Daniel Clausen's Blog, page 40
August 31, 2017
A Mission from Richard Branson
Richard Branson is a random fun-junkie. Or, so I've heard.
Anyway, I rolled out of bed one time and found Richard Branson laying next to me. He didn't say, "Whatcha thinking about?" like some clingy girlfriend. No, he's too classy for anything like that. Instead, he pulls out a roll of money and says, "I need to hang low for a few days."
So, there he is in my apartment. He drinks my tea and wears my socks, as eccentric billionaires do. And I ask him, finally, "What does this have to do with anything? What does this have to do with success, with love, with victory? What am I supposed to learn from this?"
"Randomness, mate. I wanted to live your life for a day to see what I was missing out on by not sleeping with beautiful women, being rich, and making the world's most awesome companies."
"And...?"
"And...well, now I can go back to enjoying my life. As far as what you can learn from all this...well, just remember. There was someone out there who wasn't being you and doing all the great things you get to do, whatever that is...mostly wearing clean socks -- immaculately clean by the way. And not having a fluffy pillow -- and 8.5 on the fluffiness scale. Oh, and not having clean water to drink and all that. That's important and ought not to be taken for granted."
"I need more, Richard. You're disappointing me."
He snaps his fingers and my small apartment suddenly fills with amazing women all dancing to club music in a very small space.
"See," he says. "Sometimes it pays to have a small apartment."
And because my apartment is so small we can literally high five each other over the five hot women dancing between us.
"One more thing!"
"Yeah, what's that?"
"You have to make sure Dustin and his monkey finish their journey in the Underground Novel..."
And before I can ask him what he means and why the project is so important, Richard Branson disappears in a cloud of smoke leaving me with an apartment full of attractive women...
...as Richard Branson is apt to do.
*Richard Branson wants you to lead an amazing life.
This may or may not include reading random fiction like “The Underground Novel”, which can be checked out here:
https://www.wattpad.com/story/1024623...
Anyway, I rolled out of bed one time and found Richard Branson laying next to me. He didn't say, "Whatcha thinking about?" like some clingy girlfriend. No, he's too classy for anything like that. Instead, he pulls out a roll of money and says, "I need to hang low for a few days."
So, there he is in my apartment. He drinks my tea and wears my socks, as eccentric billionaires do. And I ask him, finally, "What does this have to do with anything? What does this have to do with success, with love, with victory? What am I supposed to learn from this?"
"Randomness, mate. I wanted to live your life for a day to see what I was missing out on by not sleeping with beautiful women, being rich, and making the world's most awesome companies."
"And...?"
"And...well, now I can go back to enjoying my life. As far as what you can learn from all this...well, just remember. There was someone out there who wasn't being you and doing all the great things you get to do, whatever that is...mostly wearing clean socks -- immaculately clean by the way. And not having a fluffy pillow -- and 8.5 on the fluffiness scale. Oh, and not having clean water to drink and all that. That's important and ought not to be taken for granted."
"I need more, Richard. You're disappointing me."
He snaps his fingers and my small apartment suddenly fills with amazing women all dancing to club music in a very small space.
"See," he says. "Sometimes it pays to have a small apartment."
And because my apartment is so small we can literally high five each other over the five hot women dancing between us.
"One more thing!"
"Yeah, what's that?"
"You have to make sure Dustin and his monkey finish their journey in the Underground Novel..."
And before I can ask him what he means and why the project is so important, Richard Branson disappears in a cloud of smoke leaving me with an apartment full of attractive women...
...as Richard Branson is apt to do.
*Richard Branson wants you to lead an amazing life.
This may or may not include reading random fiction like “The Underground Novel”, which can be checked out here:
https://www.wattpad.com/story/1024623...
August 29, 2017
An interview with Leo Robertson about viscosity.
Daniel: You’ve written extensively on the Cannon Company and the concept of Viscosity in your previous works. Can you tell us a little more about these things?
Leo: Cannon Instrument Company have a page on their site where you can access their catalogue and sales literature. Cannon is an innovative company that sells viscosity measurement instruments. I thought viscosity was such a fascinating topic that I have spent, to date, maybe a year or two of my life studying viscosity, talking about viscosity, predicting viscosity… Oh the viscosities I’ve seen! Honey, bread, crude oil, milk, prawns, even a non-Newtonian mixture of Miscanthus grass in water: you name it, I’ve seen it flow. That last one was so interesting that it took six months alone, and I wrote a master’s thesis about it. Would you believe that we humans, in our hubris believing ourselves so exalted now by having conquered nature, don’t even understand grass?
