Raronauer'ed

NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert is the MTV Unplugged for the...

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 21:36:00 -0700

NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert is the MTV Unplugged for the internet age.

After a long hiatus, The Cranberries is about to return with a new album called Roses. But if this performance at the NPR Music offices is any indication, the group isn’t afraid to dip into its arsenal of early hits.

“Get a Life.” “I Have a Life.” “Yeah, I Know All About It.”

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:23:16 -0700

It wasn’t too long ago, when bored and inebriated, I decided to buy Beverly Hills, 90210, the complete season 4. Say what you will about Amazon, but they do enable purchases of this sort.

Some background: Season 4 was the last of the Brenda years, and the gang’s first year at California University, and where, among other things, Brandon joins the Task Force and has an affair with Lucinda Nicholson, Steve rushes KEG and is accused of date rape, Andrea loses her virginity and becomes pregnant, Kelly and Donna join the Alphas, David develops a problem with Uppers after doing the graveyard shift for KXCU, the campus radio station, and Dylan’s car is hijacked and he meets his long-lost sister. This leaves out Brenda, who in one year, transfers out of Minnesota University, becomes engaged to Stuart Carson after a three week courtship, is arrested for her new-found animal rights advocacy, and takes the lead in the campus production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roofed after rumors circulate of her affair with famed director Roy Randolph.

I love 90210 for a lot of reasons, not just the plot points. In some ways, it’s a window into the 90s, or some rich producer’s idea of the 90s. There are jean shorts, scrunchies and flowy dresses. It’s not just the aesthetics, it’s the politics: consensual sex, animal rights, and abortion politics. Out of all the things that strike me as unrealistic about the show, Andrea’s pregnancy is probably the most outrageous, even more absurd than David’s meth habit depending on fresh squeezed orange juice. Obviously, Gabrielle Cartes is about 33 when she’s supposed to be a freshman in college, and in every scene, this fact is impossible to ignore. And yes, she really was pregnant, so there wasn’t much chance of her getting an abortion. But still, the characters act as if her having a baby as a freshman in college is the only option and that Jesse threatening to break-up with her if she has the abortion is tantamount to a proposal.

Maybe since there was no internet and next day episode summaries, the writers aren’t too concerned with making the plot make sense. For instance, after rushing off to Vegas to elope with Brenda, Stuart Carson disappears for ten episodes. And what about that episode when Brenda discovers the diary of a young woman who lived in her bedroom decades before and casts the whole gang in her imagination as some version of this woman’s life in 1968? What of it? It’s hard to object any time Dylan McKay is in period clothing.

I’ve been watching 90210 s4 occasionally with a friend, and emailing plot points to another one in Bulgaria, whose career in Anthropology was bi doubt inspired by Lucinda Nicholson and her penchant for seducing younger men with a traditional feast from an aboriginal tribe in Guatemala. But like I did in the 90s, I’ve been watching this season mostly alone. There’s something oddly satisfying about watching something so unwatchable, and not even be able to confer with the internet about it afterward. It’s like the solitude of the mountains, but in my bed, on a laptop, on a lazy Sunday.

The best part of being from Westchester is when architecture...

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 09:37:45 -0700

The best part of being from Westchester is when architecture critics hate on the new Penn Station.

To me, being a feminist is about being in favor of women, and...

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 14:40:29 -0700

To me, being a feminist is about being in favor of women, and luckily, more women aren’t afraid of the term. We’re such a big minority group that we often don’t see ourselves as one large body, laughing alone with salad.

emilygould:

Obviously many men give a fuck what people think about them. But if they don’t, it doesn’t mean they’re insane. Whereas for a woman not to care – that’s actually pathological, self-destructive behavior, in the context of our culture. I love and valorize this kind of female craziness and the art it produces – I created a business to celebrate these women and their art. But I fear not giving a fuck, for myself. I wonder what it would be like to let go that much.

Calling Ben McGrath

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 18:05:51 -0700

This #Yale #football #Rhodesscholarship #rape story is amazing. It’s got all the things that make for good upper middle class journalism: higher education, sexual politics, the discretion of campus authorities and the discretion of the press, all over a college football rivalry.

It’s like the JoePa story for the effete class.

Diverging Stories of a Rhodes Candidacy

Some Things About Seeing Wilco on the First Night of Their New Tour

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 08:30:48 -0700

I could trace my entire adult life around Wilco albums. And seeing them on Thursday—my first big show in Denver, which I attended with my no longer new Denver friends—was like seeing an old pal.

