One art

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster,

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three beloved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

-- Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.

Elizabeth Bishop

If Mark Twain had kept a blog...

The Autobiography of Mark Twain is here at last, bringing to mind the revelries of what must've been my senior year of college in Missouri. That's when I took an entire course on Twain and spent most of the time in class trying to impress the boy sitting next to me. He wound up wowing me by acing all the tests despite goofing off throughout every single lecture and skimming the books a few minutes before the tests. What's up, Cory?

Anyway, I have to agree with this review of Twain's autobiography (which I leafed through in a bookstore in Montana and would have purchased except it is about four inches thick and was too big to fit in my suitcase along with all the other books I'd accumulated on the trip), that this book is the equivalent of Twain's personal blog:

"Perhaps "repository" is a better word for what he proceeded to pile up over the course of six manic months in 1906 and left behind, still incomplete, at his death: an unorganized, crumbling, sneeze-provoking mass of letters, diaries, oral transcripts (more than 5,000 pages of them), news clips and other memorabilia. Now to be published in its entirety—this is the first of what will eventually be three volumes—"Autobiography of Mark Twain" aspires to completeness and definitiveness. Yet, as even the publisher admits, it is less a book than a gigantic fragment: the outpourings of a egotist so garrulous that the type sometimes dwindles to a size that will constrict your pupils.

Fortunately, Twain was that rare motormouth whose every word beguiles us. That does not mean that this book does not ramble. On the contrary, rambling is its deliberate style. Except for a few "written" passages of orthodox narrative and other preliminary scraps, it is mostly a collection of stream-of-consciousness monologues, dictated in Twain's New York townhouse between Jan. 9 and March 30, 1906.

He congratulated himself on having hit upon something new in nonfiction, after more than 30 years of stylistic experiments: "a form and a method whereby the past and the present are constantly brought face to face . . . like contact of flint and steel." At the drop of an ash from his cigar, he could segue from memories of "Uncle Dan'l," the original of Nigger Jim in "Huckleberry Finn," to a headline in that morning's newspaper. Oral flexibility transcended the drag of linear narrative and enabled Twain to be selective in his truth-telling. And since saying a thing was, in a strange way, less specific than writing it, he could edge closer to self-exposure—always with the liberating assurance that his comic persona would step in and make light of stories that threatened to become embarrassing or libelous."

Twain even predicted the possibility of the electronic delivery of his divergent collection of thoughts:

By June 1909, Twain realized that he was on the way to producing the longest book ever attempted. He lost heart and left it unfinished—at a half-million words. His stream of consciousness had become an unmanageable flood: He needed to get out of it before he drowned.

One of the first magazine men to pitch for serial rights to the autobiography prophetically advised Twain to insert a clause in his will allowing for full publication in "the year 2000 . . . by electrical method, or by any mode which may then be in use." This edition is a bit late for that deadline. But stylistically speaking, it can only gain by appearing at a moment when the preferred forms of human communication are torrential texting and tweeting. What an irony that our supreme literary craftsman should be seen, in retrospect, as the inventor of the blog!

Something to aspire to. Using wit and wisdom to spin everyday news into literary gold, a la Samuel Clemens:

On the whole, however, this volume is hard to stop reading. Twain's prosody is so sure, and his powers of observation and selection so great, that he can take the most unpromising material—a real-estate deed, a letter from a would-be author—and make it glitter, like dull stone that turns out to be quartz or even diamond. Like Nabokov, he knew how to "caress the details, the divine details.

Paging Ida Tarbell; we have new monopolies to investigate

Oh dear. Are we In the Grip of the New Monopolists?

Can you live without Google, Amazon, Facebook and Twitter?

I can't. In fact, I'm hoping they'll help bankroll me for a few years as a blogger.

The problem with these new monopolies - the reason they've become monopolies - is that they provide the platforms upon which so many things now rest. They've made so many of our lives easier, says Tim Wu at Columbia Law School. But what happens if these innovators stop inventing and start working merely to maintain their stronghold over the marketplace?

Here's what Wu says, via WSJ:

"Info-monopolies tend to be good-to-great in the short term and bad-to-terrible in the long term. For a time, firms deliver great conveniences, powerful efficiencies and dazzling innovations. That's why a young monopoly is often linked to a medium's golden age. Today, a single search engine has made virtually everyone's life simpler and easier, just as a single phone network did 100 years ago. Monopolies also generate enormous profits that can be reinvested into expansion, research and even public projects: AT&T wired America and invented the transistor; Google is scanning the world's libraries.

The downside shows up later, as the monopolist ages and the will to innovate is replaced by mere will to power. In the 1930s, AT&T took the strangely Luddite measure of suppressing its own invention of magnetic recording, for fear it would deter use of the telephone. The costs of the monopoly are mostly borne by entrepreneurs and innovators. Over the long run, the consequences afflict the public in more subtle ways, as what were once highly dynamic parts of the economy begin to stagnate.

