I Forget The Subject 7 January 1999

Oh, Christmas Poo! My office crush brought her boyfriend into the office for a little pre-MacWorld meet&greet today. That was supposed to stay as an abstract possibility, at most. Well, at least they're not married yet. I only ask for theory here.

Back to work, hi ho. I was surprised this morning, to actually wake up feeling well. Well, better, anyway. I guess I felt guilty over taking two whole days off, and so expected to have that second day make no difference, proving that it was unnecessary. But ha! it worked!

In this spirit, I encourage Our President to stop dancing and just start kicking booty. Bring on the witnesses, bring on the CSPAN, bring on the halftime shows and commentator cockfights. Don't use real lawyers, hire actors. Wilfred Brimley, is he still alive? Real lawyers can write the lines, but only Tom Cruise can pop those little temple veins for justice quite that way. This business is about as solemn as my mother's backside.

I am reading way too fast anymore. Went through all three of Geo. Alec Effinger's Audran Marid books yesterday, in between drooling comas and more formal naps. They're not such big books, but still. The idea here is supposed to be that a book provides more hours of entertainment value for your dollar than any two movies. I forget where I read that, I think it was the personal theory of some terribly Heinleinian type, but it still struck me as being true. I've never even been tempted to learn to speed-read. I want to hear the words, dammit.

I was reading Godspeed by Charles Sheffield over vacation, which is kind of a boy's pirate book set in space. There are jacket blurbs comparing it to Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson - never read that so I wouldn't know, but it seems likely, it's got that sort of tone.

Anyway, there's a main character in it that starts out sympathetic, then turns scary and you think "Ah hah!", but then is actually not all that scary especially by comparison, and is always pretty smart anyway. All over the map, because that's how the narrator is reacting. He knows that this guy is doing bad things, but gosh darn it, he still kinda likes him anyway. (Hmmm. Familiar?) I'm reading through this and it's so-so, when I started to imagine it as a movie and realized that this ambiguous character had to be played by Kevin Spacey. Bingo - for the rest of the book, that's who I heard saying his lines, and it made it all much more plausible. And I probably don't even owe anybody money for it.

Oh, and some more bitching about the bank and all that, but at some point it's like slaves lying around after work and one says "You know, that overseer, he sure is irritating!" To use a grossly exaggerated example. Thank you, I will.

Did I read correctly, that Li'l Jakob Dylan's band got a Grammy nomination for their cover of Heroes?? It must be some secret remix version, because the one they play on the radio is one of the most boring covers I have heard in my life. Since I am right this very second listening to the Carpenters Tribute Album, you know this is a serious charge. It's arranged in this very ordinary yes-yes-guitars-fine way, and his singing, what is he singing about? or for? Does he know? The central metaphor did get torn down a while ago. Is this some kind of ironic nod to that, and it's just too subtle for me to get?

Or is it possible that they just give Grammys to bad songs by relatively famous people?

Oh, my virgin brain!

Willfully blind self-indulgent nebbish or amusingly quirky old coot? And how bout that local sports team? Discuss among yourselves.

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