tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64805116204422333652024-03-13T16:54:08.468-05:00Classic BrianClassic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.comBlogger666125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-19245489918142802292016-01-15T07:22:00.000-06:002016-01-15T07:35:35.178-06:00Conor - Trust The Process (UPDATE: PROCESS DUMB, UNNECESSARY)Hey. It's Conor. I'm not here to talk about anything in my life other than this video game I started playing yesterday. It's called Rocket League. This is Rocket League. Don't watch the whole video. I want to keep your attention and I don't think asking you to watch more than 20 seconds of that video is a good way of accomplishing that goal.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Lk1CJYAkuXQ/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Lk1CJYAkuXQ?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
That is Rocket League if you play it all the god damned time. I downloaded Rocket League yesterday from my brother's Playstation account, booted it up, and ignored the exhibition game it offered me as well as the tutorial (do not insult me, O Rocket League) and dove straight into a 27 game season. There were several difficulty levels below "All-Star," all of which I scoffed at. And we're off!<br />
<br />
Game 1 Wyrms @ Skyhaws L 1 - 9 (0 - 1)<br />
<br />
Imagine an NBA or NHL team were somehow forced to have someone on the field at all times who had never, ever played the sport that they were now competing in at the highest level. This person isn't necessarily unathletic, in fact they could be in incredible shape (the analogy here being that I've spent an embarrassing amount of time playing video games -- I know the way they move, generally), but still. The results will be ... telling.<br />
<br />
That was the setup to the Wyrms game and first loss of the season, 9 to 1. It was 8 - 0 and man, did that one goal that we scored (I think it was Merlin? Can't be sure) shine a ray of hope onto our stupid car faces. Onwards and upwards, right.<br />
<br />
Game 2 Wyrms @ Rovers L 2 - 6 (0 -2)<br />
<br />
Within the first 20 second of play I fucking drilled a goal straight into the god damn goal for a goal. We then proceeded to meltdown. It was during this game that I realized the importance of personifying my teammates and my enemies. Merlin and Sundown are hard to read, Merlin incredibly so. Sundown often does some questionable things on defense (I know this because I get a great, relatively unobstructed view of much of our defensive tactics while I struggle with the controls on the other, empty side of the field), but the second I question him he does something cool. He scored our second and last goal.<br />
<br />
The Rovers had a pretty clear enforcer on their team. I saw Buzz destroy my teammates 2 or 3 times through this game, because I guess blowing up your opponents in this game is a thing. I have not yet experienced it, but I fear it greatly. I do not want to be destroyed.<br />
<br />
I'm looking at Merlin and Sundown and I do not think either of them are enforcers. This means I have a niche to fill.<br />
<br />
Game 3 Express @ Wyrms L 9 - 3 (0 - 3)<br />
<br />
The score can't be entirely trusted on this one. In a lot of ways the Wyrms are a team who are finding themselves. I scored a goal that was the equivalent of a put-back dunk, a no-skill effort point I was rewarded for following the ball like a dog chasing after a car, or, less adorably, a terrified kid on a bike. Merlin went off, scoring the first two points of the game.<br />
<br />
Still a lot of problems. A look at the box score says that Sundown made neither of his two shots on goal (meanwhile I was 1 - 1 -- thought I'd mention that), he had no assist and four saves. Defensive specialist, right? Wrong. I got very, very worked up about one goal we suffered because Sundown threw it in reverse right as a ball came careening at the goal he was defending. It looked a lot like this.<br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="480" src="https://vine.co/v/eAVmTOBvlgX/embed/postcard" width="480"></iframe><script src="https://platform.vine.co/static/scripts/embed.js"></script><br />
<br />
I like this core. As both team manager, coach, and clear worst player on the team (I have no idea how our personal scores are calculated at the end of game but here were are standings this time -- Merlin with 290, Sundown 180, me with 145) I have to remain optimistic, but my optimism is not forced. I feel like we can go somewhere. I just have to remember the acceleration button and Sundown has to play some god damned defense.<br />
<br />
Game 4 Pioneers @ Wyrms L 2 - 6 (0 - 4)<br />
<br />
This one was painful. Definitely a step back. Miscommunications everywhere. I did at one point say out loud "CLEAR IT DOWNFIELD, I'M SO OPEN, THERE ARE NO OFFSIDES IN THIS GAME, WE'RE ALL ROCKET CARS." I'm still worked up about these games, even though the progress I want to be seeing isn't always there. That's a good sign. Gotta stay engaged.<br />
<br />
Side note: This stadium is awesome! Haven't been talking about the stadiums because they've all been the same, I had assumed up to this point that they were all the same layout with different aesthetic differences, but this one, The Wasteland, it seems to be called, had raised edges as if we were playing in a plate. Why oh why don't sports do this? This is the one thing baseball does better than other sports, it's cool that it's way easier to score home runs in certain ballparks. Fuck whatever difficulties that creates for the people who are supposed to compile advanced statistics, that shit's awesome! As a kid, and then as a teenager, and then as a college student and now still as a post-grad I've always wanted there to be loop-de-loops on highways, or trolls I have to fight in order to get across certain extremely necessary bridges. Sports are escapism, right? Why can't they be more fantastical? Fuck yes, tell me this isn't the craziest map they have.<br />
<br />
Oh god looking at the results throughout the league going into Game 5 is not not not encouraging. There are 10 teams and we are now the only 0 - 4 club. Let's change this.<br />
<br />
Game 5 Wyrms @ Cyclones L 4 -7 (0 - 5)<br />
<br />
Holy shit did I want this one so bad.<br />
<br />
I'm obviously very glad that point differential isn't a thing in this league, because our first couple of games would have definitely damned us if that were the case, but this game was so <i>close</i>.<br />
<br />
I'm looking at the league. 27 games in a season before the playoffs. 6 of 10 teams go to the playoffs. (The other option was 4. So very glad I chose 6) Is this doable? Yes, when it comes to numbers, yes, very clearly it can be done. Am I going to achieve this? No, probably not. Am I going to play the rest of the season out? Yes. Because Merlin, Sundown and I are going to watch the post-season, and we are going to be hungry. And then there will be the season after that. And then the season after that.<br />
<br />
Trust the process.<br />
<br />
GAME 6 WYRMS @ MAMMOTHS W 4 - 3 (1 - 5)<br />
<br />
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA<br />
<br />
WHAT DORKS<br />
<br />
THE MAMMOTHS SUCK THE MAMMOTHS SUCK THE MAMMOTHS SUCK<br />
<br />
WE HAD THE LEAD WITH 10 SECONDS LEFT AND THEN I BLACKED OUT AND THEY HAD SCORED<br />
<br />
AND THEN THEY ESSENTIALLY LET US SCORE FROM THE KICKOFF<br />
<br />
BUT IT'S NOT EVEN A KICKOFF, BECAUSE NO TEAM HAS AN ADVANTAGE<br />
<br />
IT'S LIKE A JUMP BALL<br />
<br />
IMAGINE THAT SOMEHOW THERE WHERE 9 SECONDS LEFT IN A BASKETBALL GAME<br />
<br />
AND SOMEHOW<br />
<br />
SOMEWAY<br />
<br />
YOUR GUY JUMPS INTO THE AIR, CONFIDENTLY CLAIMS THE BALL, IN THE SAME GORGEOUS MOTION SHOOTS AND SCORES<br />
<br />
AND THEN THE GAME IS OVER<br />
<br />
ROCKET LEAGUE IS THE BEST THING IN THE WORLD<br />
<br />
FUCK THE PROCESS<br />
<br />
WYRMS 2016 GOING ALL THE WAY<br />
<br />
Game 7 Wyrms @ Monarchs L 3 - 6 (1 - 6)<br />
Game 8 Rebels @ Wyrms L 8 - 4 (1 - 7)<br />
Games 9 Wyrms @ Guardians L 2 - 7 (1 - 8)<br />
<br />
Not much to say about these. Maybe there was something to the process after all.<br />
<br />
Game 10 Wyrms @ Skyhawks W 7 - 6 (2 - 8)<br />
Game 11 Wyrms @ Rovers W 5 - 3 (3 - 8)<br />
Game 12 Express @ Wyrms W 2 - 4 (4 - 8)<br />
<br />
What the fuck?<br />
<br />
Game 13 Pioneers @ Wyrms L 3 - 2 (4 - 9)<br />
<br />
Listen this one is technically a loss, but it's in this game that Wyrms fans really saw what we had in mind for this franchise. Against the Pioneers (The god damn Pioneers! 10 - 3 after this game, they're unstoppable. Can anyone slow Scout down? And does Skyhook get enough credit? [I made Skyhook up, I can't remember any of the other names, I'll be on the lookout next time I play the Pioneers to decided which car will forever be nicknamed Skyhook]) oh shit where was I that parenthetical aside really got away from me<br />
<br />
oh right, yes, anyway, this was a really good game, and we won our three previous. The playoffs are no longer a dream. It'll be difficult, but we're only two victories behind the 6th seed (The Express! Those pretenders we handed a 4 - 2 loss to last week!). I've decided that this league is ruthless, and the bottom 2 teams at the end of the regular season get demoted to the next difficult down, known as the Pro-League but more commonly referred to as the No-League, or maybe the So-Bad-League.<br />
<br />
The Wyrms will not be demoted to the Faux-League. It's not going to happen. The Wyrms have wormed their way into the hearts of whatever town or city they represent (ideas? This game seems to take place in the future, but I'm willing to spin this into some high fantasy shit), and soon they'll scorch their way into the playoffs.<br />
<br />
Where they will probably be eliminated in the first round by the Pioneers, or the Cyclones, if they're lucky.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-17347538340619840732013-09-09T03:32:00.001-05:002013-09-09T20:05:52.819-05:00I've Never Drummed Hard EnoughToday, I was celebrating my best friend's birthday. I've always considered him my best friend, even though I've never been entirely sure that he thinks of me in the same way. Anyway, I was drumming a pretty mediocre beat on a practice drum pad while we listened to some of our favorite songs, playing loudly over the TV speakers. This particular song that was playing was especially important to me, because it always makes me think of a certain person that I've cared about for a long time. Then my friend comes in, drunk, and tells me, "Brian, you don't drum hard enough". Naturally, I ask what he means by that, and he says, "Like, for this song, and for life in general".<br />
<br />
I can't express to you how sad this makes me. Because he was right. I've never drummed hard enough.<br />
<br />
I've always wanted to be a rockstar. I've dreamt about it every day. But I've never thought that I have the talent. Sometimes I blame my parents for that, because unlike all my friends, I never was enrolled in music lessons when I was younger. But then I think about it, and it isn't their fault. They never had the money to give that to me, and I was always introverted as a kid, so they couldn't even have known that that's what I wanted above all else. I never talked to anyone about what I wanted, let alone my parents. Nothing I loved was on the table. Everything I loved was out to sea. It's my fault. Maybe if I ever had the balls to just have a real conversation with anyone, I would be what I want to be today. Maybe if I wasn't so scared of failure, I would be happy.<br />
<br />
But I'm not.<br />
<br />
Instead, I'm now a spectator in my own life. I get to sit by and watch while other people live the lives I want to lead. They get to be the person I want to be. They know what they want, and they've taken it for themselves.<br />
<br />
I'm a coward. I've never even been able to admit to myself, let alone to anyone else, what I want. To this day, I don't even <i>know</i> what it is that I want. All I can do is close my eyes, pull the trigger, and hope I don't hurt anyone that I care about.<br />
<br />
"We're going to be together until one of us dies". Never have I heard a more beautiful, sincere statement, and never has anything depressed me more. To have that kind of certainty and passion about literally anything must be exhilarating, but I wouldn't know. The highlight of any day for me is when I manage to break the seal of apathy that restrains my life. I can't even express to you how good it feels for me to care about anything. Even being sad about something makes me happy in a way. But that's rare. Instead, I find myself drifting.<br />
<br />
It's so good to feel.<br />
<br />
Someday, I'm going to be a rockstar. Someday, I will be happy. I swear to God that one day I will have the balls to be what I want, to do what I feel. I'll tell everyone how I feel about everything, and I'll be at peace. I'll be the man I should be. I'll have direction. I'll know what I want. I'll know who I love, and God dammit, they'll love me too. I'll climb my way out of this ridiculous pit I've dug myself. Sad songs will no longer be the most relatable thing in the world to me.<br />
<br />
I have spent so much of my life hiding my sadness, because I've always thought that I wasn't worthy of it. There will always be someone out there with more problems, with bigger problems. But I've come to realize that life isn't like that. Everything isn't some sort of competition. I'm entitled to my sadness, even if you don't think I deserve it, even if I don't. Feelings are feelings, and I feel them. Someday, I will learn to control them, I will learn to own them. And then I will be happy.<br />
<br />
Never forget what it is to love. Never forget what it is to hate, to feel sad, to be resentful, to be annoyed, to be happy, to be lonely. And never stop caring. Because the day that you forget, the day that you stop caring, is the day that you stop living.<br />
<br />
She's never been there for me. I have a glitch. I don't know who I am.<br />
<br />
Always drum your hardest.<br />
<br />
-Brian<br />
<br />
<br />Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-88186378476394177732013-09-09T02:37:00.000-05:002013-09-09T02:37:14.402-05:00Eliot's last post on Classic Brian because, you know, like, fuck it, it's his 21st birthday.Listen; it's my birthday, and I'm totally above this kind of shit. Because, hey, now I'm 21, and if you think about it, when this blog started, I was 17 years old.<br />
<br />
What was I thinking at that point in time? I don't know; I have no idea. It's this same idea, this same ideal. Because growing up is such a fucking arduous task, I decided to document it. With the help of my friends. Because I wanted to give you multiple perspectives, because despite the fact that you never experienced multiple perspectives and never learned empathy, I trusted you. I trusted you to know more what our life was about. And so, hey, here you go, because why would I not give this to you, after, you know, we've been through so much.<br />
<br />
This is me.<br />
<br />
<br />
I've been alive 21 years. This realization, this legal martini and this under-appreciated shot of pumpkin schnapps, they're all I have left in growing up. I can't tell you how confusing it's been. But at the same time, I can't lie to you and say that I've had it easy or have been waiting for this to happen. It's just this thing, you know, growing up, that you have to experience for yourself.<br />
<br />
I only say that because everything that I've experienced to this point has the conventional research to that point and I thought that she would be there for me.<br />
<br />
... I don't even know who she is. Because, like, yeah, I'm dating Jenn, and surely by now, you know that. But, hey, why don't you know that as who I am when I input text into this medium. It's a part of you. Blogging is scary. But don't act like it's not the best way of reaching yourself along with reaching your subject matter.<br />
<br />
I have so many troubles. And God, I'm so scared. But I'm a late bloomer and a late guesser, so shit, I mean, who ever is going to take dreams away when everyone assumes they're already gone. Who? Fuck you, I'm ending my Classic Brian blogging with a question. Because I have done a great job of figuring out who I am. And, hey, gotcha!, that was why I made this blog up, so, ha!, ha. So, hey, what have you figured out of yourself? Because you have a glitch too. You have a mistake, too. So don't act like that will never occur again. Just, acknowledge it.<br />
<br />
Be who you are.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Look, deep inside yourself.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
And hopefully you find you.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Because otherwise,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
