Girl Detective

From the Wall Street Journal, “Get Out of Your Own Way: Studies Show the Value of Not Overthinking a Decision” (link from Arts and Letters Daily and The Morning News)

The brain, they have found, appears to make up its mind 10 seconds before we become conscious of a decision….

Such experiments suggest that our best reasons for some choices we make are understood only by our cells. The findings lend credence to researchers who argue that many important decisions may be best made by going with our gut — not by thinking about them too much….

Moreover, the more factors to be considered in a decision, the more likely the unconscious brain handled it all better

These studies throw the concept of “free will” into question. If our body knows ten seconds before our brain does what the decision is, are we really choosing? Not addressed by the article is what happens when the body makes a decision, and the person overthinks and overrides it. (Story of my life, I believe.)

I am reminded of Douglas Adams’ directions for how to fly in the Hitchhiker books: Throw yourself at the ground, then forget that it’s there.

At Where the Hell is Matt, Dancing 2008. I loved this. It made me laugh and smile. And I bet 4yo Drake is going to love it, too.

Link from Jim Walsh at MinnPost and Morning News

Facebook, that is. Apparently not.

A friend from high school recently emailed that she’d joined Facebook. She’s an international athlete, and found it was a good way to stay connected to friends around the world.

I decided to test the waters, and have since found many, many friends who were already there, from all different parts of my life: family, former co-workers, neighbors, Philly friends, high-school classmates, and more. (Interestingly, no college classmates yet.)

I’m a bit overwhelmed by the scope of it, and the time-consuming possibilities. Remember back when google became a verb, because people looked up old friends? Facebook is like a school yearbook for the world. I’ve even gotten a friend request from someone I don’t know or can’t remember. What’s the etiquette for that? I may have bitten off more than I can chew, here.

I was vacuuming the basement yesterday when 4yo Drake and 2yo Guppy lost interest and ran off. I heard them laughing. Then I smelled something, and went running.

They had gone into my husband G. Grod’s office; Drake had been spraying Guppy and the floor with Endust for electronics. Drake’s shirt and Guppy’s hair were wet with cleaner. I yelled about poison. I mopped. They cried. I tried to get them out of the office; they refused. G. Grod yelled, and I hustled the boys upstairs for an unplanned bath with shampoo.

While Guppy was in the bath, Drake played with the cord on the window blinds, putting it around his neck. While Drake was in the bath, Guppy grabbed, opened and spilled the bottle of baby shampoo. They’d really learned their lesson, no?

I sometimes think it’s largely luck if children survive to adulthood. There are things we can do to help them along (like putting toxic cleaners up high, or not having them in house; sigh), but the world is dangerous and kids are curious, a dangerous conjunction.

Denis Johnson’s short story collection, Jesus’ Son, got on my radar during The Morning News’ Tournament of Books. Several judges preferred it to Johnson’s more recent book, Tree of Smoke. I thought ToS was quite good, so I was intrigued to see what Jesus’ Son would yield.

I liked to sit up front and ride the fast ones all day long, I liked it when they brushed right up against the buildings north of the Loop and I especially liked it when the buildings dropped away into that bombed-out squalor a little farther north in which people (through windows you’d see a person in his dirty naked kitchen spooning soup toward his face, or twelve children on their bellies on the floor, watching television, but instantly they were gone, wiped away by a movie billboard of a woman winking and touching her upper lip deftly with her tongue, and she in turn erased by a–wham, the noise and dark dropped down around your head–tunnel) actually lived.

This passage, about riding the train in the city, described how I felt as I read the linked stories–along for a whiplash ride. The unnamed main character is addicted to heroin and alcohol, and stumbles through bars, rehab, relationships, jobs and crime. The writing is beautiful, while also conveying both the horror and kaleidoscopic nature of addiction. The stories and book are brief, but powerful. If you like the short story form, these charted new territory when they were collected in 1992, and still resonate today.

From the New York Times, “A Drink in Search of a Frosty Mug” (link from The Morning News)

Originally, root beers were more like herbal teas, bitter infusions of roots, vines, herbs and spices, including sarsaparilla, sassafras and licorice. Nowadays, the basic components include anise, wintergreen and vanilla, with the addition, perhaps, of flavors like ginger, cloves and mint.

Out of 25 brands (strangely not named), Sprecher of Wisconsin took the top slot. Sprecher is one of my favorites, along with 1919, made here in Minnesota.

