Yoshimi Battles The Purple Japandroids

Good day, reader. Right now I bet you're surrounded by vaguely sad middle-class white people. America! One of those vaguely sad middle-class white people is probably you. Awesome! I am too. Let's distract ourselves from taking any action to improve our mediocre lives by writing/reading/vacantlystaringat another paragraph.

We at HLA have given up any current or future attempts at prolific posting here, as every time we promise we fail miserably, though this time I got like two weeks in or something. Understand that this blog will forever remain at the periphery of your Intertube-perusing activities.

Now is the point where you ask yourself why the hell you kept reading this far. I said nothing you didn't already know. I am sorry for this. I don't say anything I don't already know, which is why this blog is so shitty. So go on your way to download some good gifs, drink a warm bottle of wine, even listen to that shitty fun. album if you must. Just remember that I ♥ U. Forever.

Day 16-17: The Fat Lady

“I remember about the fifth time I ever went on ‘Wise Child.’ I subbed for Walt a few times when he was in a cast–remember when he was in that cast? Anyway, I started bitching one night before the broadcast. Seymour’d told me to shine my shoes just as I was going out the door with Waker. I was furious. The studio audience were all morons, the announcer was a moron, the sponsors were morons, and I just damn well wasn’t going to shine my shoes for them, I told Seymour. I said they couldn’t see them anyway, where we sat. He said to shine them anyway. He said to shine them for the Fat Lady. I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about, but he had a very Seymour look on his face, and so I did it. He never did tell me who the Fat Lady was, but I shined my shoes for the Fat Lady every time I ever went on the air again—all the years you and I were on the program together, if you remember. I don’t think I missed more than just a couple of times. This terribly clear, clear picture of the Fat Lady formed in my mind. I had her sitting on this porch all day, swatting flies, with her radio going full-blast from morning till night. I figured the heat was terrible, and she probably had cancer, and—I don’t know. Anyway, it seemed goddam clear why Seymour wanted me to shine my shoes when I went on the air. It made sense.”

Franny was standing. She had taken her hand away from her face to hold the phone with two hands. “He told me, too,” she said into the phone. “He told me to be funny for the Fat Lady, once.” She released one hand from the phone and placed it, very briefly, on the crown of her head, then went back to holding the phone with both hands. “I didn’t ever picture her on a porch, but with very—you know—very thick legs, very veiny. I had her in an awful wicker chair. She had cancer, too, though, and she had the radio going full-blast all day! Mine did, too!”

“Yes. Yes. Yes. All right. Let me tell you something now, buddy . . . Are you listening?”

Franny, looking extremely tense, nodded.

“I don’t care where an actor acts. It can be in summer stock, it can be over a radio, it can be over television, it can be in a goddam Broadway theatre, complete with the most fashionable, most well-fed, most sunburned-looking audience you can imagine. But I’ll tell you a terrible secret—Are you listening to me? There isn’t anyone out there who isn’t Seymour’s Fat Lady. That includes your Professor Tupper, buddy. And all his goddam cousins by the dozens. There isn’t anyone anywhere that isn’t Seymour’s Fat Lady. Don’t you know that? Don’t you know that goddam secret yet? And don’t you know—listen to me, now—don’t you know who that Fat Lady really is? . . . Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It’s Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.”

For joy, apparently, it was all Franny could do to hold the phone, even with both hands.

- Franny & Zooey, JD Salinger 

Finished reading this for the second time today. Hated it the first. Realized how wrong I was.

Say what you will about his characters (too neurotic?) and his themes (too juvenile?) Make what you will of his vanishing act. A great writer does not work from some lofty perch of moral or intellectual authority. Great art comes not from above humanity but from within. And this is a guy who chronicles all that lies within a soul better than almost anyone else. Holden Caulfield was not at all like you - and yet you related to him, right?

You wonder how a recluse could portray such humanity. Maybe it makes sense. Maybe understanding what it is to be human requires one to also be alone. To be human is to be alone? To be alone is to be human?

It seems that's the struggle any creator faces. A successful public life is a war against self-consciousness; a successful creative life is a wallowing in self-consciousness.

