Taking the Purple Pill: Trying to Step Outside the Moral Matrix

This sentence is going to be a random, stream-of-consciousness mess, but I think (for once) my form fits my function: lately, I have been trying my damndest to understand the polarization between liberals and the conservatives in our country, and how this is shaping the current economic policy and the election platforms . . . I've been doing my homework and listening to conservative talk radio-- some Rush Limbaugh and plenty of Mark Levin, and in between the overblown rhetoric, the ranting about Hillary "Rotten" Clinton . . . how she is a felon and a serial liar and the devil incarnate, the disgust with poor people and immigrants, the lack of empathy for people of color, the absolute hatred for the government and its programs and the possibility that our liberties might be curtailed (guns!), the fear of socialism and any redistribution of wealth, the paranoia that taxation and public works projects will just allow the government to get its dirty hands on our money, and like the mafia, take its cut-- as a public school teacher, it's hard to listen to this-- but in between all this vitriol, there is a kernel of an idea that these conservative blowhards are trying to espouse . . . that the government should be smaller and taxes should be lower and regulations should be less and that the best way to produce wealth is an unfettered free market-- and while is think this is true in a limited sense, for certain goods and products, I also think a free market is expensive and volatile with certain things, especially things that we wish to flow: electricity, water, health care, infrastructure . . . we just want these things to be reliable so that other things can work on top of them, and I also think there's a question of externalities, which the conservatives rarely mention . . . but underneath all the hatred there is something to talk about, and I find it interesting that the conservatives don't agree with all Trump has to say, especially on jobs and government infrastructure spending and protectionism and minimum wage . . . meanwhile, the liberals want a revolution-- free college, free healthcare, higher living wages, alternative energy, restrictions on corporations, control of externalities, and equal treatment for all people: rich, poor, immigrant, native, white, black, gay, transgender, and don't mind some redistribution of wealth to encourage this, and I've been listening to the ultra-liberal and fairly funny Citizen Radio to get a bead on some real radical left wing logic and emotions, and while I have more in common with those ideas, they can be really annoying and idealistic and insular and obnoxious as well . . . and it doesn't seem like any of these candidates or their followers are going to do what Jonathan Haidt suggests in his TED talk and "step outside the moral matrix" and actually look at what some smart people have figured out, which is that it's a combination of free markets and regulations that make economies work, and no one knows the exact balance . . . read some Ha-joon Chang to understand "kicking away the ladder," which is how many developed countries arrived at economic stability and wealth through complex and strategic protectionism, tariffs, regulation of foreign investment, regulation on imports and exports, and subsidies-- but then once these these nations (and he uses America, Britain, and his home country of North Korea as his prime examples) have reached a position of economic power, they use institutions such as the WTO and the IMF, treaties, embargoes, copyright law, and tariffs to force impoverished nations into adopting extreme free market policies despite the fact that these countries are not ready to compete in a free market . . . in other words, there's no magic bullet for an economy and it takes a mixture of ideology to understand this, which is what Jonathan Haidt's TED talk is about, his research shows that while there is some consensus between liberals and conservative on fairness/reciprocity and harm/care as valid moral concerns, conservatives tend to be much less open to experience and thus much more concerned with three moral traits that liberals don't interest liberals: purity/sanctity . . . so the strict interpretation of the Constitution . . . in-group/loyalty . . . so "real" Americans and patriotism and military jingoism and Ronald Reagan as God . . . and authority/respect . . . so law and order and belief in the police and a more traditional patriarchy and Christmas and religion and all that . . . and Haidt points out to the mainly liberal crowd (he polled them, and it's a typical TED talk audience: open to progress, science, and new ideas and almost entirely liberal) that BOTH of these mentalities are required to create a great society . . . there needs to be some revolution and progress, but order is also delicate and hard to maintain and actually requires the three moral traits that liberals tend to ignore . . . now Trump throws a bit of a monkey wrench in this because he doesn't seem to be concerned with some typical conservative values-- purity and respect for authority-- and so his economic and policy plans might be something entirely new (and unpalatable in some respects to the "true" conservative) while Clinton certainly can be more jingoistic about the military and more loyal to her group (the Democrats) than a typical rebellious, progress-minded liberal might like and while I know that these two sides are never going to love each other, or even see eye-to-eye . . . conservatives work on a five-channel moral system while liberals work on two-channels, so conservatives will always be annoying to liberals because they care passionately about more stuff and seem angry, and liberals will always seem to be amoral libertine radicals because they don't care about enough things, but we are going to have to embrace the fact that what makes America great is diversity, and Donald Trump and Ted Cruz and Ronald Reagan are part of that diversity, and those conservative views-- which I often find hateful and ranting and humorless-- are important, just as important as the stereotypical diversity most liberals embrace: multi-cultural, multi-gender, pan-religious, multi-ethnic diversity . . . diversity that appeals to people who are open to all kinds of experience, the diversity that leads to a wide-variety of good restaurants, many of them quite cheap . . . such as the new Tacoria in New Brunswick . . . and that's what this is all about, right?

