John Bowe and Us: Just Fucking Wrong.
John Bowe, co-writer of a lovely movie called Basquiat, put together an account of first-person experiences of love — and gets it totally wrong.
Fine, your life is ruined by some woman because you both can’t seem to make it work, and what do you do? Blame love. Call it faulty and confusing and utterly impenetrable.
Ostensibly, that seems fair. But it also seems too easy. “I’m right,” you say, and “I’m right,” she says and because you are both right, love must be wrong — easy, simple deductive reasoning.
Wrong.
Assume, for a moment, that love is simply an experience, like happiness or sadness or masturbation. It will come and it will go, necessarily, because biology demands it. What you have left, then, is the value of your relationship and what you are willing to sacrifice for that relationship determines said value.
So, if you let go of the relationship to resume your comfortable life, in essence you are saying that the relationship was disposable, as were your feelings of love (as are you, former lover). Because to continue that relationship would require great sacrifice (though, presumably, not your life, though you’ve admitted it was “the love of your life”), and you weren’t willing to do that because, presumably:
“You know that idea that true love conquers all?” he said. “It can conquer a hell of a lot, but it can’t conquer everything.
That actually says something about you, not love, because love is an experience (in a way), and it’s up to you to make the most of it. (Read: Dude, it was up to you to conquer everything. Why? Because you’re a man. That’s your job.)
Wal-Mart makes a funny.
Run during the AFC championship game:
James Patterson: writer, adman, shark.
The NY Times Magazine published a wonderful, wonderful piece on James Patterson — a guy who apparently has no problem publishing nine hardbacks every year, at the least.
Surprising:
There are many different ways to catalog Patterson’s staggering success. Here are just a few: Since 2006, one out of every 17 novels bought in the United States was written by James Patterson. He is listed in the latest edition of “Guinness World Records,” published last fall, as the author with the most New York Times best sellers, 45, but that number is already out of date: he now has 51 — 35 of which went to No. 1.
And incisive:
Unsatisfied with publishing’s informal approach to marketing meetings, Patterson had expected corporate-style presentations, complete with comprehensive market-share data and sales trends. “A lot of authors are just grateful to be published,” Holly Parmelee, Patterson’s publicist from 1992 to 2002, told me several weeks earlier. “Not Jim. His attitude was that we were in business together, and he wanted us both to succeed, but it was not going to be fun and games.”
And revealing:
Patterson built his fan following methodically. Instead of simply going to the biggest book-buying markets, he focused his early tours and advertising efforts on cities where his books were selling best: like a politician aspiring to higher office, he was shoring up his base. From there, he began reaching out to a wider audience, often through unconventional means. When sales figures showed that he and John Grisham were running nearly neck and neck on the East Coast but that Grisham had a big lead out West, Patterson set his second thriller series, “The Women’s Murder Club,” about a group of women who solve murder mysteries, in San Francisco.
Seriously revealing:
To maintain his frenetic pace of production, Patterson now uses co-authors for nearly all of his books. He is part executive producer, part head writer, setting out the vision for each book or series and then ensuring that his writers stay the course. This kind of collaboration is second nature to Patterson from his advertising days, and it’s certainly common in other creative industries, including television. But writing a novel is not the same thing as coming up with jokes for David Letterman or plotting an episode of “24.” Books, at least in their traditional conception, are the product of one person’s imagination and sensibility, rendered in a singular, unreproducible style and voice. Some novelists have tried using co-authors, usually with limited success. Certainly none have taken collaboration to the level Patterson has, with his five regular co-authors, each one specializing in a different Patterson series or genre. “Duke Ellington said, ‘I need an orchestra, otherwise I wouldn’t know how my music sounds,’ ” Pietsch told me when I asked him about Patterson’s use of collaborators. “Jim created a process and a team that can help him hear how his music sounds.”
The way it usually works, Patterson will write a detailed outline — sometimes as long as 50 pages, triple-spaced — and one of his co-authors will draft the chapters for him to read, revise and, when necessary, rewrite. When he’s first starting to work with a new collaborator, a book will typically require numerous drafts. Over time, the process invariably becomes more efficient. Patterson pays his co-authors out of his own pocket. On the adult side, his collaborators work directly and exclusively with Patterson. On the Y.A. side, they sometimes work with Patterson’s young-adult editor, who decides when pages are ready to be passed along to Patterson.
And, at times, obvious:
Patterson’s chapters are very short, which creates a lot of half-blank pages; his books are, in a very literal sense, page-turners. He avoids description, back story and scene setting whenever possible, preferring to hurl readers into the action and establish his characters with a minimum of telegraphic details. The first chapter of “The Swimsuit,” a recent thriller with a villain who abducts women for pornographic snuff films, opens with the kidnapping of a supermodel on a beach in Hawaii:
“Kim McDaniels was barefooted and wearing a blue-and-white-striped Juicy Couture minidress when she was awoken by a thump against her hip, a bruising thump. She opened her eyes in the blackness, as questions broke the surface of her mind.