you know,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
you'll be...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
a fucking worthless piece of shit.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
....So I hope you found yourself.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
But hey, I love you.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
So.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Don't feel discouraged.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Because.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
You know.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
You've got your own life to make completely invulnerable.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
And stuff.<br />
<br />
<br />
I love you,<br />
<br />
-Sincerely,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
-Eliot.<br />
<br />
-- Eliot (two dashes, for fun)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
miss you.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Bye.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-32153098562931853002013-05-28T03:51:00.001-05:002013-05-28T03:56:45.825-05:00Eliot's reaction to Arrested Development's fourth seasonI'll try to keep this short so I don't have to write so much. I'll also try to avoid making any Arrested Development joke references in this post because that's cheeky.<br />
<br />
I fell asleep during the 14th episode of the fourth season of Arrested Development. I wasn't sure whether to be disappointed in myself or disappointed in the show. It was a little of both.<br />
<br />
The Funniest Show's fourth season had a distinctly different feel to it than its previous three seasons, which were a dream. It was sitcom television reinvented. To compliment it to a just extent is unnecessary at this point, which is ironic, yeah.<br />
<br />
This fourth season was something different. It wasn't more Arrested Development. It was a new mold, another innovation. And it doesn't leave you the same way the original seasons left you. <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/27/arrested-development-why-netflix-s-revival-failed.html" target="_blank">Here is a really fair argument</a> against the show.<br />
<br />
In summation, here were the gripes:<br />
<br />
• It wasn't as funny as the first three seasons <br />
• The episodes dragged on sometimes<br />
• It got boring seeing the same scenes repeatedly with an extra line or so of information<br />
• Its self-awareness was gratuitous and detracted from the story<br />
• Celebrity cameos were overabundant and forced in some cases<br />
• Netflix's style of releasing shows to the masses prevents united consumption<br />
<br />
I agree with all those things. All those things passed through my mind while watching the 15 episodes.<br />
<br />
But in the end, my heart sided with Arrested Development and its creators, Jace Lacob and The Daily Beast be damned. Seriously. They can go to hell.<br />
<br />
Here's why you can box up your complaints and ship them up your own ass.<br />
<br />
• No one watched Arrested Development at the same time anyway.<br />
Arrested Development was like a disease to which the masses were exposed and of whom very few were infected. They spread the disease directly to others and soon the entire country had the itis for AD. Sure, if they released episodes one at a time, it'd be cool to watch it as this giant family of infected Arrested Developers, but that's not what the show was about, nor was it what we missed about it. It was never a communal experience, and it has become one now, more or less, with everyone racing to various devices to see it within about a week or so. An hour (or half hour) per week doesn't really fill the hunger of TV fans. People always watched AD at their own pace. This keeps that up.<br />
<br />
• The show was saturated with celebrity cameos out of respect.<br />
Everyone wanted to be a part of this show because everyone loved it and wanted to pitch in. I thought it was adorable. Dozens of new funny people scraped out screen time, and I think it's great because it allowed the show a massive cast. It was a comedic inspiration, and everyone wanted to pay respects by playing a part. I think the real winners here were Kristen Wiig and Seth Rogen, who landed the parts of flashback-Lucille and flashback-George Sr., respectively, and did well with them (I liked Wiig better than Rogen, for what it's worth). I didn't necessarily <i>like</i> all the cameos. I didn't light up when I saw the boys from Workaholics on screen, but I was sure they were really honored to play roles in the show and it made me think about what this season meant to television comedy as a gesture, if nothing else. It was like a living funeral.<br />
<br />
• The fourth wall has been broken on this show for a long time.<br />
The reason they couldn't reel off a smooth fourth season is because their previous season was cut short awkwardly as they made subtle jabs at their own cancellation and general doom, and also was seven years ago. The time element is impossible to ignore, and with that, you have some gray area there that, if ignored, lowers the quality of your show. Had they just made the narrative, and ignored the gravity of their resurrection as having a tangible impact on their story, they'd be ignoring the most triumphant aspect of the return.<br />
<br />
• The structure of the storytelling was a good thing.<br />
Like it or not, this season had to go in circles because the premise of it is "What happened?" So they have a lot to explain, and it wouldn't be AD's style to lay it all out chronologically and run out of breath exposing the next event in the story repeatedly until we're done. That would be boring. Instead, the writers gave fans something to do, keeping with the same active watching crowd that praised the original works. Now viewers are trying to keep the whole timeline in their head, piecing together events and scenes as a means to enjoy what is a fairly arduous expository story. It took a lot of effort for the show to separate itself from the season three ending that all its fans had come to understand as the end of the show. And then to create a position for the finale (being the movie) to take off from was more effort. A lot of basic moves needed to be made, and they found a way to do it interestingly.<br />
<br />
• It serves no one to limit the show in any way, timewise.<br />
The episodes dragged on. They were longer. The older ones were shorter. Yes, the quick editing made for a wittier dialogue between show and viewer. But given the opportunity for more show, there's no reason to turn it down. I truly believe that as much as anything else, this show's return was about catharsis. Being able to watch the Bluths again, to see the characters be their hilarious selves was the real win. Fans had gone so long without seeing them do new things, and now, blessed with that opportunity, the writers took serious advantage, and I don't blame them at all. We now had more time to spend with them. No one was pining for shorter episodes. Perhaps quicker editing could've been utilized but that doesn't mean I'd rather cut out dialogue that helps me get to know or affirm what I know about these characters.<br />
<br />
• At a certain point, the quality of this season didn't matter.<br />
There were things about this season that were really hard to accept, watching strictly as someone who watched as many of the old episodes before the release of season 4 to immerse myself in AD. I found myself laughing less toward the end of the series, as things became gradually more clear in ways I was expecting, rather than the AD tradition of things becoming suddenly clear in ways I didn't expect and had only subconsciously considered. But while I wasn't laughing out loud, I was smiling. This goes back to the catharsis of having a fourth season. Arrested Development was always unique for being a plot-driven sitcom, and its narrative momentum was gutted by years of hiatus. But when the bell was rung for the new season to begin, every single person involved with the show's initial run came back. Not just the main characters, but a majority of the smaller characters as well. Short of J. Walter Weatherman and Wayne Jarvis, I didn't notice anyone missing that I wanted back. The important thing of this season was that it happened, and that it didn't compromise the spirit of the show. It was pretty much a lock that its spirit wouldn't be compromised because everyone came back to put it back together. I don't think anyone expected to go in and make Arrested Development's best season yet, but to right the wrong of the show's cancellation. The show was back. It was itself, only a little aged.<br />
<br />
So yes, in regards to season 4 of Arrested Development, there were some things that I wish were not. The majority of them had to do with circumstance. Those that didn't were understandable choices. At this point, we — the beggar crowd that blamed the rest of the country for canning our baby — cannot complain. If there is a loss suffered at the release of this show's fourth season, it is lost in the time elapsed since the last new episode, and nothing more. We got what we wanted, which is more than we expected, and it couldn't have been done better.<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-12141400081681399772013-05-12T05:15:00.000-05:002013-05-12T05:15:35.988-05:00Some Russian strangerFyodor Dostoyevsky, no one has ever recommended I read you. None of my friends my age, to my knowledge, have ever read you. I, in a certain sense, could be considered never to have read you. All the while, I really enjoyed reading The Idiot. Thank you for writing it.<br />
<br />
I don't know anything of 19th century Russia. What I do know of it, which is nothing, I know from reading The Idiot. I don't know the type of aristocracy that exists there, I've only read about it. I've read an account of it, rather. I do not know much of anything about what I read, but I read it.<br />
<br />
Jeff Kirshman (sports editor Jeff) quoted someone in the final sports desk meeting before last summer, that as an aspiring writer, you should read stuff that intimidates you. OK so he paraphrased. But Dostoyevsky, you son of a bitch, you are intimidating.<br />
<br />
The only reason I knew who Fyodor Dostoyevsky was is I remember my dad read a book by him several years back, and so enjoyed his name, <i>Doh stoi yeff ski, </i>that he often said it in a certain gruff, low voice. And that he would, when inquiring about my English classes in high school, ask if I read any <i>Doh stoi yeff ski</i>. He would say it so that the <i>Doh</i> was a regular quarter note, the <i>stoi </i>slurred into the <i>yeff</i>, which was staccato, as was the <i>ski</i>. If you don't know exactly how he said it by this point, I'm sorry for wasting so much of both of our time.<br />
<br />
Anyway, my impression of this guy was simple: gruff, Russian (Grussian). After reading For Whom the Bell Tolls, I wondered if Dostoyevsky was like a Russian Hemingway. I wanted to read something by the guy who had inevitiably earned the favor of my father. So while perusing my mom's vintage boutique, Birdsong, located in Elkhart, Ill., right off I-55, where you can fulfill all your vintage clothing/book/miscellaneous needs, and my mom might have Mac(s) with her, and you could pet him, and tell him hi for me, ... I saw an old copy of The Idiot. The cover was black and white, featuring a fair haired and bearded young man, whose eyes carried both frightened vulnerability and determination. This was the Idiot, I supposed. I decided to grab it, and that I would read it at some point or another, and see what this Russian guy was about. I remember liking the work of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, so why not Fyodor here?<br />
<br />
I met the Idiot, and Fyodor, and a lot of semicolons. The Idiot, Prince Myshkin, which is a great name that I one day would absolutely consider endowing to a cat or dog, is more than a dim-witted royal junkpiece. He's epileptic. That's what "idiocy" is. The disease translates fairly well to the modern slang colloquialism. The Prince is an utter dupe, he takes everything at face value and doesn't learn from being duped in the past. He is, at first acquaintance, the most wholesome person one could ever meet, and never shows any depth of character beyond that. He is honest for better and worse, and has an inherent trust, or rather, love, of everyone he meets.<br />
<br />
It's hard to know what you want for Prince Myshkin, should his climax be to climb out from under his illness, to break through and be 'cured'? (The novel used single quotes for every quote, and double quotes for quotes within quotes.) Or should he fall in love with the beautiful Nastasya Fillipovna, who is also crazy? Or should he settle for Aglaya Yepanchin, who is the more decent looking, slightly crazy but more home-y type who loves him for his simplicity. My personal hope was for Vera Lebedev, the landlord's lowly daughter, but it wasn't to be.<br />
<br />
Should he even have a love interest? After all, he's mentally ill. Perhaps if he helps everyone else find their dream match, I'll be satisfied as a reader. Also, reading from his perspective becomes grating and difficult when someone is pulling his leg. As a character, he's sympathetic, frustrating and ultimately pitiful.<br />
<br />
If anything, Dostoyevsky's writing struck me as brave. Whenever I pick up a 'classic' novel, I fear that it will have a cliche ending, excusable via grandfather clause of it setting the bar for said cliche, but nevertheless disappointing. This novel was unique, and I found it bold to write a story with a mentally ill person as the main character. Because of this, you can never doubt that Dostoyevsky knew exactly what he was looking to do with the story, otherwise he would never have dared to tell it in such a way. If I lived in 19th century Russia, I think I would find it a fascinating commentary on my civilization. As it is, it is a fascinating social commentary given the time and place. The narrative is intricate, but the story was long, at about 660 pages.<br />
<br />
Dostoyevsky used semicolons and colons seemingly as often as commas and periods, pretty well thwarting my Ernest Hemingway comparison. But I'd say he tackled the subject he aimed for with the exact type of fortitude and informed confidence that made Hemingway great. And there were a couple passages where the novel gets on a roll and makes you laugh or leaves you agape, similar to how Hemingway throws himself into drunken tirades or explodes his own powder kegs at a climax. It was a translated work, so any superior manipulation of the language itself was lost, which is most unfortunate.<br />
<br />
Fyodor. No one recommended you to me. You were dead for a century before I was born. You wrote in the other hemisphere, about the other hemisphere, for the other hemisphere. You didn't even write these words; some bloke named David Magarshack translated them. But hey, I read your story about Prince Myshkin. And I rather liked it. Thank you.<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-72801109435465689802013-04-26T04:28:00.000-05:002013-04-26T04:44:53.746-05:00The New Orleans trip, part IBy Eliot Sill<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
John Steinbeck and I were leaving Texas
together. He ended up getting out a couple hours before I finally
did, but we were there together, and instead of consuming he and
Charley's travels, I was rivaling them. Instead of a dog, a fully
equipped truck and a fantastic poetic disposition, I had Nick, Brian,
Conor and Nina Horne — a friend of Conor's from Oklahoma University
— for companions.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I suppose the most important aspect of
my vacation is that I did it. Until a week before, I was fairly
committed to the idea of using Spring Break as a sabbatical to catch
up on classes and read some books in the solitude of my efficiency
apartment, in a city that everyone I knew would be vacating for a
week. It would be nice. But I was tired of turning down my friends'
expeditions for the sake of giving myself time that I could only hope
would be put toward bettering my journalistic aspects. I could only
hope to use that time. I would put myself in the arena and wait for
the game to be played around me. I needed to leave the arena. The
ease with which I did so was liberating. I simply decided to go. A
week later, I had gone.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The trip began without ceremony. I left
my dog Mac(s) and my mom behind, riding with Nick and Brian out of
Springfield (we were to meet Conor in Norman, Okla., and Nina in
Dallas). I fell asleep pretty soon after we got on the highway, have
vague sleepy memories of the difficulty experienced navigating St.
