Winston-Salem's Lone Beatnik

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

2010-10-04T12:29:00.000-04:00

Since moving into my new apartment, I've done something very arcane that harkens back to a bygone era-- I've subscribed to an actual newspaper. Now, it might not surprise you that the paper to which I subscribed was The New York Times. I subscribed to the NYT when I lived in Austin and I never picked up/renewed the subscription when I moved to North Carolina, in part because I was so busy with classes and what not I knew I wouldn't be able to read the paper regularly. But now that I have a little bit more free time, coupled with the new apartment, I decided it was time to re-subscribe.

Anyways, there was an article in the August 24th issue that caught my eye and was about (at least in some respect) something I love so very much: coffee. The article in question deals with the places where many of us go to have our coffee in addition to read/meet up/work/write/hang out/talk with people-- the coffee house. The article itself was titled "The New Coffee Bars: Unplug, Drink, Go" and discusses how many new coffee shops and coffee bars opening in NYC are forgoing couches/abundant table space/countless power outlets to prevent people from bringing their laptops and spending lots of time there, while instead favoring counters and high chairs that are closer to a "bar" setup. The article then discusses one example of these newer coffee bars that has been opened in Brooklyn, Café Grumpy, which the article goes on to describe as being

[O]ne of a growing number of coffee bars that have opened recently around the country, particularly in New York. Instead of idling at a chair, customers at these establishments stand or perch on a stool to down a cappuccino or an iced coffee at the counter. By doing away with the comfy seats, roomy tables and working outlets that many customers now seem to believe are included in the price of a macchiato, the new coffee bars challenge the archetypal American cafe.

Coffee-bar owners say that while space and rent can be considerations, they’re installing counters because they create a lively environment where it’s easy to have a quick, convivial exchange. “There’s clearly a philosophy behind the coffee bar,” said Christian Geckeler, who describes his ongoing odyssey to taste the country’s best coffee on Manseekingcoffee.com. “It puts the emphasis on the coffee and the barista.”

The article, by Oliver Strand, goes on to discuss how more and more coffee "bars" are popping up and that they are closer to those seen in Europe. While there are some cafés in Europe that lend themselves to more leisurely coffee consumption, there are also many more that are places for quick cups of espresso modeled very much after a bar (and you don't see as many people with books and/or laptops at the more expansive cafés either). But in America, by and large, every coffee house is in that "café" model where people can come and stay, often using laptop computers or reading or sitting and talking. I can understand the value of each approach, and thus I can understand why some places are moving from that "café" model to the coffee bar style especially in these tough economic times when real estate is a premium and places don't want to rent the space required in addition to the other overhead to have that "café" environment.

I think it's interesting that this was a piece that came out of New York and focused on the changes in New York for two reasons. One is that Greenwich Village is probably the breeding ground for this American café/coffee house model (something I'm acutely aware of given my academic interest in Kerouac/the Beat Generation/50s and 60s counterculture) but also that I never really thought that New York was overflowing with those kinds of cafés where people could just... sit and be. In New York, such a premium placed on space as well as the general go-go lifestyle that pervades The City That Never Sleeps. While cities like Austin and San Francisco, cities that have a slightly less hectic and relatively "newer" feel to them, seem logical to have lots of cafés and coffee houses, cities like New York (except for Greenwich Village, which is a bit of an anomaly) and Washington D.C. and Boston don't really lend themselves to those kinds of establishments. Those aren't cities where sitting around and spending time just... sitting is really normal behavior. So I can understand why a city like New York wouldn't universally accept places like your average café-style coffee house and would shift towards this "coffee bar" style. Nevertheless, I thought it was interesting and was worth talking about here.

But something else I wanted to also touch on was what good/what purpose these café styled coffee houses serve and why I think they should persist and have some presence in the grand scheme of things. Some people like to use places such as these if they don't want to pay for internet in their home/apartment/hovel and thus take advantage of the (usually) free internet you can find at your average coffee house. And if that was the case all the time, then I can understand why coffee houses might want to go to a different model to keep people from "setting up camp" and instead promoting turnover and more customers. But, as someone who has internet in his apartment yet still frequents (with an almost ridiculous regularity), I still go to these places and write/browse the internet/read and I know some people wonder why that's the case. I mean, wouldn't I be able to work better if I was in isolation, by myself in some private place? Well that's not the case, at least for me. I find that if I'm in total isolation, if there isn't some kind of ambient or distant activity around me that I'm not able to focus. If there's a vacuum and nothing else besides me, I tend to fill it by getting distracted and doing things other than the things I need to be doing. But if I go to a coffee house, I can put on my headphones and listen to music (which allows me to focus) but I don't feel so isolated and alone because there are things going on around me as well. It makes you feel isolated and that you can do what you need to do, but you don't feel so alone that you're distracted by that solitude. It's hard to explain, and it might not be that way for other people, but that's the way I feel and I know there are other people who feel the same way. While the idea of spending all day in a coffee house working and writing might sound strange (and lazy) to some people, I'm here to say that it has some value beyond the free wifi and thus that model of coffee house should not be immediately dismissed. I understand why certain places might want to go to that "coffee bar" model, especially in a city in New York, and I think they serve a great purpose in that European model. I just also believe that the café style has a place and serves a purpose (at least for people like me) and I would hate to see it disappear completely.

Literary Polygamy

2010-09-10T16:53:00.001-04:00

I recently heard an interview on NPR's Talk of the Nation with the author of an article for the Chicago Tribune by cultural critic and book reviewer Julia Keller. Keller recently wrote an article on a subject that was of particular interest to me. Keller's piece examined the whole idea of only reading one book at a time and the stigma that goes along with someone who reads more than one book at a time, yet how that approach might be better or yield a greater and more enriching reading experience. For me, this was an issue that hit very close to home as I am someone who almost always has more than one book going. Now part of that was by virtue of being an English graduate student, so I had my class reading in addition to reading I would be doing for other academic projects and then things I would read for "fun" or outside of the literary world.

I've tried to only read one thing, and I remember really sticking strictly to that pattern for my non-class reading as a sophomore in college. I guess, as I became involved in the English/literary scene, I thought there was a certain seriousness involved with only reading one book at a time and that was the way things went. But even as I read one book at a time, what Keller calls "serial reading," I found myself getting hung up in certain books and eventually needing to read something else to break things up. As I put it, I "cheated" on the book I was reading with another book that I was maybe a little more excited at the moment to read. And like so many things where we make "one time exceptions," my whole system came tumbling down and I began reading multiple books at a time.

And, like so many things, there is a good and bad side to reading multiple books at once. Of course it enables you to learn and discover a much wider range of things. Some books take more time to read than others (and I'm not just talking about page lengths, but certain styles or subject matters tend to be denser and slower reading as opposed to others) and closing off your reading experience limits the things you can discover. But the flip side of this, and what ends up happening to me a lot, is that we don't always finish what we start as we move from one book to another. The list of books I started reading and then "lost track of" as I began to read something else that stole my attention would be a very long one, and it's unfortunate because there would be some great and important books on that very list. But I don't think it has anything to do with how good or bad the given book is, but it is all about how we, as the reader, feel at that moment and this is a point that Keller touches upon in how she organizes her reading. Keller writes:

Life, I maintain, is enriched year-round when lived amid a multiplicity of books, all of which you're reading concurrently. You can juxtapose a melancholy book with a more hopeful one, a great fat shout of a book with a whisper-thin one. You can mitigate an intimidating hunk of literary fiction such as Jonathan Franzen's meaty new novel "Freedom" with a light, palate-clearing sprig of chick lit. You can deliberately set books against each other — the eloquent misogyny of a Philip Roth novel such as "Sabbath's Theater" (1995), say, can find itself stared down by a novel such as Margaret Atwood's "Cat's Eye" (1989), a story predicated upon the audacious notion that women possess souls as well as bodies.

In that way, books are a lot like songs and albums and sometimes we will listen to a certain kind of music at a certain time of day, but maybe we don't want to listen to that later when our mood is different even if we haven't listened to the entire album. And in that same vein, the book we would read in the afternoon might be different than the one we reading in the evening and that might be different from the book we read before we go to bed. Keller also writes of the synergy that can emerge by reading multiple books at the same time, and I think there's a great deal of truth and potential in that point. Then, if you are learning or discovering something in one text, it might illuminate something you might not have noticed in another. This happens a lot in the English classroom, as students will often bring up books they read in other courses in different classes with different professors. So what makes it wrong to take that approach and move it into the world at large?

I don't think that my way is better than reading one book at a time, nor do I think that serial reading is vastly superior than reading many books at a time. Yes, you might end up not finishing some of the books you start if you are reading multiple books at a time, but if you're forcing yourself to read one thing because it's the only thing you're reading then you might not get everything out of it. It's really about what works best for one's given mentality and how they are wired. As someone who enjoys multi-tasking and who also has many diverse interests, I find myself almost having to read multiple books at a time to satisfy my intellectual curiosity and the breadth of my interests. Now I try to balance things out in some ways. For example, I try not to have too many novels going at once, and I try to balance fiction with non-fiction and even within the non-fiction I like to break that up a little bit (books about current politics, history and sports) and even different genres and styles (novels, short stories, poetry, essays). But even though I understand why exactly I read multiple books at a time and have a rhyme and reason to my approach, it's still reassuring to know that I'm not the only one who thinks about these things.

Movie Review- Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

2010-08-31T09:00:00.000-04:00

Everyone has their summer movie, at least it seems that way amongst my friends and peers. There's always the one movie, usually a big one, that comes out during the summer that someone gets really excited about. While there were lots of candidates out there this summer (perhaps, most prominently, Inception), I knew which film was going to be "my movie" for the summer, and it was the one I was certainly the most excited about. That movie was Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, directed by Edgar Wright (who previously directed Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead) and based on the graphic novel series by Brian Lee O'Malley. The film tells the story of Scott Pilgrim (played by Arrested Development's own Michael Cera) who lives in Toronto and plays bass in a band called Sex Bob-Omb and dates high schooler Knives Chau (played by Ellen Wong) until he sees Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who moved here from New York City and falls in love with her. However, there is one condition if Scott wants to be together with Ramona-- Scott must defeat Ramona's 7 evil exes in video game-styled fights.
After hearing that they were making this movie, and then reading the graphic novels and seeing the trailers, I knew from the beginning this was going to be a movie that appealed to certain people (of the geeky persuasion, like myself, and people around the same age as me) and those people would like it, and it would not register at all with people on the other end of the spectrum.

Discerning the "stakes" or the goals for a film like Scott Pilgrim is important to evaluating and reviewing it. Wright had a difficult task ahead of him, because he was tackling an adaptation of a series of graphic novels with a solid following and that presented him with a lot of material. Six books, seven evil exes... there's a lot of ground to cover in the span of a 2 hour film, but I think Wright did a good job of synthesizing the material in order to make the film work. Wright incorporated all the main and important plot points, as well as the more important or central... flourishes (?) that one sees in the graphic novels. Of course, having read all of O'Malley's graphic novels, I knew there were things that were either left out or ideas that were incorporated into the film in other ways. Wright's adaptation proved to be faithful for the most part to the overall narrative of the source text, and thus avoided the potential pratfalls of adapting a book into a film. Like I said, Wright was jumping into the deep end by taking on a story that provided so much backstory and potential, but I think he by and large did a good job incorporating and synthesizing and deserves a great deal of praise for that given the high degree of difficulty with this task.

Michael Cera did a solid job as the titular title character Scott Pilgrim, hitting the right notes and following through on the model presented in the graphic novels. My one problem with Cera is that he's too nice/cute/innocent and sometimes Scott Pilgrim needs a little bit of an edge and a kind of... jerkiness that Cera doesn't really have (at least in my estimation). That's what makes the Scott Pilgrim character interesting and real-- he's not a perfect guy all the time. I mean, he's not "bad" and he's an easy character to like, but he's human and young and thus he sometimes doesn't do the best things and makes mistakes, especially in regard to relationships and the opposite sex. I think casting Cera prevented Wright from really developing that aspect of the character, though Cera does bring out the earnest and sweet side of the character. Again, this might be a choice made by Wright, to de-emphasize that "side" of the character, to keep the film under control. I don't think this took away from the film at all, and now I have a hard time thinking of anyone else who could play Scott Pilgrim, but I do think that the "other side" of the Scott Pilgrim character had to be underplayed a little bit because of that choice. However, that has nothing to do with Cera and his performance, and I think he did a great job and made the character we saw on the page translate onto the screen. Winstead, playing Scott's beloved Ramona, was outstanding and did a great job with the character and keeping it pretty close to the Ramona we see in the graphic novels. I've heard some criticisms that we don't get enough in the way of backstory and so the characters occasionally come off as flat, and sometimes I think Winstead falls victim to that, but I also think that attitude is part of the character. Winstead does a great job of getting the complete Ramona, as someone who is trying to escape something and protecting herself, which necessitates a kind of distance and coolness. Also, there is a certain erratic-ness and eccentricity to Ramona we see in the graphic novels, and I don't think the people who levied those criticisms understood that.

Beyond the two leads, Ellen Wong was very funny as Knives Chau, the high schooler Scott dates before he meets Ramona. In addition to that, there were also standout supporting performances by Anna Kendrick as Scott's sister Stacey, Allison Pill as Kim Pine, Sex Bob-Omb drummer and ex-girlfriend of Scott and Kieran Culkin in a scene-stealing performance as Scott's gay roommate Wallace Wells. I won't go through and talk about all of the evil exes because there are, you know, 7 of them, but I thought two really stood out-- Brandon Routh as one of Ramona's exes who is a vegan and plays bass in a band with Envy Adams, Scott's ex-girlfriend who broke his heart, and Jason Schwartzman in a hilarious turn as Gideon Graves, the ultimate and final ex that Scott must fight. Schwartzman does a great job as the slimy and (for lack of a better term) douchey ex-boyfriend, the "boss" ex-boyfriend to use a video game term, and does a great job of bringing the Gideon we see in the graphic novel to life.

Now, that kind of video game jargon is very appropriate, as the film is shaped according to video game aesthetics and those sensibilities dominate the film. This is another thing I've heard the film criticized for; those critics have felt that the whole "video game" aspect of this film, particularly as seen in the fight scenes, wears thin after a while. But Wright stays true to the source material as the graphic novel is totally infused with this kind of video game knowledge and sensibility, and consistently uses it throughout the film. Perhaps it is because I am of a certain generation and I've responded to this film, but I didn't find it particularly distracting or redundant. I mean, complaining about the video game motif in Scott Pilgrim is like complaining that Lord of the Rings is too fantastical or there's too much stuff about space in Star Wars. The movie, like the graphic novel, is very much participating and existing in a world of video games that is inhabited by people who are aware of those things, and thus it has to be a central part of any adaptation of the story.

The film itself is beautiful from a visual perspective, at times frenetic (especially during those fight scenes) with a certain futuristic beauty. It's beautifully rendered and that makes it fun to watch, not just because of what is happening but also because of how the action occurring on screen looks. My biggest criticism of the film, something that I think hurts the film a little bit, is the ending. I don't want to get into it too much so that I won't spoil it for anyone, but I will say that the ending feels extremely tacked on and a little bit forced. It felt as though Wright had an ending he needed to reach, but they didn't leave enough time in the film to reach it naturally.

After seeing the film for the first time, I've read statements by Wright about the ending and how it was affected by the publication of the final volume of the graphic novel series, things that perhaps explain why I feel the way I do but it doesn't make those feelings about the ending any less real. I'm happy with the ending they chose, but I just think the way they got to it was lacking and felt extremely rushed and thus took away from its power and immediacy. Also, I didn't like the way Wright deviated from the source material in the final fight with Gideon with how he used Ramona and Knives, particularly how he used them interchangeably., though I won't say anymore about that here. Though I think it yielded an interesting conclusion and emphasized the theme and notion that we can't run from our past but we have to live with it, it ultimately felt a little strange and like too great of a divergence from the source material. Wright did such a great job leading up to the ending, but I feel like he lost a little bit of control at the end and it fell a little bit flat and didn't live up to the promise set up by the action that preceded it. I also have some interesting thoughts and criticisms in regard to the ending, but I don't want to get into those thoughts here, as I don't want to spoil anything. But if you have seen the movie and want to hear, just let me know in a comment and I'll e-mail you my thoughts.

Even though the ending of the film feels a little rushed and tacked on, I don't think it takes away from what this film is-- an entertaining, fun, exciting and sweet film. There is an earnestness and sweetness to the romance between Scott and Ramona, and that love between the two characters really permeates throughout the entire film and makes it more than just a highly stylized video game-esque movie. There's heart there and you want to see Scott earn the hand of his beloved Ramona because you see how he is willing to fight on behalf of her. The heart and the sweetness is what makes this film a cut above, and that's definitely a result of Cera and Winstead as well as Wright's direction.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is (in my estimation at least) a perfect summer movie that strikes a balance between the showy visuals and action of most blockbusters while also infusing those aesthetic achievements with a heart and romance that stands up on its own. The actors are great and do a good job with their respective parts, with Michael Cera and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in the lead roles while there are also scene-stealing supporting characters throughout the film. Yeah, I'm not a big fan of the ending, or perhaps I should say the pacing of the ending, but I think that has more to do with my position as someone who has read (and loved) the graphic novel series and less to do with Edgar Wright's direction. It's a bit unfair to hold that against the film because there is much more room for pacing and setting up an ending, just like there's more room to further develop certain characters who don't get as much attention in the film... but I can't help it. Those criticisms, however real and true they are, don't sour the entire film though. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a fun and visually stunning film that geeks (like myself) will love but will also resonate with anyone in the 18-27 demographic, as well as people who love the interplay of action (and fantastical action) and comedy. Edgar Wright has done a great job with the adaptation of Brian Lee O'Malley's graphic novels and takes the magic on the page and brings it to life on film. A supremely entertaining film with a killer soundtrack as well, I give Scott Pilgrim vs. the World a B+ (though I'm grading on a bit of a curve because I'm familiar with the source material) and would definitely recommend that you go see it, especially on the big screen.

On Not Being Back at School

2010-08-25T09:30:00.004-04:00

For what has seemed like forever, the fall has always been "back to school" time. I know this isn't the strangest feeling in the world to have, since most of us spend the majority of our lives (or our young lives at least) in some kind of school-- elementary school, middle school, high school and potentially onto college. But this association of fall and "going back to school" and the anticipation that goes along with that time was truly solidified within me when I made the choice (at least in my own mind) to continue on the academic track and be involved with that world as my chosen career as an undergraduate. I thus was under the impression that fall would always be "back to school in one capacity or another; it would just be a fact of life. But then last spring happened, and staying in school stopped being an option, at least for the time being.

Now it's fall again, or perhaps I should say it's "back to school" time. Most of my friends are still in graduate programs and they are getting ready to take classes and start reading and working on papers and things like that. Those people who aren't still in school in one form or another are either starting jobs or have been employed and thus have a job. While all these things are starting or continuing, I'm... not doing anything and I feel completely empty.

Now, I know there's a reason why I'm not doing anything right now-- namely, the LSAT course I'm taking doesn't start for another couple of weeks and I know I still have some time before I need to get working on all my applications. But I'm still filled with this emptiness, this lack of definition because I'm not in school and I'm not "working" and it makes me feel like I'm not totally myself.

I know I could undertake a full on job search and find something/anything, but I know that probably isn't smart if I want to make the best effort in terms of my applications to law schools and English PhD programs and American Studies PhD programs. I felt like one of the biggest problems with my application effort last fall was that I was way too busy between class work, my work at the Writing Center and getting the ball rolling on my thesis, and all those other complications and responsibilities kept me from sending out the best applications I could potentially make in some form or another. Thus there is a reason why I'm not throwing myself out into the job market right now but I still feel like... I should be.

There's a certain emptiness that I've been feeling, or perhaps I should say a weightlessness that comes with a lack of purpose. I'm not a student anymore and so I feel much more insignificant and lacking in self worth. In that regard, I'm definitely looking forward to having my LSAT course start in addition to applications to schools becoming more of a reality, even though I know I'm going to hate all the work and miss being able to set my own agenda and do the things I want to do during the day. But at least I'll be back to being a student in some capacity and I'll be able to experience the purpose and focus I've taken on for this fall. I know I shouldn't be feeling this worthless because there's a reason for all this (I will have a purpose, namely taking a standardized test and applying to a lot of programs, very soon) and yet I worry that it won't be enough and this alien feeling that makes me feel distant and cut off from everyone (especially people who are still in school) won't be going away.

For the first time in a long time, I'm not a student and I'm not getting ready to go back to school after a summer break. I'm not going to have the structure of classes and reading assignments and papers (now there will be work/studying/reading for the LSAT prep course, but that's not the same as a class class). I feel like I've lost a big part of my identity by having lost this (at least for the time being) life of a student, and it's definitely made me feel like I'm not quite myself. Not being filled with nervous excitement and anticipation the night before the first day of classes is going to be extremely strange, and it's something I'm going to have to deal with.

In a weird way, I'm excited for all those people who do get to go back to school and re-enter that world. Maybe I feel like I'm living a little bit vicariously through them. Though I know I'll be happy I'm not in the midst of papers and huge reading assignments by the time the middle of the semester rolls around, it's also always going to be weird for me to not be in the thick of it even as all my friends are. I know it's trite for me to wish and hope that all the people starting up school will enjoy it but... do enjoy it, and enjoy the optimism and opportunity that comes with a brand new semester and definitely don't take it for granted like I did at times.

This post might be a little self indulgent, and I'm complaining about things I really shouldn't be (my "job" is going to be applying to schools and taking a standardized test-- CHILL OUT!) but it's definitely a real and pronounced feeling within me, and thus worth talking about. I'm probably making a bigger deal out of this than I need to be, and all this might subside after a couple days. But all I know is that it's the first day of school and I'm not a part of it and it feels really, really strange.

Outside My Comfort Zone

2010-08-20T09:00:00.001-04:00

My dear friend Ashley, who is quite a prolific blogger, has introduced me and many other people to the world of vlogging. Ashley vlogs quite a bit herself and even instituted something called VEDA, in which she vlogs every day in August (Vlog Every Day in August, thus VEDA). She's been very proactive about vlogging, trying to get people to try it and to become a part of that community and that world. Well, I was inspired by one of her most recent vlogs and decided to film one of my own. The subject matter of my vlog, like Ashley's, are the books that I'm ashamed to say that I haven't read. It's definitely a topic I've thought a great deal about over the years and a list I've been going over in my head for many years. But feel free to share the books that make up your list as well as what you think of mine. But perhaps more importantly I want to hear what you think about the vlog format and if it's something I should try again in the future (though maybe using subjects and topics that aren't quite as unwieldy). I hope you enjoy it!

Letters With Character

2010-08-04T10:00:00.002-04:00

A couple months ago (where did the time go!), I saw on Half Deserted Streets a post inspired by another blog (in conjunction with a book) about writing letters to your favorite literary characters and I also could not resist writing a post of my own that centers around letters to my favorite literary characters. After checking out the entries for my two favorite authors, I definitely felt like I needed to do this because... well, they weren't very good and missed the point and what those authors were writing about. To be honest, I think Letters to Dead People did a much better job with those two and I enjoyed it a lot more or at least it didn't make me as angry, especially the Kerouac one. Seriously, go check it out and you'll see it's pretty off base, missing the point of the book and playing into the stupid stereotypes of Kerouac's masterpiece.

OK I'm done with that rant, and now here we go, writing letters to fictional characters.

Dear Frederic Henry,
Look, I know this hurts. There's no denying it doesn't, and the world is a place that hurts people. You even said as much yourself. It's not worth me saying "don't let this affect you" because it's going to. You did say that "the world breaks everyone" but you also have to remember that "afterwords many are stronger at the broken places." The world is a tough place, harsh and unfeeling and often taking away "the very good [and] the very brave" and it's not fair. Yet it also allows us to be stronger after we have been broken, and after that we are better prepared to face the harshness of the world and the next wounding it will present us with.

But I also want to share something that a man with whom you have a great deal in common said- "the world is a fine place and worth the fighting for and I hate very much to leave it." You've experienced the worst the world can throw at you, and there's going to be a tendency to give up on the world because it takes away those who are good so often. But that's not it, that's not all the world is. It's also a place that can be good and thus is worth our pain, our struggling and our fighting on its behalf. I'm not saying what happened didn't hurt and won't continue to hurt and stay with you, but you have to "be strong at the broken places" and remember that it is worth it to continue on and worth it to fight for this world.

[BONUS]

Dear Sal Paradise,
Don't stop. Don't ever stop. The road is hard at times, and will continue to be hard and difficult and weary but it is those difficulties that validate your statement-- "the road is life." Life is hard when one strives to be great, to do something and to make some change or effect upon the universe. Life becomes easy when we stop striving for that and settle into something comfortable and easy. Too often in the modern world, we see people taking that easy way and getting "off the road" as it were. We need people out there who are moving, staying on that hard road to show us how one should do it and that we should strive and quest for things, things that might even seem out of reach. Some might say you're too Romantic or your wasting your time racing across the country, that you should settle down and get a job and contribute to society. But I'm going to tell you that's totally untrue and that the best and greatest thing you can do is to stay out there "on the road" and refuse those shackles that many would impose upon you. We need you out there to remind us of the power of the Romantic and the quest and the journey. In short, we need you to save us from ourselves and what we have created, so please don't stop.

[Postscript-- I really don't feel like I did this justice and I could have gone on/said more/taken more time but I needed to get this out there, put a bow on it and deem it finished. It's not perfect but it is something and it works.]

Making Moves

2010-07-30T09:00:00.001-04:00

This is my life right now:

Filling boxes with clothes/books/DVDs

Getting things labeled and ready to move to the...

NEW APARTMENT!

Right now we're gradually taking loose stuff over, like food, other kitchen things, some clothes and other miscellaneous household items, which are being thrown into bags and boxes and then transported to the new apartment in anticipation of the big move. This big move will include the furniture (couches, bookshelves, the bed, tables) and the other, larger things (the TV, stereo, microwave, etc etc).

Anyways, posting here will be sporadic at best as I finish up the move and get settled into the new apartment. However, I'll probably continue posting smaller updates (photos, quotes, maybe smaller pieces I write) at my Tumblr. But wish me luck with the move and expect lots of photos of the new apartment once I get everything set up and unpacked!

"Sometimes I feel like I don't know, sometimes I feel like checking out"

2010-07-23T10:00:00.000-04:00

I think one of the most interesting things that we, as consumers of art in all its forms (music, film, books, etc etc), experience is how we come to really love a certain piece or work. It's not always the same process. Sometimes we know instantly, as we're reading or watching or listening to something that it is going to be a favorite of ours and connects to who we are in some essential way. But what I find more far more interesting is how our opinions about a piece of art can change and grow, shifting from the apathetic (or negative) to the more positive (and vice versa of course). It's interesting to see how one grows and changes, and thus how something that didn't have meaning in the past gains greater meaning in the future.

As someone who consumes a lot of art, I've seen this happen to me. Books take on different meanings if I read them after time passes (this happened when I revisited Hemingway at the beginning of my masters degree), and movies I did not like when I was younger are now amongst my favorites.

This happens a lot with music too, and I think it's the realm where these transitions are the most pronounced. It's interesting to think about the bands I've liked for long periods of time and how my favorite song by that given band shifts. My favorite Bob Dylan, or Beatles, or Bruce Springsteen song has all shifted over the years, as one that I thought was my favorite a few years ago often becomes one I play less frequently. But this whole process is perhaps the most pronounced with my favorite band, U2, and the songs that I play the most frequently by that band.

To be honest, this has all been a rather roundabout way of getting to talk about one of those songs of which my opinion changed as the years went on and is now one of my favorite. When I first heard it, it was a song about which I didn't have any strong feelings. I would listen to it if I was playing the album it was on all the way through, but if I was just skipping around from song-to-song it wouldn't be one I would actively seek out. But sometime during 2009, all this changed as I began to hear this song with fresh ears and it quickly became one of my favorite U2 songs, and one I would put forth as one of the best overall by any band or artist. The album was Achtung Baby, and the song was "Ultra Violet (Light My Way)."

Maybe it was because I needed to get older and have my musical tastes mature and grow, but this song that I initially passed over and didn't take super seriously is now something I would put forth as being one of the best songs I know and an example of how great a rock song can be. What was fitting, with this song becoming one of my favorites, is that it was also a song that would make a comeback on U2's latest tour, having not been played since ZooTV in 1992-1993, so it was a song that was being presented to a new group of fans as I was independently reconsidering the song. But what I really wanted to do was break the song down and look at the specific points, parts and pieces that make it so great and this blog seemed like a good place to do that.

Like so many of the great U2 songs, there is a certain urgency and tension to it. In the case of "Ultra Violet" it is projected outward and driving rather than the inner tension of a song like "With or Without You" or "One," both much more restrained and quieter but also very urgent. Sonically, the song reminds me a bit of "In God's Country" from The Joshua Tree, with the very rhythmic guitar line played by The Edge. But while "In God's Country" comes out of the very organic and earthy world of The Joshua Tree, "Ultra Violet" takes that guitar style and adorns it with the electronic and futuristic trappings of the world of Achtung Baby. Larry Mullen Jr.'s drumming also gives the song a great beat and contributes to the frenzy of the song itself. But the bass, played by Adam Clayton, is responsible for one of my favorite moments in the song. It's a very, very brief one but it's something that I really love. Right before Bono sings the third verse, Adam has a small bass... flourish (?) in the short interlude between the chorus and verse. It's not something I noticed initially, or even after a few repeated listens, but as I listened to it more and more it became my favorite part. Sometimes I feel like it's those little things, the flourishes or nuances , that make songs great and stand out to us as listeners.

The frenzy and passion that sonically runs throughout "Ultra Violet" is probably the main thing that makes this song special for me. It was so much energy and power to it, but it's not energy for the sake of energy nor is it out of control and just raw power. There is a tremendous amount of emotion, energy and power yet it is controlled and released in appropriate waves. This is particularly the case in Bono's singing, as he starts out singing in a very deep and controlled voice for the first verse and then building to a frenetic and emotional tone by the third verse, before the ending chorus that is a full release of energy that is unbridled and out of control. You really see the way this builds and how Bono's mood and the tone shifts throughout the song to build towards a powerful conclusion in the live performance of the song. In particular, the ZooTV performances of this song really emphasize this, so I'll point you towards this YouTube video:

The flashing lights, the way the drums and Larry Mullen's rhythms overtake the song, and then how Bono's singing is out of rhythm and not synced up with the beat, it's really a masterful performative act. It's easy (or relatively easily) to stay in control the whole time, and it's easy to just be out of control. But to start out in control and gradually let the sound get out of control and let emotion and power win out? Now that, to me, is the hallmark of a great song.

But the song isn't just about the sound, as the lyrics are quite good as well. The song itself is a love song, which is... strange, in some respects, for U2. I mean, the band has songs about love but it's love in a bigger sense, rather than merely the interpersonal man-woman love on which so much rock music has been based. But this is a song about that kind of love and thus is filled with that kind of passion. Though there's some interesting imagery being used, I absolutely love the final verse of the song:

I remember when we could sleep on stones.
Now we lie together in whispers and moans.
When I was all messed up and I heard opera in my head
Your love was a light bulb hanging over my bed.

