How I Met Your Mother...Eventually

I'd like to take a minute to reflect on a television show and what it says about our culture in the way that it reflects it back to us and helps us form a better understanding of why it is that we do what we do when faced with the circumstances that occur in our daily life.

That show, of course, is Hee-Haw.

Actually, the show is How I Met Your Mother, and while it's not consistantly good (the recent storyline involving Barney and a stripper pushes all the wrong buttons for me, it seems like a mistake), it does do something that I think a lot of shows don't even bother to do: tell a story.

Now, as an English major (hell, as someone with a degree in English; I often have to remind myself of that when I'm feeling low. I have a degree, I'll just be damned if I can do anything with it just yet), I am what you might term a fan of narrative, the convention by which a story is an actual story and not just a random series of events strung together for high ratings or to please the insane demands of Charlie Sheen. And a few TV shows seem to fit nicely into the niche of "over-arcing story," though sometimes they become so bogged down in the mythology that they lose focus of the characters in order to advance what the audience knows (or thinks they know) is important. See the last few years of The X-Files (though I did not).

HIMYM from the very beginning satisifies both the demands of a linear story (after all, he's telling it to his kids, though I agree with Peter Griffin that it doesn't make any sense for him to sound like Bob Saget when he gets older) and the occasional foray into side-stories that complement the main narrative while not distracting us from it entirely (unless they do so in a manner that makes us appreciate the main narrative all the more). It's not so much a show about how Ted, the protagonist ("main character," as non-English majors might say), meets the mother as how it is that he didn't meet her sooner. There's an almost Waiting for Godot effect that, if I'd ever read it, would strike me as either an apt metaphor or not (after all, does Godot ever show up? Dunno).

Now, some people have problems with this, suggesting that the delay of meeting the mother (and thus starting the story of how the kids that are listening to the story came to be) is being drawn out. They're right, of course, but the producers of the show know something: this is how the best romantic comedies work.

Think about a typcial romantic comedy: boy and girl meet, then ninety to a hundred minutes later they end up happy together. End credits, wait for the obvious Rod Stewart standards cover, and consider gouging your ears out everytime you think you hear the romantic theme playing in your local Starbucks. But hold on: what occurred during the eighty-plus minutes between meet-cute and making whoopy? Shenanigans, that's what. The journey is often more rewarding than the destination (unless the destination is Katherine Heigl, then it's just torture all around).

What I like about the show is that it acknowledges this, with false leads and false starts because often times, that's what it's like in real life. We know that Ted met the mother, we know he's happy now (unless he isn't...ooh, interesting idea: what if he's telling the story of how he met the mother while he's getting a divorce? Nah, too sad). What matters is what came before, what led to that. Therein lies the drama, however well-done it is (or isn't).

I'm roughly the same age as Ted (the "protagonist," if you'll recall), and I've had my share of near-relationship experiences with various women over the years (a few of them were even aware of this and active participants in the near-relationship, happily enough), so I can relate to him better than I can, say, Don Draper (though I don't have AMC and thus cannot judge for myself whether I'd like Mad Men). HIMYM isn't my favorite show (that nod, right now, is to Community though I still watch The Office out of loyalty and obligation) but it is a show that I like tremendously, because it takes the somewhat stale notion of the meet-cute and extends it past the breaking point, to where you almost don't care how it turns out because you're enjoying the ride.

That was a slightly pretentious sentence, but what do you expect? I have an English degree, people!

Anyway, enough time spent musing in front of the computer screen about a fictional story, now off to the bookstore to buy another fictional story!

Bring the Creative Non-Fiction, Clemson!

The Clemson Literary Festival is currently underway this week, and while I can't knock the line-up for this year too much (Richard Ford is one of those authors I keep meaning to start reading, and my old professor/boss at McSweeneys John Warner is one of the authors at the event), I do have a slightly different list of people I'd like to see at the event (or events, as it's a series of readings and what not spread out over a couple of days). It's my wish-list, if you will, and while allowing for the fact that Vonnegut, Hunter S. Thompson, Updike, and Graham Greene are no longer among us (but what a hell of a panel discussion that would be: "Sin and Man in Twentieth-Century Literature..."), I think I'd stick to something that doesn't get mentioned much when people learn that you're an English major: creative non-fiction.

Barring the kind of creative non-fiction that actually is fiction (James Frey, Jayson Blair, etc.), creative non-fiction to me consists mostly of well-written essays, and essay-writing is an art form that looks deceptively easy but is anything but. For the most part, creative non-fiction has been my most publishable endeavor (i.e., magazines and online sites tend to look for it more than fiction), and I have some definite preferences.

