Can You

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Can you? I'll try.

(Lollapalooza)

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Soundgarden+Green Day?(Blink 182)+Gaga+Arcade Fire+Stroookes+Phoenix

MGMT?(Cake)+David Byrne?

Spoon+Devo?+Cut Copy+New Pornographers

Gogol Bordello+Chromeo

Metric? (Clipse or Clutch)+!!!? (M83 or AFI)

The XX

Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros+ Jamie Lidell?

No clue

The Walkmen? (Bravery?)

Free Energy?

The Big Pink?+Cymbals Eat Guitars+B.o.B?????

No clue for the rest

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Doesn't even matter, the best part of the whole fucking ordeal this year will be Perry's Tent.

Know It All

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After he became immersed in the intellectual life of the University of Chicago, Richard Posner started to apply insights from economics to a broad range of subjects. In his book “Sex and Reason”, written in 1990, he used economics to explain a part of life that specialist lawyers and economists had tended to think was beyond their reach. To take a simple example, the AIDS epidemic made gay sex unavoidably more costly, either because of the risk of disease or of switching to safe sex. It therefore reduced the amount of gay sex—and, by the same mechanism, cut the number of illegitimate births and inc reased the number of legitimate ones.

The book was a success because Posner had the field pretty much to himself. “Sometimes one goes into a new area and there hasn’t been much done in it and then you are a little ahead of the curve,” he says. Even then, the monomaths were in hot pursuit. “After a while there is so much in it that you don’t know what you’re going to do. Since 1990 the field has become extremely crowded because of specialisation and not very attractive.” Time to move on.

The monomaths do not only swarm over a specialism, they also play dirty. In each new area that Posner picks—policy or science—the experts start to erect barricades. “Even in relatively soft fields, specialists tend to develop a specialised vocabulary which creates barriers to entry,” Posner says with his economic hat pulled down over his head. “Specialists want to fend off the generalists. They may also want to convince themselves that what they are doing is really very difficult and challenging. One of the ways they do that is to develop what they regard a rigorous methodology—often mathematical.

“The specialist will always be able to nail the generalists by pointing out that they don’t use the vocabulary quite right and they make mistakes that an insider would never make. It’s a defence mechanism. They don’t like people invading their turf, especially outsiders criticising insiders. So if I make mistakes about this economic situation, it doesn’t really bother me tremendously. It’s not my field. I can make mistakes. On the other hand for me to be criticising someone whose whole career is committed to a particular outlook and method and so on, that is very painful.”

For a polymath, the charge of dabbling never lies far below the surface. That is why modern institutions tend to exclude polymaths, he says. “It’s very hard to show yourself as a polymath in the current academic climate. If you’ve got someone interested in going across departments, spending part of the time in physics and part of the time elsewhere, their colleagues are going to kick them out. They’re not contributing fully to any single department. OK, every so often you’re going to get a huge benefit, but from day to day, where the universities are making appointments, they want the focus in one field.”

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(The Last Days of the Polymath | Continue)

Tennis

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I can't ever get enough.

By way of illustration, let’s slow things way down. Imagine that you, a tennis player, are standing just behind your deuce corner’s baseline. A ball is served to your forehand — you pivot (or rotate) so that your side is to the ball’s incoming path and start to take your racket back for the forehand return. Keep visualizing up to where you’re about halfway into the stroke’s forward motion; the incoming ball is now just off your front hip, maybe six inches from point of impact. Consider some of the variables involved here. On the vertical plane, angling your racket face just a couple degrees forward or back will create topspin or slice, respectively; keeping it perpendicular will produce a flat, spinless drive. Horizontally, adjusting the racket face ever so slightly to the left or right, and hitting the ball maybe a millisecond early or late, will result in a cross-court versus down-the-line return. Further slight changes in the curves of your groundstroke’s motion and follow-through will help determine how high your return passes over the net, which, together with the speed at which you’re swinging (along with certain characteristics of the spin you impart), will affect how deep or shallow in the opponent’s court your return lands, how high it bounces, etc. These are just the broadest distinctions, of course — like, there’s heavy topspin vs. light topspin, or sharply cross-court vs. only slightly cross-court, etc. There are also the issues of how close you’re allowing the ball to get to your body, what grip you’re using, the extent to which your knees are bent and/or weight’s moving forward, and whether you’re able simultaneously to watch the ball and to see what your opponent’s doing after he serves. These all matter, too. Plus there’s the fact that you’re not putting a static object into motion here but rather reversing the flight and (to a varying extent) spin of a projectile coming toward you — coming, in the case of pro tennis, at speeds that make conscious thought impossible. Mario Ancic’s first serve, for instance, often comes in around 130 m.p.h. Since it’s 78 feet from Ancic’s baseline to yours, that means it takes 0.41 seconds for his serve to reach you. This is less than the time it takes to blink quickly, twice.

