thank you notes 4/4
i'm thankful for the association of small bombs, the novel i started last night, which is great so far. i'm thankful for the strange precision of the descriptions ("Back in the market, people collapsed, then got up, their hands pressed to their wounds, as if they had smashed eggs against their bodies in hypnotic agreement and were unsure about what to do with the runny, bloody yolk"), the metaphors ("why bother, when the entire circuitry of their brains had been rewired to send up flares of grief"), the level of understanding of the narrator ("Later, everyone reported seeing a gushing white star, and there was a long silence before the screams stared, as if, even in pain, people watched each other first to see how to act.").
i'm thankful to remember when i tried to mine all of the similes from the flamethrowers and to imagine that i might do the same with this book when i'm done reading it. i'm thankful for finely milled parts, but i'm also thankful to witness the impossible possibility of complicated machinery in action. i'm thankful for how whole and human the characters feel to me after only a few chapters.
i'm thankful for this kotaku podcast episode, which raised an issue i hadn't considered, which is that with VR goggles, it's hard to smile or laugh or have any facial expressions. i'm thankful, even though i'm really excited to try VR, to think about the kind of scary implications of that with regard to how we mirror other people's facial expressions as a way of emotionally aligning with them to communicate and how the movement of facial muscles is tied to our feelings (i.e. the idea that the physical act of smiling more makes us happier). i'm thankful for the host's description of trying to watch inside out in VR and crying and how his tears filled the lenses and he had to take off the headset.i'm thankful to remember when i tried to mine all of the similes from the flamethrowers and to imagine that i might do the same with this book when i'm done reading it. i'm thankful for finely milled parts, but i'm also thankful to witness the impossible possibility of complicated machinery in action. i'm thankful for how whole and human the characters feel to me after only a few chapters.
i'm thankful, to move along a parallel line, for this lrb piece by frances stonor saunders about borders and place and identity and "the digitally verified self." i'm thankful for all of her great barbed jokes, especially when she says, "smiling was banned in 2004, along with frowning or raising eyebrows " as a way to explain that the reason you can't smile or have any facial expressions in your identification photos is to enable the digital image of your face to function "as a blank somatic surface, scraped clean (exfoliated) of all affective expression in order to be differentiated from other faces" by automatic facial recognition software (i'm thankful, then, to imagine a wide grin or a sobbing visage as debordian tactics for evading the grasp of mass surveillance, for the concept of using emotional weaponry to fight the data state).
i'm thankful i sorted and packed our recycling in the bins yesterday afternoon in the sun so i don't have to do it today. i'm thankful i cleaned all of the balled up plastic bags and empty packages of cinnamon gum and folded copies of medical bills and credit card offers from my backpack, which made it much lighter and made my bike ride more pleasant. i'm thankful for this delicious chocolate layer cake that d made yesterday and which is so moist and rich and good. i'm thankful for this tipsy baker post about licuados and doing crossfit and her relationship with her son, which, especially after some of the acid that's passed between them in the past, is like a piece of delicious chocolate layer cake.
i'm thankful that we were watching the michael pollan netflix show and there was a soundbite of a food industry person who's become a consumer advocate saying "i propose this diet to people--you can eat whatever you want--ice cream, cake, cookies, anything--as long as you make it all yourself" and thankful that d and i looked at each other warily and were like "uh, we could do some serious damage to ourselves" (i'm thankful that we probably are already doing some serious damage to ourselves while feeling like we're being somewhat restrained and moderate, but thankful to enjoy the damage and to try to erect fortifications against it through exercise).
i'm thankful for the show, which is beautifully photographed and made me feel a need to question my consumption of some of the processed foods i love more than some of the arguments i've seen before, but then i'm also thankful for the post i saw on the internet later about coffee peanut m&m's, which instantly birthed a deep lack inside my mouth. i'm thankful that we bought four new spoons at target because we were tired of always running out of spoons and having to wash them. i'm thankful that i got two spoons from the .75 bin and two slightly heavier spoons from the 1.25 bin and thankful that the person at checkout rang them all up as .75 spoons because she didn't feel like scanning them all.
i'm thankful that we were watching the michael pollan netflix show and there was a soundbite of a food industry person who's become a consumer advocate saying "i propose this diet to people--you can eat whatever you want--ice cream, cake, cookies, anything--as long as you make it all yourself" and thankful that d and i looked at each other warily and were like "uh, we could do some serious damage to ourselves" (i'm thankful that we probably are already doing some serious damage to ourselves while feeling like we're being somewhat restrained and moderate, but thankful to enjoy the damage and to try to erect fortifications against it through exercise).
i'm thankful for the show, which is beautifully photographed and made me feel a need to question my consumption of some of the processed foods i love more than some of the arguments i've seen before, but then i'm also thankful for the post i saw on the internet later about coffee peanut m&m's, which instantly birthed a deep lack inside my mouth. i'm thankful that we bought four new spoons at target because we were tired of always running out of spoons and having to wash them. i'm thankful that i got two spoons from the .75 bin and two slightly heavier spoons from the 1.25 bin and thankful that the person at checkout rang them all up as .75 spoons because she didn't feel like scanning them all.
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