Mathematics After The Fall

Particuarly with the Daily Show and Colbert Report off the air, my TV and TiVo work as an expensive stereo. In my home wireless network, I’ve connected my TiVo box. With a couple little legal hacks, it can play any music from iTunes. Thus, instead of buying a stereo, when I want to listen to the Chrono Trigger soundtrack, I can fire up the TiVo. Sometimes, when I want to keep track of today’s hits, I’ll tune up one of the many channels on the digital music tier: 5 MTV brands, 3 VH1, 2 BET, 3 country, and two other. Of course, of those fifteen channels, only about two are playing music videos at any given time (and the count is going down), but I will see videos eventually.

One interesting remix is Kiss Me, by New Found Glory, a 21st century boy band. It’s number 1 on the pop countdown on Fuse this week. New Found Glory doesn’t call themselves a boy band, but there are young men, high pitched singing, no depth, and simple melodies. Same thing, different instruments. However, because this boy band isn’t hot, they got mostly actors for their video. In it, shirtless shaved teenagers run around a giant mattress-covered treehouse, engaging in random carousing, jumping, and kissing. There’s very little subtlety, romance, or permanence. It’s a scene, a feeling, for a day. That’s hedonistic, but doesn’t rise to the level of offensive. The original, sung by Christian band Sixpence None the Richer, is just much better. That song was sweet and charming. This new version is basically forgettable.

It doesn’t take long to find something offensive and non-forgettable, though. This month’s example is Soulja Boy and the single Crank That. It’s gotten a lot of airplay, reaching number one on the Hot 100, video charts, and Billboard ringtone charts. I heard undergraduates playing the video at Bellarmine. It’s popular. And it’s offensive. The chorus involves the phrase “Superman that Ho.” My street lingo, well, is practically nonexistant. I shouldn’t have had good expectations given the last word of that phrase, but I decided to look it up anyway. Then I felt sick. I try to keep PG-13, so I have to wordsmith a little here. A male climaxes on a woman’s back. Then, he puts a sheet on her back. When she stands up, the sheet sticks, making it look like Superman’s cape. Often this is performed after a woman is asleep, having refused an offer of sex. I heard that, and I’m sick.

Because it’s catchy, this tune gets played in some college arenas. Would it still be if the DJs checked as I did? Sports Illustrated at least noticed that the act couldn’t be described in their magazine. My thesaurus has trouble finding words. degrading? mortifying? wretched? Here’s a commentary from the paper of the school I knew as wustl, Washington University in St Louis. Somehow, two of the four comments are against the article.

In general, I detest the people who feel that Catholics should remove themselves from society, with special music, special TV, special books, and special activities. There’s still plenty of place available, and retreat is surrender. I’d rather try to create and support positive culture. Sixpence None the Richer can and will win over New Found Glory, a winsome tune over mediocrity. But what do I do when arenas dance to a song about physically degrading a woman? Really, what do I do?

This is a pretty brilliant name for a team, right?  Almost perfect.  I’d prefer the Scrapbooking Martha Stewarts.  Though another option, the Story Problems, is pretty scary too. I’m getting these from 99% Perspiration, the second collection of Frazz comic strips. During my recent sinus infection I read both (the other is Live From Bryson Elementary) in between more serious tomes. Frazz is my current second favorite, behind Get Fuzzy, ahead of many, many others. What’s next? Well, there’s a big drop. Simply, I have bought books for Calvin and Hobbes, Dilbert, User Friendly, PhD Comics, Get Fuzzy, and now this creation of Jef Mallett.

Before coming to Louisville, I was fortunate enough to live in Washington and Chicago, where the Post and the Tribune have excellent comics sections, two full pages. Smaller Louisville has one page, which for some reason must be in color. I don’t need to see that a pig is pink or skies are blue. I just want humor. I miss the good funny pages. Incidentally, this is one of the reasons I don’t like the New York Times. Printed funny pages are better than online, and that’s part of a newspaper’s mission. I mean, even the Wall Street Journal publishes their humor, though for some reason they call those pages “Editorials”.

Why Frazz? Well, yes, it’s set in a school. Not a college, though occasionally my students have the self-control of those kids. More importantly, it’s a comic not afraid to be intelligent. Many comedians go lowbrow, but any perusal of what I write should indicate that’s not my approach. Others make comments with a little humor designed for a smile, not a laugh. I assume that’s the goal of For Better or for Worse.Otherwise, I’m clueless.I could go on her with examples of jokes, like the long plot line throughout two books about a date, or Halloween costumes, or such. I will point out that Mr. Mallett remembers to provide a measure of respect to all his characters, which is important; if one can’t see the positivity in each person or character, it’s a dangerous place to be anywhere, comic or otherwise.

That said, there are ways these two books could be better. Particularly in the first book, the drawing is poor, to the point of distraction. The world could be a little bigger; it needs recurring characters. Even Frazz’s training buddy, a male nurse, seems to be appearing less and less. Focusing on just the strongest characters will slowly strangle a strip; comics are more TV than movies. The best shows, and comics, expand. For instance, Get Fuzzy has been using guest animals more frequently recently. With improvement, Frazz will continue to improve. There have been claims that Frazz is a grown up Calvin, stolen from the best comic of my lifetime, Calvin and Hobbes. That’s not true; Calvin favored the scientific, not the literary and musical. Still, it’s not a terrible comparison, to the best. And these books are far better than terrible. Live From Bryson Elementary gets a quality 3 out of 5. 99% Perspiration, because of the better art and longer stories including the baseball quotes, gets a stronger 4 out of 5.

When I heard about PD James’ The Children of Men, I was completely intrigued. The world seemed so interesting. Sure, there are plenty of post-apocalyptic worlds, because there are always teenage boys. But this appeared different. In this world, there were no children, like a reverse Lord of the Flies. For some reason, never explained, births just stopped. After a few months, things became frantic. Then things became strange. As we begin the novel, the Omegas, the final children, are 25 and a little bit feral.

It’s a great setup for a political novel, or an action novel, or even, perhaps, an epic.

Unfortunately, Ms. James didn’t write any of those books. She normally writes horror novels. That’s not necessarily a stumbling block. Stephen King wrote plenty of story novels, but could also change and write action epics. Quality epics, too, like the Stand and the Dark Tower, with a sense of the heroic. Ms. James didn’t change. She describes forests, and drives, with a sense of constant foreboding. At any point someone might come out of the woods, or a tire might puncture, or they might get discovered. The plot is driven by fear, in general (though there are a few exceptions).
More tragically, Ms. James took this wonderful setting and wrote an Old Person Novel. About halfway through, I looked to see the age of the author. She was about 70 when this book was written, which is what I had guessed. Not all elderly people write Old People Novels; age is not sufficient, but it’s necessary. An Old Person Novel has a protagonist middle-aged to elderly. The main character doesn’t live in the present; every event throws them to the past, or reminds them of some cause from 25 years ago, or forces a memory. Because of this, the novel proceeds sluggishly. It lives primarily in the internal past, not the external present. To compare, think of the great epics. For that matter, think of Harry Potter. People talk about what happened before, Snape and Dumbledore and Hermione and the rest. The time for the past, though, is not the action; it’s at dinner, or in class, or at night. When conversations are hurried, the information induces an immediate decision. The events form them, but don’t consume them. Here, the character is absorbed.

I don’t need to talk about the past of Theo, the protagonist, because it doesn’t matter. He’s a melancholy, lonely, nonheroic man, and he remembers only how he became melancholy and lonely. Even when the time arises for him to be heroic, paragraph after paragraph is wasted on what he thinks and how it relates to the past. This happens even in the penultimate chapter! When I’m in a pressurized situation, I don’t walk focused on the past; I focus on the present. There’s too much at stake. I don’t know how a writer can make such an error. Maybe Ms. James has been away from action for so long, that her life is just memory, that she believes that’s the way people think. Or maybe I’m too young to understand the approach of an Old Person Novel.

I started on page 1 hoping for an heroic epic, or at least an interesting politic. At page 241, I got a flawed, trite semi-redemption. That’s the modern thing, which Ms. James understands better than I. She’s a Baroness, a Life Peer in Britain’s House of Lords, and … well … I rent an old house. Tough. If this is the future, with Old Person Novels and non-heroic tales, then I’d rather find my own memories. The Children of Men gets a 1 out of 5.

I adore letters. Next to a big check, the best thing I can see in my mailbox is a handwritten address and stamp from someone I correspond with. Letter writing is in strong decline nowadays, according to the statistics and comments I hear; for some people, I might be the only person that sends them notes anymore. This makes me sad. Sure, the telephone is more convienient. Then there’s the cellphone and the text message in case the phone is too slow. With all of these, but there’s no sense of permanency, no record of what we said. Of course, sometimes that’s good, but not always. Electronic mail, like to my address adam@twelvefruits.com (and if you mail there use a headline like “From MATF”, because that has a strong spam filter), lets one send quickly, but eliminates the touches of imperfection. I can’t draw on the envelope of an email, or point out where I dropped a lettuce piece from my sandwich, or change pen colors. I like letters so much that I even care about signatures, and wrote a short page about that.

I wonder if, in fifty years, people will publish books of emails, like the old books of letters? I doubt it. Email leads itself too quickly to the short four-line reply agreeing or disagreeing, not the lengthy passion of a good paper mail. Although, I really love the ability in email to quote from what the correspondent said, and I wish I had an immediate way to do that with pencil. I’m not a total Luddite. To sit, and take the time to compose for someone (I average one letter page per hour) shows care and friendship, and I enjoy doing that. A twinge of sadness enters occasionally, that I can’t see my friend in person, but generally it’s good.

I probably do my best thinking in letters, because of the time involved. Despite my math abilities, and my speed in schoolwork, I’m really a contemplative in my soul, and need the patience that pen provides. Often, I consider phone calls too quick; I need time to articulate feelings. By focusing, what comes to pencil represents purity, in some way; no intermingling with logistic regression or 2NT overcalls or dinner plans or whatever else is on my mind in a day.

If anyone could ever get my envelope doodles on email, that would be great. Until then, I will hope for the post.