Eating the Fish From the Inside Out

I spent $120 today to have someone tell me to, um, relax. Yes, I think that was the message. Couldn’t she have written it down for that kind of money? Or, like, thrown in some pills alongside it?

(One of these days I will take up the offer of the sidewalk psychic who, daily, says to me, “Lady, a reading?” Five dollars seems so reasonable.)

“We live this life of abandonment, in New Orleans…” says Mr. X on CNN. I don’t know who this guy is in the red tie, talking about “floating bodies, snakes, alligators,” but he makes a good point. Nobody is prepared for floating bodies, snakes and alligators. Not even those who live a “life of abandonment.” Shrinks and psychics can’t prepare you for such horrors, but maybe if you pay them a lot (or a little) money, you’ll be able to keep the nightmares at bay, and, you know, just…relax.

Being and Beingness

Or, as I heard on "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" earlier today, in a Stephen Colbert clip, in which he imitates an art critic: "...the whereness and the whatness..."

It is a good question. In the days and nights of the unemployed and the discombobulated, there is little more than whereness, whatness and beingness. Forget moneyness. Or stabilitas. I mean, stabiliness.

I have an interview tomorrow at a big paper that came to me when I least expected it. I'm starting to feel like a cat--I fall from great heights but always land on my feet. (Someone remind me I said this on a bad day, please.) I've considered deleting that last thought, but have decided to keep it for posterity. Once, right here, I felt optimistic. (Forgive me, fellow irritables.)

Watching a program about a team of scientists exploring a 300-foot abyss in the Amazon. How do you do anything else after you have seen species no one has ever seen before? I mean, what feels satisfying after that? They are filming disgusting, wriggly eel-like fish. Personally, I find them disgusting. But watching these funny Brits marvel about their beauty is inspiring. (Whatness? Whereness? Who is this semi-positivist?)

How do you then walk away from something so marvelous?
How do you know if you will ever find it again?
I guess we're supposed to feel lucky for ever having come close to beauty, yes?
Not satisfying. How can it feel satisfying to come up for air, instead of desperate?

Then again, here is what the diver just said, describing the wriggly fish eating the huge bait fish he had in front of him, in the abyss:

"Yes, I would say they are eating it from the inside out!"

But he was just so excited.

Ignominy

gnomes

The BBC reports:

"Two women have been charged after the discovery of more than 40 garden ornaments thought to have been stolen from homes in Central Scotland.

"People in Stirling, Clackmannanshire and Falkirk had complained that gnomes, hedgehogs and rabbits had gone missing."

[The bobbies are, as ever, heartily on the case.]

"Police said they would endeavour to make sure the gnomes had a home to go to."

Ranunculus

ranunculus,

Someone asked me recently what my favorite flower is. I answered that it is called "ranunculus," a name I only know because I learned it while walking in a Bolognese flower market ten years ago with an Italian who was able to tell me what these stunning, lush flowers were called. I think I love them because they have so many layers. Doesn't that sound ridiculous? But I love the delicacy of their petals, how when they are all pushed up against each other, they make this very substantial object.

To Anonymous--And Others Now

Time to purge the ugliness from this entry. The angry rantings of an anonymous jerk have been deleted, and the below comments are from people who are not spawn of the devil. I think.

In other news, I saw "Broken Flowers" and loved it. Bill Murray barely blinks during it and conveys detailed thoughts and emotions.

In other, other news, I'm drinking a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale at 5 in the afternoon because I quit my job. That's right. Quit. To quit. To move on. I will decline it in Latin for you some other time.

I have begun a painting of a lobster claw in a hazy yellow-tan space. (It's from a dream I had, you know, the one about winning the award for the mathematical equation that reassembled the body of lobsters in a new way. You know, that one.)

Cheers, all.

Living Bitterly in an Obituary

My gratitude to Jack Shafer for pointing out this fantastic obit from the Telegraph in 2002. Begin with the lead:

“GRAHAM MASON, the journalist who has died aged 59, was in the 1980s the drunkest man in the Coach and Horses, the pub in Soho where, in the half century after the Second World War, a tragicomedy was played out nightly by its regulars.”

And another snippet:

“From UPI's London office in Bouverie Street, Mason soon discovered Soho, and, like many before him, felt he had come home. He continued as a foreign correspondent, taking a year out in 1968 to work for 20th-Century Fox on feature films, which he hated. With BBC Television News he reported from the Northern Ireland troubles, and in 1975 took another year out to run a bar in Nicosia. It happened to coincide with civil war, and he and Marsh Dunbar were lucky to be evacuated by the RAF. From then until 1980 he worked for ITN. One day he was found asleep under his desk, drunk. It was something of a low point.”