Serial Season 2: You Should Listen to It (and write an essay about it)

This review is a bit late-- but I loved Serial Season 2, and while I recognize that Serial Season 1 was incredibly compelling because of the solve-it-yourself-mystery and the constant interaction between Sarah Koenig and Adnan, Season 2 is more in my wheelhouse-- Middle Eastern politics, military strategy, assessment of government bureaucracy and hierarchy, the conflict of vision between liberals and conservative, and-- most significantly-- a guy who was indignant because he couldn't wear shorts when it was really hot (same deal where I work, no AC and no relaxation of the dress code when it's 93 degrees in the classroom . . . don't get me started) and, ultimately, a main character who appears one way on the surface: a selfish deserter who-- according to Donald Trump-- deserves to be shot, but when you dig deeper into the story, systemic problems and existential questions reveal themselves . . . anyway, my students wrote synthesis essays about Serial Season 2, Hamlet and Inside Out and they were excellent-- all three works revolve around the question "Who's there?" and they all feature introverted main characters navigating the world without a solid social framework of friends and family . . . and all three characters decide to run away in order to solve their problems; just in case you want to write the essay for your own personal erudition, I've included the prompt AND a sample paragraph I wrote . . . at the very least this will give you an idea of how much high school has changed in the past decade . . . I wish when I went to school that I had the chance to connect a Shakespeare play to a popular podcast and a Pixar film: these damned kids don't know how good they have it.

Who's there?

Use Hamlet, Inside Out, and Serial Season 2 to frame an argument about one or more of the following topics: character, motivation, consciousness, art, aesthetic purpose, ethics, grief, perspective, layers in art, running away, introversion, morals, human nature, action, inaction, family, friendship, political intentions or anything else that applies to these works. These are dense pieces of art that connect to many themes-- so you should be choosing something YOU want to write about.

Use evidence from these works of art to bolster your argument. Do NOT simply summarize and compare/contrast the works, use them to help make your own point. This will require minimal amounts of summary, some logical analysis, transitions and connections, and-- most importantly-- a clear thesis as to what YOU are saying and clear topic sentences that connect to YOUR argument. Your introduction should get across this idea that you are going to explore, explain, and support.

Use at least two quotations from Hamlet, two quotations from Serial, and one quotation from Inside Out. You may mention one of more of the works in the introduction if they connect to your main idea-- but you do not have to mention all the sources in the introduction, you could just blend them into the body paragraphs. Be sure to properly cite all your quotations.

Topic sentence 1: The world does not always conform to idealized rules, and if a person does not learn how to adapt to this concept, he may suffer tragic consequences.

 Hamlet believes that his mother and father's marriage was ideal; he cannot endure his mother's betrayal, so much so that he wishes his flesh would "melt" so he that he won't have to deal with the "unweeded garden" (I. ii. 133-139) that his world has become. It takes him too long to accept that his world is messy and ugly, and that he will have to adjust his morals, actions, and attitude to this new normal. Because of this, his life ends tragically. While he finally comes to the conclusion that "the readiness is all" (V. ii. 238) and accepts his fate as an angry and vengeful son, he realizes this too late. Bowe Bergdahl suffers a similar fate. Like Hamlet, he keeps his romanticized ideals intact into his young adulthood. This philosophy does not mesh well with life in the military.  In Episode 1 of Serial (DUSTWUN) Bowe likens himself to "Jason Bourne." His interviewer, Mark Boal, describes Bergdahl's aspirations to be a super-soldier. The reality of Bergdahl's military experience is far different than what he imagined. OP MEST was a godforsaken shithole (literally) and the army mission there was ambiguous at best. Bergdahl could not reconcile what he thought the military should be with his actual experience, and this led him to make a rash decision.

