ah well, argentina is out. i can go back to not caring about soccer for another four years.

title taken from something james joyce said about the "appropriateness of names."

my point, though: how awesome is this?

here's to the united states senate: making me want to burn a flag or ten just because they don't want me to.

wsws analysis (all emphasis mine):

"The US Senate fell short by the narrowest of margins Wednesday in a vote on whether to adopt the first-ever constitutional amendment to restrict free speech. An amendment backed by the Bush administration to give Congress the power to 'ban desecration of the American flag' received 66 votes with 34 against, just missing the two-thirds margin required.

The campaign against flag-burning has long been a political hobby-horse for right-wing and chauvinist elements, going back to the Vietnam War period when antiwar protesters frequently burned flags at demonstrations against US aggression and war crimes in Southeast Asia. Numerous state laws against flag-burning were enacted in that period, but convictions under these laws were appealed on civil liberties grounds. The Supreme Court eventually ruled in 1989 that burning the flag and similar symbolic anti-patriotic acts are protected as free speech under the First Amendment.

[...]

The right-wing domination of official politics in the United States in recent decades has included a push for the first constitutional amendments that would restrict rather than expand democratic rights: banning abortion, for instance, or gay marriage, or flag-burning. In each case the religious or political prejudices of a section of the ultra-right would be embedded in the document that establishes the long-term framework of American political life. Successful adoption of the flag-burning amendment would undoubtedly encourage efforts on behalf of the other amendments.

There are also potentially important legal implications. The amendment, by using the term 'desecration,' confers a quasi-religious status on the American flag. What a Christian fundamentalist or fanatical chauvinist regards as desecration could go well beyond burning or destroying the flag. Given the top-heavy majorities in both houses for the amendment, a law implementing it would undoubtedly be passed quickly and with the widest possible scope. It is entirely possible that, for example, carrying an American flag upside-down at an antiwar demonstration could be characterized as 'desecration,' or the use of the flag in antiwar art and filmmaking. If one recalls the outrage among right-wing pundits over the immigrant rights demonstrations in the spring, it is not farfetched to suppose that even the ordinary display of the flag by non-citizens at such a protest could be criminalized as 'desecration.'

[...]

It is hard to say which was more revolting in the Senate debate—the patriotic hogwash coming from the Republicans, who overwhelmingly supported the amendment, or the legalistic hairsplitting by the Democrats, whether they supported or opposed it. There were only a handful of speakers in the debate who addressed the fundamental issue of free speech. The vast majority either howled in the chorus of flag-wavers, or argued for the prohibition of flag-burning by legislation rather than constitutional amendment.

Nearly every senator in the debate denounced flag-burning as odious, obscene, hateful or otherwise beyond the pale. Most of these gentlemen and ladies were not so exercised about US torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo, or the countless atrocities against innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. Children dismembered by 500-pound bombs are 'collateral damage,' but a piece of colored cotton set on fire is an outrage."

dear random girl who sent me a message on facebook expressing enthusiasm at the prospect of the presence of people carrying the surname "o'connell" (including the two of us) and attending (as we do/will) salem state college,

when i was in high school, i knew a girl whose last name was o'connor. whenever we had a class together, someone would invariably ask if we were related, not bothering to notice the difference in our names. perhaps you've experienced this as well, living as we do in a world and region populated not only by many o'connors and o'donnells, but by large numbers of people who can't be bothered to imagine an irish surname that starts with "o'c" and does not end with "or" (or ends with "ell" and does not start with "o'd.")

anyway, after a while the two of us grew tired of explaining that we did not in fact share a last name and were not related. instead, we started to claim when asked that were were sister and brother. it worked, among other reasons because she was a year older. a year of plausibility.

my proposal, or at least something that i thought of when i went to write a new blog entry: it being so that we actually share a surname, if we are ever together among people who do not know either of us, we should attempt to pass ourselves off as siblings. wacky happenings may ensue, especially if we made up a significantly wacky family history. spontaneously. it does not matter that i already have a real sister, because she is not in college.