Daniel: Actually, this interview has gotten a bit out of hand. Would you mind terribly if we terminated it here?
Leo: Nothing ends. All things are part of one giant flow. I flew to Canberra to visit the National Gallery of Australia, where Michael Craig-Martin’s conceptual art piece An Oak Tree resides. An Oak Tree is “a pristine installation of a glass of water on a glass shelf on metal brackets 253 centimetres above the ground.” Craig-Martin transformed the glass of water into an oak tree “without altering its accidents.”
Daniel: Hmmm...so, you seem to have some training in the conceptual arts...
Leo: I am not a conceptual artist: I am a scientist. Unfortunately this means I don’t have the same skills in conceptual art, and when I stole the piece and transformed it into Miscanthus grass (in order to better understand it), I may or may not have deliberately given it some accidents. I drank the grass and accidentally became an oak tree, then measured my own viscosity.
Daniel: Well, we started off by talking about viscosity, then you ended up an oak tree, and we still don’t know that much about viscosity. Still, I’d like to thank Mr. Leo Robertson for avoiding gratuity and keeping his pants on during this interview, even when he became an oak tree. Hopefully, I haven’t given him too many ideas for his next interview.
*This micro-short was kindly provided by Leo Robertson.
You can check out his book "Sinkhole" right here:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
Leo: Cannon Instrument Company have a page on their site where you can access their catalogue and sales literature. Cannon is an innovative company that sells viscosity measurement instruments. I thought viscosity was such a fascinating topic that I have spent, to date, maybe a year or two of my life studying viscosity, talking about viscosity, predicting viscosity… Oh the viscosities I’ve seen! Honey, bread, crude oil, milk, prawns, even a non-Newtonian mixture of Miscanthus grass in water: you name it, I’ve seen it flow. That last one was so interesting that it took six months alone, and I wrote a master’s thesis about it. Would you believe that we humans, in our hubris believing ourselves so exalted now by having conquered nature, don’t even understand grass?
Daniel: Actually, this interview has gotten a bit out of hand. Would you mind terribly if we terminated it here?
Leo: Nothing ends. All things are part of one giant flow. I flew to Canberra to visit the National Gallery of Australia, where Michael Craig-Martin’s conceptual art piece An Oak Tree resides. An Oak Tree is “a pristine installation of a glass of water on a glass shelf on metal brackets 253 centimetres above the ground.” Craig-Martin transformed the glass of water into an oak tree “without altering its accidents.”
Daniel: Hmmm...so, you seem to have some training in the conceptual arts...
Leo: I am not a conceptual artist: I am a scientist. Unfortunately this means I don’t have the same skills in conceptual art, and when I stole the piece and transformed it into Miscanthus grass (in order to better understand it), I may or may not have deliberately given it some accidents. I drank the grass and accidentally became an oak tree, then measured my own viscosity.
Daniel: Well, we started off by talking about viscosity, then you ended up an oak tree, and we still don’t know that much about viscosity. Still, I’d like to thank Mr. Leo Robertson for avoiding gratuity and keeping his pants on during this interview, even when he became an oak tree. Hopefully, I haven’t given him too many ideas for his next interview.
*This micro-short was kindly provided by Leo Robertson.
You can check out his book "Sinkhole" right here:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
August 27, 2017
The Exalted Fogie (an essay)
Details about my dad stand out now in ways they didn't before.
He played the harmonica; he sang the munchkin song from the Wizard of Oz to make us laugh; always cereal and yogurt, usually in front of the television.
When he got older he got really buff as a way to offset the look of his face from the laser surgery to cut out the cancer.
He watched the Price is Right and daytime TV and liked to hang by the pool.
Long after he passed away, I still continued to believe he was around living another life. I believed that he had faked his death so that he could live beyond our judgment -- a free life as a fogey, wearing torn jean shorts and playing the harmonica, going to the thrift stores and hanging by the pool, he would give his money to strangers freely.
I was looking out the window one day from my car when I saw a man in an old, sun-worn t-shirt and jean shorts. Few were as skinny and sunbaked as my dad.
