Walter said that while lying in bed last night he had pondered
a meteor crashing through his ceiling and while he was pondering this
possibility a mixed metaphor came to his mind – “Don’t cry over the spelt milk
of human kindness” and he said that he couldn’t figure out what it meant and
that this was bedeviling him – it had become an obsession – a mental nematode.
He had been unable to get back to sleep. I told him that it meant that he
should not bemoan a lack of opportunities for gratuitous sex. In some cases you
should look a gift horse in the mouth, I said. Ok, he replied, but how does
the meteor figure into it? It doesn’t, I told him. As Freud supposedly said "sometimes a
cigar is just a cigar."
Lets go back to my place and bad mouth Bush – It used to be
a great pick up line. But it doesn’t seem to work with Obama.
45% of all unemployed workers in the U.S. have been jobless
for more than six months – a higher rate that that during the Great Depression
Laughter on American television has
taken the place of the chorus in Greek tragedy. It is unrelenting … so obsessive is it that you go on hearing it
behind the voice of Reagan or the Marines’ disaster in Beirut. Even behind the
adverts. It is the screen that is laughing and having a good time, You are
simply left alone with your consternation – Jean Baudrillard – America,
1988 p49
In the competition for the benefits
Of
cooperative action
It is usually those who refuse
To
cooperate that benefit
Things last no longer than the time
it takes for them to happen… I doubt now whether we really see our whole life
flashing before us at the moment of death; that marvelous perspective
presupposes that things unfold in a necessary, predestined order, the sense of
which lies beyond them. There is nothing like that today; things merely follow
in a flabby order that leads nowhere – Jean Baudrillard – America, 1988 p72
It’s a yearning a little too much for the ladies. Slinky low cut
dresses and a best ass competition - erotic and exciting - with guitar solos -
um um thum um um thum um um over and over in a hypnotic round and the drum goes
ginka, chinka, chinka, chink and the guitar overrides the beat with another um
uma thu - um, uma un thu um over and over and conversations get louder and
louder swelling into a cacophony. Oh Erica you are missed and you fell and
cracked you rib. No I didn’t push you my little vervet. A chorus joins us,
harmonizing – voices and guitar. Erica I am so sorry.
The under thrust of the breast is to beat a rhythm of
distillation, mild and erotic but slightly restrained. James Jones’s little
bird held in the big hand of the Burt Lanchaster. His Captain’s lady (Deborah
Kerr) embraced on that nocturnal beach while America's innocence remained intact. The soft hearted Sergeant; mean and
sadistic. An Hawaiian sunset with Frank Sinatra going to his oblivion - on and
on - Pearl Harbor of the heart - destruction and re-creation - erotic and
devastating - innocent adultery - boom da boom da, uh uh boom da - the juke box
plays on. Is this the Stones? Unda
Unda Unda; oh yeah. Umba, Umba. It’s not, but it could have been.
Moll Flanders eats erotic pizza with Albert Finney - oh you,
dum da dumph da, bang bang - munch, munch, slirp, slurm - and the boys sing on,
but I don’t understand a word and it bleeds into another tune without ever
pausing, pulsating, pulsating without a cigarette break, nerves on edge -
dumdum dump, uh-ouch - dumb due boom plunk. Take five boys. Let me rest - um,
um, um and still no face off - bung ad bung ad undo, blink bluing and a female
chorus. Damn it I want a cigarette. And we check Ids. One Guinness Stout and
the aroma of desire and in slinky black too. Bunga Bunga Bung - oh, ooh, ooh!
Damn it, when do I get to stop and have a cigerette. I am sore and I am tired
and I not do this any more, but I do. Blink, blinka boomda, plinka plinka doomda. On
and on and on. Shall there every be a rest? So slumber? No oblivion? No. No. No. Mixed media. Mixed metaphor. Mixed up.
About 10% of all Americans over age of six now take
antidepressant drugs. Antipsychotics are the top selling drug class in the U.S. Many subscribed off-label.
The obsessive desire for survival
(and not for ‘life’) is… the most worrying sign of the degradation of the
species – Jean Baudrillard – America, 1988 p43
Progressives want to restore. Radicals want to raze and
rebuild
All you need to know about American
society can be gleaned from an anthropology of its driving behavior – Jean
Baudrillard – America, 1988 p54
75% of the Fortune 50 Companies are in healthcare or have
health divisions. Healthcare is expected by the year 2019 to account for 20% of the U.S. GNP.
Successful healthcare companies focus on the dysfunctional or redundant parts
of the system.
In this world now dominated by economic thought, we have
discovered that comfort and security are not solutions to the human condition –
Wes Jackson – Becoming Native to This Place, 1994
p105
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