But poems are like dreams: in them you put what you don’t know you know.
Adrienne Rich, ‘When We Dead Awaken: Writing as Re-Vision’ On Lies, Secrets, and Silence (via thedaysarenotfullenough) (via libraryland)
Monthly Archives: July 2014
One of the three B’s?
This morning, kidlinger walks up to my desk while I work, looks at the laptop screen critically and asks: “What’s that?”
Me: “I’m listening to Shostakovich.[1]”
Kidlinger: “He’s not one of the three killer B’s.[2]”
Me: “True. Would you prefer to listen to Bach, Beethoven, or Brahms?”
Kidlinger: “I don’t know.”
Me: “How about some Bach… violin sonata in G minor? Something to encourage you to practice your violin.”
Kidlinger: “Yeah, that sounds good.”
NOTES:
[1] Here’s a brief bio on Shostakovich: http://www.classical.net/music/comp.lst/shostakovich.php
[2] This is not a reference to the 1991 release of Anthrax’s B-sides collection Attack of the Killer B’s. But it is a reference to the three greatest classic music composers, commonly knowns as the Three B’s, Bach, Beethoven, or Brahms. Here’s a link to recent relesases of the Three B’s from NPR’s “Music We Love Now: New Albums Of Bach, Beethoven And Brahms”: http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2013/03/18/174659127/music-we-love-now-the-3-bs-on-cd
Quote: “I use the Internet intensely….”
I didn’t foresee that my whole little life was going to revolve around this object, this computer. That’s worth exploring to me, not simply being critical of it. If you’re going to have a movie about people my age in L.A., they’re going to have to be online a lot of the time or it’s not realistic. But for anything to happen, they have to stop being online. All of those little moments throughout the day when you’re like “What am I doing? Who am I?” I just check my e-mail, or I go online. That sort of mini-lost feeling isn’t new, but I’m curious what happens when you don’t really have to see it through, ever. There is always a distraction.
Miranda July, on the characters in her new film, The Future (via thesalinasvalley)
Meformer, informer, which one are you?
“Meformer” (vs “informer”) is not a new term,[1] but for some reason it is making its rounds on social media the last few[2] months.[3]
NOTES:
[1] Jennifer Van Grove, Mashable, “STUDY: 80% of Twitter Users Are All About Me”, September 29, 2009, accessed July 15, 2014, http://mashable.com/2009/09/29/meformers/
[2] Patrick Allan, LifeHacker, “Be an Informer, Not a ‘Meformer’, To Get More Followers On Social Media”, May 29 2014, accessed July 15, 2014, http://lifehacker.com/be-an-informer-not-a-meformer-to-get-more-followers-1583508468
[3] Kirk Englehardt, LinkedIn, “Are you a Twitter ‘Informer’ or ‘Meformer’?”, June 03, 2014, accessed July 15, 2014,
https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140603184736-3091133-are-you-a-twitter-informer-or-meformer
Quote: “Our brains are affected … by the media we use”
“I’ve always been suspicious of those who seek to describe the effects of digital media in generational terms, drawing sharp contrasts between young “Internet natives” and old “Internet immigrants.” Such distinctions strike me as misleading, if not specious. If you look at statistics … the average adult has spent more time online than the average kid. …. And the idea that those who grow up peering at screens will somehow manage to avoid the cognitive toll exacted by multitasking and persistent interruptions is a fantasy contradicted by neuroscientific research. All of us, young and old alike, have similar neurons and synapses, and our brains are affected in similar ways by the media we use.”
Nick Carr, from the afterword of the paperback edition of The Shallows (via wwnorton)
Coffeehouse Junkie 