It seems the two generally don't go together.

In that regard, Salinger doesn't give you hope. But let's ponder the nature of genius another day; let's celebrate it for now. So what his work wasn't sophisticated? So what he didn't take his own lessons to heart? The cranky old fuck just wanted to write. He did so pretty fucking well.

Day 13: You Get Up

"I often wonder if the world has it all wrong. Is it really a good thing to work 40, 50, 60 hours a week for scraps of paper we exchange for goods - most of which are wholly unnecessary - and get caught up in a cycle of wanting and acquiring and becoming indebted and trapped, when really at our core we're just animals with higher thinking abilities? 

Then I remember that I really do like bad reality TV, and buying prepackaged foods, and having fast transportation, and keeping my home at a temperate 73 degrees, and heading off to Best Buy for Lost, Season 1. And then I go to work."

I think I want a job that challenges me. I think I want to get an English degree and write and go to grad school and write some more and eat ramen and somehow understand human suffering and along the way write The Great Azerbaijani Novel. I think I don't want to be like my dad. I think I want to do something different, more challenging, more fulfilling than everybody else.

Then I remember I can go get a PR degree and come home from a shitty day and eat and watch and do whatever the fuck I want. Actually sounds pretty awesome - and also horrifyingly mundane and fundamentally pathetic, of course - but not bad. Not bad at all.

Day 11: Evacuate the Dancefloor

The weirdest thing about Highland is its obsession with dance. The obsession isn't the weird part because every small town is obsessed with something: something they're good at, something to form an identity around, something to make you proud of the otherwise you live, or more likely to temporarily forget the otherwise shitty place you live.

But dance. Fucking dance. Dance in all its dark and pathetic forms. Pom dance, jazz dance, hip-hop dance, and worst of all lyrical dance, which basically involves looking really emotional while rolling around on a dirty floor. Apparently we excel at all of these. 

You wish parents could steer their kids to more worthwhile pursuits, like chess maybe, or Model UN. But no. I guess dance provides the greatest vicarious thrill.

Women are sad to start out with. You live in Highland, or you watch Dance Moms (or the new spinoff Dance Moms: Miami!) and you see that age only makes things worse. I do all three of these things. (This is why misogyny is one of my major problems.)

But now we're making our young males dance. Out of the 100 or so dancers at my sister's recital on Saturday, 12 were male. We have a male dance team at the high school. We also have a winless football team. They really fucking suck. A fucking 0-9 football team and 10 potential future star quarterbacks are thrusting their groins and tap-dancing to Luke Bryan dance remixes*. But he has a dick! And he's dancing! What bravery and courage! And all for art!, if that's what you call aimless movement to Lil Jon's "Get Low."

I don't mind dance, besides feeling like a pedophile while watching it and worrying about the actual pedophiles that certainly lurk in the audience. I cringe at the mustachioed fathers in the crowd yelling "Do your thang girls!" And simultaneously I realize this is my future, a lifetime of yelling at my progeny, wanting them to do all I never could, wanting to relive my own athletic glory days**, wanting to escape the hopelessness and desperation that seem to come once you reach a certain age. 

Let us all hope I live this out on football fields instead of packed auditoriums.

*Really. They souped up the beat to "Rain is a Good Thing" and had this 10-year-old guy do a tap routine to it. When I was 10 I spent most of my time unleashing predatory dinosaurs on my guests in Zoo Tycoon. Any objective psychoanalyst will tell you my childhood was better and, as a consequence, my adulthood will be way more awesome.

**If you consider golf a sport, which you shouldn't. Pussy shit, but I could actually play pretty good and all. My kid will be much more manly and athletically talented. I will not let him take the easy way out. IT. WILL. BE. FOOTBALL. (Or chess. Or Model UN. Or theater. Or anything besides dance or golf, because really, golfers are douchebags, and dance is just fucking awful. Do anything other than those things and I'll luv u 4evr, unborn son!)

