Clarissa's Blog

The Hispanic people who are genuinely upset / bothered / annoyed / insulted by the “breakfast tacos” comment are not really Hispanic people. They are pouty Anglos posing as “people of color” for clout.

The idea that people should collapse and die of outrage the second anybody brings up food that is associated with their culture (whether correctly or not) is an Anglo fad. Nobody else cares. I’ve had people bring up borscht whenever I show up more times than there are hairs on my uncommonly hairy head. And I find it sweet and endearing.

Klara has the exact same outfit as the girl in the pink shorts, so this photo really got to me. The building in the background looks very much like the one I lived in. It’s not the same building but it’s just like it.

One thing I find frustrating in contemporary American literature is the endless procession of strung-out characters. Between yesterday and today I moved from the highly postmodern Goon Squad by a 60-year-old female writer to a neorealist novel Ohio by a male author 20 years her junior. But in both novels there are page after page after repetitive page describing the characters ingesting all sorts of drugs and experiencing their effects. I don’t understand what the point is supposed to be. None of this is shocking or original any more. It’s repetitive and boring, that’s all.

Both are great novels, by the way. But I’d enjoy them more without the exhausting drug scenes.

When there’s no real crisis that can be dragged out and used to justify the extraordinary measures of disciplining and hurting the population, crises are invented. Right before the COVID crisis, there was a completely manufactured Trump crisis.

Nobody can name any actual policy of Trump’s that was all that different from Obama’s but remember all the howling, the drama, the impeachments, the wails and screams about fascism and democracy in danger? Nothing was happening. There was no crisis. But who cares? The fake crisis worked just as well.

And now the fictitious “abortion ban” is being used for the same purpose. After that’s milked for all it is worth, there’ll be something else. And something else.

I know somebody who embraces every one of these real and fake crises with passionate abandon. Next week she’ll have to remove all of her stuff out of the office she’s been in for 15 years because we never again are going to have a contract for her or any other lecturer. There was a time when this could have been averted but now it’s too late.

I was asked by a Czech journal to review an article about Greek literature. Because it uses my theory! I’m so glad. The whole point was precisely that the permanent, never-ending crisis is a global phenomenon. I’m happy people outside of my field are catching on.

The theory is what I wrote about yesterday. I predicted back when the Great Recession took place that it wasn’t going to end. Instead, it was going to mutate into another crisis, then another, and then another. And with each iteration of this endless crisis we would lose wealth, rights, and and the rest of the good things we have gotten used to in the nation-state.

As we are all seeing now, my theory is being proven right in real time.

I have a new theory now. Or the beginnings of one. It’s about how we will wake up from the collective hypnosis that we are in and that is facilitating this robbery masked as crisis. Stay tuned.

When a fashion accessory you purchase isn’t satisfactory, it makes sense to sue.

It is absolutely horrid that children are being sold to consumers who are hormonally incapable of bonding to them.

Canada sent 6 turbines to Germany to enable the smooth functioning of Nordstream 2 (which Trump didn’t permit but Biden subserviently did). The Biden administration loudly celebrated Canada’s decision to give this gift to the Putin regime.

Today. This all happened today. The Bidens and the Trudeaus need Russia like they needed COVID. It’s a way to maintain an endless state of exception. We migrate smoothly from recession to COVID to Russia-pandering. There’s always some crisis that needs to be mitigated and we always become poorer and weaker as a result of these mitigations.

The overhead fan here at the condo we are renting is operated by a remote control. I’ve never seen that. I’m maniacally addicted to overhead fans.

Actually, we are renting three condos because there are that many of us. I’ve got to say that communal child-rearing is very convenient. I don’t have to provide all of the meals and entertainment myself, which is very relaxing. Of course, the community here is that of my own extended family, and not anything that’s been assigned to me which would have made this intolerable.

This is an earlier book by Jennifer Egan. The Candy House that I wrote about recently is a sequel. Egan is massively talented, and Goon Squad is as impossible to put down as The Candy House.

Egan’s getting better at her craft, and while the earlier book is great, it’s still not as accomplished as its sequel.

Even within Goon Squad we can observe the writer’s growth. The earlier chapters are weaker than the later ones. For instance, at the beginning of the book Egan gives little summaries of what happens to the characters after the episode she narrates. (“Lou will marry Mindy and they’ll have two daughters, the youngest of whom will inherit his business after he dies, etc.”) The fussy concern over how the reader imagines what happens next and the desire to control that process is a mark of an inexperienced author. An accomplished writer feels secure enough in her talent to avoid trying to tell people how they should read or understand her book. Thankfully, Egan dropped this annoying habit after the first half of Goon Squad.

I’m very glad I discovered this writer. Egan doesn’t teach any lessons or offer any profound insights. What she offers is a completely unmarred, unmessed-with, narcotizing pleasure of reading. Her books are very enjoyable to read. And that’s what makes a great writer.

Excellent, excellent writer. Real literature.

The HIMARS could have been in Ukraine in March. Or April, May, June. But they weren’t. Everything was done to ensure that Ukraine’s victory is delayed as much as possible.

This is exactly how COVID was managed. Everything was done to inflict maximum pain and prolong the issue as much as possible.