John Crowley's Blog, page 8

Nixies

On a day in 1969, late at the office where I was one of the proofreaders of the new compiuterized NY phone book, a salesman cold-calling businesses in the building wandered in trying to sell a new kind of desk calculator. He wasn't going to make a sale there, but he showed it off for us anyway: it was a beauty, dark and mysterious. The row of numbers at the top were alight, somehow, little orange ghosts inside glass tubes; at the press of a button they'd change. If you looked closely you could see that surrounding the digit that was alight were silver threads of all the other nine digits that could light up. Well, on remembering this, I of course repaired to the Web, where in a few minutes I found technical descriptions and pictures of machines like that one, though they all seemed a tad less wonderful. And I learned the name of those magic numbers: they are "Nixie tubes." "Nixie" from NIX-I, a technical designation, but also of course the word for a magic water-sprite. Here's a picture.

Dutch Spaniards at work

From today's NY Times, about the ongoing IRS probes and the 501(c) organizations: "With work at the Exempt Organization Division at a standstill, Owens pointed out that 'the clear impact of the investigations has been to throw a proverbial wooden shoe into the machinery, causing it to grind to a halt.'"In whose proverbial universe is it a wooden shoe that stops the machinery? I have only ever heard that it was a monkey wrench (whatever exactly that is) or in Britspeak a spanner (see John Lennon, "A Spaniard in the Works"). Wooden shoe?

Me, storyteller

In my new position (apparently) as Digital Editor of the Wall Street Journal  (would that be different from Editor of the Digital Wall Street Journal?  All this is in flux) I have lots to say about powerful storytelling.  It should be immersive. Who could argue?

http://www.journalism.co.uk/news/tips-on-immersive-storytelling-from-the-wall-street-journal/s2/a555919/

crowleycrow @ 2014-02-14T17:05:00

Seen Michael Cimino's "Heaven's Gate"? It ended his career, was called pretentious overblown, overlong, bloated pointlesss. I finally decided to see. It's not awful. It's quite wonderful in many ways -- superb cast of amazing people, Vilmos Zigmond cinematography, beautiful crafted setpieces crowded with extras and movement. True, the story (such as it is) comes to a halt while all this is poured out, but in a way the film is modern in its unconcern for a tight plot and setups and payoffs. Could only watch an hour before turning it off for the night. 2 hours to go.

Maybe I'll start watching the great disasters and elephantine flops by good filmmakers.  Ishtar.  What was the one about Tong wars in Chinatown?

Anachronisms and plagiarisms

Somewhere in my novel Lord Byron's Novel I had Byron (as author) describe something lost or forgotten as "gone where Saturn keeps the years," a phrase I had Byron put in quotes.  Becasue of a question that cme up a few postings ago I looked up the quotation, which I've known for years and assumed was, oh, SHakespeare, Pope.  No: It's Edward Arlington Robinson, around a hundred years after.

And last night I was watching North by Northwest and came upon the following interchange between Cary Grant and spymaster Leo G. Carroll:

GRANT:  I don't think I caught your name.
CARROLL:  I don't think I pitched it.

The same joke -- with "tossed" instead of "pitched" -- is in my last novel Four Freedoms.  Could I possibly have remembered it from the movie?  It seemed when I thought it up to be something a little of wiseacres might have said, but I believed I'd made it up.

Oxymoron of the day

The NY TImes on the Christie associate Bill Stepien:

"Bill Stepien has not broken any laws,” the lawyer, Kevin H. Marino, wrote, arguing that the subpoena violates his client’s rights against self-incrimination and unreasonable search and seizure. “He is one of the most well-respected political consultants in America.”

Spells cast, anyone?

This came in as a comment ot a long-ago post, and so that those who need it won't miss it, I post it here:

Is Dr.parto you can email him if you need his assistance in your relationship,Ipromise you.your problems will be solve immediately. After being inrelationship with him for seven years, He left me, i did everythingpossible to bring him back back but all was in vain. I wanted him backbecause of the love I have for him, I begged him but he refused until Iexplained my problem to someone online and she suggested that I shouldrather mail a spell caster that could help me cast a spell to bring himback but I am the type that never believe in spell, I had no choice than totry it, I mailed the spell caster, he told me there was no problem thateverything will be okay before three days, that my ex will return to mebefore three days, he cast the spell and surprisingly in the second day,that was around 4:00pm. My ex called me, I was so surprised, I answered thecall and all he said was that he was so sorry for everything that happened,that he wanted to return to me, that he love me so much. I was so happy andsurprised. Since then I have made a promise that everybody I know willnever have a relationship problem, that I will refer them to the spellcaster to help them.

An email address is attached.  Post here if you would like it sent to you.

Take back your poils

Language goes viral vaster than any video. Only days ago I first heard a term -- maybe it lay doggo a long time before suddenly beginning to multiply -- that now I hear again from Emily Bazelon at Slate: "In all the pearl clutching about college-age men and women getting drunk and getting laid, we’re missing the fact that for lots of young people in the U.S., college isn’t one big party." "Pearl clutching" -- is this new, old, just made up, inherited? It's funny and right, and will be welcome -- until about 40000th iteration. Then it will go where Saturn keeps the years (note formerly viral tagline).

AA+

Note from a rather touching NY Times story about a man who defined his pursuit of money as wealth addiction:  "Dozens of different types of 12-step support groups — including Clutterers Anonymous and On-Line Gamers Anonymous — exist to help addicts of various types, yet there is no Wealth Addicts Anonymous. "

We know well those AA meetings in church basements or the like, folding chairs, flourescent lights and a coffee urn.  Wonder what a support group meeting for wealth addicts would be like?

The article: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/19/opinion/sunday/for-the-love-of-money.html?ref=opinion

crowleycrow @ 2014-01-04T09:06:00

The beloved column/site News of the Weird has a category of weird events they call "Not Clear on the Concept."  Here's a nice example in writing -- this taken from the NY Times article about Urban Dictionary http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/04/technology/a-lexicon-of-the-internet-updated-by-its-users.html :

Because Urban Dictionary allows people to add multiple definitions to each entry, questionable entries include follow-ups that offer perspectives on why those words are not acceptable.For example, the definition for a word describing people with cognitive challenges and difficulties includes the sentence, "People who choose to make fun of the mental retarded tend to be complete morons and cannot comprehend that these people have feelings and emotions just like anyone else."