Here you go.

The Ugliest Thing in the World

Is a hilarious sight. This thing, it is a dog, they tell us. Look if you feel bold.

Sound-Bite-Sized Questions

What’s a girl to do when a big-name TV anchor calls to ask about her reporting on one of her stories? (Speaking of which, why do so many people assume I work for TV when I say I’m a reporter? Doesn’t anyone read anymore? Besides TV news anchors, that is?)

I know what a girl is to do: allow herself to discuss said story, not at great length, and allow herself to believe, with incredible naiveté, that said anchor will credit her paper, at the very least, with the original reporting. My editor told me she was glad I “still have a sense of humor.”

My sense of humor feels on the fritz, after driving through torrential thunderstorms on the way home from Boston last night, arriving home to a 400-degree apartment and getting to work less-than-raring to go, only to be the opposite of super-sized by a TV dude who uses the word “telescoping” in the way that only J-schoolers ever say it.

Behold, the Jerk-O-Meter

Just what I’ve been waiting for. I know you have, too:

“The Jerk-O-Meter is one of many projects at MIT that aim to make cell phones and other communication devices more ‘socially aware.’”

The thing is “software for cell phones that would analyze speech patterns and voice tones to rate people -- on a scale of 0 to 100 percent -- on how engaged they are in a conversation.

“For now, the Jerk-O-Meter is set up to monitor the user's end of the conversation. If his attention is straying, a message pops up on the phone that warns, "Don't be a jerk!" or "Be a little nicer now." A score closer to 100 percent would prompt, "Wow, you're a smooth talker."

“However, the Jerk-O-Meter also could be set up to test the voice on the other end of the line. Then it could send the tester such reports as: "This person is acting like a jerk. Do you want to hang up?"”

But here’s my favorite little bit, thrown in for added value, it seems:

“The study indicated that men and women are interested in conversations for different reasons.

“The subject of the chat was more important to men than women, Madan said. "For the women, it was more dependent on who they were talking to and what the mood was like," he added. "It wasn't just about the topic itself."”

~

Moody, sensitive creatures are we.

Huey and the Developmentally Disabled

I want to encourage you to read “A Very Special Concert: The enduring bond between Huey Lewis and the developmentally disabled,” by Katy St. Clair in the SF Weekly, but maybe some clips from the story will actually make you want to read it:

“Sean has a framed picture of himself and Mr. Lewis locked in an embrace. At first I thought it was cool that he had met the singer and was lucky enough to snap a photo. Then, as I visited other clients' houses, a pattern started to emerge. Rose, Jennifer, Linnea, Donald (whose names, like everyone else's in this story, have been changed to protect their anonymity) -- each had a picture of him- or herself posing with Huey Lewis or at a Huey concert. Was Huey Lewis the Pied Piper of the developmentally disabled, only with a harmonica instead of a fife?”

****
“If gays can take back "faggot," and blacks can take back "nigger," then surely developmentally disabled folks can take back "retarded." And since they can't do it for themselves, I'm going to do it for them.

“Here are some facts about retarded people. First, they are zero-bullshit. If you are a jerk, they will call you on it. If you have a booger hanging out, they'll damn sure let you know. That's all I've ever asked for from a friend.

“Retarded people never make fun of someone else, never point and laugh at anybody. In fact, my clients generally see the good in everyone. All of these are generalizations, and of course there are exceptions to the rule, but mostly these are the reasons why I love my work.

“There is, however, one stereotype about retarded people that is true, one broad brushstroke that one can make about them all: Good gosh a'mighty, retarded people love them some Huey Lewis.”

****

“Bobbi recognized some of her friends and waved. "Huuuuueyyyy!" they all yelled back. It was just like people who yell "Bruuuce!" at a Springsteen concert, only more retarded. In fact, Huey Lewis is a retarded version of Bruce Springsteen. Think about it. All of his songs are three-chord chug-a-lugs about working-class schlubs trying to make it through this crazy thing we call life.”

[Give the rest a go, here.]

Everybody Hates

A black woman and a Jewish man on Long Island have been the targets of hate mail. They were living with their seven children on in Smithtown, but have decided to move to North Carolina to escape the racial hatred. More than 95 percent of Smithtown’s residents are white, which probably still does not explain this neighbor’s comment:

"We had lovely Negro, um, African-American neighbors to the left and right," said Niebuhr, who is not suspected of sending the mailings. "I think all that was blown out of proportion."

