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How’s this for irony?

My co-worker asked me if I had ever read the book “The Bridges of Madison County.” I had not. She told me it was a short read but very good and would bring the book in for me to read.

Then I remembered. I have this funny little cube sized book called “The Writer’s Block” which is filled with spark words, words of inspiration, writing exercises, ect. One such piece of inspiration has to do with “The Bridges of Madison County.” The writer of “The Writer’s Block,” Jason Rekulak, suggests that in your darkest hours of your writing life, when you think you don’t have what it takes to be a writer, you should read Robert James Waller. Specifically, “Bridges” which stayed at the top of the best seller list for 115 weeks and Warner Books claims it’s the best selling hardcover novel of all time.

Yeah, I know. You’re thinking: “How the hell is that supposed to make me feel better?!”

Because, despite the success of the book, it’s full of the most awkward and “clumsily constructed” sentences you will ever read. Rekulak points out three of them. Having now read the novel, myself, I could point out a lot more.

So the point of that, obviously, is if a book with such terrible writing mechanics is the best selling novel of all time, why the hell ain’t I famous yet?

More than that, and this where some irony comes in, you might say that “Bridges” had mass market appeal and was suitable for the average taste yet by some writing standards it’s dreck. Funny isn’t it that, after coming off my previous rant about Andrew Keen and his “Cult of the Amateur” I was struck by this part of “Bridges” as spoken by the photographer, Robert Kincaid:

“That’s the problem with earning a living through an art form. You’re always dealing with markets, and markets - mass markets - are designed to suit average tastes. That’s where the numbers are. That’s the reality, I guess. But, as I said, it can become pretty confining. They let me keep the shots they don’t use, so at least I have my own private files of stuff I like.

“And, once in awhile, another magazine will take one or two, or I can write an article on a place I’ve been and illustrate it with something a little more daring than National Geographic prefers.

“Sometime I’m going to do an essay called “The Virtues of Amateurism” for all of those people who wish they earned their living in the arts. The market kills more artistic passion than anything else. It’s a world of safety out there, for most people. They want safety, the magazines and manufacturers give them safety, give them homogeneity, give them the familiar and comfortable, don’t challenge them.

“Profit and subscriptions and the rest of that stuff dominate art. We’re all getting lashed to the great wheel of uniformity.”

I think Kincaid, were he alive today, would marvel at the Internet, (although he lamented about the end of “free range” and the concept of computers and robots running things in place of humans). However, with the Internet he could have set up his own website to display his photos that were “too daring” for the likes of National Geographic or other mass media publications. The Internet, in some respects has become the new “free range” outlet for creative expression. Like I pointed out in my previous post, there’s no middle man. There’s no studio executive or magazine editor or somebody to tell you that your art is crap and they’re not going to feature it.

Art is not dead, nor is it dying. It’s flourishing. Mr. Keen’s fear of there being no audience is absurd. Technology changes the way we create and view various art forms. This has happened many times over the past century. But what technology has not done, and never will do, is obliterate art in it’s entirety.

So the week before last on The Colbert Report, Stephen makes the following generalization about bloggers: “They have a laptop, an axe to grind and their virginity.”

Well, I have the laptop. And my axe. And…I wonder if there’s a prize for having all three?

Anyway, I was surfing around the net last weekend, figuring to post something smarmy about that generalization and was looking for another pic of Stephen to use. Found several. From there, I got sucked into the vortex of clicking on link after link after link until I ended up at NoFactZone.net (a Colbert Report fanblog). Since I tape The Colbert Report during the week and catch up on the weekends I was about to quickly exit the site to avoid any spoilers, but the post about a preview of this past Thursday night’s guest, Andrew Keen, caught my eye.

To make a long story short, Mr. Keen has lamented about the progress of the Internet, specifically that which is being called Web 2.0. The basis of which is the reason why Time magazine name me Person of the Year. Okay, not me specifically but “YOU!” all of us geeks with the laptops, axes, our virginity (or not), a corner of our parents basement and way too much time on our hands creating various dreck and drivel and clogging up the Internet with it. Apparently, Mr. Keen is to the point of nearly losing sleep over this. We’re all so wrapped up in being authors/creators that we’re no longer part of the audience, he says. Anybody can write a story, make a video or record a song, post it to the Internet and enjoy about fifteen seconds of fame.

He goes on to say…

Yes, the people have finally spoken. And spoken. And spoken.

Now they won’t shut up. The problem is that YOU! have forgotten how to listen, how to read, how to watch… We’ve lost truth and interest in the objectivity of mainstream media because of our self-infatuation with the subjectivity of our own messages. It’s what, in “Cult of the Amateur,” I call digital narcissism. A flattened media is a personalized, chaotic media without that essential epistemological anchor of truth. The impartiality of the authoritative, accountable expert is replaced by murkiness of the anonymous amateur. When everyone claims to be an author, there can be no art, no reliable information, no audience.

