Call Me Maybe

The achievement of Carlie Rae Jepsen in this song is to have made something fun and catchy that does not lack a soul and identity of its own. I hear so much music now that is all catchy with no soul. Call Me Maybe has something to it. Maybe it's the string section, maybe it's the meeting-a-romantic-interest jitters inscribed in the lyrics, but it has something different. This is in opposition to the two-line EDM/faux dubstep tracks that litter the radio waves. These all seem to be manufactured with the same set of machine tools in a music factor somewhere in Denmark. They do not move me. Good job, Carlie Rae Jepsen, good job. Yes, I know the song came out two years ago and I'm unfashionably late to the party, but good job.

Mr. Money Mustache review

After seeing a column about the Mr. Money Mustache site and its founder in the Washington Post, I've been reading through some of the posts on the site.

He's basically a guy who decided he wanted to retire at 30, then went out and did the damn thing. He and his wife saved the majority of their take-home pay, lived cheaply on what remained, and didn't get into debt. Presto, retirement at 30.

Conclusions:

-The rhetoric can be a little overheated. Here's a sample line: "After years of careful study, observations, and interviews with real car drivers, I have come to the conclusion that about 90% of the car use that occurs in the United States is Pure Bullshit." This might put me off if he didn't have something important to say

-The advice is generally good, based around the principle that you should avoid credit, save more than you spend, and invest in the stock market via low-fee index funds

-It's a little easier to retire at 30 when you're making 100k a year at a software job in your 20s, but I think the writer would counter that he's pushing a philosophy more than encouraging you to exactly replicate his example

-Box wine is a steal!

-It makes me want to save more and try to retire by 40 if I can (too late to try for 30)

-The site encourages an anti-consumerism mindset, which can't be a bad thing if it catches on. It encourages readers to be conscious of the financial choices they make and remember that habits can be costly.

Rough edges aside, the man has something to say. Is anyone listening?

Creation Myth

Flour + Water + Yeast comes alive.

I gave myself a minor coughing fit by putting cayenne pepper into boiling water and inhaling the vapors.


Wholesome things bring more joy than grocery store cellophane sweets.



We'll need onions, honey, tea, and applesauce.


Early Saturday morning is all potential and sometimes it gets realized.

Archival material

I got hot sauce on my finger while I made the chili. It burned my tongue afterwards when I licked the finger. Unexpected, that burn, but not really unpleasant. I ate a pineapple that had to be refrigerated, or it would have been hot like every other thing in the whole place. Even the sheets seemed to be collecting heat, storing it until it was needed to burn me when I sat down on the bed. When the rain came, I celebrated the cool coming back; I didn't have to pine after winter, at least for the moment.

Winter trains part 2

Our train that was set to depart at 6:25 had not physically reached the station until 6:45. The people turning and sheepishly working back through the Lowell deluge after the official boarding announcement were Newburyport commuters with a scheduled theoretical departure of 6:45. What cheek to think they would leave the station within 10 minutes of on-schedule. Their delay was heard fading as I shuffled the platform with the horde, and it gave me a vague sense of justice served. The perverse mind of the frozen delayed commuter; his misery is actively seeking company, and he condemns those who aren't foundering with him yet.

Winter trains part 1

The coffee came to 1.07. I had the nickel at the ready, expecting 1.04, but the tax had gone up under Democrat control, and I fumbled with two pennies, hastily produced from some pocket.

The coffee's purchase was a thing definitely settled, and in my arrogance I thought it marked me out as a seasoned traveler, beater of chills. With hot liquid input and vigorous walking in the station, I could overcome the dual disadvantage of a pronounced lack of personal insulation and 15 minutes on the platform in sub 10-degree Ipswich already chilling the flesh. This is special cold that can't be rooted out by the heat in most train cars; it is the rare one that can play the role of microwave and re-heat humans who are starting from a refrigerated imbalance, it being hard enough to maintain the warmth of people who enter the cycle at a neutral level. I was unable to get rid of the cold in my feet, which felt like wet soldiers in draft canvas tents at Valley Forge.

The chill is an unwelcome houseguest, insisting on one more glass of wine after an awkward dinner, and then another glass, reveling in others' discomfort. After it is gone, the hollow remnant of its presence lingers. It can't be forced but by bluntness and boldness. Even this, though, requires appropriate conditions.