Louis, then woke up in earnest somewhere in Missouri. How nice.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The weather for the first leg of our
trip, a 10-hour dive down to Norman, was utter shit. Gray skies made
for ease of sight, but eventually those skies opened up and spit and
urinated on our silver Taurus for approximately 900 percent of the
trip. My driver's license was suspended, so I was useless beyond
added conversation and enthusiasm for radio plays of Taylor Swift's
“Trouble,” which I had picked up on pretty quickly as what would
be a hallmark of the trip. Other hits were Justin Timberlake's “Suit
and Tie” and R.E.M.'s “Losing My Religion.” What a crew.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
After Nick spent a few hours trying to
outrun the rain — which looked on the radar like a Google Maps
route line for our progress thus far — we pulled into a Steak N
Shake for a late lunch in hopes that the rain would get over itself.
I felt the familiar judgment one feels whenever walking into his
local Steak N Shake chain; these places are typically filled with
locals who have a good chance of knowing anyone who would walk in. I
ordered cheese fries and was greeted with phony ass nacho cheese
drizzled over my fries. Oh, Missouri. Pretty soon after Brian took
over the driving duties, the rain became inconsequential.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Robert once called Missouri “the
brooding artist of the Midwest,” speaking about its geography. I
don't know if they were his words, but if they were, he can take
satisfaction in knowing that the phrase has stuck with me and is
warmed in my memory every time I travel through Missouri. Missouri
has great hilly rifts within itself that paint the highway scenery in
such a way that makes even the 70 mph speed limits not enough to
counteract its beauty. Steinbeck wrote of his travels in the time
when such interstate highways were just being built, and he saw them
as a potential demise of the aesthetic appeal of travel. I subscribe
to this belief, if for no other reason than that I've never been
wowed by high speed countryside.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The 70 mph speeds, when combined with
the gray rainy weather barf, were enough to make Missouri as
breathtaking as a pile of wet toilet paper. At one point, Missouri
open fired on us with a barrage of hail that changed the 70 mph
speeds to 0 mph ones. Nick, driving, laughed in terror as Brian and I
sat more upright in our seats and used our hands to hold on to
things. Other than that minute-long sample of hell, the weather was
drab and boring. Brian, Nick and I were left to commenting on
Missouri's alter ego, Missouruh, which is how we referred to
Missouri's trashy parts. Brian went so far as to say that Missouri's
landscape is just like Illinois' but with hills, which I agreed with
in the same vein that I think the ocean shares Illinois' geography,
only it has water.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Eventually Brian took us into Oklahoma,
which geographically is an impressionable friend of Texas and
Missouri that holds no loyalties to either state. It is plains upon
plains with minor variations here and there, but nothing particularly
characterizable. It is also a big state, and hides Norman from
Illinois like the human body hides its liver. We traveled through
Oklahoma for exhausting lengths of time.<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Our correspondence with Conor to this
point had been very little. We were going to spend the night with
Conor in Norman before shipping out for New Orleans the next day.
Eventually we made it to Oklahoma City, where I saw that one building
TNT always shows during city cut-away shots before and after
commercials of Thunder games. OKC phased seamlessly into Norman, and
suddenly Conor was within shouting distance.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Conor was a friend with whom I had
become quite distant over the past couple years, mainly because I
kept turning down offers such as these for extended stays with him.
Staying in Champaign had produced exceedingly moderate results, but
this decision produced Conor O'Brien, right in front of me, when I
otherwise simply would not be in contact with him. At Conor's, we had
beers like men while catching up and swapping stories and engaging in
a random dance-off to please the funk emanating from his iHome. The
catching up felt sweet and genuine and more or less I was with my
boys again for the first time since Solstice 2011. A game of Mario
Party 3 stopped short, thank God, and I went and slept.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I had read John Steinbeck's “Travels
With Charley” at a stone's pace over the semester, and was
determined to finish it on this trip because the stack of books I was
“determined to finish” before the end of the semester was
mounting, having been defeated by course readings yet again.
Steinbeck was an appropriate romanticizer. He would take a brief
conversation had by some local in a stranger, with he in all his
writer's pretense and massive, overstocked truck dubbed “Rocinante”
— he may as well have been a blog riding an elephant, and
characterize an entire state or region with care and poignancy. Many
digressions of his tackled seemingly outdated subjects with an
uncanny timelessness that made me lower the book in incredulity.
Maybe it was his writings, and how he tied these tales of wisdom to
the simple fact that he got the hell out and went somewhere, that
persuaded me to enlist in this vacation.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I read a lot of “Travels With
Charley” before the trip, and this made me want to take Mac(s) with
us, though I knew how implausible that was. But the half of the book
I read on the road made me glad Mac(s) had stayed back.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
That and the fact that we picked up a
fifth person just a few hours after leaving Norman and our car became
stuffed. Nina Horne, an Ultimate teammate of Conor's from Oklahoma,
whose parents live in New Orleans, was someone who had let me sleep
in her bed before I ever met her. Maggie Tyson turned out to be one
of these people as well, but we'll get to her later. Nina was someone
whom I'd wanted to meet since Conor began telling me stories involving
her two-plus years ago. Plus she was from New Orleans, so how awesome
could she not be? Nina's dad, Kevin Horne, or Mr. Kevin, as Conor
called him, had shelled out drinks like peanuts last time Conor, Nick
and Brian had visited. He had quite a reputation, and his daughter
was friendly, polite enough not to chastise us for singing along
everytime “Trouble” came on the radio, which was very frequently.
We had to alternate the GPS with the iTrip because the Taurus only
had one cigarette lighter plugin. The iTrip was off in city areas,
and the competition between “Trouble” and “Suit and Tie” was
in full swing. As of this writing, it is still ongoing.*</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
It was during this leg of the trip,
after picking up Nina from Dallas, where I read to the end of
“Travels With Charley.” The sun had joined us for the drive from
Norman to New Orleans, thankfully enough, making reading a more
pleasant experience. I am not a skilled reader. I still pass through
stretches of text while thinking about my personal life without remembering to reread the passage. I hate to think of how many
intricacies I passed over during moments of sleepiness and bright
sun. I hate to think this because I don't like rereading books. I
like it in theory, but I am not a skilled reader, and thus read quite
slowly. To reread one book is to unread another, and I need not
unread any books, few as my kill total stands. I always try and force
more interaction between myself and the outside world than is
required, because ultimately it is this interaction that keeps one
from passing through the world unnoticed. However, I know full well
that I still do a lousy job of this. In Steinbeck's time it was more
commonplace to talk to strangers, now everyone's just afraid you're here to
rape their loved ones, and with understandable reason, given the
commonality of such tales of late.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I came to a part in “Travels With
Charley” where Steinbeck drove through Texas, which was doubly
cathartic when read while traveling through Texas. A memorable
passage was of a grand dinner he and his wife (who had visited him
during this phase of his traveling) had with some wealthy Texans. He
talked of the special preparation with which the meal was prepared.
He ended by stating he refused to believe people in Texas ate like
that every day. This realization is one that everyone should
inherently know about hospitality, but doesn't think to consider
specifically. In Steinbeck's journey, he left Texas for New Orleans,
which in reading created a giddy excitement in me. I was also heading
to New Orleans via Texas. Steinbeck was going to see the
Cheerleaders, New Orleans mothers who protested integration of
schools. I was going to glorify the unique cultural blend harbored by
the city. There we differed, and it was ironic. Steinbeck's writing
lost passion after New Orleans. He tired of traveling and this was
reflected in his writing. It made me feel good to know that the
Steinbecks of the world get tired of projects they enter with ample
excitement and are carrying out successfully. For this reason, the
book ended quickly after Steinbeck's trip to New Orleans, and I
partly wished it would have ended there, but I was thrilled with the
parallel nonetheless. Of course, I had been riding the superhighways
that defeated the beauty of travel, and was neither writing my
experience down as it occurred nor washing my clothes in Brian's
trunk.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Nina soon ran into a traffic jam. We
chided her for “driving so slow” and she took it well in stride,
which while not surprising was pleasant and went to make it easier to
talk to her. I wanted to get a start on my next literary target,
Dostoyevsky's “The Idiot,” which was, uhh, placed in the trunk
for this journey. Our traffic jam slowed to a dead stop, however, and
Nina agreed to pop the trunk while I ran out into the middle of I-20
to retrieve it. “The Idiot” scared the hell out of me. Tiny text,
imperceptibly thin pages, translated work, 1800s writing, Russian
setting I knew nothing about. This was not the timeless Steinbeck
writing an acute depiction of a country I already knew in a neat 250
pages. This was Dostoyevsky, whatever the hell that meant. I read
that day until it got dark on the road, reading for pages and trying
to invest myself in a story I knew a certified nothing about.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
We got to New Orleans after midnight.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The city — though we were merely on
the outskirts and away from “the city” in the sense one would
imagine it — greeted me with a hug of warmth, the kind which I had
not felt in months, that of a natural, night warmth. Like an
invitation to see someone you thought was angry with you, it grabbed
me by the shoulders and led me out of the car. Here I met Kevin Horne.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Nina's dad, Kevin Horne, was here for
the same reasons I was. The difference was that he had gotten to stay
here and raise a family, and I likely will never get that chance. It
only took about halfway into our handshake for me to envy him. His
salt-and-pepper moustache was not so flamboyant as to be
handlebarred, but was an upward twist away from that level, and
nevertheless a prominent feature of his. He sported horn-rimmed
spectacles that reminded me of something my mom would find at a
thrift store and subsequently try to pass off as vintage-fashionable.