These negative effects are why people like Theodore Roosevelt, Louis Brandeis and Thurman Arnold regarded monopoly as an evil to be destroyed by the federal courts. They took a rather literal reading of the Sherman Act, which states, "Every person who shall monopolize…shall be deemed guilty of a felony." But today we don't have the heart to euthanize a healthy firm like Facebook just because it's huge and happens to know more about us than the IRS.

The Internet is still relatively young, and we remain in the golden age of these monopolists. We can also take comfort from the fact that most of the Internet's giants profess an awareness of their awesome powers and some sense of attendant duty to the public. Perhaps if we're vigilant, we can prolong the benign phase of their rule. But let's not pretend that we live in anything but an age of monopolies."

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704635704575604993311538482.html#ixzz15KJtVfUJ

Another book I'll probably never read

Well, it's here. George W. Bush's memoir: "Decision Points."

I don't want to read the excerpt in WSJ: Lessons Learned by a Prodigal Son

But I didn't want to forget that the book exists. Add it to the list of books I'll probably never read.

They say there's a memorable showdown with his father contained within. For those who care.

EPA: Rivers shouldn't smell like shit

This would be a good framing for an Ecotrope post or two. Just leave out the four-letter word. Or change it to something more palatable ... like poop?

EPA: Rivers shouldn't smell like shit

WASHINGTON—A study released Monday by the Environmental Protection Agency concluded that rivers should never smell like shit, noting that when naturally occurring waterways do reek of fecal matter there is "more than likely something wrong with them."

Elizabeth Smart

I don't remember how I came across this glimpse into Elizabeth Smart's love affair with poet George Barker.

She bore four of his 15 or so children - all without him ever leaving his wife.

She poured her heartache into a novel entitled By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept.

Here's the excerpt that spoke to me:

“He has martyred me, but for no cause, nor has he any idea of the size and consequence of my wounds,” she writes, “Perhaps he will never know, for to say, You killed me daily and O most especially nightly, would imply blame. I do not blame, nor even say, You might have done this or this rather than that. I even say, You must do that, you have to do it, there is no alternative, urging my own murder. But if a knife is stuck in the engine that pumps my blood, my blood stops, no matter how I reason with it. Will he notice that my heart has ceased to beat? But he may, O he may at one glance, restore me and flood me with so much new love that every scar will have a satin covering and be new glitter to attack his heart. From this great distance, after these nights of separation, more I cannot see. My imagination is snowed under the eternal unpunctuated hours”.

“How can I put love up to my hopes so suicidal and wild-eyed when the matter is too simple and too plain: It is her tears he feels trickling over his breast each night; it is for her he feels the concern; and the pity after all, not the love, fills all his twenty-four hours”.

Whoops.

Investors walk out as the Fed buys in

All the gains in the Dow from the $600 billion stimulus are gone!

How did that happen? It's not entirely clear. Probably has something to do with China saying it's going to keep its inflation in check and Europe's debt crisis.

Bummer. For a second there, everybody thought the second stimulus had kinda worked.

Doing the Dougie

I had to check this out because a million other people have: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pry6Cp0kSO0

Now I know how to do the Dougie. But I don't think I will do.

A race to the bottom?

U.S. gets rebuffed at divided summit

The G-20 is fighting over who can devalue their currency; the timing of the meeting is awkward for the U.S. because the Fed just pumped an extra $600 billion into the U.S. economy.

China, Germany and other countries were ticked because that essentially devalues the dollar and puts other countries' currencies at a disadvantage in global trade.

Oh, and wasn't it just last month that the U.S. was spitting at China for doing roughly the exact same thing? Namely, artificially stifling inflation to keep exports flowing.

Refresher: A lower-value currency means other countries can import cheaper goods. What's to prevent a race to the bottom? Something to look into...

Chinese are buying GM; should I buy too?

Now that I'm starting to understand the blogosphere, I am starting a narrative of the stuff I find that doesn't fit into my little enviro news niche.

A great excuse to spruce up the old blog, which I see I haven't updated since 2006. I'm also thinking it might help me learn the art of quick and dirty posting. Just get it out there. NOW!

Chinese plan to buy stake in GM

So, after the US spent $50 billion in tax dollars to resuscitate General Motors, Chinese, Middle Eastern and Asian investors could now buy a big share of the company when it goes public next week.

Is this fair? (and should I buy in?) Last I checked the taxpayers got their money back, but at the same time it's unnerving to see major global economic players swoop in to make a profit off a company that has become symbolic of the fragile state of the American manufacturing sector.