This graphic novel, Hellboy: The Right Hand of Doom, reminded me why I stopped buying individual issues of Hellboy, the darkly humorous horror comic. Publisher Dark Horse does a fabulous job of collecting them, and author/artist Mike Mignola adds lots of interesting extras. The first short story, “Pancakes”, featured a two-year-old Hellboy, and made me laugh out loud. And the last story, “Box Full of Evil,” not only gives interesting background on Hellboy (those aren’t goggles on his head) and contains some of the funniest panels of series, I think:

Hellboy: Hey…what’s that in the corner?
Abe Sapien: Is that a monkey?
Hellboy: HE’S GOT A GUN!
Monkey: [BLAM BLAM]

I first learned about the Vietnam War by reading a set of Doonesbury books: Even Revolutionaries Like Chocolate Chip Cookies, Just a French Major from the Bronx, The President is a Lot Smarter Than You Think, Don’t Ever Change Boopsie, and Bravo for Life’s Little Ironies. I don’t remember how old I was when I went scrounging around my parents library looking for something, anything, to read. Collecting the earliest strips starting in 1970, these books covered student riots, race relations, women’s rights, the Vietnam War, unemployment and more, all seen through the characters of schlump Michael Doonesbury, football star B.D. and activist Mark Slackmeyer. Butthe supporting characters made me love these books: Rufus the tutoring student, wacky Zonker, ditsy Boopsie and mad scientist Bernie. The cartoons are funny, depressing and political, and probably as good a way as any to learn about the early 70’s United States. They’re also a good complement to my recent reading on the Vietnam War.

The days of overdue books, hefty library fines and interminable waits for best-sellers are over in Chicago.

The city of Chicago just got a big tech upgrade to its library system. Patrons can now reserve and renew books online, resulting in fewer overdue books. (Link from Blog of a Bookslut)

Not, to gloat, but we’ve had that at the Minneapolis Public Library for ages. (Suck it, Chicago! Heh, heh. Just kidding.) It’s a great system. I hate to burst the bubble, though, but there are still interminable waits for bestsellers. For example, I’m 116 (of 163) on the request list for the Into the Wild dvd, and I placed the request in January.

Have you visited your local library lately?

As part of my post-Tree of Smoke reading on Vietnam, Dispatches was recommended by trusted pen pals Kate and Duff. Herr was a writer for Esquire in his mid-20s when he went to cover the Vietnam war in the late 1960’s. He spent most of his time with marine soldiers on the ground, or “grunts” and his respect and affection for them is palpable. The feeling was mostly, but not always, mutual:

…another of the war’s dark revelations. They weren’t judging me, they weren’t reproaching me, they didn’t even mind me, in any personal way. They only hated me, hated me the way you’d hate any hopeless fool who would put himself through this thing when he had choices, any fool who had no more need of his life than to play with it in this way.

Herr’s prose is poetic, and often trippy, reflecting both the insanity of the war, and the drugs many took to help get through it. He often uses second-person address to draw the reader in:

It seemed the least of the war’s contradictions that to lose your worst sense of American shame you had to leave the Dial Soapers in Saigon and a hundred headquarters who spoke goodworks and killed nobody themselves, and go out to the grungy men in the jungle who talked bloody murder and killed people all the time.

It’s an interesting counterpart to Tim O’Brien’s Things They Carried. Herr was older and had a different vantage point, and Dispatches is labeled military history, not fiction. There are also some significant differences in the Army and Marine soldiers, according each to their author. The books are different, but the same. They’re often tragic and wrenching, but redeemed, perhaps, by the telling of other’s stories to show the brute stupidity of war. They are still frighteningly relevant today, and probably timeless.

2yo Guppy woke screaming the other day at 4am, angrily yelling, “But _I_ wanted to take off my sandals, Mama! Not YOU!” I gave him some water and a pat, and we went back to sleep.

Next day, 4am. This time, Guppy hollering, “I wanted my milk, but YOU poured it out, Mama!” Water, pat, sleep.

This morning he woke at 5:45am, but not screaming. I told him it wasn’t time to get up. Water, pat, sleep.

I fear for our future relationship, if Guppy is going to clutch each day’s little injustices till they induce nightmares.

I feel as if I’m caught in a reading zeitgeist, with many online articles touching on similar themes.

At The American Scholar, William Deresiewicz details what he sees as “The Disadvantages of an Elite Education“:

[I]t makes you incapable of talking to people who aren’t like you …[and] inculcates a false sense of self-worth.

An education from an elite US university, like Yale, will reinforce the class system, and prepare students for the security of an upper-class job, not introspection and independent thought.

In “The New Learning That Failed” at The Criterion (link from Arts & Letters Daily), Victor David Hanson argues that modern universities have lost two important lessons from a classic, Western education: the value of self-criticism and introspection, and theories of exploitation based in the real world. The result, according to Hanson, is pedagogy focused on what to think, not how to think.

Hanson also notes the loss of three things that used to distinguish between what once was studied in a traditional liberal arts education, and pop culture:

an appreciation that a few seminal works of art and literature had weathered fad and cant and, by general agreement, due to their aesthetics or insight, or both, spoke universally to the human condition.