What We Find When We Look

In a moment of googling myself—I love seeing how weirdos have taken articles I’ve written and ripped them apart, etc., it’s a guilty journo pastime—I have rediscovered a chilling website: my university had set up a “check-in” site after 9/11, for all alums to post who was okay and who wasn’t. I posted about my time at ground zero in those days, but I’ve also discovered a friend posted that I was okay. That is amazing to me. I feel loved in the way that love reached so deeply in those days.

(We lost two alums that day—one of whom was a friend. PTSD kicks in if I talk about it too much. Still.)

Strange the way these memories come back in full when least expected. They’re just dormant, I think. Like volcanoes. No one ever wants to declare a volcano “dead”—just in case. (Thank you, Susan Sontag, for highlighting that axiom.)

On the Topic of Restraint

A judge has given the go-ahead for a lawsuit against David Childs for copyright violation—he’s being sued for possibly having ripped off a 1999 Yale student architectural project. (See the rendering here for a hint of the similarities.)

I finally finished that piece (kind of) about the abuse of immigrants, and I have to say, no one has been exhibiting much restraint when it comes to their infused nature of hatred for people who have less than them, not to mention people who have more than them.

Restraint: my mechanic apparently has none when it comes to charging me for car repairs.

The very word calls to mind shackles, keeping things in, stopping yourself from doing whatever the hell you want. How do people do this? Why do they fail when they fail?

As for me, your humble McBickle is sitting on her hands so as not to write unflinchingly on certain topics. What she really needs is a vacation, somewhere like the unglamorous Jersey Shore maybe…

Then again, it can’t be all vacation-need all the time, can it? Then we’d need vacations from our vacations.

Restrain ourselves. It sounds so Puritanical. And so many of us were born outside that faith.

A Moment to Discuss the Midget

My poor car. It has a hairline fracture in its head. And its gasket is blown. And it’s going to cost me about $1,500. And that includes using a replacement head from a junkyard to keep the cost down. I bought the midget for $1,800. And don’t ask me what a head is.

I also want to mention that in my year and a half of owning the midg, I have never had a conversation with a mechanic in the presence of a man whereby the mechanic would actually look at me when he spoke. Usually, a friend comes along. A guy I’ll call Superman, because he has rescued me each and every time my car breaks down, including one time on the BQE in the morning. Supe just rolled up and saved me. Random.

Anyway, the mechanics. They only talk to other men, not me. Because they know I don’t know what a head is. Right. That’s it.

Now I Do

Who knew how entertaining it could be to watch a panda sleep on a live webcam?

I didn’t.

Now I do.

Don’t get me started on how crazy it is when the thing moves its head…

Snow Cones and Old Men

Holy crap. After all these years, my suspicions have been confirmed: New York City ice cream trucks really do sell crack!

After years of living on a street with two bars in the East Village, no one could tell me anymore that those dingling trucks were selling ICE CREAM at midnight on the corner.

Until now, however, I was just a lone voice in the wind…

In other, less invigorating news, the great Abe Hirschfeld has died. Let me tell you, having written about the one-time candidate for Senate and always-time master NYC builder, I am sad. That crinkly man could spit-shine your shoes with his wit. Or dirty mouth. Whatever.

Goodbye, Abe.

Afternoon Like Afternoon

I am pretty sure I just witnessed a colleague letting her phone ring once and then dropping the receiver to hang up on whoever it was. Like, it rang four times. Thirty seconds went by, it rang again, so she picks up the phone and drops it into the cradle.

I should mention here that we don’t have caller ID (yes, I know, we are a newsroom and we never know who is calling us), so her hanging up is a particularly irritated gesture at nobody in particular.

Way to start a day.

A particularly humid day. A day with water thick in the air. A morning so dark that you know it will feel off-time all day—morning like afternoon, afternoon like afternoon.

In passing, I want to say goodbye to Peter Jennings. I always had great respect for that man, and chose him to watch if I watched evening news. I knew someone who used to work with him, and said Jennings went over every piece of copy and changed whatever he had not written himself into his own language before each broadcast. That, the fact that he apparently ad-libbed as a master, not to mention his charm—I’ll miss him.

Everything Tastes Better With Fat On It

In the waxing early hours of a post-migraine afternoon, when the left half of my face tickles with the memory of pain, I scour the web for reasons to not work. Here is my favorite find so far:

Ranch Dressing - Why do Americans love it so much?

Yes, Slate comes through, as always.