Topic Sentence 2: People who learn how to cope with with the instability of the world when they are young are much more likely to be mentally resilient. 

Serial Season Two vs. Dave's Brain!

Last year, I taught Serial Season 1 to my high school seniors-- I couched the podcast within a process analysis unit, and the kids really enjoyed it; Serial Season 2 is a bit harder to get a grip on, but I like it even better than Season 1, perhaps because it reminds me of all the things I learned when I lived in Syria, and-- despite the difficulties, I am teaching to my seniors and (with the threat of constant quizzing) they are doing a fantastic job with a dense and difficult story . . . this time I've embedded the podcast in a compare/contrast unit, because that seems to be the main structural trope that ties the story together . . . here are some of the topics that the podcast invites you to compare and contrast:

1) the liberal interpretation of Bergdahl's story vs. the conservative perspective . . . Katy Waldman (on  the Slate's Serial Spoiler) calls the tone of the podcast "radical empathy" while many of Bergdahl's fellow soldiers consider him a deserter and a traitor;

2) Bergdahl and Jason Bourne;

3) Bergdahl and a "golden chicken";

4) Bergdahl and a "ready made loaf";

5) Bergdahl and and a "free-floating astronaut" with no tether;

6) the American Army and a "lumbering machine" and an AT-AT;

7) the Taliban as a mouse running beneath the machine's legs;

8) Pakistan as "home base," the mousehole in the wall in Tom & Jerry;

9) the rumors about Bergdahl vs. the reality of his captivity;

10) The Haqqani Network and the Sopranos;

11) Bergdahl's imprisonment and treatment vs. the imprisonment and treatment of Muslim detainees in Guantanamo Bay, Bagram, and Abu Ghraib;

12) the feelings about infidels of moderate Muslims vs. radical Muslims;

13) the code of conduct required for POW videos vs. actual military expectations for POW videos;

14) the sovereign state of Pakistan and the tribal area of North Waziristan;

15) the captivity of Bergdahl and the captivity of David Rohde . . . Rohde was kidnapped and held for three months by the Haqqani network in the same area as Bergdahl at nearly the same time, he is a civilian journalist and not a soldier, and he wasn't blindfolded and isolated as much as Bergdahl, but his story is still very helpful in understanding what happened to Bergdahl;

16) the entire story and the children's book Zoom;

and these are the issues that I think will surface in the future-- I'm speculating, of course, but that's necessary when you're teaching a piece that's not finished yet . . . it's like teaching a book that hasn't been finished, it's exhilarating and exhausting, but also really fun; I can teach Hamlet and Henry IV in my sleep because I know what happens, while doing this is really keeping me on my toes, and this is where I imagine the story is going:

17) there will be comparisons drawn Bergdahl's endurance in captivity and the hero's journey . . . the fact that Mark Boal was interested in interviewing him for a movie and the fact that he is the longest held captive since the Vietnam War and the fact that they are viewing him with such empathy in the podcast leads me to believe it will head in this direction;

18) good leaders vs. toxic leaders . . . if Bergdahl is going to be portrayed as heroic, Serial is going to have to provide a reasonable story of why he deserted his post, and I think they are saving that portion of the narrative and I also think that it is going to open a whole crazy can of worms about the military and it's purpose;

19) the motivation behind Bergdahl's decision and the Pixar film Inside Out . . . which I have promised to show to my students if they survive the podcast;

20) the reaction you should have when you think about how long Bergdahl spent in captivity and the following clip from Grosse Pointe Blank (and while I realize that it doesn't connect exactly in a mathematical sense, the tone is perfect).