His gut toed the preferred side of the line between happily married
and fat. He was wearing shorts and sandals, but the rest of this
paragraph should have given that away to you already.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Out of the corner of my eye, from the
low-lit front yard, palm trees tugged at my attention from the corner
of my eyes, as if to say “Hey, see us? We're palm trees. And down
here, we're freaking walkway foliage.” I took their arrogant jabs
in good stride, knowing that I'd have palm trees in my front yard if
I lived in New Orleans as well, and they'd be instructed to convey
the same message to any out-of-towners.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
New Orleans, for its cultural
sublimity, is my version of a dead-sexy Hollywood actress that I
can't get out of my head, that I don't admit to my friends just how
much I love her based on only surface knowledge. She is the one whom
I must have, be she out of my league or not.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
We parted with Nina and went over to
the Tysons to sleep. We parked our car in front of their yard and
nervously walked our way around the house to the back door, where we
were greeted by a bug-eyed black and white miniature boxer pug pup
with a red, rubber-stubbled ring in his mouth. It was as if we were
late to an appointment to play. No humans found us as we snuck up
quietly to the bedrooms the Tyson family had sacrificed and set up
for us. We quickly, quietly divided rooms, before finding one of
Maggie's two sisters — whose name may have been Sarah but I can
hardly remember and she shouldn't credit me for thoughtfulness if I'm
correct — who gave us the Wi-Fi password so we could get on with
our lives after hours spent away from the Internet.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Classic and I shared a room, and the
puppy came up to play with us, feeling stood up. We were nervous
about making noise and thus were poor playmates. We sent him out of
the room eventually, and I turned a light on, read a chapter of
Dostoyevsky, and went to sleep.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<i>part II will come out eventually; just wait, knuckleheads.</i><br />
<br />
*- It is no longer ongoing.<i> </i> </div>
Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-85830391271843707612013-03-14T01:58:00.000-05:002013-03-14T02:08:36.463-05:00Someone should be shot in the face for this<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVYk2cNjTHh3xTpxdMrKaPzIAni4Cne7k31sLjYzComFAvyXeXWX3-1wUYvCyGEUQE1NhKNh2jqxPPKYZboG_sdUY6G0r7lGeB5uq4C3qgAbGIpH9wI8Zu0axlUAI9Lcdw-ChD-UQHZCNG/s1600/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVYk2cNjTHh3xTpxdMrKaPzIAni4Cne7k31sLjYzComFAvyXeXWX3-1wUYvCyGEUQE1NhKNh2jqxPPKYZboG_sdUY6G0r7lGeB5uq4C3qgAbGIpH9wI8Zu0axlUAI9Lcdw-ChD-UQHZCNG/s320/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.18.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Whoa, that is some delicious looking juice. As we all know, red and green are complementary colors, so this bottle pops. It's a slim bottle, weighing in at a petit 10 ounces. Great, now I don't even have to count calories. But can I draw attention to that red ass grapefruit again? I mean look at that thing! It looks like and uncooked steak or something, or an ocean with the sun setting inside of it. It's goddamn gorgeous, which could not be a more perfect adjective, because I want to gorge that grapefruit or anything associated with it, namely this bottle of grapefruit juice.<br />
<br />
Right now, you probably feel like you're watching the hopeful beginnings of a horror movie. We're all going to camp! Where we'll tell ghost stories, eat s'mores, drink merrily without getting caught by the police, and yay! But the title of this post suggests that yay is code for a serious violation. I'm getting there. It is.<br />
<br />
The juice itself tastes slightly underwhelming. There's the initial "Mmm!" factor, where you're hit in the mouth with sweetness and red flavory redness. Those are the 33g's of sugar at work on your tongue. It's so sweet, so regularly sweet, so pasteurizedly, processedly sweet. It's not too sweet, but something is fishy. Let's go back to the bottle.<br />
<br />
100% juice! Praise Jesus, 100 percent of what's in this bottle is honest to goodness bone raising juice. If you took away all the juice from this bottle, nothing would be in your hand. Even the bottle is made of juice! Plasticized gourmet labely juice. Man, what a great tasting thing. Good thing I paid $1.55 plus tax for this nectar of steak-ocean grapefruit paradise. And BAM! If you don't want 100 percent juice, there's no way you don't want 100 percent Vitamin C. So we'll at least give you a bottle that's only 10 fluid ounces that carries 100 percent of your daily value of Vitamin C. That's 10 percent per ounce. Holy mackerel. By the time I've taken a gulp of this baby I'm already throwing colds off my shoulders. Both shoulders! Left and right. So this grapefruit elixir, that tastes so plainly sweet. How did they do it?<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWgBSHbbf3d5sCgvK5hKXYRlFFvDAO998chqFv6g2p4VZKz6Ss8Yw9tQBGBPuyjPYKAkK_DX70-Bt7CSTVP24oisFaIz2Ry1dCf5f7Az0-yaYJV_aEYb3CqANZm702C7yodNcVqJ0eQzq5/s1600/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.19.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWgBSHbbf3d5sCgvK5hKXYRlFFvDAO998chqFv6g2p4VZKz6Ss8Yw9tQBGBPuyjPYKAkK_DX70-Bt7CSTVP24oisFaIz2Ry1dCf5f7Az0-yaYJV_aEYb3CqANZm702C7yodNcVqJ0eQzq5/s320/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.19.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Wait, I thought that was supposed to just say, like, "juice"? <br />
<br />
Now the horror begins.<br />
<br />
First ingredient: filtered water. THANK GOD THEY FILTERED IT, BUT, I'M PRETTY SURE NEITHER FILTERS NOR WATER ARE JUICE. .......... Wow. Ok. I guess most things have water in them. That doesn't mean they're lying to me, I guess it has concentrated juice or someth—WHAT THE FUCK WHY DOES THAT SAY WHITE GRAPE JUICE CONCENTRATE?<br />
<br />
Let's examine the label again.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmnKyXRNzs2IDLhFhEF8cAmqKHs2VNNovWlbpP1Ar2r2TT949PJab54L07CqWfHJXN0A-cTezrVDqh9ThXJVP-Tb4hoH-1xNbOykbV3pxyFmW4380R7DY0cOdn4edNuaXiCFGVQRbQkpP8/s1600/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmnKyXRNzs2IDLhFhEF8cAmqKHs2VNNovWlbpP1Ar2r2TT949PJab54L07CqWfHJXN0A-cTezrVDqh9ThXJVP-Tb4hoH-1xNbOykbV3pxyFmW4380R7DY0cOdn4edNuaXiCFGVQRbQkpP8/s320/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.18.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
I'm not crazy, am I? That says RUBY RED GRAPEFRUIT! They even specified the shade and color! There is no way white grapes are on that label? Maybe they're really small and hard to see. MAYBE BUT I DON'T SEE THEM. So it's grape and grapefruit. That's why the sweet is so civilized. There's no space in "GRAPEFRUIT" either, I checked. Still there's a bunch of other st—WHY THE SHIT, THE NEXT INGREDIENT IS APPLE JUICE CONCENTRATE! LOOK!<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4kEI4FxD0QrsFQY1FLQF6JBAcBW4sKI4QiQ2HfKh2bSSTinyDko34sV7sCdBleJx-DwGrYkjKn7E4C6nkCZ8ehU-sC2GyxBG7GUmnkUjgr08oj-r6gA_gpBkO8jjHl5oQ2rDtMNTfr3sP/s1600/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.19.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4kEI4FxD0QrsFQY1FLQF6JBAcBW4sKI4QiQ2HfKh2bSSTinyDko34sV7sCdBleJx-DwGrYkjKn7E4C6nkCZ8ehU-sC2GyxBG7GUmnkUjgr08oj-r6gA_gpBkO8jjHl5oQ2rDtMNTfr3sP/s320/Photo+on+2013-03-14+at+01.19.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
So this 100% RUBY RED GRAPEFRUIT JUICE's first three ingredients, the three most prominent ones, have absolutely nothing to do with rubies, red grapefruits, and aren't 100 percent juice. Right now we're at 66.67 percent juice. Jesus. The next ingredient is ruby red grapefruit juice concentrate, as if it's any consolation. It's like when you ask for 100 dollars for your birthday and you get a suitcase, a book about lawns, a 12-pack of Dasani water and 15 dollars. You're like great. I was going to use 100 dollars to feed my homeless friend, but now I'll have to settle for a meal for two from Subway, even though we both hate Subway.<br />
<br />
Tropicana, Mr. Tropicana, if you're out there. You sick-witted filthbag, what makes you think white grape and apple juice make a combination suitable to lead the ruby red grapefruit juice bottle into the American marketplace. IF LEBRON IS SCORING THE MOST POINTS IT'S CLEARLY NOT D-WADE'S TEAM, RIGHT? Well in this case we're claiming the team is Mario Chalmers'. It isn't. I'm drinking a lie, living a lie. And what the hell is the word "Tropicana" anyway? It's some dumb word association between Americans knowing that fruit is made in tropic climates and "cana" is a Latin suffix. What a genius combination. If this is the way America views grapefruit juice, America should be deported. It's a travesty. It's a transvestite. <br />
<br />
I bought this bottle of 10 ounces — which is really not a satisfying amount of liquid — to taste the acidic quenching sweetness I get when I fang into a plump pink grapefruit. Grapefruits, the best fruit by the way, are made up of crystal shards containing a sweet stinging citric acid packed nectar. And this tasted like grape juice with apple juice and grapefruit flavoring poured in. It's the artificial flavor made authentically, and it defeats the purpose of selling grapefruit juice. I'm hurt by this lie, and I don't know why it's been deemed acceptable to market such a deceptive product.<br />
<br />
Oh yeah, it says 3 Juice blend on the front of the label in the bottom right corner. Haha. Joke's on me. You got me Tropicana. For the last time.<br />
<br />
Shout out to Espresso Royale for carrying this falsehood in its Caffe Authenticana atmosphere; it fits right in.<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill <br />
<br />Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-66206881286831457432013-03-02T16:42:00.000-06:002013-03-02T16:58:41.442-06:00I'll write for whatever fucking blog I want<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><br /></i><i>~ by robert langellier ~</i></div>
<br />
<br />
Looks like you dickbags are at unofficial right now.<br />
<br />
I can tell because:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjy8wrV2GABvW9RQUR9NoAY_oWH4Cfsiq3gCi2NCJmjJic5Rj1sqZktorPWaNqZlfAHh9CO7oBRKfjnR40sJzgAU5H7uHTfOqMOvqrVe_1IpTFCS__uXpjiuiZPXp7njC6EQAh1lm-9e7d/s1600/Screen+shot+2013-03-02+at+11.20.49+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjy8wrV2GABvW9RQUR9NoAY_oWH4Cfsiq3gCi2NCJmjJic5Rj1sqZktorPWaNqZlfAHh9CO7oBRKfjnR40sJzgAU5H7uHTfOqMOvqrVe_1IpTFCS__uXpjiuiZPXp7njC6EQAh1lm-9e7d/s320/Screen+shot+2013-03-02+at+11.20.49+PM.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">nice one, Mada</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In France we don't have holidays. Mardi Gras? Nah. St. Patrick's Day? Do they have Irish wine? Nah, okay nah.<br />
<br />
I'm not jealous. Unofficial last year was one of the worst experiences I've ever been technically a part of. I trust it's going equally badly for all you suckers. I don't need to be jealous. No, I'm much happier here. It's much quieter, and I can work, and Kristian got me all this wine before he left for EuroTour 2013.<br />
<br />
While you guys are busy being wasted little socialites, I'm happily holing up. My roommates all left for vacation, and I've been avoiding all possible contact with these visiting friends from Brussels. You're here for the whole weekend? Yeah, sure, definitely we'll find time to meet up and hang out. Hahahahah. People are drags, and if they're not properly pissed off or completely calm then they're not particularly inspiring. They're not as complicated as these mindbending games of solitaire and they don't blow soft currents of wind on your palms as you shuffle and fold them into each other.<br />
<br />
I read something on the internet today that if you're ever feeling down about yourself, imagine that someone somewhere has masturbated to the thought of you. Then I thought, taking into account the few people for whom that is not the case, the sum of sad negativity there still far outweighs the sum comfort taken by the masturbatees. I hope I'm on the right side. Please confirm in the comments.<br />
<br />
There are shreds of cardboard all over my room.<br />
<br />
Man I'm not even drunk, I'm just shitty.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-46127894539397818262013-02-25T03:44:00.000-06:002013-02-25T03:58:01.757-06:00Conor - Classic Brian.<span style="font-size: large;">ALTERNATE TITLE:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;">Y'all Motherfuckers ain't never saw this coming</span><br />
<br />
I find it as funny as you do that I'm writing a Classic Brian, other ex-Classic Brian writers who are (hopefully) reading this. I'm not exactly sure why I'm writing this, and that's what I'm going to start the post with. I guess that's the whole thesis of this post. Why am I writing this, and what am I writing about.<br />
<br />