Then you follow that with the repeated "Baby baby baby, light my way" and you can really understand the passion and the love that the narrator (ostensibly a "he") feels for his beloved (ostensibly a "she"). It is a love that is overpowering, in which he needs her to "light [his] way" and be the one who saves him.

[NOTE: I say narrator because I think we too often do with singers and songs what we do with poets and their poems-- assume the speaker of the poem is the poet, rather literally. We can certainly and safely assume that this song's lyrics are imbued with Bono's own experiences and feelings, but it would be silly to assume it is based on a specific experience in his life. Anyways, sorry for that tangent...]

It is highly devotional and that's where the power really comes from. It's not just about wanting, it's about needing someone and a love that is more powerful than anything else. This is where we get the lines The Edge sings in his falsetto after the second and third verses before the chorus: "ultra violet love." It's something different, that can't be seen but is there and remarkably powerful. Also, and apropos of nothing, I absolutely love that line about "[lying] together in whispers and moans." It's a very physical and sensual, and I think "whispers" and "moans" play well off of each other. OK OK, I don't want to turn this into a literary analysis paper... I mean post, but the lyrics are definitely a big part of this song for me as well and make it such a great one.

Well, this has quickly become one of those posts that I've lost control of and I don't really know the point I was trying to make. To be honest, I don't really know if there is one, besides the fact that "Ultra Violet (Light My Way)" has claimed a spot near the top of my list of favorite U2 songs and that's something that is a bit of a surprise to me. While many of the songs I think of as being the best or my favorite were the ones that jumped out upon first listen (or listens), "Ultra Violet" was a song that flew under the radar for me. But seeing as how I've written around 1,500 words about this one song I think it's safe to say my opinion of it has changed to the point where I would put it forth as one of my favorite songs to listen to. I guess the point I want to make is that one should keep an open mind with art, particularly with music and songs, because your preferences can change and shift to the point where something will sound new upon a repeated listen. Don't be afraid to re-visit things and try them again, and more importantly to allow yourself to change your mind and opinion and to let things shift and change as you grow. Yeah, that seems like the driving force behind this post.

And, oh yeah, go listen to "Ultra Violet (Light My Way)" because it's really really good.

10,000 words (or 10 pictures) about Austin

2010-07-21T15:30:00.000-04:00

Look, we all know it would be strange if I didn't post something that was nostalgic for my time in Austin while lauding the many, many, many, many great things about the city. Well what I thought about doing was something a little different, and I'd post 10 of my favorite pictures of Austin (though not ones featuring people I know, rather the scenery) and talk very briefly about them.

These are the cupcakes you find at Quack's, a coffee shop and bakery very close to my old apartment in Hyde Park. They make all the stuff from scratch right there, but what's even more amazing is how they look. They're just as visually stunning as they are delicious, but they are incredibly delicious as well.

A Mexican Martini from Trudy's TexMex restaurant, a staple as far as Austin drinks go. They are extremely delicious and great paired with enchiladas or some other TexMex meal. But you can only drink one- if you drink two you won't be feeling so good... or perhaps I should say you'll be feeling a little too good.

The famous Epoch Coffee, open 24 hours a day. This is where most, if not all, of my best writing was done while I was in Austin. There were many nights spent here, cranking out papers at the last minute while fueled by a cup (or multiple cups) of coffee, and most of the best writing for my undergraduate thesis was done here, as I sat at one of those many tables. If Epoch was in Winston-Salem, my masters thesis would have been a lot easier to write and it certainly would not have taken as long as it did.

The Downtown Alamo Drafthouse at the Ritz Theatre. Not my Drafthouse of choice (the abundance of parking and the variety of films at South Lamar put it over the top) but it's still a Drafthouse. It was also here that I won the Dionysium debate and proved that the Beat Generation was vastly superior and more important than the punk rock movement. Plus, I love the retro stylings of the theatre and especially the aesthetics of the sign and the exterior, which lead me to...

This sign, one doesn't have any real significance in the grand scheme of things. I saw it one night when I was out for dinner down on South Congress but I always liked it. As I'm sure you'll discover, I take a lot of pictures of things at night and this picture is definitely an example of that. That said, it reminds me of South Congress in some strange way.

The Capitol Building at dusk. Having the state's capitol building so close was definitely something I took for granted during my years in Austin, but it was always amazing to be able to look down and see the seat of the state's government right there.

Again, another example of how much I love taking pictures at night, especially of urban settings. This is a picture from Sixth Street looking at the Frost Bank building, one of the most prominent and famous sights in the Austin skyline. I've never been to this building, never had a reason to, but I've seen it so many times and it's something I always associate with Austin and especially downtown.

The famous Daniel Johnston "Hi, How Are You" mural just off the Drag near the campus. Here's Daniel Johnston's Wiki bio, if you don't know who he is. But Johnston's is definitely a part of the culture of Austin and its history, so it's funny to think I've walked by this mural so many times and not even thought about it. It is one of the things that people (or at least a certain segment of people) associate with Austin, yet I would walk past it on my way to lunch while never really thinking twice about it.

The main tower, lit up in burnt orange with a #1 to commemorate our victory in football over USC in the 2006 Rose Bowl to claim the 2005 BCS Championship. Seeing my school win a national championship in football, beating a team in USC that I had absolutely no love for, and all during my 1st semester at the school I wanted to go to all along after having to spend a year someplace I didn't really want to be? It was a pretty incredible experience and easily one of the best parts of my time in Austin. This picture will always be one of my favorites as it reminds me of those good times and the fact that, in 2005, we were the national champions.

Finally, a picture of that same main tower from the night of my graduation, lit up burnt orange with an "08" on it as well to commemorate the University of Texas at Austin Class of 2008 of which I was a member. And, oh yes, there were fireworks being shot out of the tower as well. It was a graduation ceremony unlike any other schools, and the fireworks display was the perfect end to a great day of celebrating the hard work and energy I put in during my time at UT. It was a great graduation, a great time, and a great way to wrap up and put a bow on my academic career at UT. And thus, this makes a lovely picture as well.

Movie Review- Inception

2010-07-19T09:45:00.002-04:00

Inception, directed by Christopher Nolan of Memento and, perhaps more famously, Batman Begins and The Dark Knight fame, has quite possibly been the most anticipated film of this summer. There was one of Hollywood's most prominent directors and Nolan's first film after the smash hit success The Dark Knight and then you include a cast filled with some of the biggest stars out there, from Leonardo DiCaprio to Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page and Marion Cotillard. This was a movie that was on most everybody's radar and topped countless "must see" lists for film goers in the Summer of 2010. And thus, there I was sitting in The Grand in Winston-Salem at midnight to see the first showing of Inception, eagerly awaiting whatever fantastic story Christopher Nolan cooked up and was going to play out before us.

The film tells the story of a team of thieves, led by Cobb (played by DiCaprio), Arthur (Gordon-Levitt), Eames (Tom Hardy) and new recruit Ariadne (Ellen Page), who are collectively contracted by Saito (Ken Watanabe). But these aren't thieves in the traditional sense, for the stealing they do is in the mind. Cobb and Arthur were trained by the US military to infiltrate other people's dreams in order to gain information. However, Saito does not contract them for extraction but instead for "inception," the incredibly difficult and nearly imposible task of placing an idea within the mind of another, namely in the mind of Robert Fischer Jr. (played by Cillian Murphy) to break up his father's company, which is a rival to Saito's own. Here's the trailer for the film, which will give you a little better idea as to what the film is about:

Even with my own description coupled with the trailer, I know I'm only scratching the very surface of what is a very complex film. It's a hard film to briefly describe, but a fascinating one to investigate and consider. Now, I know most (if not everyone) is going to love this movie and I'm sure it will earn a spot on nearly everyone's end-of-the-year best films list, and thus I want to be contrarian but... I absolutely cannot. Inception is good, really really really good, an outstanding and well-made film and I think the bulk of the praise goes to Nolan.

Nolan, who wrote the film as well, creates a world on the screen that is complex but not so complex that you lose your way as you watch. He crafts something that is intricate with many layers and complexities, yet manages to not be obtuse and refusing general understanding. The visuals in the film are amazing as we see in the dreams the scenery and the world that surrounds the characters being bent and torn apart right before our very eyes. Nolan has taken a huge step forward in directing as well, visually commanding the camera. One can see how he's grown as a director from The Dark Knight to this film. Nolan creates a world that is amazing to even witness, while not even delving into the film's narrative. Nolan blends old and new, retro and futuristic, to make something that is remarkably pleasing to the eye and that you want to see. The art direction and set design, as well as the cinematography and camera work, deserves a great deal of praise and should be in the running for the appropriate Academy Awards when the nominations are announced.

Inception is thematically rich as well and thus will be a film that will stand up to intellectual consideration and intense discussion as the years go on. What I thought was most interesting was the way the film played with the idea of genre. There were elements to the film that were out of science fiction, particularly echoes of The Matrix as there was an alternate reality located solely within the mind or divorced from the physical world. In addition, there were elements that were positively film noir-ish, while I was even reminded of Oceans 11 and those other heist films that occupy a genre unto themselves (something the great Will Leitch picked up on as well). But beyond the invoking of different genres and style of films, we see Nolan considering the ideas of the subconscious, considering how dreams affect us and our thinking as well as the very power of an idea. One of Cobb's lines in the film really hammers this point home:

"What's the most resilient parasite? An Idea. A single idea from the human mind can build cities. An idea can transform the world and rewrite all the rules. Which is why I have to steal it."

Beyond being a science fiction-y/noir/heist film/psychological thriller, Nolan is also exploring the very nature and the power of ideas, and thus the creative process as well. It also reminded me of that line in V for Vendetta about how "ideas are bulletproof." But Nolan took ideas and made them (ideas) as valuable as money and the most important thing, which reflects the age we live in in so many ways. These themes and the consideration of the power and complexity of the mind, as well as this seeming exploration of different genres, is what makes this film a rich one and pushes it beyond the mere science fiction/psychological thriller film. Also, the layering of time (with the distinction between the "real" world and "dream" worlds) was very well done and gave Nolan room to explore and play with the action. (I hate saying things like this but...) The layering of time, and how time was portrayed in the film, seemed decidedly postmodern to me, as time within the different worlds were layered upon one another and stretched out in one point while not in another.

The film's cast and their performances were all great as well, and everyone did a good job with their respective roles. It was particularly interesting to see Gordon-Levitt and Page in this kind of film, filled with action and psychological drama that they didn't really have to deal with in their other films. I mean, I still see Ellen Page as Juno, so seeing her in a film like this was startling at first but I though she did a good job, as did Gordon-Levitt (whom I will always think of as being in 10 Things I Hate About You). DiCaprio was strong as well, and displayed the acting chops he picked up after doing so many films for Martin Scorcese. I also enjoyed seeing some of the actors from Nolan's Batman moves, such as Murphy, Watanabe and Michael Caine, make appearances throughout the film. I particularly enjoyed seeing more of Cillian Murphy, who I really liked as Jonathan Crane (or The Scarecrow) in those Batman movies. I was intrigued how Nolan used Cotillard and a little bit surprised, but I thought he used her well while maybe not using her as much, which kept the film from feeling too crowded with stars.

I've been heaping a great deal of praise on Nolan and this film, but it certainly wasn't perfect. Sometimes I felt the film became... predictable? at least within the context of the genre and world you were inhabiting. There were a couple big plot turns and revelatory bits of information I had already guessed before they were revealed. Also, I have a major issue with the ending, which felt really out-of-touch with the feelings and sense of the rest of the film but I won't get into it here so I don't ruin the ending for anyone else. If you'd like to hear what I think about the ending and perhaps discuss it, leave a comment and we can continue this discussion via e-mail. While I don't think the ending ruined the movie or anything, I just... had some issues with it that slightly diminished the film's luster for me.

But that said, it was only diminished slightly as Inception is certainly one of the best films I'll see this year. It's a great movie for this summer, one that blends action, drama, intrigue and issues of reality into a complex and rich film. It is highly entertaining and exciting, but certainly is not fluff and you feel enriched after having watched the film. Normally, the exciting movies one sees during the summer are big-budget pieces of fluff but Inception is the antidote to all that, as a movie that is thoughtful and complex while also exciting and engaging. With this film, Nolan shows that he is not merely a great director of Batman films, but a great director in his own right, and he has created a film that stands up very well. From his outstanding cast featuring many of the biggest and most well-known stars in Hollywood today, to the amazing visuals and the rich and complex story he crafts, Nolan has created something in Inception that is certainly worth the price of admission. I give the film an A-, with the only reason it doesn't get an A being my issues with the ending, but it is definitely a film I would recommend to anyone and will be one that stands out when I think back on 2010 and the movies. If you want to beat the summer heat by taking in a movie, but you want to see something that challenges you just as much as it entertains you, go see Christopher Nolan's Inception.

"Every now and then we hear our song, we've been having fun all summer long"

2010-07-14T17:02:00.001-04:00

"Well, no, why don't we say 9:30, and then make it your beeswax to be here at 9:30? I mean, we're all gonna be in our late 20s by then. I just don't see any reason why we can't be places on time."- Wet Hot American Summer

Even though I'm not the world's biggest fan of the beach (my pale-ness makes me an easy target for sunburns no matter how much sunscreen I put on), I feel like some time in the sun and sand and salt water is required for a good summer experience. Well, luckily North Carolina is home to some wonderful and beautiful beaches and this past Saturday evening I set off with some dear friends to spend a few days down at my friend Anna's house on Harkers Island and get my fill of the sea and sand.

I won't get into a play-by-play of the trip but there was a great day spent on the beach at Cape Lookout (yes, I did get quite sunburnt, in case you were wondering), delicious breakfasts, dinners and desserts, movies (Wet Hot American Summer and Saved!, which both immediately earned spots on my list of favorite movies), the World Cup championship game, trips to aquariums, a ridiculously strong thunderstorm featuring lightning striking a transformer and knocking out the power and, most importantly, great times spent with great friends. It was a wonderful trip, a great respite from the stress of throwing my life into boxes to prepare for the move, and so perfectly... summer. Though my arms and legs tell a different story because of the burns, it was a great time and hopefully it won't be the last time I find myself on Harkers Island.

I'll keep this post short on words, and use pictures to fill in the rest- they tell me that they're each worth a thousand words anyways.

The landing on Harkers Island for the ferry to Cape Lookout

The lighthouse at Cape Lookout

The beach

More beach

Fish!

Harkers Island, a wonderful little seaside town

A Good Paper is a Presented Paper

2010-07-12T09:45:00.000-04:00

If you follow me on Twitter (and if you don't, why aren't you?), then you've probably picked up on the fact that I've returned from Switzerland after presenting my paper on Ernest Hemingway and spending a week at the Hemingway Society's bi-annual conference. The whole week and my experiences there were all absolutely amazing. The paper itself went well, as I was very happy with what I read and the ideas I presented, and the feedback I got in return was also very positive. Overall, I was amazed at how nice and accepting everyone was, as scholars whom I had previously read and knew about from my own work were welcoming me into this society and this community of scholarship.

I knew that, from the beginning, I was a bit on the outside as this was my first time at a Hemingway Society's conference and I only had a masters degree (most everyone there was either working on a PhD or already had one and was teaching) and I was in-between (as I had just graduated with the masters, yet I obviously am not enrolled in a PhD program for the fall). I was green, new and a little bit on the outside yet everyone there treated me like I belonged and made me feel like I was a part of that intellectual community and that there was a place for me within that world.

But in addition to taking an idea I pursued and expanded upon in the paper I presented, one that I hope to revisit in my future work on Hemingway, I feel like the most important part of this entire experience was how re-invigorated I felt at the end. I've talked a great deal about it here, but I've been feeling very... blasé about scholarship and my academic work recently. I haven't felt quite as passionate or inspired as I did in the past, and the thesis-writing process was a very difficult one for me because of that. I'm happy with the work I did and I certainly did enjoy it at certain points, but there were other points where the process felt like a drag and I was more focused on the whole process being over rather than the completed work I would produce at the end. I definitely didn't feel that way writing my undergraduate thesis, and I think it was the result of everything involved wearing me down (certainly my recent experience with applications) and not feeling as enjoyable. Even in the days before this conference, I was thinking about it more as something I would do and then be done with.

But once I got there and interacted and conversed with so many great scholars and bright minds, I was totally reinvigorated. I had that same energy and enthusiasm I felt back when I was writing about Kerouac in my final semester at Texas. I wanted to read more and learn more about Hemingway, consider ideas I had never considered and work towards producing things that further illuminated the intricacies of his writing. I was reminded of how much I love the study of literature, and that I want to be a part of this world and community because I belong in this community. I have insights to make and contribute, thoughts to share and analysis to present, and these are all the things that I do well and that I enjoy. Sometimes it's very easy for me to forget just how much I enjoy this life, the life of the mind, and I need experiences like the one I just had in Switzerland to remind me how much I love and enjoy this discipline of literature.

While the more direct and professional benefit is the paper itself and the contacts I made, as these are the things that will help me as I attempt to pursue a PhD, the excitement and enthusiasm that has returned to me is (personally, at least) more valuable and for that reason alone, this trip and conference was an absolute success for me.

Happy 4th of July

2010-07-04T14:16:00.000-04:00

Kerouac's hand-drawn cover for On The Road

It was but a scant 234 years ago that Thomas Jefferson made that famous and formal Declaration of Independence for the colonies that would soon become the United States. And like so many years past, we all celebrate that first act of rebellion that made us... well, us. While sometimes hyperbolic patriotism can trend on being silly, what is certainly not silly is that "idea" of America and that we are a country whose very existence is predicated on rebellion, which is a pretty cool thing when you think about it.

Anyways, I wanted to wish you all out there a happy Fourth of July and happy celebrating! Enjoy your BBQs and beer and fireworks and sunshine and baseball and whatever you may do to celebrate!

Now, you might be wondering: "Why did he post an On The Road-related picture in a post about the 4th of July?" Well on this day when we celebrate America I thought I should also point out one of my favorite aspects of America- our literary heritage. Just like the Founding Fathers who rebelled against the British government, our literary heros rebelled as well and created a literature that persists and is undeniably ours and undeniably American. While we should celebrate and remember the Founding Fathers- Washington, Jefferson, Franklin and Adams (and those who weren't Founding Fathers but still remarkably important in our country's historical narrative- Lincoln, Roosevelt and Kennedy), we can also celebrate those writers who helped to shape that idea of America by creating a literary tradition that belonged to us and no one else. Writers like Hawthorne, Emerson, Melville, Thoreau, Whitman, Wolfe, Faulkner, Fitzerland, Steinbeck, Hemingway and the author I always think of when I think of America and literature... Jack Kerouac.

(I know I'm forgetting some authors on this short list but those are some of my favorites and I know I could go on forever with this list. But I digress...)

On The Road is one of the greatest books about America and the beauty and wonder that can be found here and not anywhere else. Here's one of my favorite quotes from the novel about America, at least in some sense, and I'll leave you with that and wish you all a happy and wonderful Fourth of July!

"I woke up as the sun was reddening; and that was the one distinct time in my life, the strangest moment of all, when I didn't know who I was — I was far away from home, haunted and tired with travel, in a cheap hotel room I'd never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, and the creak of the old wood of the hotel, and footsteps upstairs, and all the sad sounds, and I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn't know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost. I was halfway across America, at the dividing line between the East of my youth and the West of my future."

Pressing Pause

2010-06-21T08:30:00.000-04:00

This message applies for both of my blogs, but I'm taking a mini-break right now from all blogging. Why?

Well I'm busy trying to finish up a paper about this guy for a conference (a big conference) I will be attending in Lausanne, Switzerland. I will be there from June 24th through July 3rd. Once I get the paper itself finalized and hashed out, I'll get back to posting but right now I'm back working on papers so I'm going to focus on that right writing for the time being. Just hold tight, I'll be back before you know it.

Cold Calls

2010-06-14T10:00:00.001-04:00

I know I'm not alone in this, but the realm of the political is something in which I am very interested. Like sports, or music, or literature, or film, it is something I like to keep up with, talk about... well, maybe I should say argue about, but it's also one arena where I think I could do some good. Because of what ended up happening this fall and spring and my being forced to consider other options (not totally by my own choice), I've been considering politics as something to "do" and not just something I'm "interested" in, just like what I've said about sports or music or whatever in the wake of this major life/existential crisis I've been undergoing after graduating/hearing back from PhD programs. But as I've thought about getting involved and as I've been involved on the smallest and most micro of levels, I've run into difficulties.

However, they aren't the difficulties I would have expected encountering as I tried to become involved. Namely it wasn't a problem of not knowing people or knowing where to go to seek out opportunities. No, it was something different and something more personal. I've discovered that the opportunities that are available to the amateur and thus at the "grassroots" level, really the only area I can really occupy at this point in time, are all things that I cannot do well and would not choose to do. Namely it involves making cold phone calls to potential voters, talking with those people spontaneously on the phone and making a "sale," as it were or going door-to-door in certain neighborhoods and essentially doing the same thing but instead in person. This whole enterprise is called canvassing and it's the way in which most, if not all, people get involved in politics.

However, it's also something with which I have extreme difficulty. I never know how to describe myself, because I feel like I'm shy but I'm also not shy. I don't have a problem being open with people, making friends and being social but I become cripplingly shy in those sorts of situations like the ones you encounter when you're making phone calls on behalf of a candidate or talking with someone about that candidate. It's an experience that fills me with a disproportionate amount of anxiety. I mean, I'm a smart and articulate person, I don't mind talking to people and often times talking with people I don't know, yet doing canvassing and things like that drive me crazy. I've made phone calls and prayed and prayed that it would be an answering machine so I could just leave a message, not having to interact with anyone and being able to just read from a script. I think that's a big part of it- improvisation is definitely not my strongest point. When I did theatre, I always hated improv exercises and stumbled through them. Now if you gave me a script I could work with it, shape it and make it my own and something unique, but having to create that something on my own and on the spot? That was always my biggest challenge as an actor. But it's tough when you want to help out and help the candidates you support to win their elections, but you know the way that they usually ask for help is something you don't like/can't do well/isn't your strong point. It is a very vexing thing.

But what I wanted to talk about here was more than just my own shyness and difficulties with improvisation. It's more than that... I've just been thinking about what do you do when something you want to do is also the most difficult thing for you to do? I'm interested in the political realm, and I think I can contribute in that arena... this is all the long way of saying it's something I think could be a career-y kind of thing for me. But the way into that world is usually through things like canvassing, going door-to-door, and that often leads to the next level and positions where you aren't doing those sorts of things. This isn't about "paying your dues"... at least I don't think it is, but it's about what do you do to help out and support something you believe in when the way you are directed (?) to support is something that is unnatural or something that is very difficult to do? This is definitely not a post where I have an answer at the end, and I'm interested if some of you out there in the "blogosphere" have some thoughts. It's something I struggle with quite regularly. I also have felt this in my time as a writing tutor- I know I understand the language (though it might not show up in my writing here) but I have a hard time communicating and articulating what exactly I do know to others. I'm struggling to bridge that gap. Maybe it's just a matter of confronting these things that I don't like doing and overcoming them, but I think it's more than that. But it's hard when the things you care a lot about also involve you doing things you can't do well.

Movie Review- Please Give

2010-06-04T12:45:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite directors is Woody Allen, and particularly in films like Annie Hall and Manhattan he portrays a certain world and segment of society, showing life in New York City and its.... intellectual and artistic communities. To be honest, I think a lot of the negative stereotypes of the Upper West Side and its residents stem from Woody Allen's films, and people who aren't from the city think people from New York are all liberals crushed with anxieties and liberal guilt... ok there might be some truth to all this (and I'm definitely an example of that kind of person, even though I'm not a New York resident, yet...). But the lives of those living in New York, particularly those who are particularly affluent and overcome with a certain kind of liberal guilt, were the focus of most of Woody Allen's greatest films. However, it seems like Woody Allen has moved away, for whatever reason, from the setting of New York and focusing on its inhabitants. But other directors have picked up the mantle, and one such attempt is made by Nicole Holofcener in Please Give, which is out now in a limited release and should be moving to a more general release soon. I heard about this film on the most recent episode of Filmspotting and was able to see it while I was back home in California at one of my favorite movie theatres, the Shattuck 8 Cinema in Berkeley.

The film takes place, as you might have guessed, in New York City and focuses on the life Kate (played by Catherine Keener) who runs a vintage furniture store with her husband (Oliver Platt) that is supplied by buying the furniture of the recently deceased. Kate is overcome by guilt, making her livelihood based upon death (albeit in a second hand way) and thus we see her throughout the film trying to put something out into the world, through service or by giving money or food, in order to "rectify" some imbalance that has been created by her job while also struggling with her teenage daughter (Sarah Steele) who doesn't really experience or understand her mother's guilt. Here's the trailer for the film, I'd recommend giving it a watch and you'll get a better sense of things:

In addition to the main plot of Kate and Alex's business and the guilt that Kate feels, we also see their neighbor in their apartment building, the cantankerous 91 year old Andra (a hillarious job by Ann Guilbert) and her two granddaughters, the altruistic and caring Rebecca (played by the gorgeous Rebecca Hall), who works at a radiology office that does screening for breast cancer, and the less-kind Mary (played by Amanda Peet) who works at a day salon. They both struggle with their grandmother, as she gets older and her health continues to diminish, as well as Kate and Alex struggling as they know that when she dies they will be able to buy Andra's apartment and expand their own.

There are a lot of things going on in this film, and it's not just about one or two characters but rather about a group of characters who are all in concert with one another and the world that exists around them. This presents a challenging task for any director but I think Holofcener does a good job balancing the camera and the narrative so we get an equal amount of time in each character's world to see their concerns. Each of these people has their own life and their own worries and anxieties that they must confront, and Holofcener does a good job at making each character an individual while also making it clear that this is also about a world and something bigger than just a couple people. The one thing I didn't like about the film was the romantic subplot involving Rebecca, as it felt a little bit tacked on and I don't feel like it really furthered or pushed the main narrative and the dominant themes of the film. It really felt like someone said "this needs some romantic element, where can we put it...?" and that just came off as forced and contrived to me. It doesn't take away from anything, but it leave a funny taste in your mouth.

The performances in the film are all suburb. Keener does an excellent job as Kate, really encompassing and embodying that guilt over what she does while Platt's Alex clearly is more at ease with their chosen profession, as reflected by the humor and levity he brings to his role, which contrasts with the seriousness that we see in Keener's Kate. I think they both work well together and there's a certain chemistry and playfulness between the two of them. As I said before, Guilbert is absolutely hilarious as the snappy, blunt and occasionally rude grandmother Andra, and she definitely steals the scene whenever she's on camera. Hall and Peet do a good job of balancing each other out, and you definitely find yourself liking the Rebecca character while finding yourself disliking the much less virtuous Mary, played by Peet. Though she's not as funny as Andra, or as viscous and thus as commanding as Mary, the Rebecca character was definitely one of my favorites and is someone who, like Kate, struggles in her own way to be good and give back. I've enjoyed a lot of Keener's other performances, and I'm also planning on checking out her other work with Holofcener because I'm such a fan. And I hadn't seen anything by Hall up until this film, but I definitely would like to see some of her other work. Though they don't "steal scenes," their performances in this film give it a kind of moral and just center, and you find yourself sympathizing with them and feeling for them as they struggle through a myriad of different issues.

But, above all, I couldn't get over how much this film felt like an homage to Woody Allen, or an attempt to pick up where he left off in some respects. It's not just the setting either, but also the characters, the dialogue, the anxiety experienced by all these characters and, most of all, the warping guilt that Alex identifies as you see in the trailer. I'm a big fan of guilt and particularly this kind of... liberal guilt that I also experience and can identify with. But it's something that is very real to me and that I can relate to and so I think I enjoyed this moving just a little bit more. It's funny, sad and true and often all at the same time, and I think that this film can hit all those notes reflects the writing and direction of Holofcener. She creates a world that does reflect what many of us experience, a balance of the good and the bad, the funny and the serious, and that mix comes out truthfully and makes this a good film. It received great reviews from Peter Travers and Roger Ebert and is doing pretty well on Rotten Tomatoes. It also reminds me, in some strange way, of a film I saw around this time last year-- Away We Go. But Please Give is a much more authentic film, I think, and it comes off as a more authentic product of the world and the way things are today. Holofcener picks up where Woody Allen left off (his newer films don't really focus on stories such as these) and Please Give deserves a place amongst those films of his, the ones that examines our modern anxieties and concerns over life, death and love. It's definitely a summer film worth checking out, and here's the list of where Please Give is currently showing or where it will be showing when it is given a wider release. When it comes to your town or city, check it out.

Dennis Hopper (1936-2010)

2010-05-31T16:55:00.000-04:00

Amongst the biggest news from this Memorial Day weekend was that Dennis Hopper, the actor, director, photographer and general iconoclast, had died at his home in Los Angeles due to complications related to prostate cancer. There have been many great tributes around the internet and the world to the life and career of this "American original" (I hate that cliché, but it's very applicable here) but I will try to remember or celebrate Hopper here because of his roles in two of my favorite films of all-time: Easy Rider and Blue Velvet.

As a great lover and admirer of Kerouac, it definitely makes sense that Easy Rider would rank high on my list of favorite films. Hopper, both as director and starring alongside Peter Fonda, did a good job of internalizing and encapsulating the rebellion and the energy that began with On The Road and moved it forward, into something new and different. In that sense, I think that Easy Rider is much closer to Kerouac's vision than something like The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, or the exploits of Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters that was documented in that book. But Hopper directed one of the best films of all time in Easy Rider, and one that also featured one of (if not the) greatest soundtracks of all time. That Hopper was responsible for this American cinematic masterpiece places him amongst the titans of Hollywood and should secure a spot in the minds and hearts of all fans of film.

In addition to his role acting and directing Easy Rider, Hopper could also be seen in other landmark films such as Rebel Without a Cause (in a very small capacity, but he's there), Cool Hand Luke, True Grit, Apocalypse Now and Hoosiers. But, at least in my opinion, his greatest acting role came in 1986 with his performance as Frank Booth in David Lynch's masterpiece Blue Velvet. This film served as Hopper's comeback in Hollywood, as he had fallen victim to drugs and alcohol to such a degree that he had disappeared completely off the Hollywood map until Lynch picked him to play the nitrous-oxide inhaling, obscenity shouting, sexual deviant whirlwind of energy and evil at the heart of Blue Velvet. The legend goes that, after reading the script for Blue Velvet, he called David Lynch and said "I have to play Frank Booth because I am Frank Booth!" But, whether or not that was true, Hopper was cast as Booth and did his part by playing one of the most menacing and terrifying characters in all of film. Watching Blue Velvet for the first time this past year, I couldn't help but notice the menacing energy that Hopper brought to Frank's character, and how that fear and terror he brings drives the film. I also rank Blue Velvet amongst my favorite films of all time, and it is due in no small part to Hopper's terrifying violent and brutal performance. So as we remember the late Dennis Hopper, I'll share with you my favorite scene from Blue Velvet that features Hopper, including a, shall I say, ringing endorsement for one of my favorite kinds of beer (Be warned: this is incredibly profane and NSFW in any capacity. But you should still watch it). Feel free to share and Dennis Hopper-related thoughts or opinions, and let's remember the life and career of this great actor, director and, above all, original.

