Friday, August 20, 2004
(12:23 PM) | Anonymous:
Summer of Lists
Realized yesterday, to my utter horror, that I haven't posted here in at least two months. While it's nowhere my year-long hiatus from the Weblog that ended a few months ago, it's still plainly unacceptable. So I think I'll go on awhile about my summer activities here, then follow with posts containing actual, content, later.Like most everyone else here, I've largely spent my summer reading, listening to music, and making far too little money. The first two have been great, the third's bearable enough, and I get to live in Chicago, which I strongly support (as it turns out, girls on Michigan Ave. and the surrounding area are distinctly prettier than elsewhere in the world--I wonder if this also holds true for Yonge St., Piccadilly Circus, The Ginza, Nevsky Prospekt, etc.) And while I still maintain that Frank Gehry needs to be stopped eventually, Millenium Park is a really cool addition.
I also have the immense good fortune to live down the street from Powell's Books, where one can get new (used) books, in remarkable condition, for $5-10. Good editions, too--trade paperbacks, like being in a college bookstore, only with prices like 75 percent lower. Distressing to walk by $10 editions of books I paid 50 for a year ago, but oh well.
Anyway, among the books I've come away with, paying no more than $7.50 for any of them:
1. Milan Kundera, "Immortality"
2. Jorge Luis Borges, "Ficciones"
3. Michel Foucault, "Madness and Civilization"
4. Eric Hobsbawm, "Revolutionaries"
5. Yukio Mishima, "Confessions of a Mask"
6. J.M. Coetzee, "Disgrace"
7. Umberto Eco, "The Island of the Day Before"
I'd like to say there's some sort of grand plan to my reading list, but used book stores, even the good ones, don't lend themselves well to that sort of thing. Though I am rapidly completing my Mishima and Kundera collections. Out of curiosity, does anyone else actually like Mishima? He seems to be universally reviled by every other major Japanese author, which seems unfair, his status as a raving nutcase towards the end of his life notwithstanding.
The summer's been very productive, music-wise, as well, even leading to a semi-serious rant about why lyrics are no longer relevant. My moratorium proposal seems to have gone nowhere, but I basically stand by it. 10-15 songs I've listened to far too often lately.
1. Aphex Twin, "Jynweythek Ylow"
2. Autechre, "Maetl"
3. Autechre, "Clipper"
4. Ladytron, "Evil"
5. Mogwai, "Summer"
6. Sigur Ros, "Hun Jord" (weird Icelandic characters in there that i don't feel like tracking down)
7. Muse, "Citizen Erased"
8. Daft Punk, "Aerodynamic"
9. Gackt, "birdcage"
10. Schwarz Stein, "New Vogue Children"
11. Moi Dix Mois, "Nocturnal Romance"
12. "Moi Dix Mois, "Pessimiste"
Yes, the last four are Japanese. And they're really good. I say this only because every last one of my friends, while apparently accepting my music tastes as bascially good, tend to exchange worried glances when i mention the Japanese stuff, like I've just started ranting about how underappeciated Hall and Oates are. I'm sure I'll write a post explaining why these groups are excellent eventually.
So that's been the summer--reading and music, with occasional trips to the Museum of Contemporary Art. Oh yeah, and the Olympics. Endless hours of tracking down the weird sports, irritating my roommate with tales of Haile Gebrselassie, Naim Suleymanoglu, Roman Sebrle, etc. ("But he's like the best distance runner, ever! seriously!"), and shouting at Bob Costas when he butchers some hapless Central European's name ("It's pronounced 'yend-ZHAY-chak', damn you!"). Good times.