The view --- Korea (2)

(We've arrived on Jeju Island:)

Thesis

Antithesis

Synthesis

 (People who've followed the 2002 worldcup may recall a venue being located on Jeju; we're located right next to it) 

Touché

Fewer people would listen if his name were Adam Smith, but here it is what he has to say, Tyler Brûlé, the well-named editor of the Monocle Magazine and columnist of the Financial Times:

HOW ABOUT SUBSTANCE?

And the occasion? Well, anything could be the occasion, because nothing, nothing has ever ruled the world as much as marketing in all its ugly emanations does these days.

Tyler Brûlé

In Brûlé's case --- not sure he would like us to call him Tyler --- in Brûlé's case it's  --- and now we are interrupted by a chain of events reported under Connubial Bliss  --- in Brûlé's case it's  --- and now we could dwell on the fact that it wasn't so much an event as the absence thereof, like, like Conan Doyle's dog not barking in the night --- in Brûlé's case it's  --- it's perhaps a lucky coincidence that we're not writing a column in the FT but a simple blogpost  ---  in Brûlé's case it's a conversation with a friend who has started writing for this "large-ish news organization," finished her first story, and is now spending her time on getting the message of its publication across via "a media channel" (Facebook, probably). And then he asks:

Invariant under rotation?

(A friend from the East Coast sent this picture:)

(He didn't actually, he sent this one:)

(Well, you know us.)

Who of you is the man? --- Korea (1)

We didn’t have a fight for a few minutes, so it’s not really something for the Connubial Bliss, plus, we’re in Heathrow, changing planes for our trip to JeJu, Korea. South Korea, that is, the place nobody dares to visit since the North is reiterating its prediction that it will throw “small nukes” if feeling annoyed by is ethnic neighbor much longer.

Heathrow airport

Everybody hates Heathrow (queues) but the shopping is supposed to be good, so we have to buy “Polo.” Polo, among other things, is a fragrance created by Ralph Lauren and used by Chang. A spunky duty-free sales-female takes charge first of Chang and then of yours truly as the mammal bond between the two homosexual travelers transpires. We’re apparently adrift in the wrong place and should follow her to the male section and get “something for men.”

(This is a bit overwritten, apologies.)

“We’re kinda girls,” I say ...

A man is beautiful

It's perhaps a minor issue, so give it perhaps a minor thought. What's wrong with this poem:

A man is beautiful

but

you have to swing

and swing and swing

and swing like

a handkerchief in the

wind

Well, consider this one:

A woman is beautiful

but

you have to swing

and swing and swing

and swing like

a handkerchief in the

wind

That better, right? Well, it's also from Jack Kerouac, the last one. But that's not the only thing. Let's think about this some more.

Freedom Fries --- Chapter 3: "I said Hu" (part 1)

Previously. Pamela Nachtrieb Timbers, the voluminous Dean of Berkeley Law School, had been asked by President Obama to swing by for an interview --- a position at the Supreme Court is vacant --- but Pamela, regretfully, had to tell Obama about a skeleton in her closet. She will now explain to Georg Lukacs, the charsimatic hedge-fund titan (who happens to be an old friend of hers) why.

The maitre d’ is very pleased with her squeaking bag, and very kind to Pamela’s coat. George didn’t bring one, since the New Tearoom is only 6 minutes and 23 seconds from his office, which he had suggested they would walk together, for fresh air and aplomb. People would recognize him in the street, obviously, and wonder who this woman is, but he was used to this. Plus, they really didn’t look like former lovers. She looks more like his shrink, or worse, or vice versa; well, not vice versa, obviously.

Charles — as the maitre d’ is apparently known — spreads his fingers, raises his arms, and touches her breasts, almost. “We’re so pleased to have you with us, M’am,” Charles says. “Don’t worry,” George comments, “he doesn’t know you, he’s just doing his thing.” Charles laughs obligingly, then asks: “You’re famous, M’am?” Pamela can’t resist. “Yes, I’m a famous madam.” Charles laughs more obligingly. “First time you hear that reply?” Pamela asks. Now George laughs. “Her name is Pamela,” George says, “and she’ll be famous all right, starting tonight.” “Famous all right, starting tonight,” Charles comes back, “that rhymes.” All three laugh now, and George claps his hands. “Listen,” he says, “I’m a famous po-it, but nobody know-it.” General hilarity, everybody claps.

Central Park in Manhattan

Unlike other New York restaurants, the New Tearoom has been around for more than six months. This being Manhattan, the large cubic volume alone defines serious luxe, so Philip Stark could relax and contend himself with light wood, white walls, large windows, and serious art. Charles leads them to their table. Most other tables are already occupied by a hodgepodge of new New York society, like Asians with absolutely oversized, heavily rimmed glasses, or Blues Brother’s types (wasn’t that Chicago?). Times have changed, Pamela thinks. Their table, the best of course, is waiting for them in its pristine virginity at the upper level balcony with a view of the Central Park. Two waiters are in attendance to handle their chairs. Pamela and George sit down in style. Thick napkins, thin waiters, Pamela observes.

"If you have enough darkness, will you have enough light?"

