The Presidential Debate

About halfway through the debate, my dad and I paused it (thank you DVR) and I asked him how he thought it was going. I was shocked to hear that he thought that McCain might have gained more ground than Obama. To me, Obama was the more poised, well-articulated candidate, and the one who had more compelling answers.

I am liberal though, and so I agree more with Obama, but I tried to be aware of that when evaluating the two candidates' performances. Still, though, I would chalk this one up for Obama. McCain held his own for the most part, though at times he seemed flustered, but what frustrated me about his answers is that he seemed much less willing to debate the issues, most notably in the segment on the economy. Obama repeatedly pointed out the differences between their tax plans, but McCain only wanted to pin the label "big spender" on Obama. Frankly, it felt like a return to Bush's (regretably successful) tactic of labeling Kerry as a flip-flopper. I can understand how it is important to point out where a candidate is wrong or hypocritical, but please at some point debate the issues.

The other thing that bothered me about McCain was that he seemed to use misleading information to try to sway voters away from Obama. This is probably something that both candidates do, but I don't think Obama did this during the debate (at least, McCain never called him on it). What I am referring to is how McCain said that Obama said at one point that he would never cut spending on the troops, but then did. Obama pointed out that what he did was vote against the Republican funding bill that didn't include a time table, but he did vote for the bill that included one. It just seemed dishonest, and a shameful tactic to use.

That said, McCain did pick up ground on the foreign policy segment. Though I think the two came out even on this, I can see how people would say that McCain won this half of the debate. However, I would then agree with the analyst from Fox News, of all places, who said that although McCain won the segment on foreign policy, Obama won the first half on the economy, and since the economy is the more pressing issue, Obama came out ahead overall.

I'm not uber-political, as you all probably well know. I do think that both of these men want the best for America, and I'm a lot more optomistic about these candidates than I was in the last election. All that is to say, this post is about how the candidates faired in the first debate, not what people think of them overall.

Do you agree, or am I way off base (way to the left, no doubt)?

A Day in the Life of Sam Black

It drizzled as I made my way up to my office. It's been raining for weeks, it seems. I was meeting a client about a case I had been working on. The case seemed simple--they all do--but I kept having the nagging feeling that this one wasn't. At first glance it appeared to be a simple accident, a man slipped and fell, hurt his head, but the dame who was paying my bills suspected foul play. The guy doesn't remember anything, not even his name, so he's been no help.

It all revolves around Jill. I had talked to her when I first took the case and thought she was a good broad, but messy--the kind that will make you forget things just by looking at her. I wouldn't mind forgetting things with her for a while...and that's what makes me distrust her.

As I mounted the steps to the fifth floor I turned the facts over and over in my mind: on Saturday, September 13th at 10:40 in the morning, two people go up a hill to get some water. Why were running errands together at such an early hour? Were they lovers? Ex-lovers? At the crest of the hill, Jack, according to Jill, falls down and splits his skull. Why did they choose the steepest part of the hill to climb when it was so wet? Could Jill have overpowered Jack, knocked him over the head and caused him to fall down the hill? Here the details become fuzzy. Jack, in a raving, confused state, stumbles back to his house and covers his head with vinegar and brown paper. Or is it Old Dame Dob who bandages his head? So far everyone has had tight lips about this one. Where was Jill during all of this? Her alibi was sketchy at best. And how does Old Dame Dob come into the picture? An innocent, well-wishing bystander? Unlikely.

All of this could be accidental, or coincidental, but in my business I've found that things rarely are. But I still can't see how these people are tied together. Was there money involved? Drugs? Is this some sort of bitter love triangle? With these thoughts rattling around my head, I opened the door to my office, expecting to see my client, whose role in this remained an even deeper mystery. Instead, I was greeted by the steely eye of a revolver. I didn't recognize the man who was holding it, and he didn't offer a name. "Sit," he said. I could tell he wasn't one for pleasantries. As I walked to my chair, I felt the hard kick of the butt of his gun against the back of my head. The world slid away from me as I hit the floor.

When I awoke, my office was mostly unchanged, though now there was a jackhammer at the base of my skull. At times like these I turn to the only faithful friend I've got, Mr. Daniels. I poured myself a drink and noticed that there was note on my desk. How thoughtful.