Summertime Will Be a Love-In There

2010-05-28T09:30:00.000-04:00

While I won't be going back to the Bay Area for the U2 concert, as I wrote about earlier, I wasn't planning on spending my entire summer away from my home, my friends and the place that I love. So during this long Memorial Day weekend I will be heading back to San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and (most importantly) Alameda to spend some time back with friends and family. The main reason why I'm going back was for my grandmother's 81st birthday, which is definitely a good reason to be coming back, but this trip was planned while I was still under the assumption that I would be coming back in a couple weeks for the U2 concert. But since that's fallen through (and probably for the best, at least in regard to the conference paper I need to start writing), this has become my "trip home" for the summer (though I might be coming back for a while in August, something I'll probably talk about later). But I'm planning on jamming a lot of Bay Area goodness into a few short days-- trips to Haight/Ashbury and North Beach in San Francisco, maybe visiting Berkeley, eating Mexican food and most importantly hanging out with friends and family while talking about sports, politics and the general goings-on in our respective lives. Even though I'm actually going back to home, which is closer to Oakland, here's one of my favorite songs about San Francisco, one that was written in 1967 to entice people to come to Haight/Ashbury during the "Summer of Love." And as I head back to San Francisco, I'll be sure to wear some flowers in my hair.

Changing Summer Plans

2010-05-26T10:00:00.010-04:00

As you've probably gathered, if you've read this blog at all for any length of time, I'm a pretty big U2 fan. Actually, that's putting it mildly, I am a HUGE U2 fan. I've talked about their albums and many of my favorite U2 songs, commercials that feature their music, reviewed not one but two of their concerts from their most recent tour that I went to, and there's definitely more U2-related content on the horizon here. Just click here and you'll see all the posts I've done here that have been "tagged" as U2-related in some way and you'll get the idea.

Needless to say, I was pretty excited for the 3rd leg of U2's 360 tour and getting to see U2 play at the Oakland Coliseum this summer. I planned a nice, long trip back home around this concert, planning on going to see a couple baseball games as well as yvisiting with friends and enjoying my summer. But this was definitely going to be a highlight-- U2, playing right in my proverbial backyard on a summer evening, and getting to go with my mom (who is a pretty big U2 fan in her own right, thanks to me) to enjoy another great show. It was going to be one highlight on what I hoped would be a wonderful summer.

But then, the news came out that Bono needed emergency back surgery and that the opening show of the tour in Salt Lake City would be postponed. This was definitely a red flag, but I thought he would be able to heal enough to make it for the rest of the tour (including the date in Oakland a couple weeks later). But then today the news came out that Bono would need much more time to heal and recover, and that the entire Summer 2010 US leg of this tour would be postponed until 2011 and that the band wouldn't be able to play at the Glastonbury festival where they were scheduled to be one of (if not the) top bands. Though it looks like they'll be able to make the dates on the European leg of the tour, this is definitely a radical change in the band's summer itinerary.

Though I'm definitely glad that Bono got this medical issue taken care of, and I wish him a safe and speedy recovery and that he'll get back to doing what he does best (namely, being Bono on stage)(I realize it's very strange to wish this huge public figure a speedy recovery, but it''s true)(three parenthetical comments next to each other... I am a revolutionary), I'm definitely bummed out that they had to totally reschedule the American dates of this leg of the tour. I'm not upset and I completely and totally understand why (and it's pretty clear from the band's comments that they're disappointed and sad this had to happen as well), but of course I would like to see U2 live and especially performing such an amazing show like they have been doing on this tour. However, for me it's probably best that they totally moved the dates to 2011 rather than pushing things forward a couple of weeks in the US, because then I probably would have been out of the country and thus not able to make it to the show. So in that respect, I'm personally glad that the tour was postponed rather than just being pushed forward a couple of days. But I'm bummed out that I won't be getting my expected U2 fix this summer. One of my favorite parts of last summer was the U2 show in Paris. And even though it was technically in the fall, the U2 concert in Raleigh that I went to felt like a summer experience, I think it part because it was an absolutely gorgeous and perfect night weather-wise. Now it looks like a live U2 show won't be a part of my summer plans. But as I wish Bono a nice and speedy rehab that will leave him healthy and get him back to the stage, I'll have to watch U2's new concert DVD, filmed at the Rose Bowl this past fall, to get me though the summer (you can see the trailer for the DVD, which will be released soon, below).

Movie Review: Iron Man 2

2010-05-25T10:45:00.000-04:00

As the days get hotter and longer, school fades into the background as a distant memory as spring becomes summer, we also enter another kind of season. But it's not a season we experience outdoors, by going to the pool or the beach, but that we experience indoors in dark and air-conditioned movie theatres. Yes, it's summer/popcorn blockbuster season and one of this year's most highly anticipated films is the Jon Favreau-directed sequel to his 2008's smash hit, Iron Man 2. As a huge comic book fan (especially Marvel comics) and as someone who thoroughly enjoyed the first Iron Man film, I knew I wanted to see this film. I also tried my best to avoid the reviews and commentary that was being released about the film. Most of the time, I don't usually care but when it's something that I'm pretty excited about seeing I try to avoid those things so my vision isn't clouded and affected by other people's critiques and views. But, unfortunately, I did cave as I was listening to the Filmspotting podcast and they were reviewing the film. I stopped listening maybe halfway through, not because of how I felt about the film or that I was somehow upset by what they said, but because I felt that I was "tainting" my own view and I would go into the film and only notice the things they did (and, admittedly, those things were on the more critical end of things). But as I watched the film, and as I formulated my own views and critiques of the film, I found that my own were in line (in some respects) with those of the hosts of Filmspotting, but not to quite the same degree. I did find myself noticing the things that they had highlighted in their review of the film, but I definitely did not think it took away from the film as much as they did.

Now we come to the part of these reviews that I don't like, namely where I do a little plot summary as a kind of jumping off point for the rest of my review. We're taken back to the world of Tony Stark, played wonderfully once again by Robert Downey Jr., as he revealed to the media that he was, in fact, Iron Man. I think that this whole conceit of the Tony Stark/Iron Man character is one of the most interesting and makes him a fun and fascinating super hero. While other superheros, like Spider-Man, Superman or Batman, hide those secret identities, Iron Man does not. In a scene where he is subpoenaed and brought before a Senate committee headed by Sen. Stern (hilariously played by Gary Shandling), he emphasizes this-- he is Iron Man and the suit and him are one. Stark is brought before the Senate committee because they are worried about this "weapon," as they deem it, being unsafe or falling into the wrong hands. We are also introduced to the duplicitous rival and munitions manufacturer Justin Hammer (portrayed by Sam Rockwell), who seeks to replace Stark as the preeminent defense expert in America and secure government contracts, as well as James Rhodes (played in this film by Don Cheadle), a lt. colonel in the military. Meanwhile, in Russia, Ivan Vanko (played by a scary-as-hell Mickey Rourke) seeks revenge for his father who he believes was wronged by Tony's father and Stark Enterprises patriarch Howard Stark, and constructs an arc reactor (like the one Tony uses to fuel the armor and keep himself alive) with electrified whips that he can brandish. There are also subplots dealing with Stark's own health as a result of using the Iron Man armor and the arc reactor keeping him alive, his assistant Pepper Pots (Gweynth Paltrow) and his taking on of a new assistant, played by the always gorgeous Scarlett Johansson, who turns out to be an agent for S.H.I.E.L.D. and Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), who wants to recruit Iron Man to their secret operation. It's also worth noting Favreau's small part as Stark's bodyguard/chauffeur as well as a cameo appearance by Oracle CEO (and hopefully future owner of the Golden State Warriors *fingers crossed*) Larry Ellison.

Visually, the film is absolutely amazing. Favreau and his cinematography team do an absolutely amazing job creating a sleek, shiny and visually stunning film. I think the nature of Iron Man, the character and the things he uses, lends itself to a sleek film such as this and it's definitely amazing to watch. The action and the fight scenes are captivating and pulse pounding, as they very rarely let you breathe because of how quickly things move. The screenplay, written by Justin Theroux (from Mulholland Drive and Inland Empire!) did leave something to be desired and I think this is where I agreed with the Filmspotting guys. This script did fill a little overloaded with jokes and humor, rather than letting it come naturally like it did in the first film. Also, the dialogue felt a lot like the action scenes, in that there was a fast pace to it. But while that 's good when you have Iron Man and War Machine (Rhodes' name, after he takes one of Stark's old Iron Man suits and outfits it with plenty of artillery) fighting against armed drones and Mickey Rourke, that doesn't work when you're trying to have dialogue and characters are constantly talking over one another. This, I thought, was the result of the screenwriter trying to be a little bit too cute and too funny, and it was definitely annoying at times. The story arc was pretty good, it was at times pretty unbelievable but most of the time it flowed well and was good in terms of how much of it you were willing to accept (which is saying something for a superhero movie). There were a couple deus ex machina moments that left you feeling a little unsatisfied, but by and large the story was a solid one, though not an exceptional or great one. I wasn't wild about Rourke's acting, as I felt like he was merely doing a ridiculous Russian accent. There could have been a depth to the character, but either as a result of the screenplay or Rourke's characterization, that didn't shine through. The one thing that was good about Rourke is his physical appearance and the intimidation and fear he creates from being as physically intimidating as he is. There is a certain physical power to Rourke and that shines through, even when he isn't wielding electrified whips. I thought Cheadle was solid as Rhodes/War Machine, and I think he did as good (if not better) than Terrance Howard would have if he'd been kept on (Howard played Rhodes in the first Iron Man film). Paltrow and Johansson were also strong in their roles and served as strong female characters in a world that can easily be overtaken by men. Paltrow in particular, as Pepper Potts, does a good job of not just being a "damsel in distress" character who Iron Man has to save, but as one who does stand on her own a little bit. Johansson was great as well, I wish I could say more but I was so in awe of her beauty that I couldn't formulate much more than that (haha).

But, to me, the two actors who really carry the film and keep it on the right path are Rockwell and Downey Jr. Rockwell is outstanding as the slimy and villainous Hammer, a kind of counterpoint to the more virtuous Tony Stark. Though he's definitely (and not supposed to be) as physically menacing as Mickey Rourke's character, the deivous-ness and subverting nature of the Hammer character is perfectly emphasized by Rockwell. In that respect, there is a kind of concert between him and Rourke that form a symphony of villain-ry, with Rourke as a kind of over-the-top comic book villain while Rockwell is more real world and a much more plausible villain, like someone who ran Blackwater or any of those other companies contracted by the government. There isn't the same kind of sheer terror you feel when Vanko is cutting through race cars like butter using his whips, but when Hammer is present there is an insidiousness and covert maliciousness, one that Rockwell really works to cultivate in the character and that speaks to his acting ability. But the standout, just like in this film's predecessor, is Downey Jr. He is the perfect Tony Stark, and has the right panache and style to pull off being the billionaire playboy Tony Stark, and certainly Downey Jr.'s own personal struggles with addiction help him to understand and represent Stark's own self destructive behavior, particularly his latent alcoholism. But Downey Jr. brings to the character the right balance of superhero intensity as well as the humor and wit required for Iron Man, a superhero who has always been a little less serious than some of his peers. Again, this is something that makes the character of Iron Man unique and a difficult one to pull off-- there is a humor that is essential to the character. While Batman, Superman and Spider-Man can get away with being pretty straight forward and serious, that won't work with Iron Man and Downey Jr. is one of the actors out there, if not the only, who can pull that off. He commands the film, carrying it in a way that even Tobey Maguire in Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2 (we won't speak of the third film, because I just pretend it didn't happen) couldn't do, and I thought he did a great job in those films. But without someone like Downey Jr., who can hit those funny notes while also being a strong and commanding hero, this film fails.

This film is definitely a mixed bag, and it makes it tough to assign it a conclusive grade to give it some kind of value. I do agree with some of the weaknesses pointed out by the Filmspotting guys, and particularly that sometimes the humor is a little too over the top and overt and it comes off very campy or silly. It's not a perfect film, certainly, and I definitely don't think it's as strong or complete as the first film was. But I don't dismiss Iron Man 2 the way some others have, as I feel that it succeeds in spite of those issues and taking up Roger Ebert's view of the film. The film is fun, first and foremost, and it's beautifully made and a treat to watch. While sometimes the humor can be a bit much there are many parts of the film that are legitimately funny (I'm thinking of when Tony Stark testifies before the Senate Committee) in such a way that we haven't seen in a superhero film. I think Rockwell does a great job as a villain and makes him incredibly real and thus provides an effective evil counterpoint to Rourke's inherently unreal villain. But the best part of this movie, for me, is Robert Downey Jr. and his inherently likable (at least I thought so) Tony Stark. He plays Stark in such a way that he comes off as fun and interesting, but also principled and dedicated to doing the right thing. Another actor would emphasize one aspect of Stark while de-emphasizing the other, and thus we would lose the things that make Iron Man unique. But Downey Jr., showing how gifted he is, manages to put forth a more complete version of Stark that drives the film and keeps it going. If I had to assign this film a grade, I would give it a B+, maybe curving up to an A-. It's not perfect and it's not as good as the original, but Iron Man 2 is fun, well-constructed and features a stellar job by Robert Downey Jr. and I would certainly recommend it to anyone looking for a fun or visually stunning film, or someone who is a fan of the comic book series.

Have you seen Iron Man 2? What are your thoughts? Do you agree or disagree?

Splitting the Difference

2010-05-18T21:53:00.000-04:00

As I'm sure you've picked up if you're a regular reader here, I'm a man of very diverse interests. I'm prone to blog about many things, from a speech or decision made by President Obama, to the latest movie I saw or book I read, to the goings-on in my own life even to the world of sports. I also know that my blogging about sports, in all its forms and manifestations, is probably the least... popular (?) part of this blog. This one was set up, more or less, to be about my thoughts as a graduate student of literature, and how I saw things/what I liked and sports... well just didn't fit into that equation. I've actually blogged about this before but I've always felt the tension was palpable and that your (the reader's) interest definitely waned when I would blog about something sports related.

Well I've decided to branch out and make everyone's lives a little easier. I've started a 2nd blog that's going to be devoted solely to sports and my thoughts/observations/comments on that world. It's called What a Game and here's the first post (it isn't much, just an introduction to start getting things ready to go). I'm still getting things organized/set up but I think I'll be posting sometime in the very near future. What does all this mean for this blog? Well I might not be posting as regularly as I would like... ok I know I'm not posting a whole lot there right now to begin with, but I should seeing as how I just graduated (!). But I'll probably be splitting my regular posting duties over the two blogs, with all things sports going there and literature/music/movies/politics/everything else going here. Even if you aren't big on the whole sports scene, I ask that you go over and check it out once I start posting. I won't be syndicating and cross-posting, but I will remind you all from time-to-time that I'm posting elsewhere as well.

Do you like this idea? Will you check out a blog of mine that's completely devoted to sports (I hope you will)? Any thoughts/suggestions/requests? Just let me know!

Hey now, hey now, don't dream it's over

2010-05-12T16:01:00.000-04:00

As I've brought up a couple of times, I am in fact finished with graduate school. I wrote a thesis, one that ended being over 100 pages in length, as well as successfully defending it before my thesis committee AND I passed my foreign language translation exam. I took care of all the paperwork and thus I officially possess a Masters of Arts in English. What does that mean? Well, not that much really. I mean, it's not like a PhD, when you can be referred to as "Dr. So and So." I mean, I guess I could have people start calling me "Master" but... eh, it's just not the same. But nevertheless, I have completed my degree and finished what I started a little less than two years ago when I first came to Winston-Salem and to Wake Forest University. Now I'm sure you're expecting a lot of "reflection" and "remembering" to go on here, in the wake of this, and you're right. There are probably going to be multiple posts where I will reflect on my time at Wake Forest, what it meant to me, what it means that it's over, etc etc. But I'm not ready to get into that quite yet. What I will touch on is something I'm experiencing that's a little bit independent of my graduating-- that this is the end, at least for the near future, of me "being a student."

Reading into that, I guess you can all assume how the PhD application process went. In short, it did not go well and I will not be (at least not right now) continuing onto a doctoral program. Now I'm definitely looking to reapply and I'm also considering making a shift and going to law school (and there will be some studying/testing/working involved in applying that will resemble school) , but I know that the next ~12 months or so will be spent with me not being a student. To be honest, it's more about identity, and the identity I have created for myself than anything at this point. I've always known that "school" (whatever that means exactly) was something that I was good at, and at some point in time I realized that being a student was how I really self-identified. That is one reason why the PhD track appealed to me, because it is an opportunity (in some ways) to continue to be a student, to investigate and think about things and then write papers on them for a living.

Now, I know that I can still think about things, and that my ability and desire to think critically will not magically disappear because I'm technically not a student but... it just won't be the same. My whole life has been geared, pretty much, towards school and the classroom and now that's not what I'm going to be doing or who I'm going to be. And I know this isn't a forever thing, and I very well might find myself back at school next year or the year after that, but it's still a shock and a change for me. This might be a good thing though, as I have been in school and just flying through particularly going straight from my BA to my MA. I haven't really considered everything else that was out there, as I know that there is life beyond school. Perhaps this will be a good thing, an enriching experience for me and I will discover something to do that I hadn't previously considered. I had always envisioned myself continuing on the academic track that I never really thought of what else I could do and would be good at that was out there, but now I can consider those things. As you all probably know by reading here, I am interested in a wide variety of things and now I can figure out how to take those interests and make them into a "career." I'm trying to remain positive about all this, and I know that there's a lot out there that I could start to pursue and that having to leave the academy (at least for now) isn't the worst thing in the world.

That said, I'm still pretty bummed about how things worked out. Pursuing a PhD in English was something I set out to do, something I really wanted to do and was passionate about and it was something that I was ultimately not worthy (in some respected) to pursue based upon the responses to my applications. Yes, I know that it's subjective/the economy/the state of the profession/etc etc, but it still feels like I've been deemed unworthy and shunned, and that's something that hurts. I've always felt comfortable amongst professors and scholars and my peers who looked to head down that path, and now I've been made to feel as though I don't belong in that world and it hurts a little bit. I have this sometimes constant feeling of worthlessness, or like I don't measure up in the competition that mattered most to me. I thought that school was the place where I thrived and where I was one of the better ones (Lord knows there are lots of places where I don't measure up to other people, and I'm comfortable admitting that) but... I guess not, or at least that's how I feel.

But for at least the next year, I'm not going to be a student (or at least that's not how one would classify me) and it's going to be a big change, one of the bigger changes I've ever had to undertake. I've lived in different places, studied different things, had different friends, but nothing will compare to this. It's going to take some getting used to but I think and hope it will make me better/stronger/whatever and that I'll figure out whatever it is I need to figure out during this time. But it will certainly be an interesting time, and something that will provide plenty of fodder for expansive blog posts. And don't you worry, there will be plenty of posts coming up in which I reflect upon my time here and graduation and all that good stuff. But right now I'll throw these questions out to all of you-- How did you deal with times of great change in identity or lifestyle? Did you look forward to not being a student, or was it something you enjoyed being?

A Three-Pointer

2010-05-10T10:00:00.002-04:00

Well, I wasn't kidding when I said that finishing all my degree-related obligations would lead to more reading for fun and (slightly) more blogging, particularly reading and blogging about more "fun" things (which you can read as being about sports). Well I've made my way through 3 different sports-related books and I thought I'd give you a quick triple-shot review of the three. I've done them in order, from the one I liked least to the one I liked best. And on we go!

One of the figures in basketball history that has been a bit elusive for me, in my basketball fandom, has been Julius Erving, or Dr. J. While I vaguely remember watching Magic Johnson and Larry Bird (we'll get to them later) and I certainly remember Michael Jordan, Dr. J was a little bit too early for me. In fact, I never realized that he played during the mid-to-late 80s, as I had always just associated him with the ABA and the 70s. Because I didn't know that much about the Doctor, I decided I should read Vincent Mallozzi's biography entitled Doc: The Rise and Rise of Julius Erving. I started reading this biography over Christmas break, when it first came out, but had to put it down as I struggled through the thesis-writing process and was only able to pick it back after I had finished writing the monstrosity that is my thesis. In some ways, the book did what I wanted it to do in that I was able to learn more about Dr. J and his career and his impact. It went from the very beginning of his life up until the present, tracing every step, jump, leap and dunk the NBA legend made. But there were certain points of the book that I found unreadable, in part because I wasn't wild about Mallozzi's writing style, and also that it felt a little too... gushing of Erving. Now, I don't think that every biography has to be a deconstruction of our images of the subject, dealing with sordid details, but I think the actual writing style needs to be less effusive and there has to be some kind of objectivity that tempers the praise the author wants to convey. Also, I felt like the book did too much "telling"rather than showing me and making me believe the degree to which Dr. J affected basketball. I think that was the weakest point of the book, and why it's third on this list. It was very thorough and provided great insight into Erving's life and helped me to understand and situate him a little better in basketball history, but the argument it seemed to be making about Dr. J's "supremacy" never felt complete or convincing, as it was more based on the biographer's words rather than how he portrayed the life of Dr. J. It's a worthwhile read if you know nothing about Dr. J (like me) but as far as basketball books/biographies go, I'd probably recommend passing on this one.

Of course, summer is the time for baseball, not just watching the game at the ballpark while enjoying a hot dog (though not for me, since I'm still a vegetarian) but also with your reading. Baseball books make for great summer reading and one of the first ones I picked up was Jason Turbow and Michael Duca's The Baseball Codes, Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America's Pastime. The focus of this book is pretty apparent in the title, as it's going to look at those unwritten rules and the nuances that are part of the fabric of the game of baseball. Baseball is very unique, in that there are this "code" of ethics that governs many things that occur between the white lines. You don't see that in, say, football or basketball but I think that's what makes baseball special in our eyes. It's more than just the game, there's something indefinable and special about it that you don't see in other sports. The book goes through and documents the "code" of baseball players and how it manifests itself. This runs from what you're supposed to do when you have a big lead (stealing bases and trying to score more runs) to how to act when someone hits a player on your team to stealing signs to... many, many other things. Turbow and Duca use many examples throughout baseball history to illustrate the code and how it manifests itself in the game. The book is balanced with stories about the all-time greats, other players from previous eras as well as players and coaches from the game today. Thus, this "code" that is outlined serves as the very fabric of baseball history and stands as that which unifies the players of the past and the present and what will tie them to the players of the future. But though I like the setup of the book, and found it to be very well-written and easy to read, something kept me from absolutely loving it. I think it came off as a little too dry, a little too objective or serious at times, and that an element of fun or personality (though don't ask me how you do that...) would help make this book better and more than just "interesting." Though I found it more enjoyable than Doc because I feel like it was more well-written, there was a certain dryness to the writing that kept it from flowing well and that caused me to get really slowed down. It's worth a read if you're really interested in the history of baseball, or if you play baseball and these unwritten rules and "codes" resonate with you, but it definitely wasn't the best of these three books.

Now we come to the third, and what I would say the best, of the three books I recently finished. This book was written by Jackie MacMullan, but prominently featured contributions from Larry Bird and Earvin "Magic" Johnson, and it's called When The Game Was Ours. MacMullan focuses, rather obviously, on the lives of these two basketball greats, from their encounters in college to their rivalry in the professional ranks which eventually evolved into a respectful friendship on and off the court. MacMullan focuses on the contrasts in lifestyle, personality and approach to the game that existed between these two men, but while also showing the intersections both in their lives as well as the experiences they shared and had in common. But the overall focus of this book is not on one man, or two separate men but how these two men became "Magic and Bird" and an entity unto itself. Bill Simmons, in the wake of this book as well as other documentaries and features on the two, wrote about how they (Bird and Magic) seemed to be milking or really playing up the rivalry/friendship they had, but I don't think that's the case. I think there was something genuine and special there, though I think it took Bird (being an extremely hard-nosed competitor) a while to realize that he could compete against Magic but that he didn't have to hate him. What emerges is that both of these men are aware of not just what their own personal legacies are, but also what it means that there is "Bird and Magic" always together. Jordan had no real rival (seeing as how he was so good it was practically inhuman) and today Kobe and LeBron are very distant and removed (also, neither went to college, where the Bird and Magic rivalry was born). But what this showed was that the NBA was a professional league, where the greats could duel on the court but also realized that there was something that went beyond the court that their special rivalry and friendship could further. I feel like this book had the right balance of enthusiasm for the subject, but also the right distance that kept it from being to gushing or reading like a mere puff piece. MacMullan doesn't portray their friendship in overly sentimental terms, but as something that was real and grew out of years of competing against one another, but also out of a love for the game of basketball itself. MacMullan was able to blend together enthusasism and an objective biographical/historical approach to create a great and scintillating read. I probably read it in 2 or 3 days because I couldn't put it down, I wanted to keep reading to know another story about these two basketball legends and how their careers progressed. When The Game Was Ours is definitely a book I would recommend, not just to basketball fans but also to sports fans in general, and is definitely worth a read this summer as you watch the NBA playoffs unfold before your very eyes.

Brief Book Review- 90% of the Game Is Half Mental

2010-05-05T21:27:00.001-04:00

[NOTE: I'm re-posting this because there were some issues with Ping.fm/posting this on my Twitter feed. Sorry if you've read this twice!]

Well, I finally did it-- I finished writing my thesis, defended it before my committee and passed a foreign language translation exam. Add all these things together, and it means that I'm finished with my masters degree and I will be graduating in a few short weeks, and I can finally breathe a little bit easier. After working this hard on something for such a long period of time, I knew that I needed a nice break to get caught up with the things I've ended up neglecting during this whole ridiculous thesis project. Well, a couple of those things were "fun" reading, my Google Reader and extensively keeping up with sports. Well, the weekend provided me with an opportunity to dabble in all three of those things as I read Emma Span's book 90% of the Game Is Half Mental: And Other Tales from the Edge of Baseball Fandom.

I heard about Span and this book through the numerous baseball and Yankees blogs I read, particularly at Bronx Banter where she has blogged in the past. So when I went down to the bookstore and saw it sitting there on the shelf with the other baseball books, I decided I should pick it up and give it a whirl. I knew this was a baseball book coming written by someone who (probably) had a similar perspective and approach as I have, coming from the blogosphere and not a former player nor a traditional/old media journalist. So I was going into this book with high expectations and those expectations were definitely fulfilled and I quite impressed. Sports books, I've discovered, are very hit-or-miss. Either they're really smart and thoughtful and enjoyable or they're redundant, boring and poorly written. There's not a lot of in between room when it comes to this genre, so I know that I should proceed tentatively when I read a book of that nature. But Span's book definitely falls into the former category, as it is insightful and quite funny as well as being well-written.

Now part of the pleasure I felt reading this book might have been the result of the fact that Span, like me, is a Yankees fan and wrote extensively about her experiences watching the Yankees as well as covering them for the Village Voice. What I thought made the book even more interesting for me is that Span primarily wrote about the time when I was becoming a bigger and more informed baseball fan. I read Buster Olney's Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty, which was very very well written and very interesting but felt somehow... distant from me. I definitely remember those games and I certainly remember that Yankees dynasty, but I hadn't quite matured enough to really appreciate what I was watching. I know a lot of people say that sports are perhaps best understood when you're young. While I do agree that you see more overall enthusiasm out of younger fans, you understand and appreciate things as you get older. Sports isn't quite as "life and death" as it was when I was younger (though it's still pretty important), but my understanding and appreciation for what I watch is definitely higher. So it was very interesting to read a book that focused on the time, not when I "became" a baseball/Yankees fan, but when that fandom was cemented and truly grew into what it is today. So I was a bit of an easy sell on this book, as it was more-or-less right in my wheelhouse, but as I read the book I realized that its appeal wasn't limited to people just like me.

Though Span is a Yankees fan and the primary subject matter is that fandom, this is definitely not a book "about" the Yankees. For one thing, Span spends a good deal of time discussing the crosstown Mets, which serves to break things up and keeps the book from being a "Yankee" one. But in addition to that, Span isn't writing about one season or one team or exclusively about the Yankees at all. Yes, Span is a Yankees fan, in addition to covering them for the Village Voice and other media sources, but what she's writing about is being a Yankees fan, stressing the "fan" and not just the Yankees, and that's what makes this book special and allows it to rise above some of its contemporaries. There will never be a shortage of book about the Yankees as a team, the goings-on inside their clubhouse and the lives and actions of their star players. But well-written books that go a long way to describe what it's like to be a fan of a baseball team (or a sports team, as the things that Span writes about could easily be applied to football or basketball or hockey)? Those kinds of books are much rarer and that's what Span has done with this book.

It's a book that can appeal to fans of any baseball team (I mean, except maybe the Red Sox. I mean, though it really is a book about baseball fandom, it's still written by a Yankees fan, so...) and that anyone who keeps up with the game of baseball would enjoy, even those people who happen to have a fairly intense distaste for the Yankees. This speaks to Span's background as a journalist, but also to the deftness of her writing and craft, as she can write something that appeals to many different people while still writing something that is very truly and authentically her. I think that has to be the most difficult part about writing a book that is so inherently personal-- writing about yourself and your own experiences in your own authentic voice while making it something that speaks to others as well. Span's ability to do just this is what makes this book more than just your average baseball book, or your average baseball-centered memoir, and makes it something that I think is worth picking up and checking out.

I talked earlier about the wide chasm when it comes to books about sports, and that's what I want to return to in the end. Sometimes they are written too dryly, a little too technically correct, which is often the case with older and more-established sports writers and thus the reader never really gets into the book. Sometimes the books are written by the athletes themselves, people who aren't in the business of writing so the lack of style can sometimes slow down the reader, who has to go back as they make their way through awkwardly constructed writing. Sometimes the passion of the writer gets lost, other times a book will feel too gushing and celebratory, again taking away that all-important authenticity. But when a sports book gets it just right, it's a wonderful thing and a true joy to read, and Emma Span's book does just that. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, perhaps best reflected that I was able to read it in about a day. Span writes with a humor and a joie de vivre that only the best writers have. Span draws you in with her lively sense of humor as well as her insights and observations on the game of baseball, and you cannot put her book down as you fly through page after page, chapter after chapter. This is a must-read book, not just for Yankees fans but for baseball fans and for fans of sports in general, as her account and representation of sports fandom can speak to many different people. If you're looking for a lively and engrossing book to kick off your summer reading, I think you couldn't do any better than 90% of the Game Is Half Mental.

The One That Got Away

2010-04-19T14:55:00.000-04:00

I've been refraining from commenting about PhD applications here for many reasons. One is that I'm sure most of you don't want to hear me talk (and mostly complain) about this whole process, and I really haven't had any good news on the that front that I could share. I don't want to get into a series of posting every time I hear from a school, especially if it's the "small envelope." I mean, I don't want this place to turn into too much of a pity party, at least not more than it already is. Also, I feel very strange (and afraid, in some sense) about sharing these things and especially negative things here. I know, or I can understand, that this isn't a complete referendum on me and the fact that I didn't get into certain schools doesn't mean that I have no intelligence or that somehow I have no intellectual worth. To be honest, I worry that someone (not anyone that I know, because my friends are all nice and understanding, but some hypothetical person who would not be so kind and understanding...) would use my acknowledging that I didn't get into certain schools as reasons to dismiss and disparage me. And I would probably listen and take those things to heart even though they weren't true, but that's another discussion for another time...