But there he was.
I followed the man for a long time. Eventually, I lost him. But I thought that that really could have been him. Just some guy somewhere, living his life. I might not even recognize him until it was too late.
This was around the same time I was reading Shane Joseph's Fringe Dwellers. In the story, the main character smells a dirty old man and says, "So much for cultural disparities--we are all one, at least in our filth."
I thought about what that would mean for us, his family. What does that mean that he faked his death? What did it say about us and how he felt about what we did for him (to him) in the later part of his life?
It seemed entirely logical to me though that he might try to fake his own death just so he could live as a kind of fogey, in a world, apart from us, where fogies are exalted.
*If you like this essay, you might like this short excerpt from my novel, The Ghosts of Nagasaki. You can read it right here:
https://www.wattpad.com/303342110-red...
He played the harmonica; he sang the munchkin song from the Wizard of Oz to make us laugh; always cereal and yogurt, usually in front of the television.
When he got older he got really buff as a way to offset the look of his face from the laser surgery to cut out the cancer.
He watched the Price is Right and daytime TV and liked to hang by the pool.
Long after he passed away, I still continued to believe he was around living another life. I believed that he had faked his death so that he could live beyond our judgment -- a free life as a fogey, wearing torn jean shorts and playing the harmonica, going to the thrift stores and hanging by the pool, he would give his money to strangers freely.
I was looking out the window one day from my car when I saw a man in an old, sun-worn t-shirt and jean shorts. Few were as skinny and sunbaked as my dad.
But there he was.
I followed the man for a long time. Eventually, I lost him. But I thought that that really could have been him. Just some guy somewhere, living his life. I might not even recognize him until it was too late.
This was around the same time I was reading Shane Joseph's Fringe Dwellers. In the story, the main character smells a dirty old man and says, "So much for cultural disparities--we are all one, at least in our filth."
I thought about what that would mean for us, his family. What does that mean that he faked his death? What did it say about us and how he felt about what we did for him (to him) in the later part of his life?
It seemed entirely logical to me though that he might try to fake his own death just so he could live as a kind of fogey, in a world, apart from us, where fogies are exalted.
*If you like this essay, you might like this short excerpt from my novel, The Ghosts of Nagasaki. You can read it right here:
https://www.wattpad.com/303342110-red...
August 25, 2017
The Underground Novel - The Meaning of the Hustle - Part 3 - The Wisdom of Gene Kelly
The Novel in Short: After graduating from university with a degree in business, Dustin has a problem. He needs to figure out a way to break through the confines the world has built for him. The confines of middling employment opportunities, family expectations, and the small imaginations of others. Luckily, he’s not alone. With his monkey sidekick, Dustin braves the hazards of the real world, demonstrating his own unique brand of hippy entrepreneurship.
You can read the latest chapter right here:
https://www.wattpad.com/460791697-the...
You can read the latest chapter right here:
https://www.wattpad.com/460791697-the...
August 24, 2017
A Concise History of the 21 Century So Far as Seen from the University of Miami Gym
Daytrader #14 tells me in the University of Miami gym in 2003 how good it is to be in his late 20s, free, without a boss, and able to play the American economy like a video game.
Five years later the world almost ends.
Eight years later, an orange clown is elected president.
To this day, serious people ask: Time to become a daytrader? (And perhaps more boldly -- How do we make the world friendlier for daytraders?)
An Optimist’s View of the 21st Century: Video games are fun, clowns are interesting, and flirting with the apocalypse keeps otherwise apathetic citizens engaged.
*If you liked this short story, you might like this short one as well -- Fabian and the Flower Pot
https://www.wattpad.com/305483251-pur...
Five years later the world almost ends.
Eight years later, an orange clown is elected president.
To this day, serious people ask: Time to become a daytrader? (And perhaps more boldly -- How do we make the world friendlier for daytraders?)
An Optimist’s View of the 21st Century: Video games are fun, clowns are interesting, and flirting with the apocalypse keeps otherwise apathetic citizens engaged.
*If you liked this short story, you might like this short one as well -- Fabian and the Flower Pot
https://www.wattpad.com/305483251-pur...
August 22, 2017
Idle Tuesday (essay)
Her breath comes heavy and labored. It's the summer of 2011, but I feel like a ghost inhabiting a future self. Or maybe this is my future self, mimicking a person that no longer exists.