(Us, folks, with Sacha, our friend, who provides the model for Jack Horn in the Green Eyes, this afternoon, in Sacha's garden in Les Adrets:) 

_____________

And here are a two corresponding tidbits from the Green Eyes:

(Opening of Chapter 43:)  Every soap has its homme à tout faire, be it James Bond ("Q"), or us ("Jack"). Talking James Bond, if you ever watched the earlier movies (there is a new-new Q now, bear with me), you must have realized that Q’s lab was too small, there was no way anybody could combine a shooting range for war heads with a workshop for poisonous pens with an assembly line for Aston Martins anywhere outside the Pinewood Studios (the newest Q holds court in the British Museum where they have more space).

Talking Jack Horn, if you ever had a look at Jack's barn—he lives in a rumbling farm house outside Georgia Beach with a large garden and a big barn where he “works”—in fact, you don't have to enter the barn, you only have to look at it from miles away—it's like Q's (old) universe, and then some. There are machines, gadgets, toy helicopters, pianos, coloring books of his three lovely daughters, the original camera of Toulouse-Lautrec, teddy bears, the screen wall from Startreck, tennis rackets, entire hardware shops, books even, some of his friends write books. It's like the firm of Clutter, Clutter & Clutter. There it is, climbing the stairs, climbing the walls and climbing into the basement where antique premium cars await urgent repairment: clutter. There’s no way you could spend a minute in this chaos and not come away with the idea that Jack is your man when it comes to hair-brained schemes.

Spelling reform (Sacha)

(We've posted on this before, but here's Mark Twain's version:)

For example, in Year 1 that useless letter c would be dropped to be replased either by k or s, and likewise x would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which c would be retained would be the ch formation, which will be dealt with later.
Year 2 might reform w spelling, so that which and one would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish y replasing it with i and Iear 4 might fiks the g/j anomali wonse and for all.
Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants.
Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez c, y and x — bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez — tu riplais ch, sh, and th rispektivli.
Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

______________

OK, and now what, where's the corresponding fragment from the Green Eyes? Well, not so easy, we play with spelling only twice, when Maurice's behind is spelled "arse" since he's a Brit. Significantly, both times a beach bear gets involved. The first time because John tries to purloin a towel from said bear to help Maurice cover up his private parts following a close encounter of a certain kind that left Maurice trunk-less (in the sense that he cannot find his discarded swimsuit): 

And so, before time, a shadow falls over my feet, a hand touches my shoulder, and a voice growls: "What are you doing here?" The voice belongs to a mature man, soft in the middle and elsewhere, and it's during the next split second that I commit the next error of the day because I'm not only arrogant, I'm also slow-witted under duress. I should have risen above the suspicious context and ask the bear directly: 'Could you lend me a towel,' perhaps followed by some explanation, perhaps even the true explanation, he would possibly laugh a deep, bearish laugh, his belly shaking, and everything would be fine, and I could walk away with a lent towel to save a British arse. But I don't. "I'm admiring your towels," I say, "trying to find out about the brand, so I could order the same."

"I don't believe you," the towel-owner replies. "I think you are trying to steal something, possibly the booze." "No," I say, no, never." As opposed to me, this round man isn't slow-witted, and he's developing dubious schemes behind his round forehead as we speak. "You were trying to get hold of our champagne," he continues, "a Pommery vintage, ten years old, a bottle that George and I brought to the beach to celebrate the first week of our friendship, the bottle worth 100 bucks."

The view today

  ...Yes, this is us, this morning, the Esterel hills to the south of Le Trayas... 

...with the Mediterranean right next to it...

I've just finished reading Michael Ampersant's outrageous new novel Green Eyes.  

(Artwork by Miguel Angel Reyes)

Lübke English

Heinrich Lübke

Heinrich Lübke was the second president of postwar (West) Germany, and he is remembered for only one thing, his English. He're an example of typical Lübke English:

A: "Hello, Sir, how goes it you?"

B: "Oh, thank you for the afterquestion." 

A: "Are you already long here?"

B: "No, first a pair days. I come not out London." 

A: "Thunderweather, that overrushes me. You see not so out."

B: "That can yes beforecom. I come out Frankfurt."

A: "Das hätte ich nicht gedacht, Sie sprechen ja ausgesprochen gutes Englisch."

So, why do we bring this up? Because of Godehart, of course, the fifth generation descendant of operatic composer Richard Wagner, one of the lead characters in our outrageous novel "Green Eyes."

Spoiler alert: our attempt to dress Godehart in true Lübke English came to nothing --- it's difficult to comprehend (even for Germans), and it wouldn't be convincing given that Godehart is an educated person from an international family whose English ought to be reasonably fluent.

Anyhow, here's a fragment from the Green Eyes, from Chapter 43, "Lets have congress while I explain," where Godehart initiates John to the secrets of Manhunt advertising (Manhunt, the internet dating service):

We've reached full afterplay now, which means we are resting against the chrome grill, not the most comfortable head rests, and I don’t know what to say. Gohard is stroking his dick again. “How about a re-run,” he says as he’s pulling his foreskin in all directions.
“It was great,” I say, “but I need to save some cum for Hunnsbruck.”
“Hunnsbruck,” he exclaims, “I almost forgot. Yes, let us save some cum for Hunnsbruck. Let us get pen and paper.” He jumps off the bed and returns with a Montblanc pen and a leather-bound, Wagner-iconed notebook, this one even prettier than Howard’s lawyer’s diary.

