Syntax of Things

d-day

Dear Old Friends,

I need to make a decision soon.  Like many of you, I'm sure, we've had some belt-tightening days here at SoT headquarters and despite constant demands that the monthly fee paid to Typepad needs to be slashed from the budget, I've held firm, saying that I still have plans, that I still want to keep it going, that I'm going to wake up one morning and instead of facing a 12-hour workday, a four poop-diaper changing day, a day that I don't get accidentally elbowed in the oft-broken nose by the always-wanting-to-play Marlie, I will find time to blog again.  I've been saying this for months now.  I've also been saying I will finish one of the three dozen books (and growing) stacked in the TBR pile.  Or watch that Guy Madden movie that I've had saved on the DVR for six months now.  Or, or, or.  I keep hoping that the day will just happen, but realize that it won't until I make it.  Right now, I just don't have the energy or even the drive to make it happen.  My free time is all about being a father and a husband.  And the problem is, I don't have enough free time.

This is just to say that I'm holding out hope.  I'm keeping this line item in the budget because in the next fiscal year, we're going to do something.  Because I don't read like the the SoT of old did, it may be more along the lines of a father wishing he could read.

Who knows?

But SoT ain't dead yet.  It's just sitting here, still getting several hundred page views a day, most of them looking for nude photos of Madonna, but plenty actually finding (I hope) content of value.  Maybe there will be even more to come.  There definitely won't be any nude photos of Madonna.

Love,

SoT

Maybe?

I made a promise to myself after the twins were born that I would give myself a few months of recovery and then reevaluate whether or not I wanted to breathe life back into Syntax of Things.  The itch is back but now I've made myself promise myself one more thing:  I will not start blogging again until I can get back to reading again.*  I haven't finished a book that doesn't have a golden spine or 18-pt type since 1 month B.T. (before twins).  Today was day one of a five-day weekend...today, I'd planned on starting Urrea's new novel.  Today, I spent getting the new iPhone 3GS.  Priorities, my friends.  Tomorrow should be prime reading in between stints on the floor playing with Legos, time on the couch holding one, if not two, bottles, going up and down stairs trying to make sure everyone is accounted for. 

Anyway, I've been away too long and I owe many of you who have been long-time readers at least a bit of an update.  And I'll get to that soon enough.  Until then, I hope a picture will do.
From L-R, Presley Jack, Marlie (who will be 3 in less than two weeks), and Harper Lily.

Until soon...

_____

*I made the same promise about opening Bloglines up and reconnecting.  I haven't opened Bloglines since February.  I'm tempted to dump and run to another feed reader.  I fear what awaits me when I do click on the B.

Return Imminent...

...until then, Happy New Year and things.

38

How can I get away from all this when the tools keep pulling me back?  My wife and my daughter got me an iPhone for my birthday.  Do you know what that means?

Yes, I'm 38 today.

And thanks to all of you who commented and emailed.  I should have been a bit more restrained.  Some days I feel that quitting this blog would be the best thing as far as my time and energy goes.  As soon as I think that, I start missing the outlet.  I think sometimes I take what I do here too seriously, as if I'm somehow obligated to keep this going on a daily basis.  I should just take things as they come, when they come, and how they come.

All that said, I'm going to use the terminology of a baseball injury report and say that I'm "day to day."

Today, it's all about me.  And a hockey game.

Carolina Blue

Almost there!  This would be a mandate.  The seat that Jesse Helms held forever and a Dole took over is now BLUE.  Obama is leading. 

!

I'm a white son of Selma, Alabama.  Born less than five years after Bloody Sunday.  I never thought I would see this in my lifetime.  I hoped it would become a remote possibility before I died.  Now it's a reality.  It will take a little while for this to sink in.

For my old good buddy Willie Flowers and one of the most influential people I ever met (and am sorry I've lost touch with) Allen Carlson, one of these tears is for you!

Hologram

Did I just see Anderson Cooper interview someone via hologram?

Obama just won Virginia.  North Carolina, come on!

Mood: Almost Happy

My dad can't watch an Alabama football game.  He'll wash the car, cut the yard, trim the hedges, rewire the house.  Anything but actually sit down and watch the game.  Sure he keeps tabs on what's going on, making sure he knows the score at all times.