I have also discovered in this hazy day that the Bella in Roma (aka Vice) and I are the only two people on Earth who hate Florence. Witness the evolution of said discovery:

Vice says: annexation is bullshit

McBickle says: i know. City of Brooklyn

McBickle says: Kingdom of Naples

Vice says: why couldn't manhattan and brooklyn get some good old Italian-style urban rivalries going

McBickle says: exactly

Vice says: Florence vs. everyone

Vice says: for centuries

McBickle says: florence should lose

McBickle says: i don't like florence

McBickle says: don't make me explain

Vice says: me neither

McBickle says: i don't know why

Vice says: me neither

McBickle says: good. fuck florence

Vice says: we're like, the only two on earth

McBickle says: i know.

McBickle says: it's irritating

Hamming It Up in the Borscht Belt

When I was a child, my grandmother took me to the Borscht Belt. To Jewish resorts—Kutscher’s and Grossinger’s. Unfortunately, the only thing I really remember well from these trips is a painful bout with a bladder infection where my grandmother made me sit on the toilet until I torturously peed.

I’m happy now that I had the chance to visit these places, and an article in the NYT today has me wondering if I possibly remember the tummler—the man described as a Jewish country club’s kind of court jester.

Apparently, the last tummler’s is known as Krazy Tyrone:

“For the last two decades, Krazy Tyrone's life has been an unending cascade of ribald one-liners, sexually loaded Yiddishisms and of course, a daily Simon Sez tournament where the come-on is $1,000 in moist prize money that's kept wadded up in his sock.”

KT himself sums it up this way:

“I'm not normal,” he said, deadpan.

The story is a good read.

Back to my morning migraine now.

Maybe Grabbing a Beer Would Help

What do you do when your brain will not focus properly? When things are so distracting work is compromised, sitting still feels like pain, and the world seems dark around the edges, as if in a frame you can’t walk out of?

Meditating is good. But not at the office. Then it just looks like you’re sleeping. Full-blown reveries are just damaging for too many reasons.

The matter in my head is the color of Bud Light.

Onward, ho. Ho. Hi.

Bright Lights and the Misery of Finalizing Anything

Today I’m finalizing my upcoming cover story on the double super secret crap suffered by one local woman. (Like that? That’s my fake-o newsy teaser to make you want to read the story. If you know who I write for, that is.)

Otherwise, the temperatures are expected to reach a balmy 95 degrees today, which should, if we’re double super lucky, feel like 110 with the humidity, the broadcasters say. At least we’re not in a burning plane in a ravine off a runway, right? Ah, do you smell the optimism? It is a foul, foul stench, I realize.

Now I must crawl back into my double super secret protective shell that keeps the world from creeping into my cubicle (cubifice, as they are known around here), as well as to keep it from infecting my already tired, so tired little brain. This little brain has gone to market, and it cannot stand—just cannot STAND—the glare of the fluorescent lights illuminating all that waxy fruit.

Come to think of it, under my desk is probably the best place to spend today.

Maybe I’ll pop out later to check on you all.

Let’s Love It When We Don’t Hate It, Yes

It’s fortune cookie time. This one from the Chinese life coach in the cookie factory:

“Turbulence is a life force. It is opportunity. Let’s love turbulence and use it for change.”

Personally, I’m gonna work on that one.

And from the hippie in the fortune cookie factory:

“If you love something, set it free…if it returns, keep it and love it forever.”

Tweet. Tweet.

“We didn't really know him. We just had him arrested.”

Everything that’s wrong with the world is summed up in this article.

An Illinois nudist is being forcibly buried in clothes: “He said he wanted to be buried without any clothes, but his family is sending him to eternity wearing gray slacks and a matching shirt,” according to the story. He was repeatedly arrested over many years for refusing to dress himself. Here’s what his friendly neighbor had to say about the guy:

“We didn't really know him. We just had him arrested,” Loete said. "Normally, if we had him arrested in the spring he'd be gone for the summer and we wouldn't have to worry about him until the next spring."

Nothing Makes Any Sense

Trying to do what is right in life. What does this even mean? Does it mean offering as much respect as you can to the people you care about and then even to the ones you don’t? What about your own self—when are your needs and desires selfish instead of just what is good for you? When is it okay to hurt other people? Why do I spend my days looking for “truth” when anyone with a brain readily admits that everything is subjective?

How do you know when to trust your subject, especially if you are it?

How do you let that person speak enough?

How do you listen well enough that you finally hear?

Don’t give me any one-hand-clapping retorts, people. But give me something here, please. Thank you.

And so it goes

It’s the kind of day where I am chewing coffee—the last grits in the pot, literally.
And so it goes.
The lungs will close and refill with air in a repeated pattern, one hopes.

The Pain and the Pleasure of Being Human

TEACHER: Glenn, how do you spell "crocodile?"
GLENN: K-R-O-K-O-D-I-A-L"
TEACHER: No, that's wrong
GLENN: Maybe it is wrong, but you asked me how I spell it.