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?"
"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.)