Lacquered Brain

"What lies within the darkness one cannot distinguish, but the palm senses the gentle movements of the liquid, vapor rises from within forming droplets on the rim, and the fragrance carried upon the vapor brings a delicious anticipation." Tanizaki 15.

This quote is in reference to a dark, lacquered bowl of miso soup eaten in an old room with old lights. And other things, probably; everything, by virtue of existing in this world, is touched and tampered with by everything else--even in the smallest of ways, this quote is connected to many things besides soup and shadows. Some more than others. Some less than others. But everything's got a claw in it somewhere.
But those last four sentences were throwaway; I am trying to obscure and making a mess of it. I am trying to keep from saying that I am holding on to this quote like my last coin, my last weapon against (for?) syntheticism, against an unresolvable story. But my brain has found the weak point in the armor, and I can't forget it's there. And if you have to forget something to make it work...then it doesn't work, does it? I wish it did. I'm working on it; I'm working on it. I just need the right numbers.

decanters look cool.

antonym

1870, created to serve as opposite of synonym, from Gk. anti- "equal to, instead of, opposite" (see anti-) + -onym "name" (see name).

anastrophe

"inversion of usual word order," 1570s, from Gk. anastrophe "a turning back, a turning upside down," from anastrephein "to turn up or back," from ana "back" + strephein "to turn" (see strophe).

strophe

c.1600, from Gk. strophe "stanza," originally "a turning," in reference to the section of an ode sung by the chorus while turning in one direction, from strephein "to turn," from PIE *strebh-strophaligs "whirl, whirlwind," streblos "twisted"). "to wind, turn" (cf. Gk.

A turning of a turning of a turning of a turning--spinning spindled wait, look, listen, catch up your legs, you're dragging threads and I know this song I know this face I bit its eye I twisted its lips I tied the thread so many colors so many frays and ways around this weird house my house? no not my house just my points and my eye and my string and my running and--is this-is this what--?

I am so tired. I do not have nearly enough of a reason to be tired--just a history of animals and loud noises, mostly. I can sleep with the TV on, with my laptop fan on, with the dreadful light in my room on. I have I do I probably will. But when you get one good night of warm, dark, quiet sleep...sand is forgotten much more quickly than it is recalled. Sand is heavy. Collecting takes time.

If I could just--If I had-I don't care ab-I don't want t-I-I just--

"I run the numbers through the floor."

5.4 Things I Might Have Said

And probably should have said in class.

However,

(This aptly explains the entirety of my feelings on public speaking.)

So I write things down--so, here are written things concerning the Google advert discussed in tooth-hurty today.

The Google Parisian commercial was a cute and fuzzy sort of thing. First impression: aw, that's charming. But I don't know that google can guide your life like that. There is some misrepresentation, or potential for misinterpretation at the very least. Google does not play that big or that sort of role; it is likely not the catalyst to meeting a girl in France, to marrying her, to having kids. Oversimplification, sir, just a tad. But then, it's a commercial.

And simple things are pleasing. There was no talking; just music and words, actions--and it is pleasing to think of Google as sort of seamlessly being incorporated into your life, superimposed like a slightly opaque, guiding hand.

I do like this commercial, though, because it shows a thought process I'm very fond of. Google, Wikipedia, and Google images are the main places I hit when I'm writing a story about shit I don't know nothin' 'bout. What's this? What's that? How does it work? Gimmie some terminology I can work into my dialogue, some scaffolding, some bones. It's very good for this sort of thing. But irl? How does it stack up to experience? That link he clicked--How to Impress a French Woman--is that really going to work? Rly? And if it does, is it because of that webpage, or something he already has, already is? What difference would it make to go out and blindly experience everything instead of all this preemptive steadying, this research, this rehearsal? If we are rehearsing now, are we acting later?

If the French girl to be wooed is getting her answers from Google as well, ("How to charm an American man," "How to tell him I'm pregnant"), then wait--what's going on here? Things get strange, that's what. If one or the other does it, it is endearing to the audience--we identify with things that need a little help every now and then, a little Google here and there. But if both of them are being helped, are being aided, are almost playing each other with identical goals--what is this? What is going on here? Deja vu: who does she love, anyway? That dashing American man, the clever googling machine inside him, or the Google machine outside?
Google squats on their relationship--makes it pleasant, makes it right, but something's strange, something's off. Perhaps Google has taken something for its own.


I think it was Jesse who brought up that nobody focuses entirely on a commercial when they're watching it on tv, during the super bowl. All there's time for is the logo and a warm, fuzzy feeling. Google's advert does not yell it's message, as loud as it can. But I don't think it means to.
Maybe the advert isn't really about what Google can do for you. Too much work. A movie, or a whole pamphlet--not a commercial. Maybe all we really get out of this, while waiting for the game to come back on and grabbing some chips and keeping the bowl away from the dog and making sure that wag-wagging tail doesn't slap your drink right off the table, is "Google good, Google good." It doesn't need to yell; it's Google. It just has to say enough to keep its purchase on an already yielding surface. Reaffirmation.