Day 8-10: Random Bullshit

If I weren't lazy and surrounded for hours and hours with a TV, an Xbox, and abso-fucking-lutely nothing else, this blogging every day thing would work out. Alas, FIFA 11 (because I'm too cheap to get the new one and will be too cheap to get the next one too) has been calling, along with reading a book on North Korea that I must discuss with little freshmen next fall. Moral - Mizzou is oppressed hellhole like DPRK, right down to the alcoholic tendencies of respective Glorious Leaders Kim Jong-Il* and Gary Pinkel.

* * *

Twitter tells me the Rams released Justin King. That Justin King was ever paid to play cornerback will forever boggle my mind and forever give me hope that I can land a job for which I'm way underqualified. Maybe a newspaper will pay me to write words for them! Maybe they'll let me write for free, just for the shits and giggles and resume building! (So far, no dice - but not for lack of trying.)

In other Rams-related news, Jeff Fisher has set a goal for his defense: break the all-time single-season sacks record. Your response, Dwight Schrute? 

* * *

"Life happens too fast for you ever to think about it. If you could just persuade people of this, but they insist on amassing information."**

Thought this was a ballin' quote. Too bad I found it in one of my 77 daily checks of Twitter.

Is it hypocritical to call oneself a hypocrite?


*Before you ask - of course I know The Glorious Leader Kim Jong Il has passed on. I also know that I do not pass up chances to reference his outrageous Hennessy consumption. Just one of the many reasons I hope to be just like him when I grow up.
** Because of course Kurt Vonnegut is tweeting from beyond the grave.

Day 5-6: Teeth Like God's Shoeshine

Our generation has had the most comfortable upbringing of any group anywhere at anytime in the past 10,000 or so years* the Earth has existed. Chances are you're part of this generation, which means you have enough of everything you need - food, water, security, sleep, porn. You probably have too much of these things.

* * *

To do something great, you have to aim to do something great. Jordan wasn't born with that jump shot. Steinbeck didn't stumble upon East of Eden. You make the choice to put the work in for the chance at a delayed reward.

You think ambition is ugly, and yeah, it often is, but you have to realize how beautiful it is too. After all, you are a human being. You always aim higher. You have to. You should. 

* * *

You think the American Dream is a sham. You think you can't make it in this country as easily as you used to. Maybe you're right. Maybe opportunity is disappearing in quantity and declining in quantity. Or maybe you're spoiled. Maybe wealth and status and prestige are finite qualities that are all used up. Maybe  this is where ambition meets economics.

You think the United States is in decline. You think jobs should be plentiful and unions should be strong and our boys should be landing on the moon and constructing new interstates and Dick Clark should be on TV. You want to take home a decent day's wages for a decent day's work.

But what is a decent day's work? Fixing sewers? Picking up roadkill? Microwaving McChickens? Writing press releases? Wasting away in middle management? 

* * *

The good news is that you can still have half the American Dream. You can bring home the bacon or you can bring home your soul, but your upbringing dictates that you can't have both. Because as much as you want to meet those higher needs of love and esteem and self-actualization, you have to survive first. And to survive you need money, and to get money you must help run the magnificent capitalistic machine. 

Your dad wasn't as comfortable as you were. He grew up with nothing, but he made it, through some hard work and some good bullshitting. He doesn't love what he does. That never mattered. What mattered was that he still got somewhere. That he gave you that awesome childhood full of chicken nuggets and cable TV he could never have. That he fulfilled his ambition of getting comfortable. That, as a consequence, you were quite comfortable too.

* * *

You won't be satisfied that easily. You need more than you really need. Something more than money (though, of course, you need that too). 

You realize your dad had all of your big hopes and dreams. You realize he wanted to enjoy his work. And when you grow up, you realize that having a job is more important than having a career. That self-esteem is impossible without shelter, that you can't care about morality if you don't have any money. 

You know the job pool is shrinking. What you didn't realize was how much further your expectations shrink it, the dreams the cogs of the capitalism give up, the fantasies you'll have to give up too. 

Maybe it's just part of growing up. Maybe selling out is necessary for survival. Maybe just because things are doesn't mean they should be.

