San Francisco (2) ("Sex im Zeitalter seiner technischer Reproduzierbarkeit")

Right. "Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter..." Even readers of The New Yorker will know, this was Walter Benjamin. What they don't know, what even I didn't know at the time, I went to school with Walter Benjamin, sort of, in the sense that the house of his (Walter's) parents was located right opposite to my primary school in Grunewald, Berlin, Germany. He was born there. I didn't know since I didn't know about Benjamin at the age of 6 through 11, and because the plaque that informs post-nazi Germany about his birthplace had not been in place so soon after the war.

Walter Benjamin

Reader's of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung will certainly know (about Benjamin), Germany's newspaper of record, although a bit less than the New York Times (the record), because they (the Frankfurters) had been leaning a bit too far to the right (then). They sound more balanced now (the FAZ), (are you still there?) (nice, isn't it, running your own blog, no anal copy editor to deal with), the layout has changed (the FAZ's), and square miles of its tree-based newspaper space are now dedicated to large, pictogrammatical pieces of artwork so that Germany's post-intellectual elite doesn't have to read so much. The German sounds different, too, a bit more modern. What sounds surprisingly old-fashioned is an article in the last weekend edition of the FAZ about sex and the internet. I didn't keep the copy of the paper, so this is from memory (stupid). (See below for more about Ampersant's hyper-parenthesization).

San Francisco (1)

"We're on our way" (no, actually, "I'm on my way") was the sad swansong of an aging Phil Collins eight years ago. Well, we are on our way now, even arrived in San Francisco already, but stopped over in Frankfurt, Germany, at the Hilton Garden Inn of Frankfurt Airport, the Ikea among the Hilton brands. Right next to the entrance for the Hilton Garden Inn there's the entrance of the Hilton Frankfurt Airport, The Hilton among the Hilton brands, and both outfits share a common atrium, 11 floors high. We're sent up in Hollywood glass elevators to the 11th floor, to room 1126, and an atrium bridge sends us to the other side, the Hilton-hilton side of the atrium.

Not painted by Piero della Francesca

Everything is new here, including the smallness of a room that radiates the coziness of a mansarde of three-pane insulation windows 6 inches thick, and a fashionable bathroom design (if bathroom designs can be radiated (lol, (loller)))---a fashionable bathroom design of misleading tiles that look like hardwood but are made of materials from Mars (this sounds unintentionally old-fashioned but there's no way to salvage this sentence anyway).

We take a shower. Shower and bathtub are integrated, as usual in hotels, and our eye falls on the sink.

Now what?

Have you ever seen a sink like this? Yes. Have you ever seen a sink in this location, right at the center of the tub? Come on, it's not so difficult. It's all about sex, or at least foreplay. You understand if you ever tried in a traditional bath tub.





In the next post we'll hazard a mini-essay about sex and modernity, which, if it were written in German, would be titled "Sex im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit."

Go here for the next SF post.

Turtles all the way down

You'll figure this out yourself (2)

George Washington boozehound (reblogged)

Andrew Sullivan found this for us here: 

Indeed, we still have available the bar tab from a 1787 farewell party in Philadelphia for George Washington just days before the framers signed off on the Constitution. According to the bill preserved from the evening, the 55 attendees drank 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, eight of whiskey, 22 of porter, eight of hard cider, 12 of beer, and seven bowls of alcoholic punch.

That's more than two bottles of fruit of the vine, plus a number of shots and a lot of punch and beer, for every delegate. That seems humanly impossible to modern Americans. But, you see, across the country during the Colonial era, the average American consumed many times as much beverage alcohol as contemporary Americans do. Getting drunk—but not losing control—was simply socially accepted.

Reality meets art (Glenn)

Find a caption (Glenn)

Find a caption

(In Seattle they have a sex cinema with a sign outside: "Veni, vidi, veni." Along those lines, how about "Fail, fame, fail?")
(Okay, just trying.)

