12/31/2011

Books I Read (2011)

Another year, another list of books.

These are the books that I completed over 2011. As usual, unfinished/abandoned books aren't here. (Seemed to have a lot of those this year.) Books that left a significant impact on me – a quality that is both arbitrary and really hard to articulate – are in bold.
at 10:24 AM

12/27/2011

Oh...Holy Night


The first mistake was drinking beforehand. I think I had something like three glasses of wine and a hot apple cider mixed with whiskey. I'm pretty sure that someone could make a strong theological argument against drinking before church, but I also bet that someone else could argue that it's just practice for communion.

The second mistake was watching about a half hour of Mystery Science Theater 3000's take on Santa Claus, in which Santa battles Satan in an effort to capture the hearts and minds of children. This got me in a pretty giggly mood, which I guess shouldn't have been surprising. Combine MST3K with alcohol and you've got a recipe for hilarity more potent than watching Pronunciation Book on laughing gas.

It's a Christmas Eve tradition for my family to go to church. A weird part of the tradition is that the church changes from year to year. One Christmas Eve, we'll go to my mom's Lutheran church; the next year, per my dad's urging, we'll take a trip to the Catholic Church. My dad can be weirdly adamant about going to the Catholic church in spite of the fact that it's the only time of year that he steps foot in mass. Regardless of his long-distance relationship with Catholicism, he still has a solid grasp on all the trimmings that make me feel like an outsider at mass. You know: the chants, the dour call-and-responses. And don't forget the sign of the cross – or, as I prefer to call it, the Catholic Handjive.

There's a weird unintended consequence of this compromise. If we go to the Lutheran church, my dad feels a little like an outsider. And if we go to the Catholic church, everyone but my dad feels like an outsider. It's not a perfect system, but it's the way things have worked for the past few years.

Last year was an exception. During that one, we all felt like outsiders. See, we spent a good chunk of break in Hawaii. Per my dad's request, we went to a Catholic mass. Except this was a Hawaiian Catholic mass. What wasn't sung in Latin was sung in the native Hawaiian tongue. The family spent the whole evening glancing at one another, with expressions somewhere in between wow-this-is-neat and what-the-hell-is-going-on. 

Thankfully, the mass wasn't completely incomprehensible to us. The sermon was delivered in English – albeit heavily accented English, since the priest was from India. The highlight had to be when he wondered aloud if poverty, violence and sin was "somehow a part of God's great dickery." It took me a few seconds after a few double takes to realize that I'd misunderstood his accent; that he was actually talking about God's great decree.

But apparently we hadn't had enough slight self-perpetuated religious alienation. Just a few days ago, we decided to attend a Methodist church that a few family friends frequented. The decision didn't seem terribly momentous. Now that I think about it, I don't really remember when this decision was made. (I blame the alcohol.) It wasn't until we stepped into the building that I realized that the evening might be a little stranger than Christmases past.

The initial welcoming wasn't that out of the ordinary. A smiling family stood at the entrance, shaking everyone's hand and greeting us with a hearty "Merry Christmas!"  We ran into a few familiar faces: my piano teacher, my sister's friend, his family. And then the service started.

The first few minutes were pretty smooth. The Bible verses and Christmas carols were all familiar. A little script for the call-and-response moments were helpfully printed on church bulletins. (Take note, Catholic church.) But then the two women came up to the front of the church.

They were probably in their late fifties. Both wore black wire-framed glasses. One wore a sweater. The other wore a button-up shirt. Both wore dress pants. They both seemed happy, confident.   Each glance at one another was followed by a smile. I wasn't sure if they were sisters, best friends, or lovers.

The pastor stepped aside. "And now Mary and Joan are going to sing a song for us."

Okay. Great.

Mary, holding a mic, glanced at the sound guy in the back of the room. The speakers started playing orchestral strings and handbells that just barely sounded synthesized, like someone had recorded the thing on their home computer and had taken great pains to disguise that. Joan stood there, her eyes closed, swaying back and forth a bit.

And then Mary started to sing. She had a nice voice. It was a little lower than you might expect it to be, but there was something pleasant about it – I mean, in a mellow kind of way. And then Sue started to sign.

Not "sing." Sign. She started gesticulating like crazy, doing this exorbitant, totally over-the-top sign language. She was really into it, closing her eyes, mouthing along to the words. She rolled her eyes into the back of her head in the throes of religious ecstasy borderlining on sexual pleasure. Perhaps it was a bit of both; maybe God decided at that very moment that the world needed a second virgin birth.

And then Mary – the one singing – would pause at odd intervals throughout the song. And she'd break into sprechgesang – you know, when people start rhythmically speaking in this limbo somewhere between rapping and just talking.

It was like listening to a sleazy lounge singer do Christmas standards.