[an] old assumption that professors, through long training, were necessary to guide students through such classic texts [like] Dante’s Inferno

an appreciation of a manner of formal thought and beauty that separated some high art and literature from more popular and accessible counterparts.

Historian David McCullough echoed this idea of established classics in a recent commencement speech, “The Love of Learning” (link from Mental Multivitamin):

Read for pleasure, to be sure… But take seriously–read closely–books that have stood the test of time. Study a masterpiece, take it apart, study its architecture, its vocabulary, its intent. Underline, make notes in the margins, and after a few years, go back and read it again.

At The Times, Rod Liddle writes about books that don’t survive their age (link from Bookslut):

[T]hey seem to be books that fitted in far too comfortably with the sensibilities of a certain chattering-class elite when they were published. Remove a work of fiction from the milieu in which it was written and you remove some of its purpose and point, of course; however, with Hesse, Powell and Fowles, as with Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, you seem to lose all the purpose and point. Everything simply evaporates.

Liddle’s, though a rant, is similar in subject to Jonathan Yardley at the Washington Post on Cannery Row and other Steinbeck works (link from Arts & Letters Daily):

Not many books of our youth survive unscathed into what passes for our maturity, and many other books await that maturity before we are ready to appreciate and understand them.

For more on Steinbeck’s books as classics, see “The Rescuing of Steinbeck” at The New York Review of Books. (link from Arts & Letters Daily)

All of the preceding articles provide an interesting context for Entertainment Weekly’s lists of new classics–the top 100 since 1983 in books, movies, tv, music, and more. In the blogosphere, at least, EW’s lists seems to have quickly eclipsed the AFI’s 10 top 10, released the same week. As with any list, there’s a great deal of righteous protest: This should have been higher, that lower, this one’s missing, I can’t believe that one is on there.

EW qualifies their lists up front. They’re not only based on quality, but on influence. They include recent works, because that’s what EW does–it’s a weekly magazine for entertainment, focusing on what’s new.

A few things struck me about the lists, and the commentary on it. First, I think there’s great value in a waiting period to see if a work endures. Second, lists are only ever a starting point for discussion. Nearly every list that’s published acknowledges this, but that gets lost in the ensuing outrage. Third, I think there was a great deal of justice done in the lists for works that were critically acclaimed but not blockbusters, or for things like comics that still aren’t considered by many to be real books. Finally, my own numbers told an interesting story: 37 books, 87 movies, 67 television shows, and 46 albums. I don’t agree with all of EW’s choices, and I think they put too much emphasis on recent works, but it affirmed why I am a fan of the magazine–I like much of what the writers like, so EW is a good index of things I might like.

Minnesota is home to many famous writers, many of whom aren’t even on that list, like Kate DiCamillo, Faith Sullivan, and Alison McGhee. Minnesota is also home to many great comics writers and illustrators, as this article at MinnPost notes.

I figure it’s the tough winter that makes a happy home for artists.

I like Johnny Depp. I’ve liked Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas and Edward Scissorhands. So I thought I would like Sweeney Todd. I thought the quality of the production and acting (Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen and Alan Rickman) would outweigh the dark and gory aspects of the film.

I was wrong.

The film is so dark, and so relentlessly gory, that I spent much of it gazing at the ceiling, waiting for scenes to be done. It’s embarrassing to admit I didn’t like the film because it was too dark and gory. What did I expect? Perhaps a little more humanity, a lot less blood and violence. But the acting, the look of the film, and the singing were all top notch. And it was interesting to see the pregnant Bonham Carter’s bust and belly change size, sometimes even within a scene, depending on when the scenes were filmed.

Remember a few weeks ago when I celebrated a mother’s trifecta? Well, yesterday’s good fortune went on from there. Uninterrupted night’s sleep; hot coffee and pastry for breakfast; time to read in peace; kids playing independently so I could practice yoga; a double espresso (our machine’s still in the shop. Sigh) on the way to the park/pool; kids left pool without a fight; nap, reading and writing time; grilled Caesar, Duck confit and grilled duck on a date with my husband at St. Paul’s new Strip Club; browsing at the bookstore without buying; excellent chocolate desserts from Nick and Eddie’s excellent pastry chef. It was lovely.

Then last night was interrupted by 2yo Guppy crying for water in the wee small hours, and he was awake before 6am demanding love, attention and books. And today’s trip to the pool involved fights on either end. So life is more like usual. But yesterday was really great.

I’ve begun to reread Neil Gaiman’s Sandman graphic novels, prompted by my recent viewing and reading of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Shakespeare is but one of many sources the author draws on in this sprawling tale of Morpheus, the King of Dreams. Milton, mythology, and magic are a few of the others. The series of 76 total issues has been collected in ten graphic novels.

Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes.

You say that dreams have no power here? Tell me, Lucifer Morningstar–ask yourselves, all of you–what power would hell have if those here imprisoned were not able to dream of heaven?

The first volume plants the seeds for both the mood of the series, and many of its later stories. Morpheus is captured and imprisoned for decades. Once released, he seeks revenge and to regain his power. It’s sometimes hard going, but the whole is well worth the reading. Don’t stop before issue #8; you’ll miss something wonderful.

Sandman: The Doll’s House. From the introduction by Clive Barker:

There is a wonderful, willful quality to this mix: Mr. Gaiman is one of those adventurous creators who sees no reason why his tales shouldn’t embrace slapstick comedy, mysterical musings, and the grimmest collection of serial kills this side of Death Row.

The tales diverge, and Rose Walker, an American teenager with a peculiar provenance, becomes the heart of the story, with Morpheus appearing on the fringes.

Sandman: Dream Country. Of four standalone short stories, my favorite is “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, based on and around Shakespeare’s play, and beautifully illustrated by Charles Vess. It was the first, and last, comic book to win a World Fantasy Award. (They changed the rules for the award so it would not happen again.)

Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot.

It’s 4yo Drake, growing up. He has a handful of bedtime friends from when he was an infant: Mouton, a sheep blankie; Daisy and Duckie, stuffed ducks; Googly Fish; and Snake, from Ikea. When he was three, during what I thought of as his age of imagination, he would fashion a car out of the snake, put the other animals inside, then say he was going in the friends’ car to the friends’ house to play.

In a recent swirl of tidying, I picked Mouton off the floor, held her up and said, “Drake, Mouton belongs in bed, not on the floor. The floor hurts her back.”

“Mom,” he said gravely. “Mouton is a _stuffed animal_. She doesn’t have feelings.”

I paused as the emotional wind got knocked out of me, then tried again.

“Even if she’s a pretend sheep, then she has pretend feelings, right?”

“OK,” Drake replied, then grabbed the sheep and tossed her on the bed.

It’s funny and sad to see a stage about to end. It always feels like certain things will go on forever, until they don’t. Interestingly, 2yo Guppy is getting picky about his loveys just as Drake has become less interested in his. Today Guppy had a brachiosaurus jump on my head while I did yoga, insisted on Snuffles the bear and Binky the triceratops in his crib for naptime, and let the pigeon pick out books to read.

May and June mark several personal anniversaries:

10 years ago: I moved to Minnesota and met friends Big Brain and Blogenheimer, and the future Mrs. Blogeheimer.
8 years ago, I began practicing yoga. Still can’t do a headstand or crow pose–8 years of humility.
6 years ago I started blogging, after my friend M. Giant told me about his blog, Velcrometer.
4 years ago, I resigned from my job to stay home with my son Drake, who’ll be 5yo in August.

All good things.

I sought out Karen Hesse’s Newbery Award winning Out of the Dust after reading Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath. Both are tragic stories about families from Oklahoma’s dust bowl during the Great Depression; that’s about where the similarities end. Out of the Dust is a short, spare novel in free verse, narrated by 14yo Billie Jo Kelby. More details might spoil the reading experience for others. Sad but redemptive, it’s a beautifully written historical novel.

Last weekend, my husband, G. Grod, and I went to the Guthrie Theater to see A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I wore a dress, heels, lipstick AND mascara. It was truly an event.

Joe Dowling directed, so we knew to expect a crowd-pleasing, rather than an intellectual, take on the material. The fairy costumes were appropriately ostentatious, but looked like leftover Cats costumes. The play had other similarly dated cultural references, not surprising given it’s a revival of a production Dowling did over a decade ago.

I find the Guthrie succeeds best on a small scale, rather than when it tries to emulate New York City. The fairy productions felt weighted down with effects and gimmicks, as well as by pedestrian musical numbers. But the smaller scenes, especially those of the players, were successful. The final scene featuring their play within a play went long, but was one of the funniest parts of the production.

I followed the play by reading the text. I savor the familiar lines, like Puck’s “Lord, what fools these mortals be,” and Lysander’s “The course of true love never did run smooth.” It is not a play in which it’s good to be a woman. Hippolyta does not seem nearly as eager as Theseus to wed, perhaps because he “won [her] love, doing [her] injuries.” Hermia must choose among death, marriage to a man she doesn’t love, or a nunnery. Helena is spurned by her former lover, who wishes to marry the unwilling Hermia. And Titania is bewitched by Puck and her husband Oberon into loving the foolish mortal Bottom, whom Puck has disguised as an ass. While the ending is replete with the weddings required for this to be a comedy, I didn’t enjoy this earlier play of Shakespeare’s as much as I do the later romances.