Bank Kapi (2) (Mr. E.) (A year in shorts --- teaser)

Mr, E., yes, Mr. E., the mysterious blogger behind the brilliant blog 50ShadyGays has finished his book, and here's another teaser, the second part of the first chapter, titled "Bang Kapi." It's out, the book, it's on Amazon, scroll down for the link. (Artwork by Bob Bienpensant).

He is distracted and his eyes are searching for some stimulation and they come to rest upon the slender hips of our geeky-looking waiter. James’s eyelids squint a gluttonous moment of gratification, and in a hideously Freudian moment, his conversation ambles towards obscenity as he recounts the tales of his new lover’s sexual exploits.

“I love to feel his rock-hard cock inside me...”

I try very hard not to care, or even to let his words take effect, but there is something primal in imagining true horror. Already my overactive imagination has concocted a revolting picture of smooth, tanned skin greedily exploring the folds of James’s over-indulged rump. I bulk at the thought of his muscle-weak corpulence receiving the attention and the care of anyone, but why should I care? My prissy judgment says more about me than it does about him.

It strikes me that I am being hypocritical about this. In asking myself the question, “why would anyone share such intimate information with virtual strangers?” The irony is not lost on me. I have looked back at my own blogs, postings and articles, and I cannot fully understand my motivations for discussing my sexuality. Is it pure narcissism? Is it indulgence? I’ve not ruled these explanations out; however, I maintain that human sexuality is a natural aspect of our lives that frequently gets distorted. I feel to some degree that my sexuality has been hijacked. I’m not sure of the exact moment it happened, but all of a sudden, I felt the language of gay discourse no longer included me. It began to serve a privileged elite who publicly proclaimed their love and sought to marginalize the cruising that has, at its heart, an authentic engagement with the sexuality of men.

Why do we post this? (Green Eyes teaser: 500 million spermatozoa can't be wrong)

Because...





...we have a pretext, a clip alluding to Part I of the Green Eyes, Chapter 42 (500 million spermatozoa can't be wrong):   

An anchorman and an anchorwoman appear in the beaming studio and greet each other expansively against the backdrop of the police department’s parking lot. Assorted vehicles are still parked there, and Charleze (the local reporter), is still on location. "The top story today is so breathtaking, it is positively, absolutely, and definitively unbelievable," the anchorwoman (“Olivia”) enthuses, “Charleze has more." Charleze expansively greets anchorwoman (“Olivia”), who expansively greets back. Next to Charleze a man is standing whom we know already thanks to our interest in family blogs. Hunnsbruck is dressed this time, dressed to kill, you’d say, or at least dressed to advocate innovative punishments for police department homicides, so he’s emphasizing local roots with a light seersucker suit of modest stripes and cut. The reporter turns to the seersucker suit and introduces him as the youngest DA in the history of the galaxy: "When we arrived on the scene this morning," Charleze explains to Hunnsbruck, "having been alerted by vigilant members of the Georgia Beach community to the unsettling traffic on the lot outside the local police department, right here where we are standing, rumors were swirling that an officer has been shockingly shot dead inside and that an assistant district attorney from your office is implicated. Does the size of the CSI vehicle” (pan on the white-cubicled truck) “points to the size of the crime committed inside?"
“Splendid”—Maurice.
"Thank you for having me on"—Hunnsbruck.
"You are always welcome"—Charleze.

And now, in unison: “Thank you”—both.

A brief moment of recovery, Charleze catching some breath. "The word is, Sir, that Lieutenant Blake Jackson of the Georgia Beach police force was shot dead last night."
"Although I’ve never had a chance to meet him in person, I am convinced that he is, or was, a truly wonderful person. My thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends at this difficult juncture."

