- Activating the Napoleon Alert System. Haven't seen him since last Sunday, and this absence feels different than others. Earthgirl said so first while I was just thinking it. The neighborhood listserv is alive with two possible pertinent issues. First, there are roving gangs of raccoons the size of pitbulls that roam through the neighbor at dusk terrorizing humans and animals alike. Second, some kids, who have not been put to death despite my urging, were caught torturing cats in Rock Creek Park. I've urged their parents to move them to a witness-protection like disappearance.
- Bleggalgazing.
- 45 of the 136 blogs in Because the First haven't updated in more than a month.
- 61 of the 140 blogs in Because the Second haven't updated in more than a month.
- The History of Fear, part one and part two.
- Syria PSYOPs.
- Ivory towers and reflective powers.
- Fishing for informants.
- Maggie's weekly links.
- New Inquiry's Sunday reads.
- Again with the Xenakis:
- Happy Birthday Ilse!
- Strangeness and poetry.
- Calibrations.
- He will never understand.
- Pynchon's Mrs Dalloway.
- I'm 2/3rd done with Bleeding Edge. I won't say it sucks. I will say if it wasn't Pynchon I would have set it aside a hundred pages ago. I long ago gave up the moral standard that once I start a novel I am obliged to finish it. Pynchon has earned the right to be finished, but it is hard to believe this is the same author that wrote Against the Day.
- I was flipping channels Friday waiting to go out to dinner, saw an hour of Breaking Bad, an episode from season three, first time I ever saw one. Admittedly, I didn't know the background, the characters, the build-up, but holyfuck, suck. So glad people will be shutting the fuck up about it after tonight.
- Horrifying headline.
CALLIGRAPHY ACCOMPANIED BY THE MOOD OF A CALM BUT DEFINITIVE MOOD
Dick Allen
Make your strokes thus: the horizontal:
as a cloud that slowly drifts across the horizon;
the vertical: as an ancient but strong vine stem;
the dot: a falling rock;
and learn to master the sheep leg, the tiger’s claw,
an apricot kernel, a dewdrop, the new moon,the wave rising and falling. Do these
while holding your arm out above the paper
like the outstretched leg of a crane.
The strength of your hand
will give the stroke its bone.
But for real accomplishment, it would be well
if you would go to live solitary in a forest silence,
or beside a river flowing serenely.
It might also be useful
to look down a lonesome road,
and for the future
to stare into the gray static of a television screen,
or when lost in a video game
to accept you may never reach the final level,
where the dragon awaits, guarding the pot of gold,
and that you’ve left no footprints, not a single one,
despite all your adventures,
anyone following you could ever follow.