Serial Acronyms

While season two of Serial is fantastic, and swinging for the fences as far as big journalism goes, it's also a bit more difficult than the first season; this is partly caused by acronym overload, so here's a key to ten of them:

1. DUSTWUN . . . duty status whereabouts unknown;

2. OP . . . observation post;

3. FOB . . . forward operating base;

4. TCP . . . traffic control point;

5. IED . . . improvised explosive device;

6. GI . . . gastrointestinal;

7. MRE . . . meals ready to eat;

8. MRAP . . . mine resistant, ambush protected vehicle;

9. CIA . . . Central Intelligence Agency;

10. PL . . . platoon leader;

and so while you're listening, you have to be prepared for dialogue like this: Bergdahl wanted to get from OP Mest to FOB Sharana, while causing a DUSTWUN, so that his PL would have to contact the FOB, but some of his fellow soldiers, who were already dazed from suffering GI infections because they couldn't wash their hands properly before eating the MRE, thought that he might have been a mole in the CIA, but Bergdahl was hardly that, and though he had a plan to pinpoint where Taliban had planted an IED near the TCP, so that the specialists could drive an MRAP and defuse the IED, he actually just caused a huge SNAFU.

Winter Solstice Miracle!

Let's try to remember that the lesson of this post is that Dave is a Super-Genius (not an idiot) and that The Subconscious of Dave is constantly working to make brilliant connections, however they might manifest themselves; so it was very dark yesterday morning, as we are very close to the Winter Solstice, the moment when the sun is at its most southern declination, resulting in the day with the least amount of sunlight (technically, I think it happened last night, but who cares-- dark is dark, and Monday morning was very dark) and so I was barely able to crawl out of bed when my alarm went off at 5:30 AM . . . and I turned on the light on in the bathroom, cracked the door, and got dressed in that faint sliver of light (so as not to wake my wife) and drove to school in the dark, and then began teaching first period in the dark because first period starts at 7:26; I was teaching Season 2 of Serial-- which is investigating the Bowe Bergdahl desertion and captivity case-- and we were reviewing how a good story promises you certain things, and then hopefully makes good on those promises . . . and one of the main things this season of Serial promises us is a glimpse into Bergdahl's brain, the reason why he ran away from his post into Taliban territory . . . but before I brought up Serial, I talked about the Pixar film Inside Out, which many of the students had seen-- and asked what this film promised . . . which is something very similar to Serial Season 2 . . . Inside Out is very, very ambitious-- as it promises to explain to us how the brain works and why we do certain things, from the inside out (and the film succeeds-- it made me cry . . . poor Bing Bong) and it wasn't until fourth period that I realized what a brilliant connection this was, because not only do Serial Season 2 and Inside Out promise the same thing, they promise it about the exact same kind of decision, as the little girl -- Riley Andersen-- also runs away from where she is supposed to be, and the film illustrates the development and emotional underpinnings of the exact same kind of radical, angry idea, AND HERE'S THE MIRACLE . . . when I thought of this, during first period, I was wearing my gray golf shirt INSIDE OUT . . . it was so dark when I got dressed, and I was so logy, that I put it on with the tag sticking out on the back collar, the buttons on the inside, another tag sticking off the side seam, and I didn't notice, and while no one said anything to me until the period was over-- they said they were too embarrassed to tell me during class, someone must have muttered the words "inside out," as in "our teacher is an idiot, he's wearing his shirt inside out" and that must have led to the wild firing of neurons that me think of the movie and then the astoundingly brilliant Subconscious of Dave went to work, and now I've got this awesome hook to get kids into the new season (and I wore the shirt inside-out for two periods of teaching . . . best Winter Solstice ever!)

Heavy Stuff in Small Packages

Guest editor John Jeremiah Sullivan chooses some heavy stuff for The Best American Essays of 2014; tales of sexual abuse, miscarriage in Mongolia, alienating illnesses, foreign deaths, candid sexual promiscuity and obsessive contemplation (even of joy) dominate the collection, but there are two "lighter" essays and both are worth reading:

1) "The Old Man at Burning Man" by Wells Tower, which describes a trip the narrator and his dying father take to the bizarre post-apocalyptic festival out in The Black Rock Desert in northern Nevada;

2) "Slickheads" by Lawrence Jackson, a description of a Baltimore gang war in the '80's between the Woodlawn slickheads and the Oxford preps . . . the language in this one is wild, inventive and colorful-- "yeah, they was popping and breaking, helicopter and all that, but that shit is for tourists"-- and there are lots of nicknames-- Pretty Ricky, Knuckles, Meechee, Charm Sawyer (and, if you listened to Serial, then you'll appreciate the references to Leakin Park).