I'm playing an old arcade version of the football game Blitz in the lobby of a movie theater in Edgewater, Florida. The same one I played eleven years ago when I was a high school student. My mom has to settle herself down on the bench next to the game to catch her breath.
She has COPD and in another two years she will have trouble just walking into the movie theater. Soon we're out of the lobby and in the theater. It's 4:00 on Tuesday in the afternoon and we are the only ones there. We are watching a movie that is out of time. It's the new Planet of the Apes movie, which is really based on number four of the old Planet of the Apes movies. I try to explain this all to my mom and I think she does a good job of pretending she understands. In the back of my mind, I notice that she's still having trouble catching her breath.
Later that day, I'm reading Feeding the Ghost by Fred D'Aguiar, one of my old novels from college I had in storage. A week later I give it away. Little by little I'm learning to let go. Before I do, though, I write a little nothing review of it on goodreads.com--something to mark the passage of time. The only thing I can think to say about the book is that it's poetic.
My mom and I are driving through Oak Hill now, a little town just south of Edgewater. Actually, I'm driving and she's talking. My mom tells me that the town is so small that if I blink I might miss it. This too strikes me as poetic. The town is small and beautiful and she asks me to take her there again someday.
This is how the summer of 2011 goes.
A nothing summer really. I quit my job, play old arcade games, read books from my college years, and vaguely I sense that my mom might not have much time left.
Now two years in the future, I know this to be true.
One idle Tuesday with my mom. If I hadn't looked closely, I might have missed it.
If you like this essay, you might also like the short story "Sam and Ruddy" here:
https://www.wattpad.com/413598810-pur...
I'm playing an old arcade version of the football game Blitz in the lobby of a movie theater in Edgewater, Florida. The same one I played eleven years ago when I was a high school student. My mom has to settle herself down on the bench next to the game to catch her breath.
She has COPD and in another two years she will have trouble just walking into the movie theater. Soon we're out of the lobby and in the theater. It's 4:00 on Tuesday in the afternoon and we are the only ones there. We are watching a movie that is out of time. It's the new Planet of the Apes movie, which is really based on number four of the old Planet of the Apes movies. I try to explain this all to my mom and I think she does a good job of pretending she understands. In the back of my mind, I notice that she's still having trouble catching her breath.
Later that day, I'm reading Feeding the Ghost by Fred D'Aguiar, one of my old novels from college I had in storage. A week later I give it away. Little by little I'm learning to let go. Before I do, though, I write a little nothing review of it on goodreads.com--something to mark the passage of time. The only thing I can think to say about the book is that it's poetic.
My mom and I are driving through Oak Hill now, a little town just south of Edgewater. Actually, I'm driving and she's talking. My mom tells me that the town is so small that if I blink I might miss it. This too strikes me as poetic. The town is small and beautiful and she asks me to take her there again someday.
This is how the summer of 2011 goes.
A nothing summer really. I quit my job, play old arcade games, read books from my college years, and vaguely I sense that my mom might not have much time left.
Now two years in the future, I know this to be true.
One idle Tuesday with my mom. If I hadn't looked closely, I might have missed it.
If you like this essay, you might also like the short story "Sam and Ruddy" here:
https://www.wattpad.com/413598810-pur...
August 21, 2017
Literature as Religion (The Sage and the Scarecrow)
Project Summary: The following is Chapter 1 from my 2004 novel The Sage and the Scarecrow.
At the moment, I am revising the chapters from this book into 3-4 page short stories for posting on my blogs and in literary magazines.
The Novel in Short: Six months after his father has died from cancer, Pierce finds himself in a state of anxiety and crisis. The book follows Pierce through a journey to find his best friend and the only person he thinks can “cure” him.
People often ask me about my beliefs: whether I believe in God, whether I’ve read the good book, and the like—I tell them I’m an English major and that I have a horrible propensity for reading too many books and having too much free time on my hands; and, although I haven’t read the Bible, I have read Nietzsche’s The Anti-Christ and numerous amounts of Greek and Roman literature involving divine intervention.
Religious fanatics always give me a strange look when I jokingly tell them that I’m currently forming a religion based on the revival of polytheism, the idea being that quantity over quality is the new direction in popular religion in this modern day of capitalist production.