But there has been one school that said "no" to me that hurt above all and it's the one whose decision probably lingers with me the most. The funny thing is it's a school that wasn't necessarily on the top of my list, in that it might not have been the best "fit" for the ideas I wanted to pursue, in addition to other external factors that would all make this school, for me, a very tough one to get into (not to mention that they had a record number of applicants this year). But even though the odds were already really (and I mean really) stacked against me, I still was really stung when I found out that I didn't get into this school, even though I knew to prepare myself for bad news from certain schools. The school I'm talking about is my alma mater, the University of Texas.

Now, as I was saying, I understand that this wasn't some personal affront or a condemnation of my intellectual aptitude. There were many, many factors that would make it really difficult for me to go back to Austin and a lot of those were totally beyond my control. I also know that the English graduate program at UT is different and, in some respects, separate from the entire university you enter into as an undergrad (in terms of how you're let in and how those who look at your application evaluate it). But I won't lie-- hearing that UT didn't let me in made me feel very strange and bad. Above all, I think that it is because it "ruins" my "image" of the university, or my experiences with it. Up until this point in time, all I've associated with Texas has been the good things, that it was the place I went for my undergraduate education and where I had a lot of fun as well as discovering many things that I love and that have become very important to me. In my mind, when I think of UT I think of a place where only good things happen and I had fun. But these recent developments have upset that image a little bit, and I feel like this has clouded and affected the image I have or what I associate with UT. It's disrupted the image or the happy place or happy memories I have of my time in Austin.

This whole application process, no matter if it's for graduate school or law school or medical school or business school or whatever, requires you to not take things personally. Decisions are made not arbitrarily, but they aren't decisions that are made in a vacuum and other things come into play, like the make up of the department (what professors are there), how many spots they have, what the applicant pool is like, what the applicant is emphasizing in their application, etc etc. Applications like these are things where you can, technically, do everything "right" and for some reason, it doesn't work out. Thus I've tried my best not to take it too personally or get me down or out of my rhythm, though to say it hasn't had an effect would be silly, but the Texas one definitely stung. Not because I thought they would somehow be loyal because I was a graduate from there (in fact, I knew that the opposite was true and it would probably be tougher for me). But because, in spite of all those things I said I understood about the application process, I felt like it was saying I wasn't good enough for a place that I had been good enough at before and that I really did, in some strange way, care about being at. Texas was going to be different from all the other schools I applied to, because I had gone there and I had really really really REALLY enjoyed my time there, but that means that hearing them say "no" was going to hurt just a little bit more. And I know it's silly and the university is a massive institution and not something in which "loyalty" to a former student would factor in, but... it still stung.

I'm not saying this to elicit sympathy, and as things have moved along it's bothered me less and less as I've gotten away from the initial moment of finding out, but I won't lie and say it's completely gone away. Maybe I just need to realize (at least for right now) that I can't go back to being a student at UT and getting back to that point I was a couple years ago. But, above all, I think I need to not take it personally, something I have a hard time doing.

I Hope You Dance

2010-03-18T09:00:00.001-04:00

OK, I know my posting has been extremely sporadic... OK, who am I trying to kid, I've been on a "for real" blogging hiatus recently. I've got a couple of posts that I've started writing but I can't seem to finish, and a couple of ideas that I haven't had the time to write-- writing a thesis is no easy task, let me tell you that much. Unfortunately, I'll have to ask you to continue to have patience but there's a pretty good chance I'm going to have a lot of time to blog so you'll be hearing plenty more from me to make up for this absence.

But it is March, which means March Madness and the NCAA College Basketball Tournament. And I would be remiss if I didn't weigh in on that here. So I've posted my bracket, which culminates with Syracuse winning their 2nd national title, by defeating West Virginia. So as I retreat into my thesis-related exile, take a look at my bracket and leave any and all thoughts on the NCAA Tournament and college basketball in the comments. And, I promise, I will return soon!

The Drowning Man

2010-02-22T08:55:00.000-05:00

This post was, in part at least, inspired by a post on Jeff Pearlman's blog from about a week ago

In my writing, specifically my academic writing, I have a very bad tendency from which I cannot seem to break free. No, it's not windy and complex sentences (though those often are a problem) nor a lack of good ideas. But when I'm working on a paper, specifically a research paper that integrates secondary sources and literary criticism, I have a tendency to "over do" it. I end up reading and using too much of that criticism and thus my writing and analysis gets weighed down in those secondary sources.

I remember, when I was writing my thesis on Jack Kerouac at the University of Texas, that I worried that I would "drown" amidst all the potential research and avenues I could pursue with this project. To be honest, I wanted to drown in all of it to some degree. This was the first time I really got to work on something that was "my own" and my specific and particular research interests. Now, that's not to say that I didn't enjoy the classwork I did but this was my own project and my own thing and I was finally getting to follow through on it. This was something I had wanted to do, and something that I had been thinking about for a long time and now I was finally getting to act upon those ideas.

Which brings me to right the present day, and I'm once again working on a thesis, though in a much different way. Now I'm constantly working through the idea; this thesis on Lawrence and Hemingway is more process oriented rather than taking something quasi-articulated from my mind and fashioning and finishing it, as was the case with my Kerouac thesis. In some ways, that makes for a much better and more informative experience, but it is also much more difficult and thus leading to more frustration. With my Kerouac thesis I knew (more or less) what I was going to say and write over the course of the entire project. With this Hemingway/Lawrence project, however, I don't have that same sense of purpose or vision and that often leads me into dead ends or full stops in the writing process, which in turns lead me to do more research. I turn to the research because it's something I can do and can turn to where I know what to do (namely, reading and comprehending things).

Because I can turn to this, namely when I want to work but I don't know what I want to write, I often end up (once again) drowning and almost purposefully so in this sea of research. In some ways, research becomes a crutch or something I can turn to when I want to work (or feel like I'm doing work) but I don't know what I want to write or go with my writing and that induces more of the "drowning" of too much research. Then I will panic because I feel overwhelmed, but I don't feel like I can "write my way" out of the problem, so I end up... that's right, doing more research. It's a vicious cycle and it makes it very difficult to make any progress on the project. But then, much like the Kerouac project, I enjoy that drowning because I am immersing myself in something I love and enjoy and thus I don't want to stop, even though it isn't helping my project progress. It's quite a dilemma and one that I don't know how to really confront the problem and deal with it.

I know there are many of you out there to write, and specifically research-related writing. How do you feel about this? Do you often get overwhelmed by your research and feel like you're drowning? Do you, secretly, enjoy it? How do you combat it, if you do and find it a hinderance?

VegetariLent 2010

2010-02-17T08:30:00.000-05:00

Well, it's that time of the year. With Ash Wednesday, we also have the beginning of Lent. I think it's so interesting that you see people from all different backgrounds and approaches who "do" something for Lent and recognize it. I think it's pretty cool that it does transcends and everyone gets into the spirit or mode of doing something or giving up something, giving of one's self in one way or another.

Well, I know you all are probably wondering "Well, what's he going to give up for Lent?" In the past, I've given up soda (pretty easy) sweets (really difficult) and coffee (almost impossible, but I did it!). This year, I've decided I'm going to relinquish another thing I'm very fond of-- meat. That's right, I'm going vegetarian for Lent, thus I've dubbed it VegetariLent 2010. On the one hand, I'm looking forward to this opportunity. I know I don't eat well and I think this will make me really consider what I'm eating and make me eat better and take care of myself. On the other hand... I love meat, and this is going to be a tough thing to do. But I'm going to do it!

But Lent isn't just about giving up something you like or breaking a bad habit, but there's also a more outward approach or component you have to take. So I'm thinking of things I can do to make myself a better person, not necessarily for myself but for others so I can be a better person in the world. I'm going to try to keep a journal, so that I'm at peace (I think writing about stuff is a great way to make peace with it, so you lose some residual emotion, especially if it's anger, at the end of the day). I'm also going to be more open to things and try to genuinely learn about the people around me and understand them as people much better. I know it's very abstract to say "Well, I'm going to try to be a better person" but I think that's the approach I'm taking, in that I will be trying to limit or diminish the things I do that I'm not particularly fond of so that I will be... maybe not better per se but happier or more at peace. Now I'm not sure if this is the exact approach I'm supposed to be taking but you know what? I'm doing it. And you all will get to see how it goes, because I'm sure it will come up in my blogging.

Now I get to ask you all out there: What are you "doing" for Lent, if anything? How do you feel about the whole Lent season?

Goodbye Albuquerque...

2010-02-16T09:00:00.000-05:00

I've bid adieu to (somewhat) sunny Albuquerque, New Mexico and I've returned to slightly snowy and cold Winston-Salem. The conference itself went well, and I was pretty happy with how my paper turned out. I really like the idea behind the paper I presented and I was glad to get those ideas out there and talk about them and confirm that it is something feasible for me to pursue. I think I communicated the things I wanted to communicate (though I wasn't totally happy with my delivery of the paper, but that was in part due to not having that much time to practice it) so I would classify the whole experience as a success.

Anyways, I could get into this a little bit more, but I think I might have to shelve that discussion for another time. You would think that, after having delivered this paper, that I would be able to blog a whole bunch. But that's not the case, because even though I'm done with the conference paper I, now, have to really get into writing my thesis (I'm shooting for my 10 page introduction by Wednesday) and I've been hit with my usual, post-traveling cold. It's definitely cut into my energy and handcuffed me in terms of getting lots of things done. Now I'm not saying that I'm taking an extended break (at least I don't want to take an extended break) but I'm feeling pretty worn out, which means that there won't be the same kinds of posts you're used to, as least in terms of volume.

One thing I was able to finish writing was a post over on the sports blog that I occasionally write for, where I talk about 5 radical (and controversial) changes that can happen in sports to make them collectively better. I won't do the usual re-posting of it, but I will direct you to the post and ask you very nicely to check it out, tell me what you think (I'm sure some of you might disagree with my suggestions and want to let me know that you do disagree) and check out some of the other posts as well.

Albuquerque (again)

2010-02-10T14:00:00.000-05:00

After the Super Bowl, the star player on the winning team (which this year was Drew Brees for the New Orleans Saints; didn't someone predict that the Saints would win...?) will generally film a commercial where he says "I'm going to Disneyland!" Well, after the Super Bowl, I did not get to go to Disneyland. Instead, I got to say "I'm going to Albuquerque!"

That's right, I have returned to Albuquerque, New Mexico for the same reason I came here last year-- a conference presentation. I will be presenting later today, 5 PM local time, once again about Jack Kerouac and specifically how his Catholicism affected On The Road. This is along the same lines of what I presented about last year. But while last year I talked about the effects of considering Kerouac as a Catholic writer (specifically a Catholic countercultural one), in this paper I will be attempting to consider Kerouac's most well-known text as being informed or reflecting Catholic ideas.

Anyways, for that reason my posting has been a little bit sporadic and will probably be a little bit sporadic for the near future. This paper was very different, in that I had to actually compose it and put it together unlike my paper from last year which was literally the concluding chapter from my undergraduate thesis, and so it took a little bit more time to craft. Because of that, I had to press the "pause" button on my thesis work, so I've... well I haven't fallen behind but I need to really get rolling again, so I will be devoting a lot of time to my thesis after I present this paper.

I'll be sure to let you all know how the presentation goes, whether you want to know or not, and hopefully it will go well. I'm definitely more nervous about this paper than the one I presented last year, because I've had to piece this one together rather than merely extracting it from a larger work. But hopefully it will come across well and that the other panels I attend will be interesting and informative.

My Super Bowl 44 Prediction

2010-02-05T13:00:00.000-05:00

All right, it's that time of the year (or at least the sports year). The Super Bowl is upon us and this year in Miami the New Orleans Saints will be facing the Indianapolis Colts for the Vince Lombardi Trophy. Before I get into what I think about the game itself, I need to go through and talk about the championship games and why the Colts and Saints are playing in the Super Bowl.

The first championship game was for the AFC, and the New York Jets traveled to Indianapolis to play the Colts. The Jets were everyone's favorite surprise team, having just knocked off the Chargers (a team a lot of people had going to the Super Bowl) and coached by the gregarious and ever-quotable Rex Ryan. But even though a lot of people liked the Jets and wanted them to make it to the big game, most people didn't think they could stop Indy. I mean, yeah they had a great defense but they were going up against Peyton Manning. Well, in the first half, the Jets showed they belonged in this game and went into halftime with the lead. In the first quarter, the Jets sacked Peyton Manning twice and held the vaunted Colts offense scoreless (though the Jets didn't score either). Then in the second quarter, after the Colts made a 25 yard field goal to go up 3-0, Jets QB Marc Sanchez found Braylon Edwards for an 80 yard TD pass to go up 7-3. The Jets added another TD and FG, after the Colts kicked another field goal and had a 17-6 lead with around two minutes left in the first half. But the Colts next two drives proved to be back-breakers for the Jets. Manning drove the Colts down the field at the end of the first half and scored a TD on a 16 yard pass to Austin Collie, making the halftime score 17-13. Then, at the start of the third quarter, Manning once again got the Colts into the end zone on a 4 yard TD pass to Pierre Garcon. With that score, the Colts took the lead and never looked back. Manning would add another TD pass to Dallas Clark and Matt Stover would add one more field goal for a final score of 30-17 in favor of the Colts.

Though the Jets were able to get pressure on Manning early in the game, he was able to adapt and ended up with a great statistical performance: 26-39, 377 yds and 3 TDs. Pierre Garcon had the best day of any Colts WR, pulling down 11 catches for 151 yards and a TD. The Colts defense played well, shutting down the Jets rushing game as Shonn Greene only had 41 rushing yards (before leaving the game due to injury) while Thomas Jones only ran for 42 yards. Sanchez played well, going 17-30 with 257 yds and 2 TDs to 1 INT. While this is a solid stat line, especially for a rookie QB, that is not the way that the Jets are going to win. Between the inability of Greene or Jones to get anything going on the ground, the lack of pressure on Manning after the first quarter and the fact that they lost the time of possession battle, things did not bode well for the Jets and thus Indy pulled out a game that was close in the first half but saw them pull away in the second.

The late game was in New Orleans, and the NFC Championship game featured Drew Brees and the Saints against the Minnesota Vikings and QB Brett Favre. This game was unlike the AFC Championship game, as it was almost a "pick 'em" and you could make very good cases as to why either team would win. The game proved to be just as evenly matched as it seemed on paper, as the two teams went into the half tied at 14 and both offenses showed just how explosive they could be. The game went back and forth throughout the second half, as Drew Brees and Brett Favre traded blows and scores before the Vikings got the ball with about two minutes to go with an opportunity to win the game as they drove into field goal range for kicker Ryan Longwell. But then Vikings HC Brad Childress made some very questionable calls, the Vikings were penalized for having 12 men in the huddle and then Brett Favre, having to try to throw the ball to move back into field goal range, through across his body on the run (a BIG no-no) and the Saints promptly intercepted the ball to force the game into overtime. The Saints won the toss, moved into field goal range (with the help of a few questionable calls, I won't lie) and Saints kicker Garrett Hartley drilled the 40 yard field goal to win the game and send the New Orleans Saints to the Super Bowl.

This was a game that the Saints won not because they played better (though they didn't play poorly) but because the Vikings could not seize opportunity. The Vikings fumbled the ball 6 times, losing 3 of them as well as throwing 2 INTs, which included that incredibly costly one at the end of the game. In addition to this, the Saints defense completely battered Favre to a degree that many of us had not seen. It was clear that Favre was not at full strength throughout the game and the effects of the Saints pass rush clearly began to show. Adrian Peterson had a solid day running the football, with 122 yards and 3 TDs, though he had a tendency to put the ball on the turf (though he didn't lose any fumbles). The Saints did a good job containing the Vikings main receiving weapon in Sidney Rice as he only had 43 yards and a TD, while Bernard Berrian had 9 receptions for 102 yards (though with one fumble). Drew Brees did throw for 3 TDs for the Saints, but only had 197 passing yards. No Saints receiver had more than 50 yards, but Brees did find 6 different players for multiple catches. The Saints rushing attack wasn't at its best for this game, as Pierre Thomas only had 61 yards and a TD while all other rushers were held to single digits. The key to this game was the physicality of the Saints defense. Though they didn't have a statistically dominant performance, they continuously and relentlessly hit Brett Favre. The Saints physicality, along with the Vikings' propensity to turn the ball over and not seize the moment, kept the Saints in the game and put them in a position to win it in overtime.

Now we move onto the Super Bowl, which will feature two of the most prolific offensives in the league. In addition, something that is problematic for me as a viewer who isn't a fan of either of these teams, is that I can fairly easily root and be happy for either team. On the one hand, I can appreciate the great and what I call "technical" prowess of Peyton Manning. I know some people don't really like Peyton Manning for whatever reasons, but I'm not one of them. But on the other hands, we have the New Orleans Saints and I know I don't need to discuss why I would want to see them with. In addition to the team finally breaking free of its losing legacy, the city underwent the horrors of Hurricane Katrina and was able to rebuilt to make it to this point. The Saints have come to represent New Orleans, specifically post-Katrina New Orleans, and to see them win the Super Bowl after suffering all that would be nothing short of amazing and a truly good thing for the city and its population.

But now we need to get into the real nitty-gritty and take a look at how these two teams match up on the field. As I said, both of these teams boast electric and explosive offenses, particularly through the air. Each team averages around 280 passing yards per game, and have the second (Indy) and fourth (New Orelans) ranked passing offenses in the NFL. The Saints also put up the most points per game at 31.9 while the Colts score almost 26 points per game. The Saints feature Drew Brees, one of the greatest free agent signings ever, at QB while the Colts have 2009 NFL MVP Peyton Manning calling the plays. All right, you get the idea; both of these teams have great offenses and great QBs and they will play a big, big role in determining the outcome of this Super Bowl

Also, both of these teams have similar weaknesses, namely problems on the defensive side of the ball. Each team ranks in the bottom half of the league in terms of total defense, with the Saints giving up more through the air (235 yard per game) while the Colts are susceptible to strong rushing attacks (giving up 126.5 yards per game on the ground). Both teams have, in the playoffs, worked to dispel these labels as the Colts have bottled up big time running backs like Ray Rice for Baltimore and Greene and Jones for the Jets. Meanwhile, the Saints did a good job slowing down Kurt Warner and the Cardinals though they had troubles with Favre and the Vikings. One thing the Saints do well on defense is create turnovers, as they have the third-most interceptions in the league as Darren Sharper tied for the league lead in INTs with 9, as well as sacking the opponent's QB 35 times this season.

The Colts defense is also strong in certain areas, namely in terms of scoring defense. Though they give up a lot of yards, they don't give up a lot of points (19.2 per game, which is in the top 10 in the league). Each team also boasts prolific pass rushers, as the Colts feature Dwight Freeney and Robert Mathis while the Saints have Will Smith. Freeney has become one of the biggest storylines of this Super Bowl, as it was revealed he suffered from a bad ankle sprain and might not play. Even if he does play, he won't be at 100% and that should make things a little easier for Jermon Bushrod and the Saints offensive line, but not totally easy as they will still have to deal with Mathis, LB Gary Brackett and CB Kelvin Hayden. Even if Freeney isn't as his best, they will make it hard for Brees to find Marques Colston and Devery Henderson as well as his TE Jeremy Shockey. That said, the Saints have a few weapons on defense as Jabari Greer will do his best to take Reggie Wayne out of the game and LB Jonathan Vilma will try to disrupt Manning and the Colts offense as best he can.

But when it comes to making my prediction, I'm interested in two things. The first is the aforementioned injury to Freeney and the second is the Saints ability to run the football. Though I don't believe the Colts defense will completely fall apart with Freeney at less than 100%, I do think it will make their defense slightly less effective. Even though it might be a small step back, a great QB like Brees can take advantage of that. Having Freeney a little banged up will give Brees that extra split-second to make a play. The second point, about the Saints ability to run the football, is one that is flying completely under the radar. The Saints featured the 6th ranked rushing attack in the NFL this season, while the Colts finished dead last in that category. It gets lost because of the explosive passing game, but Pierre Thomas, Mike Bell and, yes, Reggie Bush are all good running backs and can make things happen on the ground. This, coupled with Indy's admittedly suspect rushing defense, leads me to believe that Sean Payton will create a game-plan for the Saints offense that tries to exploit this. Though we always think of Brees and the passing game, the Saints are a very balanced offensive team and can run the football well.

To wrap this up, I think this will be a very exciting Super Bowl with lots of points scored. Manning and Brees will both play spectacularly and I don't think either defense will be able to stop these QBs. I think Sharper will make one big play, finding a way to intercept Manning, which is probably one of the toughest things to do. But other than that, I don't see the Saints defense having any kind of answer for Manning, as he will probably hit 300 yards and 2-3 TDs. Freeney will be slowed down enough and won't be able to have as big an effect on the game as he would like. This will allow Brees to find either Henderson or Colston for a big play for a TD. But what I'm expecting to see is a heavy dose of Pierre Thomas and Mike Bell. The Colts defense will have to play for the pass (it's Drew Brees, you HAVE to watch for the pass first) and that will give the underrated Saints RBs room to run. Though it won't be about ball-control in the same way it is with a team like the Jets, I think the Saints will try to control the clock on the ground a little bit and keep Manning on the sidelines for as long as they can. But no one is going to pull away in this one, not with both of these offenses, and it will probably be close going into the fourth quarter. And even though the whole world seems to think the Colts are a mortal lock, I think the Saints have a little too much "team of destiny" about them. People talk about how this might be like San Francisco- San Diego in 1994, but the Saints are MUCH better than that San Diego team. These teams are more evenly matched that a lot of people realize or want to admit. Now I'm not saying that Brees is Manning's equal as a QB, but each team's positives and negatives are about equal and I like the Saints ability to (relatively) control the clock with their ground game.

But the main reason I'm leaning towards the team from the Big Easy is for something totally intangible and inexplainable. After watching that NFC Championship Game, this isn't just some plucky explosive offense that got lucky in going to the Super Bowl. I don't want to talk about the Katrina devastation in New Orleans too much, but I think these players realize this would be very special to a city in need of something special. Call it whatever you want-- mystique, karma, destiny, magic-- but I think the Saints have it on their side. It will be close, it will be exciting, there will be many points scored, and I wouldn't be surprised if Indianapolis ended up winning, but I like New Orleans to win Super Bowl 44.

Also, I will be making this gumbo recipe in my crockpot for the Super Bowl party I'm throwing. I'll be sure to report how all that turns out. But please let me know what you think-- Did I get it right? Am I totally off-base? Who are you rooting for in Super Bowl 44?

ATL

2010-02-04T11:00:00.000-05:00

This is another post I'm syndicating that was first published at Sports Only. I hope you'll head on over there and check out some of the other posts if you're interested in reading about sports!

By and large, most people assume that the Lakers and Cavaliers are the top two teams in the league almost without question. Though the designation of the singular number one team will often switch between them, they are generally accepted as being the best teams featuring the game's two best players in Kobe Bryant and LeBron James. But from there, it gets interesting as the race for the NBA's third best team is very competitive, and that rank is very much up in the air. Orlando, Boston, Denver and Dallas can all make potential claims to the position, as perennial powerhouse San Antonio has had a bit of a down year this time around.

But I believe that not one of these teams can make the best claim to the spot as the NBA's third best team in the 2009-2010 season. My pick is one that not a lot of people are talking about in the national media, at least not as much as Dallas or Denver, and that is flying under the radar a little bit. I believe that, at this point in time, the NBA's third best team is the Atlanta Hawks. This season has been one where every team has shown certain weaknesses, even those at the very top. Thus, rather than making the case against all those other teams and showing why they're flawed, I want to instead focus on why the Hawks are better or "less flawed" than everyone else. This is going to involve a little statistical analysis, so stick with me...

The Hawks have quite a few good players, but no transcendent players like those other teams have. There is no Dirk or Carmelo or Dwight Howard or Paul Pierce and/or Kevin Garnett combo on the Hawks. Despite this lack of a true focal point that exists in one singular player, there is a consistency to the Hawks' lineup that is unmatched in the league right now. One of the statistics that best reflects this are their +/- numbers. Here is, according to NBA.com, what exactly the +/- numbers mean:

The AutoTrader.com +/- stat shows the power of teamwork. It's a way of showing the best-engineered/best combination of players on the court. The +/- stat is a statistic that looks at the point differential when players are both in and out of the game, to see how the team performs with various combinations. The +/- stat can look at a variety of combinations including the best two player, three player and even five player combinations for each game.

Looking over the +/- combinations for this season, the Hawks are responsible for many of the top combos. In terms of two player combinations, the Hawks make up almost half of the top ten, with pairings of Joe Johnson, Mike Bibby, Josh Smith and Al Holford. Only the Lakers can compete with the Hawks on this level. The Hawks also possess the top four "3-player" combinations as well as having the top "4-player" combo and fourth and fifth ranked "5-player" combinations. The Hawks also rank in the top 10 in John Hollinger's assist ratio statistic, with 15.5% of their possessions resulting in an assist, as well as having the fourth ranked offense in terms of efficiency according to Hollinger's calculations (which are way too complicated for me to explain here). This is due, in part, to their care for the basketball, as they have the lowest turnover ratio of any team in the league this year, which speaks to the smart and careful play of veteran PG Mike Bibby. What is amazing, and speaks to how well the Hawks play as a unit rather than a collection of players, is that Bibby and SG Joe Johnson each average about the same number of assists per game. Their game is not predicated on the point guard getting the offense going, as the shooting guard can get in the act as well and that reflects a great deal of depth and consistency to their offensive approach.

Where the Hawks are a little bit weak is on the defensive end. The Hawks give up 97 points per game, which is middle of the pack but for a contending team that's a little bit higher than you would like to see. They also rank fairly low according to Hollinger's Defensive Rebound Rate statistic and in the overall Rebound Rate category. Marvin Williams, the SF from North Carolina, underperforms a little bit and that seems like it would hinder their defensive performance a little bit. But what they lack in terms of size and defensive performance they make up for with offensive depth. The Hawks have Jamal Crawford coming off the bench, as he has made his presence known and is a contender for the Sixth Man of the Year Award. Crawford is their 2nd leading scorer, with 17.5 points per game coming off the bench while only playing 30 minutes per game. Joe Johnson puts up only 4 more points on average while playing 7 more minutes than Crawford. In addition, the Hawks have a potentially solid and explosive young point guard in Jeff Teague on the bench as well as Maurice Evans and Zaza Pachulia to take up minutes so the starters can rest.

While there are some concerns about their defense, and I think the back end of their bench is a little thin, I think their offense (and their offensive efficiency) as well as the strength of their top 6 players make the Atlanta Hawks the NBA's third best team heading into the All-Star Break. Above all, I like the cohesion of this team, as it is clearly one where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The other teams in the conversation, Orlando or Dallas or Denver or Boston, may have the better singular players, but Atlanta frequently puts out the best combinations of players and players that can flourish when they are put together on the court. They might not have the best players who, as individuals, perform the best but the group of players they have together collectively perform about as well as anyone else in the league.

One More Cup of Coffee

2010-02-03T10:00:00.000-05:00

If you read this blog or know me at all, you know I spend a lot of time in various coffee shops/cafés. This approach has come about for many reasons-- I love coffee and many of my favorite writers (and thus, the figures who are very close to me) are associated with the café lifestyle. Though it’s not just out of mere emulation that I go to coffee shops, but another reason that’s a little more intriguing. What I like most about going to those places to work/read/write/whatever is that it’s a nice balance of being alone and being with people. On the one hand, you can go there by yourself and do what you want. You can sit there and listen to music or read or write and be in your own little world. But you are around other people, even if they aren’t communicating with you. You can be by yourself but you aren’t alone, if that statement makes sense. I find that I am able to work better under those conditions, where I can be doing my own thing yet I can sense life and movement around me. This is the problem, a lot of the times, with libraries because one has to remain quiet and thus you feel more “alone” than “by yourself.”

But enough of this, as this isn’t what I wanted to talk about with this post. What I have been thinking about is what, as someone who is a discerning patron of numerous coffee sops, I like about coffee shops. What do the coffee shops I enjoy frequenting the most do most often? If I were constructing my ideal coffee shop, what would I include? Since I know a lot of you out there are like me and enjoy the café “lifestyle,” I thought you might find this interesting.

1.) “For here” cups

Now, my status as a Prius owner belies the point I'm trying to make. I’m not trying to be a preachy green environmentalist with this point (though it is true that “for here” cups means less waste, but that’s another story...) but it’s more about the ability to enjoy one’s drink. “To go” cups are problematic for coffee enjoyment especially for espresso drinks that feature a lot of foam; they work well enough for drip coffee and lattés (which are a bit heavier on steamed milk rather than foam). Properly enjoying and consuming a cappuccino or a macchiato, drinks that do not have a great deal of liquid mass, is not really possible with a 12 oz to go cup, or at least it's much more difficult. A cappuccino calls for something like a saucer or a smaller cup, and that can’t be really replicated with a to-go cup. Also, drinking from the “to-go” cup while you aren’t “going” elicits a certain feeling within the drinker best articulated by a friend of mine talking about going to Starbucks: “You feel stupid sitting there with your paper cup sitting 5 feet from the door.” You feel weird or strange using a cup that’s designed for travel when you aren’t traveling. Now I can understand this at a place like Starbucks, where there’s an emphasis on turnover and getting people their drinks and then on their way. But at a lot of coffee shops (especially in North Carolina, for some reason) where it’s clear that they aren’t trying to keep people from staying/working/hanging out they still use only the “to-go” cup. If you are going for that set-up, where people are encouraged (if that’s the right word) to sit and stay and have a cup of coffee, if you’re going to truly try to be the “third place” besides work and home, you can’t have only “to-go” cups. When I go to a coffee shop and I’m planning on staying for a little while to do... whatever, I want to be able to drink out of a real cup or mug or glass and not something paper that’s designed to go in my car or to carry out with me.

2.) Easily available cold water

One of my many flaws and problems is that I don’t drink enough water. By and large, I will chose a Diet Coke over the cup of ice water when I’m very thirsty. But one of the times when I like to have cold water readily available is when I’m out at a coffee shop and drinking coffee. When I’m consuming caffeine, I’m a little more conscious of my water intake and I want to be sure that I’m not getting dehydrated, which leads to headaches and unhappiness. Also, I think that I like to counterbalance the hot coffee with something cool and refreshing, especially after I finish drinking it. Maybe it’s the acidic nature of the coffee, but I generally get thirsty and want cold water to drink after I have a cup of coffee. Now the one thing I don’t like to do is have to ask someone for that glass of water. I will speak a little more about this later in regard to something else, but I'm a fairly passive-aggressive person and I don't really like having to ask people for certain things. Also, I drink water pretty quickly so I like to be able to refill my glass as quickly as I would like without having to bother someone, especially when they are busy dealing with other customers. Other issues, along these lines, that I've encountered is that the water isn't very cold/fairly tepid or that the glasses they have are very small or not what I would call "grown up" glasses. So one thing that is essential to a perfect coffee shop is cold ice water and normal sized glasses that are easily available.