-David Foster Wallace (Roger Federer As Religous Experience | Continue)

Jaws

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Nobody's safe.

(Two Sharks Found In The Tennessee River | Continue reading)

Love

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I submit that tennis is the most beautiful sport there is and also the most demanding. It requires body control, hand-eye coordination, quickness, flat-out speed, endurance, and that weird mix of caution and abandon we call courage. It also requires smarts. Just one single shot in one exchange in one point of a high-level match is a nightmare of mechanical variables. Given a net that’s three feet high (at the center) and two players in (unrealistically) fixed positions, the efficacy of one single shot is determined by its angle, depth, pace, and spin. And each of these determinants is itself determined by still other variables -- i.e., a shot’s depth is determined by the height at which the ball passes over the net combined with some integrated function of pace and spin, with the ball’s height over the net itself determined by the player’s body position, grip on the racket, height of backswing and angle of racket face, as well as the 3-D coordinates through which the racket face moves during that interval in which the ball is actually on the strings. The tree of variables and determinants branches out and out, on and on, and then on much further when the opponent’s own position and predilections and the ballistic features of the ball he’s sent you to hit are factored in. No silicon-based RAM yet existent could compute the expansion of variables for even a single exchange; smoke would come out of the mainframe. The sort of thinking involved is the sort that can be done only by a living and highly conscious entity, and then it can really be done only unconsciously, i.e., by fusing talent with repetition to such an extent that the variables are combined and controlled without conscious thought. In other words, serious tennis is a kind of art.

-David Foster Wallace

Nah

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Immerse your soul in love

-Radiohead

Given the happenings in Washington this week, its hard to even find a place to begin talking about the fuckery that political happenings have slowly become. Washington attracts some of the smartest, well schooled gents in the nation to its marble hallows, with the promise and influence of power and do gooding. Yet watching the political meddlings unfold in Washington this week and the reactions of everyone across the nation has revealed a host of ugly truths about human nature and the futility of today's political spectrum. I can't even stretch out in the sun between classes without catching a facefull of hot air from some good ole boy walking past, talking his stout and blonde girlfriend's ear off about  "fascism and the goddam healthcare disaster" like it personally walked up to him, pulled his pants down, and bit him on the arm only moments ago. She can hardly keep stride, much less understand anything about Obama, fascism, or legislation. At most, in keeping the pace, she can feign attention like girls like always do when boys (this one's since middle school, true love) get all riled up from rolling on a tear like politics. To the dumpy blonde, politics is like bridge, a game played by old people. To her man in Deere with the white shades on, bless his heart, politics is simply a chance to get off by getting on other people, which not only speaks true of the farm class heros here in Bowling Green but also the gentlemen in Washington as well. Strange, but true and unfortunate. No matter the degree of academic merit achieved, all hints of diplomacy, manners, and class get shot all to pieces when guns are draw in formal discussion and mutuality of proper debate fades into a big mangle of emotionally tasteless flamethrowing. I played in a dodgeball tournament a few weekends ago and in between games, I watched an exchange where a guy threw a ball that missed another guy just barely, yet the thrower was dead sure it hit him and wasn't hearing otherwise. They duked it out while throwing and dodging, which was a pretty remarkable exchange to witness. "Yer out!" Dodge, duck, chase, throw, all while hollering "No way dude I'm not out that didn't hit me." "Yeah it hit your FUCKING shirt!" "Nah man, it didn't hit my shirt" "YEAH well, FUCK YOU BRO YOU WANNA TAKE THIS OUTSIDE". It was like reading the comments under videos on Youtube, arguments that go from "I just don't like this" to "Go die now FAG" in no time at all. 

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What can be gained? Education obviously does not lead to transformation. Some of the most stubborn people I know are almost too educated. Knowledge doesn't simply bless one with the wisdom of contemplation and the ability to see different perspectives but rather gives people better reasons to justify dualistic rationality, as seem clearly in Washington's blowhards. But what's even more evident in the seeing both the right wing's mean spirited finger pointing and the liberal snootiness at work is evidence of human nature's biggest delusion; the need for control. Human nature will always have the need to play the victim or create one, because control hates change. And just because healthcare gets passed doesn't grant Tea Partiers a green light for bigotry or for liberals, a chance to fan the flames of discontentment. 