What's Better Than One Serial Killer?

Two serial killers, obviously-- The Dollmaker and The Follower-- and though Michael Connelly's third Hieronymous "Harry" Bosch novel was written back in 1994, The Concrete Blonde still feels relevant today because of the lurking theme under the double menace of the killers: unauthorized use of force by authority; Bosch shot The Dollmaker in the line of duty four years before the novel begins, and story opens with him being sued by the Dollmaker's widow for being a vigilante-- he shot the purported killer while he was naked and reaching for something under his pillow, which turned out to be a toupee, not a gun, and while there was a preponderance of evidence linking the suspect to the case; the plaintiff's attorney, Honey Chandler, brings up Rodney King and the noted corruption and civil rights abuses in the L.A.P.D. and meanwhile, the killings continue, making everyone-- including Bosch-- wonder if he got the wrong guy; while the book eventually veers away from this heavy stuff into more procedural law and the usual hot pursuit, with the requisite twists and turns (and plenty of pornography and violence) this is no lightweight beach read . . . so far it is my favorite of all the Connelly novels, and so I'd like to thank Joyce Carol Oates again for recommending him (you can say "you're welcome" in the comments, Joyce).

Music For Winter and Spring

Two new seasonal Slouching Beast songs:

1) "Long Winter" is a testament to just how long and brutal this winter was . . . I recorded it back in February and my voice sounds even raspier than usual . ..  because it was so cold and dry for so long; check out the bass riff, I played it on my short scale Danelectro Longhorn, and the song was inspired by a Christina Gutierrez line from Serial;

2) "Shining Incident (Averted)" is my tribute to spring, or to making it through the winter without going Jack Torrance on your family . . . while it's not exactly Vivaldi, the vocals are a little more chipper and there's a full-fledged jazz interlude at the bridge . . . happy spring break!

 

High Jingo

Harry Bosch investigates two cases at the same time in Michael Connelly's The Drop . . . a cold one involving a sexual predator and a serial killer and a hot one: the possible suicide of a powerful City Council Member's son . . . the hot case leads to political conspiracy and what Bosch calls "high jingo," which is his term for high-level political manipulation and gamesmanship-- something he and I both abhor-- which is why Bosch will remain a detective and I will remain a teacher . . . neither of us wants anything to do with the world of bureaucracy, administration and "high jingo," and while this means you can't have as broad an effect on the system, it also means that you don't have to compromise your values as often (but you can still use violence and intimidation once in a while to coerce a confession . . . that's just good fun).

Murder on a Sunday Morning

I highly recommend this documentary . . . almost as much as I highly recommend NOT being black in Gainesville, Florida when the police are out looking for a murder suspect (fans of the podcast Serial will love this . . . and Murder on a Sunday Morning has a unambiguous and satisfying ending, I promise).

Icy Stairs vs. Hannibal Lecter

We just started watching another crime show about a serial killer (True Detectives) and this made me wonder how often serial killing actually occurs-- because if you watch Luther and The Fall and Dexter and Hannibal and The Following (I've only seen the first two on the list-- and that's enough serial killing for me) then you'd think that the world is absolutely overrun with psychopathic homicidal maniacs . . . but it turns out (according to Scientific American) that only one percent of the 15, 000 murders that occur in the U.S. each year are the work of serial killers, and the FBI estimates that there are 25-50 serial killers operating at any particular time . . . which is actually more than I thought, but you should still worry more about getting the ice off your porch steps then the chance that your neighbor has a bunch of frozen heads in the freezer.

Faculty Follies

Once again, the Triennial (not triannual, thank God) Faculty Follies were a roaring success-- teachers, administrators, secretaries and hall-aides performed skits, dances, and other entertaining stuff to a packed house (plus there were videos, including an awesome parody of Serial that Stacey made . . . I was the prime suspect) and while I never physically got up on stage-- it's too weird up there-- I performed below the stage in the "house band" (we called ourselves the SATs . . . not nearly as good a name as The Hanging Chads) and it's too bad Weird Al cornered the market in stupid song parodies, because though we only rehearsed once, we rocked the house; here is our set list:

1) Instagram-- to The Beatles "Yesterday"--

2) It's Fun to Guess on the P.S.A.T. -- to "Y.M.C.A"--

3) Take Me to Lunch-- to Hozier's "Take Me to Church"--

4) You're Not the Only One-- to Sam Smith's "I'm Not the Only One."