3.) Abundant power outlets

Generally, my laptop goes everywhere with me, especially when I’m going to any coffee place. And while my Macbook Pro gets pretty good battery life, it does run out and thus I need to find a place where I can plug it in. I know I’m not the only person who deals with this, as outlets are amongst the most hotly competed over things at any coffee shop. Seats and tables aren’t good or bad because of how comfortable they are but if there is a nearby outlet where one can plug in their computer. Then it becomes almost a Darwinian exercise to acquire one of the coveted spots near an outlet. My favorite spot for coffee in Winston-Salem, Krankies, is very good about outlets as almost every table is near one but there are plenty of places I've been to where there are only one or two outlets and thus those tables go very, very quickly. Now this isn't a problem if you have a very good and a very big battery for your laptop, but I feel like I run so many applications simultaneously (I generally have Google Chrome, Apple Mail, iTunes, Last.fm, Adium Twhirl and Skype running simultaneously, and Pages and Preview if I'm working on a paper) that my battery life goes very quickly. Also, I'll get into this in my third point, but I don't like feeling the constraints of time and I don't like watching my battery meter and feeling pressured to work quicker because I'm worried about running out of power. If I'm able to plug into an outlet, that takes care of everything. But if I'm designing a coffee shop to fit all my needs and fulfill all my needs, the presence of numerous power outlets would be a must have.

4.) Wifi that doesn’t have a time limit and that you can access without having to ask someone (even if you have to pay for it)

This bespeaks to my aforementioned passive-aggressiveness and my desire to not have to talk to anyone. Now I could say here that I want free wifi but I'm being a little bit pragmatic and I know that not every place is going to be able to offer completely free wifi. But what I would like even more is to be able to access the wifi for an unlimited period of time without having to talk to someone to add more time. For example, Peet's (generally found in the Bay Area and one of my favorite cups of coffee) gives you an access code that gives you free wifi... but for two hours. Now if I'm just stopping in for a quick cup of coffee that's enough but if I'm having a couple drinks and trying to crank out some writing... that probably won't be enough. For some reason, even asking for that code makes me feel weird. I don't know why since it's a completely legitimate thing to ask for but every time I ask for it I feel a little funny. To me, it's that whole act of asking for it that's troublesome. I don't mind paying that much (though, obviously, I'd prefer if it were free...) but I do mind having to ask someone for a password/code or being limited by time. Maybe this is a sign that I need to be more willing to interact with people instead of being passive aggressive, but I don't think so. And my ideal coffee place is one where I can access the wifi, whether it be free or for pay, without having to ask someone.

5.) Music that provides background noise but isn't too forceful

My favorite coffee place in Austin, Epoch, had a wide range of music that they would play. Sometimes they would play things that would fade perfectly into the background, usually stuff like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, or R&B from the 60s and 70s. But then there would be nights where they would play loud, oppressive world music from Eastern Europe that you couldn't block out even if you had noise canceling headphones and your own music turned up all the way. I think the key, with coffee house music, is that if you don't want to listen to it you can have your headphones on and clearly listen to your own music. Now I'm not saying that the only music that can be played is plaintive acoustic indie stuff. No no no-- like I said, 60s rock or R&B both work well. But sometimes I'm not in the mood for that kind of music, or music in general when I want to listen to a podcast, and I want to be able to put on my headphones and listen to that without the coffee shop's music encroaching in on it. But if I don't want to listen to my own music or I don't want to pick something out, I want to be able to listen to something in the background that isn't distracting but is... there in some way. It's that balance, being there without being too overbearing or omnipresent. If I don't want to listen to it, I don't have to and I can listen to my own music but if I don't want to listen to my own music I don't have to sit in silence (or an absence of music) but not something that's distracting as well. It's probably the most difficult thing to articulate that I would want in my ideal coffee house, because it's very intangible, but finding that balance between present but not being forced on you if you don't want it with the music is something that I often find in the coffee shops I frequent the most.

What do you think of my list? Do you like going and working at coffee places? What would be on your list of things you like most at a coffee shop?

NBA All-Star Voting-- Is It Broken?

2010-02-02T10:00:00.001-05:00

I'm syndicating this post, which can also be read at a sports blog I'm participating in with some of my friends. We're just getting off the ground but head on over to Sports Only and take a look, check it out and tell us what you think!

The two all-star games that seem to captivate the fans of each respective sport are for the MLB and NBA. The NFL's Pro Bowl doesn't really get discussion going. I mean, I've never heard an argument started because one player was voted to the Pro Bowl over another. But with baseball and basketball, the discussions can be relatively contentious, at least over a game that ultimately doesn't matter (well, the MLB one determines what league gets home-field advantage in the World Series but you get the idea). People will debate the merits of one player over another and why that player deserves to be an all-star instead of another. These debates are usually exacerbated because the fans, in both instances, pick the starting lineups. And, to be honest, the fans don't have the best track record on picking the best players from the given season and instead picking the biggest or most well-known names. Since the NBA All-Star Game is right around the corner and it's fresh in our minds, I want to focus on it this year and what the cost is of all this.

If you look at the West's starting lineup, it seems like the fans got it right (Nash, Kobe, Carmelo, Duncan and Amare) but the East's starting lineup shows just how much the fans vote for the "name" rather than the performance from year to year. The fans selected Allen Iverson and Kevin Garnett to start the game, when there were clearly not deserving of a starting spot. Iverson has only played in 25 games while Garnett is only averaging 14.6 ppg and 7.4 rebounds per game. Meanwhile, the Hawks' Joe Johnson is averaging 21.4 points per game and the Raptors' Chris Bosh is putting up 24 points and 11 rebounds per game. Their biggest problem-- they either play in Toronto or they aren't Allen Iverson, one of the most recognizable basketball players of modern memory. If you put Bosh or Johnson on the Celtics, they would easily be in the starting lineup because people would know who they were since they played for one of the most well-known NBA teams.

This is what happens when you let the fans vote, and being able to vote multiple times (there's a cap, that you can vote like 10 times, but still that's a lot of times to vote). Yes, there are fans out there who vote based upon who is having the best year and has the superior numbers, but that's a very small minority. Not to get too political, but the same things happen during presidential elections. I like to imagine that people voted, like I did, because I listened to what the candidate had to say and followed them and firmly believed that their plan was the best for the country. But most people vote based upon one or two soundbites which might be accurate, but can also be misleading. If there isn't a real standout player (like LeBron or Kobe-- they're both big names but also deserve to start without a doubt), the majority of fans will go with a big name, even if it's faded, rather than someone who they would have to dig a little bit deeper to discover. Now, I don't have a problem with that on its own and I know the majority of people don't care as much about basketball as I do to really consider who is having the best season. But I believe our expectations about the All-Star game means that we need to take it a little bit more seriously.

Whenever one complains about these voting irregularities, someone playing in an all-star game because they have a greater name recognition even though they are statistically lacking, people point out that "the game doesn't count" and "it's just an exhibition." Well I think there are three reasons why that is a faulty approach to maintain. First of all, all-star appearances factor in when some of these guys are negotiating their contracts. It's used as one barometer for success and ability in the NBA, so we shouldn't be quite as flippant about its weight. One might also say "well, if he's not starting he'll be picked as a reserve so he'll make the team anyways." But then you're bumping out someone, like a David Lee or Paul Pierce this year, who is deserving and would get a reserve spot had the spots been more or less correctly distributed. Secondly, if everyone is all right with big names winning out over smaller names with superior stats, we should really change the name from "All-Star Game" to "Big Name Game." If you're presenting this as a display of the NBA's best players playing together, you can't have players in who aren't playing on that same level. If the fans really want to see a game where all the big names play even if they aren't playing a lot or having good seasons, guys like Garnett or Iverson or Tracy McGrady or Shaquille O'Neal, then make it the "Big Name Game" and don't tell me it's a true "All Star Game." Finally, people who have no problem with the way things are now say the game is "just for fun" and "a show" or "entertainment." To be honest, a lot of these people are involved in television so things like ratings matter. But wouldn't it be easier to sell if you had truly the most talented players playing? The product will clearly be better if you have only players who are playing at a high level together. If it's just a show, I think having Joe Johnson or Chris Bosh starting and playing more minutes would make it a much better and inherently more watchable one.

I'm not quite sure what the solution to this problem is. I clearly don't think the fans always get it right, as this year proves that point, but I do think it's good for the fans to have some say in the matter. Perhaps the fan's vote needs to be weighted somehow, split 50/50 with basketball writers for the starting lineup while the coaches would choose the reserves for each squad. I think that would allow the fans to have some voice but the writers (who are, ostensibly, authorities on such things) could correct irregularities in situations such as the one we had this year. I know I'm making a big deal out of something that is an exhibition, but if it's an exhibition why should we, as fans, care this much about our vote? We should be concerned with getting to watch the best display of talent on the basketball court. And while the fans have shown the ability to get most of it right, they also are able to get certain parts horrendously wrong.

If you really want to hear about it...

2010-01-29T08:30:00.005-05:00

Yesterday, everyone was shocked... well, maybe not shocked but everyone was certainly startled with the news that J.D. Salinger, author of Catcher in the Rye and Franny and Zooey, had died of natural causes at 91. Mr. Salinger, with the novel Catcher in the Rye about alienated and cynical Holden Caufield, became something of a literary celebrity as he crafted a novel that was read by countless people, particularly young men and women in high school. I'm not going to try to sum up Salinger's career or provide an exhausting biography of one of the greatest and most well-known authors in 20th century America but I will point you towards his New York Times obituary and maybe quote a little about Catcher:

Though not everyone, teachers and librarians especially, was sure what to make of it, “Catcher” became an almost immediate best seller, and its narrator and main character, Holden Caulfield, a teenager newly expelled from prep school, became America’s best-known literary truant since Huckleberry Finn.

With its cynical, slangy vernacular voice (Holden’s two favorite expressions are “phony” and “goddam”), its sympathetic understanding of adolescence and its fierce if alienated sense of morality and distrust of the adult world, the novel struck a nerve in cold war America and quickly attained cult status, especially among the young. Reading “Catcher” used to be an essential rite of passage, almost as important as getting your learner’s permit.

Like I said, I don't want to turn this into some re-telling of Salinger's career, because there are many other people that do a much better job of this. But this is one of those deaths that makes me personally think about things-- myself, where I am, what I've done, etc etc. It wasn't a death that was a big surprise, since I knew Salinger was very old and had famously been a recluse and out of the public eye for pretty much my whole life, and he hadn't published anything in many, many years. But it was still a shock and a sad thing for me personally, because Salinger is one of the authors who affected me and pushed me in the direction I've gone, and Catcher in the Rye is, was, and always will be one of those books that means a great deal to me.

When I was a young man, much younger than I am now, many people told me that I had to read Catcher in the Rye, that it was a book that I'd relate to and understand. So when I was in 7th grade I picked up a copy and read it and everyone was right. It did speak to me and it was the first book I felt like connected to me, to who I was, in some way. It stood as my unquestioned favorite book throughout middle school and into high school until I met a couple of fellows named Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald and a few of their novels and stories catapulted to the top of my list. But when I think about where my love of literature came from, and why I'm a graduate student studying literature, it all really starts with Catcher in the Rye, particularly getting to read and analyze that book during my junior year of high school, in my AP English class with one of the teachers who helped me to realize how much I loved literature and that it was something I wanted to focus on as I went on to college. Though I have moved away from him and become interested in other authors, it wasn't because I thought Salinger was not as good a writer or Catcher was an inferior novel. I just changed and realized other nuances about myself and became interested in Hemingway, Jack Kerouac and D.H. Lawrence and on and on. But that beginning period, those formative years when I realized that literature, and specifically modern literature and the modern novel, could capture and depict what things were like. It made me realize that, though I often felt alienated and alone that I wasn't alone in that and wasn't as strange as I thought I was.

Even though I've moved away from him and I'm not doing my thesis or any "academic work" on him, J.D. Salinger is very much the reason (or one of the reasons) why I'm a graduate student in English. He's someone I will always associate with a specific period in my life, though I don't say that as a disparaging thing. A lot of people say "Catcher in the Rye, that's just a high school book." While the subject matter might be grounded in adolescence and that kind of angst, that doesn't take away from that book's greatness and does not make it any less important or Salinger any less of an author. I also think that, like a lot of books associated with high school, they deserve some reconsideration beyond that. Salinger falls into that realm of authors who are immediately dismissed as being something you read at a certain time in your life and that's it. Sometimes we look past these works when we really need to revisit them and consider them through the new lens that life experience provides us. Books like Catcher, Sun Also Rises and The Great Gatsby are great books and should be considered beyond being "high school" books.

But no matter where or when you read him, J.D. Salinger will always stand as one of the greatest American authors and who contributed to our own literary landscape. He's someone who has had a profound impact on my life, as his works both showed me that I wasn't alone in the way I felt (being alienated or feeling like an outsider) and that literature was something that I cared a great deal about and that it was something I wanted to be a big part of my life. Those of us who have read Salinger's words will always remember the power and effect they had upon us. So thank you very much J.D. Salinger for sharing your gift with us. You will certainly be missed and remembered by us all.

Feel free to leave any thoughts/stories/memories you have about Salinger or any of his works.

NFL Playoffs Championship Round Predictions

2010-01-23T17:43:00.000-05:00

Well, since I've made it this far I might as well see the entire thing though and thus here are my predictions for the championship round of the NFL playoffs.

New York at Indianapolis: Just like I thought they would, the Jets won against a highly favored Chargers team on the strength of their running game, with Shonn Greene went for 128 yards and a TD on a 53 yarder, and their powerful defense that intercepted Phillip Rivers twice and shut down the San Diego ground game. The Jets were also aided by a couple questionable coaching decisions by Chargers coach Norv Turner and having the Chargers placekicker Nate Kaeding miss 3 field goals, including ones from 36 and 40 that he would normally make during the regular season. The Jets, with first year head coach Rex Ryan and QB Marc Sanchez, were the perfect combination of lucky and good and with the upset victory they move on to face the Indianapolis Colts, who took care of business against the Ravens winning 20-3. In that game, Peyton Manning played all right, going 30 for 44, with 246 yards and 2 TDs with only one INT. The Colts defense had the big game, holding Ray Rice to 67 yards rushing and intercepting QB Joe Flacco twice. The key was the Colts ability to stop the Ravens in red zone situations, keeping them out of the end zone and only able to pick up one field goal. Coach Jim Caldwell's defense, led by Dwight Freeney, Gary Brackett and Robert Mathis, ruled the day and won the game for the Colts.

With the Colts and Jets advancing, we have the age old matchup of great offense versus great defense. The Colts boast one of the best offenses in the league, led by arguably the game's greatest QB, against its most punishing and hottest defense coached up by the fiery Rex Ryan. A lot of people are going with Jets because of that defense that was outstanding against the pass, only giving up 153 yards and 14.8 per game. The Jets are a blitz happy team that gets after the quarterback and boasts one of the game's star CBs in Darrelle Revis. Many people look at the Jets and reiterate the old football adage-- "defense wins championships." While I believe that is usually the case, I don't think it applies to this Colts team and its QB. In the past, these defenses would give Manning trouble as Manning's early career struggles against the Patriots have been well documented. But Peyton Manning has evolved into something even greater than the stat machine he was early on-- now he's someone who can win even when things aren't going his way and this is going to be the kind of game where Peyton has to play that way. Revis will certainly limit Reggie Wayne's ability to get open, and I think the Jets defense will get some pressure on Manning and he won't be able to find Austin Collie and Pierre Garcon every time. This won't be a vintage beautiful game for Manning, but I do think he will be able to make the throws when he needs to make them. TE Dallas Clark will be invaluable for the Colts, as I don't think the Jets have an answer for him. In addition, Manning is one of the best QBs against the blitz so I don't think Shaun Ellis and Bart Scott will be able to do everything they want. On the other side of the ball, seeing how the Colts were able to shut down Ray Rice leads me to believe they can do enough to stopp the Jets rushing attack of Greene and Thomas Jones, and I think the Colts pass rush will be able to get to Sanchez and force him to make some mistakes. The Colts defense is playing very well right now, and I think they will keep that going at home. It will be a close game, neither team will play a perfect game but I like the Colts defense to force Sanchez to make a couple mistakes as well as slowing down the Jets rushing attack and I like Peyton Manning to make the throws in clutch situations, especially to Dallas Clark. I think Indianapolis takes care of business and advances to the Super Bowl.

Minnesota at New Orleans: Boy, was I wrong about the Vikings... They completely and utterly dominated the Cowboys at home, getting a massive pass rush on Tony Romo as well as taking care of business against the Cowboys defense with a great game for QB Brett Favre, who threw for 4 TDs and WR Sidney Rice, who had 141 yards and 3 TDs. Even though Adrian Peterson only had 63 yards rushing, the Vikings offense held off the DeMarcus Ware and Cowboys defense, while Ray Edwards sacked Tony Romo 3 times for the Vikings defense. It was a dominating performance by the Vikings and one that I nor many other people saw coming. Meanwhile, in the Big Easy, the Saints absolutely demolished the Cardinals 45-14. Things looked good for the Cardinals on their first possession, as Tim Hightower did his best Ray Rice impression and broke off a 70 yard run for a touchdown. But after that, the Saints marched down the field to score a TD and then on the next possession the Cardinals fumbled, the Saints capitalized and they never looked back. Cardinals QB Kurt Warner, coming off that outstanding performance against the Packers, was battered in this game and knocked out during another fumble recovery at the end of the first half, though he would return in the 2nd half. Warner's numbers were pedestrian, going 17 of 26 for 205 yards and one interception, while Larry Fitzgerald couldn't do much of anything either with 6 catches for 77 yards and no TDs. The Saints offense, however, was able to do just about whatever it wanted against the Cardinals defense and Drew Brees scored 3 TDs to 3 different receivers and Reggie Bush contributed one rushing touchdown and one 83 yard punt return for a TD.

Thus we have the matchup between number one and two in the NFC, two dome teams with strong offenses. Each of these teams boast prolific offenses, ranking numbers one (Saints) and two (Vikings) in points per game this season. The Vikings have better singular players at RB and WR with Adrian Peterson and Sidney Rice, but the Saints have more talent spread out over the players at those positions, with Bell, Thomas and Bush rushing and Colston, Meachem and Henderson at WR. In addition, the Saints have the better option at TE in Jeremy Shockey. The Vikings come in with a much better defense, especially against the run. The Vikings give up only 87 yards on the ground, while giving up 218 yards through the air. The Saints defense is nowhere near as strong as the Vikings, ranking near the bottom in both passing and rushing. The one thing the Saints defense does well is intercept the ball, as they intercepted opposing QBs 26 times, which was 3rd best in the league. While Favre has been good with the football this season, only throwing 7 INTs, he is prone to make mistakes and throw INTs and I think that Saints FS Darren Sharper could capitalize on Favre trying to force a throw in a big situation. In addition, Jabari Greer is a solid CB and should be able to play well against Sidney Rice and slow him down though probably not totally shutting him down. The Vikings are also susceptible to good pass rushes, and I think the Saints Jonathan Vilma could cause some problems in the backfield for the Vikings. Meanwhile, I like the Saints offensive line to slow down Jared Allen and Ray Edwards (if he plays, since he was injured in the Dallas game). This game is shaping up to be a shoot-out between two of the best gun slingers in the league right now-- Brett Favre and Drew Brees. I think both teams will be able to do what they want offensively, by and large, and there will be a lot of points scored in this one. I believe that setup favors the Saints slightly, but I don't think that is what puts the Saints over the top. This game is being played at the Superdome, and that place is going to be ROCKING. The Saints are a franchise that has a long suffering fan base in addition to the way they bonded with this team after Hurricane Katrina and they are looking for a reason to celebrate. The Saints fans will give them a home field advantage unlike any that the Vikings have ever seen. Yes, the Vikings also play in a dome but... this is going to be very different. I know it's an intangible thing and something that can't be measured on the stat sheet, but I really think the crowd is going to play a role in this game. They will be loud and thus preventing Favre from clearly making audibles at the line of scrimmage and the Saints offense will feel much more comfortable playing on their home turf with those fans cheering them on. The Superdome crowd and the fact that I really like Drew Brees in this kind of situation leads me to pick New Orleans to move on to Miami and play in their first Super Bowl.

Thoughts? Comments? Leave them here! And don't forget to ask me those questions!

Inquiring Minds Would Like To Know

2010-01-20T10:00:00.000-05:00

I'm blatantly borrowing this meme from Ashley who did a post like this a week ago, but I'm going to a post where you out there can ask me questions. Unlike Ashley, I haven't really seen this in the blogs I read (except for her blog) but I still think it's a good idea. Maybe I need to expand my blog readership and branch out a little more, but that's another story for another time. Above all, I want to try to find and reach more readers my little ol' blog and thus I want to craft content that other people really want to read. Hearing from the people who are reading my blog is extremely important to achieving this so comment, and use this as an opportunity to connect via a question.

Anyways, please leave me your questions on whatever you'd like to know about me. I want to hear from the people who know me fairly to pretty well and who will come up with very deep questions, or maybe people who don't know me that well, who read this blog but don't comment much and want to know just a little bit about me. I also hope that maybe some of the people who read but don't comment will use this as an opportunity to comment for the first time. But comment here with your questions for me and I will answer them in a later post.

Ask away!

But Seriously...

2010-01-19T09:00:00.000-05:00

I know I'm not alone in this, but I probably spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about how I am perceived by others. I feel like today's society features a lot of people who ask themselves constantly "am I an introvert? An extrovert?" It's so strange how was want to be ONE of those things and we aren't comfortable just... being (sorry to go all 1960's on you). It reminds me of that line from 10 Things I Hate About You: "I know you can be overwhelmed, and you can be underwhelmed, but can you ever just be whelmed?" It's like that with being an introvert or an extrovert- why can't you just be a "vert," as one might say. I know that the purpose of the introvert-extrovert distinctions are not to be complete things, but people refer to it as such-- you're either an introvert or an extrovert and that's it.

Along those lines, I often wonder where I fall in regard to two other distinctions: if I'm a "serious" person or a "funny"person. Again, I acknowledge that making this kind of distinction is tricky because most people are serious and funny are certain points in their lives. Sometimes you feel very jokey and jovial, and sometimes you feel a little bit more somber and subdued. But that said, we generally see people in those terms- a funny person or a serious person. By and large, I think I come off as a more "funny" person- I joke around a great deal especially about myself, I'm sarcastic at times, I don't get too worked up about things. By and large, I'd say I'm a pretty funny, easy going person and I don't take myself too seriously or to such a degree that it holds me back.

But along with that, I sometimes feel like I'm not taken seriously or people don't think that I'm a serious person about the things that mattered. What I believe is that people don't think I'm serious because I don't take myself too seriously. I feel as though my approach, one that is fairly easy going and that keeps me from getting too hung up about things, makes people think that I'm not a serious or passionate person about a lot of things and thus they don't have to take me seriously. That line, between being "serious" and "taking yourself seriously" is a tough one to see. I want to be seen as a serious person, particularly about certain things like literature/politics/sports/music/the things that mater most to me, but I don't and never will take myself too seriously because I think that makes life a lot harder than it has to be. I mean, I'll joke about my own position, or my future, or I'll minimize the importance of the things I do because I don't feel much self-importance, but I don't want people to take that as a cue to not take me seriously or to think that things don't matter to me. Like I said, it's a very tricky thing.

But then I feel like, when I'm around my family, that other side comes out and I appear much more "serious" than I am around people in my own age group/demographic. At numerous family functions, I've had people say to me, "You need to have more fun. You're so serious all the time." What I wonder is why is being a serious person such a bad thing, at least amongst my family members? If I'm serious, it means that I'm very passionate and determined in regard to certain things. This is not a bad thing to be. You can have fun and be serious, and your serious-ness can also lead to fun. I mean, I've had fun (in some perverse way) with all the things I've accomplished as a student, and those things were all born because of my serious commitment to those things and my determination. Again, I think it's a matter of people not understanding the distinctions. I'm serious about the things I do, but I'm not serious about myself, which certainly allows me to have fun and not be constantly burdened by things.

At the end of this post, I'm not sure I'm left with any conclusion and this was much more of a thought exercise or me thinking out loud (metaphorically of course). I will alternately feel like I'm not taken seriously by others or the things I care about aren't taken seriously because I don't take myself seriously, but then I'm criticized for being too serious if I'm not totally free and easy. I'm striving for a balance between these two things, and I don't know if I've found it yet. Maybe in time I'll find that right balance, but for now I just ask people to not confuse my (occasionally) non-serious approach to myself with not being a serious person and seriously concerned with certain things.

Have any of you felt like this? Do you think of yourself as "serious" or "funny/non-serious?" If you know me at all, what are your thoughts? Do I really come off that way or is this all in my head?

Album Review- Contra

2010-01-18T10:00:00.001-05:00

One of my favorite new bands that fit into that "indie" music label (though they have reached a much wider audience than your average indie band) is Vampire Weekend. Well, this shouldn't be big news because everyone, or most everyone, likes them. They broke onto the scene in 2008 (I think...?) with their self-titled album that featured "A-Punk" and the ubiquitous "Oxford Comma." All in all, that album became one of those albums, ones that you associate with a specific time in your life. I definitely listened to Vampire Weekend heavily throughout my final semester at Texas and those songs are firmly entrenched in that period of my life. But it wasn't just me that Vampire Weekend hooked, as countless other listeners were drawn in by their blending of African music with classical and indie/pop/rock/what have you. And as everyone played and re-played their first album, we also waited for something new from this band from the Upper West Side of NYC. A couple of years later, we were all rewarded with the band's second album-- Contra. By and large, this sophomore effort has received good reviews, including 4 stars from Rolling Stone and an 8.6 out of 10 from Pitchfork, which is pretty damn impressive.

I legally downloaded the album from iTunes the day it came out, January 12th, as I finished writing my thesis proposal. Because things ended up being fairly busy on that front, I wasn't really able to give it the extensive, directed and focused listens that I would if I had more free time, or time that wasn't totally clouded by thoughts on Hemingway and Lawrence. But now that I have the proposal finished, I've been able to digest the band's new album and cobble together some thoughts that constitute a review.

I had pretty high expectations for this album based upon the song that the band released for free as a quasi first "single" for the album-- "Horchata." Now, I might have been prejudiced to like this song because I like the actual drink horchata (cinnamon-spiced rice milk) but I thought it was a very good song irregardless. The song features a tinkling keyboard melody and a lot of strings, with no real guitar presence in the song. Lead singer Ezra Koenig displays his ability with wordplay by rhyming "horchata" with "balaclava," and it's that kind of playfulness that some people don't like about Vampire Weekend but that I don't really mind. I thought it sonically fit with what the band did in songs like "Oxford Comma" but also gave it a more world-y sound. That said, I do agree to a certain extent with a friend of mine who said that "the verses sound a little bit like a parody of a Vampire Weekend song," but even that didn't diminish the song in my eyes.

But after listening to the album, I've found it to be different from the model set out by that first song. While "Horchata" didn't feature much in the way of guitar, songs like "White Sky," "Holiday" "California English" and "Cousins" all feature trademark Vampire Weekend chirping guitars while the rhythms of these songs are a lot more advanced and diverse as opposed to those on their first album. "Cousins" is the second song I heard off the album before its release, through the music video the band made for it. It reminded me a lot of "A-Punk" off their first album, which was a song they released as a single but that I didn't like all that much. After listening to "Cousins" once or twice, I felt the same way- the melody wasn't all that immediate and the guitar was a little too sharp and chirpy for me. But after I downloaded the album, I gave it a couple more chances and I grew to like it. I enjoy the song's fast tempo-- it's really a song that gets you excited and energized. Also, while it doesn't have the immediate melody of a song like "Horchata," there's still something there that I could hear and grew on me after a while.

That approach and feeling has dominated this whole album for me-- it's one that grows on you and that doesn't immediately hit you over the head and draw you in. While their first album had such a degree of immediacy to it, this album is something like a "slow burner" and grows upon repeated listens. There's also a variety to the songs that wasn't there on the first album. They range from very energetic and fast on "California English," "Holiday" and the aforementioned "Cousins" to very restrained on "White Sky," "Taxi Cab" and "I Think Ur a Contra." The band can move from a driving, full-speed-ahead tempo to a much slower and more ambient mood in one song to the next. What is amazing is that they do both things very well. "California English," with its Auto-Tune the churning drum beat underneath palm-muted guitar notes and keyboards, hits its marks in the same way just like the piano notes and strings of "Taxi Cab." Vampire Weekend is a band that can go from a full spring to a crawl, and they can do both very well. Then you have the songs that take up the middle ground like "Run" and "Giving Up The Gun"that ride melodies to occupy the place in between. It's not filler by any stretch of the imagination, but it's a middle ground, a "just right" point between the churning "Cousins" and the slow and almost ethereal "I Think Ur a Contra." I haven't mentioned "Diplomat's Son" either, which samples M.I.A. and Toots and the Maytals, brings us back to the band's world music-y roots as well as tying in keyboardist's Rostam Batmanglij's side project with members from Ra Ra Riot-- Discovery.

As I try to bring it all together and leave some kind of conclusive analysis. What I'd say about Contra is that it is much more complex than their first album, and thus it takes a little while to grow on you. I know it took me a while to get hooked on some of the songs on the album but I did get very into those songs after repeated listens. I think it's an album that reflects a band trying to grow and diversify while also doing what they are good at, so there are some missteps and the album is a little inconsistent. But I think I don't think those inconsistencies take away from the album altogether. As far as my favorite tracks, I'd say "Horchata," "White Sky" and "I Think Ur a Contra" are at the top of the list, though it's pretty early in the game and that can change. Drummer Chris Tomson flies a little bit under the radar, but it's definitely his playing on the album that gives it that "Paul Simon's Graceland" feel to it, and I love the guitar and keyboards by Koenig and Batmanglij throughout. I'd give it a 3.75/5 stars... well, let's just round up and say I give it 4 stars out of 5. It's not perfect, but I think it's a solid move in the right direction for Vampire Weekend, showing their ability to change and grow while keeping the sound they had on their first album at the heart of it all. It's definitely an album I'd recommend, but I'd say be careful to not get too hung up on your first listening experience. Above all, this is an album that grows through repeated listenings, so if it doesn't really jump out at you after the first couple of plays give it another chance. I think you'll appreciate it more and more as you listen to it again and again, just like I did.

NFL Playoffs Divisional Round Predictions

2010-01-15T19:00:00.000-05:00

Let's keep a good thing going, even though I'm pretty sure a lot of you are unhappy that I'm blogging so much about sports. But since it's almost the weekend, I need to give my picks for the NFL playoffs divisional round.

