I don’t think the cartoons from this week were that good, so if you are reading this and you can remember what you did on October 12, 2009 as if it were in the last week, don’t judge the cartoons based off of what you see as this week’s cartoons. Or if the cartoons from your week sucks (I hear the week of May 13th, 2014 is going to be shitty) then just look at another week’s. Yeah, that was a digression that took too long but was still very necessary.
I know New Yorker cartoons have been demonized in many other media, such as the famous episode in Seinfeld, and I’m pretty sure Family Guy had a joke about it somewhere. And I guess you could sort of agree with the criticisms that they are too elitist. But I don’t think that is fully true. The jokes are simple and funny, they are just put into a rather obtuse context in which everybody is either a struggling writer or a Manhattan socialite; as if there was a difference. So I still think that the jokes are fairly understandable and just as funny.
I have been going to this website for a couple of years now, and whenever I’m high I find myself going through his articles, because they are immensely insightful and interesting. I’m not sure if I enjoy it because I’m a public policy geek or because it is just well-written; I would like to say it’s a combination of the two, which is why I think you should check this out, especially if you’re interested in current events and policy issues.
I first learned about Brendan Nyhan when he went on the Daily Show for his book All The President’s Spin and to plug his blog, Spinsanity. I think this might have been back in 2004. Anyway, even though I don’t usually do this, I was so impressed by him during the interview that I went out and bought his book and started to read Spinsanity daily. Once that dissolved, I started to go to this website.
This is mental candy for somebody who is high. Basically what this site does is it takes misleading statements by politicians and people in the media and shows how what they say is either disingenuous or downright wrong. He also traces the way that lies develop and explains political phenomena. Finally, he has some fun diversions.
Here is the link in case you want to go there: http://www.brendan-nyhan.com/
Filed under: Reading | Tags: Fuck Goldman Sachs, Matt Taibbi, Politics, Reading, Rolling Stone, Weed
If any of you enjoy Hunter S. Thompson, you’ll love Matt Taibbi. If you don’t like Hunter S. Thompson, then I still think you’ll like him. However, I want to stress that while there are many similarities between the two writers (both of them are political correspondents for Rolling Stones, both of them love to experiment with crazy drugs and both of them are phenomenal writers) there are also a lot of differences. Matt Taibbi’s style of writing is a little bit more reserved, and while some his pieces may have to do with drugs, or were written while under the influence of drugs, they are not as dominated by the drugs he took as Hunter’s. Finally, while both of them indulge in first person narratives in order to describe a topic, Hunter S. Thompson’s pieces were really about him, and not so much about the topic, while Matt Taibbi focuses all of his attention on the topic. And, his writings are a little bit more technical, and some are so unbelievably technical that you have to read them a couple of times over to understand what he’s saying. But that’s not because he’s a convoluted writer, but rather because the subject matter he deals with sometimes is so difficult that, while he is great at explaining it, it is still hard to understand.
One reason why he’s so fun to read when you are high is because he can be extremely funny in how blunt he can be. He just calls people the fuck out. He calls politicians corrupt when they are, he calls people retards when they are and he calls something a scandal when it is. I first saw him as guest correspondent for Real Time with Bill Maher and I was extremely impressed with his work. Then, I read his article on Thomas Friedman and I was sold (here it is in case you want to read it: http://www.nypress.com/article-19271-flat-n-all-that.html). The first half of the piece deals with the tortured ways that Thomas Friedman bastardizes the English language and the second deals with his illogical idiocy. When I first read it I was sober, and it was one of the funniest pieces I ever read in my life. Then I decided that since I enjoyed it so much while I was sober, I must also enjoy when I’m high. So I tried that out for size and I loved it. One of the best things about reading Matt Taibbi is that his writing has such clarity that it is impossible to get lost in his words, even when you’re high. And most importantly, when you read something that he writes you learn a substantial amount about the topic, mainly because he does a shit load of research and communicates that research to you extremely well. And he also spends a lot of time thinking about his subjects, so the conclusions that he comes to are not only well informed, but some of them are quite brilliant. In short, he deals with a lot of otherwise tedious material in an extremely interesting way.
There is much more that I could say about how great it is to read what he writes while under the influence, but I’d much rather just show his work to you. So, if you want to see the best thing to read, it’s the article above about Thomas Friedman. Even if you don’t enjoy it at first, finish it, because the end is just perfect. Then if you like that, I would recommend getting one of his books (The Great Derangement is a great one) or just going to his blog: http://trueslant.com/matttaibbi/ or reading his pieces in Rolling Stone.
Filed under: Reading | Tags: Batman, Comics, David Mazuchelli, Frank Miller, Graphic Novels, Weed, Year One
Alright, weed is usually supposed to be a cool thing, so I guess when you smoke weed you’re usually supposed to be doing cool things. This is not one of those cool things that you could be doing. But I don’t believe in doing things only because they’re cool, so I still think that you should read Batman: Year One when you’re high. It is, to the best of my knowledge, a Batman comic written by Frank Miller that attempts to rewind the clock on the Batman comics and start anew, something that seems to be done a lot. But oh well, he does it really well.
I think there’s a certain appeal to reading when you’re high. It sort of becomes second nature in an odd way and the information gets processed without you really being aware of it. This is really cool when you read a comic book (sorry, graphic novel) because you get that cool feeling, and it couples with the amazement that you feel at how cool the pictures are. And the pictures are fucking amazing. They aren’t particular “artsy,” no real surreal imagery or exaggerated detail; just the typical solid section of color within the lines of a picture that seems to occupy all the recent Batman comics. But I don’t really think that pictures in a comic book are really supposed to be that “artsy.” They definitely can be, but if they’re not, it’s not really a problem, and I think this comic really proves that. They tell the story well, projecting the appropriate mood and supplying you with the information in an aesthetically pleasing way.