"Oh…" she'd sing.
And stop.
"Holy night." she'd speak.
"The stars are…"
A breath.
"Brightly. Shining."

I think it only took seconds into the song – seconds – for me to start smirking. I glanced over at my sister. She was smirking too.

And then I glanced at my mom.
She was not smirking.
"Be respectful," she said.

I tried. I tried to recall advice that I'd learned from comedians and improv teachers about how to stop yourself from laughing. I bit the tip of my tongue. The inside of my lip. I tried to intimidate myself. I imagined that I was in a concentration camp, facing an angry Nazi guard. "I vill shoot if you show me ze slightest ounce of disrespect!" he shouted at me.

None of it worked. The Nazi in my head was furious; my mother followed suit. And so I just had to suffer through it, trying to disguise my smirks as smiles of approval and joy, hiding occasional chirpy giggles as sneezes or coughs.

The song finally ended. The women left; the audience clapped. (I still wonder if anyone in that audience actually needed Joan's sign language services.) I glanced again at my mom, who was giving me her glare of disapproval that I'd come to know so well throughout childhood.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I really am. But it's like an SNL sketch or something." She shook her head, but I could have sworn that I saw an ounce of a smile there.

The pastor reclaimed the stage. We sang a couple more songs, listened to a few more Bible verses.

And then another singer took the stage. It was a tiny white man with huge glasses, balding, wearing tight, above-the-waist khaki pants.

A nearby pianist began to play. And the man started singing this obscure Christmas song. I think it was originally an African American folk song. I only say this because the man was singing like he was cast in a production in Porgy and Bess. Every "Lord" was "Lawd", every "the" was "de." I'm pretty sure that, at one point, "children" was replaced with "chillen".

I didn't laugh at that man. I'd had enough anxious, uncomfortable amusement for one night. I nodded, which gave way to nodding off.

Then I glanced over at my mom. And there she was, clearly smirking. At one point she covered her mouth, maybe coughing, maybe stifling a laugh. I felt the crinkles of a smile at the edge of my lips, but I stopped myself. I stayed silent until after the service.
at 6:52 PM

12/25/2011

Things of Note #5

Merry Christmas! How did you celebrate? My cat celebrated by trying catnip for the first time. It was pretty amazing. First he went up to the little test tube shaped bottle that I was holding, giving it the once over with his nose. ("That's some good shit, huh Boo?" I said.) I unscrewed the cap to sprinkle some in the new toy he got. And just like that, the bottle cap disappeared.

And there was Boo off in the corner, batting the cap around with his paws, licking the thing like he was a fat kid on the Fourth of July with a bomb pop. And then his eyes went wiiiiiide. Not long after, he started rolling around on the carpet, jumping around, contorting himself into bizarre shapes like a gymnast on ecstasy. His crash was just as fast, just as extreme. He spent the whole rest of the day lying around, licking himself. That's typical Boo cat behavior, but today he seems like he's relishing the licking a little more than usual. Like he finally realizes how tenuous his grasp on reality really is.

Merry Christmas.

at 7:59 PM

12/22/2011

Analysis of Crazy Dude on Red Line (AKA "Killer")


LOCATION: Red Line. Chicago, IL. Southbound from Lawrence stop.

DATE/TIME: Saturday, December 17, 2011. Approx. 11:25 PM.

SUBJECT: Tall, thin man. Blond hair. Stubble. Everything about all of the above is scraggly. Wears a car mechanic's jumpsuit. May or may not be wearing absolutely nothing underneath it. May or may not be under the influence of massive amounts of drugs.

EVIDENCE FOR THE PRIOR STATEMENT: Subject rates highly on the talkative/social scale, low on the coherence/logical scale. Asks a number of questions to fellow passengers, including:
  • "I would be a homo, but I'm too easy."
  • "Hey. You wanna go to Russia? Shoot up heroin? No?"
  • "Hmm? Nah. Those people. Those people there. They're Russian. That's what they are."
  • "Hey. Hey. Wanna go to prison? It's just like being in the military."
After the above quote, subject jumps up from seat, then gets on his belly. Proceeds to do a pretty decent pushup. He stops, stands up again. "I'd do more, but I don't want to show off." Subject's modesty/consideration score slightly increases.

Subject continues to pace within a three feet area of the train car. He turns to another passenger. "You're a nice guy," subject says. Passenger nods, smiles nervously. "I'm a nice guy," subject says. "I'm a killer," he quickly adds.

Subject then proceeds to shadowbox, shouting, "I'm a killer, I'm a killer!" Train's nervousness score slightly increases.

He later sits, reaches into a pocket on the inside of his jumpsuit. He pulls out a long, thin object; at least one passenger gasps, believing the object to be either a knife or a heroin needle. Upon further inspection, it is a clicky pen.