(Sadly, it was like seeing an old pal for a quick coffee. There was some catching up on the new material, but not enough time to reminisce on all the old memories, that is, all of Wilco’s b-sides from 15 years ago.)

The show reminded me not just of the times when the lyrics of “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” limned the emotional landscape of my sophomore year of college or when my friend and I memorized the phonetic alphabet in the album’s honor our junior year, but also of seeing Oscar Robertson play basketball in an old timers game. Like watching the Big O thirty or so years after his prime, Wilco did not have the speed of their younger days, but still had an undeniable grace.

In chapter 1 of “What I Talk About When I Talk About Running,” my perennial desk side reading, Haruki Murakami asks “Who’s going to laugh at Mick Jagger?” This is in response to a silly thing a younger Mick Jagger said about singing “Satisfaction” at 45. That is, he’d rather be dead than be doing it. Of course now, Mick Jagger is over 45, still playing “Satisfaction,” and is not dead. Murakami’s point is that we all turn 45 or die, and who’s to laugh at a younger man for thinking he’d prefer the latter fate.

And while I wouldn’t laugh at Mick Jagger, Wilco is not still playing “Jesus, Etc.” at 45. That song, probably their most famous, was missing from Thursday’s set. Instead, what got most people to their feet was “Dawned on Me,” a song not about trying to get laid, but about being reminded of how much you love someone, and making a call to let that someone know about it. The new Wilco album isn’t about love lost, love poorly treated or love hard to achieve. Instead, “The Whole Love” is a record about the slow drama of maintaining love over a lifetime. That is, the kind of music a dad could rock out to.

vneckandacardigan: Orange nails and a ridiculous looking first...

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 07:59:38 -0700

vneckandacardigan:

Orange nails and a ridiculous looking first generation Kindle (Taken with instagram)

It’s not that I don’t appreciate technology. I’m typing on a beautiful white machine that’s not connected to any wires but is connected to the internet and is light enough to rest on my stomach. And I like reading about Alexis has recently eaten, which technology allows me to do. (And I like Alexis, who I even met once.)

It’s just that, how much technology do we need? Because at a certain point (maybe now?) they’re just inventing stuff so we’ll buy more stuff again. For the past 400 years, no one looked at a book, and thought, damn, that shit looks antiquated. But after four years, a first generation Kindle looks “ridiculous.”

My often wise dad once said, “We live better than Louis XIV.” Which is true when you think about indoor planning and access to tropical fruit. But it seems like all we’re striving for now is convenience and novelty. But something nice about inconvenient, old things: they’re not part of this absurd cycle of want that technology creates now.

Sometimes the New York Times is just so the New York Times.

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 09:04:00 -0700

Sometimes the New York Times is just so the New York Times.

What Happens Every Morning.

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 07:37:56 -0700

I wake up at 6:04, which is about 5:59, since my iTouch’s clock is fast. It’s still dark out, but I get out of bed and feel very proud of myself.

I check the internet for about ~~three~~ 15 minutes before reminding myself that the reason I’m up early is to write, so I set Freedom (without a doubt, the best $10 I spent in 2011) to 60 minutes.

And then I try to write. But I also stare out the window a lot and watch the colors change.

For a while, everything is just black, except for the diagonal streaks of light serving some sort of design purpose I can’t imagine/don’t agree with in the big apartment building on the corner of my street.

And then the sky starts turning navy, the kind of navy you want to believe is black if you made a mistake when purchasing stockings.

From there, everything gets bluer, though it’s still a dark blue, a blue that could pass for this season’s new black, and the naked branches of the trees become visible.

Then the sky is really blue, a blue that, if you were being gender normative, would do well in a baby boy’s room, a blue so light it would surprise you, considering how dark it still is.

And then, I’m not staring out into total darkness, but the house across from mine, though I can still make out my reflection in the window.

Each moment, the sky gets lighter and lighter, which feels like this betrayal of the night, which I suppose it is, as it’s turning into day.

And it’s just like that Hemingway line about going bankrupt, slowly, then all at once, and then it’s time to go to work.

How Visit From The Goon Squad Is This?

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 09:01:20 -0700

How Visit From The Goon Squad Is This? :

Sadly, a recurring feature.

Six of one, half dozen of the other.

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 09:43:04 -0700

Six of one, half dozen of the other.

Denver has one of everything. Except for Grateful Dead bars. It has two of those. -Jordan, on...

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 09:11:54 -0700

Denver has one of everything. Except for Grateful Dead bars. It has two of those.

-Jordan, on what she knows about Denver.