Arizona at New Orleans:

Arizona is coming off an incredibly dramatic win against the Packers with offensive fireworks that seemed like something out of a video game rather than real life. Kurt Warner went 29-33, throwing for 379 yards and 5 touchdown passes, including 2 to Larry Fitzgerald. Warner threw more touchdown passes than incompletions, which is pretty darn remarkable. Fitzgerald, Arizona's all-star wide receiver only had 89 yards (but 2 TDs) while Steve Breaston (Arizona's third target after Fitzgerald and Anquan Boldin) had 125 yards and 1 TD. Now, the Arizona defense didn't play all that great as they let Aaron Rodgers throw for over 400 yards (!) and get back into the game after being down 31-10 at one point. But the defense did come up with the big play in overtime, with Michael Adams sacking Rodgers causing him to fumble which Karlos Dansby returned for a touchdown for the win. Now the Cardinals face the only team in the NFL with an offense as ridiculously explosive as the way they played last weekend- the Saints. A lot of people are taking the Saints lightly, as they've lost their last three games and didn't play their best football at the end of the season. Now I wouldn't give them any heat for losing to the Cowboys, but I think the fact that the Saints might be rusty and not clicking at the right time is a valid one to raise. But what we're forgetting is that Drew Brees threw for well over 4,000 yards and 34 touchdowns and put together an outstanding regular season and probably deserved to be a little bit more involved in the MVP voting (though Peyton definitely deserved it). Though this layoff and these past couple of weeks, where the Saints didn't play well (though the last game they really didn't have to play for anything) benefits the Saints because they are flying completely under the radar. That coupled with the Cardinals' explosive performance last week means people aren't really remembering just how good the Saints are. They boast a surprisingly balanced attack, with the sixth ranked rushing offense led by Pierre Thomas and Mike Bell, who combine for 1,447 yards and 11 TDs. But this game is coming down to Drew Brees against the Cardinals pass defense, which gives up 233 yards per game. I don't think the Cardinals secondary can slow down Saints WRs like Marques Colton and Devery Henderson will get open against the Arizona secondary. Even though the Saints defense isn't a world-beater, I think Drew Brees will do even more and be more consistent than Aaron Rodgers (and he was able to do a lot) and the Superdome crowd will factor in as well, as that place will be at a fever pitch for this game. I'm going with New Orleans, who are flying under the radar for a team that went undefeated very late into the regular season.

Baltimore at Indianapolis:

The other team that took a lot of flack for how they finished the year is the Indianapolis Colts. They went into their week 16 game against the Jets and sat their starters in the third quarter when they had a chance to win the game and continue their perfect season. The Colts took a lot of heat for that move, and rightfully so. While I can understand the logic that you don't want your best players to get hurt when you've clinched everything you need for the playoffs, you HAVE to go for the perfect season. It's an un-written rule that you take that shot when you have the opportunity. The Colts rested their starters the rest of the way and, much like the Saints, come into the playoffs with a lot of people thinking they're rusty. I think it's a very different situation than the Saints and they're coming in cold rather than under the radar. The Ravens, on the other hand, come into this game riding high after a big win against the Patriots in New England, where they haven't lost in the playoffs since the 70s. The Ravens won that game with great defense, as they intercepted Tom Brady 3 times, and by running the ball for 234 yards including 159 by Ray Rice including 83 on one of the first plays of the game. In addition, the Ravens went 10-16 on third dow, while the Pats only went 3-12. The Ravens are everyone's upset pick, as everyone thinks that physical defense will get to the Colts just like it did to the Pats, but I think it's a mistake to look at the Colts and Pats the same way. Peyton Manning won't have an MVP game numbers wise, as the Ravens defense is really good and can slow down the Colts offense. But I think what is being forgotten in this matchup is the Colts defense. The Patriots defense was down this year, as they'd lost a lot of guys and perhaps most prominently Richard Seymour to the Raiders. The Colts defense, while it has its weaknesses, has a couple of studs in Dwight Freeney and Robert Mathis and I think they will be able to force Flacco into a few mistakes. Ray Rice will get his yards, he would do that against anyone really, but I don't think that will be enough for the Ravens offense and I think that Peyton Manning will make the big throws when it matters. The Patriots weren't able to take advantage of a weakened Ravens pass defense, but Peyton Manning will. Look for a big game out of Dallas Clark in a game that goes back and forth. It will come down to the fourth quarter, but Peyton Manning has proven he has the ability to win games when things aren't totally clicking for his team and I think that's what will happen as Indianapolis wins a tight one to move on.

Dallas at Minnesota:

Well, so much for all that "The Cowboys/Wade Phillips/Tony Romo can't win in the playoffs" talk. The Cowboys absolutely demolished the Eagles 34-14 at Jerry's Palace in Arlington, TX. Romo was efficient, going 23-35, 244 yards and 2 TDs, with Miles Austin and the forgotten Roy Williams making big grabs. The Cowboys won because of their defense, sacking Donovan McNabb 4 times and intercepting him twice. The only big play for the explosive Eagles offense came from the arm of Michael Vick, who found Jeremy Maclin for a 76 yard TD. Other than that play, the Cowboys defense completely snuffed out the Eagles offense. The Cowboys ground game also came to play, racking up almost 200 yards, including 148 yards and a TD from Felix Jones. Now the Cowboys head up to the Great White North to face the Minnesota Vikings and their QB Brett Favre. The Vikings feature an outstanding rushing attack, led by RB Adrian Peterson who rushed for 1,383 yards and 18 TDs. Sidney Rice had a coming-out party as a WR and Percy Harvin looked good when he wasn't hurt, while the Vikings great pass rush was led by DE Jared Allen. The Vikings struggled a little down the stretch, losing to Carolina and Chicago before demolishing the Giants at Giants Stadium in the last game of the season so I don't think it's the case that the Vikings are coming into the playoffs cold à la the Colts. What I do think is that the Dallas defense is playing out-of-its-mind right now. It's not that the Vikings are playing bad, I just think the Cowboys are playing that good. These teams match up very evenly and they're both very good, but I just think the Cowboys are playing a little too well right now and have too many things going their way. I also like the three-headed monster in the Cowboys backfield-- Jones, Marion Barber and Tashard Choice-- as opposed to the Vikings offense that leans so heavily on one guy in Peterson. I think DeMarcus Ware will get pressure on Brett Favre and force him into an interception or two, while Romo won't have to win the game for the Cowboys and won't make any mistakes. Another close tough game, but I think the Cowboys know how to win on the road (see the game against the Saints in New Orleans) and their defense is playing lights out right now. I like Wade, Tony and Dallas to win at the 'dome.

New York at San Diego:

I'm conflicted about this one- Rivers and the Chargers don't lose in December (which extends into January I guess?) but the Jets are riding a hot hand and a hot defense. I go back and forth about this game. The Jets backed into the playoffs, yes, but they did the job against Cincy on the road in the opening round of the playoffs. The Chargers boast a great number of weapons, with QB Phillip Rivers, WR Vincent Jackson, TE Antonio Gates and RBs LaDainian Tomlinson and Darren Sproles and LB Shawne "Lights Out" Merriman. While the Chargers have been very hot and no one's held them to under 20 points this season, I don't think they've faced a defense that matches up as well against them this year as the Jets. CB Darrelle Revis for the Jets will remove Vincent Jackson from the game, opening up their defense to blitz and get pressure on Rivers. The Chargers also feature the 20th ranked rush defense, giving up 117 yards per game and now they're going up with the number one rushing offense for the Jets. That's a matchup that not a lot of people are focusing on, and one that I think will make the difference. The Jets, with their RBs Thomas Jones and Shonn Green, will control the clock and keep the game out of Mark Sanchez's hands. I also think the Jets defense will get pressure on Phillip Rivers with guys like Calvin Pace and Shaun Ellis, and the physicality of the Jets defense will take the Chargers out of their game. I'm also not a big Norv Turner as head coach fan- I think he's one of the best coordinators ever but I'm skeptical of him in a big game. I think the Jets will find some way they can exploit the Chargers for long enough and that Turner won't make the adjustments quick enough. I do think the Chargers will get to 20 points and Sproles will break off a long run. But I think the Jets showed they were for real last week and by being physical and showing the Chargers something they haven't seen, they can pull the upset and put up something in the neighborhood of 24 points. I'm going with New York on the road for the biggest upset of the weekend.

Thoughts? Comments? Questions? Concerns? Comment away!

The Spring 2010 Semester

2010-01-13T10:00:00.000-05:00

It’s a tradition around here that I do a post at the beginning of the new semester about what classes I’m going to be taking. But this semester is a little bit different, because I’m not going to be taking any classes. Instead, this semester I will be doing one thing and one thing only-- writing my master’s thesis. OK that’s not entirely true, because I also have to pass a language exam in order to graduate and I will still be tutoring at the writing center and working on a couple of conference papers including my return trip to Albuquerque in February. But my primary objective this semester will be to write a thesis of about 60-70 pages.

The first step of this process has been writing a thesis proposal/prospectus, which I have been working on throughout my winter break when I wasn’t taking self imposed respites from academic matters. I’m hoping that my prospectus will be accepted by the panel who decides these things, but my main concern isn’t the idea I’m investigating in the thesis project but rather the execution of the proposal itself. That said, good thoughts/vibes/prayers would be appreciated. But this thesis will look at two writers and it won’t surprise anyone that I’m working on these two: Ernest Hemingway and D. H. Lawrence. What I will be looking at in these two writers is their works from the period directly after World War I and how war/violence, trauma and injury all affect the constructions of masculinity in each authors works from that period. I wasn’t sure whether the project would focus on the war or masculinity, since they came into play in both of these writers’ lives (though Hemingway more so). But masculinity is probably a more central idea, because even though Lawrence was affected by the war and addressed it, it is not central in the same way as it is to Hemingway while masculinity is equally central to the analysis of both authors. I think it’s a pretty good idea for a project and one that’s rich with potential insights.

But I’m not here to re-hash my thesis proposal or start writing the thesis (I’m definitely not ready for that yet) but the thesis project will be my one thing for the spring semester, albeit a very big one thing. I’m very excited about this setup, and not just because I get to work on two authors that I really like (though that’s past of the equation). But I’m also really excited about just having my own work to do- no classwork or daily readings or assignments. I’ll be free, more or less, to do the work I want to do at the pace and time that works best for me. I’ve never really experienced this. Yeah, I wrote a thesis as a senior at UT but that was in the midst of classes and I had to try to find time to work on it. But now, outside of working at the writing center, all I will be doing will be working on this thesis project. I’m hoping that, because I will only be working on the thesis, it will turn out even better than my Kerouac undergraduate thesis that I had to write as I was dealing with other classes.

What’s also strange is that this could potentially be my last beginning of a semester as a student. I’m not counting on any of my PhD applications to come through, so I’m treating this as though it could be my last “first day of the semester” ever. It’s a weird thing, that this could be the last time I start a semester as a student, after a lifetime of being a student and understanding the world through that lens. But this could be the last time, as I might have to enter the “real world,” though I’m sure if I’m not in school I can find something sufficiently not “real world” enough for me to do. We won’t know for sure until I hear back from all the schools I applied to, but this could be a very big and historic “first day of the semester” if it ends up being the last one for me. But it feels very anti-climatic, because I’m not taking classes and all I’m doing on this first day is turn in my thesis proposal and I won’t be going to any class meeting. Nevertheless, it’s the beginning of a semester and I’m sure it’s going to be a very different and unique one but that it will be a great experience and something I enjoy.

BCS Championship Game Recap

2010-01-11T09:00:00.000-05:00

Well, it happened- the game's over and unfortunately (for me and the burnt orange faithful) the Alabama Crimson Tide won the 2009 BCS Championship by defeating the Texas Longhorns 37-21. It was a very exciting game with countless twists and turns that ultimately ended in a victory for Alabama and sadness for myself and all my fellow Texas fans. Again, harkening back to the style I've been using recently, I'll give my 5 thoughts on the game. Be prepared, they're going to be a little bit Longhorns-centric but I can't avoid that. Let's get to it then...

1.) There is no doubt the most important part of this game was Colt McCoy getting injured.

I, like many people, had played out many scenarios in my head as to what would happen in the game and I know I wasn't the only one who saw this game going any number of ways. But the one scenario I didn't visualize was Colt McCoy, Texas'.... well, Texas' heart and soul really, getting hurt on the first series of the game and never returning. Colt was tackled hard by the Alabama defensive lineman Marcell Dareus, who hit him right in his right shoulder and caused Colt to come out of the game. It took us a long time to figure out what exactly happened to Colt; based on replays of the hit, sideline reporting and the way he looked coming off the field, we knew it was his shoulder but we didn't know what. It was only later that we found out he pinched the nerve in his right (and throwing) shoulder and that his arm went totally dead. Colt said, in the heart-breaking interview after the game, there wasn't any pain he just couldn't feel his arm at all. I want to quote the story filed on Yahoo! Sports by Dan Wetzel, which absolutely breaks your heart to read:

So Colt gripped the ball, stared at his dad and thought, “It’s just a simple throw.” He threw. The ball went soft and wide. Everyone grimaced. “Give it to me again,” Colt demanded. Brad got the ball and gave it back to his son. The next throw was the same, bouncing harmlessly away. “Give it to me again,” Colt said, again. Brad did.

It was the same. It was over. Colt couldn’t throw it 7 yards to his own father. “My arm was dead,” he said. The dad hugged his son. The son broke down and cried.

“There’s no pain on my body,” Colt said later. “If I was a free safety, I’d go out there and make a tackle. I [just] have no strength to throw a football.”

It was complete and utter fluke- the hit was hard, yes, but definitely not dirty and it's one that Colt's experienced countless times as a football player. The defensive lineman just hit him in the exact spot that pinched the nerve and completely shut down Colt's throwing arm. Texas then had to turn to the 18 year old true freshman, Garrett Gilbert, to play quarterback on the biggest stage in college football against one of the best and toughest defenses in the nation.

But, without a doubt, the fact that McCoy wasn't playing quarterback for the Longhorns was the biggest factor in this ballgame. I'll expand on this later, but trying to claim that this wasn't the biggest facet of the game is absolutely silly. This was never about Alabama's tough SEC defense or its running game dominating Texas. Anytime a team loses its quarterback, especially a team like Texas, it's going to have a big effect. It totally changed the complexion of the game, since Texas couldn't run the offense they wanted, thus not allowing them to sustain drives to keep their defense off the field and causing them to constantly have bad field position. The injury to McCoy hurt more than just the offense for the Longhorns, it totally changed the game and the game's outcome must be understood through that lens.

2.) Except for some play-calling lapses, Texas played a very tough game.

For a team that lost its heart and soul, Texas fought hard- at least in the second half. The first half play-calling was particularly horrendous, which isn't surprising when the offense loses its four-year starter and replaces him with an 18 year old true freshman. But the coaching staff didn't put Gilbert in good positions with their play-calling, with the way they approached the passing and running game. Both the rushing and passing calls were way too predictable and thus Alabama was completely ready for them. While I know that you obviously need to simplify your offense when you have a true freshman at quarterback, it didn't need to become too predictable. The other major play-calling gaffe came at the end of the half, when Texas could have taken a knee to run out the clock but Mack Brown and/or offensive coordinator Greg Davis decided to try a little shovel pass to D. J. Monroe that was bobbled by Monroe and intercepted and returned for a TD by, you guessed it, Marcell Dareus. I don't blame Mack/Greg for that call to the degree that some people do; I understand the logic and you very rarely see a play like that intercepted and returned for a touchdown. It was definitely a fluke, though I do agree it was probably smarter to kneel it down and head into the locker room down 17-6 instead of 24-6.

But despite those gaffes in the coaching and the struggles experienced by Gilbert, Texas responded in the second half. The Texas defense played out of its mind more or less all night and their performance in the third quarter keeping Alabama's offense under wraps really let Texas hang around. The offensive playcalling got a lot better to, and Gilbert was able to have time and find a rhythm that led to a 44 yard TD pass to Jordan Shipley in the third quarter and a 28 yard TD to Shipley again in the fourth to make it a 3 point game. In the second half, Gilbert showed poise when many would have folded and Texas was able to get the ball on the Alabama 17 yard line with three minutes to go. Unfortunately, Gilbert was sacked and fumbled and shortly after Ingram ran it in for a TD and the game was over, but the fact that Texas was able to make it that close was nothing short of remarkable seeing as how Texas lost their star player and the focal point of their offense. Though the final score was 37-21, it was definitely closer than that and that is a true testament to a gritty performance by the Longhorns.

3.) However, Alabama deserves the championship

This is tricky, because I'm trying to navigate the space between "bitter" and "disrespectful." Yes, I am very bitter, but that's because Texas lost their best player and a player that I (and many others) believed could change the game and tilt it towards Texas. I don't want to disrespect the Crimson Tide's achievement (though Nick Saban's running up of the score was a little bit disrespectful in my eyes but that's another story...) but I'm bitter that the opportunity to give our best shot was taken away by complete and utter chance.

I definitely think that this game was mired by the injury to McCoy and the Crimson Tide didn't play the whole Texas team that went undefeated in the regular season and there are some questions that some will ask, especially those of us who root for the Longhorns. But I don't bring those things up to take away from Alabama's championship. The Crimson Tide did what they had to do- they won the game they were asked to play. There shouldn't be any asterisk attached to this and Alabama's championship isn't somehow devalued. But unless you're an Alabama fan, you don't want to see a national championship decided by an injury the way this one was. I won't say that Texas definitely would have one with Colt at QB, because that's a very silly argument to make. But we did move the ball when we had Colt in there, and we were able to get it close with an 18 year old true freshman playing QB. Though I won't claim that Texas definitely would have won, I will say that it definitely would have been a different game and I liked my chances with Colt as my QB from the beginning and nothing I saw last night disuades me from that line of thinking. But even though I (and many Longhorns fans) have those thoughts, it is still Alabama's national title- they earned it, they deserved it and even though I don't think they faced the true Texas "team" that went undefeated this year, they still beat the team that lined up against them in the national championship game, and thus they deserve to be the champions without a doubt.

4.) I'm not big on moral victories, but I'm very proud of this team

I brought this up in point number two, but the fact that Texas was able to fight back and stay in the game was nothing short of amazing. What will also be lost in this game is the stellar performance of Texas' defense. Yes, Ingram and Trent Richardson got their yards, with each going for 100 and 2 TDs. But I said in my preview we knew that they would do that, and that Texas needed to focus on containing the run, which it did. Except for one big gash by Richardson, a 49 yard TD run in the second quarter, the Alabama rushing attack was (relatively) limited. Texas' pass defense was absolutely amazing, holding Alabama QB Greg McElroy to 6 of 11 passing for only 58 yards. Sergio Kindle played out of his mind, picking up 2 sacks for the Longhorns as he, along with Lamarr Houston and Sam Acho, were in the backfield pressuring McElroy all evening. When McElroy was able to throw, he only completed two passes to his WRs as Earl Thomas and the Texas secondary did their job. It was Texas' defensive effort, holding Alabama to 2 of 12 on third downs, that kept them in the game.

The Texas offense also came together in the second half, and Garrett Gilbert played amazing given the circumstances. Though he looked like a deer-in-the-headlights in the first half, the second half he calmed down and played well until the sack-fumble that led to Ingram's touchdown and then throwing an interception in the fourth quarter. Gilbert could have easily crumbled under the spotlight but he showed a great degree of toughness and resiliency that is definitely worthy of praise. Jordan Shipley also had a great game despite his roommate/BFF Colt being out of the game. Shipley had 10 receptions for 122 yards and 2 TDs. It was Shipley making big and clutch catches that allowed Texas to move the ball and score in the second half, and he definitely didn't quit on this game. The whole team could have easily just given up once Colt went out, but they clawed and fought to get back into the game. I hate moral victories, because it means you have to lose, but I think this Texas team showed way more fight than anyone would have expected and they can be very proud of that even though they didn't bring home that ultimate prize.

Finally, I need to say something about Colt and how heartbroken I am (as I'm sure he is as well). I'm a big Colt fan, as has been previously documented here. But beyond being upset because my team/school lost in the championship game, I was sad because Colt was denied his shot at a national title. It would have been different if Colt had been outplayed by Alabama or something like that; Colt just didn't get to play because of something totally beyond his control. This was why Colt came back to school for his senior year- to try to play for a national championship after being denied that shot the year before (curse you Michael Crabtree!). Colt had the most wins as a starting QB in college football history, held almost all the Texas passing records, had become a legend on campus at Austin and now he was getting his chance to become one of the all-time greats, but it wasn't meant to be. You have to feel bad for him, having this shot taken away through no fault of his own, and being denied his chance to try to do what he'd be building towards over his whole career. I don't know if tragic is the right work, but it really breaks your heart if you're a Texas fan or just a football fan in general. But I know that I'll remember Colt for all the great games he played during his four years on the Forty Acres, and that even though he never got that glass football he never really got his shot and he's still a great, great player.

5.) The future is big and bright, like those stars at night, deep in the heart of Texas

This harkens back to my second and fourth points, but I think that Texas won't be going very far from the big-time national stage any time soon. Yes, we're losing quite a few big time players-- Colt, Jordan Shipley, Earl Thomas, Sergio Kindle, but we've seen that we have a real QB in Garrett Gilbert. Also, we'll be returning plenty of people and there will be youngsters waiting to come up and replace those Longhorns who are moving on, hopefully to play on Sundays in addition to the star high school players we'll be bringing into the program (including some very good WRs). But, above all, the future looks bright with Garrett Gilbert because of the toughness and resiliency he showed during the second half against Alabama. Sure he'll have some rough patches and he's not a polished QB just yet but he's got the talent and he's got the toughness, all he needs to do is play and he's going to get his shot with Colt moving on.

While I think we've got a year or two to go before we're back playing for a national title, I think that Texas will still be near the top of the Big XII and competing for BCS bowls. Sure we may take our hits here or there, even losing a game or two (this incarnation of the Longhorns only lost twice in two years, that's pretty impressive). But with the talent we've got on our team year in and year out, in addition to Will Muschamp leaving his mark on the defense and Greg Davis and Major Applewhite creating a new offense, I don't think it will be that long until Mack Brown is leading the Longhorns back to undefeated seasons and firmly staking out a place in the BCS title conversation.

So that'll close the book on the 2009 college football season. Congratulations are in order for the Alabama Crimson Tide for their well-deserved national championship. But even though they fell short, I'll always remember this Texas team for their toughness and the brillance they showed over the course of this season. And as the burnt orange faithful shift their attention to their undefeated men's basketball team and their baseball squad that went to the College World Series finals last year and returns many key players, we can be proud of this 2009 Texas Longhorns football team. Even though we didn't achieve everything we wanted this year, we still achieved a great deal and we'll be back very soon. Hook 'em Horns!

On Agent Zero

2010-01-08T13:00:00.000-05:00

We have all read about the failings of professional athletes. In the age in which we all live, with the internet and 24/7 news cycles, the scandals and failings of these athletes are made much more public and widely disseminated. We saw this in a big, big way with Tiger Woods' infidelity recently as well as countless other, smaller examples. Well the next and latest example of this has come in the form of Gilbert Arenas. This story has spiraled and mutated so many different ways that trying to sum everything up would be very difficult. But Gilbert Arenas, allegedly, brought unloaded and unregistered guns to his locker at the Verizon Center while also using them in a "joking" manner in regard to a gambling debt with a teammate who said he would "shoot Arenas in [his] bad knee" which caused Arenas to bring out those unloaded guns with a note to "pick one." The best summary of what we know so far can be found on Deadspin, so if you want to read a better description of all these actions read this. In addition to these actions, Gilbert mimics shooting guns in the huddle before the Wizards' game against the 76ers (photo credit to NBA Off-season) which did not sit too well with NBA Commissioner David Stern. Stern suspended Arenas indefinitely because Arenas is "not currently fit to take the court." In the wake of this suspension, the Wizards are widely believed to be attempting to void Arenas' large contract because he violated a "morality clause."

And why I wanted to post about this is because I'm very conflicted and not quite sure what to think/feel about all this. On the one hand, Arenas did act very (and I mean VERY) stupidly and did something that was illegal by carrying unlicensed guns into the District of Columbia and keeping them in his locker. One of my favorite NBA blogs, Ball Don't Lie, goes into detail about how Gilbert really did this to himself and that we shouldn't feel sorry for him because he willingly thumbed his nose at the potential consequences of all this in actions like the one documented in the above picture. And the writer of that post is absolutely right, Gilbert wasn't contrite and instead acted as though he hadn't done anything wrong. There was definitely some punishment that needed to be levied against Arenas, I definitely agree with that but more as a result of Arenas' bringing guns (albeit unloaded ones) into the locker room rather than his attitude. While I don't agree with what he did in the huddle against Philly, and I do think he has been glib about these things in a time when he can't afford to be, I don't believe you can go after the guy because of this. Does it make him lose some credibility in everyone's collective eyes? Yeah, maybe. But making his attitude appear to be the true impetus for the suspension, which is what Stern seems to have done, makes Stern seem vindictive and not concerned with an objective "justice." I do think that Gilbert should receive a suspension, though not an indefinite one, and I do think there probably needs to be some legal ramifications for him bringing guns into the locker room and not being totally serious with them, as well as having unregistered ones. I always have a hard time talking about athletes and guns, because I don't see why they need to have them yet I know it's a totally different world in which they live. For most of them, guns are some kind of a norm for better or worse, so having them around in one way or another isn't that big of a thing. I know it would be for me, but I know for them it isn't quite as far fetched. That said, they were unregistered and in the locker room (where they shouldn't) be, so there much be some kind of punishment. But, as I'll get to later, the reasons they were there and the fact that they were unloaded and thus he never fired them should really make us see the situation in a different light.

This leads me into one of my other thoughts or feelings on this matter, which is one of sadness. To be honest, I'm pretty bummed out about all this because Gilbert Arenas was one of my favorite players in the league. I was a big fan of his when he played for my team, the Warriors. I mean, he even lived in the town I'm from and I had a friend who knew him and got him to sign a pair of his shoes for me. Even when he left for Washington, I always rooted for Gil and wanted to see him do well especially because of his eccentric and hilarious behavior. He was (or seemed to be) a special kind of NBA player who was totally fun-loving and played the game with an exuberance that could only be described as child-like. Sure, sometimes I could see how it might be maddening for Wizards fans and that approach might come off as arrogant to his opponents, but I've always loved the guy. I bring this up because I'm definitely sad that one of my favorite players won't be able to play and that he might possibly be done in the NBA (though, barring serious jail time, I'm pretty sure Gil will be back). We're also seeing lots of people using this opportunity to take shots at Gilbert Arenas, as a person but also as a player and talking about how the Wizards should just cut ties with him and he's not worth it. I'm not saying that he should be let off the hook because he's a very good player but I am expressing that I'm a little bummed out that we're going to lose this talent from the hardwood for an indefinite period of time.

I'm definitely upset at Gilbert for acting so stupidly both through his actions with the guns themselves as well as the miming shooting actions he did before the game, and I'm sad that I'm losing one of my favorite players for a little while, I'm also upset at the approach and rush to judgment that a lot of people covering this story are exhibiting. Bethlehem Shoals from FreeDarko (another awesome basketball blog) wrote about how we need to remember that Gilbert Arenas isn't a "role model" (to borrow from the Charles Barkley lexicon) and that we're treating him as more than he is and thus a lot harsher. I do agree with this, as I expressed when I said that I thought Stern was being a little vindictive with his approach. People have noted how Stern wants to rid the NBA of its "thug" image and wants to make examples of people who do things to reinforce those ideas. I think he saw, with Gilbert, a chance to do something that would get attention even if his actions weren't exactly deserving of it. Maybe I'm just a softie, or an apologist for Gilbert and other athletes but I don't think that what he did (if the story we have now, per the Deadspin post is true) was that bad. Well, I know it's not because I don't think athletes can screw up because I thought what Michael Vick did was absolutely deplorable and he deserved to be suspended longer. But Gilbert didn't hurt anyone or anything by his actions, he didn't even fire off his guns (as Stephen Jackson (another player I liked when he was with the Warriors) did. I think what has happened is that because Gilbert has a certain level of celebrity and people know him, Stern knows that if he can make a big example of him people will really get the message that he means business. I'm not saying that what Gilbert did was right, far from it. But I do think that we're treating him like he did something completely reprehensible when he really did something that was very thoughtless. Gilbert did not do something that was harmful or malicious, but that was pretty... stupid, for lack of a better term, and probably inappropriate. He's not a murder, or an abusive person, or a thief or an animal killer or anything like that. He's just someone who didn't think and act appropriately and joked about something one probably shouldn't joke about. We've all done that, on much smaller scales, in our own lives and we would assume that we aren't defined as bad people because of that. I think that distinction, between malicious and thoughtless, needs to be made and that people aren't making it right now when they talk about this situation.

Like I said, I'm very conflicted about this and I'm not quite sure what's right. I do worry that I'm willing to look past something wrong because I really like the way the guy plays sports. And I acknowledge that what Gilbert did was very, very, very, very stupid and foolish and irresponsible. But that said, I also think we're rushing to judge a little bit here and that we're taking on Gilbert because of what we think he stands for rather than what he actually did. What he did was thoughtless, but we're treating him as thought he did something malicious. I'm not saying that Gilbert was right and that there shouldn't be some kind of punishment, far from it, but I think that the way we're approaching this is maybe too extreme. I also know that guns are no laughing matter and are definitely not meant to be joked around with, and I do firmly believe that Gilbert should be reprimanded for the actions that seemed to imply that he doesn't take firearm ownership seriously. Like I keep saying, he was stupid but he never actually did anything harmful towards another person and so we shouldn't treat him as thought he did. You can call him thoughtless or stupid or irresponsible, but don't try to make him into someone malicious. He deserves a suspension, but certainly not an indefinite one. I want to wrap this up by using an extended quote from the Bethlehem Shoals post that I referenced earlier. Please go and read the whole thing, because it's probably the best-written thing I've read about all this and gets close to what I'm thinking/feeling. But I feel like this (extended) quote alludes to some of the things I've been feeling and why I feel so conflicted about this. Please feel free to comment and leave your thoughts on this specific issue or all that it entails.

Arenas was, it seems, careless about the law, and to the outside observer, showed poor taste by using an unloaded gun for prop comedy. As one reader wrote me, somehow it's also fallen to outsiders to decide whether or not the joke was funny—and that's also among the offenses at play here.

Arenas appears to have made a mistake, displayed bad judgment, and perhaps proved that he really is genuinely off in his own world. You know, the way we've talked about him as being for years. Just like when "crazy Ron Artest" does, or recounts, something beyond the pale. But more to the point, while none of these things mark Gil as a man brimming with maturity, responsibility, or common sense, the moral high ground has no place here. Same for the "this man does not take firearms seriously" line, which is straight out of NRA propaganda.

Gilbert Arenas is a basketball player. He happens to be one who is alternately brilliant and maddening, as a player and teammate. His comeback from two years on the shelf has been admirable, but he's also done a lot to sabotage the Wizards this season—and possibly annoy his teammates. However, none of this has anything to do with how close he is to realizing Plato's ideal statesman, or what stage of enlightenment he's reached in his practice of Buddhism.

To paraphrase Avon Barksdale from The Wire, Gil's just a basketball player, I suppose. And that's all he should be. Flawed human beings can be great athletes. Yes, flaws can creep into their careers. But just as often, imperfections remain separate from their workplace, or are sublimated into something that has no effect on performance. We don't watch sports to gain moral instruction, and nothing like the death penalty hangs in the balance when the Wizards suit up.

Arenas may be setting a bad example for the young people of America, who look up to him, by being irreverent about gun ownership. But he's one athlete. Cover the ones who are wonderful people. Put his offense into perspective. Or return, as we all should regularly, to Barkley's immortal words.