Subject continues to mumble. At one point, he turns to the assessor – yours truly – and asks if we're heading toward the Morse stop. "No," assessor replies. "That's a couple of stops north of us."

Subject replies: "Awwwgh!"

Assessor replies: "Oh, no worries. You can always get off later, transfer to a northbound train."

Train later stops at Addison. Directly across from this train is a northbound train. Assessor politely suggests that subject take this northbound train, that is, if he feels like going north, if he'd, uh, be into that sort of thing and uh, yeah. Subject ecstatically obliges; he hobbles to the train doors and leaves.

FINAL ANALYSIS: Subject is an amalgamation of contradictions. To paraphrase his own words: he is a nice guy, but also a killer. His lack of sexual inhibition prevents him from exploring alternate lifestyles and sexualities. Subject also appears to be very good at pushups.

Subject's current whereabouts are unknown. He is suspected to be in Russia.
at 3:48 PM

12/21/2011

Illness, Laziness, Homeness


Back home again. My immune system took this as its cue to kick its feet up and go, "Fuck it!"

Then again, maybe it deserves a little bit more credit. It got me through the semester with a minimal amount of interruption. Not to mention that I've seen Jordan nearly every day for the past week or so, who, as it turns out, has strep throat. And then suddenly the little tickle in the back of my throat felt a lot more ominous. No fever or anything yet, but that's not unexpected. For some reason my body considers even the teensiest move above 98 degrees to be a last-ditch-oh-my-God-I'm-just-going-to-force-this-guy-in-bed scenario.

Another thing my body doesn't like? Vomiting. It doesn't do that. Understandable, though. When you are a skinny dude, your body wants to hold on to as much mass as possible.

But enough about body temperature and vomiting.

Over the past few days, I've been on a pretty steady diet of zinc, elderberry-based medications, amoxicillin, spicy foods, and warm whiskey. As someone who likes whiskey, I can assure you that it becomes a lot harder to tolerate after being heated in the microwave for fifteen seconds. Really. Get a whiff of it and you'll jump a few feet backwards. I know this because this is precisely what my cat did yesterday evening.

Being here is nice, but I have a hard time being productive. Not just because of the whole sick thing. There's just something about being home that makes my mind go into high school mode. I become a little more dependent, a little less motivated. A little more lazy. For a day or so, this is nice, but as you probably know, after too much inactivity, I go a little crazy.

Maybe that'll change in a few days. Hopefully that'll change even more when this antibiotic does its thing. But in the meantime, all I can do is try to do.
at 9:08 PM

12/19/2011

Things of Note #4

A little late on this one...not to mention that there were no other posts between this and the previous Things of Note. That's what finals week will do to you. Anyways...




at 5:22 PM

12/11/2011

Things of Note #3


More links! So many links! More links than you can link a link at!
at 7:20 PM

12/09/2011

Oh, Shit: The Seen and Unseen in Amnesia

People just have to talk about shit when they discuss Amnesia: The Dark Descent. But it's not the metaphorical sense of the word they typically use – as in, "this game is shit." Nor is it the good metaphorical sense of the word they use – as in, "this game is the shit."

No. When people talk about Amnesia, they use the verb form of the word shit. As in, "This game made me shit my pants."

I'm serious. Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation called the game "almost unmatched as a constipation aid." The ever-reliable Urban Dictionary defines it as "an independent video game made to make you shit yourself."

Okay. Enough about shit. The point I'm trying to make is that this game is scary. And if the above words sound like a whole bunch of hyperbole, I suggest you do one of two things: one, watch a bit of this hilarious compilation of choice reactions to Amnesia. Or – and this is what I really think you should do: buy the game, wait until night, shut off the lights, put on a good pair of headphones, and start playing. If you aren't even slightly freaked out at least one point within the game, I will be more than happy to buy you an ice cream cone.
"The point of presentation is to infuse terror. The human mind is extremely efficient, as it will trigger itself into greater fear simply by imagining it." – in-game note from Amnesia: The Dark Descent
The best storytellers realize that raising interesting questions – about plot, character motivation, or stuff beyond the scope of the story they're telling – is at the core of great storytelling. As Ira Glass has said, when a narrator raises a question, it's implied that the audience will get answers to this question by the story's end.

But sometimes we don't get answers. Intentionally, I mean. And sometimes, when that's done by inexperienced or inept storytellers, we as an audience feel frustrated, betrayed. Like our time's been wasted.

But when withholding information works, it's incredibly gratifying. Christopher Nolan knows this – that's why we never really find out why The Joker became The Joker, let alone why he's doing the crazy shit he does. Imagining what led to The Joker becoming The Joker is way more satisfying than any answer Nolan could provide.

And speaking of filmmakers: Hitchcock was the master of the unanswered question – after all, he's the dude that popularized the MacGuffin. What made his work shine was the stuff that you didn't see. The shower scene in Psycho comes to mind. We never see a single wound in that scene, nor do we see any explicit nudity. And yet the overwhelming sense of violence and sexuality in that scene is overpowering.

