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"The frightening power of Harvey's filthy lies makes me tremble like a Frenchman. I frequently wet myself in terror and... Oops... damn." - Glenn Reynolds

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  Sunday, March 07, 2004


TODAY'S LOVE NOTE

(Introduction)

Anything less than mad, passionate, extraordinary love is a waste of time. There are too many mediocre things in life, and love should not be one of them.


posted by Harvey at 10:11:21 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME




TODAY’S GRAFFITI CURRENCY



Sure, I should've known it was too good to be true, but when I saw that ad that said "We'll show you how to make 2000 on $1" I thought they'd just forgotten the dollar sign on the first number.


posted by Harvey at 10:09:40 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME



BUT IS IT GOOD ENOUGH?

LeeAnn of The Cheese Stands Alone asks (although not in so many words) the quintessential blogger's question: "Why the hell am I spending an hour tweaking this stupid five-sentence throw-away entry?"

Oh, darlin', do I EVER know THAT feeling! More times than I can count, I've sweated blood, re-reading, re-editing, over and over & over, trying to perfect a stupid little bit of twaddle that I know in my heart will get neither links nor comments. It'll be read in 30 seconds and forgotten in five. No one's life will be saved by what I write, much less even marginally improved. So why all the fuss?

I can't honestly say for sure. I can only toss out a few notions about what drives me personally.

I think the biggest thing is my belief that words are precious. Something I picked up my extremely taciturn father who never engaged (as far as I know) in idle chit-chat. When Allen Olson spoke, it was to convey specific information, and after that, it was shut up time. I've picked up the habit myself, so when I post an entry, it has to make a point, make it well, then shut up. Anything less would be to disrespect the value of the English language. Which, despite what some people might think, is practically a crime.

Another reason is that, despite my raging hatred of typographic errors, I'm both prone to creating them and poor at spotting them. With enough re-reads, I know I can catch a good 99% of them, so I go back and forth repeatedly, hunting for strays.

And let's not forget about word choice. It's a big, boring mistake to keep using the same adjectives over and over. Even twice in the same post is a big, boring mistake. I don't like making big, boring mistakes, so I'll go back through to make sure that I'm not making the big, boring mistake of using the same adjectives (or other words) over and over. Variety is the spice of life. Big time. And not varying your words is a big, boring mistake.

The last reason is that I'm a nerdy little bookworm. I spent probably the first 30 years of my life nose-in-book, so I'm intimately familiar with the sound of quality prose. Although it isn't as stuctured as poetry, there's still a certain quality of rhythm and lyricism to be found in good writing. A "fair balance" of big words & little words, of long sentences & short ones. If the balance is missing, the writing sounds dissonant and off key. I don't claim to have the prose equivalent of "perfect pitch", but I'm far from tone deaf. If my words don't sing pleasantly to me, I'll tweak them until their inner harmonies are released.

So, yes, sometimes it doesn't seem quite worth it to gut-twist over a few insignifcant phrases, but that "inner editor" is a whip-cracker, and as tough as it is to write well, it's often even tougher to ignore the master's call to perfection.


posted by Harvey at 9:58:37 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME



WHO'S THIS FOR?

In the comments to this post by Matty O'Blackfive on the closed-minded Bush haters and how deep their hatred goes, one of the commenters (JarheadDad) makes a beautiful mini-rant.

Matty - impressed by his showing - tells him he needs a blog. JarheadDad demures with the "I don't have time" gambit, provoking the following response from Phil of News From the Fridge:

JarheadDad: Do what I do. Get a 'blog and just don't update it if you're busy, and write stuff when the spirit takes you. Just always remember to write for _yourself_ and not some audience out there.

That last sentence caught my eye. I've read it before. I know what it means, and any other day I'd agree with the sentiment, but a thought occured to me today - I don't write for myself, and I never have.

Usually when I blog, it's actually more like I'm writing an open letter to the person whose entry I'm linking. It's usually for their specific amusement, but I try to broaden things a bit so it can be appreciated by uninvolved onlookers, too.

When the entry isn't inspired by a particular bit of writing, it's still more or less an open letter, but it's to an imaginary "ideal reader". Someone who's very much like me, but not exactly. Someone who appreciates my sense of humor and would laugh at all the right places.