Wild Card Weekend

2010-01-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

Way back when, in my first foray into blogging, this blog's primary incarnation was as a sports blog. Though I've moved away from doing strictly sports stuff, I always feel indebted to it for my start in blogging. And one of the big things I remember blogging as I started out was the NFL playoffs, which happen to be starting this coming weekend. For each round of the playoffs I gave a brief breakdown of each game as well as my pick for the game. Now I'm pretty sure that no one read those posts and that I was a lone and unimportant voice in the (metaphoric) desert, I'm feeling like I should head back the sports way a little bit in my blogging and I think I'll start by bringing back my NFL playoff analysis. With that introduction out of the way, let's get to my thoughts on Wild Card Weekend

New York Jets at Cincinnati Bengals: These are two teams that no one really thought would be in the playoffs at the start of the season, and the Jets only made it in because the teams they played in Weeks 16 and 17 (the Colts and Bengals) decided to rest their starters and not really bring their "A" games, allowing the Jets to pick up wins and sneak into the playoffs. The Jets come into this game riding the tough, blitzing number one pass defense in the league and a solid ground game featuring running back Thomas Jones. The Bengals, however, don't really do one thing really well. They have a solid defense, but not a spectacular-dominant-game changing one in my estimation. They've got a great QB in Carson Palmer and a solid (and outspoken) WR in Chad Ochocinco (aka Chad Johnson), but they only average 180 passing yard per game and 19 points per game. The Bengals are pretty strong in the running game, with Cedric Benson having a resurgent season as the Bengals' starting RB. These teams are almost mirror images of one another, so this is a game that will be decided by intangible things that aren't in the statistics. Namely, I don't think things are set up for a rookie QB like Marc Sanchez to really thrive. They'll be playing in Cincinnati in front of a fired up crowd, and he's a rookie who has struggled especially with turnovers. The Bengals will gameplan on shutting down the Jets' run game and forcing Sanchez into trying to beat them and I don't think he'll get it done. Expect a big day from the Bengals defense, and Carson Palmer will make a few key throws to his receivers that will prove to be the difference as the Bengals win this one.

Philadelphia Eagles at Dallas Cowboys: Everyone makes a big deal about how the Cowboys are playing the Eagles for the 3rd time this year and how it's really difficult to beat a team 3 times in one season (even though the Steelers did it to the Ravens last year). And these teams are really close in terms of talent, as a few breaks here or there and we might be playing this game in Philly and not Dallas. The Eagles boast an explosive passing game, led by QB Donovan McNabb and WR DeSean Jackson while the Cowboys give up almost 225 passing yards per game. But the Cowboys have done a good job of containing Philly's passing attack this year. Meanwhile the Cowboys bring with them one of the most balanced offenses in the NFL while the Eagles give up almost 21 points per game on defense. The Cowboys have talent both at RB (with both Marion Barber and Felix Jones) as well as in the passing game with QB Tony Romo and his favorite targets- WR Miles Austin and TE Jason Witten. Romo, in particular, has had a solid season in which he passed for nearly 4,500 yards as well as throwing 26 TDs. But I think this game will be won by the Cowboys' defense, with DeMarcus Ware getting big-time pressure on McNabb as well as the Cowboys rushing defense putting the clamps on an already anemic Eagles rushing attack. I think Romo and the Cowboys finally win a playoff game as it's Dallas that moves on to the next round.

Baltimore Ravens at New England Patriots: Another big NFL storyline focused on the Colts and how they rested their starters and gave up a chance at a perfect season to try and stay healthy for the playoffs (they had already clinched the number one seed and home field advantage). Many people wondered how could a team do something like that, but then the Patriots' Week 17 game against the Texans gave us all the answer to that. In that game, do-everything slot WR Wes Welker tore his ACL and MCL merely making a cut, not even being tackled, and now is out for the playoffs and quite a bit longer. The Patriots lost one of the most vital cogs in their offense, besides Tom Brady and Randy Moss, and are reeling a bit as they head into the playoffs. The Patriots have relied more on their passing game this year than their rushing attack, and that's the way they rack up most of their yards. Though the Ravens pass defense isn't as strong as it usually is, I think their pass defense will be able to contain the Patriots to a greater degree because they won't have to focus on the slot guy like they would if Welker was playing. In fact, the Ravens came close to beating the Pats earlier this season and that was when the Patriots had Welker. Meanwhile, the Patriots defense isn't terribly adept at stopping the run, ranking in the middle of the pack and giving up around 110 yards per game. This will make it difficult against a Ravens running game, led by Ray Rice and Willis McGahee, that averages almost 137 yards per game on the ground without the benefit of a big time passing game (no knock on Joe Flacco, but he's definitely not the focal point right now for their offense). I think the Baltimore defense will do enough to slow down the Patriots passing game with Ed Reed making a big play or two in the Ravens secondary as the Ravens will get pressure on Brady, and the Patriots defensive line won't be able to slow down Rice and McGahee as Baltimore wins in the upset.

Green Bay Packers at Arizona Cardinals: From the beginning of the season, I thought the Packers were going to be pretty good. And though they experienced a few hiccups along the way and still haven't figured out how to beat that Favre guy, they were by and large a pretty well-respected team this year. And despite a notoriously porous offensive line, Aaron Rodgers managed to put up pretty good numbers as he continued to grow into one of the best young QBs in the league. In addition to Rodgers' maturation, the fateful decision made by the coaching staff to switch the defense from the 4-3 to the 3-4 paid HUGE dividends, as defensive linemen like Cullen Jenkins, Johnny Jolly and LBs Clay Matthews and A.J. Hawk were able to work. The Cardinals, in my opinion, seemed to back into this playoff spot as the 49ers just didn't have enough QB play to win the division. They're near the bottom of the league in terms of rushing offense, with Chris "Beanie" Wells and Tim Hightower splitting carries, and their defense isn't very strong as they give up 346 yards and 20 points per game. That said, they do feature QB Kurt Warner, a solid offensive line that gives him time to find targets like the amazing Larry Fitzgerald and Anquan Boldin (when he's healthy). But I think the Packers have too much talent on both sides of the ball- Rodgers will have time to find Greg Jennings and Donald Driver when he isn't handing off to Ryan Grant, and Charles Woodson should be able to limit Larry Fitzgerald's productivity and enable them to get pressure on Warner and force him to make mistakes. This is why I'm picking Green Bay to win in Arizona and move on to the divisional round.

Feel free to leave your thoughts/comments/complaints in the comment section- do you agree or disagree with my picks? Are you a fan of one of these teams? Do I know what I'm talking about or am I a total idiot? Let me know what you think!

The BCS Championship Game: #2 Texas vs. #1 Alabama

2010-01-07T12:00:00.000-05:00

Well, it's finally here! The BCS Championship Game will be kicking off tonight at 8 PM ET (7 PM in Austin) between the #1 ranked Alabama Crimson Tide and the #2 Texas Longhorns. The game will be on TV on ABC, as well as on ESPN Radio if you can't make it to a TV set. I did a preview earlier for the game and what I think will happen, so if you want click on over there to read that so you can get a sense of what I'm thinking and expecting for the game. But I'll be abstaining from blogging for the rest of the day because I'm going to be way too nervous. I should be twittering during the game, if you're DYING to hear what I'm thinking as the game goes on but even that will be dictated by my iPhone's battery life and how the 3G network holds up where I am. I'll be watching the game at one of my favorite sports bars/wing restaurants- Pluckers. It should be a fun time and hopefully it will be a great game. Leave any thoughts/comments about the game here- we can consider this an "open thread" (I've always wanted to say that, haha). So if you get a chance, turn your TV onto ABC tomorrow night and watch Texas take on Alabama for the championship of college football.

And, oh yes, Hook 'em Horns!

5 for Pasadena and the BCS Championship Game

2010-01-06T11:00:00.000-05:00

Well, it's finally here- the BCS Championship Game between the University of Alabama Crimson Tide and the University of Texas Longhorns. Obviously I am very excited and very very nervous about the game but I wanted to do a little breakdown/preview from my point-of-view here. I thought I'd keep with the "List of 5" approach I've been using recently and do my 5 thoughts/observations on Alabama vs. Texas for the BCS title.
1.) The whole "underdog" thing matters
Texas is very clearly the underdog in this game as Alabama is a big-time favorite, especially after Texas had to eek out a win against Nebraska in the Big XII title game. Because of this, we get two contrasting narratives leading up to the game- either it's a coronation of a very good Alabama team that rolls over Texas, or Texas plays the part of the plucky underdog and knocks off a complacent and unprepared Alabama squad. I always love hearing these stories and thinking about things in this way, but I generally greet them in "real life" with a healthy degree of skepticism. By and large, I think that the only thing that matters is what happens on the field and that those kinds of extra curricular stories are only interesting to fans and the media.

But then I remembered that this is college football and thus a little bit different than pro sports. As a god friend of mine has always said about college football: "Those are 18-22 year old guys out there. They can get excited and pumped up to the point so they play beyond themselves." Things like being an underdog and being disrespected by the media don't factor in/affect professional athletes, but it can definitely have an effect on a college kid. Thus I've reconsidered my stance on the "underdog" aspect not mattering, and I do think that will help Texas because of the kind if praise that Alabama is getting. I'm not naive enough to think that it's always a bad thing to be the favorite (because usually that means... you're better) but I think the situation Alabama's in is tricky and has a lot to do with our collective memory. We remember Alabama beating a Florida team everyone thought was really good, while Texas struggled against a Nebraska team that most people didn't see as being that great and thus there was a lot of talk about how Texas didn't really deserve to be in the game or how Alabama should win easily. But it wasn't because Alabama was a one-in-a-lifetime team (like a 2004-05 USC or 01-02 Miami) but that they were just better than Texas, who was lucky to be in the game. I think hearing that story over and over again, for an entire month, will get the Longhorns a little bit more fired up to play despite how much Saban tries to downplay it and I do think it will have a positive effect on the Horns play in the game. It's not the only thing or the biggest thing, but it's a big thing.

2.) Alabama's D is going to show the Horns something different
Everyone has focused on how Texas' highly potent offense struggled against the two strong defenses they faced-- Oklahoma and Nebraska-- and how Ndamukong Suh absolutely dominated Texas' offensive line. This is usually brought up when people talk about how Alabama's defense is going to completely dominate Texas' offense. Well, I'm not bringing up that debate here but what I want to point out is people talk about defense as being the same thing. I think the defense that Alabama is going to present is very different from the one's they saw from Oklahoma and Nebraska. Alabama's defense appears based around its athleticism, as opposed to the brute strength up front from Oklahoma and Nebraska. Now that's not to say that Alabama doesn't have some big, strong guys up front on defense, and Terrance Cody is definitely a monster on the defensive line. But the Alabama defense is more of a unit, rather than one that is predicated on a guy like Suh or Gerald McCoy for Oklahoma disrupting thing. There's more all-around athleticism on 'Bama, with Rolando McClain and Javier Arenas and LB and CB, respectively. But it's going to be a more athletic defense that the 'Horns will be facing that stretches the field better and covers more ground. Though Oklahoma and Nebraska both had great defenses, they were great in a very different way and Texas is going to get a look at the other way you can have a really good defense when they line up against Alabama.

3.) Ingram will get his yards, but 'Bama's offensive success will come down to Greg McElroy
It's another case of selective memory when people think about the Texas defense. People only seem to remember the game against A&M, which was an offensive show with not a lot of defense. But that game stands as an anomaly for the Texas defense as they played very well throughout the season and slowed up a potent offense like Oklahoma State at their stadium. In addition to that, Texas' run defense was pretty solid throughout the year and hasn't allowed a 100 yard rusher since Beanie Wells did it for Ohio State in last year's Fiesta Bowl. Now, Texas hasn't faced a runner as good as Alabama's Heisman Trophy RB Mark Ingram since Wells or maybe Adrian Peterson when he was a Sooner, and I don't think the Longhorns defense will totally shut him down. But what I think they can do is limit Ingram's opportunity to change the game and force the game into Greg McElroy's hands. McElroy has had an up-and-down season, starting strong and ending strong but getting a little lost in the middle, and I don't think that Nick Saban really wants him to be the focal point of their offense. But I think the way Texas will approach the Crimson Tide's offense is that Ingram will get his yards and a score or two, but they want to contain that side of the game to the point where they can match it with their strong point (their passing game). Texas wants the game to be in the hands, for Alabama, of the guy who DIDN'T win the Heisman Trophy and I think they have enough talent to do that. Like I said, I'm not saying they're going to completely stop Ingram but I think they can "slow down the bleeding" and force the issue into Greg McElroy's hands. This all leads me into my fourth point...

4.) The game will come down to which team does better at what they're not used to doing

To be honest, this is what I think the game comes down to and this is what happens when you have two pretty good teams in a title game (I'm leaking into the fifth point a little bit there), though Texas is a pretty definitive underdog. Both teams have a style of play that works for them; Texas with its prolific passing offense and Alabama's running game with Mark Ingram. But the other team has the talent and players to slow down that most effective part of their game, whether it be Alabama's passing defense or Texas' run D. So the game will come down to what team does better doing the thing that they are the least used to doing. For Texas, it will be running the football. Though they have some pretty good RBs (Tré Newton has emerged as a game-breaker, and they also have guys like Cody Johnson and Fozzie Whittaker to complement him), Texas' offense is so passing-centric that the rushing attack never really got going and always looks like it's not flowing correctly when they use it. The same thing seems to be the case for Alabama's passing attack. Though McElroy has shown he can be a solid QB and they have a stud WR in Julio Jones, they're a rushing team above all (who can blame them when you have Ingram back there?) and they don't really want to lean too heavily on the passing attack. Though McElroy did play well, almost exceptionally well, in the SEC title game, that hasn't been the consistent norm for him. Now that's not to say the guy's terrible or as bad as his worst performances, but the Florida game is also an anomaly. And I think that both team's defenses are strong enough and talented enough to force the other team into having to rely upon these aspects of their game. Then the game comes down to whether Texas can move the ball on the ground one way or another or McElroy can create offense with the Texas defense gunning for the run.

5.) Texas is pretty good, lest we forget

If there was one theme that runs throughout this entire preview-type thing, I'd say it's the problem of selective memory and how that has so tilted the view of Texas. People only remember Texas (and Colt McCoy specifically) struggling mightily against Nebraska in the Big XII title game, and they did. BUT that wasn't how they played the entire season. And what is also lost is that Colt McCoy, despite being knocked down many times against the Cornhuskers defense, got up off the mat and led his team down the field to get into field goal range to win it, so we're overlooking his resiliency and ability to will his team to win even if he/they aren't playing well. But beyond that, Texas played really well throughout the year and they are a very good team, despite what apologists for many other schools may say. And because of how Texas seemed down and not as good after that title game, Alabama was elevated almost by proxy and pushed Texas down further. For a lot of people, it seems unfathomable that Texas could win because what they've "heard" is that the SEC is so much better than everyone else and that Texas was lucky to get to the title game, and they probably only reached there because most people hear the name "Texas" and assume they're the second best team. What people then overlook is that Texas is, in fact, a pretty good team and that they can compete with Alabama. Though Texas is and has been made to be the clear underdog, I don't really think of Texas as a "David" to Alabama's "Goliath" but most people see the game that way. It would be an absolute shock if Texas played well in the game, and I think that's a very misguided point. Texas has just as strong a claim to play in this game as Alabama does, and thus the idea that Texas might win shouldn't seem as foreign as it does to many of the people talking about the game.

Now, what do I think will happen? Well, I've very hesitant to make a prediction and I can see the game going any number of ways, since both teams are very very good. But what I think this game comes down to, above all, is what team does better when not everything goes right. Each team is good enough to trip up the other, but some teams are designed to win only when things go their way, and some teams can win even when they don't play their game and the other team does play their way. And I think that favors Texas because we've seen them, against Oklahoma and Nebraska, totally struggle and have to grind out the game while the other team played out of its mind and Texas still won. We even saw this last year in the Fiesta Bowl with Ohio State. I think both teams have enough talent to equal the other in that respect, so it comes down to who can do the things they don't usually do and who can make things happen even when they aren't totally clicking.

It will be a tough game, a hard-fought battle that won't be decided until the fourth quarter. I think Ingram will have 100 yards and a TD, I think Colt McCoy will face a good deal of pressure but not like he did from Suh and Nebraska, I think that the Texas special teams will make a big play or two. But above all, I think the Texas defense will control the game more than most people think they are capable of and I think Colt McCoy's resiliency and toughness will come out as he wills Texas to the gritty win for the national championship.

New Year, Same Blog

2010-01-05T19:48:00.000-05:00

Happy 2010 to all my wonderful readers out there! Again, I've gone MIA a little bit but a combination of working on a thesis proposal as well as ringing in the new year in Austin has severely hindered my blogging productivity. But luckily I've got my thesis proposal to a point where I can take a little break (my advisor is taking a look at it and I can't get back to working on it until I hear back from him) and I'm totally finished with my PhD applications. The combination of these two things means I'll be able to start blogging again! I'm going with the bullet point approach for this post though. I'm not ready for a full "real" post quite yet, but I will soon.

- I've been debating about doing a "5 for the decade" post, much like I did for 2009. And as I think back on the past decade, I really don't know where to begin. I mean, this was a pretty transformative decade for me as I'm sure it was for everyone in my age group/demographic (I went from 15-24, those are some fairly formative years). I feel like I personally underwent a million changes during this decade, and the whole world seemed to as well. So trying to sum things up like that seems almost impossible, but the alternative of trying to chronicle EVERYTHING seems equally as daunting. I'm not quite sure what I'll do but I need to come up with something or else I'll miss out on all the "decade gone by" nostalgia that's going around these days. Though maybe there's something to be said for living in the present/looking ahead to the future.

- I've been in Austin since the evening of December 31st and I'll be here until January 8th. It's been an absolutely great time, even though I haven't been out partying all that much. To be honest, I've been spending most of my time in my favorite coffee shop working on my thesis proposal or making my way through my Google Reader. For some reason, though, that has been exactly what I needed and I feel a lot happier and in a better overall mood. It's really amazing how something that many people would think is boring or not all that fun can make you feel really really good.

- One thing I did while I was in Austin that didn't involve working on my thesis proposal (and eating and drinking) is going to see a movie, namely Avatar. On New Year's Day at the South Lamar Alamo Drafthouse (so I was doing some eating and drinking there too), I saw James Cameron's epic $280-310 million dollar film in 3D. I'm going to bypass a full, extended post and review and I think I did a good job summing up the movie with the Facebook status I posted right after the movie ended:

Avatar = The Matrix + Star Wars + Fern Gully (so he's heard) with commentary on Iraq mixed in.

With that summary out of the way, I'll get into my brief thoughts on the film. I thought it was pretty good, definitely not horrible or a bomb in any way but it wasn't great either and I wasn't totally engrossed by the plot. It goes without saying that visually the film was spectacular, especially in 3D. But I'm sure that, even in regular 2D the visuals of the film would be amongst the best anyone has ever seen. Unfortunately, the problems I felt with the plot could not be totally masked by the stunning aesthetics of the film. And when I talk about the plot, I'm not talking about it being poorly constructed or too complicated. Instead it just didn't feel... original or like its own story. Again, I point back to my pithy Facebook summary to point to how I feel about the film. Cameron seemed to take certain aspects from all of these films, throw in a little social commentary and serve it all up. It was an amalgamation of ideas, tropes and clichés rather than an original plot and story. To be honest, I feel like the "story" that Cameron wanted to tell could have been told through much more original ways that felt less like appropriations of many other stories. Throughout the film, I found myself saying "This reminds me of" a certain film WAY too much, and that ultimately proved to be the film's downfall. I'm not saying you can't have analogues and draw on other films and other stories, but you need to synthesize them and use them to make something that is your own. Because of that, Avatar falls short because it felt totally unoriginal. Yes, it was beautiful and that aesthetic value does draw you in slightly but it's not all the way. For me, being drawn in all the way is the mark of a good film and I just didn't feel that way about Avatar.

5 for '09

2009-12-31T14:40:00.000-05:00

I, like many bloggers out there, have been trying to wrap things up for the new year- both the end of the year and the end of the decade. And while I had grand visions of my head of doing the "best of" for certain categories for both the year and the decade, that ultimately proved to be unsustainable with PhD applications and a thesis proposal to do. But I did come up with what I thought was a better and more sustainable choice to wrap up the year. What I will do is talk about the five biggest things- it doesn't matter what exactly they are, but just five things- from the past year.

1.) Paris

This was the year I went to Paris and spent a month this summer just... being a sort-of Parisian. I thought so much about this trip in 2008, when I was thinking about it as I tried to raise myself out of the major funk I was in throughout the end of 2008 into 2009. But then to actually go to Paris and live there for about a month... it seemed almost surreal. But it was an incredible experience and I got to explore and delve deeper into a city that I already loved. I saw and tried so many new things, whether it be a new kind of food (steak tartare) or art. I even participated in Bastille Day, which is France's Fourth of July. And I even had my mom come for a week, so I was able to show her around Paris. But best of all, I got to re-trace Hemingway's footsteps across Paris, which mainly entails eating and drinking at a lot of different restaurants. But I'll always remember 2009 as being the year I stayed in Paris for more than a few days and that I was able to navigate the city on my own.

2.) U2

Any year in which U2 puts out a new album and mounts a huge tour means U2 will probably be somewhere to be found on my "end of the year" lists. This was a very big year for U2, and a big year for my own U2-fandom as well. The band's latest album was released, No Line on the Horizon, and it definitely did not disappoint. In fact, there were a couple songs on the album, specifically "Moment of Surrender" and "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight"that I thought were among U2's best of all time. But as far as albums released in 2009, I think it's one of (if not THE) best and the fact that it wasn't nominated for the big three Grammy awards (Record, Album or Song of the Year) is a crime.

On top of that, U2 mounted their 360º Tour and I saw two shows during the tour, one in Raleigh, NC and one in Paris! Both shows were incredible and I saw things I wanted to see, like performances of "In a Little While" at both shows, as well as songs that I'd never heard live before but enjoyed on their albums like "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)" and "The Unforgettable Fire." But the whole show was perfect and vintage U2, combining stadium-sized bombast (for the encore, Bono comes out wearing a jacket with lasers shooting out from the sleeves. Oh yeah, the stage itself is a massive claw as well...) but also intimacy and bringing that same up-close feeling I remember from the shows on the much more literally intimate Elevation Tour. Even though you were in a massive outdoor stadium, you still felt connected to the band like you would in a much smaller venue. But U2 factored in greatly to my own experience of 2009, both through the album they released as well as seeing them live and in concert.

3.) Getting a cat

This happened pretty late into the year, but it's been one of the biggest things I've done in my entire life. I've become a responsible "adult" and I adopted a cat of my own- Jack. It's been a very interesting experience having a cat, though I treat him more like a kid than a pet. I've been learning what it means to be responsible for another living thing and what exactly that entails. I've also learned that sometimes being responsible for something means you have to use discipline, like I do with Jack when he bites/nibbles on my arm or starts chewing on my computer's power cord. But I love ol' Jack very much, and I've definitely found myself missing him when I've been away for extended periods of time. Though taking on responsibility is always tough at first, I'm very glad I adopted Jack and I don't regret it for one millisecond.

4.) The inauguration of Barack Obama

This was big- really, really, really big. I mean, this was the culmination of one of the most important and transformative elections ever. And it was definitely something that I felt connected to, as one of my best friends worked for the Obama campaign in Ohio and was going to the inauguration. If it hadn't been the first week of classes and I didn't already know that I was going to miss a full week of classes later in the semester, I might have made the dive up to Washington D.C. to be a part of the history. But instead I watched everything from a snowy Winston-Salem, but I will always remember that day and what it signaled and how much the course of the country seemed to change. It was a very very big deal, and it all started that January morning in 2009, when Barack Obama was sworn in as president.

5.) Hook 'em Horns

To be honest, it was a pretty good year to be a Longhorn fan in 2009. We started the year with a trip to the Fiesta Bowl, pulling out a thrilling win over Ohio State. Though the basketball team underperformed in the 2008-2009 season, I did get to see them play their first round NCAA Tournament Game in Greensboro against Minnesota before they eventually bowed out to Duke in the second round. Then there was the magical run to the College World Series, which included a 25 inning game in Austin against Boston College. Though we fell short against LSU, it was a great run through the summer months to the title round. But, since this is Texas, it all builds up to football and Texas had a great and thrilling 2009 regular season that saw them go undefeated (though there were some close calls against Oklahoma and especially Nebraska in the Big XII title game...) and in the BCS Championship Game on January 7th, 2010.

But beyond just my team doing well and being successful, I will always remember how the Longhorns helped to get me through the tough points in 2009. If things were tough or not going the way I wanted, I knew that I could turn to Texas sports, whatever sport that might be, as a good means of distraction. More abstractly, I discovered how sports really functioned as a distraction and something that I could watch to take my mind off the things that were bothering or concerning me. But it was the Longhorns in particular, and their athletic exploits, that made 2009 memorable for me as a sports fan.

Honorable Mention- Conference Going

2009 was the year that I presented at my first conference, the SW/TX Popular Culture/American Culture Association's conference in Albuquerque. In addition to going there and presenting a paper of Kerouac's Catholic countercultural legacy, I also was accepted to present at the Hemingway Society's conference in 2010 in Lausanne, Switzerland as well as being selected to present once again in Albuquerque in 2010 about On The Road's Catholic influences

Finishing Up The Challenge

2009-12-29T09:00:00.000-05:00

December 29 Laugh. What was your biggest belly laugh of the year?

Though I'd watched the show a lot before, 2009 was also a year where I delved very, very deeply into Arrested Development and I'm pretty sure that watching or re-watching that TV show led to the biggest and best laughs of the year for me. Two examples in particular stand out as the funniest- the episode where George Michael runs for class president, and namely the campaign video that GOB makes for him, and GOB at the Bluth Company Christmas Party talking about how much his suits cost and when the employees toast/roast him. If you're a fan of Arrested Development and have seen those episodes, you know exactly how funny they are and why I'd listen them as my answer for this question

December 30 Ad. What advertisement made you think this year?

I'm not sure if this commercial made me "think" per se, but it did made me think... it was funny. It came out during the 2009 NBA Playoffs and the name of the ad series is the MVPuppets. It has a puppet Kobe Bryant and puppet LeBron James who both live in the same house and... well, funny things happen. The one that stands out, in my mind, is the one called "Lil Dez" and I think it's one of the most hilarious ads I've seen in a long time. Take a watch and tell me what you think:

December 31 Resolution you wish you'd stuck with. (You know, there's always next year...)

It's funny, I feel like I did a pretty good job on the more meaningful resolution that I made to not get too bogged down in negative things and focus instead on the good things that are out there if I just keep moving and look for them. But on the more menial resolutions I made for myself, namely eating better and exercising more, I came up very short. I've unfortunately discovered that the life of a grad student isn't conducive to these things but I'm going to give them a better try in 2010. But while the bigger resolution was something I found I could stick to, the more down-to-earth one proved to be more difficult and is definitely something I wish I had stuck with to a greater degree in 2009.

That's it for the Best of 2009 Blog Challenge! I'll be getting to work on some "Year in Review" posts shortly!

Station to Station

2009-12-28T20:56:00.000-05:00

December 27th: Social web moment- Did you meet someone you used to only know from her blog? Did you discover Twitter?

I talked about this earlier when I was describing how this blog was my "project" of the year, but getting "involved" (and I use that term very, very loosely) in the 20SB community was definitely my social web moment of the year as it were. It was through that medium that I first interacted with people primarily as a "blogger" and formed ties/friendships/whatever because of that. That's not to say that they were any less real (again, I think the idea of "in real life" has always been somewhat lame) but that it was all rooted in the blogging world and mediated through social networking online.

Though I had Twitter through all of 2008, I definitely think that 2009 was the year that I came into my own as a Twitter user. In particular, my penchant for live-tweeting sports events (a lot of Texas baseball during our run to the CWS finals as well as throughout the 2009 football season) came to the forefront. So while it wasn't the year I discovered Twitter, it was the year I maximized my tweeting potential.

December 28th: Stationery- When you touch the paper, your heart melts. The ink flows from the pen. What was your stationery find of the year?

To be honest, I really can't think of an answer to this question. I'm such a product of the modern age/21st century/whatever that I rarely write things out by hand on real paper. I bought some WFU emblazoned paper and envelopes that I used on occasion when I actually had to "write" a letter, but it definitely would not qualify as a "stationery find" by any stretch of the imagination. Maybe I should make one of my New Year's resolutions to buy and use some fancy stationery in 2010...?

Eureka!

2009-12-26T21:00:00.000-05:00

December 26th: Insight or aha! moment- What was your epiphany of the year?

To be honest, I feel like I am living in the midst of my "aha!" moment right now, since it is directly related to my thesis project. I've known since... well, probably beginning in January of 2009, that I would be writing about Ernest Hemingway and D.H. Lawrence. But for most of the year I wondering what exactly I would be writing about in regard to these authors. I knew it would have to be about masculinity (because you really can't avoid that topic when you talk about both of these authors) and that World War I would factor in as well (definitely can't be escaped with Hemingway, and it's the main point of overlap with Lawrence) but other than that... I was pretty lost and not quite sure where the project was going. Luckily, I had an insightful (albeit daunting) chat with my thesis advisor during finals week for the fall of 2009 and it opened my eyes to what I'm going to be looking to do with this project.

The war will definitely be factoring in as well as ideas about injury, trauma and violence and how those ideas affected the constructions of masculinity in their respective texts. The war won't be the "central" idea, because it's not the greatest point of overlap between the two authors, but it will definitely be a large component of the analysis related to masculinity, which is a slightly bigger point of comparison. I'm still in the process of choosing what texts by each author I want to focus on, though it's much more narrowed down for Lawrence than it is for Hemingway. In addition to that, I'm writing the proposal and that is proving to be very difficult as the ideas I have in my head are proving to be very difficult to articulate.

But nevertheless there are ideas there that weren't before, and ideas that I think are very strong and will hopefully result in a good and interesting thesis project. But it was that moment, talking about my thesis in early December, that I had my biggest and most important "aha!" moment of 2009.

A Christmas Double

2009-12-25T18:56:00.000-05:00

December 24 Learning experience. What was a lesson you learned this year that changed you?

This stems a little bit from the events of late 2008 but this year was one when I finally learned that I had to be happy and in a good place to do and feel well. I always went with the tough approach-- just grind through it and it doesn't matter if you're happy now, since you have to get certain things done and that is the only thing that matters-- for most of my life and I always felt as though that was the right approach. Over the course of 2009, I really learned that wasn't always true and that sometimes you need to make yourself happy (to some degree) in order to merely get things done. The instance when I most remember this coming into play was in the spring. I was finishing up my semester and had a great deal of work ahead of me in the final weeks, but I was also very unhappy being where I was and what was going on. I knew that change and shaking things up were essential for me to merely survive, let alone thrive. Thus, even though it wasn't terribly practical, I packed up my things and drove up to DC to finish up my work. Though I do question whether or not it was the best idea from a work perspective, it definitely made me feel better and more able to actually write. So even though it wasn't something that was done strictly because of the task at hand but instead was done based on how I was feeling and what I needed to do to be "happy," I could accept and understand how that was just as important. That understanding was something that I didn't have at the beginning of this year but that I grew into.

December 25 Gift. What's a gift you gave yourself this year that has kept on giving?