So let's establish some facts. I'm writing a Classic Brian. That's an event. Didn't use to be an event. The idea was that I would write one of these a week. This served a couple purposes. It gave me either A) an outlet for a joke or some artistic pursuit within the medium of essay writing, B) an outlet for some emotion I was feeling or C) both A and B. Also key to Classic Brian was the audience. When I wrote a Classic Brian I could safely assume at least 2 or 3 of the other Classic Brian and a handful of other regulars would read it, mostly from Springfield. It was a way for me to remind them, hey! I'm not with you guys anymore, I'm elsewhere, but I'm still doing stuff. I'm an evolving version of the person you spent a lot of time with. This is what I'm upto, or what I'm thinking about, or something. It helped maintain a lot of friendships I still depend on. It's funny to me how theoretically easy it is to maintain communications with people, while simultaneously being so hard. Classic Brian was a creative way for a lot of us to fight that problem. It was a creative outlet, and also a weekly e-mail to several people we didn't want to grow too far away from saying "heywhaddup <i>I exist." </i>It also bound our new worlds together in a way. Some of my Oklahoman friends would occasionally read my Classic Brian posts and talk to me about them. It allowed them to see how I communicated with the people I was closest withm, and it was a nice way for me to introduce them to and contextualize the people I considered important in my life back home. I know it worked that way for some of you other writers, because just a few months I was at a party in Columbia, MO and one of Robert's friends said he recognized me because I wrote for Classic Brian.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLJolJGJeBvUEJQzmYB48Z1AUeXS0wAXy5ezePbrKCI3-YboGnSodmhqEojQ6vkue_d7NRyQvg2oXIwFqSH5gVGnnmhcYoahDazfFM4rIn2UbuhKeq5pHiB20_jV5OlT-6mJg96wbzappq/s1600/I+was+like+fuck+yeah.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLJolJGJeBvUEJQzmYB48Z1AUeXS0wAXy5ezePbrKCI3-YboGnSodmhqEojQ6vkue_d7NRyQvg2oXIwFqSH5gVGnnmhcYoahDazfFM4rIn2UbuhKeq5pHiB20_jV5OlT-6mJg96wbzappq/s320/I+was+like+fuck+yeah.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>I was like, "fuck yeah I wrote for Classic Brian."</i></span></div>
<i><br /></i>
That said, I'm not too terribly sad Classic Brian's dead. * It's dead because I/we didn't need it anymore. ** Some friendships it sustained faded anyway, because yeah, some friendships are going to fade a little bit, and the other friendships proved strong enough to not need the weekly wake up call. I was busy, too. Friday's are a shitty day to have to write a blog post. What's that you say I could have devoted some time earlier in the week to writing my post so I wouldn't have to do it Friday <i>I don't know if you've ever met me but that's not something I'm going to do, guys.</i><br />
<br />
The part that I was thinking about tonight though, and the real reason I'm writing this is because I used to use Classic Brian to sort out the things in my life I was conflicted about. I no longer need that, most of the time. I sortof need that tonight, or at the very least, I was for some reason inspired to sort out my thoughts in public via a blog post again, and I haven't felt that way in a while. Which is a good thing, mostly, I think.*** I, like everyone else, have changed in the past few years. Like, I wish we would've had the foresight to take a picture of Nick every month since our sophomore year of high school, but alas, we didn't. One change I definitely know I've gone through: I work through my problems in a more internal, withdrawn fashion these days. If I'm upset, I'm quieter. I'm mulling over the things that are upsetting me, I'm turning them over in my mind. I'm not writing a blog post about my feelings, with the extremely ironic exception of this blog post. More on that later. I don't really have a choice in this change, it's been a natural reaction to my surroundings, but I feel okay about it. I'm frankly a little embarrassed by some of the more emotional things I posted in the past, and I'm glad I don't normally require such a public outlet for things anymore. It's not an entirely healthy change, though. If the problems involve other people this internalization can hurt things. If you don't communicate problems with the people involved with these problems they often get worse. I recognize that.<br />
<br />
So what's upsetting me now? A tiny, million, irrelevant things that don't really matter but add up to a still small but upsetting whole. First, let me establish that I am happy. This school year has been my best year here in Norman. I've made new friends and the friendships I already had have almost uniformly improved. For the first time since I came here I feel like I can really confide and communicate with a small handful of people, and that's awesome, and also probably a factor in Classic Brian's slow death. Things are great, blah blah blah<br />
<br />
I'mma only articulate one of the tiny problems that's bothering me, because I feel like it does a good job of touching on most of the big things and because fuck this post is long enough as is and typing is annoying and hard when one of your fingers is broken. The problem is: my finger is broken!<br />
<br />
hahaha see?! See?!?**** That was an awesome transition there, guys, and you should re-read it again so you can really appreciate it, although I know it's going to be impossible to ever recreate the visceral reaction you had when you experienced it for the first time. Like Fight Club.<br />
<br />
Anyway, yeah, my right ring finger is broken. In early January I broke my left big toe and so I couldn't play ultimate for like a month or so, and then the day before I return to practicing with the team regularly I went to a pick up game of ultimate and got my finger broken by my friend Holden. Veeeery frustrating. When I the toe broke I was like hahaha okay. Didn't find the finger too funny. I can't really write, I can't play piano with my right hand, and I continue to be off the ultimate field. Most of these problems are somewhat easily dealt, but man are they frustrating. I'm very aware that things could be much worse, I'm very aware that lots of other people deal with much much worse conditions, and in general I've been dealing with it, but tonight it sortof got to me.*****<br />
<br />
It got to me because our ultimate team, the Apes of Wrath, went to a tournament this weekend and they just came back, victorious and full of team spirit. I decided after breaking my finger that I would be done with ultimate for the semester. I had already been out of practice for a month, and this new injury takes me out for another 2 months, give or take, so what's the point? I'll focus on academics, I'll focus on redliners, I'll focus on having a good time.<br />
<br />
Thinking about it again tonight, I don't know if I'll stick with that. I miss ultimate. I miss feeling like I'm getting better at something that doesn't come naturally to me. I miss being a part of a team, specifically this team. These are fun, great guys, and being their teammate has been one of the defining experiences of my college career, easy. I don't get any of that this semester, because of pure dumb luck. There's nothing I can do about my broken finger. I've tried running out into the rain and cursing the heavens as the water beats down on my powerless figure, but nothing's working. If I don't go back I'll never play OU ultimate with a lot of people ever again. Nolan, who's always helped me out when I'm doubting myself. Kit, who was my partner in the Beer Olympics last month. Our team name was the Spoony Bards. Falkor, who's Falkor. These are just 3 names, there are more. Also, if I don't go back at the end of the semester I will definitely be a worse ultimate player for it, come next year. Over the past 2 and a half years I've worked so god damn hard to get in better shape and play at least somewhat decent ultimate. It's really frustrating to see that come undone.<br />
<br />
But there's just not enough time in the day to justify going back. The other aspects of my life are improving because ultimate's not in the equation. I'm caught up with most of my classes, Redliners is definitely more organized than last semester when I was doing both things, my life has breathing room, and I like it. I don't want to give that up. I don't know which will make me more happy, and that's really bothering to me.<br />
<br />
----<br />
<br />
So if those 4 hyphens didn't make this clear, that's the end of the angsty confessional part here. It's 3:30 in the morning and I have shit to do tomorrow.<br />
<br />
I wanna finish by talking a little more about Classic Brian, and why I came back. Like I said, it's rare that I feel like expressing my feelings this way these days, and good riddance, RIGHT, but tonight I did. I'm not sure why I did, but I did, and I'm glad Classic Brian is still here so I can do this on the offchance that I want to. I'm glad Classic Brian wasn't deleted from the internet after months of disuse <a href="http://popwatch.ew.com/2013/02/19/old-websites-still-online-hotmail/?hpt=hp_t2" target="_blank">(interesting reading on websites that still exist from decades ago, on that topic. Credit goes to my brother Sean for this find)</a>.<br />
<br />
I honestly hope I don't have to depend on Classic Brian for a while, but once in a while isn't bad.****** It was fun writing this, and I feel better. Look! It's like I'm a teenager all over again. I hope it was fun to read, too. It's been too long/maybe just long enough.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">*how I will finish my eulogy at Brian Malone's funeral </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">**can't decide if this sentence should be included in that eulogy</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">***let it be known that at this point my computer died and I came back to finish the post instead of not coming back to finish the post! Huzzah! <i>You're welcome!</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>**** SEE????!?!?!??!</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>*****Two things real quick: 1) on the subject of other people having it worse, the day after I broke the finger I went to the gym and was thinking about how tough and cool I was for still going to the gym the day after I broke a finger, and then I walked past a dude with one leg working out and I was like "okay, I should shut up." 2) I felt like I would be failing my readers if I didn't use the word sortof in this post.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>******also true when it comes to Brian Malone, again. Maybe I got carried away with these footnotes.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Can I talk real quick about how it's bullshit that I only get 200 characters for all of my labels combined? That's bullshit, it's like the hardest tweet of all time. There are so many good fucking labels I wanted to use but couldn't. I'm done here that's it no more Classic Brian I'm burning this website to the ground</i></span>Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-29862090124401297232013-02-07T15:44:00.001-06:002013-02-07T15:44:55.842-06:00Nick - GraffitiI made this for a class and I thought you guys might like it.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZcf2T6CYWhT5_pIHZyijo5U_epDC_CUi4aeJkSRyocSmnQi7-ZjwwH-XZWDvcDrluO-2vl85GF0un0FUgVcxyZD_AF3yKIwF-TyVcg21YnDacXkZov4auIHwQoDuMRx0Gbhu-LWl3Xgif/s1600/PNC_Graffiti.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZcf2T6CYWhT5_pIHZyijo5U_epDC_CUi4aeJkSRyocSmnQi7-ZjwwH-XZWDvcDrluO-2vl85GF0un0FUgVcxyZD_AF3yKIwF-TyVcg21YnDacXkZov4auIHwQoDuMRx0Gbhu-LWl3Xgif/s640/PNC_Graffiti.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
-Nick.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-11695269382134130652013-01-24T14:03:00.000-06:002013-01-29T04:12:18.691-06:00The Light You Can’t Escape<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>robert langellier</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Marc ordered one
more drink. Saw the fluorescent light shower on the back of the server’s neck
as she bent it to watch the glass fill. She was bone thin, with her skin
stretched tight around her elbows, knees and hips and all the other corners of
her body. Marc stared at the arching vertebrae bulging from the back of her
neck, reptilian, rippling with each little movement of the nape.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"> Above
the server on the wall were the colored lights of beer companies, liquor
companies, advertising themselves. Behind that, in the background, were the
darkened windows of the brasserie looking out into the black city street, to
which Marc’s eyes were drawn. He felt suddenly hot under so much light and in
the face of the dark windows. The feeling made him hyperaware of his situation,
of his location at the brasserie and the hour and his thoughts. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">He
decided to leave. Got up, left before the drink arrived. Swung his coat up from
its spot on the shelf between two booths by the entrance and threw it on, swung
his scarf over his neck on his way out and tried to loop it, but the loop
stuck. He’d tied it wrong. Tried it again, slung the scarf, threw the end over
and looped one side, and the second loop didn’t stick. This, all outside the
brasserie on the sidewalk, snow falling from above. In a minute it would stop. Marc
knew this — the snow never fell consistently here. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">He
started, and for some minutes he wandered down Boulevard Saint-Germain, looking
for a local tabac. It was 9:30. The snow fell at dizzying speeds and degrees,
sticking only to the tops of the cars and the heads of pedestrians. The
Parisian streets at night were cold, and very dark and very bright at the same
time. Lights from storefronts blazed, always in motion at the speed that Marc
paced down the busy street, cut off for moments by the shadowed bodies of
passers-by that moved alongside him. If one light were shut by a body to Marc’s
right, 20 more from grocers and brasseries and cafés would still glare from
every direction. It was a world of light, and not a damn tabac in view. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Marc
took an alley to the left. Slipped along the pavement to the next street.
Whatever street. Rue de neige. Rue de lumière. And there, finally, a tabac. Marc
walked up to enter. Through the window he could see the young homme, bending
down inches from him behind glass, stacking up chairs. Locked. Sunday, of
course. The sound of the metal bolt pitching against its frame caused the young
homme to look up, catch the eyes of the good-looking man on the outside. The
young homme for a second was stricken by fear, which quickly melted into an
apologetic shrug and a return to the chairs. They were to be stacked, and he
was to go home. 9:30.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">In
a sudden burst of drunken rage, Marc slammed his open fist into the glass door.