I like the work especially of non-fiction writers (or fiction writers dipping their toes in the non-fiction stream) that challenges accepted notions. I'm something of a pop-culture obssessive (in case you couldn't tell from some of my previous posts), so I love to read either about bands or artists or directors that I already know or love, or discover new paragons of whatever art form I'm reading about who either just started or were unknown to me before I read that essay or collection.

With that in mind, let me offer my dream list: Roy Blount Jr. (Southern writer whose book About Three Bricks Shy of a Load is my favorite football book), Michael Chabon (kinda cheating, because he's primarily a fiction writer, but his collection Manhood for Amateurs is a must-read), A.J. Jacobs (The Know-It-All), Anthony Bourdain (c'mon, you gotta read Kitchen Confidential), Sarah Vowell, Tom Wolfe (he invented the creative non-fiction genre, more or less), P.J. O'Rourke, David Sedaris, Chuck Klosterman, Greil Marcus (these two are the best rock critics I've ever read), and I'm blanking on who else but I'm guessing that's a pretty solid line-up. So make it happen, Clemson...I dares you!

Unless you can get Thomas Pynchon to come out of hiding, I think my list is hard to top (but that would top it).

Trevor has spoken...

Easter 2: Electric Boogaloo

Easter is around the corner, and that means that my internet access this weekend will be kaput, as I rely on the auspices of the local libraries to allow me access to only the classiest nineteenth-century erotica and, well, they're gonna be closed.

Charlie Brown: "Augh!"

Anyway, I have some good news: I may have a book review published in the next issue of Paste Magazine (next week sometime). I'll know more probably by Monday (such as...well, if it is being published), and will update accordingly.

Until next week, then, be safe out there, San Diego....

We're the Young Generation, and We Have Nothing to Say

Last weekend, I made a judgment call that might come back to bite me in the ass. Indeed, it already has, to a certain extent. What was it?

I bought the Monkees' greatest hits on CD.

Call it folly, call it whimsy, call it ironic detachment from a cultural lodestone with associations with the bizarrely kitsch experience of nostalgia for an era that I never experienced, or call it simply being reminded, via Davy Jones' recent death, that the "made for TV" band actually had some good songs, whatever it was that compelled me to make this purchase faded almost as soon as I popped the CD in my car, not even having exited the parking lot of the record store where I went, and realized with growing horror that in addition to the five or six songs I wanted, there were twenty-plus on the CD that I did not.

And before you lump me in with the people who only buy CDs for the one or two songs they like (you know, the whipping-boys of late-nite "Hits of the Seventies" CD collections courtesy of Time-Life), allow me to say this: I am not one of those people, generally. That's why we have iTunes now (thank you, disembodied voice of Steve Jobs!). But I felt a little weird about buying "Daydream Believer" without hearing "Last Train to Clarksville," "I'm a Believer," or "Pleasant Valley Sunday." Say what you will about the obvious artificiality of the group (any TV band that strives to be more "authentic" need only look at the songs on the CD not credited to professional songwriters to realize that sometimes creative control can be a bad thing), they made four or five instant classics, and I discovered as I let the CD play on that a few more non-hit "hits" could almost make up for the treacle that dominated the playlist.

Really, honestly, do yourself a favor and scan some of the songs on iTunes at your convenience. They're either bad Beatles knock-offs or hippie-era platitudes that sound hilarious in our more cynical age.

Most of the good songs, contrary to what the obits said at the time of Jones' passing, were in fact sung by Mickey Dolenz, the "drummer" (they didn't actually play on the first couple of albums, because that would've been commercial suicide). The CD booklet from Rhino tries to make an argument that the group really flowered when they got to write their own material, but I'm skeptical. Sometimes people who want artistic control get it because they deserve it; sometimes they squander it because, let's face it, they weren't the creative force behind the scenes anyway.

But I have the CD, and I have listened to it now enough to not be as worried what other passing motorists might think (most of the time their systems are booming so much they couldn't hear it anyway), and while I'm tempted to maybe offer it up for free to the party or parties most interested in listening to it, I might as well keep it a while. Hell, it might grow on me (note: it will not grow on me, I was being polite). Generally, you get what you pay for with "greatest hits" packages, from the sublime transcendence of Al Green and the Kinks to...well, whatever it is that happens when you listen to the Monkees songs that aren't well-known, and for good reason.