* * *

So: what to do? 

Maybe you should lower your expectations. Maybe you should get used to manual labor. Maybe the 75-year-old woman scanning your Wal-Mart purchases shouldn't make you sad. Maybe that will be you in all those years. 

You should probably get used to the new economics of America. You should probably worry that your goddamned ambitions might well go unfulfilled.

Tempus Fugit

Contrary to what you believe, this blog has readers. One in Champaign, one in St. Louis, and (according to Google Analytics) one in Omaha. So you, Omaha reader, just know: you are not alone! (Also: I'm stalking you! This is the chief purpose fulfilled by modern technology.)

You readers demand high quality content, which (of course) I always deliver. The problem, though, is the eternity between deliveries. Sixteen days is way too long to make my bros wait, but alas, 200-page cross-cultural journalism projects intervene sometimes.

This place serves no purpose. None of its content matters. It makes no immediate impact. Yet in this void of uselessness a purpose does appear. 

The more I read, the more I realize I can't write worth jack shit. Though writers may appear fully formed upon their emergence into public consciousness, they weren't born that way. They first have to read and write and read and write and maybe type out every word of The Great Gatsby and probably do some actual work for actual money on the side and come home every night and read and write some more. 

I try to remember this whenever I promise to blog more frequently but always end up forgetting. Doing that econ homework or researching for that project matters much more in the now than any silly post here. But you only learn how to write more good through a helluva lotta practice. That time you spend staying useless is what makes you the most useful writer you can be. And if you wanna make a hobby and, God forbid, a career out of filling blank computer screens with words, you sure as fuck better practice.

I don't. I need to. I will.

See y'all sooner than two weeks from now. (Maybe).

Fear and Loathing in Chambana: May the Odds Be Ever In Your Favor

Last weekend, yours truly fearlessly drove a 1998 Mercury Sable without a working gas gauge thousands of miles from Highland to The Eighth Wonder of the World, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).

Needless to say, while there we killed people, burned shit, and fucked school.

There were a lot of things I wanted to do that I didn't. I wanted to pass a level 11 song on Dance Dance Revolution. I wanted to protest the introductory press conference of new basketball coach John Groce (more on him at a later date). I wanted to ask every Asian I passed "Hu's your professor?" because apparently that question can get quite complicated. I wanted to drink some wine and snort copious amounts of cocaine.

Sadly, none of these happened. I have not played DDR in years and thus miserably failed at even the easiest songs. My mother forced me to stay in Highland to support my badass little bro at his first track meet, so I could not infiltrate the press corps at Groce's introduction. I was too busy raffing at all the Asians studying on the weekend to ask them such politically incorrect questions. And as for the imbibing, we did that vicariously through The Boys and Girls Guide to Getting Down, my favorite independent film of 2006.

But the best part of this trip was obviously our time spent fapping to the love story of breadmaker Peeta Mellark and archeress Katniss Everdeen during The Hunger Games*. I would have preferred Kristen Stewart appeared somewhere in the movie (nothing sexier than a monotone voice and face made of stone), but drunk Woody Harrelson and creepy Lenny Kravitz more than made up for the story, you know, not being  nearly as enthralling and beautiful as Twilight.

UIUC is the weirdest place you could ever hope to be. You have about 20,000 forever-arone Asians**, another 20,000 whitebread fratstars and sorostitutes, and all ten people from Highland somewhere in between. That bizarre mix and the massssssssive campus (though the place has a real, functional bus system, something we at Mizzou are too good for) turned me off from going there, I do not mean to dismiss UIUC. 

No - the world needs UIUC. We need its thousands of engineering graduates to repair our nation's crumbling buildings during President McCubbins' Second New Deal. We need its weekend library dwellers to make us feel better about our own pathetic lives. We need its shitty TV channel to entertain us at 3 AM. We need the denizens of its Rec Room to film the next hit weight loss infomercial. We need its athletic programs to make the rest of the B1G look good, and we need the B1G to make the SEC look like the greatest collection of schools ever assembled in the history of mankind***. We need its women to wear yoga pants 24/7/365 and to remove them while in the close company of one Ricky Newcomb.