No Doubt

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"Would you be happier if you spent more time discussing the state of the world and the meaning of life — and less time talking about the weather?

It may sound counterintuitive, but people who spend more of their day having deep discussions and less time engaging in small talk seem to be happier, said Matthias Mehl, a psychologist at the University of Arizona who published a study on the subject.

“We found this so interesting, because it could have gone the other way — it could have been, ‘Don’t worry, be happy’ — as long as you surf on the shallow level of life you’re happy, and if you go into the existential depths you’ll be unhappy,” Dr. Mehl said.

But, he proposed, substantive conversation seemed to hold the key to happiness for two main reasons: both because human beings are driven to find and create meaning in their lives, and because we are social animals who want and need to connect with other people."

(New York Times | Continue reading)

Beauty

1925 Rolls Royce Phantom

Rover

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The search is over. This is what I want.

Yamrocks

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I'm fixing up something new for the looks around here, so pardon the lack of substance. Several topics have been boucing around for the past few days and one or two need to float to the surface. I watched the SEC tournament the past few days and John Wall continues to dumbfound. Here at Western, there's more blue than red walking around, which makes as much sense as it is shameful. Folks don't even like the sports being played for the most part, they just bleed and breathe Kentucky. Even with Western's team being equally as competitive (just not as good), not to mention playing games across the road, students here can't compute anything beyond....Kentucky. Blue. John Wall and I can't stand that. Granted, I love Tennessee football and some of my happiness moments to date have happened watching Vandy play in Memorial. But its taken beyond the point of ridiculous here and I've been nagging on Kentucky all year because of it. John Calipari is low character and Kentucky isn't as good as people say they are. They beat a struggling North Carolina team by ten early in the year at Rupp. A win is a win is a win but North Carolina has gotten beat up all year along in the ACC thanks to being undersized and that's Kentucky's strongest asset. They are the tallest team in the NCAA this year, super physical, and should have rocked the cute off UNC's baby faces. Demarcus Cousins, 6'11 and 290, holy fuck. But the opportunity cost is that when your team lives and dies by big, strong basketball, chances are you don't play too smart. Kentucky got soundly drummed by a strong South Carolina team earlier in the year that was rolling on six wins. They barely beat Miss State this weekend, a team that has had their number twice this season. The brightest spot for Kentucky is obviously John Wall. His speed with the ball and overall athleticism has folks drooling. His jumper has gotten light years better from the start of the year, which could round him out to be a huge impact, change the game player in the NBA. Besides Great Oden-sized post men, the greatest investment a team can make is a point guard because its the ultimate functioning position. The Suns wouldn't be half as good as they are without Steve Nash, not just because of his talent individually, but in his ability to yoke the best out of the other players out there, specifically Amare Stoudemire. How will Kentucky fare this month against smarter teams? They're good, but not that good. But who knows? This year's draft is going to be madness anyways, honestly a tossup.

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For now until soon, I've got two reasons why Marqus Blakely from lowly Vermont (Go Catamounts) is the best player in the American East as well as the best dunker in the NCAA. Poor guy is stuck up in Vermont with pale, neurotic folks from the North who press bugs and make snowshoe a verb.

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But that's not even the best dunk of recent weeks. Truly, the best things come from where you least expect it. Gerald Anderson from Cal State at Fullerton as case in point here, finishing a fast break in fantastic style high above the rim. Holy smokes, rise above.

Black Flag+Rise Above

Bros

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Jefffff The Brotherhood+Screaming Banshee

Acres of Shade

 

Spring Break 2010:

Tumbled and Stoned

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The sun didn't burn down, but a week at the beach was still a blessing. Having a day's worth of space to wobble round, as well as the occasional flash of sun from the clouds winding past was well worth the trip down. I read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and thought lots about Jules Verne. Science fiction had a different idea and meaning in late 19th century France than it does today. The house in Seagrove had blue shutters and was tucked away from the main road, with a little wilderness feel to it thanks to being surrounded by the swamp and sand of a few empty lots. Wasn't more than a minute from the beach either. Margaret was the middle aged woman with glasses that lived upstairs and drove a red jeep to the main drag by the beach every day, where she worked the limonade stand in the old Airstream. No more questions asked. I tried to stay busy since I hadn't done a whole much to deserve time off. Mango orange juice helped ease the day along. This song helped slow the rolling feel of being excited and focusing on at least  finishing the page before going to hit tennis balls against the wall. I'm not the the biggest fan of the UK's two step, but this is West Coast dub that will make you wobble along under acres of shade. 

