Echopraxia

I think I'll let that last one stand, if for no other reason than that I'm in no clearer a state of mind right now than I was then. I do have some half-formed thoughts about singers, and vocalists, and the way that an otherwise not terribly prepossessing man (who, now that he's grown his hair out a bit, bears an unsettling resemblance to Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban) can deliver a line in a way that just commands the attention of a room, whereas the fellow from Coldplay still, for all his yammering, doesn't really seem like he's trying very hard - but now is not the time.

Besides, I should shut up about the Mountain Goats for a while. To help me with that, I was just out cleansing my musical palate at a club, out there on the mean streets where the young people congregate with their challenging slang. We were entertained by a popular local beat combo, whose frontman was immortalized in the South Park spoof "Fightin' All Over The World."

This was about as strange as you'd expect. A review, of sorts, will follow when I'm sober. This should be tomorrow, although I can't discount the possibility that William Vollmann or Dennis Farina or someone will turn out to have an experimental oompah band playing in the neighborhood, in which case I'll probably feel obliged to go and get hammered at that as well.

Posted by zerlesen at 1:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Holy shit. I've been to some shows in my time; enough shows that I dread going to shows. (I don't use the word "dread" lightly: these days, I proactively find reasons not to be where live music is played. I can see an older, balder version of me avoiding cinemas in ten years' time, for similar reasons - and if I had to continually war with assholes over standing room in movie theaters, it'd be happening already. Yes, I'm aware that I'm sounding like Pat. Pass the vegan popcorn, motherfucker.)

But I still make it out every so often. And that, that was fucking awesome. Enough so to make me wonder if it was in my top three all-time, and to wonder if that notion even made any sense, and then to wonder if I should just cue up some tunes and drift off to sleep in relatively-dignified silence and finish this post when I'm sober.

Actually, that's a thought. I'll just come back and edit the hell out of this in the morning. Who's going to know?

Posted by zerlesen at 2:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Before my head explodes, here is a charming little folk ballad about the troubled life of an NBA general manager.

It's not all good, but the line

Encouraging teams to stay below the tax threshold allows them flexibility to re-sign their draft picks!

Posted by zerlesen at 3:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A while ago I refigured my US taxes and realized I was actually owed a fair chunk of change more than I had thought. I also discovered that non-citizens are not allowed to file electronically, presumably for fear that we will somehow infect the IRS computers with terrorism. This meant I needed paper forms from my former employer. The paper forms needed to be sent to me the old-fashioned way.

So, around Wednesday, I realized that trusting my former employer to put something in an envelope, write an address on it, and put it in the mail might be construed as negligent - or the forms might have just been eaten by a whale en route. After a modest amount of cajoling, I managed to get them to authorize and send me an electronic version, which was relatively easy once I'd gotten them to admit that there was such a thing as an electronic version. Anyway, problem solved, return ready to file, four days before deadline. Except that Australia closes down completely over the four-day Easter weekend. Nothing is open on Good Friday except for pubs, and even they all close at 10 PM and are unreliable when it comes to delivering the mail. Post offices reopen and mail delivery recommences on Tuesday, one day too late for my purposes. However, I thought, surely the efficient whirling cogs of private enterprise will not let me down. After all these weeks of midnight phone calls to offices on the East Coast that will be closed by the time I wake up for work, tedious negotiations with former employers, etc, all I have to do is get something in the mail within the next hundred or so hours. Surely this can be done.

Saturday morning, I jog down to my local FedEx branch. After all, even if the post offices are closed for no very good reason, and it costs a little extra, I can at least be confident that I'll have a record that I mailed the thing off in time. Local FedEx repository is closed. A little disquieting, but I slow my pace and head for the center of the city, reasoning that there absolutely has to be some way of mailing something in the city of Sydney on a Saturday. Downtown there is another FedEx branch. It is open. I smile broadly and skip to the counter.

Here was my trivia lesson - and final straw - for the day: FedEx won't ship to PO boxes or non-street addresses in the US from foreign countries. This, to me, makes no sense whatsoever. The guy was not unsympathetic, but was adamant that they would not deliver my tax return. "Australia post," he said. "Tuesday." Offers of bribery and disquisitions to the effect that it is completely ludicrous for a modern industrialized country to just cease operating for four days like this did not move him.

The tax return is sitting in the corner of my desk, as it has been all week, staring at me victoriously. Technically, the feds stop owing you your refund three years after the return comes due. However, since literally every single other rule in the system has a clause built into it to screw foreigners, I'm assuming that "three years" can be interpreted as "thirty seconds" as and when it becomes convenient, say just after midnight on Monday. The tax return may think it has the upper hand, but I am more determined than that. On Tuesday the 18th, I am going out to buy a carrier pigeon, shove my tax return up its ass, point it towards Philadelphia, and release. Failing that, I am going to burn the fucking thing.

Posted by zerlesen at 3:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

A few months ago, being given a ride up I-5 by the artist formerly known as e-rocky-confidential, I was turned on to the Mountain Goats. I was, I have to confess, sceptical. I react very badly to other people trying to play me music that they like, despite the fact that I am a evangelical asshole about music that I have decided is the best thing ever this week.

Anyway, it turned out to be this fantastic minimalist thing of acoustic guitar and tape hiss, and what sounded like a concussed folk singer on top of it. Again, not a good omen: I have an incredibly low tolerance for people who sound like folk singers. I think the thing that won me over for good was the guy muttering offhandedly

But selling acid was a bad idea... and selling it to a cop was a worse one... and the new law said that seventeen year olds could do federal time...

Anyway, the upshot is that now I am tremendously excited about this going on a short way up the road from my apartment. They even observe, in passing

Our love for you is an unquenchable fire! We cannot sleep!

Posted by zerlesen at 4:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Reading about Sho's journey through San Francisco is a major nostalgia trip for me, as he has obligingly hit some of my favorite spots - places like the Pork Store, Hobson's Choice, and most of all the Black Horse London Pub & Deli in Cow Hollow.

I happened upon the place in the summer of 1999. It's not easy to happen upon, but at the time they had a big Union Jack protruding out into Union Street, and that was unusual enough for me to stop in. (Admittedly, it doesn't take a huge amount to make me curious enough to stop in at a new bar.) The bartender - also the proprietor - stood to attention and said "Welcome home." And home was what it felt like, for the next six hours, after which time it felt more like a fuzzy, soft-focussed, gently yawing and pitching version of home. Then I fell over.

The Black Horse is the kind of place where, if you don't know anyone, the bartender will introduce you to the rest of the patrons. This is not a process that takes very long. There's seating room for about seven, and standing room for about zero. There's a keg behind the bar in a bathtub, a couple of bottled ale options, a totally impractical dartboard. You can order a cheese plate, and you used to be able to buy cigars. You can leave a conversation and pick it back up six months later the next time you're in the city. The last time I was there I had, through a series of logistical mistakes, no place to stay, and ended up with more offers of a place to crash than I knew what to do with. I'm not sure if they even need the business - I'm not exaggerating; the entire establishment could fit behind the bar of my current local - but, for what it's worth, if you're ever in the neighborhood, this is as close as I've seen to the Platonic ideal of a bar. And they don't even serve spirits.

Posted by zerlesen at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Oh, my aching head. Imagine me saying that yesterday, when I wasn't really capable of posting, or of leaving the house. Anyway, thanks for the well-wishes. A good time was had, and when it became necessary, I was pleasantly surprised to find a bartender who was perfectly aware of what Flatliners were and how to make them. This has happened to me, I think, twice ever. Here's the recipe:

Pour a measure of sambuca into a large shot glass, then layer a measure of tequila over it. (I use the back of a spoon to do this, because I'm not very good at fancy pouring techniques.) Then add Tabasco sauce. If you've done this correctly, the Tabasco will sink through the tequila and settle on top of the sambuca, giving you a perfectly clear drink with a thin red line in the middle of it.

This sounds awful, I'm aware, but everyone I have inflicted them on is surprised by how smooth a drink this is. First, that acquired tequila taste is completely wiped away by the Tabasco scouring your tastebuds, then the fiery unpleasantness of the Tabasco is mitigated by the sambuca - which itself tastes much less sickly than usual, since the sweetness is actually being used to offset something. It's all over very quickly, and you're left with a faint nutty aftertaste and the sensation that something - something momentous - has just occurred. It's a perfect fusion of ingredients, and I'd go on except that writing about liquor is making me feel slightly unwell.

UPDATE: It hardly needs to be said, but it is very important that you drink this in one go. Under no circumstances should it be sipped.

Posted by zerlesen at 3:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was going to start rambling about Situationism, but life's too short. Speaking of which, I'm all older and stuff. This post is still fairly representative, I think. Different continent, different sedan chair, different watering-hole, different oracular pronouncements - but the song remains the same.

(Any of you who happen to be in an appropriate place to do so, have a Flaming Blue Dolphin on me. Well, not "on me" in the sense that I'm going to pay for them - just that I'm providing a viable excuse.)

Posted by zerlesen at 4:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)

I thought to myself, what can I do to get them as angry as they have made me? Then when I lifted my arm I saw the anger in their faces and I started to laugh.

Leipzig's Nigerian midfielder Adebowale Ogungbure was walking off the pitch when hooligans ran up to him, spat at him and called him "Dirty Nigger," "Shit Nigger" and "Ape." He ignored it and walked on. Then, when he passed the main stand and heard fans making whooping monkey noises at him, he decided he'd had enough. He put two fingers above his mouth to symbolise a Hitler moustache and stuck out his right arm in a Nazi salute to the crowd.

1) Ogungbure actually faced criminal charges for doing this, because sieg-heiling is everywhere and always illegal in Germany. The charges were swiftly dropped, at least, but for Christ's sake.

2) The slogan adopted by Germany for the impending World Cup is "A Time To Make Friends". I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry.