Need a job?

(Maud sent this:)

The view this morning

Just kidding

"In truth I need the money to buy a copy of Michael Ampersant's outrageous new novel Green Eyes"

Green Eyes --- Chapter 19: Naked girls

Previously, Alex ("Green Eyes") offered to give us a ride, we took him upstairs for the same, we did it, and somehow we fell asleep. We wake up, and he's gone. We've spent the last chapter mourning him. What will we do next? 

I brew coffee without further justification. I drink a cup and don't know what to do. The sun is still at it, embracing the ugly water tower, it is almost on top of it now, what's the name of this position? I should take pictures for my blog, and mention in the post that the tower resembles—better is—is an ugly frog, how do we say, ‘in attendance,’ ‘in expectation,’ ‘in dire need of,’ what, ‘relief,’ ‘transmogrification,’ that word possible doesn't exist, ‘transcendence,’ perhaps. I could perhaps use an older trick, insinuating lightly that the tower is, in reality, a spaceship, which is now awaiting trans-whatever into an ugly frog. We're not getting anywhere. My blog, that's the blog that could have saved me if I would only have shown it to Alex, (or ‘showed’ it to Alex?) so that he could have liked it, and liked me more, and leave his number behind, I’m repeating myself.

My blog lives in the spare room, on the ambulant desk, in my computer (I'm still stuck with a PC). I leave kitchen and coffee behind and turn the switch. It takes forever, as you know, my PC is four years old (why did everything happen four years ago?).

Let me see, I don't quite remember when I posted the last post, like what, three days ago? About what? I forgot as well. This blog, confusingly named Freedom Fries, is about everything and nothing, including loose talk about the gay condition, risqué pictures of the semi-graphical kind, more soft porn, it never angles more than 35° above the ground, we're barely in erection country, not because I'm prudish, but because I want to avoid a content warning, which, I fear, would discourage the last of my regulars of whose sexuality I know little. Beyond the pendulous porn, there are posts with shots at light fun of the acridic type, political posts against slavery and the Confederacy, sometimes somebody emails a new joke, I find a fitting picture, you name it. There are millions of these blogs, perhaps more than potential visitors (some guy from the computer science department told me that 20 thousand new porn sites go on line each day, I can't believe it, but then I never believe other faculty).

Adult content

(This is Frank Sinatra, isn't it? Well, for once we are out-plussed. We have no corresponding fragment from Michael Ampersant's outrageous new novel Green Eyes)

Find a caption

"My fellow Americans, let me say to you: Stand witness to the death of the red tie!"

À propos (Doonesbury)

This is us, folks, this is us, Chang saying ""book,"" ("your hobby," "don't get obsessed about it," etc.), and Michael saying "book."  Chang carrying some laundry/garbage bag, Michael not carrying some laundry/garbage bag; der Rest ist Schweigen (we live together for 20 years).

Right, so here are two examples of such paragraphs from the Green Eyes (opening Chapter 21 and 29, respectively; it's usually the first paragraph of a chapter that's difficult):

(Chapter 21, My father and your father were fathers): I'm on my way to the convenience store now, except that I'm not, since the truck doesn't start. Father is in his box, I can forget about him, but my truck is a different box, in particular when it acts up. I never knew it was a truck until Joe, a neighbor, told me so—I thought I had bought an SUV from a stupid lemon dealer, a first generation Mercedes 320 ML from another millennium. But after a few miles it transpired that the fine line between arrogance and hubris had been crossed once again by some autonomous part of my brain in that the lemon dealer turned out to be right. It helps a bit, though, that this Joe—a wealthy oil man from Louisiana who owns the latest version of my model at some six-digit pricepoint and the entire top floor of the condo—that Joe calls his ML a truck, it makes a difference in the delusion compartment whether it's your truck that breaks down, or your premium-brand SUV with leather seats and other luxe options.

(Chapter 29, The sycamore tree): I realized too late what I had done, or not done. In the confusion of my father’s arrival I had left the cell phone behind, and then, despite all the mental notes to self, had forgotten about Alice, because it had been exactly ten PM when Gracelyn suggested, insisted, in fact, that I sleep with Ben in one bed. That must have been it, the mental notes to self, the deities of the English language took offense and punish me dearly now, (or it’s other deities with other concerns that punish me dearly now, but dearly it is).

Sirrr --- "Couldn't agree more"

More Sirrr-wise, this time as a comment on the Daily Beast (scroll down). Let us explain. Andrew Sullivan has a post on Philip Roth, who, in a NY restaurant, got accosted (if that's the word) by young, budding (and handsome) author Julian Trepper, who has just published his first novel "Balls" (balls). Trepper presents Roth with a copy of said Balls, Roth jumps up, and shoots into a tirade against writing:

“I would quit while you’re ahead. Really, it’s an awful field. Just torture. Awful. You write and write, and you have to throw almost all of it away because it’s not any good. I would say just stop now. You don’t want to do this to yourself. That’s my advice to you.”