Well, the nut didn't fall far from the tree.  I don't think I ever saw more than 1/3 of any of the Braves' playoff games.  I'd do anything but sit there and wait for the next pitch.  One playoff series, I think against the Cubs, I decided that sit-ups were a good idea.

Tonight, I cleaned the carpets in our house. 

I've finished cleaning the carpets.  This one is over.  All but the LEFT coast.

We almost have!

Flashback

One good thing about having a blog all these many years is that I can look back to what I was doing last time there was a presidential election.  In 2004, I lived in a red county (San Diego) of the blue state of California.  Looks like this year, I might live in a blue county (Wake) in a blue state, or if nothing else, a blue county in a barely red state.  Anyway, here's what I posted on election day 04.  Seeing old Hannah brought a tear to my  eye.

******

We Voted!

I voted with my left hand.

Hannah supports stem cell research and wants reform of the three-strikes law.

Homer ate the ballot.

Canvas

After weeks of never hearing from the Obama GOTV people, we've been visited every day since Friday.  Even in the miserable weather we're having today, a woman rang my doorbell just hours after I'd voted.  I was hoping she was bringing me another cup of free coffee, but she just wanted to make sure that I voted.  When I said yes, she knew it was one more in the Obama column (we have a bumper sticker).

By the way, I didn't have time to canvas this year, but I'm no stranger to canvassing.  A few years out of college with few immediate job prospects, I spent a few months working for Citizen Action, a distant cousin of PIRG.  That was during the 1996 presidential campaign.  I had the honor of walking neighborhoods in Baton Rouge and New Orleans, Louisiana and Cleveland, Ohio, the latter during one of the snowiest Novembers in Cleveland history.  While we weren't officially campaining for candidates, we weren't discouraged from doing some GOTV.  I usually did my part, except I skipped mentioning Clinton during a visit to one neighborhood plastered with David Duke signs, four years after Duke's previous run for elected office.

One benefit of working in Ohio was attending the acceptance speech of this guy.  That was before anyone save Clevelanders knew him.  I recall being blown away.  And drunk.

All that just to say thanks to all of the canvassers, both those who walked the streets and those who burned the phonelines.  It's hard work and hopefully in a few hours you'll see all of your labor pay dividends.

Mood:  Impatient; optimistic; nervous.

Long Line

I found the long line.  Starbucks.  I wanted my free "I Voted" coffee and it seems everyone else did also.  Ten minute wait and lots of cars with Obama bumper stickers in the parking lot.

Mood:  Optimistic but nervous.

Coffee:  I got a venti for free instead of the tall.  Yes I Did!

Crash Test

If you're on your way to vote, be careful.  According to a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, you are about 18% more likely to die in a traffic accident on presidential election days than on any other Tuesday.  Why? 

One explanation is increased traffic, but other factors might contribute. A 4% increase in average speed, for example, could yield an 18% increase in deaths even with no increase in average travel distance. Additional factors might include distraction (driver inattention), rerouting (unfamiliar pathways) enforcement (decreased police presence), and demographics (mobilizing unfit drivers).

Man, I love scientific research.

{via}

Yes We Can!

Not even 8am here in North Carolina. It's raining today, not the symbolic blue skies I'd hoped for. M y wife and I went in two shifts to vote.  Neither of us stood in line.  In fact, my total time from leaving to returning to the house was a smidge over 15 minutes.  Usually this would be a disappointment seeing as Obama's hopes in this state probably rely on high voter turnout, but I think he's locked in such a large number of early voters that today the rain may benefit him.  Of course, it's still early and we don't live in a highly populated area of Raleigh, so take my polling observation for what it is.

Still, I'm optimistic.  We'll know more in about 14 hours or so.

Breaking

I am suspending my blog until I'm able to fix my economic problems.  Or until Monday.  Whichever comes first.

Off Week

I'm hiding in my bunker for a few days.  See you next week.

Proper

From The Rut:

[Much thanks to good pal Kay for sending this along.]