"We have to interrupt briefly for this message," Charleze informs Hunnsbruck, who gracefully cedes the floor to a risqué soda commercial with a curly-blond girl, the wind-surfer back of a hot male (only the back), and a soda bottle. When finally allowed back, Charleze and Hunnsbruck have obviously had a chance to follow the ad on their return video—so Charleze suppresses a giggle when asking Hunnsbruck: "Sir, this is a shocking crime, is it not,” (her left hand gesturing, digits splayed, dramatic nail-paint-jobs exposed, the right hand doggedly clinging to the phallic mike) “is it not a shocking crime when a trusted member of the local police force is shot dead while in full discharge of his duties. How do you feel about this?"


Are you still there? Then you'll possibly like the GREEN EYES. The first part is out now, available as Kindle book on Amazon, under this link:

"click"

Family material

In a bow to romantic romanticism, Bob Bienpensant has managed to produced a non-pornographic picture; behold:

Shaolin monks training session

How not to use dope

Make it full screen, stare at it for the duration of the forty seconds it lasts, the look elsewhere. Apparently, the Strobe-illusion tricks your brain to release the drug DMT, in small quantities, and for a minute thereafter you enjoy real hallucinations. The walls undulating, and stuff. Really works. Great. As if we had nothing better to do.

The view (of the slopes) again ...

...yesterday...

...and this morning.

I knew it, I knew it

(Glenn)

Hair by Brad Pitt (2)

(Let's see how many hits we'll get)

Crocodile hates model (Glenn)

Déja-vue

I was re-reading George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-four" in preparation of a review of Dave Egger's "The Circle," (Facebook as new totalitarianism), when this message from Tagged@taggedmail.com arrived in my mailbox:

To self-publish... (Glenn)

...or not to self-publish?

(Glenn sent the link to this picture, which is to be found on Walmart called, your photos are ready.)

The religious war is over

Bang Kapi (Mr. E.)

Mr, E., yes, Mr. E., the mysterious blogger behind the brilliant blog 50ShadyGays has finished his book, and here's a teaser, the first part of the first chapter, titled "Bang Kapi." It's out, the book, it's on Amazon, scroll down for the link. (Artwork by Bob Bienpensant).

I had descended with some trepidation. It felt like I was looking for justice, but here in Bangkok there is no justice, only karma. The motorbike taxi driver who had greeted me at the entrance to my condo was particularly feral, he had skin tight jeans and oil stained hands. He reeked of Thai Whiskey, cheap cigarettes and fingering. A heavy night weighed down on his eyelids, and I could see the morning sun was not his friend. He drove like a lunatic and decided to have an argument with a girl on his phone while we were speeding on the burning overpass. Now I am sitting in a soulless shopping mall, listening to a fat, old drunk who is dressed like a clown. He is talking and all I can hope is that this grotesque scene is merely a shadow dancing on the wall of my imagination.

“...You see it was the seventies and it was a whole different time back then...”

I’m not exactly sure why I had arranged this meeting with James, it is the third time that I have met him. I suppose I had become fascinated by the twisted turns of our conversations, I don’t know, I have always been drawn to the macabre. As he pours Whiskey from his silver flask into his paper Starbucks cup, I am still trying to figure this all out.

He’s talking again but I’m not really listening. I acknowledge the clangs of the dropping names which animate his anecdotes, but these people are meaningless to me. Who are they? It’s a list of notorious drunks who were all celebrated at some point for being, “such fun.”

James Farnham is now both spiritually and physically redundant, he does little more than consume in order to maintain a veneer of usefulness. He looks like something that might have knocked up Ronald McDonald’s mother at a traveling fair back in the 1960’s. Beneath his rubber mask and bright orange wig, his thinning hair is dyed sandy brown. As he removes the mask and the wig to drink his coffee, I cannot help wondering where the wig ends and his hair begins. He likes people looking at him. He absorbs attention along with everything else.

Bürchen again

We arrived yesterday. Here's a view of the main ski run.

