Another Trifecta

Once again, they come in threes. In the last week Robert Asprin, Sidney Pollack, and Harvey Korman have all died. I think they have varying levels of fame, probably in increasing order as I've listed them, but they're all significant.

Robert Asprin wrote the "MythAdventure" novels--humorous fantasy books whose titles always replaced the syllable "mis-" or the word "miss" with "myth." I've never read them, but they've sold a ton.

He also wrote the "Phule" science fiction books, of which I've read a few, and he co-edited the original "Thieves' World" books. Big name in the fantasy/SF industry. He was supposed to be a guest of honor at Marcon in Ohio last weekend, but couldn't make it due to a bad case of dead. One line in his Wikipedia entry made me chuckle: "Asprin passed away 22 May 2008, dying quietly in bed where he had been reading a Terry Pratchett novel." Not a bad way to go.

Sidney Pollack was a little more famous, generally speaking (though I'm sure there were some people who worshipped Asprin but had never heard of Pollack). He's best-known for directing the movie Tootsie and playing the part of the protagonist's agent.
Michele and I saw him in Michael Clayton the night before Pollack died. That was weird. I hadn't seen him in anything for a long time, and then I did and then he died.

It wasn't my fault. Honest.

And then there's Harvey Korman. Sure he was hysterical as Hedly Lamarr in Blazing Saddles. Sure he had a career that went back to the mid-1960s, when he appeared on the Danny Kaye Show. But what I'll always remember Korman for is his years on the Carol Burnett Show. Our whole family would watch that show every week, and every week Korman barely kept a straight face as Burnett or Tim Conway would do something so outrageously funny any normal human would be reduced to a giggling mess. And Korman was as funny as the others.

I don't like to embed videos, but since no photo can do Korman justice, here are a couple of sketches that still make me cry laughing:

RIP, guys. We were amused.

The Guns of Avalon by Roger Zelazny

This is the second installment of Zelazny's Amber stories. The good points here are the same as those in the first book: Zelazny's world is interesting, Corwin is an interesting and believable protagonist, the specific fantasy and SF elements of the story are unique, and the voice is effective. Think Raymond Chandler without the restrictions of reality.

The flaws I find are the same as I saw in Nine Princes in Amber as well. The story is really just an installment in a series and not one that can stand on its own. There's a progression of action without a real arc, and that makes the book feel like I'm reading Super Mario Brothers at times. There's little to no character development, though there are revelations that make Corwin alter his plan and make secondary characters change in their dispositions toward Corwin.

Again, a satisfying diversion, and it's probably exactly as Zelazny intended it. What I see as flaws are recognized within serial fantasy as mere convention, so it's another reminder that just because it doesn't satisfy me doesn't mean it's objectively bad.

The Summer

I'm not sure how this summer is going to develop yet. I have a training session to go to this week, and then next Monday I start teaching my one section of Fundamentals of English. I need to find another part-time job to fill in the income gap, but I'm not sure where to go for that.

My class runs from June 2 to July 25, which means it ends the Friday after my 20 year high school reunion*. I don't know if I'll be able to go. I want to--it should be surreal--but I don't know if I can swing it, financially or logistically. I may not get a chance to visit Minnesota until August.

*This isn't causing me any trauma yet. I'm sure at some point it will, but so far no aging-related breakdowns. Just the usual ones.

More Books

One Writer's Beginnings by Eudora Welty
College students get exposed to Eudora Welty fairly early, and probably often. Her short stories "Why I Live at the P.O." and "A Worn Path" are required by law to be included in every anthology published in America, and for good reason. They're great short stories, and Welty's skill is evident to even a beginning reader.

I picked this book out of a box of giveaways in one of the offices in Mankato, but just got around to it a few weeks ago. I'd never seen any nonfiction by Welty, and this seemed like a good source of insight on writing. As it turns out, it is and it isn't. Welty makes a number of connections between events in her life and how she became a writer, and that's interesting. Welty's life, and the lives of her relatives, are not very interesting, though. The events that shaped her as a writer aren't compelling--just mundane everyday things that she turned her curiosity and perception on. It's Welty's memory, detail selection, and insight that make her writing interesting. This book serves to remind me that while some writers are made, some are just born. Welty was one of those.

Punish the Sinners by John Saul
I guess there's not a whole lot to say about this book. John Saul is a fine writer, and he certainly understands the convention of a horror novel, but this one didn't do much for me. It follows a predictable pattern, the horror isn't very horrifying, and the nature of the danger in this story strikes me as hokey, maybe because of the conflict between faith and reason throughout, and maybe especially because science's representative in this story is psychology, which in my mind is about as scientific as astrology.

The net effect of reading this book is I'm wondering if this genre means anything to me anymore. I have a shelf full of Dean Koontz, Clive Barker, Robert McCammon, Thomas Tryon, Dan Simmons, Saul, and of course Stephen King. My intention has been to read everything before I get rid of it, but I may just dump all of these. I won't feel deprived without them.

Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane
When we read Lehane's Mystic River in Terry Davis's Form and Technique class, Terry kept returning to Lehane's use of physical detail. He used words like "relentless" to describe the physical elements of the story. That's my lasting impression of Mystic River, but I've always wondered whether that was because it was my impression of the book or because Terry Jedi-mind-tricked me into believing that. Terry's passion for story can do that sometimes.

I wasn't thinking of Mystic River when I started reading Shutter Island, but within about ten pages I was thinking, "Holy crap, this story is almost tactile, there's so much detail." Then I remembered Mystic River and Terry and Form and Technique, and I knew Terry hadn't Obi-Wanned me. Lehane packs his fiction with concrete detail, and so even though it's genre work there's some craft to take from it. The story itself has some surprises, and the characters are amusing and charming, but in the end the value of Shutter Island is in the details.

Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett

It's Pratchett, so it's fun. This book is even pretty smart, mixing in elements from Shakespeare's work (primarily Hamlet, MacBeth, and Richard III). While the story is enjoyable, it has some problems I don't normally notice with Pratchett. It lacks focus much of the time, it's largely predictable, and there isn't much in the way of development. Maybe the focus problem stems from the protagonists being a group of three. Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat are the three witches of the title, but it's the actions of Granny and Magrat that really drive the story--more precisely, it's the tension between the two. Maybe the Shakespeare element is what makes the story somewhat predictable, and that isn't a terrible problem anyway, since nobody I know reads Pratchett for revelation through plot. What struck me most about this was that the characters are so static. There are some superficial changes in the Fool, and maybe to a lesser degree in Magrat, but for the most part the characters are in the end who they were in the beginning. Again, not a deal-breaker, because Pratchett is just fun to experience, but some of his other novels (Small Gods, anyone?) are greater accomplishments.

Hillaryous

Hillary Clinton is done. She's been done for some time, and everyone knows it but her. It's good that the Democratic race is essentially over, because it's way past time to start thinking about the general election and making sure the conservatives lose as much power and influence as possible. And that's where this gets weird.

I prefer Obama as a candidate over Clinton, and have from the beginning, even though the two are close on every policy position and in most other respects. I prefer Obama not because Clinton is a woman (the recent charges of widespread misogyny are just pathetic), and not because Clinton is a Clinton (I liked Bill as President), but because Obama at least tries to practice a different kind of politics, because his persona isn't constructed for political expediency and restructured every time the landscape changes. Because Clinton is part of, and manifests the rhetoric and attitudes of, the generation of politicians that has caused this hyperpartisan, all-or-nothing, self-righteous political atmosphere. She seems incapable of disengaging from the dialogue the Republicans have dictated since Reagan, recognizing it for the shallow, destructive distraction that it is, and moving toward a more civil, productive mode of governance.

That said, Obama and Clinton are extremely close in most of the criteria of greatest importance in a presidential candidate: policy position and stated intention.

But like I said, this is where it gets weird. There are Clinton supporters who say they will not vote for Obama if he's the Democratic candidate in the general election. This boggles my mind. I can only think of a few reasons someone would take this position.

1. The voter supports Clinton as a candidate, but sees John McCain as the next best alternative. I'm hesitant to say anything's impossible, but this would be incredible. It would have to be explained to me, because the only aspect in which Clinton is closer to McCain than she is to Obama is age.


2. The voter thinks Obama is unelectable because too many racist white Americans won't vote for a black man. This might have some merit, in a strategic sense, in the primaries, but it certainly doesn't hold water in the general election. If Candidate A is a better choice than Candidate B, but I vote for Candidate B because other people might not vote for Candidate A, then I'm just compounding the problem of racist stupidity, aren't I? That would make me dumber than the idiot racists.


3. The voter wanted Clinton but is disappointed, sad, and maybe even angry that more voters prefer Obama, so will either vote for McCain or not vote at all out of principle. The legal voting age in the U.S. is eighteen--the age of legal majority. That means a voter has to be a chronological adult, but does not mandate a corresponding emotional maturity. Voters whose selections are motivated by this kind of petulance need to grow the hell up.


4. The voter thinks experience is the most important aspect in a candidate. McCain might be an ideological caveman, but at least he has experience. While this might be the most factually supportable reason, it's also one of the least sensible. John McCain first took office as a Representative of Arizona in 1982. Hillary Clinton took office as a Senator from New York in 1993. Barack Obama took office as a State Senator in Illinois in 1997 and as a US Senator in 2005. So yes, Clinton has been in office four years longer than Obama has. But McCain has been in office longer than Clinton has--by more than a decade. If experience trumps policy positions and ideology, those supporting Clinton should have supported McCain from the start. If policy positions and ideology trump experience, the Clinton supporters would be seriously inconsistent for shifting away from Obama on the basis of experience.