We need it to keep living up to that status - The Eighth Wonder of the World.

*Later, we found a group of Beanie Babies have already shot a far superior remake.

**Of course, many whites fit the forever-arone description, and a few Asians are in the Greek system. We just seek to reinforce racial stereotypes and make easy generalizations through our in-text depiction. This is all we're good at. Don't take it away from us.

***Which, of course, is totally true. #RollTide #WarEagle #WooPigSooey #GoStephenGarcia #GatorFansWearJortz

Life, The Living of

You always want to go home.

When home is Highland, Illinois, you just make sure not to stay too long.

I guess there are things to do. There are friends to see, the few I have still in the area. There are endless video games to play. There is Sports Center, and the repeat of Sports Center, and the repeat of the repeat. There are DVR-ed episodes of Dance Moms. There are blog posts to type out at 3 AM while watching P90 X infomercials. 

There is a Wal Mart. It is a SUPER Wal Mart. If you've lived here long enough, you've gone there needing to buy nothing. If you're under the age of 18, you've hung out there, because hell, there's nowhere else. You may have even practiced an interpretive dance to Total Eclipse of the Heart in the motor oil aisle. It's something to do.

So because there isn't much to be done, you consume yourself with the things that happen. They rarely matter, as you will see.

Neighbor's car has a new bumper sticker. Reads "my son fights for your honor student's freedom." Good they make that sticker, because the son in question sure as hell never made honor roll.

Same neighbor was out mowing the lawn today, shirtless per usual. He's about 5'10" and pushing three bills. And that large gut is covered in hair. Gray, curly, sweaty hair. There are kids in the neighborhood. Guess he doesn't realize. 

Found out my dad listens to conservative talk radio. Lost a little respect. Maybe a lot. He's looking forward to the repeal of Obamacare. I think he's a little racist, but he did vote for Alan Keyes over Barack Obama, and Keyes is black. Keyes is also certifiably insane, but never mind.

Dad works in the healthcare industry. They're doing pretty well, so why change it? He does bring home the bacon. Guess you can't blame him.

Driving around town, saw a lot of campaign signs. It is an election year. Every single one supported a Republican candidate. The county still occasionally elects Democrats, but that's only because of the liberal scum in Edwardsville.

Our Madison County treasurer is one of those Republicans. Apparently he's a sharp dude. Has a bachelors from Illinois and an MBA from Wharton. He also lost his kid while handing out flyers at the county fair. Shocking, considering the fluorescent orange color of the silly campaign polo he and his father wore. Hardly surprising when you consider the extent of his father's dipshittedness.

You feel so sorry for some of the people here. There are the ones who have lived here forever and will continue to live here forever. This place does that to people. It is Norman Rockwell's America, in demography if not in spirit. Other towns have tattoo parlors and black people. It's best to avoid them and stay here.

Then there are the outsiders. The racially diverse. The queers. The actors. The mathletes. The artists. The fake photographers. 

Some fake it well. Some, like this writer, get by. The writer is white and tall and masculine and succeeded in school and played a varsity sport. He has nothing offensive he has to say out loud. Those that don't look the part, that are different in more significant ways beyond some pithy mindset, aren't so lucky.

Oh well. At least there's Columbia to go back to. More things there, though fewer friends to do anything with. You feel awful when you're alone on a campus of 30,000 students supposedly so similar to yourself. Then you realize how many others feel that same way, even those that have the most friends and the best grades and the craziest weekends, and you wonder how to reach out to them, but communicating is really fucking hard so nothing changes.

It all looks so depressing on the page, but it isn't really. Though this place is an insular bubble, there's something to be said for the comfort that provides. Though you can't really relate to most people, at least they all look good and similar and won't steal anything from you, save your soul maybe. Though things could be better, they will never change, and humans, especially older ones, love knowing what to expect. 

The trick is to expect something more than what Highland gives.

It's a good thing I won't be here much longer.

Fear and Loathing in CoMo: Damn Africa, That's So Fetch!

Last weekend, the lovely lady known on the internets as "aRoseMcCubbins" visited yours truly in scenic Columbia, MO. We were the lamest people in town that Saturday; I mean, it was her spring break, St. Patrick's Day, and we only had enough alcohol to get Amanda's tiny little self "slightly tipsy" during a Mean Girls drinking game. (Yes . . . I celebrated my Irish heritage like a real man. DON'T HATE. TINA FEY IS A COMIC GENIUS AND PRE-CRACK LINDSAY LOHAN WAS OK I GUESS.)

BUDDHA BROS!
(and my awkward smile)

In spite of this, it was a lovely time. Yes, much of it was spent in an emergency room. Yes, we watched lots of Bridal Wars and Rob Dyrdek's Ridiculousness. Yes, the only souvenirs were fat Buddhas and finger puppets of historical figures. And yes, it was fucking awesome.

Saturday night we let the party get the best of us*. Due to the jacked sleep schedule we were on, there was no sleep to be had, so we just talked and talked and talked about the shit people who think too much think about. Politics, genius and the nature of success, the impossibility of maintaining mental health in our modern age, our love lives, the words of Truman Capote and the songs of R Kelly, the principles of misogynistic feminism, the possibility that the creationists are right, the massive right-wing conspiracies behind 9/11 and the moon landing . . . basically, all the normal shit people already address in everyday conversation.

We concluded that the world is fucked. It's the truth, and it's kinda ugly, but it's not bad. Life on Earth isn't easy. You gotta deal with a never-ending stream of assholes and bitches and dumbfucks and bullshit heading your way. So what? There are still laughs to be had and tears to be cried. There are awesome people to meet and talk to and possible fuck and marry and divorce. There are MGMT albums and Rams Super Bowl victories. It's OK to get down as long as you remember all the reasons there are to get back up again.

Here's to a future full of more great weekends with great people. Hopefully there's more booze and weed to accompany the journey next time.

*I claim to be cultured, yet I just linked to a Wiz Khalifa song. LOLOLOL. /hides in shame

Should You ♥ You?

"The importance of Liking Yourself is a notion that fell heavily out of favor during the coptic, anti-ego frenzy of the Acid Era- but nobody guessed, back then, that the experiment might churn up this kind of hangover: a whole subculture of frightened illiterates with no faith in anything."

--Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72

We're a long way from the Acid Era, but that hangover hurts worse than ever. Except today the frightened illiterates aren't a subculture- they are the culture. They are all of us.

Not that Liking Yourself is bad or that self-loathing is somehow noble. Of course not. Of course not. But now it seems like everyone doesn't just suspect himself of the cardinal virtues; we're also sure that nobody else possesses them. The Self must always be Right and Righteous. The man that disagrees is a European socialist intent on destroying the meager scraps left of the American Dream. The haters just can't handle your phenomenal swag.

But this is total and utter horseshit. Sometimes we are Wrong about things. And sometimes we are also unhappy or unenthused or (gasp) alone. That's fine. If there's anything wrong with being Wrong or Sad or Alone, then a) there's something wrong with being Human; and b) there's something wrong with Truth. That's terrifying.

(And then there's the more complicated issue of wanting Other People to Like Us so we can confirm that we are worthy of being Liked by Ourselves. It's the goal of every advertiser pimping consumerism as the Way to Happiness, of every passive-aggressive bitch posting man-hating Facebook statuses in search of self-affirming comments, of every no-good two-bit snake-oil salesman that wants your son to play basketball at the University of Kentucky. It's very complicated, very paranoid, very Nixonian- and damn dangerous. Paradoxically, it also seems to make ourselves less likely to Like Ourselves.)

The takeaway- it's OK to be wrong. Being pissed-off, not knowing what to do or where to go or whether to laugh or cry or both, is totally natural. Liking Yourself is natural too. What isn't OK is cheating yourself. Don't dismiss other people and points of view just because they're different. Don't think your shit smells that much rosier than the other humans you share 99% of your genome with. Take others and their strengths and faults and quirks as they are and find ways to like them, and then do the same with yourself.