This is also an extremely intense Batman graphic novel. Again, this is heresy, but I heard that this is the graphic novel that the original Christian Bale Batman was based upon. This comic is as intense as that movie and then some. It definitely doesn’t come after you with its intensity (as the movie does), as if it were coming after you to take you and engulf you in its story; rather, it is a sort of pathological intensity. The imagery entices you to keep on experiencing the madness that this series is based upon, but only gives you so much that you know well enough what underlies the series, and leaves you wanting so that you keep on reading. It scares you and makes you want more at the same time. Now, this isn’t really a scary graphic novel, you won’t have nightmares, nor will you look around your backyard for hidden crazy criminals. It’s just intense on an extremely black, grim and criminal way. There’s a lot of vengeance and anger in this comic, and it’s presented well through the choice in imagery, and when you’re high you can sort of see how they accomplish establishing the mood and it becomes really interesting to watch how they are playing around with your emotions.
Filed under: Reading | Tags: Classical Greek Literature, Epic, High, Homer, Iliad, Weed
“Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans. Many a brave soul did it send hurrying down to Hades, and many a hero did it yield a prey to dogs and vultures, for so were the counsels of Jove fulfilled from the day on which the son of Atreus, king of men, and great Achilles, first fell out with one another.” This is most probably the most epic beginning to anything ever. And it’s fitting because the Iliad is one of the most epic things ever.
Alright, I feel like I may be losing you on this one but just hear me out. I would say The Iliad is the best epic story to either read, watch or listen to while you’re high. Here’s why. Most other really epic stories (take Lord of the Rings, for instance) are way too long to watch when you’re high. You can’t really watch the movie, keep track of it and not fall asleep for 12-16 hours when you’re high, you just can’t do it. I mean, you can if you want to try, but then it becomes more about the epic watching experience than it is about the epic thing that you’re watching. The problem is, that you can’t really just go to a certain point in Lord of the Rings and feel the epic, grand nature of the story. I mean, you’ll feel it, and that’s what makes it a good movie, but it wouldn’t be enough to satisfy your need for something really epic. I know I’m repeating epic a lot, but that word really encapsulates what this story is about.
The Iliad doesn’t have that problem. Each scene is astounding. People call on Gods to send plagues and kill people. There are prophecies, and false prophecies, in dreams. Gods just kill people randomly because they feel like it, or they are angry. There are massive, immense battles. The disputes that they have are way cooler than the ones that exist in other epic stories (wars are won and lost over silly little possessions). People get consumed by greed or anger or whatever. And they are vicious too. They don’t spare an enemy, they destroy their enemies. And you have these crazy struggles going on constantly. It’s like an epic TV show. But instead of having melodramatic disputes over boyfriends that eerily resemble almost every other show ever made, these people just do the most insane actions. Fuck that melodramatic shit, Homer has armies and Gods and he can do whatever he wants.
But the major asset this story has is its tone. At times it may be hard to read, but I think that’s because we try to read it as a normal, present day text. It’s not. It’s an epic tale sung by a minstrel about Gods and men killing over the most trivial things, of people fighting one another at their worst. It’s just really cool to read, and the writing style speaks to that.
So, I promised that I would have another article up yesterday after a brief hiatus. As you can most probably tell, that didn’t actually manifest itself. To be quite honest, I’ve been too busy recently smoking pot and doing some of the fun stuff that I recommended that you all do (I especially loved Pineapple Express and T.J. Pearces). Since you are all stoners and have put off shit before because you were getting high, I assume you will all understand.
It’s weird but this is the second reading activity I’m going to recommend. I didn’t think that I would have this many, but I think it’s a testament to the fact that stoners are also academics. This is actually a website that was shown to me by one of my friends (he complained that he wasn’t referenced in another recommendation, so I’m going to make this indirect shout-out to him). In fact, it was shown to me about 10 minutes ago.
The url is: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/how-to-make-your-live-better/Content?oid=2015823
Some may think that this site is like this one. It isn’t, although it is sort of similar. Because I have only read a couple of articles, I can’t really give a lengthy review, but it’s fun to read and has some pretty cool ways to make your life better by smoking weed. I’ll make some more reviews in a while, I have to smoke first.
When you’re high your attention span is not nearly long enough to read a full book. Nor does your high really last that long. So, while I would usually recommend his books (the most famous of which is Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas); when it comes to being stoned I would recommend either reading passages from his books, maybe a chapter, or just reading his Gonzo journalism articles. One article that is easily accessible online is The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved. Now while this is a sports article, the likes of which you could find in Sports Illustrated (a publication he even worked for), you aren’t going to learn anything about the Kentucky Derby, and at the same time you are going to learn everything about it.
To put it bluntly, Hunter S. Thompson doesn’t really give a fuck about his subjects in the way that they were assigned to him. Let’s use the Kentucky Derby as an example. In the article he doesn’t talk about who won what race; nor does his interview jockeys, owners or trainers to figure out the “secrets” of riding. If you want to learn about the Kentucky Derby that way, you can really just read any other sports columnist. Hunter S. Thompson works to capture the mood and character of the people at the Kentucky Derby. He includes conversations (not anything along the line of an interview) with drunkards, naïve loungers, bellboys, people that he meets and Steadman, the cartoonist hired by his publication (Scanlan monthly) to draw something about the Kentucky Derby. This article includes the first interaction between Hunter and Steadman, an interaction that would lead to others that would eventually transform Steadman from a straight-laced British conventional cartoonist to an innovative abstract cartoonist, who most probably does his fair share of acid. Now, even though this is a specific article, most of his other articles go along the same line.