Doesn’t he know, as Don Henley has said, “there are no facts, there is no truth. Just data to be manipulated?” I don’t know what epistemological means but apparently Mr. Keen doesn’t have cable, or he’d know already that the mainstream media is already chaotic and seemingly lacking in truth, impartiality and accountability. How many times have we heard about the left wing media? The right wing media? What media are we supposed to believe now anyway? We have grown to the point that we no longer accept mainstream media as the “be all end all” of our everyday worlds. Some of us have become cynical and we take what we hear and see with a grain of salt. This is why blogs pop up. We seek out alternative perspectives and opinions. We seek to share our own alternative perspectives and opinions.

Of course, there is, indeed, complete and total crap out there, this I do not refute. For all I know, Mr. Keen probably thinks that what I produce on the Internet is crap. Crap is in the eye of beholder. (And it’s probably not very comfortable to have crap in the eye to begin with…)

And this isn’t all limited to opinion/editorials. Mr. Keen is including the creative arts of writing and music as well, along with film making. Anybody with a camera can shoot some footage, edit it together with their computer and slap it up on YouTube. I’ve been writing fanfiction for years and posting my stories online. Musicians can record their songs and post them to the Internet and find an audience. All these things can be done without having to go through an audition, or try to find a publisher or try to find a producer. No studio backing, no need for a record deal, no nasty letters saying your manuscript sucks and we only want “established” writers. No middle man.

You know though….even before the advent of the Internet, there has been mainstream dreck and crap in our films, music and books since the advent of films, music and books. Although it seems as though everybody wants to be an author/creator, we are still part of the audience and yes Mr. Keen we’re still listening, reading and watching. And the audience will decide if what’s being presented it worth partaking in. Or, as Stephen Colbert has said “the market has spoken.”

And the market says, I got about six people who repeatedly visit my blog. Dreck?

Anyway, I was extremely fired up about this last weekend but then I realized that truthfully, The Colbert Report should not be making me think this deep about anything. But now that I have caught up on this past week’s episodes and have seen the interview with Andrew Keen I have to ask….

Who the @#$%! is Andrew Keen anyway?! What makes him so damn special to make the decision that what I create and post on the Internet is crap? Oh he’s published a book. Whup-dee-doo. So I’m supposed to accept his conclusion about the internet as the be all end all of the world because….because….because he’s written a book about it?

Phbpthbpthtpbhtp!!

Some reaction to Brian’s “Mortgage Meltdown” entries.  I really don’t refute a thing my cousin has said but I do have some commentary of my own to add.

Disclaimer: I know nothing. Really. So what I’m about to say next may or may not make any economic, or educated, sense.

First some commentary on the insurance companies. Perhaps the reason they’re not bleeding to death like the mortgage companies is because the insurance companies, in many instances, aren’t paying out their claims in the wake of Katrina, Rita and whathaveyou. They’re also pulling up stakes in those risky areas and no longer issuing insurance policies in the Gulf coast region or anywhere that has a 25% chance of flooding within the next 100 years.

The insurance company didn’t lend any money to you with the hopes that you will pay it back. Instead, you’re paying the insurance company in the hopes that they’ll pay you a large chunk of money when disaster strikes. The insurance company however, is banking on the odds to be in their favor, that they’ll collect premiums from you for many years and never have to pay out a claim.

And when you do file a claim, you would have better luck waiting for money from the tooth fairy.

Back in April, my state suffered a repeat spring filled with a lot of rain and a lot of flooding. Rivers literally changed course, roads were flooded out and homes were washed away or damaged beyond repair. One such story involves a customer of a local financial institution who lost her mobile home in the flood. (A good portion of the park she was living in ended up under water).

First, I can’t even comprehend losing everything I own in a flood. The first priority of course is finding another place to live. She did get an apartment, but that was nothing compared to the battle she had to wage with the insurance company and the token aid she got from FEMA.

Since her home was located in a flood zone, and per lending requirements, she had flood insurance. Don’t be fooled by what a “good job” Brownie ever did for FEMA. FEMA doesn’t do jack for people who have endured a flood. This woman got a whopping $640 in aid from FEMA.

But getting a dime out of the insurance company for the loss of the mobile home was like getting blood from a stone. First, the home had to be declared condemned by the town and the town took it’s sweet time doing that. All in all it took over three months to get the money from the insurance company. It went toward paying off the loan and an unsecured home improvement loan. She ended up with about a thousand dollars in her pocket when all was said and done.