Such is life...

Rick Santorum Makes Bush Look Like Einstein

To lighten the mood a bit, because I've had a stressful couple of days, I want to admit something that might shock some people.

I do not care for Slim Jims.

There, I said it...the all-purpose mystery-meat byproduct, no doubt, of late pitchman Randy Savage is not something that I would consider appetizing.

But because of my gallbladder issues, I've had to go on a diet that cuts out a lot of the things I do love: pizza, lasagna, cheeseburgers, salsa, basically anything that's good but not good for me.

I am more than ready for my gallbladder to be gone, I guess I'm saying.

But I don't know where Slim-Jims fall on the dietary laws debate, because I've not eaten one in quite a while. I imagine because of their spiciness (no doubt a byproduct of the Macho Man's insistance on personally selecting only the finest herbs and spices from the Far Orient), they would not agree with me anyway, gallstones or no. But dammit if I'm not curious!

Trust me, I don't actually want a Slim Jim...I just miss the option to choose one for myself to eat, if I were so inclined. It sucks quite a bit...but it's a minor complaint, naturally.

Somewhere in Pitchman Heaven, the Macho Man is encouraging Billy Mays to snap into a Slim Jim...

The Love You Make Is Equal to The Love You Take

I just finished a biography of Paul McCartney (Fab, by Howard Sounes), and I feel like addressing it here because, well, Amazon doesn't truck with cursing in its reviews...dammit.

Actually, I wanted to address it here because I felt like more of an open-ended essay than a proper review, so here goes:

I have a complicated relationship with Sir Paul, dating back to when I first got into the Beatles and realized that, for all its many faults, the local library was stocked with Beatles-related histories and biographies for me to pursue. I gravitated towards Paul first because (do I really have to say it?) I play air-guitar lefty.

In my defense, I started doing air-guitar in my early pre-teen phase of liking music but not necessarily loving it, and I enjoyed doing air-guitar in the mirror because this was the tail-end of the hair-metal movement and everything that I saw on TV featured long-haired guys with wicked guitar solos, usually done in slow motion while they milked it for the camera. A towel draped over my head and any long, vaguly rectangular object (such as a ruler or even a stick) in hand, I would emulate these fellows, looking in the mirror and seeing myself reflected as playing right-handed, even though I was actually doing it wrong (I'm righty). I did it this way for long enough that, to this day, when I do air-guitar I favor my left hand, even though really I should be doing it right-handed.

There, now you know my secret shame...anyway, I gravitated to Paul for that most superficial of reasons, which is why, when I eventually rejected him as a false idol and turned to John instead, it was for an equally superficial reason (John and I have the same birthday). Plus, it doesn't hurt that, in his solo career especially, Paul has aimed for the easy buck, with schmaltz that was evident during his Beatle career taking over for the genuine songcraft he often exhibited when pushed to do better (usually by John). But the man wrote my favorite song of all time, "Hey Jude" (and I bet, if you're honest with yourself, you probably like one or more of his Wings or solo songs, too. They're just so damn catchy sometimes). So, like it or not, in addition to reading each and every new Beatles book under the sun (as well as the classics, of which Philip Norman's Shout! is hard to top even today), I find myself drawn, unwillingly, towards the collective literature around Sir Paul, of which Fab is merely the latest, if not the best, of the bunch.

Sounes does that rare thing for a Beatles biographer; he calls Paul out on his shit (see, there's the cursing!) that he produced in the Seventies and Eighties, as well as that stupid-ass mullet that Paul affected for way, way too long (in terms of rock-star hairdos, the mullet is the poor man's permed-up late Eighties 'do). But he also shows that, despite everything, Paul is perhaps the most decent guy in rock music, a man who genuinely loved his late wife Linda (who was, let's face it, a groupie, but one who was in it for the long haul), and was duped by Heather Mills into a marriage that made Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor look tame by comparison. He donates to charities, often without any public notice (except, of course, when you hear about it, through journalists, so maybe he does do it for the public notice after all), and he tries to perserve the legacy of the Beatles despite his insecurity over John's well-publicized canonization as a saint of rock and roll since his death in 1980 (various biographies of John pass muster or fail in terms of how much they stick to the facts about John's various issues, not in glossing over the nastier sides of the man).

After reading Fab, I kinda wanted to give Paul a hug, despite the fact that part of me loathes him and, in my darker moments, I always thought that if any Beatle deserved to be shot, it should be Macca. Nowadays, I can accept that Paul will probably be the last one left standing (Ringo is only a couple of years older, but he looks worn-out, and his All-Star Band tours do nothing for his standing in the eyes of rock and Beatles fans). I can even concede that maybe, if Paul were to ever buy back the rights to the Beatles' catalogue, his wish to change the credits around to "McCartney/Lennon" would probably happen. But I don't think I'll even hold him in the same estimation as I do John because (much like Francois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, where I discovered the films of the former through the work of the latter and, as I studied their lives, found more in common with Truffaut than I did Godard) Paul is a good gateway Beatle, but he's not the one that you want to say is your favorite, unless you're a former teenage girl stuck in arrested development.

So Sir Paul, while not okay in my book, is a decent enough guy, I guess. I hope his third wife isn't the pariah that Heather Mills was, and I found the story of his life with Linda touching (even if I would never, ever consider becoming a vegetarian. I come from a family of meat-cutters). He might be dopey, even a little creepy with his prenaturally dyed hair, but Paul is still a Beatle, after all. And the motherfucker could write great songs when he wanted to (see, I cursed again!).

Gallbladder Blues, I Got 'Em

In the wonderful world of Medical Oddities, it seems that my family is a prime carrier of a gene which causes the gallbladder in our bodies to periodically go out and try to kills us. Now it's my turn, and I couldn't be more thrilled.

No, really.

Back around this time last year, I suddenly started having trouble sleeping, on account of the fact that my stomach, once a trusted friend who could take anything I shoved down my gullet with a minimum of fuss (except Mexican food), started to...well, not hurt so much as make its presence felt, often at one in the morning, and abating only when I'd given up on getting that eight hours I felt I was entitled to.

I was in fear of it being something terrible (such as cancer, or an alien baby growing inside me. Neither option seemed attractive), but I was also in debt, and as the summer came around and I ate less in general due to the oppressive heat (hard to be hungry when it's 110 in the shade and you have to work in a sweaty place with questionable AC), the "attacks" as I dubbed them seemed to fade away.

Cue Christmas, when, among other things, I realized that maybe going back for seconds on that lasagna wasn't such a great idea. Gradually it became clear that, no matter what I tried (antacids, Pepto-Bismol, laxative, apple juice), all these were temporary solutions to what seemed to be a permenant problem. Finally, a few weeks ago I broke down and went to the doctor I'd seen about getting pills to take when I had my teeth worked on a few years back, because he's a general practicioner and he works with people who don't have health insurance (yours truly). I turned to him because, after a calm of two weeks, I endured probably the worst case of an "attack" after consuming two fried baloney sandwiches (which, in turn, turned me off baloney forever. I mean it, the thought of it makes me want to hurl). He surmised that it could be gallstones, but we wouldn' t know for sure until an ultrasound was performed.

Ultrasound? But doctor, I'm not pregnant!

Apparently they do those for gallstones, too, and as it turned out (my ticklish sides notwithstanding) it was a fairly easy thing to sit through as the tech scanned my side and stomach. The verdict that they gave me? Gallstones.

I plan to name them all "Mick" because they've got moves like Jagger.

In all seriousness, I'm relieved to finally have a diagnosis for my ills, and not one involving the "c" word. My well-meaning sister suggested I read Tuesdays With Morrie some time back, but the thing that stuck with me most was a description of Mitch Albom's uncle being in pain and "clutching his stomach" because pancreatic cancer was slowly killing him. Not sure I remember much after that passage, as I tried to both block it out with positive thought and let it overtake me with negative thought.

I've known people that had to deal with cancer; some of them licked it, some didn't. It's something to take very seriously. So I was happy to learn that, apart from a few cuts into my body to remove my gallbladder, I would be fine.

Wait, you want to cut into me?

Visions of various medical procedures in movies and TV that went horribly wrong flash thru my head on occasion (anyone who is familiar with the defibriliator scene in John Carpenter's The Thing or the chest-bursting scene in Alien can't take the idea of abdominal work lightly). But I read a really good biography of Humphrey Bogart over the weekend (Tough Without a Gun), and I think I can channel some of his world-weary nonchalance on the operating table and I'll be fine. I don't know when the cut date is (surgical consultation is tomorrow), but I look forward to getting it over with.

Because as my muse Kelly Clarkson might say, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Of course, I don't turn to Kelly for everything in my life, just decisions regarding major medical surgery.

Maybe I need a new muse.