Today I went for a run in the nineteenth century.
-
So the Massachusetts election reminds me of that point in Monopoly when, if you’ve been luckier than your opponents, you’ve gotten the first monopoly of the game, put some houses on your properties, and had your opponents land on your monopoly once or twice, and you compare your assets to theirs and you think alright. The game isn’t won yet, but you’re safe and you can sit back. Relax. Enjoy it. Then one of your opponents gets Boardwalk and Park Place and mortgages his or her other properties to buy houses. And you land on Boardwalk and you think, how bad could it be? All his or her other properties are mortgaged. I still have this fine monopoly. I am safe. And you pay in cash, because you can, and you like the idea that you can pay in cash, because you have such a good monopoly. But this leaves you without the cash to buy more houses, and when your opponent goes around the board once or twice without landing on your monopoly, he or she has the cash to put more houses and then hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place, and when you land on one of them again—it doesn’t matter which one—you have to mortgage your monopoly and you have no means of income and no more cash, and you realize that there is no gradation between winning and losing and the moment you lost your monopoly on monopolies was when you lost. And you think why didn’t I take this more seriously? And fortunately it’s only a board game, and you run out to the kitchen so the winner has to put away all the money and the little houses and hotels, and you make popcorn and then it’s time for dinner and after that bed and TV.
-
Today was my first time voting outside New York City since the days when Bill Clinton had yet to read Vox. Ah, those massive NYC machines (the voting gizmos, not the parties); the little switches and enormous levers—now that’s voting. Steampunk voting!
This afternoon the polls were quiet, the poll workers all incredibly chipper. Out in front, a lone, soggy Coakley supporter held his sign high.
(ridiculous Boston Globe pollwatcher reports via The Awl: Wonkette)
-
Local Heroes
Northampton gets a shout-out in Brian Kitely’s new novel The River-Gods, which NPR’s Alan Cheuse digs.
Over on Salon, Kelly Link’s Magic For Beginners makes Laura Miller’s (odd) list of the decade’s best books.
The Pioneer Valley—“arguably the most author-saturated, book-cherishing, literature-celebrating place in the nation.”
It hadn’t quite registered with me that the decade ends in three weeks, until articles evaluating it started to drop. This is it? Have we even settled whether to call it the oughts or the naught[ie]s? I’m as delighted as the next first-worlder by the digital marvels it’s let us take for granted, but culturally I feel we’ve barely caught up to where we were before the hanging chads (tea partiers would doubtless have a different interpretation).
-
Sunday Music I: Military Brass
Our local NPR affiliate plays more classical music and jazz than news, which I’ve come to really enjoy. Today’s classical program had a couple of particular gems.
The U.S. Air Force Band CD Evolution features Holst’s “Second Suite in F major for military band, Op.28, No. 2” (which sounds like Copeland must have listened to it a lot). As the commenter on the album’s Amazon.com page notes, Air Force Band recordings are “paid for by our tax dollars and not for sale,” but I was unable to find this piece for download on the Band’s site, which does, however, have a wonderful collection of other mp3s: free, searchable, and downloadable—classical, jazz, folk, choral, holiday, marches and more.
Those of you in Northampton/Amherst: this suite is on the program of the Symphony Band & Percussion Ensemble concert at UMass this Thursday at 8 pm at the Fine Arts Center Concert Hall.
-
Northampton Journal
There’s a trace of last night’s perfume when I lift my coffee cup to my lips, but my hair seems to have shed the cigarette smoke blown in my face by a woman it turned out none of us knew.
I woke up too late for this morning’s Hot Chocolate Run but not too late to make an omelet for breakfast (is it ever too late for omelets?)
All along Main Street, the lights have been stung through the trees, and depending on the hour of the day and police activity the downtown blocks recall either Bedford Falls or Pottersville (which, as Gary Kamiya points out, rocks). The first snow of the year is ticking softly on my air conditioner.
Yesterday, returning at dusk from running, I passed a pair of Smithies sharing headphones, arm in arm, belting at the tops of their lungs:
Just a small town girl, living in a lonely world
I think they were glad of an audience, and I was glad to be one.
(sign in front of the Smith campus center)
-
-
If You Pay For Our Aspirational Package
Small Beer Press satirizes Harlequin’s new
imprintvanity press by announcing Easymark Books:We’re not interested in monetizing the slushpile, we’re interested in getting you to pay to publish it for our profit!*
* This is an example of an unproofed sentence with a comma splice. If you pay for our Aspirational package (Usually $5,999, for this month only $1,995!) we will proof your book. Your unedited, uncopyedited, and unproofed sentences will become more like this:
We’re not interested in monetizing the slushpile. We’re interested in getting you to pay to publish it for our profit!** Or even this: We need to hit up the uninformed and rip them off before anyone else gets the idea.
io9 gives a nice shout-out and back story.
-
Words and Guitar
Northampton and Amherst friends: I will be performing here tomorrow night. Hope to see you!
Two songs written before I started adding lyrics:
