Crankiness Ebbs
Having recovered from my hangover nicely--my students were actually rather intimidated by my surly, Byronic manner, so I was able to snarl and grimace my way through the hour and a half without challenge or interruption. Unpleasant of me, perhaps, but it's better to be feared than be loved, as good old Niccolo reminds us.
It strikes me that I haven't fulminated properly against something larger than the circumstances of my own life in quite awhile. While political blogs are, for the most part, stridently unreadable--yes, yes, we all know that Bush is the Anti-Christ and that Secular Liberalism is in fact the Sign of the Apocalypse, could we change the subject please???--there's something to be said for saying something about the world outside one's own sphere of activity.
Nothing, however, comes to mind these days. Perhaps it's just that leaping back into a full-time teaching schedule has rattled me into a state of emotional exhaustion from which I'm unable to arouse the appropriate level of ironic spleen, but the fact is that as I limp home at the end of the day, I'm inclined to collapse in front of televison (or, if I'm particularly good, to get on the treadmill in front of television) or computer screen and just jack myself into the electronic feed of mindless pablum. Mmmm...CSI...24...House...
I'm trying to be good and work a little bit on the novel each day, though again, being creative and giving a rat's butt about characters who exist only in my fevered imagination (except it isn't fevered--it's torpid) is rather difficult. (Whiny little bastard, ain't I?) Still, following my 20-minute rule, I press on. Feebly.
But none of this is to the point--which, in itself, is the point. (Ooo, I'm clever.) I really can't spend my time ripping on the wiretapping scandal, or Abramoff's multiple pleas of guilty (you've gotta know that every time he pleads guilty to another crime, that's another Congressional individual who has to change his shorts, given what kind of canary-like singing--or rat-like ratting out--he must be trading for leniency), or whether Alito will single-handedly make abortion punishable by stoning (he won't, people--I'll say it again and again--the Supreme Court hates to overturn precedent--because it makes it that much easier for their own precedents to be overturned--trust me, Roe v. Wade isn't going anywhere). I just can't quite summon the bilious 'oomph' to make myself amusing on these subjects. So for the time being, I shall continue to focus squarely on the most important thing in the whole wide universe: me. And since I'm plagued by a bi-polar tendency towards self-aggrandisement and self-loathing, it should be quite a ride...
It strikes me that I haven't fulminated properly against something larger than the circumstances of my own life in quite awhile. While political blogs are, for the most part, stridently unreadable--yes, yes, we all know that Bush is the Anti-Christ and that Secular Liberalism is in fact the Sign of the Apocalypse, could we change the subject please???--there's something to be said for saying something about the world outside one's own sphere of activity.
Nothing, however, comes to mind these days. Perhaps it's just that leaping back into a full-time teaching schedule has rattled me into a state of emotional exhaustion from which I'm unable to arouse the appropriate level of ironic spleen, but the fact is that as I limp home at the end of the day, I'm inclined to collapse in front of televison (or, if I'm particularly good, to get on the treadmill in front of television) or computer screen and just jack myself into the electronic feed of mindless pablum. Mmmm...CSI...24...House...
I'm trying to be good and work a little bit on the novel each day, though again, being creative and giving a rat's butt about characters who exist only in my fevered imagination (except it isn't fevered--it's torpid) is rather difficult. (Whiny little bastard, ain't I?) Still, following my 20-minute rule, I press on. Feebly.
But none of this is to the point--which, in itself, is the point. (Ooo, I'm clever.) I really can't spend my time ripping on the wiretapping scandal, or Abramoff's multiple pleas of guilty (you've gotta know that every time he pleads guilty to another crime, that's another Congressional individual who has to change his shorts, given what kind of canary-like singing--or rat-like ratting out--he must be trading for leniency), or whether Alito will single-handedly make abortion punishable by stoning (he won't, people--I'll say it again and again--the Supreme Court hates to overturn precedent--because it makes it that much easier for their own precedents to be overturned--trust me, Roe v. Wade isn't going anywhere). I just can't quite summon the bilious 'oomph' to make myself amusing on these subjects. So for the time being, I shall continue to focus squarely on the most important thing in the whole wide universe: me. And since I'm plagued by a bi-polar tendency towards self-aggrandisement and self-loathing, it should be quite a ride...
posted by Yr. Hmbl. & Obdt. | 12:05 PM
1 Comments:
Ummm, don't you have an interview soon? Have I heard about this in any substantial way? No (and a passing comment on my blog does not count). More, more, tell me more! (Unless you avoid such discussion rather than tempt the fates, in which case you will be forgiven.)
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