Be yourself

Not photoshopped

Downtown Los Angeles

Yesterday ---- Part I: We must buy condoms today

Not the Green Eyes, folks. Instead a visit of friends from Australia in early November 2013. This is Part I of a short story of three parts. Enjoy:

No, it wasn’t yesterday, it was three days ago that Josh and Jason arrived in Cannes. We had to pick them up at the train station---a semi-lit location with password-protected toilets tucked away under an ugly overpass that divides the town into two. The announcement screen goes dit-dit-duuh-dit (d#--g--g#--d#), the TGV noses into the station, I wonder briefly what would happen if I lose my balance and hit the tracks, but Josh and Jason pour out of the sliding train doors in front of us just in time.

Josh hasn’t changed at all since his last visit. Jason I never met before, but he gets chatty immediately, it feels like a conversation left dangling an hour ago.

Thinking outside the box

Redirected (Jacky)

(Jacky has a new movie out:)  

Jesus Christ! (Plus Roman abortion clinics and the conversion of homosexuals)

No, she won't go away, Sarah Palin. And she can't because the left wages War on Christmas. And not only Christmas, but all the other Christian holidays they can lay their hands on as well.

Sarah Palin

So Sarah goes on FOX to promote her book against the "War on Christmas" and says:

"It makes me so gosh darn angry. The liberal left in this country has targeted Christian holidays and is trying to secularize them right out of existence.

"When Jesus celebrated Easter with his disciples there were no Easter bunnies or egg hunts. There were no Easter sales at department stores or parades in the street. Easter was a special time of prayer and Christian activism.

"Jesus would gather all the townspeople around and would listen to their stories about the meaning of Easter in their lives. Then he would teach them how to love one another, how to protest Roman abortion clinics and how to properly convert homosexuals.

"You can't even do things like that these days without getting called out by some wacko left-wing human rights group. Christians had more freedom under Roman rule than we do now in our own country! We need to return Easter back to the way it was when Jesus was alive."

She says this in an interview on FOX news. Now, Easter was celebrated first in the second century AD to commemorate Christ's resurrection. One always wonders whether Palin and her ilk actually do read the Bible --- according to the biblical record, Jesus had disappeared from the cave where he had been laid to rest, and later reappeared as wraith to his disciples and before his ascension to heaven. He did not celebrate anything on that Sunday following the fatal Friday night of his crucification --- but never mind.

Computer says "No"

This is funny...(Sacha)

...for a while. In fact, it took us a few years to understand that "bonjour" is more important than "s'il vous plait." We've commented on this before, here.

Green Eyes --- Chapter 32: The humble worm C. Elegans

Previously --- John fell in love with Alex. That's the most important thing. But other events interfere, such as the rape of Maurice, a friend who lingers in the hospital at the moment, or the attempt of the rapist to eliminate Maurice as the witness to the crime (Maurice survived thanks to John's interference). John is about to leave the hospital and go home, where his Tea Party father awaits him.

I'm on the Coastal Highway again, driving home. Some new billboards have gone up, or changed their tune---right, next week is Georgia Beach Week, the so-so attempt of the local business community to replicate Woodstock, or Burning Man, and put our town on the map by means of a local festival. It’s always themed, the Week of Festive Sales, and this year it’s vampires. Men and women with extreme fangs have replaced dental paste and Pampers on the bill-boards, the undead appearing with their fangs next to the fresh, ever-reborn face of the new mayor. I'm behind as usual, I haven't even seen the latest installment of Twilight. I'll have to ask Luke about this and fetch some food anyhow for tonight.

Caenorhabditis (“C.”) Elegans (enlarged)

I tell Luke about my truck and the galactic Merc man. Luke is quite interested, I even tell him about the ‘Armani minimum,' he likes that, too. "Keep me posted," he says.
“The Week is coming up, with vampires. Your work?”