Posted by zerlesen at 4:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This story is wonderful on a number of levels: an investigation into an alleged "race-hate crime" committed in 1999 by Tony Blair. (I'm not sure if the Times is quoting someone describing it as a "race-hate crime", or if they're inserting a little editorial scepticism.) Apparently, while watching the returns from the Welsh assembly, Blair shouted, assuming I'm reading between the lines correctly, "Fucking Welsh."

The story is tantalizingly thin on detail, though. Where was Mr. Blair at the time of his allegedly shouting "Fucking Welsh"? Was he in a pub? Was he drunker than everyone else at the table and making a belligerent attempt to start a fight with a neighbouring table of Welshmen, perhaps causing Jack Straw to purse his lips and consider whether his half-pint of shandy could be appropriately deployed as a melee weapon? If so, then Blair is even more in touch with the British electorate than he has ever been given credit for.

Not that the two men typically bear comparison, but Churchill probably would have shouted something much worse, and then thrown a decanter of sherry at someone.

Posted by zerlesen at 11:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I think I'm settled on the layout. Tried to import Blogger archives; everything went horribly wrong; decided that Blogger archives might not be worth preserving for future generations after all.

Pointless, maybe, but at least it was less exercise than clearing my desk, which now features a fairly impressive archipelago of unbalanced half-reams, some typed and some scribbled, together with a system of weights to prevent them flying everywhere when I turn the fan on. Pizza boxes, food detritus, empty bottles of Toohey's round out the scene. I was going to clean the place, but now I'm afraid of giving away too much about myself.

Posted by zerlesen at 5:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

I have learned a great deal this afternoon about the mechanisms for filing your US federal tax return online. Unfortunately, one of the last things I learned - not one of the first, as would have been more useful - was that non-resident aliens are not allowed to file online. This was less of an issue when I was the kind of non-resident who actually resided in the country, but now it is a gigantic pain in my balls, as I'll be needing official paper copies of all the employee information that I have scattered around the place in various electronic formats, and I have a sinking feeling that they are going to take their sweet time getting these pieces of paper sent to Australia so that I can immediately send them back again. There is absolutely no good reason for this that I can think of.

Anyway, the fuckers owe me three hundred and fifty dollars, and by the time I get done with this I'll actually feel like I've earned it: notwithstanding, of course, the time last year when I already did earn it.

Posted by zerlesen at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I love it when politics blogs start talking about sports almost as much as I hate it when sports blogs start talking about politics. Imagine my delight, then, as in this astonishing thread MyDD guy Chris Bowers launches an early salvo in the Pennsylvania governor's race. Since Republican candidate Lynn Swann is locally popular in his capacity as a Hall of Fame wide receiver for the '70s Pittsburgh Steelers, the logical thing to do is to start arguing that he shouldn't be in the Hall of Fame. And this Bowers does quite passionately.

As always, the amusement value comes from the fact that, if Lynn Swann were running as a Democrat, Bowers would be outraged - outraged - at any aspersions that might be cast on his athletic bona fides, and some other douchebag would be running around casting them in much the same manner. "An attack on Lynn Swann," would then come the defense, "is an attack on the very institution of blah, and how typical of the whoever to engage in such underhanded etc."

To be fair to the frequently unhinged MyDD crowd, the ensuing discussion mostly consists of sensible comments to the effect that this is not the way to go about disqualifying a candidate, and Bowers does later reconsider slightly. Interspersed, though, are classic comments like:

We ARE talking about why he shouldn't be Governor. Undermining the notion that he was a legitimate Hall of Fame player is Step #1.

Posted by zerlesen at 4:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am not a goth. All the other default Movable Type designs I tried were worse. I quite like the white-type-against-dark-background-with-no-pictures-of-cherubs look in principle, but it's a) hard to read and b) makes me look like a goth. This must be fixed.

UPDATE: I'm not sure I like it, but it definitely looks less goth-like now.

Posted by zerlesen at 10:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sydney, Australia. Before that, an undisclosed location in the US. (Undisclosed not because I was doing anything exciting and classified, but because some friends are even more serious about not being identifiable through their blogs.) Before that, a couple of spots in England.

Moving around a lot does have many things to recommend it, but there has been some serious damage done to my accent. I don't even know what I sound like anymore; last Friday someone asked if I was Irish.

Posted by zerlesen at 9:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Most people who actually read this are doing so because they know me personally, and the rest of you could probably figure it out without too much effort, so posting anonymously seems like it might be a waste of time. However, I'm still in that tricky pre-tenure stage of academia, a professional adolescence that can easily last until your early forties, so blogging anonymously is a precaution as well as an affectation. It's mostly an affectation, because I'm not planning to seriously violate any codes of professional ethics here, but still.

This is not supposed to be representative of my day job, especially when I'm writing it during the day. As the needlepoint sampler that hung in my old office put it: Don't say "cunt" in front of your students.

Posted by zerlesen at 9:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With thanks to my nominally anonymous host, here is the new place.

Everything is different now.

Posted by zerlesen at 4:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)