On How To Spend Free Time

Sat, 07 Jan 2012 14:55:18 -0700

You confuse being weird and spending time alone … But anyone who’s really interested in anything spends time alone …If you want to be good at something, you have to practice, and usually you practice by yourself.

-Prep, Curtis Sittenfeld

Year in Read, 2011

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 10:27:00 -0700

This was the year I left New York. It was also the year I learned it’s possible to read without riding the subway. Looking over the list, in 2011, I especially enjoyed being in the middle of a big book. I guess I like to spend time in a world someone else made. There are also a lot of books on this list that I didn’t really enjoy, just read. But I like reading, and when you like a verb, you do it in any form that presents itself.

KEY:

® - Raronauer Recommends

* - Reread

/ - Didn’t finish

A Short History of Women /, Kate Walbert

Pale Fire, Vladmir Nabakov

I read for a book club, and I enjoyed the sausage lasagna the host served more than the book.

The Fall®*, Albert Camus

I got a lot more out of this book as a 27 year-old than I did as a 15 year-old.

For Whom The Bell Tolls®*, Ernest Hemingway

And so began Hemingway month!

A Moveable Feast®, Ernest Hemingway

I bought this book for myself, retail, as a reward for doing a job I didn’t want to do but couldn’t turn down. It was a great way to treat myself.

The Snows of Kilimanjaro, Ernest Hemingway

A Visit From The Goon Squad*, Jennifer Egan

Just Kids by Patti Smith

Related

A Family Daughter by Maile Meloy

This list includes all the books I read straight through, or at least tried to, this year. But I came back to specific stories by Maile Meloy throughout the year, specifically, “Agustin,” “Garrison Junction” and “The Children.”

The Nick Adams Stories, Ernest Hemingway

Bearing the Body, Ehud Havazelet

Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi

The Art of Racing in the Rain /, Garth Stein

I couldn’t finish this book narrated by a dog, but one of my friends from book club actually liked it. I think that speaks to how much she likes reading.

Miami®, Joan Didion

Despite being the fifth location of the Real World, by city limits, it’s actually pretty small. Didion, as always, does a deft job of explaining why Miami has taken on such international and cultural importance. If you ever want to go beyond the “I sort of know there’s a situation with Cuba” understanding of Miami, I recommend this book. I also recommend this twitter feed.

Emperor of All Maladies, Siddhartha Mukherjee

After I got a fight with someone I was dating about Livestrong bracelets, I put this book on reserve at the library. Soon after the book was available, it won the Pultizer, and I felt I had to read it. Not an uplifting situation.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love®, Raymond Carver

Some credit goes to Gordon Lish.

The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson

Another story about a failed attempt to start a book club.

Cooking for Mr. Latte®, Amanda Hesser

If you like reading about rich white people eating—which is a real thing to like!—this is the book for you.

Heartburn, Nora Ephron

The Custom of the Country®, Edith Wharton

The Keep, Jennifer Egan

Great Plains®, Ian Frazier

The Heart Says Whatever, Emily Gould

Civilwarland in Bad Decline, George Saunders

The Collected Stories of Grace Palely, Grace Palely

The Good Soldiers®, David Finkel

Revolutionary Road®, Richard Yates

The Rez, Ian Frazier

I found this at a used bookstore in Rapid City, SD on the road with my friend who had lent me The Great Plains. We read it to each other as we finished driving across the country.

The John McPhee Reader®, John McPhee

The Loser, Thomas Bernhard

The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion

You can’t appreciate this book without having read other Joan Didion, which I learned first hand after rereading this book.

A Visit from the Goon Squad®*, Jennifer Egan

Not a typo, I read it twice in one year.

Notes on Yellowstone, Jim Carrier

A Backwards Glance, Edith Wharton

Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney

I read this book in a day at work.

Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves, P. G. Wodehouse

1Q84®, Haruki Murakami

Emma, Jane Austen

Food Matters®, Mark Bittman

Samedi the Deafness, Jesse Ball

Let the Great World Spin, Colum McCann

Nondenominational holiday music on repeat.

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 21:36:18 -0700

Nondenominational holiday music on repeat.

Nearing the End

Thu, 22 Dec 2011 11:06:58 -0700

I find end of year lists released in early December a little offensive. Offensive is too strong a word, but you know, culture is still coming out in these final days. So I will wait until December 31 to release my year in read list. That said, since finishing 1Q84, I’ve had a lot of trouble getting into another book. After all these years of reading on my own, I still can never figure out the right book to read for whatever mood I’m in. I always end up with history books or short stories on a plane, which is the exact wrong thing for me.