Stella Gibson is a Better Swimmer Than Gillian Anderson

In the BBC series The Fall, Gillian Anderson plays Metropolitan Police Superintendent Stella Gibson, who is sent from London to Belfast to investigate a string of serial-killer type murders; she is a cold, weirdly sexual, detached character and when she's not frowning or sleeping in her clothes in the office, she likes to swim laps to blow off steam . . . but while Stella Gibson is the sort of person who does everything with crisp and lean efficiency, apparently Gillian Anderson doesn't know how to swim very well; this provides the only humor (at least I thought it was funny) in an otherwise dark and dour show: Anderson's swimming is hectic . . . she breathes frantically between every stroke, her stubby little arms pumping away, her body rigid, her head snapping violently, over and over in the same direction . . . and all this poor form must have contributed to her "frozen shoulder," which is why-- as she explains in this article-- she used a body double for the swimming scenes in season two (so Gillian, since I'm sure you're reading this, here are a few pointers: you want to take as few strokes as possible to cover the length of the pool, slipping your hands into the water they way you would slip them into a glove and turn your entire upper body to breathe-- you should try to point your belly-button at the sides of the pool with each stroke, and don't cross your arm over the center line, reach out and use your forearm as a paddle . . . and you can thank me in the comments).

Did Ajim Suck Out Michael Rockefeller's Brains?

This is the essential question at the heart of Carl Hoffman's book Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller's Tragic Quest for Primitive Art . . . and unlike Serial, this journalistic journey down the rabbit-hole of time delivers a fairly definitive answer to the mystery of what happened to Michael Rockefeller in 1961-- although you're going to have to wait until the last page of the book to get it-- but along the way Hoffman raises plenty of other issues about colonialism and otherness, cultural relativism and morality, the motivations and rituals of subsistence cultures, revenge and balance, the value and acquisition of primitive art, and what connects and separates human culture (think headhunting, chairs and sewage) and while much of this might be anthropological abstraction or a maze of historical detail (I still can't figure out exactly what went down between the Asmat villages of Otsjanep and Omadesep) the narrative is held together by the lurking shadow in the New Guinea swamp, the ultimate taboo: cannibalism . . . and this pervades the story and the Asmat culture-- these are people without access to protein, warriors who believe in a spirit world as much as in the dense, green and watery reality of their actual home, and they are complex people, who have had to deal with an upheaval to their culture, in the form of mysterious white men-- who are generally all-powerful, possessing guns and flying vehicles, white men who made them feel guilt and regret for their sacred rituals-- and while they now profess that they are reformed of their headhunting habits, there are still those living in the villages, elders, who have tasted human flesh, and fifty years ago, when they had the chance to strike at a weak and vulnerable white-man-- not long after they suffered a massacre at the hands of a Dutch colonial-- then the case that Hoffman presents makes perfect sense.

Some of the Best Sentences Ever Written (By Me . . . This Year)

Once again, it's time for me to arbitrarily choose my favorite posts of the year; I hope you enjoy them and perhaps 2015 will provide more excellent material for me to condense (or refuse to condense) into sentence form . . . so without further fanfare, here are some of the best sentences ever written . . . by me . . . in 2014:

Greatest Holy Miracle (Involving Balls)

The Commenter of the Year's Favorite Sentence of the Year

The Sentences That Produced the Comment of the Year

Human Consciousness Explained and Illustrated

A Most Titillating Sentence About Racks and Knobs

The Best Advice for Ebay Sellers

An Ironically Woeful Sentence

An Unsolved Mystery

Best Before/After Incident

Least Awkward Moment of  Dave

Prank of the Year

Crackpot Theory of the Year

Most Educational Use of Facial Hair

An Actually Woeful Sentence

A Sentence That Contains Two of My Favorite Places in the Universe 

Most Surprising Cameo (and Comment) of the Year

A Mystery Solved

Angriest Sentence of the Year

Most Reflective Moment of Dave

French-kissing Your Sister (the Best Tie Ever)

Best Paean to Sarah Koenig and Serial

A Fashion Statement

and, finally . . .

A Fashion Dilemma.