She’s lucky, she actually saw the money. But she had to fight like hell to get it and she is an older woman who had also endured the lost of her elderly mother during this time too. There are some stories out of Katrina where people have yet to see any money. Even after two years.

As for the Fed not predicting 9/11 or the length of the Iraq War…. well, no they didn’t have a crystal ball. But after 9/11 President Bush told us to go shopping. Literally. At a time of crisis in our country we were not asked to make any sacrifices, financially or otherwise. We were fat, dumb and happy before 9/11 and we’re just as fat, dumb and happy after 9/11. We went shopping and spent money we don’t even make. (No, not money we haven’t made yet, money we don’t even make to begin with.) We bought homes, cars, big screen tvs, motorcycles, boats and all the toys to our little hearts desire. And who’s worried about tomorrow? We’re not, apparently, as we’re not saving a dime. The savings rate in this country is in the negative. The last time it was that low was during the Depression, when nobody was making hardly a dollar to begin with and what little money was made went to putting food on the table. Now we’re just spending, spending, spending. And we’re not putting food on the table, we’re going out to eat. Oblivious. Hiding behind our “eminence front.”

Looks like the party might be over, or at least severely interrupted. Now we got the fall out of sub-prime loans, the stock market is in flux and the financial analysts on the television are all breathless about the “credit crunch.” Oh gee, well let’s see. The cost of goods in this country is outpacing the wages earned. Hmm….so technically I can’t afford my car, or my house on the wages I make to begin with, but my bank or mortgage company managed to finagle this great loan deal for me so I could, at least, for a few years. But of course, the bank needs to earn income too and most of that comes from the interest I pay and a low interest rate isn’t going to help their bottom line. And there’s no way they would do a low rate fixed loan so I got this thing called an adjustable rate mortgage. So for a couple years I had a nice low rate but woah! It’s jumped up and I can’t afford the payments anymore. My car has been repossessed. My house is being foreclosed on. Why was this house $250,000 to begin with when just 10 years ago it was down around $100,000?

And yet today, the Fed dropped the discount rate. This is the rate that banks pay to the Fed to borrow money (which is then loaned out to customers). The theory is that if the discount rate is cut, then banks can lower their rates to customers a bit and encourage…you guessed it…more freakin’ spending.

Look, let’s be serious. The stock market crash of 1929 was due in part to the purchase of stocks for companies that didn’t exist and in some cases the purchase of legit stock that was outrageously overpriced. With the crash, everything collapsed and the US (along with most of the rest of the world) took a financial butt kicking. Truthfully, had it not been for WWII, we would still be feeling the effects of the Depression. It would have lasted much longer than it did.

So, is now really any different? We’re spending money we don’t even make to begin with, buying things on credit to what? Keep things at the level they are? Why are we doing this? This is insane. We’re bailing a sinking boat with buckets that have holes in them.

As I was working on my blog tonight, I found something I had written back in June but never posted.  Not sure if the link to the article still works but, here you go…

Headline on AOL news, June 12, 2007

Texting and Driving is a Deadly Mix.

Umm……DUHHHHH!!!!!???

Are they kidding? People are trying to TYPE while driving?? What the hell are they holding the steering wheel with, their teeth???

Ladies and gentlemen, it would appear that we have now officially entered the Age of Stupid. We are a nation of complete and total morons!!! ARGGHH!!!! Look, I know Lexus now makes a car that will parallel park itself, but last I knew it does not DRIVE itself! YOU need to be driving the car!

When you’re behind the wheel of a car, please, for God’s sake, put the phone down, shut the hell up, stop texting, stop drinking, stop eating, stop putting on your makeup, stop writing your best selling novel,  stop writing your blog, stop drinking your coffee with the lid off and basically, STOP BEING STUPID!!! Pay attention to the road! There’s someone out there with a 5,000lbs car that could conceivably smash into you and you will DIE! Conceivably, you are driving a 5,000lbs car that could smash into someone else and kill them!

So pay attention dammit!!

Well, I tried different pics of me without my glasses on and unfortuantely did not match with Ms. Bacall.  One pic of myself did match with Audrey Hepburn though.

So that boosted my self esteem for about ten minutes, and I really should have  just left well enough alone. But no, I had to try some other pics. Two of my attempts netted a repeat match with Amy Weber. I had no idea who the hell Amy Weber was until I did a Google search. She’s an actress/bikini model! Yee frickin’ terrific, I manage to kinda match her face but I sure as hell don’t match her figure! Thus, that turned into a devastating blow to my already fragile self-esteem.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, I still managed to match with some men. Including Dale Earnhardt Sr. and…Vin Diesel.

Vin Diesel?!?!

Ugh.