murmur is hailed as one of the great debut albums, a record that managed to sound both impressive at its genesis and prophetic in hindsight regarding many future directions the band would explore. Murmur captures the band at a very interesting moment in their genesis. To put it bluntly, out of four musicians only one of them has any idea what he’s doing – Bill Berry, the drummer. The other three are all quite enthusiastic, and already developing the chops that will carry them forward as a more balanced four-piece. But that first album is all about Bill Berry: he can play fast and he can play subtle, but mostly he can just play.

The presence of a competent drummer inspires other musicians to follow, and in little time the rest of the band caught up – 1984’s Reckoning is confident in every way that Murmur was tentative, the work of a band who may not have completely caught their drummer but who are working hard to stay in the cut. The same dynamic can be seen on Turn on the Bright Lights­ – an album that, like Murmur, masks any deficiencies of technique with atmosphere and hooks. It’s a murky album, a late night album. It’s also an urban album, and not just because songs like “NYC” are explicitly about, well, New York City. It’s claustrophobic and paranoid music about cities for people who look upwards expecting to see not the reflected light of the sun shining across concrete and glass skyscrapers but tall buildings crumbling to the ground.