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Babylon System-Get On Up

As an appropriately slow bonus, the life's imaginative majesty slows on Mars.

David Bowie-Life on Mars?

Can't Outgrow the Strokes

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I wish two drinks were always in me and the Chicago Tribune confirms the Strokes are headlining Lollapalooza this summer in Grant Park.

Tennessee

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Davy Crockett was born in Limestone, Tennessee on August 17th, 1786 and served three terms in Congress between 1826 and 1835. This is an exert from a speech he gave in Washington to his fellow constituents.

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"I say, Mr. Speaker; I ve had a speech in soak this six months, and it has swelled me like a drowned horse; if I don’t deliver it I shall burst and smash the windows. The gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Everett] talks of summing up the merits of the question, but I’ll sum up my own. In one word I’m a screamer, and have got the roughest racking horse, the prettiest sister, the surest rifle and the ugliest dog in the district. I’m a leetle the savagest crittur you ever did see. My father can whip any man in Kentucky, and I can lick my father. I can outspeak any man on this floor, and give him two hours start. I can run faster, dive deeper, stay longer under, and come out drier, than any chap this side the big Swamp. I can outlook a panther and outstare a flash of lightning, tote a steamboat on my back and play at rough and tumble with a lion, and an occasional kick from a zebra.

"To sum up all in one word I’m a horse. Goliah was a pretty hard colt but I could choke him. I can take the rag off-frighten the old folks-astonish the natives-and beat the Dutch all to smash-make nothing of sleeping under a blanket of snow and don’t mind being frozen more than a rotten apple.

"Congress allows lemonade to the members and has it charged under the head of stationery-I move also that whiskey be allowed under the item of fuel. For bitters I can suck away at a noggin of aquafortis, sweetened with brimstone, stirred with a lightning rod, and skimmed with a hurricane. I’ve soaked my head and shoulders in Salt River, so much that I’m always corned. I can walk like an ox, run like a fox, swim like an eel, yell like an Indian, fight like a devil, spout like an earthquake, make love like a mad bull, and swallow a Mexican whole without choking if you butter his head and pin his ears back."

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I'm been propped up in the sun the past few days, living and thinking at a woozy pace, nursing a heavy heart and listening to these cassettes I grabbed in my travels around Africa. They sound absolutely crazy, all rackety and completely unhinged like a wobbly, colourful dragon float running to and fro down the street during the Chinese New Year. I'm thinking to try and get them on the computer somehow from cassette in order to a mix series about crazy sounds but I don't know. Wishful thinking floats around everywhere here at the beach, where ease is king and the pace is even slower when the sun is burning everyone out and forcing their slow retreat back inside. I'm reading almost five books at a time now. What's catching my mind's eye is this book about the history of America, starting from the early explorer's to the end of WWII. It's absolutely humbling to read about the great men that influenced the upstart of this nation. Some of them were pretty bonkers of the sly. Benjamin Franklin actually was a deist and Thomas Jefferson was an ardent naturalist. At a 1962 dinner for 49 Nobel laureates, President John F. Kennedy quipped that the event was "the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever gathered at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone." The precedent that America set was unlike anything the world had ever seen. Science, talent, and courage were suddenly held in higher esteem in the governing bodies than rank and birth, all thanks to the collective conscience of a few extraordinary individuals. The United States of America is the greatest country in the world, seen even here in Florida where America goes to die. Speaking of extraordinary individuals, check out the thought processing of my man over at The Future Looks. He moves and shakes and he's dangerous. Don't hesitate. Also, yall gotta listen to Harlem. These boys hold it together pretty well for bros that probably take too many pills and rage on the beach to the psychedelic sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators or to the deep reverbery surf snafu of the Deltones. 

Okay den. +

Harlem-Gay Human Bones.

Think On Your Feet

"...Boyd's key concept was that of the decision cycle or OODA Loop, the process by which an entity (either an individual or an organization) reacts to an event. According to this idea, the key to victory is to be able to create situations wherein one can make appropriate decisions more quickly than one's opponent. The construct was originally a theory of achieving success in air-to-air combat, developed out of Boyd's Energy-Maneuverability theory and his observations on air combat between MiGs and F-86s in Korea. Harry Hillaker (chief designer of the F-16) said of the OODA theory, "Time is the dominant parameter. The pilot who goes through the OODA cycle in the shortest time prevails because his opponent is caught responding to situations that have already changed."

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Buy the book, it rocks.