Immediately, with the force of impact, a rush of pain exploded along the length
of his hand, and up the ulna to the elbow, where it stopped. Marc recognized
that it stopped. The forearm, the hand, were not him, so he didn’t feel it. The
young homme, and his father at the bar who owned the tabac, looked up again and
did not move. Looked at the clean, good-looking creature at the window, could
do nothing but look at his eyes. And with that, Marc struck again, breaking his
wrist upon the thick glass of the door of the tabac. The resulting minute crack
in the window was imperceptible to anyone but Marc. A couple pedestrians
stopped hesitantly on the sidewalk at the noise of the rage, but continued on
for fear of the rage. The two men in the tabac remained still, the young homme
still holding onto a small chair. Marc held the eyes of the young homme, ready
to kill the bastard. To the two men inside, the lights of the Monoprix and the
streetlights behind Marc lit up his edges on all sides and made him a terrible
beast. Still the young homme did not move — the passers-by straggled
on.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Marc’s
hand was shooting bolts of heat down his arm. But it did not go past his elbow.
He lifted his hand again, clenching his fist, and something in his being slowed
his movement at the last second, his third blow weakened by the overrides of his
brain, and when his wrist did come in contact with the chipped glass, he broke.
Roared with pain, turned around violently and threw his free left arm out at
the people five feet from him on the sidewalk, who then began to walk faster
than before. The injured man, he burst into the busy street, letting out a long
and howling cry, and for a moment everyone paid attention. For ten seconds he
was the fear of Saint-Germain. But the noise quickly dissipated and the lights
glowed over it anyway, so Marc turned again to the young homme, who by now had
escaped to the tabac’s back room with his father. He grinned at the empty room,
tipped his hat in a polite and sinister way and continued down the rue for the
next métro entrance.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The
métro at night is much lonelier than it should be. It’s by day a place of
commute and connection, but at night it’s a place to hide from the colored
lights. In the métro the lights are pure white, very artificial and bright, no jinks
to them but very pure and serious luminescence. Not like the supermarkets and
jewelers and pharmacies and cafés that wanted your eyes for specific greeds.
Just light to show things and to drag them sullenly out of darkness. One can
see how it can be a lonely experience. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Marc
stood at the edge of the platform and looked left. No train. He looked right.
No train. He looked at the other three people on the platform. Not one of them
moved. Not one of them looked at him. The lights of the métro continued buzzing
into everything in the underground room, blistering bright. Forced Marc into
clarity. He didn’t want it — he was not drunk by accident — but it was
métro light and the clean straight plainness of métro light is so oppressive
and so chemically reactive to alcohol and quiet that Marc, in a way he had
never known in the métro, was forced to see everything exactly as it was. Full
of light.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">At
that moment, movement caught the periphery of his eye. A faint shift in matter
to his left, to the stairwell. Marc turned his head, focused. Just in time to
see a rat scurry along the bottom step and disappear into the recesses of the
métro’s long reaching tunnels. It was no telling to Marc when the rat would
ever be in light again. But it had been there in the light, and while none of
the other three men on the platform had seen it, Marc had seen it, and he was relieved
for having seen it. It was calming and relatable. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It
was all Marc could see on the métro ride back home to Raspail<i>. Saint-Sulpice. St.-Placide.</i> Just
the rat.<i> Raspail</i>. <i>Denfert-Rochereau</i>, <i>Alésia</i><i>.</i>The rat. At the end of the line, Marc
descended the métro and ran up into the clean night. It was 10:15 and now
raining. Marc moved maybe a half a block before he came near upon an empty
parking lot. There was a large ornate building for which the parking lot was
built, but Marc didn’t know what it was. In the middle of the parking lot was a
tall streetlight, which towered over the flat ground of the nearly empty lot.
It was a vast empty square lit only by its surrounding light poles and the tall
one at its center, causing the drizzling rain to glimmer in front of all of it.
He moved toward it but stopped at the edge of the lot. His head was still
dizzy, but he could easily see the reflection of the streetlight on the wet
concrete between him and it — long, and white, and bright on the black surface.
A clean little ovular line in the earth coming straight toward him. Slowly, but
sans hesitation, Marc paced along the edge, to the other side of the lot.
Wherever he went, the reflection of the beacon followed, always pointed, always
facing him. It didn’t matter where he stood. The center was pointed and always
moving with him and toward him. Marc blinked. Moved back the other direction to
the other side of the lot, where the light followed him again. For a moment he
stood silent, considering his next move. Listened to the rain pitter on the
hard ground all around him. He blinked once more, so as to imprint the beacon of
light on his mind as he turned away, and he walked in the other direction,
thinking of the rat, the reflection stretching after him at the same speed that
he walked. </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment--></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-56258812833970255552013-01-10T05:00:00.002-06:002013-01-10T05:15:32.621-06:00Hell, you were askin' for itBy now, he should have noticed what his watch was telling him: it was past the hour, he was late, and he was blowing it.<br />
<br />
Samuel Price couldn't have been any more oblivious to what he was missing at the time, for the interview was the last thing on his mind. For Samuel, routine ruled all in the suburban nation of Ecklandburg, and waking up meant video games for as long as the sun poured through the panes of the basement windows, business when those warm rays turned to a more generic light, and pleasure -- drinks, friends, more video games -- when that light had succumb to nighttime. Stuck in a game of Wii bowling in the furnished basement of his old home, he was patting himself on the back for a finely bowled 216 before it occurred to him exactly where he was supposed to have been at 1:30.<br />
<br />
A sick feeling tore through Samuel's abdomen and up into his chest before materializing in his brain: the interview was supposed to start 40 minutes ago, the job he wanted vanished into an ether of laziness and attention deficit. As the feeling made its way through his esophagus and out the back of Samuel's neck in the form of sweat, seepeing toward the sensory perceptors in his face where it became throbbing, red hot reality, Sam slinked back into his chair and stared in amazement, showing a shellshock that would have been more than enough to convince Mr. Essing of his wholehearted commitment. The rims of his eyes became hot and watery, but the pulsating light from the number 216 flashing on his television prevented him from resorting into a cliched despair. He simply sat, and began calculating his recourse, like a population after having suffered from a violent tornado.<br />
<br />
Sam made his way upstairs, where his mother was preparing for her first errand of the day, the bank.<br />
"Mom," he began, but was cut off.<br />
"Sam, you're not... done with--" he retaliated her interruption, to admit his guilt before the accusation could beget his regret.<br />
"I fucking missed the interview."<br />
His mother took some time to assess the situation and calculate the next move, like Sam had. She had no answer.<br />
"How did you forget the interview," she said softly.<br />
"I don't know... it was totally just ... inexcusable."<br />
"I didn't know you were still here, otherwise I would've gotten you out of here, I had thought you were gone already."<br />
"Nope, I was playing Wii bowling."<br />
Sam's mother said nothing, as Sam took solace in the fact that she was as hurt by this absurdity as he was. She wouldn't laugh, but be right there in his frame of mind, sharing in his disappointment taking in the gravity of the situation the same way he was. <br />
The silence of Sam's statement lingered in the air, before he broke it as a mercy toward both himself and his mother.<br />
"Should I call him?"<br />
"Only if you have something to tell him other than you missed your appointment to play video games."<br />
"Yeah." He pondered the notion. He couldn't just be "sick," like when he missed days in high school. He needed a reason, a profound and legitimate reason, and he could think of none right now. He set the issue aside.<br />
"I hate being this bad at succeeding," he threw out.<br />
"Well, it's something you'll have to avoid, letting things like this happen."<br />
"Yeah."<br />
"And it's just a summer job, at least it's not a permanent job."<br />
"If it were permanent, I wouldn't have forgotten it."<br />
"Well now you won't forget next time even if it isn't permanent."<br />
"Small consolation. I feel like shit."<br />
"Well you can't go back and fix it, so feeling sorry for yourself isn't gonna help."<br />
"Yeah, well neither is pretending this is OK."<br />
"Yeah, well..." she searched for proper words. "If you learn from it, you can make this a positive experience."<br />
"Almost as positive as an internship with Claire's dad's firm."<br />
"Almost," she said, growing tired of the conversation's hopelessness. She disclosed dinner plans as she grabbed her keys and left for the bank.<br />
<br />
Sam, feeling slightly decompressed about the issue, went into his old room and sat on the guest bed that used to be his. A jealous montage of his friends working successful office jobs ran through his head, as he pictured himself literally lagging behind as they pacingly walked-n-talked about their bright futures. The future was only as bright as Sam could make it, and being absent from what was a make-or-break interview cast a rather dim light on everything Sam could find to think of.<br />
<br />
Sam suddenly felt all of himself, of his weight pushing down on his thighs and buttocks, which were pressed against the crisp, cool cream-yellow sheets of the rigid spring mattress. It wasn't new-age comfortable, and that's what Sam liked about it. He tossed his head back over his shoulders and fell back onto the bed. He glanced at the plain white ceiling for a brief moment and allowed his eyes to crush closed and thought about the things he used to want.<br />
<br />
For his eighth birthday, he had wanted his dad to build him a treehouse. In his conception of it, the smell of oak wood and patterns on the two-by-fours that topped the amateurly erected walls would help him to feel independent and removed from the boredom of life in Ecklandburg. His father had always wanted Sam to become a lawyer, but never took him up on building the treehouse in exchange for a pledge to live his life around going Pre-Law. Sam's proclivity for mathematics steered him toward being an accountant, a profession that his father was only distantly interested in and made no attempt to fully understand. By the time Sam's parents divorced during his first year of college, Sam had already defaulted to an allegiance with his mother. <br />
<br />
From this daydream, Sam opened his eyes and re-encoutered the blank ceiling staring back at him, motionless and emotionless. He continued to gaze, determined to see his future emerge from the white canvas; to his mind came sheets of paper with printed type on them, though they faded away before he could read them and the ceiling became white once more. <br />
<br />
Checking his phone again with contempt for the time, Sam sauntered back into his basement and turned off the Wii. He grabbed his down comforter off the couch, wrapped it around him like a cloak, and collapsed onto the couch devoid of thought, ready to sleep for awhile. He dreamt of living in a tree house, raising only pet animals and bowling scores above 300 on the Wii to pass the time.<br />
<br />
--Eliot SillClassic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-61421305682532441722013-01-06T16:27:00.001-06:002013-01-06T16:28:15.173-06:00Nick - Mitch McConnell: 27 Years Of Not Having Lips<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihCzZlclaR8o1Mj5mgyyBux85gVtq3L8AW-c6muNhrFVSQ1vfN8gnvQykqG1eBJQz69YuYrPXqErfcaS8mz-QL02JIoR5DOoNgk3FPyedr0JYfwy8D3a0huAjDMRu7btpmSt6OSOtT2dLO/s1600/McConnell+Lips.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihCzZlclaR8o1Mj5mgyyBux85gVtq3L8AW-c6muNhrFVSQ1vfN8gnvQykqG1eBJQz69YuYrPXqErfcaS8mz-QL02JIoR5DOoNgk3FPyedr0JYfwy8D3a0huAjDMRu7btpmSt6OSOtT2dLO/s1600/McConnell+Lips.png" /></a></div>
(Please Click To View Whole Image)<br />
<br />
-Nick.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-71193016489548425592012-12-19T23:02:00.000-06:002012-12-19T23:02:35.895-06:00Nick - Additive and Multiplicative Forces<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii8vK94ug3hlWPWSvkXczlD8zZoc_5ISSkc8xTIlO1j_iC4FLsUNNBpQr0Aed-rqgY7T4LFG0MaPnm0yed3wCoz7zlGxjXwKEk2bjMRm1Uu2R1aeu33NR2B9mRGFJ_UpSCszOD6bfmWcG9/s1600/SeaBass.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii8vK94ug3hlWPWSvkXczlD8zZoc_5ISSkc8xTIlO1j_iC4FLsUNNBpQr0Aed-rqgY7T4LFG0MaPnm0yed3wCoz7zlGxjXwKEk2bjMRm1Uu2R1aeu33NR2B9mRGFJ_UpSCszOD6bfmWcG9/s320/SeaBass.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
When I started playing Animal Crossing, I would fish vigorously until my inventory was full, run to the store, and repeat until I was able to pay off my first loan. Such is the way that Animal Crossing is played: make money, spend money, get things.<br />
<br />
I got pretty good at catching fish. I figured out where I should go fish to make the most money in the least amount of time. I knew what fish were profitable, and sometimes even what time of day I should fish to earn the most money.<br />
<br />
It got to the point where I knew a ballpark estimate of how long I would need to play in order to reach my next financial benchmark. And as you might guess, it gets pretty tiring to look and see that it will only take four more hours of catching fish until something happens.<br />
<br />
So I started looking for other ways to make money, and I happened upon an old lady who sells turnips, which can be bought in bulk and then sold for a different price that fluctuates day-to-day. Pretty soon I was playing the game way less (because I didn't need to fish as much) and instead checking the prices every day on the turnips I had bought with my sizable fish-fortune. And I was making way more money than I made while fishing.<br />
<br />
<br />
All this to say that I've been thinking about finances and investment recently, probably because I'm paying rent and using my bank account a lot more often nowadays. We see my Animal Crossing experience mirrored in the real world: people add to their money until they have enough to multiply it.<br />
<br />
Retirement plans and whatnot work because money is put in over time, and then it accrues interest. With the magic of compound interest, money set aside for retirement grows pretty substantially.<br />
<br />
We see the same principle happening with billionaire investors. They never start poor and make their fortune in investing; they start with money and then they multiply it, and their gains become more significant as they accrue more capital to invest.<br />
<br />
I would love to see some research into how investment education and knowledge correlates with wealth.<br />
<br />
-Nick.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-30010623560989646612012-12-02T23:24:00.000-06:002012-12-02T23:24:22.278-06:00Nick - It's Definitely Time For Conor To ShaveListen, I know I'm probably wrong about a lot of things. And I'm okay with that! For example, I couldn't tell you much about the probability of a meteor hitting the earth within the next few hours. I'm sure there are experts who know all about that sort of thing, but I am not one of these experts.<br />
<br />
In fact, there aren't a lot of things I consider myself an expert at. I read a lot of political science literature, but I wouldn't call myself a political scientist. There are plenty of people who know more than me. In fact, there are probably a lot of misconceptions I have that I don't even know I'm wrong about. There's just a whole lot of uncertainty.<br />
<br />
There is one thing, however, that I am absolutely not uncertain about.<br />
<br />
It's time for Conor O'Brien to shave.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOjpxP9V9zVGPUL1aVh19lO24iLi-B3S0BHI3f3Hj76p_0l-5T7R5y_RTEKGGg5nVaHnTL-jEBl12ZhcNVUE-a6dfe3vOX2MbkOImbMQ6395AabCkT-T5bGimZuI2myIV_UD1yA11_d-IC/s1600/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOjpxP9V9zVGPUL1aVh19lO24iLi-B3S0BHI3f3Hj76p_0l-5T7R5y_RTEKGGg5nVaHnTL-jEBl12ZhcNVUE-a6dfe3vOX2MbkOImbMQ6395AabCkT-T5bGimZuI2myIV_UD1yA11_d-IC/s320/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">But my stubble totally says 'party!'</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I <i>do</i> consider myself an expert on Conor O'Brien's facial hair. I've seen it in various states of growth. I've seen it during the harrowing final weeks of no-shave november. I've seen it blossoming onto his face like a heinous insect shedding its larval skin. And if there's one thing I can tell you about Conor O'Brien's facial hair, it is this: avoid.<br />
<br />
I'm not sure you're getting the full effect from that picture up there. Click on it and take a closer look. Go ahead, click.<br />
<br />
Actually, don't worry, I've got you. Let's zoom in.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifANkKFzE_naThB927mo5zEZfmccOotUD67VH2npUoA1tFmu3taJ4SMY8P6Q0q-5HRfOxIvcGK2rQhmHBXmpleaBiVL3NqLZ1rjjCbyTQesU9kOA_srNuJEK5-3pRSh1M5pQhFZD80YNWl/s1600/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n+copy.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifANkKFzE_naThB927mo5zEZfmccOotUD67VH2npUoA1tFmu3taJ4SMY8P6Q0q-5HRfOxIvcGK2rQhmHBXmpleaBiVL3NqLZ1rjjCbyTQesU9kOA_srNuJEK5-3pRSh1M5pQhFZD80YNWl/s1600/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n+copy.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Don't you wonder what my whiskers would feel like against your soft lips?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Oh boy. Wow. I hope that isn't too much for you.<br />
<br />
If I were to describe Conor O'Brien's facial hair, I would say it's kind of like a carpet made of pubic hair that is also balding. Sometimes you're talking to him and you catch a glimpse of it and you just lose your train of thought.<br />
<br />
Conor O'Brien's head-hair is just looking better and better these days. He's playing a lot more Pokemon recently, which I think is cool. And, ladies and gentlemen, I want Conor O'Brien to be the best that he can be. If you're out there, Conor, I know this may seem harsh. But everything I do, I do out of love.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFTVT8-AnVC4kGXD1V4gF0Dk4tG10xm80exl4h7N4oYAavboxrZajtUOEO57POB70voF2v_IL3zDFWuzSL8y_rpETiC-Zz87sbvSQLiTGWKzAy1kjKWg4sKKf9rt2VKEFL6lcnZZuruBcf/s1600/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n+copy+2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="86" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFTVT8-AnVC4kGXD1V4gF0Dk4tG10xm80exl4h7N4oYAavboxrZajtUOEO57POB70voF2v_IL3zDFWuzSL8y_rpETiC-Zz87sbvSQLiTGWKzAy1kjKWg4sKKf9rt2VKEFL6lcnZZuruBcf/s200/382034_4362661781994_2117729432_n+copy+2.jpeg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yeesh.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
-Nick.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-37699682647334987712012-11-28T14:51:00.003-06:002012-11-28T14:53:59.753-06:00Nick - Fuck You, I've Written 119 Classic Brians<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">And I went through and tagged all of them.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">(Minus one about jellyfish that Blogger has, for some reason, decided shall never be updated, edited, deleted, or otherwise amended.)</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">Remember when Eliot posted <a href="http://classicbrian.blogspot.com/2012/07/its-my-birthday.html">this</a>? Ohohohohoho! The foolishness! While Eliot was contemplating who had got to 100 first, I was sitting comfortably at 107.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br />
"<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">While it is unknown as to whether Nick or I have accumulated more blog posts over CB's existence (it's certainly turned into a two-man game of late), let's just pretend that I own the lion's share." - Eliot Sill</span></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
Ha! Man, I am so hard working.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">You might think that just because I've missed a few posts, I'm out of the game. Don't count on it, bitches. Daddy's home.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">-Nick.</span></span>Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-21663041811132689162012-11-28T14:51:00.002-06:002012-11-28T14:51:10.590-06:00Nick - And LookI'm writing another one right here, JUST BECAUSE I CAN.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-65969803023809821922012-11-23T13:19:00.001-06:002012-11-23T13:28:56.083-06:00Vanishing Dangling Sounds<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:DocumentProperties>
<o:Template>Normal.dotm</o:Template>
<o:Revision>0</o:Revision>
<o:TotalTime>0</o:TotalTime>
<o:Pages>1</o:Pages>
<o:Words>181</o:Words>
<o:Characters>1033</o:Characters>
<o:Company>University of Missouri</o:Company>
<o:Lines>8</o:Lines>
<o:Paragraphs>2</o:Paragraphs>
<o:CharactersWithSpaces>1268</o:CharactersWithSpaces>
<o:Version>12.0</o:Version>
</o:DocumentProperties>
<o:OfficeDocumentSettings>
<o:AllowPNG/>
</o:OfficeDocumentSettings>
</xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<w:WordDocument>
<w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom>
<w:TrackMoves>false</w:TrackMoves>
<w:TrackFormatting/>
<w:PunctuationKerning/>
<w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>
<w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>
<w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>
<w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>
<w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/>
<w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>
<w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent>
<w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>
<w:Compatibility>
<w:BreakWrappedTables/>
<w:DontGrowAutofit/>
<w:DontAutofitConstrainedTables/>
<w:DontVertAlignInTxbx/>
</w:Compatibility>
</w:WordDocument>
</xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="276">
</w:LatentStyles>
</xml><![endif]-->
<!--[if gte mso 10]>
<style>
/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:"Table Normal";
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-parent:"";
mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0in;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;
mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria;
mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;
mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";}
</style>
<![endif]-->
<!--StartFragment-->
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>robert langellier</i><br />
<br />
The arc of Ron’s sentences would often loop up and hang there suspended and strangled, unsure of where to travel, his sense of locutional direction suddenly vaporized, the arc left to flitter in the air for a moment and fall lazily to the ground like dropped paper scraps. They would come out as half-thoughts, mere hesitations: <i>There was a bridge next to the uh—the uh—.</i> And then nothing. It was at this point of change, this stopping moment in the sentence arc, where his sanity would be momentarily hooked and slammed, a brief interruption to the listener but a monumental shakeup of Ron’s sense of clarity. Because it happened all the time. This getting lost in communication. It was in part the devastating notion of lingual possibilities, the incalculable multitudes of word combinations, thought combinations, where a sentence could be shifted and adjusted mid-course by a single word, and the whole thing would diverge: <i>I was in the car—on the car—on her car—on her something—in her something…</i> Ron did not trust such a feeble and fallible thing as himself with the great responsibility of assigning language in its proper order. And since Ron preferred the universe to be in perfect order, he was greatly depressed by the overwhelmed synapses between his tongue and his mind. And he soon became a picture of shining quietness.</div>
<!--EndFragment-->Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-47350214846049542852012-11-23T02:16:00.001-06:002012-11-23T02:16:46.003-06:00Unbuckled under the legal limitIt's all typography. Something about these characteristics makes it apparent. The old fraud wouldn't be getting his view from that window back for many days. It was just something that couldn't be prevented. The giant sky rose like glitter over the rest of the world. Everyone turned out their lights to avoid being burned alive. Something in that kettle made her wish she had never been alive. As it turned out, only kind of was she proven incorrect.<br />
<br />
Something in the dog's breathing reminded me that elsewhere, a child was being raped. I looked away from the dog, for a moment, then I looked back at it. I longed for music. Because when I was listening to music, nobody was getting raped necessarily.<br />
<br />
They found her screaming at a tree just two miles south of here. Screaming curse words. Throwing sticks. She was dirty.<br />
<br />
From somewhere came this horrid noise, and it sounded like a car engine stalling due to a dying rabbit stuck in the carburetor. I looked out into the forest, took a moment to sneeze, and then carried on with the conversation.<br />
"So, tomorrow then. And don't be late with it this time."<br />
<br />
The three of them sat facing inward at a central point, trying to combine their theories and ideologies into one central all-powerful idea. It didn't work. Only one of them would know the way.<br />
<br />
Some say the reason she was so scary was because of her dark humor. Others, more observant others, would say it was how she was hung in effigy from the stoplight just outside the school, wearing a T-shirt that read: "...until now, that is."<br />
<br />
The puppy, Gruber, threw his legs in front of themselves, bounding toward a destination he had never felt before: speed.<br />
<br />
<br />You know, I never won any young authors competitions. Not even close. I wrote once about Fastky the dog, I wrote about The Good Week. But apparently my work was bullshit. It still is. Nothing I've written can grow. It all dies of my own A.D.D. I feel that maybe I used to be a more focused writer. Though maybe my writing itself wasn't focused, I could sit down and go and go and go until I had wasted 2,000 words of thought on the simple subject of adjusting from high school to college.<br />
<br />
Something about writing trips you up. It's a different something for everybody, but no one can feel perfectly fine with the way they write. Otherwise they're not writing at all. They're doing some other menial activity.<br />
<br />
Where has all the time gone? Oh I don't know. Oh, oh, but I don't know. Wake me up. I'm a timeaholic. I'm having the time of my life. Of all of our lives. I'm having it as though to myself, I am keeping the fourth dimension.<br />
<br />If everyone in the world battled cancer untreated at the same time, they would all die.<br />
"Don't mess up my hair," God said, "ever."<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill<br />
<br />
<br />Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-33747435645774629972012-11-20T04:01:00.002-06:002012-11-20T17:55:03.723-06:00Stick a fire in the shellhole: A corn on the cob storyNow old Maurice was really uptight about his wares. There's hardly anything in his shop you could talk him down for. But his wife Candice would work the shop on Saturdays and that's when you could strike it rich. Something about the smiles of innocent children made an affable sale seem more important than cold currency.<br />
<br />
One Saturday morning, after a couple hours of catch down at the sandlot, my friend Pete and I went down to Plum Pickin's for a score off the old batty woman. She had graying brown hair, and it was tied up in a bun on this particular morning. She was wearing a blue dress with frayed hems around the wrists. Pete and I had dirt all over our clothes from the ballfield and so she insisted we go outside and brush ourselves off before we look around.<br />
<br />
In the back of the store — where all the good stuff was — we found an old chess set with about half the pieces missing. The pieces themselves were fair quality, made of old oak, and there were more black pieces than white. Carrying that and a set of used boxing gloves up to the counter, we asked Candice Pinsleton how much.<br />
<br />
"Altogether that should be 10 dollars boys."<br />
"Oh, but Mrs. Pinsleton," I groaned, "we only got five dollars on us between us both."<br />
"Well, those boxing gloves are right expensive for a boy your age." (I was eleven) "You should ask your mother if she could get them for you as a birthday present." (My birthday was in two and a half weeks, but there's no way she could have known this)<br />
"Well this chess set here is missing about half the pieces, and as you can see, these gloves have been used."<br />
"Well everything in this store's used, Quinton, you know that." (Pete nudged me to indicate he was ready to leave. I shot him a look and he looked at his shoes.)<br />
"But Pete doesn't have any money, and I'm buying these gloves mostly for him." Pete looked at Mrs. Pinsleton and became obnoxiously sullen. Mrs. Pinsleton sighed, and turned back to me.<br />
"Do you boys have any change on you? Or just the five?"<br />
"I've got a quarter and two dimes," Pete piped in.<br />
"Well there you go," Mrs. Pinsleton was sold, "I'll take $5.45 for the lot."<br />
<br />
We gave her the money and turned to leave when Maurice Pinsleton walked in, back from an early lunch or so it seemed.<br />
<br />
"Howdy, what's going on here?" He asked.<br />
<br />
Thinking quickly, Pete punched me in the stomach with one of the boxing gloves and I chased him out of the store.<br />
<br />
I was mad though, because he had hit me hard, so I actually did chase him down and punch him in the back. Pete was ten.<br />
<br />
From inside the store, the sound of the Pinsletons arguing became audible through a couple of the store's open windows. Meanwhile, I tried to think of ways to make a chess-based game that involved boxing. I also scanned the ground as I walked for any spare change that may be lying on the ground.<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill<br />
<br />Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-19114731094110107232012-11-18T12:15:00.000-06:002012-11-18T12:17:35.220-06:00Sunrise Over the Back Balcony <i>robert langellier</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
