Thursday 10/7/21
A couple of lighthearted anecdotes with which to begin. People like that game two truths and a lie? I don't, because I'm not a fan of lying, and the point of the exercise, it seems to me, is to convey something surprising that says much about the person in question, but I never find it surprising, and I never find that it says much. My takeaway is invariably, "Okay." But these are two truths. Well, not truths in the larger sense. They just both happened.
I worked so far past the point of exhaustion that yesterday I awoke at 7:57, which is the latest I have arisen in years. I haven't gone into what I've been doing as I've not been in these pages much this week. Almost eight o'clock! Shocking.
The other day someone asked me how many times I've seen the Beatles live in concert. This would put the C-Dawg in his sixties.
Of course, that wasn't the reason for the query, but rather that people have no idea when the Beatles existed. Which sounds impossible. But it is true. I told someone this, so you know what they did? They went home and asked their wife what the best concert she ever went to was. She didn't have an answer. So then this guy says the best concert he ever went to was the Beatles. We're the same age. She accepts this at face value, and asks who he went with, to which this fellow said he went alone. She then said he was lying, that he must have gone with Colin.
Ah.
We then fell to talking the day after. I would bet you that less than 1% of the people in this country know about Normandy. I bet you very few know who this country fought for its independence at the end of the eighteenth century.
I'm aware of these things when I write. It plays a part in how I write. Because my aim is to reach people. Connect with them. No reader left behind. But you watch these talentless idiots write, and no wonder no one likes it or could like it. They're writing for their colleagues. As if to say, "Te he he, did you get that, no one else will get that, we're so smart, we're better than everyone." I both do 1. Smarter and 2. More accessible. That's something else they hate and envy when it comes to me.
Perhaps this text exchange was inevitable:
C: Beatles tickets are on sale. We should go.
C: Sitting on the water listening to them now actually
J: It would be nice to catch Lennon's solo act too
J: We should go though
C: Eh. They'll probably just play the new shit, not the hits
J: Thank God those patriots fought for freedom in that war against Ohio so you can enjoy a beautiful day on the water
These are different texts:
C: You know what I've learned with publishing types?
C: Doing bad, boring work in the same manner and style of other bad, boring work = good
C: Doing good work that is fresh and likable = bad
C: It throws them off completely
C: When they're thrown, they're not smart or secure (confident) enough to process what's going on
By the way: when I wrote a feature for The Atlantic on the Beatles's 1963 BBC recordings in 2013, they spelled Beatles as Beetles, and I had to go in and correct this about thirty times. Again, you're almost always just dealing with idiots at these places. At The Atlantic, those idiots are also bigots (like Ann Hulbert, for instance; more on her soon). They even wrote "Beetles" in the contract.
These are some things I recently put up on Twitter. Because they are intelligent things, no one is going to want to have anything to do with them. Which is what happens every time. And a state of affairs I must reverse if I'm going to get anywhere.
The way I look at the ALDS for the Red Sox is it’s house money time now. This is further than anyone thought they’d get. Play loose, play smart—stop running into outs—and take your shot against a tough and complete team. A house money team can be dangerous.
Listening to Oasis at Knebworth in August 1996, I am reminded that for a brief period of time, Liam Gallagher possessed one of the greatest instruments in rock and roll history.
I’ve always dug Bonanza, and today I learned that Lorne Greene built his house as a replica of the Cartwright spread on the Ponderosa. Even the inside. Like he really was Ben Cartwright.
In the 1928 World Series, Babe Ruth had an OPS of 2.022. Teammate Lou Gehrig had an OPS of 2.433. This has to be the most dominant that two teammates have ever been at the same time in the history of sport.
Great writers don’t have a style. A great writer has total command and the ability to always invent anew. The better the writer, the more variety from work to work, such that a reader can barely believe the same human produced all of it, and yet the paradox makes perfect sense.
Of the mid-1930s Universal Karloff-Lugosi pairings, The Black Cat is the masterful entry, and arguably America’s finest horror film. The Raven is pure cheese. Not that well done, but irresistible, with Lugosi as the Poe fan boy who goes a mite too far.
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