Mr. Black,
You should think about dropping this case.
You're in over your head and you're sinking fast.
Consider this a warning. Next time won't be so friendly.

I'm sinking fast...funny that's what my wives used to say. I could see that this case was more complicated than I thought. If one of the parties was willing to bring in hired goons, well that must mean that I'm on to something. But the only one who knew that I was coming to my office at this time was my client, which means I was probably set up. But my client was the one who set me on this trail in the first place. Things just didn't make sense. They didn't have to, as far as I cared, as long as my check came in the mail.

I grabbed my pals Smith and Wesson and made my way to the street, the only place I felt at home. Once again, I reviewed the facts: Jack and Jill go up a hill, to fetch a pail of water. Later Jack is found with a broken crown...and then all hell breaks loose.

I head towards the scene of the crime, hoping to find some clue--something, anything--that will link all these pieces together. It's raining harder now, and it doesn't look like it's going to let up today. Perhaps it never will...

Pardon the Interim

Two weeks ago, on Thursday the 21st, we were told by our landlady that the house we were renting from her was sold and that we had 30 days to move out. This came somewhat as a shock, even though the house had been on the market for a while and people had come by to look at it (though not many stayed for long). Frankly, I would never buy that house, and I think anyone who does will regret. It was great to rent for $300/month, but it had too many problems to ever come out on top with it. It's not a fixer-upper, it's a do-over.

So, we moved kind of fast after that. On Friday we went around and looked a bagillion apartments and townhouses and finally fell in love with the last one we looked at, The Cliffs. We signed the lease on Monday and booked the Cliffs's moving van (if you're moving from Fayetteville to Fayetteville, you can use their van for free, which is pretty sweet) for Thursday. That week we moved pretty much everyday, though the bulk of it obviously came on Thursday and then over the weekend as we unpacked everything. By Monday we had everything in its place, and to celebrate we had my dad and step-mom over to play games. We can actually invite people over to entertain. Amazing.

Here are the advantages of our new place:
It's aweful shiny.
It has (and our old place did not): a dishwasher, a garbage disposal, central blessed heating and air, walk-in closets (two of them), a game closet(!), and lastly: doors.
Yes, I meant doors. Our last place, strangely enough, was arranged in such a way that only the bathroom had a door. And you had to nudge the water heater out of the way to shut that door. We're talking ghet-to.
It also has a sweet amenities package that includes access to a workout space, a pool, a sauna, a hot tub, and their business center that has a couple of computers and a copier and fax machine. We can also get a free massage from the on-site masseuse once a week. Heavenly.

Of course, the con is that it costs more, and currently I only have a part-time job, so that may turn out to be a problem. But right now, I'm basking in my airconditioned, door-enclosed, large-enough-to-hold-all-of-my-books office, and I say whatever. I like it here.

Death the Sound of Static

While reading White Noise, I've been thinking of what the book is about, what its primary concern is. I began to think that, along with its concern with how mass media and consumerism have changed our social landscape, the novel centered mainly around the issue of death, our fear of it, and the fact that all of our technological advances have not made a dent in either our fear of death and its inevitability. Then I came along the title passage:

"I do want to die first," she said, "but that doesn't mean I'm not afraid. I'm terribly afraid. I'm afraid all the time."
"I've been afraid for more than half my life."
"What do you want me to say? Your fear is older and wiser than mine?"
"I wake up sweating. I break out in killer sweats."
"I chew gum because my throat constricts."
"I have no body. I'm only a mind or a self, alone in a vast space."
"I seize up," she said.
"I'm too weak to move. I lack all sense of resolve, determination."
"I thought about my mother dying. Then she died."
"I think about everyone dying. Not just myself. I lapse into terrible reveries."
"I feel so guilty. I thought her death was connected to my thinking about it. I feel the same way about my own death. The more I think about it, the sooner it will happen."
"How strange it is. We have these deep terrible lingering fears about ourselves and the people we love. Yet we walk around, talk to people, eat and drink. We manage to function. The feelings are deep and real. Shouldn't they paralyze us? How is it we can survive them, at least for a while? We drive a car, we teach a class. How is it no one sees how deeply afraid we were, last night, this morning? Is it something we all hide from each other, by mutual consent? Or do we share the same secret without knowing it? Wear the same disguise."
"What if death is nothing but sound?"
"Electrical noise."
"You hear it forever. Sound all around. How awful."
"Uniform, white."