Saturday matinée (reblogged)

For unclear reasons we were sent to the Tumblr page about surrealism, and here's the result:

Very deep (Glenn)

Green Eyes --- Chapter 31: I expect you to die, Mr. Bond

Previously --- well, basically we fell in love with Alex. That's actually the most important thing. But other events interfere, such as the rape of Maurice, a casual acquaintance who lingers in the hospital at the moment, or the attempt of the rapist to eliminate Maurice as the witness to his crime.



We've been here before, right, I’ve seen these eyes before, and the person to whom they belong, and I know this room, a hospital room with a bed between my vantage point and the window, and lying on this bed is a person I know as well, wait, it’s Maurice, the guy who is dozing. A hint of concern, how does it look in the greenest eyes of the world?

My field of views widens until I realize that I'm a patient myself, lying on a bed next to Maurice's bed, more or less in horizontal position, my head between the ears of a pillow. The head section of the pliable mattress is inclined somewhat. "This head section, it's inclined at 35 degrees, right," I say (I don’t know why, but it’s the sort of thing I do). Alex laughs.
"You’re getting dangerous," he says.
"What am I doing here?"
"You were getting dangerous," he replies.

A spy flick comes to mind, with a German accent hovering above an encumbered spy who's strapped to some torture bench but asks in an odd gesture of helplessness: 'What do you expect me to do?' and the German accent replies: 'I expect you to die, Mr. Bond.'

 Sean Connery and Gerd Fröbe in Goldfinger (1964)

I tell Alex. Alex laughs his dry laugh again. The more I make him laugh, the more he’ll give me his email address. I raise my arm, trying to clutch his arm in an awkward gesture, he understands. We never held hands before. "Why don't you give me your email address," I ask.
"You've got anything to write?"
"I'll remember it."
"It's Alex-six-five-five-three-seven at gmail dot com. What's yours?"
"That’s almost a phone number."
"Two digits are missing," he says.
"Come to think of it, it's not a bad idea, helps you to remember your own number."
"Until you move out of state."

Digging too deeply: The boys of the summer (Cathy)

We have been in vivid contact with Cathy, the soul of Hollywood hates me, her brilliant blog. And she has started this series about song lyrics. And we suggested the song The boys of the summer by Don Henley, a song that plays a role near the end of part one of the Green Eyes (Nick, the owner of Nick's restaurant, performs it at one of of darkest moments of John's brief life), and also at the beginning of the second part of the Green Eyes (we explain later). And she listened. So here it is, her analysis.

By popular request ("popular" means "one person," right?), here comes an analysis of Don Henley's The Boys of Summer. You know you can't wait to learn what this song really means.

Nobody on the road
Nobody on the beach
I feel it in the air
The summer’s out of reach

Our first verse opens in September. Everybody's gone back to school, except our singer. Possibly he's a dropout, possibly he's too old for school. All he knows is that, man, it was great when everybody was back in town for the summer, hanging out at the beach and on the road.

"Stop looking so happy. I really miss you guys!"

Sunday matinée

Yes, it's a fox. We met him/her a few days ago in the Esterel park nearby, perhaps one klick from the house. The picture was taken by Seong-gon, our friend from Jeju, Korea. 

Sagittarius (Jezza Smilez)

International children's day

Erosion

Heavy rains washed a lot of debris into the sea this morning---the stream ends up in the left corner, next to the marina---and you can see the border between the muddy rain water and the sea water. 

Interesting, isn't it?

And while we are at it...our Korean in-laws are still visiting...

Sunday matinée

We were at such a low, we considered joining the ranks of tasteful bloggers and post this picture for the Sunday Matinée...

...instead of, say, this one...

But then we discovered this article about the X-factor applied to Italian writers (link), clearly a phenomenon we failed to appreciate when starting to write the "Green Eyes." The article has a link to a Monty Python sketch, a sketch you doubtlessly knew already, but we didn't, so here it is:

Sometimes we need some pun (1) Glenn

The fattest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi. 

I thought I saw an eye-doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.

She was only a whisky-maker, but he loved her still.

A rubber-band pistol was confiscated from an algebra class, because it was a weapon of math disruption.