Have faith, not fear. And most of all, be real.

(I don't even fully get what I'm saying, so now I will shamelessly ask for y'all to comment and argue with me below. This would affirm that this post was Worth Something, and by extension that I, the writer of this post, am Worth Something, so that in turn I may Like Myself. Plus, I'm always up for a good circlejerk!)

Well, Shit

“The problem was you had to keep choosing between one evil or another, and no matter what you chose, they sliced a little bit more off you, until there was nothing left. At the age of 25 most people were finished. A whole god-damned nation of assholes driving automobiles, eating, having babies, doing everything in the worst way possible, like voting for the presidential candidates who reminded them most of themselves. I had no interests. I had no interest in anything. I had no idea how I was going to escape. At least the others had some taste for life. They seemed to understand something that I didn't understand. Maybe I was lacking. It was possible. I often felt inferior. I just wanted to get away from them. But there was no place to go.” 

-Charles Bukowski

I've got no idea what the fuck to do.

Not now. Not in ten minutes. Not in ten years. Not ever.

No enthusiasm. No joy. No fun. Even the most basic conversation a struggle. Always tired but can't ever sleep.

No time to do too much and too much time to do nothing.

No idea what to write. Can't put words together. Once you think you can write good and pretty, writer's block really kills the ego. Makes you feel like less of a man.

Mitt Romney is about to become president. (Though he certainly doesn't remind anybody of themselves, the man he's running against is black. Gasp! Is he also Muslim? Is he socialist for a welfare state? Does he give a slight shit about poor people? The horror!)

Football season is almost over.

Got damn. Life sucks.

It isn't that bad, I know I know. Just average first world pains combined with a mild strain of seasonal depression. The aimless and absurd ups and downs of middle-class American youth. One huge glut of insecurities to swallow and digest and shit out and swallow again. Nothing that hasn't passed before and won't pass again.

Shit, man. There really ain't anything to do but wake up and eat and try and make friends particularly girls and usually fail and feel bad and get happy and sleep and rinse and repeat and get ready to fuck the world all over again because life doesn't wait and there are mountains beyond mountains to climb.

Blogging Rule #437: Always end a shitty, pretentious post with an equally pretentious song vaguely related to the point you were vaguely trying to make but vaguely failed to articulate. The song will do all your 'splaining much better.

Think Less/Say Yes

"In the end, no one will ever give a shit who has kept shit 'real' except the two or three people, sitting in their apartments, bitter and self-devouring, who take it upon themselves to wonder about such things. The keeping real of shit matters to some people, but it does not matter to me. It's fashion, and I don't like fashion, because fashion does not matter. 

What matters is that you do good work. What matters is that you produce things that are true and will stand. What matters is not the perception, nor the fashion, not who's up and who's down, but what someone has done and if they meant it. What matters is that you want to see and make and do, on as grand a scale as you want, regardless of what the tiny voices of tiny people say. Do not be critics, you people, I beg you. I was a critic and I wish I could take it all back because it came from a smelly and ignorant place in me, and spoke with a voice that was all rage and envy. Do not dismiss a book until you have written one, and do not dismiss a movie until you have made one, and do not dismiss a person until you have met them. It is a fuckload of work to be open-minded and generous and understanding and forgiving and accepting, but Christ, that is what matters. What matters is saying yes. 

I say yes, and if that makes me the enemy, then good, good, good. We are evil people because we want to live and do things. We are on the wrong side because we should be home, calculating which move would be the least damaging to our downtown reputations. But I say yes because I am curious. I want to see things. I say yes when my high school friend tells me to come out because he's hanging with Puffy. A real story, that. I say yes when Hollywood says they'll give me enough money to publish a hundred different books, or send twenty kids through college. Saying no is so fucking boring. 

And if anyone wants to hurt me for that, or dismiss me for that, for saying yes, I say: Oh do it, do it you motherfuckers, finally, finally, finally."

-Dave Eggers*

Eggers is a pretty smart motherfucker and, while sometimes a bit overwrought, one of the better writers out there today. After about half of his A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, I'm beginning to think the title may not be an exaggeration.