Stet //

Following up on the post last week about the imminent demise of the newsroom copyeditor, an emailer sent along this link to a similar article by Gene Weingarten in the Washington Post.  There's even a little copyediting test that goes along with this one:

The inessentialness of copy editors is underscored by the advent of sophisticated spellchecking systems which have introduced a hole new level of error-free proofreading. No longer can we say that the editor's penis mightier than the sword. The sword's main foe is a computer now, and the computer is up to to the task.

But nowadays, things have changed. "Scoop" is gone. Young reporters are all named "P. Laurence Butterfield Jr." and they arrive at their first newspaper jobs fresh-faced and competent, straight from New Haven, Conn., with their high-faluting Princeton educations. They don't need copyeditors.

Truth to tell, I feel badly for all copy editors whom, I'm afraid, will suddenly find themselves out of a job. Time has past them by, however, efeated the Red Sox 6-5 in extra innings and it doesn't make sense for us to weep for copyeditors anymore than it makes sense for us to lament the replacement of bank tellers with automated ATM machines.

Stet

Are we in the last days of the newsroom copy editors? The NYT's Lawrence Downes thinks so:

The job hasn’t disappeared yet, but it is swiftly evolving, away from an emphasis on style and consistency, from making a physical object perfect the first time. The path to excellence is now through speed, agility and creativity in using multiple expressive outlets for information in all its shapes and sounds.

As newspapers lose money and readers, they have been shedding great swaths of expensive expertise. They have been forced to shrink or eliminate the multiply redundant levels of editing that distinguish their kind of journalism from what you find on TV, radio and much of the Web. Copy editors are being bought out or forced out; they are dying and not being replaced.

Webby doesn’t necessarily mean sloppy, of course, and online news operations will shine with all the brilliance that the journalists who create them can bring. But in that world of the perpetual present tense — post it now, fix it later, update constantly — old-time, persnickety editing may be a luxury in which only a few large news operations will indulge. It will be an artisanal product, like monastery honey and wooden yachts.

FuckShitPissCuntCocksuckerMotherfuckerTits

So long, George...

Here's my favorite Carlin bit:

Cyclical

I'm glad Ed's back doing his round-ups, even if he can't get things to work right to do his round-ups.  Just knowing Ed is there with his round-ups makes me feel better.  Because he's Ed and Ed cares.

I used to round-ups.  I'd spend long minutes scouring the bloglines and the googles just looking for things to round--up.  Now I look for that one thing that makes me say, "hey, that's the one thing" and then I link to it.  But I think I want to start doing round-ups again.  Only I'll call my round-ups something else.

They'll probably still be round.

Last night, I went to see music played.  It reminded me of how good music is when seen live.  Of course, it took a really good band (and good company) to get me out of the house, and Centro-matic is that.  They are damn good.  If you've been listening to them for any amount of time, you know that. And the 50 people that showed up in Chapel Hill to see them will probably attest to that. 

The M's are pretty damn good too.  In fact, they were impressively good.  Whatever that means.  I'd try to be like "you ain't no picasso" and say they sound like something mixed with something, but I think they sounded like a cross between the letter l and the letter n.   Which is better when you know what the letter p sounds like these days.  You can stream their album here.

I do recommend.

But I was looking forward to Centro-matic.  And they didn't disappoint.  In fact, I feel better now.  Not so guilty that it's been more than 18 months since I've had my hand stamped to enter a club to see live music.  I was beginning to fear that the next show I would see would involve puppets skating on ice while speaking Spanish or laughing in some frequency that only a kid of 2 can pick up on.

I'm glad it didn't come to that.  I got my hand stamped and paid $3 to get a card that tells me I'm a member of a club that sales real honest-to-bygod liquor in the state of North Carolina.   

And I got to listen to music.  Music that was impressively good, whatever that means.

If you get a chance, you should go get your hand stamped to see Centro-matic.

You might get to see them do a pretty good English Beat cover.

Remote

I saw this photo earlier this morning and I can't stop thinking about it.  I don't know why but the idea that there can still be "uncontacted tribes" out there is something that's hard to comprehend.  Apparently there are still more than 100 such tribes with more than half of them in Brazil and Peru. Look at those guys (or gals) aiming their bows at the airplane.  Primitive as can be and amazingly compelling.  More here.