thank you,
matt o'connell

my sister's last junior high report card came in the mail today with one of those ominous "to the parent/guardian of" labels we feared so when we were smaller and more easily frightened. she passed and all, but as a family we became so confused by their method of informing her (you know, other than that elaborate graduation ceremony they had).

doesn't that look to you like it should say "rejected" or something to that effect?


while we were puzzling over this, i suddenly shot a few years into the past and remembered something i used to quote frequently in my web cartoon fandom days (the era before my targeted webcomic obsession), a particular series of cartoons: we are robots. specifically one line from "angrybot." i went back and watched some of them, including the first angrybot episode. it isn't as funny as i remember it being sophomore year, but the line the odd report card (which is not a card but a piece of paper. in elementary school, they were actually cards. get with it, dracut school system: we liked the cards.) had reminded me of was just as funny as it had been before-- you get angrybot's description of his anger, illustrated with examples of actual angry incidents, and suddenly, towards the end, it brings us to a "buying things at a store" scene already in progress:

"no, my credit card's not rejected. you're rejected! i didn't want this sweater anyway!"

that's one of the classics, the repeat-it-over-and-over references of high school days. i don't know if anyone else ever thought it as funny as i did, but there it is.

i mentioned mark z. danielewski's upcoming novel only revolutions yesterday, but i'd been purposely keeping myself in the dark as to any specifics plot-wise. curiosity got the best of me and i looked at the publisher's catalog entry.

perpetual summer, allways sixteen? this is a beautiful concept. but beyond that, here's an extension, an interactive flavour to the book that i'm positively swooning over: the or audio project. danielewski is accepting audio submissions from guys and gals reading selected passages.

quoth the z:

"You are invited to submit by July 4th

ONE (1) AUDIO TRACK

of yourself reading a passage from Only Revolutions.

Why?

For starters, all the good ones will go up on the website. For finishers, if you’re really good, and we mean really really good, you may be asked in July to play either Sam or Hailey for the Full Length Audio Version of Only Revolutions due out September 12.

ALL ACCENTS WELCOME!"

patty and i actually got into a semi-heated argument about this today, she suddenly insisting that i should send one in. what? me? with the terrible, annoying voice? there's that certain element of a mother's overconfidence and irrational reverence for her child, but she was downright insisting for a while there. "you're your own harshest critic, you know. i've never seen anyone with such a low opinion of their own abilities," she was saying. i hadn't even expressed interest in actively participating beyond informing others, just saying that i thought it was a great idea-- but suddenly, whoa, the world has opened up in marvelous vistas of cascading potential and her son will henceforth be a celebrated voice actor!

so, anyway, i probably won't be doing it.

but you? (i'm looking in ashley's general direction) other people? you totally should.

so out of the eight games in the round of 16, i called six of the winners correctly. 6-2 record. not bad for someone who's only been watching soccer since june 9th, but i got interested. i mean, dude, fucking argentina. they didn't play all that well against mexico, but they still got the win in overtime. now they'll be playing germany on friday, and they will be tired. and germany is pretty good. but i'm out of the predictions game after that brief sortie: now i'm just following riquelme & co. for as far as they go.

yay for natalie dee, keeping me in an upbeat, webcomic-y mood. i have this one as my desktop and have been laughing at it for several hours. in addition to my canada and quebec flags, there's going to be natalie dee comics all over my dorm room come september. "automatic snowman" is the accepted classic from ye olde bowditch 313, no?

there's not really a lot going on this week, or much inclination to write this summer, so here are other things i suggest:

things to read:

- empress orchid: two words, people: anchee min. you must read her. red azalea, wild ginger, becoming madame mao, and now this. she's doing more books on the orchid character (based on chinese empress tzu hsi), too. can't wait.