The coffee was hot and needed but I had rashly chosen the Dunkin Donuts medium over large at the same price from McDonald's. I was already cold again before the last sip. Sidling up to the rail employee in front of the service window, I wait for other harried commuters to ask longsufferingly about their trains, which are as a matter of course delayed so long they aren't worth asking about (assume twenty-five minutes off the top). Trying to play the cool customer, seen-it-all-before commuter rail veteran of a dozen cold Januaries. I smile nonchalantly as I mosey over with my inquiry queued up in the brain-catapult, but stumbling on the destination (usually Haverhill, now Lowell) I ask the question and get the answer everyone else is stuck with; a 5 or 10 minute delay in theory stretches out to around 30 in the real world.

arming the rebels

Jack stared at the butter. I prefer a cold butter, he thought. Warm butter makes for easy spreading, but it glistens at you. The grease sweats out to the surface. Sweltering butter makes for smaller appetites, thought Jack. The knife traced its course and swiped the butter across the bread. Jack lived on.

Sometimes a blog is just a blog

For the next month or so, you can find me in the gym or applying for jobs. I'd like to schedule some eating, but there may not be time. I will probably have to find time to sit in unexpected places in my room, in chairs, contemplating. I'm just that crazy. Crazy like a fox. An Arctic Fox. In a snowstorm. In the Arctic Circle. Where am I? Behind that snowbank? You won't know. Because I'm white. And I blend in with snow.

nature disclaims in thee: a tailor made thee

Why do people hate him, Doug?

-Drink hot water with your lemon.

--Veins popped out on the backs of her hands, straining against the artificial resistance offered by the rowing machine.

---I remember air conditioning, heavy pots of leftovers, lazy warm nights to trickle out on the streets, and independence to burn.

----It was touching to hear him ask how she might be consoled, and I answered to the best of my knowledge, which was that there isn't really any answer.

Filler

-It's been a while since the last slightly lazy bullet-point post.

-Letters could be a really productive way of advancing my writing. If nothing else, they provide plenty of practice. Also, nearly every good writer wrote good letters. Also, they still feel special to write and send, and pretty sure it makes people feel special to receive them.

-Question: do I write best on trains, or is it more that I write only on trains?

-Trains are collectively a monolith. They have ever been and always will be.

-Listen to Orwell on writing; he was very good at it.

-These very words may someday be worth their weight in gold, except that internet words can't have any literal weight, so it will have to be figurative.

-My instinct told me don't lay it on too thick. You want to say nice things, but that can be taken too far. I've made my point, that I'm a clever fellow, that I can reference Shakespeare and Bogart almost simultaneously. Don't push your luck.

-The person whose job it is to choose the style of bench at Central Square-Lynn.

-Invasion of personal communications by business communication modes.

-Todd Barry: genius. G-E-N-I-U-S.

This is my favorite coffee cup in Medford

This is my favorite coffee cup in Medford. It has a narrow base that tapers outward to a wide mouth at the top. It has a stylized leaf inlaid on one side and is devoid of any design on the other. The inside of the cup is black. The outside is faux-aged stone-gray beige. It is almost never washed, and almost always contains coffee. It sits on a woven yarn coaster on my desk.

To you I'm a symbol or a monument

The pace is what frightens me.

Following people who knew half as much as they should, but twice as much as me at the time.

Acceleration is the best, when you're throwing extra fuel on the engines, and they're throwing the power right back at you, all ankles and thighs flashing, stick your tongue out as fast as you can go.

We went back there and I could remember everything, being nervous, being properly insane in youth, being entirely unready for anything; memories flashed at me through trees and down twisting paths to the river.

an Allston hypothesis

In response to a query from John B——

Interesting topic for sure. I don't really have any data about Allston, so whatever I say is based on anecdotal evidence. I found relations between the students and the other residents to be mostly harmonious, although there's definitely sort of a sense that actual human interaction is to be avoided. This is not really stated by anyone, but it's an unwritten rule. When you see people on the street who are maybe hispanic, brazilian, or older asian people, you both ignore each other mostly, I think. It's basically respectful, but you're really acting like the other person is not there. In that way there are two separate worlds. People don't mix too much. Each group has its own stores and its own gathering places. The places that the groups have in common are probably limited to liquor stores, fast food joints, thrift stores (sometimes), and some ethnic restaurants where students might interact with the mostly immigrant community.

It's also interesting that while the students are certainly better off financially in comparison to the immigrants, they are also mostly interested in living on the cheap. There's definitely a certain type of person who is drawn to the neighborhood, usually more thrifty types among students. This may be a large part of the appeal of Allston; it's relatively cheap for Boston, and by taking advantage of some of the institutions that the immigrant communities have brought with them (cheaper ethnic restaurants, laundries, and groceries) students can save money. I also think that the privileged type of person that you find at BU, for example, might consider living in Allston something of an adventure. It offers cheaper living, ethnic flavor, and something of an art and music scene, plenty of bars, without the dangerous, violent urban side that places like Roxbury and Dorchester have. It makes you feel like you're "slumming it" in relative safety. And if you ever get tired of Allston, there's also Brookline right nearby, which is comparatively white and affluent, and probably even safer than Allston.