Julian has reported on this in the Paris review and on the pages of the Daily Beast, where he's speculating about Roth's career as a bored ex-writer (Roth announced recently he had quit writing), and posits that writing is a very practical way out of boredom. 

Julian Trepper, Philip Roth

And her's our Sirrr-letter:

  Sirrr --- couldn't agree more. Boredom is the alternative to writing, or, more precisely, writing is the alternative to boredom. I'm a retired academic living in a retirement community in the south of France, and people here are bored, bored, so bored it could actually kill them. You need an inner life in order to live a good life, and while there might be other things to help you find it or live it, writing, as Julian so coyly explains, provides a practical and pragmatic way to get one, an inner life.

Folks, as an academic, I always knew about "writing," and I can tell you from experience now that there isn't much difference between writing an academic paper and writing gay pornography, especially when it’s the first draft, when the creative juices really need to flow.

OK, so. Let me tell you. The day I decided to write fiction, I found Jesus. Since I'm writing gay pornography, I'm wearing the flaccid smile of the truly reborn, my wrinkles have disappeared, my hair has grown, my penis has grown, Jesus it is. 60% of the time I'm on a high, the high people normally reach only after three glasses of champagne. And the first novel is almost finished. The first draft was finished in under five month (the first draft of my Ph.D. took two years).

Green Eyes --- teaser (Maud)

(So let's contemplate:) 

And here's a fitting clip from the Green Eyes (Chapter 20, "My father and your father were fathers," --- John is getting a phone call from the hospital (Maurice is still alive), and then father shows up prematurely; here's the beginning of the chapter, mercifully short):


The phone rings.

It's not that simple, of course, the phone doesn't ring. Instead, it speaks a pop song to me --- like your partner would in a failed marriage. I've tried everything, even phone calls (I hate phone calls, both ways), tried everything to download a ring tone like "rrringg, rrringg," a tone that nobody remembers from the analogue days. I've hit the Download ringtone now button too often, I've been charged for said tones occasionally, I've stamped on the ground like Rumpelstiltskin, I succeeded once, when my pop song was replaced by a different one that I had to learn with difficulty—it takes some time before you realize that the dahhhduhhdahh is actually yours when it happens in your pocket and not on TV—but it has happened too often now, and I love it like you love your partner during a bitter divorce.

"It’s coming back to me now," the cell sings again.

How about this illustration? Antique pederasts didn't have to bother with cell-phones, or did they? OK, here're two more paragraph from the same chapter:

How to abuse a father in the meantime? Step one, no welcome. Done. Step two, offer poison. Done. Step two-A, let him die. Fail. Step three, let him ask for the booze. Step four, there's no booze left in the fridge (Alex helped). Step five, be unpredictable. On some occasions, I go and fetch a few cans of beer from the nearest convenience store. On others, I don't, I'm off, busy, see you later, leave him key-less behind, there is no spare key, he's off to the beach, he returns, he can't get in, there are no flower pots, my cell-phone is on voice mail. The first day is almost over, two more days to go.

You wonder whether he ever raped me? No, he didn't. My mother just caught him on the wrong side of my body, when the thing stopped. Let me explain, I'm politically incorrect here in a terrible way, I know. I didn't really care. He sucked my dick, it didn't hurt. He never asked me to suck his. I wasn't hurt, or devastated, or desecrated, at least subjectively I wasn't. But I think my bipolarity has something to do with it, I learned to compartmentalize, if that's the word, or at least my brain did, the autonomous part, my father in one compartment, other things in others compartments, and myself somewhere else. These compartments are still there, I always have to think outside of some boxes, go back and forth from box to box, these boxes will possibly stay with me for the rest of my life. This back and forth all the time, it must have something to do with my mood swings, I don't know.

Sirrr --- "die menschliche Dummheit is grenzenlos"

(We did it again, we did it again. Another Sirrr letter, this time in the comment section of Paul Krugman's latest column in the NYT:)

Paul Krugman

Sirrr:  Following up on the last comment (people can't be reasoned with): why --- yes, in the end, they can. We've been there before, like the Chinese were for more than a thousand years during which time the frequent and devastating floods of the Yellow River basin were answered by raising the standards of the entry exams of the bureaucratic Mandarin elite (mostly writing poetry). Wasn't it crystal clear that the ancestors had gotten upset again about declining poetic standards and showed their anger through provoking natural disasters? Or think about the infamous earthquake of Lisbon in 1755, to which the authorities reacted by staging more autodafés --- wasn't it clear that God had shown his anger and needed to be mollified by more vigorous answers to overall sinning?

Along those lines, isn't it clear that the world will go under if we don't lower the budget deficit now, now (never mind that a significant percentage of the demographic believing this also believes that the world will come to an end anyhow soon, compliments Jesus Christ and impending Rapture proceedings). Isn't it clear that the answer to all economic problems lies in lowering taxes --- because it's the hardworking, dogged, teneacious rich that create jobs, those people that could get discouraged so easily by higher marginal taxes, even though the marginal income tax rate under Eisenhower (when the American economy really grew precipitously) was 91%, instead of 35, or 39%.