- a heartbreaking work of staggering genius: i just started reading it this morning after finishing empress orchid late last night. eggers had me somewhere between "THIS WAS UNCALLED FOR" and the profile of himself on the copyright page (complete with kinsey scale). the "THIS WAS UNCALLED FOR" introductory page rates right up there with my favourite one of all time, the "this is not for you" in house of leaves. speaking of which, mark z. danielewski's new book only revolutions stands a good chance of distracting me from early academic obligations when school returns. it'll be out september 12th.

- also of note: while my aforementioned summer drought is keeping posting light here, my dear friend laura is bringing the truths like a motherfucker on her blog.

- and finally: snakes on a plane, the novelisation. shiny. nick walker's blackbox: a novel in 840 chapters is my favourite book about planes, but it lacks the other vital component: snakes.

things to listen to:


- citrus: the new asobi seksu album, better than their first, which i thought was pretty good. pitchfork's review today just about echoes my feelings:

Contrary to what you may see written about them, Asobi Seksu aren't gazing at their shoes on their second album-- they're looking skyward the whole time. Yes, the guitar overload, massive reverb, and deceptively sweet vocals are all there, but this New York quartet is anything but a My Bloody Valentine retread.

Frontwoman Yuki Chikudate gives the band a charismatic focus, and her vocals range from a soulful croon to a delicate wisp. Whether she's singing in Japanese or English (she does both in about equal measure), she always keeps it catchy, and that squishing sound you hear when she sings 'put your tongue up to my battery' on 'Nefi+Girly' is indie boys melting across the country.

[...]the vibe is decidedly astral. It's one of many songs that drive home just how perfect Sean McCabe's cover art is: Yuki at the center of the swirl, bathed in bright colors, with big swaths of melody slathered liberally across the proceedings.

- "me plus one": this song by annie is unbelievably catchy.

- jolie holland: she is awesome. i finally got around to a thorough listen of my copy of escondida and enjoyed it, though not quite as much as her earlier work with the be good tanyas. i hear good things about springtime can kill you, her new album.

- "i got you (at the end of the century)": i caught i am trying to break your heart on the sundance channel earlier and i'm on sort of a wilco kick.

it's lonely this week and i can't think of anything except you.

and then there's this:

to conclude, random factoid: actor michael fairman, mr. pensky (of the pensky file) from the seinfeld episode "the barber," is the same guy who played niska on firefly. just noticed that.

so much for that post i mentioned yesterday: i seem to have lost the spark for writing about the apples in stereo album her wallpaper reverie. another time?

just one of those things, instead: many years ago my father decided that we were going to start getting premium cable service, which later became digital, so at my house we have just about every channel. that means i don't usually do movie rentals, i can just switch on one of the many movie channels. the average turnaround time on a film from theatre to video (and tv) is just about a year, right? so, between flipping through the movie channels at any given time and my more vivid bursts of memory, the viewing of anything i saw in the theatre tends to put me, mentally, back into wherever i was nearly a year previously. this is sometimes inconvenient.

ok, i'm calling out the winners of the upcoming round in advance, notwithstanding my very limited soccer expertise. lacking knowledge, i'll be emplying more/less sophisticated systems, such as "which country's flag has colours i like" or possibly "which country's name has more vowels in it, because vowels are awesome and promote good health for the wee children." that being said, the picks:

-germany <---
-sweden

-argentina <---
-mexico

-italy <---
-australia

-switzerland <---
-ukraine

-england
-ecuador <---

-portugal <---
-netherlands

-brazil <---
-ghana

-spain
-france <---

so the remaining eight teams for the quarter finals will be:

1. germany
2. argentina
3. italy
4. switzerland
5. ecuador
6. portugal
7. brazil
8. france

we'll see how those work out. i'll be back tomorrow with an "anecdote and obscure music" post.

i'm not a big fan of soccer in particular or sports in general, but i've been watching the world cup rather faithfully. in the rest of the world, it's kind of a big deal. and if soccer really is this important, and the nation with the best team is truly the greatest nation on earth, then that nation, at least in my frenzied opinion, is argentina.

update, 4:50 pm : 0-0 draw today, but argentina wins group c on goal differential. take that, the dutch! bring on mexico.