I do think, though that a lot of the students (and to a lesser extent, the immigrant community) don't give any respect to Allston as a place, precisely because they are usually not long-term residents. They are more likely to leave trash on the streets, break bottles at random, and make noise at night, because they sort of don't consider Allston a real place. It's just a place where the poor immigrants live and where people go to party and temporarily live cheaply during their college years. It is not, in this mindset, deserving of respect; it's not a 'real' neighborhood. I'm sure that this is also partially because people often come to Allston to visit the bars, and so are intoxicated. This is unpleasant for people like me (and I imagine for older, long-term residents), who just want to live quietly, go to work, and occasionally enjoy some of the many restaurants.

I hope that helps you some. Let me know if I can provide any more information, or if you want me to expand on any of these points.

-Allan

Check potatoes, stir

I left the truck running as we switched positions. So this is it.

Demure brown chairs stacked high in the back.

Don’t tempt fate by counting your chickens before their eggs are all hatched in one basket.

I couldn’t tell if I was smelling fresh bread baking or the celery-colored paint from last night.

That I have intuited things they couldn’t find out through hours of hard research.

I think it gives me comfort to know that I could always switch email clients. Even though I’m with Outlook now, I could easily change to Thunderbird, and that might make a big difference.

Dreams of domestic bliss, being cheeky about other people’s friends, private jokes with my lovely partner.

"50% deep, 50% bullshit"

Occurs to me now that my life is going great. Just fantastic. I could not, should not, ask for more. And yet it seems to be the default human condition to never be satisfied!

Want more, get more, find something that's better than what you have, because what you have can never be enough. I'm trying so hard to break free of this mentality and the constant inferiority that it entails, but it takes a lot of effort and conscious striving to realize that what you have is good. It's enough and it can be great if you would only take a moment to look at it and see it in front of you.

I think I could be happy this way. Without too much, but surely with enough. It's like the saying, "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush". That only works if you don't let yourself be overtaken by the thought of having two birds, and constantly longing to have them. You still have a bird in your hand, and that's dinner tonight!

a thought or two for the evening

There's not enough time in the world to do everything. There's not enough time to floss every day, read books, magazines, and the vast internet, work out, eat healthy, clean the house, visit with all your acquaintances regularly, and take day trips around New England.

There are a million different forces pulling us in all sorts of disparate directions every minute. The best I can do is to work hard and be myself. Some things I won't get to, and I have to make myself believe that that's all right, or I will explode from the worry that I forgot something, or that I'm missing some essential part of my life. It's OK! You can't be all things to all people all the time. It's enough to be yourself.

Way, haul away, we'll haul away, Joe!

What I've come to realize, or at least I hope I have, is that I have nothing to lose in this situation, so I'm pushing all my chips into the middle. To use an uncomfortably hackneyed poker metaphor.

If you don't know to what I am referring, don't worry, because I'm the only one who does. I'm just putting this down as a little reminder to myself, and for purposes of posterity. We'll see how it turns out.

And because I don't like to go too long without a blog post.

And because I want to get better at writing.

Je me fous du passé

All you need:

-gas bill included in the rent

-sturdy pyrex roasting pan

-root vegetables on the cheap

Roast and eat well

Night moves

-JD heads for Morocco tomorrow. Kinda scary, but you have to be excited for him. The whole program seems tailor-made for him. I know he'll make the most of it. Good luck brother!

-Played pond hockey with the Krajeski brothers today. Good times all around, although the skates didn't fit perfectly, hadn't seen those guys in a while. I didn't completely embarrass myself in the puck department either.

-Sweet party Saturday evening, in spite of the weird mix of age groups and the excess drinking. We need to do this stuff more often.

-Thanks to people who have told me that they read the blog. Appreciate it.

-You can't spend your life being scared of everything. Go out and live.

-We played 'fax machine' this evening. Great game.

With great periphrasis comes precious little

Dig if you will the little warning on the end of alcohol ads (because alcoholic beverage producers care about your safety a great, great deal)

It starts here:

-Don't drink and drive

It becomes this:

-Please drink responsibly

It starts to meander:

-Responsibility matters

It devolves into this here:

-With great beer comes great responsibility

I see it going here:

-A responsible person does responsible things

And in 2046, when all meaning has been painfully wrung out of the warnings and we live in a euphemistic hell of saying what we don't mean, it will end with this:

-Just be