My father (who was German) used to say: "Die menschliche Dummheit ist grenzenlos." In this spirit.

(And while we are at it, a fitting fragment from the Green Eyes --- not the first time we're posting this fragment, but there you have it:)

Chapter 38 --- What's Paul Krugman's penis size

You think Trevor would be interested in politics, or the New York Times, or economics, or Nobel prices? Possibly not—you have other problems when you're a confirmed bachelor without a future. Trevor, in any case, who must be looking right into the eyes of Paul Krugman behind me, Trevor shows no signs of recognition what-so-ever, it's crystal-clear, he's not attracted to the fifty-nine year old Nobel laureate. In the distant past, when penises had average size, there was some talk in some quarters that IQs would be sexy, but we have proof now (sample-of-one!) that Krugman either does not look the part or that IQs are out. What's Krugman's penis size? Krugman, I realize, is drinking sparkling water, which is actually penis-enhancing, at least in the sense that alcohol induces impotence. That's what I should do, drink sparkling water, do they award Nobel prices for French? Should I raise my voice a bit so that Krugman can hear me and admire what I have to say about the Normans and their conquest of the Anglo-Saxon tongue? Where am I now, 0.13 BAC? Did you know that French has more words for booze than English? Or vice versa?

Green Eyes --- teaser

(A friend sends this picture:)

(And the corresponding Green Eyes fragment is?)

Chapter 43 --- A surgical strike into semantic space

"Uhh huuh," he says, sipping his whiskey. "So you want a video installation?"
"In a sense."
"On your own premises."
"Yes."
"You won't have much traffic in your apartment."
"Should I?"
"Perhaps you should contact the MoMa for your work."
“You mean the Museum of Modern Art?”
“Yes, they have more traffic. In New York City.”
"I'm not famous enough," I say.
"I worked in Manhattan, once had sex with the secretary of the director. Of the MoMa. Twice. Three times. My-ooh-my. These people know what they are doing. Four times."
"Hiring secretaries?"
"Hiring secretaries." He smacks his lips, swipes his unruly black hair with his fingers. "A video installation, that could be challenging."
"You are the man."

Joining the staff of Elizabeth Warren (Doonesbury)

(We normally don't do senior citizen jokes, but there you have it:) 

(We may need glasses to read that, don't we?)

The fine art of doing nothing

Bob Bienpensant: The art of doing nothing

Public transport hazards

"This guy should read Michael Ampersant's outrageouos new novel Green Eyes

Green Eyes --- Neologism update

Armani minimum (n.phr.) Giorgio Armani's tumescence when he wears his Armani jeans. Usage (Green Eyes, Ch. 30): "Any hint of tumescence is stylishly kept to the Armani minimum."
dead-wife (n.) A female spouse, now deceased. Usage: "Alice had an affair with his dead-wife." Discouraged, cruel.
i-ding (n.) (i) Collective name for Ipads, Iphones, and similar devices. Usage (Green Eyes, Ch. 27): "He flips his I-ding, sends a text message to Google." (ii) The penis of compulsive app-users. Usage: "This I-man showed me his I-ding, but I wasn't i-impressed."
i-impressed (adv.) The state of being impressed by an I-thing or its doings. Usage: "This I-man showed me his I-ding, but I wasn't i-impressed." Awkward, won't fly (sounds like one of the lesser Urban Dictionary inventions).

Warm bodies (review) (reblogged)

Lokfire from Hollywood Hates Me writes:

So I saw Warm Bodies (the book) laying on the table at the bookstore. I picked it up and perused the back cover.

I'd've perused the front cover, but it was kind of off-putting

A zombie romance? Man, I liked zombies before they were cool. (I kind of hate myself.)  Warm Bodies, a zombie romance, has been made into a movie. Apparently, it's something like a parody of Twilight, which seems silly to me, because why bother to parody something that's already a parody of writing to begin with?

Seriously, though, it just seems like all you'd need to do is point at Twilight and laugh

Goood evening!

Advertisement

It doesn't matter what you wear... for as long as you keep reading  Michael Ampersant's Green Eyes

(Artwork by EthanMaxx)

"He said I would find the copy of Michael Ampersant's outrageous new novel Green Eyes in the top drawer."

(Artwork by Michael Breyette)

Green Eyes --- Chapter 34 (teaser)

So, there we are, from left to right, Maurice, Alice, John, Alex, and the legal suit. Alice is angry, you can practically see her fist clenched in her white-coat pocket, but we're all adults, so she is making the honors and presents us to Trevor Howard, the Assistant DA, who has been so kind to come all the way from Waycross to listen to our case. Attempts are being made to shake hands across laps, it would be awkward to get up again. Alex has a last name, Iglesias, which I learn on this occasion (come to think of it, the black hair, the eyebrows, the warm-colored skin, it must have been his mother then, the eyes, Irish?).