Wilds

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One of the best things I have seen all week. Can you feel it? This is the definition of the verb to Wild in moving colour, captured in its most grand manner to an almost religious effect. Not your church or mine, but maybe Mt. Absalom Zion Sacred Love of the Slain Lamb Holy Methodist, that stone church that sits quietly six days a week next to Melrose High School in North Memphis Tennessee only to come alive with I SAIDA SAID CAN I GET AN AMEN. High school basketball in Memphis is church, Nate Rucker has found eternal life and Nino Johnson is seeking repentance for having to la la la la lick 'em. Memphis does stand for Making Easy Money Pimpin Hoes Is Serious too, bitch. 

Pick out a new person to watch every time you watch this.

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Okay den. What's South Afrika know for? Apartheid, sharks, and now Zef side. Die Antwoord touched down a few weeks ago and somehow barnstormed the internet running on No Art, Fuck You ballot. And they are for real. Read the Vice interview here. Can Die Antwoord pull a Nirvana and knock America out of its state of indifference? Zef side, play it fokken loud my bru

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Can't expect to have an encounter like this at the beach, but no harm in wanting to. Close encounters with the other kind. Isn't it a bit terrifying how vulnerable humans are in the water? Can't hold our breath for very long, aren't too shapely designed for swimming (Hook 'em horns), and pretty hopeless in the face of something this big, or even dead if it has teeth. We're no longer the apex predators underwater. Makes you kinda take it for granted a little bit. It would be like if the dinosaurs still ruled the Earth. How different would Life be in America if survival was a daily priority? We would have to carry guns and look out for each other. Couldn't play sports outside. Since reptiles would be on top and not mammals, we probably would have evolved with claws or longer legs or something in order to escape predators. Avatar like, no doubt. Despite our being blue and zen, harmony between us and them would be almost impossible. We'd have to work hard to simply live. But like I've heard too many times, you can What If yourself to death. Dinosaurs being alive today are about as likely as horses growing large teeth and becoming land sharks. That would be just as terrifying.

Get Lost

Hey yall, have a great Spring Break

Blissed Out

I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both. We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience.

-CS. Lewis

I've been listening to Remain in Light all day long. This album's sound and feel is so monstrous, you can disappear inside of it and pop up on the other side of the world. I'm stuck next to the astronomy section, not studying for Western Civ but reading my friend Rachel Goldberg's blog Godlilost! and watching the sunset, thinking I'm living and dying my days away in Southeast Asia near around wherever she is. What's taking me away isn't the French Revolution looming nearby, but the Talking Head's Remain in Light. Blowing my fucking mind. I've never really sat still ever listening to this album, because you honestly can't. Remain In Light will drum you to death. The first four tracks would absolutely plaster me, render me steamrolled if played full blast. But I'm listening to it now, throwing that same energy toward thinking and my imagination has lost myself a few times. It takes me far, even with a little discretion on my part. I'm holding back from going totally berzerk and running away with it, because that could totally happen in one quick flash. There once was no buffer, no speed one at all. I loved it. It was always all or barely something, never nothing. Still as death or the far outer limits. No foot tapping or head nodding. Either sleep or yell and run, nothing in between. I see now that you can't do that in the library. You can, but I can't right now. Deep breaths. There's a whole lot happening, but I'm keeping to Remain In Light and Goldilost. The two of them make for a pretty outrageous coupling, full of sweat and hot sticky weather, jungle temples, muddy cave chases, spice, bird noises, opium smoke, tucked away monasteries with a day's worth of stone steps to climb, iguanas sprawled out on tucked away beaches and the most beautiful sunsets ever. David Byrne's haunting discordant voice simply narrates and doesn't give two hoots how you're lost and just might die. The only thing left to do now is reckon with the facts. On your own, long gone far from home. Wide eyed, enlightened, and aware, wandering through some psychotrophic jungle where long lost tribes still dance endlessly to the perfect beat on the cliffs overlooking the lagoon, hidden by countless acres of shade and exposed by the full moon. The creative process is never boring, it's a grand struggle even on the most simplest terms (word to them who photo edit). Creation, invention, associations, unconscious insight, chance revelations, new ideas all act and react to show us windows into what we don't know but possibly could, if we could simply humble ourselves and vanquish the need to control reality and think well of oneself. The concept of Travel gets us halfway there, rendering us almost helpless the further we get away from out comfort zones and totally vulnerable to whatever direction Life may throw us in. Living life once step away from the edge of all sides nurtures the soul's creative process. But with enlightenment and excitedment so far away and midterms so nearby, Goldilost is worth living vicariously through for the meantime.