You can read the entire revised first chapter of “Sage and the Scarecrow” here:
https://www.wattpad.com/314113958-pur...
At the moment, I am revising the chapters from this book into 3-4 page short stories for posting on my blogs and in literary magazines.
The Novel in Short: Six months after his father has died from cancer, Pierce finds himself in a state of anxiety and crisis. The book follows Pierce through a journey to find his best friend and the only person he thinks can “cure” him.
People often ask me about my beliefs: whether I believe in God, whether I’ve read the good book, and the like—I tell them I’m an English major and that I have a horrible propensity for reading too many books and having too much free time on my hands; and, although I haven’t read the Bible, I have read Nietzsche’s The Anti-Christ and numerous amounts of Greek and Roman literature involving divine intervention.
Religious fanatics always give me a strange look when I jokingly tell them that I’m currently forming a religion based on the revival of polytheism, the idea being that quantity over quality is the new direction in popular religion in this modern day of capitalist production.
You can read the entire revised first chapter of “Sage and the Scarecrow” here:
https://www.wattpad.com/314113958-pur...
August 18, 2017
A Positive Change
Sam started telling people to sod off. He did it with a smile. Since most of the Americans had no idea what he was talking about, he got into less fights. Not a bad change. A sign of maturity for ol’ Sam.
Story’s over. Now sod off, reader.
Story’s over. Now sod off, reader.
August 17, 2017
Cygor 2040
Comically bad presidents had gone out of style in the 30s. Absurdism was now in style.
The cyborg gorilla who wore lady’s underwear on his head was the right choice for the times. He had to get rid of the shoulder-mounted laser though because he only used it to point to graphs and charts when giving speeches.
Too professorial, polling had found.
The cyborg gorilla who wore lady’s underwear on his head was the right choice for the times. He had to get rid of the shoulder-mounted laser though because he only used it to point to graphs and charts when giving speeches.
Too professorial, polling had found.
August 16, 2017
Review of Richard Branson's Business Stripped Bare
Business Stripped Bare: Adventures of a Global Entrepreneur by Richard BransonMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
There are phonies in this world, the highest class of which are bullshit artists, and then there are people who are genuine. These people aren't always the nicest people, so it's delightful when someone is simultaneously charming and genuine.
That's what you get with Richard Branson.
You also get someone who is absolutely dedicated to a good time. This book is in fact dedicated to convincing the reader that creating a quality business is a really good time... the best time that could be had, in fact. The book is also written in a tone that suggests you're just chatting with the CEO in a bar or something.
That I'm not so sure about starting a business being a good time. I'm wary of death by 1,000 operational details.
The book also presents Richard Branson as a kind of Jim Carrey in "Yes Man." "Give it a go!" Branson writes over and over again. Life is for those willing to "give it a go". Success is only gotten by those who give it a go. I think this is a great idea...and something I've struggled to unlearn. Most of my 30s have been spent learning how to say "no" -- and only "yes" when I've said two or three "nos" or finished some other lingering projects.
Giving it a go burned me out a bit in my 20s. Pruning, focusing, organizing, consolidating have been the themes of my 30s. Richard Branson would not approve.
The way I would write the lesson is -- "You have to give something a go! But choose wisely exactly what that thing is. If you're not sure what it is...test it out in small steps until you find that one thing you really want to give a go." That's a lot less sexy than the point Richard Branson wants to make.
And Richard Branson is all about the sexiness.
Where was I...?
Oh yes, the virtue of saying "no."
This is not a lesson for the entrepreneur. Branson introduces the key figure of Freddie Laker. He is not just Freddie Laker, he is the "four-times married Freddie". That's important because the entrepreneur doesn't fear the "four-times married" life. Someone like me cringes at the one-time married life.
So, before you live like Richard Branson, an important question: Are you ready to survive three divorces on top of a number of business failures?
Grit. An entrepreneur can survive rejection, several divorces, some bankruptcies, etc. I felt like that should have been part of the book. 1,000 nos on the way to success...
One thing I also took about Richard Branson's thought process. Don't be afraid to ask elementary questions! That's a fantastic message for young people...or anyone really who is the process of becoming an independent thinker. I feel like the further we get away from primary school, the more frightened we get of asking elementary questions about what is going on around us.
If this book sounds like your cup of tea, then I suggest you give it a go!
View all my reviews