So what does this have to do with Amnesia? The game's team (made by a company of five people!) knew about the importance of withholding information from the player. And so they made an interesting design choice: if you play the game successfully – that is, never dying or dying very few times – you almost never see the ever-present monsters that haunt Amnesia's terrifying castle. And attempts at looking at them will penalize you; upon glancing at any beasts, your character's vision will blur and his sanity will drop.

And don't even think about going on the offensive; unlike most first-person video games, Amnesia doesn't provide you with weapons. So what can you do if you don't want to die? Simple: run, hide, and for the love of God don't look at the monsters.

But it's unlikely that you'll make it through the game without dying. There come moments when you fail – when the monsters come to get you and, presumably, slash you into little bits. And that entails getting a big ol' glimpse of the monsters' ugly mugs staring right in your face. And thanks to the game's lack of graphical prowess – again, it's that team-of-five-people thing – you'll probably find yourself disappointed. It's not just that the monsters are kind of blocky looking, kind of primative in an Intro to 3D Modeling sort of way. It's mostly that what they actually look like is nowhere near as scary as what you'd imagine them to look like.

Thankfully, these moments are rare. In fact, the game's designers seem to be aware of the disappointment that seeing can bring. One particularly memorable moment in Amnesia involves an invisible monster. It's scary as hell – and as far as creating terror by withholding information goes, it's freaking brilliant.

Independent game studios – like Frictional Games, the folks behind Amnesia – have ballooned in financial and critical success over just the past few years. And if you ask me, the independent studios tend to be the ones with the most interesting ideas in the world of interactive media.

The problem, though, is that independent studios rarely have the time or money to make games that look as good as the stuff that giant studios do – because, let's face it: making 3D modeled stuff that looks good is hard. But visuals are a big deal in video games – after all, video comes from the Latin videre, meaning "to see." And so indie game developers that are willing but unable to make fancy-schmancy graphics have typically been left with two options: to either make do with subpar graphics or scale down their visions.

But the team at Frictional and Amnesia present a different possibility. Who says that video games need to rely completely on seeing? Maybe an intentional absence of visuals for the sake of suspense every now and then will do something great for storytelling in interactive media.

The cliché goes that a picture is worth a thousand words. But I think it could be said that a lack of pictures is sometimes worth way more than that.
at 2:17 PM

12/08/2011

Bull and Roosevelt

I'm at the Roosevelt stop on the Red Line. This is the stop I get off at most every day. All of my classes this semester are within walking distance of it. It's kind of a weird stop. Go any further south than Roosvelt and you're suddenly on the South Side.

A friend of mine once told a story about riding the Red Line past Roosevelt. They were sitting next to this man on the train. The man said, "I'm gonna show you a magic trick. I'm gonna make all the white people on this train disappear." All he had to do was wait for the train to depart the Roosevelt stop. Presto.

Anyway, this wasn't the sort of weirdness I encountered at the Roosevelt stop. It was a much less race-driven form of weirdness. A much more surreal form of weirdness.

It's a Thursday afternoon. Cloudy. I'm walking to the turnstiles when I look up – and what I see leaning against the wall is a giant, red cartoon character.

It's somebody in a Bulls mascot costume. He's holding a narrow box; I can't quite make out the writing on it. But who cares? What I'm amazed by is that the costume is the real deal. He could've stolen the thing from the Cubs' locker room. But hopefully he didn't do that. Because a cop is standing next to him.

The cop's wearing the official CPD facial expression, this mix between goddamit-I-bet-shit's-gonna-go-down-at-any-second and I-don't-give-a-fuck. He glances occasionally at the Bulls mascot. And when the cop's not looking, the Bulls mascot steals a glance or two at him. It's like a scene from a cartoon.

Everyone who can see this is a little on edge. Passersby, CTA attendants, the pigeons strutting by. You can even sense some anxiety from the cop and the mascot.

The mascot steals one last glance at the cop. Then he tentatively puts the box he's holding down on the ground. And then it becomes clear what the text on the box says: DUNKIN DONUTS.

And the mascot takes his foot – er, hoof. He nudges the box over in the direction of the cop, like an under-the-table deal. You saw nothing. You just happened to find a dozen donuts.

Before the cop knows what's going on, everyone at the stop just dies. Then he looks down at the box. Thankfully, he's smiling.

The mascot slinks away toward the turnstiles. I like to think that he was going to ride the El wearing the thing.
at 8:51 AM

12/04/2011

Things of Note #2

Here's this week's collection of links, gathered from the usual suspects – BoingBoing, Neatorama, Reddit, and the deepest, most lemon scented corners of the internet.



at 7:12 PM
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