Maurice’s IC gear is going quiet, I wonder whether there’s a tumescence meter as well. "Apologies for us being late," Alex says. He owns the room, I don't know how he does it with this depression on his shoulders—he doesn’t know it either, I guess (that’s how he does it). Alice explains the reason for our presence, we're indirect witnesses, she explains.

Hair by Brad Pitt (no kidding)

Rave reviews for the new, and improved writer

Michael &[sic], author of the novel Green Eyes

Oh yes Mike....looks fabbo!!! --- Jenni B.
Very good --- Sacha did this? --- Glenn Ch.
Wow, wonderful......never looked so good....and just look at that hair....!! --- Pauline J.
Bravo, tu as rajeuni de 20 ans au moins !... --- Anne-Marie B.
Hi Mike, I just wanted to close my labtop and discovered your photo! You look 20 years younger. Did you go to the hairdresser? Congratulation. Keep it like that and you will be very succesful. --- Christine B.
Interesting picture, really! The next step: the red carpet in Cannes ? --- Hans E.
You Look Great! I love the Sting Dew (haircut). --- Perry LaP.
Attractive elusive Author this Michael Ampersant!! --- Maud S.
Je sais que l'on ne s'est pas vus depuis un moment mais je ne t'avais pas reconnu. Bon crois en mon avis en femme avisée je te trouve très beau. --- Annie T.

Green Eyes --- Chapter 18: Agatha Christie

Previously, Alex ("Green Eyes") offered to give us a ride, we took him upstairs for the same, we did it, and somehow we fell asleep. 

One two three, infinity (I’ll explain later). My ass.

Alex has already left his perch as a grand horizontal when I wake up. Better even, or worse, the sheer fact that I could fall asleep testified to his untimely departure, since nobody, not even straight people, would be able to do so with the Green Eyes on top of them. And I did sleep, because I have my usual morning glory, and I am alone, as outlined already, no external stimuli present, only my sleep, and sweet dreams perhaps that I don't remember. I'm too old for spontaneous erections, it's either sexual or it's sleep (not quite true, I remember now, I had one just yesterday, but still).

Sometimes I have trouble falling asleep, and sometimes I don't know whether I did actually fall asleep before waking up in the middle of the night, but then I feel my boner, and know I slept, realizing that my sleeping is better than feared, and thus comforted fall asleep again (only to wake up at a later time with another boner (I think I should stop now)).

(It is what you think it is)

Alex is gone, at least he is not the cause of my erection, and my bed is otherwise empty. Where is Alex? Perhaps he's brewing coffee in the kitchen. I get up, and my pendulous organ—I had learned the term "pendulous organ" from Alex only hours earlier—my organ was still not very pendulous on the way to the kitchen, the place where Alex was not brewing coffee.

My world falls apart, and only the second or third time in 24 hours. Through the haze of my upcoming tears I look around. There's a sheet of paper on the kitchen table, a location where experienced tricks in my days—in the days I still brought tricks home—used to leave their goodbye messages when they had been brought up well-enough to signal goodbye before leaving—after getting up as quietly as possible, hoping to undisturb my sleep, getting dressed quietly, not using the bathroom in order to avoid noises, finding some reusable sheet of paper, and a pen, and then writing in very readable hands, usually, like, like drawing a Valentine heart, signed "M," or perhaps even signed "Michael," or, in extreme cases, writing a grammatically well-formed sentence along the lines of "Sorry that I have to leave early, Michael." Sometimes even the word love was used, carelessly, perhaps, but carefully written, since most tricks live near the literacy threshold, rarely write anything, whence their writing hand is unblemished by later excesses.

Where was I? Yes, In the place where experienced, well-brought-up tricks would leave their messages (Mother: “Michael, there is another thing that you should never forget, your exit should always be graceful, and should it happen that genetic destiny strikes and you end up as a loose homosexual, so loose that his nights are spent as one night stands in the company of other loose men, even then your exit should always be proper and good-byed”), in said place I find a re-used sheet of paper with the not-so-readable words "Dear John, I had to go, I love you, Alex," and a little Valentine heart drawn under the text (he could have encircled the text with the Valentine heart, it would have been prettier, but he didn't).

No home number, address, email, homepage link, twitter, tweet, something. Alex was gone.

Now, the situation isn’t completely hopeless, at least in the technical sense that I know where he works, so I could try to retrieve him by calling the hospital and ask for Alex, the alpha-god paramedic, (“Alexander, you know, I don't know his last name, the paramedic with the green eyes”) and it’s anyone’s guess what the result would be. Perhaps he is a medical secret, (“We cannot divulge the names or other coordinates of our staff, by law”), or not a medical secret (“You're not the first person asking for Alex in this way, you know”). Or I could, in anticipation of such answers avoid any contact by telephone and position myself around dawn near the staff entrance of the hospital, waiting for Alex like fans wait at the bühnenausgang of Wagner's opera burgh in Bayreuth for a famous singer, and ask for an autograph when the alpha-god finally appears.