The Significance of #47

Having this blog has made it easy to keep track of the important things in my life, such as the number of tacos I ate in 2011 (200!) and the number of books I read in 2013 (22) and I am very proud to say that this year I more than doubled last year's book count (mainly because I read a lot of quick reads: crime-fiction and travelogues and slick non-fiction) and I just finished my fifth Don Winslow novel of the year (The Gentlemen's Hour . . . plenty of surfing, corruption, torture, and murder . . . plus some big Serial type issues, such as how the prosecution and police often "massage" eyewitness reports and confessions in order to get what they need for a conviction-- whether it's the right guy or not) and that's book number 47; for the entire list and my seven favorites, head over to Gheorghe: The Blog. 

Enough About Serial Already

Here is a piece of graffito I read on a condom machine in a bar bathroom: "this gum tastes funny."

Now That Serial Is Over, What Will My Brain Do?

The podcast Serial has finally reached its conclusion-- and while the ending might not satisfy the binge-listeners, anyone who listened to Sarah Koenig slowly explicate the case: the major and minor players, the details, the neighbor-boy and Mr. S., the time-lines, the Nisha call, the Asia alibi, the theories, the issues, the geography, the criminal justice system, the nature of narrative, human nature and truth . . . anyone who consumed this thing week-by-week, with plenty of time to process and discuss each episode with other rabid fans-- these people can't be disappointed by the ending (and I am speculating, of course, which is just what the podcast simultaneously invited us to do and warned us against) but the final episode had it all-- new shit, old theories, new possibilities, Deirdre, the phrase "West Side Hitman," and a final (sort of) conclusion about the case and our justice system; this is not to say that I wasn't rooting for The Last Minute Solution and the greatest forty-five minutes of digital audio ever recorded, and it's not to say that I didn't laugh (really hard) at the Funny or Die parody of the ending-- but I was setting the bar low (because that is the key to happiness) and I set it low enough (and I'm not ashamed to admit) that I got a bit teary-eyed at Adnan's last words-- his stoic attitude towards the universe and the case; he leaves Sarah with this: "I think in a sense you leave it up to the audience to determine" but Sarah says she can't do this -- she can't "take a powder" on a conclusion-- and then she says what we know she has to say, and while it's not last second Hail Mary into the end zone (my friend Kevin said it was more like when the quarterback takes a knee in order to preserve a hard fought tie) but I still think it was more than enough-- she provided plenty of drama and thought provoking commentary, brilliant pacing and superb detail and flawless transitions and dense tape-- tape we have listen to, and so we have to really pay attention, we can't just look at it and draw some quick conclusions; generally the only type of drama that can get me all weepy like the last two episodes of Serial are sports stories-- Friday Night Lights and Hoosiers and Rocky, that sort of stuff-- and I think that's how I felt here; I admired the fight, both from Sarah and her "little garden spade" and from Adnan, who allowed this awful time to be pried back open and scrutinized (would a guilty man agree to go through with this?) and even though it's cliche, sometimes you play as hard as you can, and you don't get a result, and that's frustrating and disappointing, but the important thing is that you put it all on the line and played . . . and that's what this podcast and Sarah Koenig and Adnan did . . . I don't think I've ever spent three months following anything this closely: a news story, a TV show, a book, a sports team . . . Serial takes the cake in that department, and now it's finally come time to conclude this sentence and I think I will end with the moral of the story-- endings are hard . . . there's so few that are memorable and perfect (The Shield, The Winter's Tale, and Let the Right One In immediately come to mind) but that's because endings are contrived and in reality there are no endings, things just keep on going, whether we like them or not . . . so hopefully Episode 13 of Serial (otherwise known as the universe that Serial resides in) will eventually provide us more information about the case, but we have to remember that our universe isn't obligated to explicate anything, and so we just do the best we can with what we have.