There are probably more insightful or meaningful answers I could give for this question, but I'm going to be very literal and list a few of the paid iPhone apps I bought this year. I've found a Twitter client that I really like-- Tweetie-- which is one that I bought for myself. But the two iPhone apps that have provided me with the greatest value and level of entertainment during 2009- the MLB At Bat and the NBA Game Time apps. Both of these applications kept me abreast of what was going on in their respective leagues and allowed me to listen to the radio broadcasts of games in both leagues. Now I could listen to games no matter where I was- in fact, while I was in Paris I would often listen to Yankees games that started in the afternoon (since that would be about the time I would go to bed in Paris). But even though I said to myself "I'll never get an iPhone app that I have to pay for" when I first bought the phone, I definitely changed my tune and I've loved using these two apps and they've provided me with entertainment and sports information for which I've been extremely grateful for.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-25T08:00:00.001-05:00

Well, I would like to be the... well, not the first nor the second nor the hundredth probably... BUT I would like to wish all of you out there, my wonderful readers, a merry Christmas and a happy holidays! I hope that this holiday season will provide you with whatever your heart desires and that you can spend it in a place that makes you happy wherever that may be.

I know I brought this one out last year, but I felt like sharing my favorite Christmas song (or version of a Christmas song, I should say) here to get everyone in the Christmas mood. I know it's tough to be really and totally happy when there are so many external Christmas pressures- shopping for presents, the occasionally difficult dealings with family members, over-eating, dealing with cold weather (if you're from the northern regions, this isn't as much of a problem for us in sunny California) but Christmas is supposed to be a fun and happy time, beyond the religious implications (which, if you are a believer, are pretty cool as well... ok that sounds really flippant but you get the idea).

I just hope that, if only for a few minutes, you all revel in CHRISTMAS and just enjoy all its trappings. I try to do this, even though the holidays definitely stress me out. Whether it's listening to a Christmas song or two, or going to see the fancy Christmas light displays, or watching one of those old Christmas movies on TV, just try to revel in it. And one of my favorite ways to do that is by listening to this song, which is U2's version of "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)." So grab yourself a cup of eggnog, tear yourself away from wrapping presents and give it a listen!

Also, there are some great NBA games on, including Kobe versus LeBron when the Cavs play the Lakers and that (great NBA basketball) is another tradition unto itself. If you get a free moment or two, sneak a peek or when you're sitting on the couch after the madness, go ahead and put on the late game, which is Nuggets v. Blazers. I do love Christmas Day NBA basketball...

The Real McCoy

2009-12-24T12:00:00.001-05:00

Unless you have absolutely zero interest in sports and/or haven't accidentally flipped to ESPN (or even a major news network) recently, you probably know that my beloved (and that's an understatement) alma mater Texas Longhorns will be playing the Alabama Crimson Tide for the BCS Championship in college football this coming January. It should also come as no surprise that I am very excited (and nervous) about this game. But while I'm certain I'll be getting into the game itself later on, this post is mainly about one player-- Colt McCoy-- and, for lack of a better term, what he means to me.

These past two seasons have really led me to consider how I rank Colt on my list of the "best Texas players of my lifetime" or my favorite Texas players etc etc. But I, like many other Longhorns fans, have been beyond surprised with just how good Colt has been these past few years. This mainly stems from who Colt had to follow as Texas QB- Vince Young. Vince Young, after he completely and utterly shocked USC (as well as the rest of the college football world) by beating them to claim the 2006 BCS title, seemed like a legend that would never ever be topped in Austin. He was the QB who brought us our first championship in a long time, who took on the "Greatest College Football Team of All Time" and beat them, who silenced all the doubters and un-believers, who rode off into the sunset a champion after one of the most dominating performances in college football (and sports in general) history. So the Longhorns came into the 2006 college football season with two potential freshman QBs- highly recruited and acclaimed Jevan Snead and Colt McCoy from Tuscola, TX (population 714) and whoever won this battle would have to fill just about the biggest set of shoes around by following Vince Young.

Most people thought Snead would be the "QB of the Future" for the Longhorns, but as the 2006 season rolled along it became clear that this was Colt McCoy's team despite the fact that Snead was a much ballyhooed recruit who played in the 5A high school championship game in Texas (the top league in terms of high school football) while Colt played in the 2A division (in fact, Colt's high school team played in the championship game the high school from my mom's hometown, which is just about the smallest town ever). Yet it was the plucky, tough QB from the small town in West Texas who took over the Longhorns and thus leading Snead to eventually transfer to Ole Miss.

Colt's freshman season was an outstanding one, perhaps one of the best for any Big XII freshman football player. Colt was only derailed by a nasty injury during an upset loss to Kansas State (at Kansas State) and then subsequently getting re-injured during a tough, heartbreaking loss to Texas A&M on the day after Thanksgiving in Austin (at the only A&M game I've been to). Those two losses kept Texas from playing for a Big XII title during Colt's freshman year, instead settling for the Alamo Bowl against Iowa, but those were things that were beyond his control (the injuries).

Despite the promise he showed in 2006, 2007 turned out to be a bit of a letdown for Colt. He once again suffered defeat at the hands of Kansas State (this time in Austin) and then lost to Oklahoma in the Red River Shootout (his only loss to Oklahoma during his college career) and another loss to A&M in College Station. However, Colt rebounded in the Holiday Bowl against Arizona State to put up very gaudy numbers in a blowout win over the Sun Devils(that proved to be, in my estimation, a spring board for the last two years of his college career). But I very distinctly remember my last game as a student in Austin, in November against Texas Tech the day I took the GREs and before that Holiday Bowl, and not really being sure what the future held for Colt. You saw the promise in him, yet would he ever be one of the best QBs? Would he be just a good Longhorns QB, a beloved legend (à la Major Applewhite) or someone who put it all together (like Vince Young)? I really didn't know, as I watched him lead the Longhorns to a win over the hated Red Raiders on that November afternoon.

Well we quickly found out in 2008 and into 2009 just how good Colt McCoy could be. Colt wasn't just a great Texas QB, but one of the best QBs in the nation who led his team to within 1 second of a national championship (damn you Michael Crabtree/Texas Tech/etc etc!) in 2008 and to the championship game in 2009. 2008 saw Colt McCoy truly transform into a commanding QB who could take over a game and will his team to a victory on his own, with perhaps the strongest example of which came in his leading the Longhorns to victory in the final two minutes against Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl. Though he didn't win the Heisman in either year, he was definitely one of the best players in college football over those two years and I'm sure that many of the people who watched him will remember him for years to come.

This all is a very circular way of "introducing" Colt but also bringing me back to the question that is at the heart of the post- can Colt compare to Vince? The fact that I would even consider this seems blasphemous if I go back in time to January 4th, 2006 (the night of the Rose Bowl/BCS Title game where Vince led the Longhorns to victory over the USC Trojans). I knew that what I saw that night in Pasadena was one of the greatest athletic performances ever and the culmination of an outstanding career for Vince Young. That was the thing for me- I had watched Vince all year (relatively) up close and I knew what the guy was capable of doing. The Rose Bowl wasn't just a transcendent performance in isolation, but it was the culmination and realization of all his talents and that of which he was capable. After that game and throughout the next season(s), I said to myself "no one will ever be as great as Vince" and "I won't see greatness like I did with Vince Young ever again." I knew Colt was going to be a pretty good QB, even a very good one but... I never, ever thought that he (or anyone really) could equal what Vince did as the quarterback for the Texas Longhorns.

But the more I thought about it and think about Colt's legacy, the more flawed that assumption becomes in my mind. The fact of the matter is Colt McCoy has the most wins as a starting quarterback in college football history, in addition to being the Texas career leader in passing yards and TDs. But Colt did more than just put up gaudy numbers, he also was a winner. Even as a freshman, Colt won tough games against Nebraska and Texas Tech, and continued this trend throughout his career including come from behind wins over Oklahoma in the 2008 Red River Shootout and Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl in January 2009. We also saw his ability to put up "big time" numbers, both in his freshman year and in that 2008 season as well, which was a bit of a surprise after what can charitably be called a rough 2007 season (3 losses, a pretty high number of INTs, struggles within the offense itself). So we saw that Colt could both be a leader as well as a statistically great QB. But it never, ever crossed my mind that Colt would enter into the "Vince" conversation. But then I started thinking about it...

In addition to the great statistical performances, the most wins of any college quarterback, a 3-1 record as a starter against Oklahoma (as opposed to 1-1 for Vince) and a 3-0 record in bowl games (Vince was 2-1, though his two were against Michigan in the Rose Bowl and then against USC for the national title). The only blemish, in my mind, for Colt is a 2-2 record against A&M, while Vince went 3-0 against the Aggies. Of course, Vince does have one transcendent performance in a championship game, while Colt is still awaiting his opportunity though I think it's almost impossible for anyone to have the same kind of individual performance that Vince had in that game against USC. So while I couldn't discern (at this point) who was "better," I did come to realize that Colt did deserve a place in the conversation and that fact alone was a shock because it would have seemed inconceivable but a couple years ago.

But what I thought more about was this from a personal point-of-view. After Vince left, I thought it would take a little while before we had a QB who I thought was as "great" and I felt as good about as Vince. I mean, he was a once in a lifetime talent so replacing him wasn't going to be easy especially in the minds of Longhorns fans. But while I might say that Vince might be the "better" or more dominant QB, I feel like I have a much greater bond to Colt. I was there at Colt's first game, which was a game in Austin against North Texas that started at 11 AM and where he threw a long TD pass to Limas Sweed on his second career pass. I was there from the beginning, I was there for some of the high points as well as the tough games (Ohio State and A&M in '06, Kansas State and Oklahoma in '07). Perhaps most importantly to me, he made the Longhorns great in '08 when I probably needed them to be great the most, as I was struggling through an emotionally hellish first semester at Wake Forest and needed something to get me excited and through the tough times. Plus, Colt was the guy no one gave a lot of credit to- coming from a tiny high school, following perhaps the Greatest Texas Football Player of All Time, with a blue-chip recruit competing with him from the very beginning, coming off injuries his freshman year and a tough sophomore year... this guy really did overcome a lot and became an all-time great at Texas.

Above all, what I came to realize by thinking about all this is that no matter what he does in the BCS Championship game, Colt McCoy will always be one of my favorite Longhorns from my time at UT and someone I firmly believe is one of the best college football players of his time. But, above all, he is someone who I saw grow (in the football sense... I sound like I'm a parent, haha) before my eyes and mature from the freshman he was in '06 into a Heisman candidate in '08 and '09. Colt will always be a part of my memories of my time in Austin and someone who, when I hear about them, associate with my time at the university and thus Colt will always be a special player in my eyes.

If you have Colt McCoy thoughts, please put them in the comments! What do you think of him? Am I blasphemous for allowing Colt to enter into the "Vince Young" conversation?

Better Living Through Technology

2009-12-23T11:00:00.000-05:00

December 23rd: Web tool- It came into your work flow this year and now you couldn't live without it. It has simplified or improved your online experience.

This one is definitely easier for me to answer than yesterday's question. There are definitely a few good candidates out there. For example, I've recently been really getting into the FourSquare iPhone app, which is a GPS locator type thing in the same vein as Google Latitude (which is another thing I loved using this year when it was finally released for the iPhone). In addition, Google cranked out a couple of big time web related things- the Chrome browser and Google Wave. But both of those things came to my attention pretty late in the year, so I don't think those can really qualify.

Upon further consideration, I believe that Google did provide me with perhaps the most important and my favorite web tool of 2009- Google Reader. Though it was released well before 2009, it was the year when I really firmly grasped Google Reader and it became a part of my everyday life. I mean, I even wrote a post about Google Reader and how much I use it/love it. So while there have been some strong newcomers at the end of the year, I'd say that Google Reader is the most important web tool I discovered in 2009.

Start Me Up

2009-12-22T10:00:00.000-05:00

December 22nd: Startup- What's a business that you found this year that you love? Who thought it up? What makes it special?

OK, this one isn't as difficult as it is bizarre. I've been pouring over this one in my mind and I really can't think of one business that really stands out and is the best answer to this question.

There isn't anything that I found this year that's really stood out and that I fell in love with. I've come to appreciate Google and ESPN a little bit more over the course of this year, but I definitely had heard of those companies earlier. But I started making use of more of Google's products, such as Latitude, Wave and their browser Chrome, as well the fact that I've begun to listen to ESPN's radio content for better or worse, really allowed me to appreciate and delve deeper into those respective companies but they were definitely nothing new in my world. Perhaps my appreciation of Apple has gone further and deeper, since I've begun to use a lot of their software as well, with programs like Pages and Numbers (their answers to Word and Excel). But again, Apple is clearly something I knew about well before 2009 so I don't think that counts either.

But I really, honestly, can't think of one business that I've totally fallen in love with this year. My love for certain businesses might have grown, but there wasn't any new businesses on the scene in 2009 (to the best of my recollection). If you can think of any that I might have overlooked, please let me know!

Project 2009

2009-12-21T14:19:00.000-05:00

December 21st: Project- What did you start this year that you're proud of?

As I find myself saying with a lot of these questions... this is a very tough question!

Though it's in the very (and I mean VERY) early stages, I'm hopeful that my thesis that I will complete next spring will be something that I'm very proud of. But I really don't feel like I've started it yet- I'm only beginning my proposal right now (and I should probably be working on that right now) and it's a lot more conceptual and theoretical than anything.

Instead, I'll pick this blog as the "project" I'm most proud of. Despite my huge lapses, particularly this past fall as well as at some small stretches in the spring, this has been my first "full" year of blogging. In fact, it was around January 1st of 2009 (well, just before in December 2008, but still... you get the idea) that I really kicked off blogging. It was the first year I interacted with and participated in 20SB and that led to many inter-blogging personal connections which have been outstanding, as well as the first year that I really saw and considered blogging as a real project and something that I could DO rather than some hobby or pastime. Heck, I even met one of my blogging heroes in 2009 so how can this not be my Year of the Blog? Hopefully this project will keep going and growing into 2010, but it all really began in 2009.

Blogging- on the weekend? What's going on?

2009-12-19T12:30:00.000-05:00

So this probably will come as a bit of a shock to your system (based upon how little I've blogged this past year) but I'm keeping up with my blogging Best Of 2009 Challenge and thus I will be tackling the two questions for the weekend. I'm going to do both Saturday and Sunday at once, so we get the two of them together and things are a little more condensed.

December 19th: Car ride- What did you see? How did it smell? Did you eat anything as you drove there? Who were you with?

In 2009, I took a few long(ish) car trips- one up to Washington D.C. then back to Winston-Salem and then one to Athens/Atlanta and back to W-S again. Both of those trips were really fun and I had a great time in both places.

But there is one clear answer, in my mind, to this question in that it was the actual "car ride" that I particularly remember and was central to the experience- it is the extended trip from Alameda to Winston-Salem, by way of Dallas/Austin/Houston. It was my first true cross-country trip; I'd driven from Austin back to California or from Austin to Winston-Salem, but never the whole way. This time, I went the distance- 3,371 miles from California to North Carolina. I'm trying to remember very distinctive moments and the one I come up with isn't a particularly a positive one- driving through the flat, wide-open spaces in West Texas for hours on end (that led to me getting a speeding ticket). But spending countless hours driving through the flat Texas terrain, for better or worse, is the thing that stands out the most to me during that trip.

Second place would be driving to New Orleans and seeing the Mississippi River, which reminded me of some of Kerouac's descriptions in On The Road of crossing the country and seeing the Mississippi River and particularly this quote:

I woke up as the sun was reddening; and that was the one distinct time in my life, the strangest moment of all, when I didn't know who I was — I was far away from home, haunted and tired with travel, in a cheap hotel room I'd never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, and the creak of the old wood of the hotel, and footsteps upstairs, and all the sad sounds, and I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn't know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost. I was halfway across America, at the dividing line between the East of my youth and the West of my future.

December 20th: New person- She came into your life and turned it upside down. He went out of his way to provide incredible customer service. Who is your unsung hero of 2009?

I know they're fishing for a specific person I can point to here but, you know what, I'm going to buck the trend and not do what "they" want. The new people of the year were easily the newcomers to our English graduate program. In any small program, an injection of new people is going to be very noticeable and felt to a great degree. And that's definitely the case of the people in our program, and it's made things a lot more fun as well as helping me in all my academic endeavors (and being kind enough to feed my cat!). I won't go on much further, because I'm sure a few of them will read this and I'm sure they know I've thought this already, so I'll just leave it as the incoming English graduate students were some of the best and have had the biggest and definitely the most positive effect upon me in 2009.

Strange Bedfellows?

2009-12-18T13:00:00.000-05:00

I've talked about this before, but I often feel like I am made to live between two worlds that are viewed as "mutually exclusive." That would be the world of the sports fan and the world of the literary fan/"scholar"/whatever you want to call it. The fact of the matter is there is a divide between the two- if you're someone who supposed to be of a high... I don't know, intellectual (?) standing, you aren't generally expected to be a big time sports fan. Now that's not to say that all sports fans are assumed to be unintelligent, but as I've entered into graduate school and even as I found myself hanging out with people heading on that same path as well, interest in sports matters definitely decreased. I was always the outlier- the person who really cared about these things (well beyond a casual fan) and that I was somehow strange because of that.

And I never, ever understood this. First of all, there's a nice intellectual thread that runs through sports, especially today. I mean, there are some amazing sportswriters out there, like Roger Angell who writes about baseball for The New Yorker. I could list a ton, but I'll just point to that example as the strongest. Also, many great writers wrote about sports and knew about what was going on- perhaps Hemingway is the best example of this, but he's not the only one. In addition, if you look at the people who are running franchises in almost all the major sports (baseball, football and basketball), the general managers are highly educated people, usually with MBAs or some post-undergraduate degree, and are highly interested in quantitative analysis and statistics (more on this in just a little bit...).

In addition to this, I feel as though the prominence of sports blogs and the de-centering of the sports journalism universe has made the dialogue a lot... higher and has made me feel as though there's a place for me in it. This de-centering of the sports journalism universe has broken apart the sports "jockocracy" which definitely undervalued intellectual rigor in favor of a system that favored the people who had been in the system and understood it on a "gut level." Now we see people who are outside that and are using new things (media, approaches, whatever) to look and talk about sports. Bill Simmons is the first of these, but his "schtick" (which I say not to be condescending, because I do enjoy his stuff, but I know he's putting a lot of that on or amplifying things because ESPN has paid him to be the "Boston Sports Guy") has become a little dated. But when someone like Will Leitch comes along with Deadspin and changes thing by breaking free of the constraints of the "jockocracy"both by being outside the ESPN-Sports Illustrated mold, but also because he was someone I could relate to (in some ways). Now that's not the same as saying he's just "one of the guys" because, to be honest, I have trouble relating to people coming from that perspective. But here's someone who I felt like came from "my world," whatever that means, and thought about things the same way I do.

While there are these people who "bridge the gap," I also think its funny that people, especially people in the humanities, who shun sports. I've found that, in some respects, I think about sports in the same way I think about literature. In particular, how we look at things in sports and interpret them and assign meaning that isn't readily apparent, those all are things that definitely relate to what I/we do in the English world. Though this doesn't just relate to statistics, though there is definitely a line between how we treat sports statistics and numbers and how we interpret literature. In the world of literary analysis, we look at what the words "say" and then we consider what they "mean" (I hope that distinction makes sense). For sports, you have the numbers put in front of you-- points per game, rushing yards, batting average, etc etc. But then, when we are presented with these things that "say" something, we then must discern what they "mean." We can try to understand, through them, what makes a great player or why this player would be good for this team or whether this player is better than another. Now we definitely aren't reaching for the great human truths that we find in literature, but there's still a fair amount of analysis that goes on. I interpret as much as a sports fan just as much as I do as a student of literature. The role of statistics and determining their meaning beyond the superficial ones, allows for an intellectual rigor to exist that we often forget exists in sports. It's not enough to just state someone's statistics and have that be the end of the argument. But you need to say that these statistics reflect some kind of bigger truth or illumination about the team or player you are looking at.

I don't know if I'll change anybody's mind through this, as most people have generally decided whether or not they are a sports fan at this point. But what I do hope is that you (ok maybe not YOU, but maybe someone who reads this...) will not be quite as surprised when they find out I'm a pretty big sports fan and that I think a lot about these things. I don't think the things I do and the intellectual rigor I value and bring to my own life make me somehow less likely to be a sports fan (in fact, I think it makes me an even bigger one). I'm not here to change your mind or convert you to the sports fanaticism to which I subscribe, but I'm trying to change the way you think about my fanaticism and hopefully seeing it as being part of me rather than some outlier or something that "doesn't seem to fit."

December 18th

2009-12-18T09:30:00.000-05:00

December 18th: Shop- Online or offline, where did you spend most of your mad money this year?

I try my very hardest to be a supporter of independent business, but I've discovered that in some places that is easier than others. For example, Austin is loaded with independent choices for all the things I'm most interested in- music, books, movies, coffee. Unfortunately, this is not the case in Winston-Salem and there is a dearth of little local businesses where I want to shop and can find the things I'm looking for. Because of this, since I've been a student at Wake Forest, I've had to turn to big chain corporation for many of my shopping needs even though it's not what I want to do. And I've found myself frequently making use of Amazon.com to buy the books, movies and CDs that I want, much more so than in the past. I definitely didn't intend on having Amazon be the place where I spent most of my money this year, but that definitely turned out to be the case. If it wasn't Amazon, it would be an equally "offensive" chain like Barnes & Noble. Again, another place that I didn't go to totally by choice, but because it was the only real option for the things I was looking for. My geographic situation definitely had an impact on me, and led me to spend most of my money at Amazon.com.

2009: A Retrospective (Part II)

2009-12-17T09:30:00.000-05:00

OK, so here's the second part of what I started yesterday- me catching up with Gwenn Bell's Best of '09 Blog Challenge...

December 12th: New food- You're now in love with Lebanese food and you didn't even know what it was in January of this year.

To be honest, I didn't really broaden my cuisine horizons this year as much as I did in years past but I refined my tastes in certain areas. For example, I was willing to try different rolls of sushi that I might have avoided in the past. Also, during the month in Paris, I tried steak tartare, which was very different than what I was used to eating. Though I didn't love it, it was definitely a good thing to try because of its role in French cuisine and just in the spirit of trying new things. But other than those two things, there weren't any major culinary revelations made by me during 2009.

December 13th: What's the best change you made to the place you live?

Even though he sometimes can be a little bit talkative, and might lightly bite or scratch, I did adopt a cat this year (Jack) and he has been the best change I've made to my living situation. Though sometimes it makes things difficult because I can't just up and go somewhere (I have to be responsible for him) but it's still been great having a cat and it's definitely been nice not feeling totally alone at my apartment all the time.

December 14th: Rush- When did you get your best rush of the year?

Well, I definitely had a positive rush of energy when I presented the aforementioned conference paper. Like I said, most of my academic goings-on were limited to the people who were directly around me, namely in my school and program. But this was a much (relatively) wider audience, so getting up there and sharing my ideas was definitely a rush. Now, if we're looking for a more negative one... perhaps having to 44+ pages for 3 different papers over the course of about a week would suffice. I'm pretty sure it was coffee and adrenaline that helped me power through those papers, and that's not necessarily a good thing.

December 15th: Best packaging- Did your headphones come in a sweet case? See a bottle of tea in another country that stood off the shelves?

This is a really odd question... but I'd say that the Klipsch headphones that my dad bought for me for my birthday probably take the cake as far as packaging goes. The headphones themselves can be stored in a little box that is magnetized so it stays closed, and then you can put that into a leather case that zips up. It's quite elaborate for a set of headphones, but they are fairly fancy ones. But as far as packaging goes, I guess that's the best of the year...?

December 16th: Tea of the year- I can taste my favorite tea right now. What's yours?

Well, I generally eschew tea in favor of the full bodied caffeine of coffee. But since I've been fighting a cold, I've been lucky enough to have some friends from the graduate program provide me with some green tea (generally, I'm a fan of jasmine green tea) and I enjoy a British staple- PG Tips. Those are, very literally, my cups of tea for the year (and overall).

December 17th: Word or phrase- A word that encapsulates your year. "2009 was _____."

I'd say the term "hot mess." Not necessarily because my year was somehow awful or crazy or that I was a hot mess myself (that'd be pretty much impossible) but that the term really slid into my everyday vocabulary this year. Also, there were a couple papers from the Fall 2009 semester that I rather aptly described as being "hot mess[es]." So, with no other word or phrase jumping out at me (a close second would have been "Pabst Blue Ribbon"- HA!), we'll call 2009 the year of the "hot mess."

2009: A Retrospective (Part I)

2009-12-16T12:07:00.000-05:00

All right, I've emerged from the black hole that was final papers and I have a nice little lull in the PhD applications. This all means I can (finally) return to the blogosphere. The one thing I find very difficult, after these long layoffs, is where do I begin- what do I blog about? Well, luckily, a nice little formula has been provided to me. I've found a blogging/internet meme that has been taken up by one and two of my favorite bloggers. Namely, you go through each day of December and respond to a certain question- most of them are things like... what was your favorite [fill in the blank] of 2009? Appropriately enough, it is called the "Best of 2009 Blog Challenge" and it is the idea of Gwen Bell.

Now I've obviously missed about half of December, but I figure I can do a whole bunch in one or two entries and then I'll be caught up. Also, the end of the year is the time for reflection and lists and evaluating, so this exercise seems like a good one. With all that behind us, let's get started!

December 1st: Trip- What was your best trip in 2009?

While my various trips to Austin were fun, and finally getting to go to Key West and see Hemingway's house and all the cats there, or trips in the summer to New York, Washington D.C. and Athens, GA, were all a lot of fun... how could it not be my trip to Paris?

December 2nd: Restaurant Moment- Share the best restaurant experience you had this year. Who was there? What made it amazing? What taste stands out in your mind?

I'll go with one that happened in January of 2009, with my friend Kat and her boyfriend. Now this was definitely not fine-dining; we were at my favorite place for chicken wings in Austin and we were watching the Fiesta Bowl between Texas and Ohio St. It was all-you-can-eat wings night and I accidentally ordered a flavor/sauce that was way too hot/spicy for me, yet I still managed to eat them. But, most importantly, we watched Texas pull out a come-from-behind victory in the final two minutes that sent all of us at the restaurant into a frenzy and launched the Longhorns into the 2009 season as contenders for the national championship. A national title they will be playing Alabama for on January 7th, and I plan on watching the game in the same place with the same people.

December 3rd: Article- What's an article that you read that blew you away? That you shared with all your friends. That you Delicious'd and reference throughout the year.

This one is a tough one- there wasn't one article that I can really remember blowing me away that I shared on Delicious or anything. That said, there were quite a few articles I read this year in conjunction with my thesis, that were about Hemingway and/or Lawrence, that were very interesting and insightful and will definitely be useful for my thesis. In particular, some of the articles I've come across relating to Lawrence and World War I have been very interesting and have helped me to think about Lawrence in a different way than I might have in the past.

December 4th: Book- What book - fiction or non - touched you? Where were you when you read it? Have you bought and given away multiple copies?

OK, this one I have a very definitive answer for, though it's a tough question for an English graduate student. It was in 2009 that I first read Hemingway's For Whom The Bell Tolls, which I would say is my favorite of Hemingway's novels and one of my favorite novels of all time. I have a pretty good way of explaining just how enraptured I was with that book- I started it as I was starting my road trip to Texas (and eventually to North Carolina) in January of 2009, and I would literally have to stop (usually at a Starbucks) because I wanted to keep reading so badly and see what happened next. I was so caught up in the book that I had to stop driving so I could satisfy my curiosity/desire and read some more. That, my friends, is evidence of a powerful book.

December 5th: Night out- Did you have a night out with friends or a loved one that rocked your world? Who was there? What was the highlight of the night?

This is definitely a tough one, much like the "best trip" question- because there are so many. Needless to say, the fact that I spent a fair amount of time in Austin definitely led to some very fun nights-out with my friends. But in particular, there was one night where I went out with a friend to a bunch of bars on the east side of Austin which culminated in going to a bar where my friend got her tarot read (if that's the right way of putting it) by someone who possessed the spirit if Alister Crowley for three days. It was a pretty bizarre experience, but I don't think I'll be forgetting it.

That said, the two U2 concerts I went to this year were pretty amazing and are hard to top, and didn't result to a hangover the day after- I guess it just depends on the way you look at it.

December 6th: Workshop or conference- Was there a conference or workshop you attended that was especially beneficial? Where was it? What did you learn?

Well, I presented at my first conference this past February in Albuquerque, New Mexico (I'll be presented there again next February, which means I probably need to start thinking about that paper...) and it was an absolutely incredible experience. I loved sharing my work and ideas with other people interested in the subject (in this case, Jack Kerouac). It was amazing, after I presented the paper, how many people came up to me and said "You know, I'd never thought about Kerouac like that before, but your ideas make a lot of sense." It was a really special feeling, like I somehow did belong to an academic community that transcending the bounds of a single school.

December 7th: Blog find of the year- That gem of a blog you can't believe you didn't know about until this year.

I could very easily name all the different bloggers who I've "personally" interacted with, because this was the first time I really seriously entered the blogosphere. But since I could never choose, I'll say Matthew Yglesias and Ezra Klein, both of whom I respect immensely and read voraciously as they blog about the political goings- on in Washington, DC.

December 8th: Moment of peace- An hour or a day or a week of solitude- What was the quality of your breath? The state of your mind? How did you get there?

I can think of two "moments of peace" that I had this past year- one was during my drive to Texas and NC, the day I drove from Los Angeles to Tuscon, AZ. For some reason, I remember being and feeling really serene as I drove and I was able to think and (mentally) relax. I personally find driving by myself to be a very meditative and peaceful experience, and that was definitely how I felt during that drive. The other was one afternoon I spent at the Jardin du Luxembourg in Paris. It was a nice day, a little hot but I was able to find a shady spot to sit and read some Hemingway short stories and I felt very nice and peaceful. Those were probably the two greatest peaceful moments for me during 2009.

December 9th: Challenge- Something that really made you grow this year. That made you go to your edge and then some. What made it the best challenge of the year for you?

I talked about this here right after the new year, about how I set my "new year's resolution" as being to live out an idea from Kerouac: "Why think about that when all the golden land's ahead of you and all kinds of unforeseen events wait lurking to surprise you and make you glad you're alive to see?" And it's definitely been tough to live that out, either because of the lingering... not good feelings from the past fall or things that came up as the year went on and school started up again. But I think that taking this quote to heart and trying to keep it in my mind constantly allowed me to grow and be a better and more open person (I won't say positive, because that's a little bit reductive. But I did try to look past the things that would typically hold me back).

December 10th: Album of the year- What's rocking your world?

This year was a good one in music, I think. I mean there was a new Green Day album, new stuff by Phoenix, Grizzly Bear, Son Volt, Neko Case, the Ben Gibbard and Jay Farrer/Kerouac project. But there is absolutely no doubt in my mind what the best album was of 2009, and I'm sure there's no doubt that you know what one I'm picking- U2's latest, No Line on the Horizon. Listen to the pain and anguish being expressed on "Moment of Surrender" and then the utter joy of "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight." No one else is making music that great and powerful. The fact that they weren't nominated for any of the big three Grammys (Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Album of the Year) really makes me mad. This was another great album by U2, and I really can't think of anything topping it this year.

December 11th: The best place- A coffee shop? A pub? A retreat center? A cubicle? A nook

Since I discovered my favorite coffee shop in town in 2008 (Krankies) I don't think I can name that. But the people who run Krankies opened a bar in 2009 called Single Brothers and it's far and away my favorite bar in town and my big find for 2009. They served a whiskey sour that was outstanding, and they also had a special kind of gin & tonic that they served with cucumber. It was strange, but also very refreshing.

To be continued...