There are other possibilities as well, think hospital email etc. Let’s do some hand-waving here (an expression I have yet to learn from Alex), you get the gist. Email, stop. Internet, Google. You know, I can't think in panic, so I type "Alex" in Google's main search window of my computer, today enhanced for unclear reasons by a Sherlock Holmes motif. Only more than one billion answers. Without thinking I click on the first link, which connects me to ALEX, the Alabama Learning Exchange. Good, I think, that's in the South. But not in Georgia, I realize, then my thinking stops again since the terrible truth strikes again, that I have lost the Green Eyes to a hopeless, lonesome future in confirmed bachelor county, GA, USA.

I would normally make coffee once detumescence (what a useful word) has com-menced, but don’t feel like it. Instead, I get my thoughts together and start a systematic search for "Alex," the "paramedic" of the "Memorial Baptist Hospital" in "Georgia Beach," in “Glynn county,” "GA," "US," which yields nothing. A hospital is not a university, they won't list all their staff in unreadable, smallish fonts, even people who died 20 years ago of disappearance, like Alex had died of disappearance, this morning, between eight and ten o'clock.

I read the message again. "Dear John, I had to go, I love you, Alex." Nothing, nothing in this message would speak of the future. There are no undertones, no overtones, the message is as neutral as his green eyes were (used to be) when his own studied ambivalence was undecided about a course of action. In the meager space of a few hours I had seen this neutrality more than a few times already, if his eyes talked, something was at hand, and there was nothing of the surreptitious eye language that tends to accompany the meaning-challenged behavior of people who have nothing to say, eyes too open, eyes too small, eyes winking, squinting, and so on.

A message as neutral as his eyes. Why didn't he say anything about a date tomorrow, or on Saturday, or the Blue Moon, or the beach. Why did he "have" to go. He was sleeping next to me, or on top of me, or whatever, his next shift starting, what, possibly at 10 PM or later. Why did he have to "go?" Why did he "love you," why did he "I love you," if he loved me, he would not be gone but embrace me tenderly while sticking his penis into my ass, a routine that we had practice already once, although, during our earlier cruisin' encounter, he had refrained from the poignant anatomical commentary that accompanied his later work.

"I love your work," he could have written, if I’d only shown him my blog. I mean the blog I talked about earlier, about everything and nothing, even the gay condition, perhaps he would have liked it (although I have no followers), and decided that he cannot ditch a person that's not only 'OK, gym-wise,' as he had said during foreplay, but also OK blog-wise, and he would now put his penis into my ass, or at least leave his number, and everything would be all-right.

There is a movement now in trendy USA, of which even I am aware, to replace the words "blogger," "blogging," etc. by better, nicer words, and if such words are ever found, I would not only be a good blogger, I would also be a good nicer word, and Alex would be sure to stay, but he's already gone.

I stare at the Sherlock-Homes-themed Google search window and realize that there is no deerstalker. It not about Holmes at all. It honors Agatha Christie, perhaps her thousandth birthday, and her biography comes to mind, how she had married this racing pilot, much handsomer than plain Agatha herself, and how the relationship had soured, and how she, famous already, had suddenly disappeared, gone, futsch, with search and rescue teams (S&R) in hot pursuit, until she had suddenly and without prior warning reappeared in some country inn, and never returned to her handsomer husband, and later marry a handsomer archaeologist, 14 years her junior, and they would write books together in the sense that when she would write a book he would take time away from his other obligations and also write a book, in the room next to hers.

This is the future that Alex and I deserve. He an accomplished sexologist with a lucrative clinic next door, I an accomplished nicer word behind my laptop, and we would happily live ever after, and he pays the bills.

Go here for more.

Green Eyes --- Part II (teaser)

You want to know how the Green Eyes are going to continue? Will John and Alex settle into a comfortable relationship? Will there be strife? Connubial boredom? Bliss? There will be a happy ending of Part I, OK, but what's next? 

Well, one thing that's for sure, the statue of Peggy Noonan will be repaired. Peggy Noonan what? Yes, her, the famous Wall Street Journal columnist. She's going to appear in Chapter whatever, we lost count, in Chapter 33 ("The Doorbell Rings"), where John and Alex will make a pivotal walk along the beach; Alex will talk about his depression, for the first time, and they are going to have sex, in the dunes, yet again, but before we arrive at the beach we actually have to get there:

We've arrived at the head of Beach Avenue, which ends right on the beach. There are no free parking spaces left, despite the early hour. We circle around the gigantic statue of Peggy Noonan, the famous columnist, a gift of the Republican Club to its hometown, and find a space right in front of the Tourist Office hundred yards up the road. I explain about Maurice, the exchange with Torquay, his ambitions as a playwright. "How long is it," he [Alex] says, "that we met, three days?" I have to count. We walk back to the beach, past the Noonan statue, which, in its better days, had an endless voice loop about George DoubleYou, him of the Freedom Fries, taken from one of her famous columns, educating tourists and natives about the 43rd president (“Mr. Bush is the triumph of the seemingly average American man”), but some mechanical failure had silenced the sculpture quite some time ago, and the repair work had been delayed for unclear reasons.