Tony Luke's is Better Than Jim's (and Other Notes for Future Trips to Philly)

Catherine and I spent the weekend in Philly (sans kids) and I'd like to note some highs and lows for both my readers and my future self:

1) Not only is the roast pork sandwich with sharp provolone and long hots at Tony Luke's better than the same offering at DiNic's-- but (though it's comparing apples to oranges . . . or pigs to cows) it's also better than a cheesesteak at Jim's-- and as an added bonus, the staff is actually cordial at Tony Luke's-- the woman taking my order didn't seem to mind at all that I had a question-- while Jim's has a "soup Nazi" feel to the ordering process . . . who do I order from? . . . the guy with the metal thingie? . . . did he make eye contact with me? . . . does that mean I need to say something? . . . I'm pretty far along in the line . . . am I too far in line? . . . should I have said something? . . . is it too late? . . . did I miss my chance?. . . do they have provolone? . . . do I have to say "wit wiz"? . . .. how do you spell "whiz"? . . . should I say "wit prov"? and after all the hazing, we were still underwhelmed by the cheesesteaks from Jim's this time around (although I must admit, that past times they were delicious);

2) our next trip to Philadelphia, I am going to get a cheesesteak from Tony Luke's and see if it is as good as the roast pork sandwich (because quite a few people were eating cheesesteaks there);

3) the Good Dog and La Locanda Del Ghiottone are great places to eat;

4) the tour of the Physick House is worth doing: the guy who does the tour is the great-great grandson of Dr. Physick-- "The Father of American Surgery"-- and while he's an eccentric man, who seems to be living his life both in the 18th Century and the present, simultaneously, there is no question that he knows a buttload about the house and the history of the area, which he gets across in passionate anecdotal fashion, with loads of bad puns, and -- odd as he is, and history buffs are usually quite odd-- at least he doesn't dress in period garb, which is a big plus . . . but be warned, the good Doctor's surgical tools are rather primitive and the accompanying diagrams made me light-headed and also, I'm pretty sure he explained to us, while discussing the family tree on the wall in the room with all the surgical tools, that he's seriously inbred;

5) The Hop Sing Laundromat has a lot of rules, so I put the kibosh on going there;

6) listening to the podcast Serial while driving is dangerous stuff . . . Lynn and Connell were so engrossed that they missed the exit . . . by thirty miles (but Lynn did get an A+ on the Episode 10 quiz that Catherine and I created for my class);

7) Connel got the perfect mojito at lunch at Cuba Libre, but then couldn't get the diner bartender to replicate it . . . but he does claim that the best drinks in the world are served at the awkwardly named Franklin Mortgage & Investment Company (but Catherine and I didn't go over there, as you have to mortgage your house to afford the drinks, which run fifteen dollars a piece-- but Lynn and Connel say it was well worth it, so next time I will suck it up and pay);

8) if you want to go to Farmicia, you need a reservation; same with Howl at the Moon, and McGillin's was a madhouse at 10 PM on a Saturday night, far too young a crowd (we walked in while the bouncers were breaking up a fight . . . the place was a giant frat party-- if you want to visit Philly's oldest bar, try the afternoon);

9) it's a long walk from the Old City to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, especially when it's pouring rain and you're only wearing a sweatshirt because your wife didn't emphasize the weather forecast (she told me, but she didn't TELL me);

10) the Thomas Bond House keeps the heat too high, so you have to break the rules and open the windows-- which have no screens because it's a restored historical house.

Sarah Koenig, Laura and the Dude Profanely Grapple in the In-Between Place (Philosophical Shit Part 2)

If you go 38 minutes and 40 seconds into Episode 8 of Serial, then you get to hear Sarah Koenig set up what she calls "her favorite piece of tape from all her reporting so far"-- and then you hear a friend of Jay's named Laura stumble and stutter and curse her way to the conclusion that she's very confused and things are extremely complicated-- there's just too much conflicting information; Sarah Koenig says that Laura's stream-of-consciousness equivocating could be her own . . . and all this reminds me of the scene in The Big Lebowski when the Dude proclaims, in the same stuttering, stumbling epithet-laced manner that "new shit has come to light" -- and the Dude and Sarah Koenig occasionally strike me as similar, though Koenig is a far more seasoned and professional investigator, but she still seems slightly over her head-- digging away at the case with her "little garden spade" . . . and open to all possibilities, as the Dude is, and though this is a wonderful trait, it means Serial may end like The Big Lebowski . . . an excellent picaresque journey that disappears into a scattered collection of phenomenal fragments (at the start of Episode 9 of Serial, Koenig presents the "new shit"-- three things that are fairly well substantiated, but actually increase the fog, complexity and ambiguity of the case).