Just one of many glimpses into new global players moving in on Western companies, WSJ reports. See also: China Investment Corp taking 9.9% stake in Morgan Stanley in 2007.

Cover letter #2

Dear Ms. Editor,

When asked what she would change about her life, 78-year-old German immigrant XXX, who grew up under Hitler and now lives in XXX, Wyo., said:

“If I stayed in California after I got my citizenship, I would be eating more fresh fruits and vegetables. Here, you can’t even get a pineapple.”

It’s true. Wyoming often feels like a culinary wasteland. A two-week-old red bell pepper, though it may be shriveled and bruised, will cost you $6.36 at the grocery store. A can of artichokes? That’ll be $5.15. Don’t bother looking for fresh herbs. If you want them, you’ll have to grow them yourself. My mother’s gourmet recipes are useless here, and I long for the diverse Chicago produce departments where just last year I refused to buy fruit for more than $1 per pound. But all is not lost. Wyoming does have some special food items to offer. Squash, for example, is growing year-round in gardens all over town. Acorn, butternut, spaghetti, zucchini…ask and you shall receive.

If you’re into wild game, you can grab a .30-06 and take your pick. There is elk, antelope and deer meat aplenty, all fresh and organic with natural sage flavor from the local flora. Don’t shell out for a hunting license until you check your neighbor’s freezer and the local Game and Fish office, though. This year, state gave out 12,000 pounds of free elk meat in 40-pound boxes. Also, check your own freezer for storage space before you pull the trigger. The average Wyoming mule deer yields 100 pounds of venison. When you find yourself with a freezer full, remember almost anything you make with beef can also be made with game. That includes kabobs, tacos, sausage, jerky, pot roast, stroganoff and even meat sauces for pasta and lasagna. The more creative you get, the longer you can enjoy eating meat from the same animal night after night.

As for Wyoming restaurants, stick with meat-and-potato fare. For a special treat, try the local buffalo. It’s leaner than beef with a cleaner aftertaste but pricier because it’s a tourist attraction. Prices will vary for Rocky Mountain oysters, another Wyoming specialty. Buyer beware, these oysters DO NOT come from the sea. Finally, expect iceberg lettuce and mealy tomato salads, canned tamales and Coors Light on tap. Certain mom-and-pop cafes will offer great biscuits and gravy, hearty, homemade soups and tasty club sandwiches, but the bill will help you remember why you rarely eat out.

Welcome to Wyoming! Hope you like squash.

Blame it on lepidolite

I was recently given a ten-pound slab of lepidolite taken right out of a million-year-old riverbed somewhere in the expanse of sagebrush and dirt surrounding the town where I live. I can't say exactly where because the guy who found it is filing a claim with the state of Wyoming so he can mine the area and sell it by the pound on eBay. He gave me a chunk so I can write a story about him for Rock and Gem magazine. But until he gets his claim, the location of this newfound stash of multicolored mica will remain a mystery.

Metaphysical believers call Lepidolite "the stabilizer." It has the alleged power to alleviate stress during difficult transitions. My slab has been sliced through on one side and polished to reveal a dark, sparkling purple surface. Lepidolite comes in a a bunch of colors, some with a high concentration of lithium. According to my guy, the lithium makes it sparkle. I like having my own chunk of lepidolite around--especialy because of the lithium. Scientists say lithium was among the first minerals created in the Big Bang. Now people use it as an antidepressant and as a catalyst to make meth. It's highly reactive--ironic for a stone that is famous for its stabilizing effects.

I've been petting my new rock and feeling more at peace with myself lately.

I brought it home yesterday and set it on my nightstand. Then, as I was getting ready to turn in, I got the urge to unleash myself. And I started blogging--a self-indulgence that is highly uncharacteristic of me. I think I know what's to blame.

Everybody in?

As to the blog title. Apparently, my grandpa was a big fan of a camp song entitled "Lollipop." Sang it all the time. Today, my dad quoted a line from the song in reference to my current job situation: "When you come to the end of a lollypop, and sit all alone with the stick, ick, ick." The line echoed in my head all night as I was writing cover letters. It's a good thing I don't know the melody.

When you put that line context with the other "lyrics" (if you will), it's really rather profound.

It’s a lick upon a stick,
Guaranteed to make you sick,
Lollipop for me.

When you come to the end of a lollipop,
And sit alone with the stick, ick, ick.
When you think of the one in the candy shop,
Of which you would like a lick, ick, ick.
When you think what the end of a lollipop,
Can mean for a tired tongue, ung, ung.
When your lollipop is all sucked and gone,
And you long for another one, un, un.

I'm trying to keep the employment parallel in mind, but thoughts immediately stray toward...other parallels. Either way, it is a wistful song that does not belong on a schoolbus or in the mess hall. It belongs here, with me and my melancholy weblog.