Six Degrees of Wikipedia

I warn you:  the following may sound trivial, but it will suck you in and then you'll finally understand that the Internet is a meaningful and omnipotent entity:

Ever heard of the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon? If you haven't, it works like this: Every actor gets a Kevin Bacon number. Kevin Bacon has a Kevin Bacon number of 0, actors who were in a movie with Kevin Bacon get a Kevin Bacon number of 1, actors who were in a movie with someone who has a Kevin Bacon number 1 get a 2, and so on (Everybody always gets the smallest number possible, so if you were in a film with two people, one with a 4 and one with a 6, your Kevin Bacon number would be 5).

The same idea could apply to the articles Wikipedia. Instead of taking "in the same film" as the relation, you can take "is linked to by". We'll call the "Kevin Bacon number" from one article to another the "distance" between them. It's then possible to work out the "closeness" of an article in Wikipedia as its average distance to any other article. I wanted to find the centre of wikipedia, that is, the article that is closest to all other articles (has minimum closeness).

The site is more than just informative.  You can actually enter two search terms and find out how many wikipedia clicks separate the two.  For instance I found out there were four clicks separating syntax and things.

I think I've spent too much time playing around at this site this already, time I should have spent coming up with something halfway interesting to more people than just me to post here this morning.  Back later.

Back to SoT

I'd like to thank Steve Gillis for taking time out of his schedule to grace Syntax of Things with his presence.  If you want more Gillis, be sure to check out his Largehearted Boy playlist or his interview over at Bookslut.  And be sure to pick up a copy of Temporary People.  You won't be sorry.

I hope to do more of this sort of thing in the coming months.  I have a couple of contributors lined up, so stay tuned.

Steve Gillis Wrapping Up

The end of the day, end of the road, end of my time on the Syntax of Things and I want to thank Jeff for inviting me and sharing his space.  Means a lot.  Awkward of course hawking my wares, but I do hope those of you inclined to give my novel, Temporary People, a read, that you enjoy.  And those of you interested in Dzanc and possibly considering submitting a work, please know we are here to support and publish the best writing we can find and are pleased to already have in our stable such great writers as Roy Kesey, Yannick Murphy, Kyle Minor, Peter Markus, Suzanne Burns, Robert Lopez, Mike Czyzniejewski, Henning Koch, Terese Svoboda, Dawn Raffel, Laura van den Berg, Stefan Kiesbye, and Hesh Kestin.  We are equally excited by our imprints, OV Books - edited by the great Gina Frangello, and Black Lawrence Press, edited by the dynamic duo Diane Goettel and Colleen Ryor, as well as Monkeybicycle Lit Journal, edited by our brilliant design guru at Dzanc, Steven Seighman.  Peace and love, my friends.  Let's remember that.  Now go out there and elect the best damn democratic candidate and read 100 new books this year and lets see if we can't right this ship.  It's a glorious world.  Let's try not to get complacent again and allow the bad guys to take over.  There's too much at stake.  Thanks for all.   Steve Gillis

The Writing Process

I am reserved by nature, am always then red faced and surprised when people want to know more about me.  "How do you write?  What is your process?"  The question gets posed and has been posed here again so I will tell you in short, for me, writing is - as Edison said of work and genius - in general 5% inspiration and 95% drugs.  No, I mean 95% perspiration.  I write everyday, 365 days a year.  I get up ridiculously early  -  don't ask  - go for a run, come home, shower and write.  And write.  I wrestle my ideas to the ground, get thrashed about, bruise my knees and bloody my head.  I don't ever quit.  I respect the process and learn from it, even now, after all these years.  Temporary People went though many many drafts.  I had an idea what I wanted to write, but getting there is not linear.  I just rely on faith (not religious faith but real faith) and no sleep and forge on.  I don't ever go "diminishing returns" on the entire novel or story, am aware of not beating a dead horse, but if a passage or chapter isnt working I labor until I figure out why.  In short, it is never the muse I wait on, but just the old fashioned nose to the grindstone and even on the worst of days, I remind myself there is nothing in the world I would rather be doing.