There are also other entries where I'm trying to get something straight in my own head by putting it down on paper (or in pixels, as the case may be). These are almost like little prayers. "Please God, I seek understanding. Help me figure out this complex subject." Think of them as open letters to a higher power.

In the end, though, I suppose it IS all for myself. It's the purely selfish pleasure of creating the mini-rants, or little jokes, or silly humor pieces, or thoughtful essays that keeps me tapping away at the keyboard day after day. But although selfish (in the good sense), it's not solitary. Everyone who reads this is keeping me company right now, and even though I may be alone, I don't feel lonely.


posted by Harvey at 9:32:36 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME



IS BUSH A CRAP WEASEL?

Keith of Berry's World thinks that Bush's use of 9-11 imagery and Kucinich's use of the names of the Iraqi war dead are equivalent. He wonders why the right isn't as outraged about Bush's commercial as they were about Kucinich's.

I had to sit down & think this one over. If I'm being hypocritical, I appreciate having it pointed out, even if I'm not overly fond of the pointer, so I'm going to take the question seriously.

I guess I could ask him the opposite question, but first I wanted to do an attitude check on myself. I like the way Bush responded to 9-11 and I don't like Kucinich because he's a socialist. So was the reason for my burst of outrage merely partisan politics, or is there a principle at stake? A line which must never be crossed in making commercials?

Thinking back to when I watched the Kucinich video, I remember watching the names flash by, and I remember being annoyed that the names were being used by a Democrat. That reaction was probably more about partisan politics, and if Kucinich had finished up with something like "isn't 300 enough? We should pull out of Iraq now. If I'm elected President, I'll stop the senseless killing." Then I probably wouldn't have even blogged about it. I'm not normally a war-blogger, as such, and I would've let it slide.

But Kucinich followed up the body count with an assertion that the war was all for the benefit of evil corporations like Haliburton. He basically said that all those people he named died for worse than nothing. He denigrated the very cause for which those people laid down their lives and used their names in support of a postition that they very likely would have disagreed with. THAT was the source of my outrage, and THAT was what inspired me to start dropping F-bombs all over my normally semi-censored blog.

So, would I have been pissed if W had used names instead of just images? No, not as the commercial was written. If he had followed it with something like, "And what did they die for? So greedy fire-fighting unions could try to get more pork from the federal government." THEN you might see some F-bombs. But W didn't do that, so you're not going to see any outrage in this part of the 'sphere.

Now it's my turn: if you objected to the Bush commercial, then where was your outrage over Kucinich's?


posted by Harvey at 9:17:15 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME



AH, MUSIC

I love a well-done song parody. This time around, it's Vanderleun from American Digest working over a bit from The Pirates of Penzance to bring us his rendition of "I Am the Very Model of A Modern Kerry Democrat". I'll get you started, you can see him for the rest:

Kerry :
I am the very model of a modern Kerry-Democrat,
I'm an information animal, a medal-dripping technocrat,
I know the Kennedys of Camelot, and hide my votes historical,
While my Deaniac supporters consult the Usenet Oracle;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters matrimonial,
I understand rich heiresses, and lust for figures patrimonial,
About Republican recessions I'm steaming up my views,
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.



ALL :
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.

Heh. Try getting THAT one out of your head :-)


posted by Harvey at 8:53:23 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME



I'M MOVING TO FRANCE

Why? Because it seems that living in a country full of cowardly, back-stabbing weasels increases one's ability to write colorful
descriptions.

Take, for example, Jeff of BigStick.US's description of the worst beer he's ever tasted:

There's the so-called brewer, graduate of "Kindof Beer Fest '76, Northern France Division", sitting at his table thinking to himself how he's going to make a living. Suddenly, the idea comes to him. he runs down into the basement and lugs up the stairs a large barrel, full of dust, rat poison, and mold. He goes to the pantry, and takes out anything that has a "b" and an "e" and an "r" in it. (For B E E R, right?) Barley? In the barrel. Butter? in the barrel. Old bread? In the barrel. (You get the idea.) Afterwards, he fills the damn thing with water, buries it underground for 17 years, dies, and leaves it in his will for it to be canned and sold.

Pure poetry. And I left some more for you to discover on your own at the other end of the link.


posted by Harvey at 8:46:06 PM  permalink    Crappy Broken Radio Comments (do not use) [] trackback []  HOME




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