“With [McCoy Tyner’s] death,” writes Andrew L. Shea, “we’ve lost our last living link to perhaps the greatest jazz quartet ever, but more importantly, we’re stripped of an individual and searching voice.” The missus and I happened to catch one of Tyner’s sets while on our honeymoon nearly 30 years ago.

Speaking of the passing of personal heroes, Brewmeister Smith shuffled off this mortal coil yesterday.

Pssst: “Although most people would define authenticity as acting in accordance with your idiosyncratic set of values and qualities, research has shown that people feel most authentic when they conform to a particular set of socially approved qualities.”

$9,992 is what an in-state student will pay for tuition and fees to attend Purdue next year. Which is what it cost in 2013.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

About a block from helveticka world headquarters there’s a business that offers “Spokanes only 15 minute workout.” A missing apostrophe, I thought to myself. Where could it have gone to?

Only as far as the shop across the street, it turns out—on a notice in the window that says they’re now “open on Sunday’s.”

I briefly entertained the possibility of returning the stray punctuation to its rightful owner, but thought better of it. There are already enough weirdos in the neighborhood.

In the meantime, repeat after me: Apostrophes don’t make nouns plural! (Unless we’re talking about, say, the plural form of lowercase letters. But that’s something else entirely.) Also, while we’re at it, if it’s possessive, add an apostrophe + s, e.g. Spokane’s only 15-minute workout.

Or, you know, if you don’t know the rules, maybe just refrain from making signs.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  make a comment

The definition of the word privilege, like that of racism, has lately been stretched so far as to have lost all meaning. So you can imagine how I felt when I read the following:

The thing I’m most sure I had though, that was a direct result of my extraordinary privilege, is the blindness with which I bounded toward this profession, the not knowing, because I had never felt, until I was a grownup, the very real and bone-deep fear of not knowing how you’ll live from month to month.

That’s Lynn Steger Strong writing in the Guardian about how “you can only be a writer if you can afford it.”

But it wasn’t the obligatory use of the p-word that raised an eyebrow. No, it was the terrible writing. And if you think a fifty-six-word sentence with six commas is bad, it does, in fact, get worse:

I did not know what this writer, who I thought was single, paid in rent, or all the other ways that they might have been able to cut corners, that I, a mother of two, could not cut, but even then, it felt impossible to me that this writer was sustaining themselves in any legitimate way without some outside help.

One sentence, sixty words, eight commas, zero rhythm. And it’s all made even more confusing by the almost aggressive use of they as a singular pronoun. Here’s another example, just for fun:

For my students, for all the people I see out there, trying to break in or through and watching, envious, I want to attach to these statements and these Instagram posts, a caveat that says the writing isn’t what is keeping this person safe and clothed and fed.

Do you have any idea what she’s saying? I sure as hell don’t.

Look, it’s not the length of the sentence that bothers me.(I’ve written about this before.) It’s not the inordinate number of commas, either. It’s not even the random shifts from one subject to another. It’s the dearth of any sort of musicality in her writing. Like the person who claps on one and three, Lynn Steger Strong has no inherent sense of pitch and rhythm.

But ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because she’s right: If someone is making money writing like this, privilege can be the only possible explanation.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  make a comment

Couple of heavy reads for y’all today.

Over at Cabinet magazine, Justin E. H. Smith takes stock of his soul: “My dad,” he writes, “was a computer guy, my mom was a rural family-law attorney, known to accept chickens and goats from destitute clients in lieu of legal tender; I am a philosopher. And we’ve all spent our lives, with varying degrees of success, chasing after that sweet, sweet cash.”

And Agnes Callard continues her series of columns on public philosophy at The Point with a look at thoughts and prayers: “I refuse to beg God. As I see it, God already knows what I want, and doesn’t need my advice on how to run the universe.”

If that’s a all bit much, you may find Jessica Riskin’s The Defecating Duck, or, the Ambiguous Origins of Artificial Life an amusing read—particularly if you’re familiar with your Voltaire. “Without the shitting duck,” he wrote, tongue planted firmly in cheek, “there would be nothing to remind us of the glory of France.”

And speaking of such things, does anyone—anywhere—need to be told this? Really?

Finally, a new music recommendation: We’re New Again: A Reimagining by Makaya McCraven.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

Words of wisdom from the great James Hubert “Eubie” Blake:

“Be grateful for luck. Pay the thunder no mind—listen to the birds. And don’t hate nobody.”

Amen.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

There is a Twitter account called Wiki Titles Singable to TMNT Themesong. It is, as its name suggests, a bot that chronicles—hourly, mind you—the titles of wiki articles that can be sung to the theme song from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. To wit: “Sisters of the Infant Jesus,” “Microsoft Solutions Framework,” “Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects,” et al. As of this writing, the account has nearly 50,000 followers.

We truly live in the best of times.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

In light if this steaming pile of stupidity—in which one of the “concerns” raised against American Dirt is that the “controversial” book, which is apparently about Mexican migrants, was written by a white American (gasp!)—I think it’s important for all you pearl-clutchers out there to read this timely essay by George Packer.

Oh. Wait. That would require y’all to embrace complexity rather than simply “bask in the warmth of a blinding glow” of your own moral certainty. Or, you know, to actually read the book before sanctimoniously denouncing it.

Never mind.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  comments(1)

Remember when President Jimmy Carter led a multi-nation boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics when the Soviets refused to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan?

Sure, the boycott itself was ultimately a failure—and the commies ended up boycotting the 1984 Los Angeles games in retaliation anyway—but at least there were principles behind the president’s action. Nowadays, you can’t swing a cat without hitting some smug, self-righteous twit calling for a boycott for anything from holding an untenable political position to thinking Bad Thoughts™.

So naturally I was pleased to hear that Philip Pullman is bringing some respectability back to boycotting. If there’s one thing all literate people can agree on, it’s that the Oxford comma is good and noble, and should be preserved at all costs.

Down with the Brexit 50p coin!

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  comments(1)