But at December 22, the facts are on the table: we are getting to the end of the year, and I’ll probably only read one or two more books in 2011. But while 2012 doesn’t start for another week and a half, starting today, the days will be getting longer. And even if it’s too early for year-end lists, it’s not too early for a stiff drink to celebrate that.

The first time I was homesick in Denver was when I saw info for...

Mon, 19 Dec 2011 16:06:30 -0700

The first time I was homesick in Denver was when I saw info for the premier of Girl Walk // All Day. I had become accustomed to being in the city where premiers occurred, and I was bummed about missing out on what I imagined to be (and turned out to be) an amazing dance party in Brooklyn. But as is the case with most forms of self-pity, it was all for not, because Girl Walk // All Day is coming to Denver this Thursday. // More info on the screening here. // Interview with director Jacob Krupnick on Listen Up Denver! here.

Sweet Talk

Sat, 17 Dec 2011 15:08:00 -0700

Two days before we left Fort Niagara, we took the dog, Duke, to Charlie Battery, fourteen miles from the post, and left him with the mess sergeant. We were leaving him for only six weeks, until we could settle in Oklahoma and send for him. He had stayed at Charlie Battery before, when we visited our relatives in Ohio at Christmastime. He knew there were big meaty bones at Charlie Battery, and scraps of chicken, steak and turkey, slices of cheese, special big-dog bowls of ice cream. The mess at Charlie Battery was Dog Heaven, so gave us a soft, forgiving look as we walked with him from the car to the back of the mess hall.

My mother said, as she always did at times like that, “I wish he knew more English.”

When I think about “success” as a writer, I mostly think I’d be happy just to write every day. But in my more ambitious idle thoughts, I dream of being on the New Yorker fiction podcast, reading and discussing some long forgotten story from the magazine’s archives with Deborah Treisman.

My all-time favorite New Yorker fiction podcast is Tobias Wolff reading Stephanie Vaughn’s “Dog Heaven,” excerpted above. I love this one in part because it’s a story about dogs, in part because Vaughn so deftly captures what it’s like to be powerless because of age, that is, what it’s like to be a child, and in part because the podcast introduced me to Stephanie Vaughn.

At the end of that podcast, Triesman and Wolff have a sort of awkward, or awkward if you’re Stephanie Vaughn, chat about why Vaughn hasn’t published anything recently. Guys, I’m sure she’s working on it.

This was all in 2008, and in this month’s podcast, Tea Obreht reads another story from Vaughn’s collection, “Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog,” which is just as moving as “Dog Heaven” though not as much about dogs. This time, Treisman doesn’t question Vaughn’s work ethic, but announces happily that Sweet Talk is being reissued.

(I wish the Internet would report on how that initial podcast with Tobias Wolff ultimately led to the reissuing of Sweet Talk.)

All this is a long way of saying: listen to the New Yorker fiction podcast. Whether you start with my favorite story, “Dog Heaven,” or the most recent one, “Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog,” you’ll meet Stephanie Vaughn, a great writer whose time has come in the age of podcasts.

Other Realities

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 11:00:00 -0700

So there’s this piece on Slate about a writer who lost her computer in a cab, and after a bout of self-loathing, she bought a new computer. This was a story because a year after she got a new computer, she checked her Facebook Other Messages and learned that someone had found her computer soon after she lost it and wanted to return it.

And what are Facebook Other Messages? Something no one checks right below Facebook Messages.

Obviously, the only thing to do after reading that article was to check my own Facebook Other Messages. And wouldn’t you know it, but I also had an alternate reality hidden for me there.

A woman whose house I looked at in September, and whose spare bedroom I was interested in, sent me a message on Facebook to invite me to move in. Because we weren’t Facebook friends, her message got hidden in the Other section. We never became roommates, and we will probably never become Facebook friends either.

While I would have moved in there—it was a furnished room, which appealed to me at the time—I ended up in my own place, an attic apartment with good light and tons of wood paneling. My apartment is probably the best thing in my life right now. Or at least it’s the thing I think about when my yoga class goes in the “take a moment to be thankful for something” direction.

In a quote brought to my attention by a recent episode of Gossip Girl, Albert Camus once said, “Life is a sum of all your choices.” It’s also the sum of all the things you didn’t get to choose. Still, it’s rare to see the mechanics of fate, and in this case, I was lucky not be given a voice.

Duh, rich people are rich because they make smart decisions with...

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 16:23:54 -0700

Duh, rich people are rich because they make smart decisions with their money. Sometimes that includes buying golf clubs at K-Mart.

NYT