I just finished the novel, and I would have to say that I recommend it. One of the things that I enjoy most about reading a book by a new author is being startled by the writing style. Delillo's writing really is distinct. He gives you the sense that he is saying something new.

For those of you who haven't seen me much in the past two years, you may not know about my new obsession: board games. My college friends will probably only remember that they refused to play the one board game, Axis and Allies, that I brought to school, even though one year for my birthday all I asked for was for people to play it with me (for shame!).

However, since my exodus down south, I have broadened my horizons some. It all starts with the Spiel des Jahres (German game of the year) for 1995, The Settlers of Catan. My acquaintance with this game occurred somewhat circuitously. My friend Otto mentioned to me that I might like it probably my junior year at Wash U. Then, shortly after I came back to Fayetteville, I joined a once-a-month game night group who introduced it to me. Not long after that, my step-brother Brian got a copy and the craze spread from Brian and me to the rest of our family.

After a while of playing Settlers, I began to thirst for a little more variety in my gaming. I soon began buying other European games, and now I have quite the collection. Not yet the collection of my friend George, the host of our game night who owns probably over fifty games, but I’m working on it.

You may have noticed that my favorite website is boardgamegeek.com. You should check it out sometime if you haven’t already.

This begins my series of posts about gaming. I will devote an entire post to different games that I own and that are out there. You should think about trying out some of them.

Man the Sum of What Have You

What is man?

What The Sound and the Fury says:

"Man the sum of his climactic experiences Father said. Man the sum of what have you. A problem in impure properties carried tediously to an unvarying nil: stalemate of dust and desire."
............................
"Father said that man is the sum of his misfortunes. One day you'd think misfortune would get tired, but then time is your misfortune Father said. A gull on an invisible wire attached through space dragged. You carry the symbol of your frustration into eternity."
............................
"Father was teaching us that all men are just accumulations dolls stuffed with sawdust swept from the trash heaps where all previous dolls had been thrown away the sawdust flowing from what wound in what side that not for me died not."

What White Noise says:

"But you said we had a situation."
"I didn't say it. The computer did. The whole system says it. It's what we call a massive data-base tally. Gladney, J. A. K. I punch in the name, the substance, the exposure time and then I tap into your computer history. Your genetics, your personals, your medicals, your psychologicals, your police-and-hospitals. It comes back pulsing stars. This doesn't mean anything is going to happen to you as such, at least not today or tomorrow. It just means that you are the sum total of your data. No man escapes that."
............................
"Everything that goes on in your whole life is a result of molecules rushing around somewhere in your brain."
"Heinrich's brain theories. They're all true. We're the sum of our chemical impulses."


Interesting the difference 57 years make.

Church Street

With my newfound free time, I decided to start a book club at my church. I've wanted to get more involved and to give something to the church body for awhile, and I felt this was the answer. It also gives me a reason to keep reading good books and to continue to read scholarly articles about them. Over the past two years I found that I really love reading scholarship, but for some reason I often lack the impulse to read it. Hopefully being the "leader" of the book club will guilt, shame, or somehow force me to do the research. We'll see.

Since we are meeting at our house on Church Avenue, I thought Church Street Book Club was an apt name. Having a name is important; otherwise I don't know how we would strike fear into the heart of our enemy or even have a rallying cry. We're working on a theme song.

We just had our first meeting. We ended up at fifteen members, which is about maximum capacity. I only expected about half that many, so I was pleasantly surprised. At the meeting I handed out a questionaire to see which of the books I was interested in reading the members had already read. Here's the list:

The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
American Pastoral by Phillip Roth
Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
The Night in Question by Tobias Wolff
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City by Nick Flynn
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

Not a bad list, if you ask me. The result of the questionaire is that we're reading Slaughterhouse Five first. It's one of my favorite books, so I'm pretty excited.

It begins like this:
Listen:
Billy Pilgrim has become unstuck in time.
It ends like this:
Poo-tee-weet?