spent so long waiting for a thunderstorm, days even, every weather report insisting tirelessly that the storms were coming. scattered, isolated, just more excuses for it won't happen here exactly. standing outside in the early evening, slight booms in the distance. we're just going to catch the edge of it. a few drops. a little after that, nicole comes by and picks me up, and we're off to find her a carrying case for her new macbook.

apple evangelism points for me: 1

she'd been here for most of the day before that, but had to leave for work. then, wonderfully, she was back. just a few minutes into driving along, we're right into the storm. rain coming down heavily, wipers not up to the challenge, we can barely see. it dies down pretty quickly, but the entire character of the night is changing. foggy wisps rising off the still-heated road. at one point, we get to a complicated intersection and all the lights have that auxiliary blue light flashing, frozen in their last positions in anticipation of emergency vehicles. like a sudden state of panic, fire engines going in several different directions.

we get to the mall after nine, finding ourselves ignorant of when anything closes. no luck at target. an over-eager radioshack clerk can't seem to sell her their standard case, it's too big. best buy instead? so we do that, with about five minutes till closing, the motions of quitting time evident among the staff. not enough time to look through cases thoroughly enough, but apparently they make "for women" ones. very feminine, possibly too expensive, maybe not even practical, so we just get the new guster album instead. drive home listening to that. the beginning of the second verse at about 2:30 into "dear valentine" is my newest "must listen to this over and over" moment in a song. got through the whole album, laughing where the lyrics seemed so appropriate in some places, me air drumming trying to pick it up as it goes along, her learning the words to choruses the first time and singing along the next. then the album becomes more like a soundtrack. our soundtrack.

this picture from aimee is one of the more awesome things i've seen lately. just saying.

a bit of insight into how my mind is working today:

got up fairly early, hoping something may happen later, but otherwise resigned to a day of music and reading as the summer often brings. i'm getting through martin dressler rather quickly. then i'm browsing through the music collection when suddenly an unexplained urge to listen to some madonna comes over me. but there's none on there.

as i'm loading patty's madonna cd's into my itunes, i flip on the tv and see that tnt is running several x-files episodes. i check through which ones will be on and notice the last one showing is the controversial season four episode "home." then i remember taping that episode one of the times it was on in syndication to show other people who aren't fans of the series how well done that particular episode was. there's a scene where the peacock brothers kill the sheriff and his wife while a love song blares from the speakers of their car outside in a grotesque juxtaposition.

which turns my thoughts to that other chris carter series, millennium. i didn't watch it regularly, but i can remember this one rather compelling episode, which featured a particularly enchanting song, an instrumental, as an integral element of the plot. so i went looking through episode guides in one of those little quests that suddenly takes on a momentarily monumental importance (like my simultaneous search for ghv2, a success, and a new ever-so-slight itch to find that tape with "home" on it, which won't happen because we have no system for keeping track of video tapes, my family insists in some ways that labels were never invented) and found it.

it was called "a room with no view," and i don't seem to be alone in remembering the music:

"Trivia: 'A Room With No View' is the second Millennium story to feature Frank Black's arch nemesis, Lucy Butler. Actress Sarah-Jane Redmond would appear once per season in the memorable role.

Inside Lucy Butler's house her prisoners are repeatedly subjected to the sounds of 'Love is Blue.' The instrumental version of the song by French conductor Paul Mauriat, heard in the episode, was the number one song on the Billboard Music Chart for five weeks in 1968. For many Millennium fans, this episode's use of the song has forever altered their emotional response to the music."

now, i saw this episode only once, on the night it premiered, april 24, 1998, and still remembered it quite vividly with just a little bit of prompting. i immediately acquired a copy of the song and commenced playing it on repeat, feeling myself entirely elsewhere. then i read the passage from the episode guide quoted above again. they are so right. that's well-made television, don't you think?

so that was the music of the rest of the day: "love is blue" (repeated over and over in long blocks) and the immaculate collection. not much else happened.