“Where was she? What the hell was going on?”
(Did you ever think someone would give up their business model so easily, so freely?)
Joyous boredom
Jennifer Schuessler, an editor at the Book Review, tackles David Foster Wallace’s posthumous novel, The Pale King, and attempts to explain, most interestingly, the importance of being bored.
A library is an enormous repository of information, entertainment, the best that has been thought and said. It is also probably the densest concentration of potential boredom on earth.
Owl City: Fireflies
I heard this over Christmas, in New York, driving on the LIE, thinking “Deathcab for Cutie finally made something I can listen to.”
Crimsonlist
Harvard students Sasank Konda ’12 and Kane Hsieh ’12 have created Crimsonlist, a Harvard-based version of Craigslist.
A story in The Crimson asserts the idea is not new.
Brooklyn Banks: Deathwatch.
The Brooklyn Banks is set to close for some painting which, in NYC-terms, means it’ll probably close forever.
It’s a NY institution; everyone’s skated there — me included.
Bush and Clinton shill for Haiti
We should never forget the damage done and the lives lost, but we have a chance to do things better than we once did; be a better neighbor than we once were; and help the Haitian people realize their dream for a stronger, more secure nation. But we need more than just support from governments — we need the innovation and resources of businesses; the skills and the knowledge of nongovernmental organizations, including faith-based groups; and the generosity and support of individuals to fill in the gaps. Visit www.clintonbushhaitifund.org to make a donation and learn more about our efforts. It’s the least we can do, and the least the people of Haiti deserve. At our best, we can help Haiti become its best.
Give now, because after this crisis we’ll immediately return to our normal state of not giving a shit. Who knew Bill and George could make such a fine cheese sandwich*?
* For those of you who don’t know, a cheese sandwich defines the lowest common denominator: no meat, no substance, just enough taste and calories to keep you alive, nothing more.
US vs. Them
Google is thinking of leaving China. Bravo. If you’ve got enough money and market share, avoid bullshit at all costs. Only start-ups have time for nonsense like that.
Met: looking for leads
An e-mail circulating at University College London:
Dear Student, The Metropolitan Police have asked us to send the following message to all students and staff. On the 25th December 2009, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is alleged to have attempted to detonate an explosive device on a transatlantic flight from Amsterdam to Detroit in America. He is currently in the USA and has been charged with offences in relation to this matter. Abdulmutallab was a student at University College London, between September 2005 and July 2008. As part of the investigation being carried out by the Metropolitan Police they are speaking with anyone who may be able to provide information about the activities of Abdulmuttalab. If you have any information it will be treated in total confidence. Police can be contacted on either the confidential Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 789 321 or alternatively via web-link at https://secure.met.police.uk/athotline/index.php
I should remind you here that it’s only confidential so long as you don’t know about England’s surveillance laws, which tend to say nothing is confidential.
Quantum Leap
The precise energy of a hydrogen molecule has been calculated using a quantum computer.
Hint: you don’t have to know what that means, really. Just understand that your children, one day, will tool you over how little you know about modern computing — and that that shift in understanding began with this.
My, how things have changed.
What’s new:
1. Apparently, the Ugandan government has been on a standards binge, bearing down on Chinese businessmen for failing to import things of quality. The problem? The measures they use are largely subjective (e.g., pulling at shoes to see if they come apart), and some items they are complaining about are actually made in Uganda.
2. Cissy, my hapless lawyer, got married.
3. The migration of workers from China is palpable. Children no longer shout ‘mzungu,’ but ‘China’ instead. And Ugandans have started to adopt a sensitivity to the Chinese: they nearly all try to speak with a Chinese-inspired accent, which, in typical Ugandan fashion, sounds as ridiculous as it seems.
4. Those meddling European consultants keep trying to improve working conditions in Uganda, but are just fucking it all up. For instance, Uganda’s thinking about a minimum wage. The problem is that it’s just another tax on foreign investment, since Ugandans are the ones who set the market wages to begin with, and are the only ones able to flout regulations with ease.
Europe, America, just leave Africa alone. Clearly, the progress you’ve failed to make in the last 50 years should tell you that you’re not helping anyone.
5. Plastic scrap is now sold at a whopping 1000 shillings a kilo. Who would’ve known it could go so high?
6. Traffic is now everywhere, all the time (we’re up to the UAM series of license plates).
7. Nakumatt may be going down the tubes: I’ve never seen so many closed shops.
8. Puppies! Chicken and Beef procreated, making 8 more. Naturally, I’m calling the one we’re keeping McGangbang, a fusion of chicken and beef.
What hasn’t changed:
1. URA: still bureaucratic as ever.
2. The guys at Surgipharm are still rude.
3. Emirates service still sucks (it figures: Beatrice has gone to Canada).