Peggy Noonan statue in Georgia Beach

We’ve rounded the corner of Nick’s restaurant and are heading south on the beach. A long stretch of crystal-white sand extends past Dewey Beach and runs for more than five miles along the outer banks to the northern mouth of Simons River. It’s surely one of the finest beaches of the East Coast. The sea breeze is picking up already—the land of Georgia heating up, the warming air rising, cooler air hastening in from the sea in replacement. We're walking past the gay beach section, which is still empty. This is where we met, in the no-man's land between the beach and the dunes of the cruising area. I want to say something about the dunes, then think better of it. He, too, casts a furtive glance at the location of our first encounter.

Aquarius (Jezza Smilez)

The second inauguration --- reblogged (Ross Douthat)

We usually don't do this, but a friend from Baltimore sent this real nice gif-picture, and we need a pretext to post it, and Ross Douthat writes well, so here it is ...

... and here's Douthat's NYT piece reblogged:


My fellow Americans, I am grateful for the honor of this hour, mindful of the consequential times in which we live, and determined to fulfill the oath that I have sworn and you have witnessed.

[long pause]

Hey, no, just kidding: That’s from George W. Bush’s second inaugural. I just wanted to see if you could tell the difference.

I’m going to keep this brief, because we’re all cold and there’s always a chance that the House Republicans might start imitating the Donner Party if we stay out here too long.

[broad wink at Eric Cantor]

You already know how the better angels of our nature are going to make hope and history rhyme, and all the usual fluff. So I’ll skip that part. But before my second term gets under way, I do have a few people from the last four years I want to acknowledge.

First, my dear friends in the press and on the professional left (but I repeat myself). It’s so nice to have you back on the bandwagon, guys! I’ve been surfing the Interwebs, reading the tweets, and it feels like old times. The Obama realignment is all the rage again. The thrill is back on MSNBC. Newsweek’s comparing me to Jesus. All I need is a will.i.am video to really take me back.

Freedom Fries --- Chapter 2: "The President is on the line for you!" (Part 2)

Previously, there have been hints that George W. Bush may experience a change of heart in retirement, that Samuel Fisher, founder and CEO of the Lynx (LYNX) network, is concerned about the ratings, and that George Lukacs, the charismatic hedge-fund titan, can't handle fair-and-balanced news. We've also learned that John Yoo, professor of constitutional law at Berkeley University and author of the infamous torture memos of the Bush era, is in some kind of trouble. Change of scene, and scenery: meet Alberrt, a young polymath prodigy in the employ of the Fisher Laboratories, LYNX's research arm, who's soon going to fiddle with the electronic copy of President Obama's birth certificate stored on the server of the Hawaii Department of Health---or is he?

Sangre de Christos mountains

A lab with a view. The pay is good, the canteen is okay, the other guys are usually okay, and the vista of Sangre de Cristos is an extra. Commuting is difficult, almost 40 miles, but it is a nice ride through the mesa, and the Mexican chicks in the retro bars of Santa Fe are always happy to have him back when he returns late from work. Joe always returns late from work since he has nothing else to do. He is supposed to assist Alberrt, the resident whiz kid, but Alberrt never asks for assistance, hiding instead under his head gear and doing his whiz-kid stuff. So Joe hangs around while Alberrt works late into the night — if it is work; it is possibly more some kind of therapy. Having nothing else to do, Joe play the role of a body guard, and he makes sure he looks the part with his shaved scalp.

Alberrt, with his slender body, beautiful mulatto face, short, cropped, light hair is sitting at his desk, the head gear in place, the green eyes fixed on the screen. A virgin version of Tiger Woods, sort of. Joe is bored. Everybody else has left. Joe takes the remote control of the Walkera model helicopter that the lab has ordered for unclear reasons — reasons are never clear at the Fisher labs — and decides to practice. He starts the rotor, has the thing lift off, and hover below the ceiling. It can go up and down. It can go fast. And it can make tight turns, which it does around Alberrt’s head. It can also touch down, which it does on Alberrt’s desk. The model is practically as large as a real chopper. Alberrt ignores it.

Joe crosses the out-sized room and puts his arm on Alberrt’s shoulder. “Man,” he said. Alberrt reacts to Joe’s touch, he is apparently in a good mood. “What are you doing?” Alberrt lowers his head gear. “Skinhead,” he says, “I’m into the computer of the State of Hawaii Department of Health. With System’s Administrator privileges.”

Joe looks at a large green sheet displayed on Alberrt’s screen. It says “Certificate of Live Birth” at the top, above what looks like the seal of the State of Hawaii. To the left, under “Child’s name” it says “BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA II.” According to the certificate, he was born on August 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii. The mother’s maiden name is given as “Stanley Ann Dunham,” race “Caucasian,”, the father’s name as “Barack Hussein Obama,” race “African.” He was apparently born at 7:24 pm on the Island of Oahu. The sex is male.

"We'll find your copy of Michael Ampersant's outrageous new novel Green Eyes, it must be somewhere. Don't worry!"

(Artwork by Steve Walker)

Is the pope gay?

That's the question that keeps us erotic writers up at night. And the answer is....

Georg Gänswein is the Camerlengo (chamberlain) of Pople Benedict XV (or XVII? --- who cares)

The camerlengo does all sort of things, like, like declaring the pope officially dead when the pope dies.