In a sunrise you can witness the planetary shift at once. Besides shooting stars and sunsets, it’s the only time you can look at the sky and see it change in real time. You can see the universe moving, groaning out of bed. (Yes, you can see clouds move at any hour, but on the scale of things those are no more in the sky than my tall friend Will’s head is.) One second the sun is buried in the sheets of trees and pillowy rolling hills, and suddenly an explosion of light, a zero moment where the spin of the earth bangs the door open to a morning. And you’re rattled awake by sunlight that’s violent and warm. Where you once and will soon feel small and powerless, a hairy mote plugged to the wall of the universe in a frozen split second of time, instantly to combust and disappear forever into the infinites, well, now you’re a planet. You see a sun get up and conform to your very most powerful animal senses, sight and touch, its heat launching over the skyline and into the skin above your arms, and the Universe is your servant, not the other way around. <i>It moves; and I move</i>, you realize, and so why aren’t you a sun? You share and identify with its personalities. A heated body of energy. A mortal object. A collection of matter. No thing can make two objects so alike than being. The stained wooden railings of the outdoor balcony with industrial stamps still on them. The dirty trickling water that rolls lazily over concrete and jutted rocks and logs in the cut out creek below, moving toward the urban woods. The shot-out silver beer cans tied together with string and hanging over the water from a tree branch, dismembered by whizzing airsoft pellets. The <i>chee-chee</i> of the wintering chickadee. All is covered in light.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-27297241622678745902012-11-07T18:58:00.000-06:002012-11-28T14:40:49.000-06:00In Which Nick Talks About PoliticsFair warning: what is about to follow is little more than an unsubstantiated and undirected discourse, fueled by unabashed partisanship and proliferous naivety.<br />
<br />
We won.<br />
<br />
But hold on, I'm not talking about the presidency. The victories I'm talking about are in the margins; behind the scenes, where they can easily be missed. The election is a giant box of circuitry, a complex interactions of millions of parts, which at the end of the first Tuesday in November every four years outputs a "0" or a "1". A "D" or an "R". But I'm more interested in what's going on inside.<br />
<br />
The first game changer that this election brought about was Nate Silver. For those who don't know, Nate Silver is a statistician, New York Times columnist, and speculatively <a href="http://isnatesilverawitch.com/" target="_blank">a witch</a> who has been forecasting elections with frightening accuracy. But despite the jokes about sorcery, what Nate Silver is doing is actually <i>removing</i> the smoke and mirrors from politics. In predicting the election almost perfectly, he dispelled the myth that elections are governed by some indefinable "will of the people" or the mysterious power of "momentum." Elections all boil down to numbers that we can study and understand. I'm hoping that (and here's where the naivety comes in) we are going to see this sports-style punditry fall away, and replace it with a new kind of political commentary. One that focuses on facts.<br />
<br />
The second thing is diversity. We are finally, finally, in the year 2012, starting to see the house and the senate get just a teensy bit more diverse. Wisconsin elected the nation's first openly gay senator. Hawaii brought in the nation's first Asian American woman. On top of that, this senate session will have a record number (20) of women serving.<br />
<br />
And then the last thing, and this is <i>really</i> where the naivety comes in, is a demographic shift the nature of which has never been seen before. Mitt Romney won seniors. All of them, everywhere. And whites. And men. But we're finally getting to the point where the woman vote is just as important as the man vote; where the black vote is just as important as the white vote; and where the young vote will be the deciding factor of the future of our country.<br />
<br />
In Colorado, they voted to legalize marijuana. Seniors opposed the measure by a 2-to-1 margin, but it still passed. The same happened in Washington. Maine and Maryland voted to legalize gay marriage. And many of these measures had been attempted before in these same states. The fact of the matter is that the median voter is not the same person that he or she was 10 or even 4 years ago. The millenium generation has arrived, and they are socially liberal. If I'm right about this, then this trend (despite fluctuations) will continue to develop for the rest of our lifetimes.<br />
<br />
Maybe I'm still just high on the knowledge that my candidate won; but I'm excited about the future.<br />
<br />
-Nick.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-14334885948239879072012-11-02T05:30:00.000-05:002012-11-02T05:36:43.401-05:00Cannon DelightNone of these took me more than five minutes to write. So I'm pretty proud, considering. <style type="text/css"><!--
@page { margin: 0.79in }
P { margin-bottom: 0.08in }
</style>
-->
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
•••</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Country, country, oh far and wide.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Unceasing sight for sight to see,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
see the light cease at night,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
for forts we fight, fortnights lay
siege.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Discomfort fester in a sea</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
seeking comfortability</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
wind still whirring, stirring tea</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
to all the fish, afloat, or flee.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lifeless, lustless, headless, hauntless</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
harness lifelessness, be gone with</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
such and such, or so for whats,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
As reason slips. And skips. And cuts.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
A newfound friend, a foreign hand</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Oh country, country, now our land</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
You bled and burned and dried and now</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
this blessed land, not for whom, but
how?</div>
<div style="border-bottom: 1.00pt solid #000000; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: none; margin-bottom: 0in; padding-bottom: 0.03in; padding-left: 0in; padding-right: 0in; padding-top: 0in;">
<br />
•••</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Unrepenting southerner, I lay to thee a
blow</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
For somewhere out among the stars,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
your reason stands to grow.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Not here, nor there, nor
everywhere,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
may you tread, black tires forwarding.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Heed, rebellious confederator,</div>
<div style="border-bottom: 1px solid #000000; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: none; margin-bottom: 0in; padding-bottom: 0.03in; padding-left: 0in; padding-right: 0in; padding-top: 0in;">
that old Civil forewarning.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
•••</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I found a cut upon my lip,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Tender and wet across the tip.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
My tongue massage, lather, and sense,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
whether one slice, or increments.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I found a cut upon my brow,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
I saw it yes, but don't know how.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
To thee I muse, and feel thy soul,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
No clear mirror could I cajole.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Now it is night, I lie awake,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
As effects upon my face take.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
To know that nicks and cuts abound</div>
<div style="border-bottom: 1.00pt solid #000000; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: none; margin-bottom: 0in; padding-bottom: 0.03in; padding-left: 0in; padding-right: 0in; padding-top: 0in;">
returns me to thy battleground.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
•••</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Away the redbird flew to morn,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
wormless, chirpless, now forelorn.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
A song he sings to doves and gulls,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
"Be mindful of the trigger pulls.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
While all wiser, the early riser,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Curtailed hopes may spare a miser.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
So dream your dreams and find your
fun,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
But know I speak for everyone,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
there they are,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
there may they stay,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
lest they sing:</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Men, bombs away.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Two-fold is it true for thee,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
a stainless bird, a crooning she.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
As ivory feathers adorn our nest,</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
My scarlet cometh from war out west.”<br />
<br />
--Eliot Sill </div>
Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-45784113917847555042012-10-29T21:22:00.000-05:002012-10-29T21:27:37.219-05:00There's these things and they're pissing me off.Man, fuck coffee. Or fuck my body. Something's not right — I drink a beverage and now I can't control myself? Fucking Parkinson's juice.<br />
<br />
Cigarettes are dumb too. I found one at a party last Saturday, brought it home and smoked it. Now it's sitting in my scented candle-turned-ashtray, all tan, white and black tainting the sky-blue wax, a perfect metaphor for itself. I look at it and feel cool for having a cigarette mashed into my candle. It looks cool. That's fucking ridiculous.<br />
<br />
I have work in an hour, and it's the worst thing that could happen to me. Working at Jimmy John's, an expanding company that's glorifying a man's idea to rip off the masses for a solidly made sandwich, thus exploiting the fantastic American laziness and allowing Jimmy himself to live his life however he wants, which he deserves no more than the panhandlers that'd love to score a J.J. Gargantuan that day, sucks. It's a minimum wage job that doesn't compensate its employees with a free meal or sandwich (or cookie, or pickle, or day-old bread, or garbage) unless you work a double-shift. I've worked their four hours today already and have 5-and-a-half ahead of me. Let there be life. <br />
<br />
Death is such a fag. Hanging over my shoulder every unhelpful second, checking my work and making silent judgments. If this is the last thing I ever write, and it had better not fucking be, I want death to know that I saw its game for what it was.<br />
<br />
Sadness too. Sadness can shoot itself in the head with a dick-loaded rocket launcher. It's either there like a blanket, keeping you draped in it so you're impervious to outside emotions, or its worn like a hat, purposefully worn for certain situations for as long as necessary. You take it at your leisure through movies, books or stories about high school kids whose sports teams get better after they die.<br />
<br />
Sadness should be like death, hanging over you but mostly avoided. Death should be like work, necessary for most people but totally fucking stupid to do and done for the sake of others. Work should be like cigarettes, trendy and eventually fatal but people do it for some reason anyway. And cigarettes should be like sadness, unfortunately permanent or sparsely but willfully consumed. Coffee should just calm down; whatever.<br />
<br />
--Eliot SillClassic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6480511620442233365.post-54330607426083235982012-10-26T00:07:00.000-05:002012-10-26T00:07:01.609-05:00Editor, give me a title<i>robert langellier</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
It's come to my attention lately that there are more important things than blogging on invisible Wordpress accounts about journalism articles you've already written. Like blogging on Classic Brian, for example. I'm going to talk here about why journalism sucks, and why journalists are some of the suckiest people you'll meet. Here are the reasons:<br />
<br />
Journalistic publications suck. Classic Brian does not have editors that pare down my silly antics and acrobatic wordplay after just having told me to write with more voice. It does not tell me I need to transition from point to point. So I won't.<br />
<br />
Editors have no idea that you're 21 years old. Someone told them all that everyone is 11 and just learning the language. They will treat your clearly thought-out and purposeful sentence constructions as your 5th grade teacher would. I'm aware that "A white button-down." is not a sentence. It's a sentence now, fucker.<br />
<br />
Editors get really mad at you for not knowing AP Style in its entirety. Why would I ever spend five seconds learning some of the most meaningless memorization facts ever thought up? If I write "Austin, TX," the world isn't going to end when you change it to "Austin, Texas." That's an editor's job, anyway. They have to have to do something, right? In other news, I'm going to lose about a half a letter grade in my class for my unparalleled failure to know or look up AP Style in my articles.<br />
<br />
The word "snark." The magazine work I do is a pathetic excuse for storytelling. I get 600 words to tell a story. Fuck that. I poop 600 words. What kind of story can I write in 600 words? All I can do is draft an advertisement. Vox Magazine is a well-designed <a href="https://www.addsheet.com/coupons" target="_blank">Add Sheet</a>. My editors compensate for this literary straightjacket by gleefully informing me that I can insert some "snark" into my writing. Thanks! I squeeze a droplet of voice into a story, and I unfailingly get this comment back from whichever editor is reading my story: "Great snark!" Good god. I want to throw up on my Word document. If you think a pinch of "snark" is going to save a story and make it worth someone's time, God help you, and may journalism destroy you.<br />
<br />
Journalists take themselves real seriously. Especially with stuff like ethics. Accepting gifts. People treat free beer or a hot dog like it's a car. I did a story last week where my videographer and I were offered some barbeque from a source. She hadn't eaten all day, man. It was night time. She said no, and left. Jessie, you are literally starving. If you're so susceptible to brainwashing that you can't eat a sandwich and tell the same story you had before your sandwich, you shouldn't be in journalism. I'll take all your beer.<br />
<br />
Journalism is for pussies and people with poles in their butts.Classic Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11045568318901346184noreply@blogger.com1