i don't know how many people remember this word from that episode of "newsradio" back in the day. that's probably not its actual origin, but it was my introduction to it. i really think it should catch on and become part of our daily vernacular. "bitchcakes" is a substitute for "crazy," as in "whoa, she's going totally bitchcakes right now." it can be a unisex term, actually. "he went completely bitchcakes and shot all those people." "everyone's going bitchcakes about it." it's already on urban dictionary.

bitchcakes: use it.

i have to avoid listening to certain music when i'm in a mood that i don't associate with it. i'm not referring to simply not having a taste for more depressing music when i'm in a good mood or something to that effect, i mean some music will literally change my mood or confuse me emotionally if i'm not careful. early red house painters material is a good example: mark kozelek can really depress the fuck out of you. down colorful hill, for example. someday i'll do a post about how "medicine bottle" and eternal sunshine of the spotless mind somehow relate in my head.

anyway, i chanced it because i have some powerful mental associations with those songs as "summer music" and not just "sad music," though i can certainly remember several points in the past where the two were quite indistinguishable. what i felt when i gave "michael" (from the album mentioned above) a listen was nothing less than a profound surge of guilt. kozelek details the search for an old friend and relates several past experiences. just in time for the last verse an awesome song musically gets even better with the addition of a truly wonderful guitar part that ends up being the most memorable part of the song. i can't really relate to most of the lyrics, but i can relate to losing old friends and the feeling i get from the music itself. so where does the guilt come in? it's something like this:

at this point in our lives, after high school and in the early years of college and adulthood, we're meeting a lot of new people and losing touch with others from before. i can think of more than a few people (and one in particular) that i really wish i still talked to, and i feel guilty, as i imagine everyone does to some degree, for not doing something on my end to stay in touch. then i stop and think that i haven't heard anything in a year or more from some of these people anyway, so the fault can't be entirely mine. there's an icy solidification between that last conversation, whether it was expected to be the last or not, and that point in the future where the next one may take place if it ever does. i'm talking about the long gaps here, not that "we all go our separate ways in summer" malaise currently taking place. possibly and in some cases probably, they don't want to talk to me or wouldn't care either way. i'm known for thinking more highly of others than they do of me, so that wouldn't be much of a surprise. still, from where i'm standing, sometimes i really feel like i should pick up the phone or somehow prove that i'm still around.

that ever-present but usually out of reach ideal of a life more sensual, now entered into: it just is, one and one is.

amazing how some days can turn around like that. nothing happening during the light, not even the promised end of the world because it was 6-6-06 and we're a superstitious population. bomb threat at the high school.

more nothing, the typical summer wasting day. nicole finally called after work. call got dropped in a hell of servicelessness (the true evil of this cursed day), and by the time she called back she'd gotten word that christine wanted to go out for ice cream. at 10:00. on a tuesday night. her crazy notions. nicole driving, came by my house, me standing outside in warmish dark. it'll be colder tomorrow, less summery.

we picked up some guy i barely know and we argued about death cab for cutie, eventually getting ice cream. how could he not like them? "title track," auditory joke. this strawberry shortcake is as good as "a movie script ending"-- oh, wait, never mind.

car crash stories. maybe a trip next week. please.

took him back to his house with the unfortunate driveway. i can't see why he'd want to live there.

we three getting back to my house, christine offering to leave us in the car, climbing out the window of the broken door, then sitting on a rock in my yard looking up at the sky and down the street at "scary lights" and antique windows. loving it when "awesome people," her friends, get together. not so much light in the car, darkness serving well, minutes passing close to and past the end of another day in the sequence of days, not special for its supposed biblical implications. special for what it'll mean now. so right. so suddenly right.

life imitates art?

nice little article for anyone else who spends a lot of time at bookstores.

update, 6/1: went to barnes & noble with nicole today. apparently they actually sell a da vinci code sudoku set-- a combination of the two most annoying cultural trends at the moment. besides, don't they know? some sudoku is...evil.