His point here is one I think about a lot, though I have little success implementing it. Even though we have greater ability to communicate today than ever before, we seem even more separated and fragmented and distant than usual. I guess it's because every time we communicate we're putting a little piece of ourselves out there to be judged, and that fear doesn't go away even for the most self-assured. In an era of constant communication, those pieces eventually add up to a paralyzing fear of opening up to new people or revealing new aspects of our lives to those we do know. And it all leads to the routine and stagnation we humans seem to naturally crave.

Eggers says, and I want to say, "Fuck that." If you want to do something, do it. If you're happy smile. If you're sad cry. If you're angry buy a Mitt Romney cardboard cutout and punch the hell out of it. If you're masochistic watch a Rams game while listening to Nickelback. Don't lie about how you feel to seem normal or to gain some perverted sense of community. Fuck the haters and the potential haters. Stay true to yourself and you won't have any regrets. Appreciate yourself and eventually others will follow suit.

Listening to the haters breeds regret, but so does not listening to the inviting call of opportunity. Better to do something and hate it than not do it and always wonder. So do things you've never done. Go outside. Laugh at others, laugh at yourself, laugh at life. You'll sleep when you're dead.

Now, if only I could listen to my own advice more often.

(song vaguely related to the larger point-you can figure out how, my genius readers!)

((plus, Japandroids are fucking awesome, so you really should listen!))

(((that is all.)))

*Eggers is a UIUC graduate! This is a fact that will hopefully please roughly one-third of our readers!

HLA's Top Ten Songs of 2011

Because everyone else is doing it, and because I'm not good enough to come up with unique post ideas, and because we must advance the spread of hipster music throughout the world.

Enjoy it, motherfuckers.

10. Wavves- I Wanna Meet Dave Grohl

Because really, who doesn't wanna meet Dave Grohl?

9. Random Guy on Subway- Niggas in Paris

Because I needed an excuse to link to this video.

8. M83- Midnight City

Because EPIC SAXOPHONE SOLO AT THE END. The audacity! Got damn!

7. Cults- Oh My God

Because who doesn't love concept albums featuring girl power vocals and creepy Jim Jones cameos over 60's pop-inspired beats?

6. Manchester Orchestra- Simple Math

Because this song and this band are fucking fantastic.

5. Neon Indian- Polish Girl

Because until there's new MGMT, Neon Indian is my go-to band for trippy shit.

4. Cage the Elephant- Shake Me Down

Because we could all learn to keep our eyes fixed on the sun- even on a cloudy day.

3. Foster the People- Helena Beat

Because it's almost as good as Pumped Up Kicks AND you haven't heard it ten million times already. (Well...at least not yet.)

2. Grouplove- Colours

Because Grouplove are the bestest new band out there.

1. Yuck- Get Away

Because that guitar sounds so fucking good I could fap to it ten times a day.
At least.

The Search

The search is what anyone would undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life . . . To become aware of the possibility of the search is to be onto something. Not to be onto something is to be in despair.

What do you seek- God? you ask with a smile.

I hesitate to answer, since all other Americans have settled the matter for themselves and to give such an answer would amount to setting myself a goal which everyone else has reached- and therefore raising a question in which no one has the slightest interest. Who wants to be dead last among one hundred and eighty million Americans? For, as everyone knows, the polls report that 98% of Americans believe in God and the remaining 2% are atheists and agnostics- which leaves not a single percentage point for a seeker. For myself, I enjoy answering polls as much as anyone and take pleasure in giving intelligent replies to all questions.

Truthfully, it is the fear of exposing my own ignorance which constrains me from mentioning the object of my search. For, to begin with, I cannot even answer this, the simplest and most basic of questions: Am I, in my search, a hundred miles ahead of my fellow Americans or a hundred miles behind them? That is to say: Have 98% of Americans already found what I seek or are they so sunk in everydayness that not even the possibility of a search has occurred to them?

On my honor, I do not know the answer.       

-- Walker Percy, The Moviegoer