I suppose there are more reasons. If you can think of any, let me know. Me? I like Obama, and I have since before he entered the race. I've never supported a conservative, and after the last eight years I'd vote for a box of hair before voting for anyone who shares policy positions or ideology with Dubya (actually that was the case in 2000, too--I've always been astounded that others could vote for such an obvious idiot). If Obama weren't in the race I'd probably have supported Clinton (after Kucinich and Richardson dropped out, anyway), but in this reality I'm fortunate that the candidate I like is likely going on to the general election.

Wait Loss

I've refrained from posting anything for a while because I've assumed I'm on the cusp of having News about Other Things. So far, no news. Waiting is not my strong suit. I start to obsess, and then I can't do anything else.

So instead of doing something productive, I'll pick on someone.

The NBA held its draft lottery yesterday, and the Minnesota Timberwolves landed the third pick. This is good for them, because it means they didn't have their usual bad luck and drop a few spots. There will be a number of good players to choose from at the third pick (though only two are considered real prizes--and won't be available at the third pick). A group of Timberwolves fans are circulating a petition to encourage the team to draft O.J. Mayo, a guard from USC who's had some issues recently.

I can't argue against their preference for Mayo--even though the Wolves already have about 37 players best suited for shooting guard, where Mayo seems most comfortable--but I have to mock one of the sentences in the petition:

We are not threatening anyone and this should not be considered one.

I suppose at some point of my life I'd have read that sentence, thought something there was mildly screwy, and then moved on, but I can't get it out of my head this time.

The problem is with the "one" at the end of the sentence. Structurally, that word is meant to point out one out of a group of count nouns earlier in the sentence. The only two nouns appearing before "one," though, are "We" and "anyone." To see if either of these make sense, we can modify "one" with the other nouns:

We are not threatening anyone and this should not be considered one of we.

No. That doesn't make any sense. How about the other noun?

We are not threatening anyone and this should not be considered one of anyone.

Again, no. What the writer clearly meant was this:

We are not threatening anyone and this should not be considered a threat.

Redundant, but at least now it's a sentence in English. The problem is that the word "one" can't refer to a verb, and it won't do the work of nominalizing a verb just to make the sentence sensible.

There. I've purged my inner pedant for the moment. I should be free of it for twenty minutes or so.

Happy Mother's Day

If mothers didn't exist, very few of us would be here. Or, as my comp students might say, "Mothers have been around longer than I have been a live."

Happy Mother's Day, Mom. You earned every penny.

Wait. There was payment?

Some Videos

This time I decided to do a batch of heavy covers of 80s songs. They're sure to disgust the original artists, and most of the songs' fans, but I like them better.

Mandy Lion - Kiss
This is a cover of Prince's little mincing song. I like this better. Mr. Lion has a pretty wicked growl to him, and this song goes from mincing to menacing in about a second.

Alien Ant Farm - Smooth Criminal
This was all over the radio a decade ago. Takes Michael Jackson and gives it some testosterone. Still surprisingly faithful to the original, though. Love it.

Dope - You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)
Originally recorded by Dead or Alive in 1985, this was one of the only dance songs I didn't feel uncomfortable liking. I like the new version by Dope better, though. Plus, for additional geekiness, the video is performed by World of Warcraft characters.

Realm - Eleanor Rigby
I've loved this cover since I bought Realm's debut, Endless War, on cassette in 1989. I like the Beatles' version too, but this one always charges me up. I can see Sly and Dave getting sick to their stomachs listening to it, though.

250th Post

In honor of this historic anniversary, I offer you a link to Fail Blog.

Thanks to my brother for bringing this to my attention. I've been screaming-laughing for about forty-five minutes. Michele is distracted. It's finals week. I may not live through the night.

Time-Out From Grading Essays

This is good news for all two of us who remember and really liked Riot's Thundersteel album. Mark Reale's reuniting that band line-up for a new album. It will be interesting to see what they sound like twenty years later, but I'm guessing the Zombie is still a killer on drums*.

Here's the title song from that recording: \m/ .

* Wow. I had no idea.

A Glimpse Into My Stagnant Mind

While I generally pride myself on my big-C Cynicism, for the last couple of months I've devolved to a lower life-form: a mundane, petty, pedestrian cynic. Not surprisingly, this blog has become an expression of my state of mind. Mostly it's stagnant, with posts hovering in position for a week at a time. When this turgid river of my expressed thought does churn down one spot it displays regurgitations of pop culture, shallow reflections on quickly-read books, and mind-numbing quiz results. It's pathetic.

In addition to my own pointless posts, my spastic interaction with other blogs and bloggers has been either inane or nasty. I'm ashamed of myself, for exercising so little self control, for choosing a snarl over silence.

Once again I've been tested under pressure--the classes I've taught this semester have been challenging on a personal level and Other Things* have not yeilded results yet--and I don't like what I see. Hopefully when the semester ends, and when Other Things have been settled, and I figure out how my summer is going to develop, I can return to a stable center and re-establish a self that doesn't depress me. But for the next week, it might behoove me (and benefit everyone around me) if I just shut up.

* I've been reluctant to even mention these Other Things. Hopefully, I'll be able to talk about them soon.