No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.

A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering. 

A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.

Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.

A hole has been found in the nudist-camp wall.. The police are looking into it.

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

Dr. Urknall

The Dutch CVB, or whatever the alphabet soup, sends us a new European Insurance Card. Because we had discovered belatedly in the ER of the Spital Visp, CH, that the old card had expired. ER? Yes, as in emergency room. Because we had gone deaf.

 (If you continue reading, there's a payoff) 

We use ear plugs when we can't sleep. The wax from the plugs talks to the organic ear wax, canals get clogged, hearing gets impaired. We attempt to clean the ears but push the wax deeper into the canals until we go completely deaf. Which is quite something. You step into the street and get killed. You say good-by to Mozart and Lady Gaga and the telephone and to the relationship with your lover beyond anything but the soundless exchange of bodily fluids.

 (If you continue reading, there's a payoff) 

I had hoped that some natural process would provide relief and foster a recovery of my hearing. I wait one day, two days, three days. Nada. So I give up and flee to the ER of the Spital Visp, a place I know well. Dr. Ursprung is not around, unfortunately (follow the link). I explain my case. People listen patiently. I listen patiently. It's like you're listening to the Urknall (the Urknall was silent, there was no atmosphere to carry sound).

 (If you continue reading, there's a payoff) 

They ask me to rest on the emergency bed (gestures, folded hands put to your (their) left ear). I lie down. Wait. "Wait!" Where is your European Insurance Card? I don't understand. Somebody gets a piece of paper and writes "Europäische Versicherungskarte." Aha. I find my wallet and flash the card. There's a picture of Obama on the card (just kidding). Everything is fine. Somebody will take my blood pressure. The nurse looks quite concerned.

 (If you continue reading, there's a payoff) 

They try all sorts of things. Liquids dripped into my ear, compassionate facial expressions, electrodes applied to my testes, prayers, Alpine cleansing rituals, shaking heads. Shaking heads. It's my fault because the European Insurance Card has expired. The healing hands are raised in despair and I am sent to the local Hals-Nasen-Ohren doctor who cleans my ears with a nanoistic vacuum-cleaner and ask for 108 CHF in cash. I can hear him loud and clear and pay and call the Dutch alphabet soup and ask for a new, valid, European Insurance Card. Which arrived today, the card. I'm not making this up.

If you are still there, here's the payoff:

Read my lips

And the mandatory fragment from the Green Eyes? From Chapter 20 of course, My father and your father were fathers:  

We're talking about John's father:

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.

History of the world --- Venice (3)

When yours truly arrived in Venice 25 years ago for a brief sojourn at the Business School, Massimo, his correspondent, picked him up at the airport and took him to a down-town café stuffed with pastries, liqueur bottles, and high tables inviting patrons to stand and drink sprits, small glasses of white wine with a schuss, a few drops of Cinzano, say. The spritz then was the stuff of true Venetians, tourists wouldn't know and drink Chianti or Campari instead---if they would drink in the morning, that is, because true Venetians had two spritzes at breakfast. Habits have changes in the meantime; the spritzes have tripled in size and been taken over by tourism, so true Venetians refrain from the stuff and drink lager instead.

"I'll spritz you."

I spent two weeks in Venice as a non-tourist and learned a lot, especially about tourism. Already then, Venice was almost completely touristicated---cool, folks, what an ugly word, "touristicated," but the spell checker doesn't recognize it so it's possibly a neologism¹---, and the locals behaved like a dying breed. They would avoid tourists like the plague, would only patronize their own restaurants (hidden away in secret alleys where the food was three times better), would not speak English, would not know about directions, would not make appointments because you only had to step into the street to meet friends, would sit on roof-top terraces and enjoy life, would spend week-end afternoons in secluded gardens (not having sex, by the way, just dozing off jointly for a few hours), would recognize the voices of the passing gondoliers at night (while still enjoying life on the roof-top terraces)...