Google, like a parasite, has to give a good story to stay. But the story is not a real one--it is amusement. A divertimento. Something to endear the parasite to the host. Perhaps that is the primary purpose of the parasite's story. it is useful to the host second; first and foremost, it must secure its position, its own life, its own survival.

But shouldn't these two things go hand in hand? Doesn't the parasite endear itself by offering a service? That story? Yes, but the story is different--it is the foot in the door. it must be stronger than the later service--it is more difficult to attach than to stay attached. Something must decisively, artfully break through the host's skin. After that? Cake walk.

Anywho--enough of that. Here's a happy Cake Dance for reading (or jumping to the end lulz).

Seadragons later, maybe. I'm trying to blog shorter. And less.

3: Mice and Cats and Dogs

"uh oh."

I have a horrifying amount of stuff to do today, and it'll be worse tomorrow, so let's see if I can get some messy thoughts out while I have a touch of time and my Faure cd (found it :3). I don't have a topic readily in mind, so I'm just going to cruise through my notebook and talk about whatever I've written (or drawn) in class. I'll add pictures or links later. Maybe.

Let's work backwards. In the most recent class (and yes, I know that will not apply after tomorrow's class), we watched a cartoon of Dixie & Pixie and Mr. Jinks. It was strange and amusing to watch the two small mice leading the mammoth sized dog (by comparison) by a rope that I question whether or not they could have even lifted. Someone mentioned in class an interesting thing: in these cartoons, you rarely see cats and dogs working together against mice, or even cats and dogs working against a dog. As we've seen in both Tom and Jerry and Dixie and Pixie, the dog is often on the side of the mouse, the smallest (but, perhaps, most persuasive) on a dog's list of "Things I Could Most Certainly Eat if I Wanted to."

But there's something peculiar about these relationships and characterizations. In Pixie and Dixie, the twin hound stands upright, and in a sense, does come to the mice as an equal, willing to help them because has his own beef with the cat. But the first African Lion Hound (Rhodesian Ridgeback, today) is bought and owned; his relationship with the mice is more one of manipulation, one of use. Even in the Tom and Jerry episode we watched awhile, the dog was a big large fellow, but sleeping for most of their antics. He did not scheme on his own; he did not really do anything more than react as either side needed him to, like a lit fuse. There is something in these cartoons that mice and, yes, even their enemies, cats, have--but that the dogs are made to lack.

I wrote down an interesting exchange from the Dixie & Pixie episode (which I'm glad I did, because I can't find it on youtube). This is when Mr. Jinks approaches the first hound, fists pumping:

Mr. Jinks: Stand up and fight like a man!
Dog: Can't I just lie down and die like a dog?

And a bit off to the side, I know Micky Mouse belongs to a more anthromorphized universe--but it's Pluto at his beck and call, and not a cat, no? They are used in these cartoons, like a quirky tool or contraption. A means of transmitting an effect. And, in this way, a bit paper-ish, I suppose.

So we're back to this idea of cat people and dog people; cats are seen as more independent, and dogs as dependent. We tend to like independent things, because that is what we fancy ourselves to be. But surrounding yourself by what seems, what is advertised as independent and individual does not necessarily make you so--on the contrary, it seems as if such a frenetic sort of collecting would render you dependent on these things, these images, these symbols-of-things-that-are-not.


As for Mr. Murrcat, I am becoming increasingly more suspicious of editor and biographer interjections. They make it feel as if the story has a frame, which is another thing I do not like in my stories. They seek to explain themselves (or excuse others), as if it is not enough that their voice exists in all the spaces between their story. I am largely fine with the way that Murr and Kreisler interrupt each other--they, at least, are from the same universe. But I feel nothing but irritation when the editor or biographer feels he must push his nose between my pages and print some greater part of himself into the book as well. I had a professor who banned the use of "I" in essays, as he considered them superfluous; if you are writing an essay, it is assumed that what you say is what you believe, or, at least, what you mean to say. Don't speak crap, and you won't have to justify it with "I think" or "I feel" concessions, was the general idea behind the rule.

But then, I must amend an earlier statement--are not Murr, Kreisler, and their respective editor and biographer all from the same universe, all from the same book? I suppose. Technically. But they pull so far out of it that it can hardly count, I feel. And cannot a certain time be a certain place? Are they not worlds apart in this manner? But, then, I suppose you will say that to the reader of the entire book, it is all past; it is, still, all the same universe. Well, I say poo-poo on you. I do not need the editor/biographers little notes to further accentuate the difference, the distance, by purporting to be real. Do not want, my good sir.