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.

자주색

That's what I find when I look up your name. But that's not your name--it's Bora. Purple. I think it must have been a purple flower, or something. But I'm pretty sure it was just purple.

[this is not a class related blog; if you're looking for parasites, go forward or backward. If you're looking for nonsense, stay here.)

I haven't had the time to paint lately. At all, really. The last thing I painted was a toy lizard I found out by Alpha, and that doesn't count, because I just painted it to look like a guilmon, which is silly, and therefore not real painting. I am still waiting for a chance to paint you. Purple, puce, lavender, magenta, rouge, indigo. In the treeline, something blue-green; no skyline. No sky. Your head in my knees; your fat belly stretched out to the side. I have never met a more comfortable creature. Or forgetful. Or cruel.

You know the way someone will come at you, slowly, if they're trying to do something they know you won't like, and they don't want you to find out until it's too late? I'm not going to do that.
I'm doing this to get over you.
Even though it's not something I can do. It still sounds good, though, doesn't it?

You're too tied up in what I was and who I am now for me to come to terms with anything. But what were you to me, really? A pillow. A damn good pillow. And that's it, I think. Really? Yeah--that's it, I think.

Or is that just what you'd say to me?
And hey--even good pillows are missed, right? But now I'm being the cruel one, I think. Don't worry. I don't mean it--I'm just looking for a way to hide the fact that I'm a sentimental twit.


I think I'll write something about you. A story, or several, that hold parts of you. This one won't go belly up like my nanowrimo one, so don't you fuss. It's the only pretty thing I have. Shut up. Don't wag your tongue like that--I'm trying to be serious here. You'll be the apprentice of a terrible, very stupid wizard. The reader will want to hate you as well, but they won't. You will be too sweet, even when you bite. You will go off on your own and have all sorts of adventures: two crows will tell you to run down the hill as fast as you can, but no, you should have turned around before you left--you would have seen a pair of bones leaning against the tree. You'll roll into a hole in the ground and find an old man with hooks for whiskers. What is he fishing for? Sense, he mumbles, tugging a hook. Good sense. A herring slips out of his mouth. You pick it up with your teeth. A mole bites your rubbery lip. You chase it through the narrow necking paths until you both break ground; you kill him dead. God, what have you done? You've learned something awful from that wizard. Now you've killed a child, dead. Mother mole collects her son. The funeral is held at the edge of the pond. You are present; you push your hands in the dirt and repent. On the other shore, the ducks are laughing. Screaming. making licentious advances on one another. At a funeral? You chase them away, and almost commit your second murder in a day. You would not have killed them, you say? I believe you. I believe you. But it is the reader you must convince.
The woods are full of mud and frogs and crawfish and grass. These are all things you grow to love. You eat the crawfish and play with the frogs. You love them, and they love you. But they are frogs, and so they also love playing tricks. They tell you to see what's on the other side of the mossy fence. So you go. It's very bright. You're very tall. You feel like you're in Oz, but you don't know what that means, do you? So you go back. But not to the frogs. There is tall, dry grass and birds hiding in the grass the way you go back. They spill nonsense as you walk by. You're short and fat again, but you still know it's nonsense.


But where shall I go from here? I am not good at writing my way through holes, as you know--only twisting threads until I've made rope. Will you return to the cruel wizard and...and then what? Is that the end? Will you fall asleep one day, and dream of frogs and mud and never wake up again? You can't destroy that wizard. No sword for you. No magic rock. It would be good for the plot, but it wouldn't be good for you.

And I've forgotten a whole chapter of your sins--what about the little urchin you brought to your master to be sacrificed? Yes, you threw the pepper under the table; and when he was out buying more, you sat and watched the birds with her. And then you pushed her out the window, so she could be one. And she was. Don't you grin like that now--you've still got plenty to be ashamed of. You were a veritable criminal. I do believe you stole from that urchin's plate not a week earlier. And it's not like you weren't well kept at home. No wonder you were so round you rolled down that hill, just like those birds told you to. You poked at the bellies of dead fish and what were you but cruel to everyone save your wizard?

Still. I want you to win. More than that, I want readers to want you to win. Can't you do something, anything before it's too late? Before your cruel wizard slips something foul into your meal that night and makes you sleep forever? I think you should cut him. Cut him good, for me and for you. If not in life, than in death. Take everything that you can from him. His things are broken. His bird is gone. His family is gone. His town is gone. But you are the only one that can make him alone. Do this. Please. Do this for me. It will show you to be warm and sweet in the eyes of the reader, warm and sweet as I've known you. It will make the writer look cruel, but haven't I been the cruel one all along?

Don't worry. You don't have to tell the story--you don't have to do a thing anymore. I'll make the bird tell it, so nobody has to get their hands messy. I don't like birds anyway. And I'll leave a soft, light, purple place at the end of it for you. You'll still be short and round, but you can put your head on my knees and rest for a bit. Just a bit.