With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy - I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
Too much sanity may be madness and the maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.
I enjoy paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.
July 09, 2008 - 3:52 p.m.
Yesterday I said that I had an idea for today's entry. I actually remember it, consider that a minor miracle. I never said it was a good idea; so don't get your hopes up.
I'll start off as I usually do with just recapping my day. I actually did something yesterday, that makes it easier.
My original plan was to go to the Met/Giant game last night. Then I saw that Anaïs Mitchell and Anthony Da Costa were playing at the Watercolor Café and decided to see that. Anaïs doesn't play that often and I try to not miss her and of course I love Anthony. On Sunday I stopped by Alan's house to return the ticket to the Met game. Then on Tuesday I saw that Anaïs was playing on Wednesday at Rockwood Music Hall. That show is free, I can get there without tolls, and I can sit right in front of the stage instead of finding a place at the bar like at the Watercolor. The upshot is that I decided to go to that show and go to the Met game if Alan still had the ticket. He did. I then was getting the ticket from Alan. I had to meet him at the Stadium. The problem with that is that I like to get to the game early, get my free soda from the designated driver program and relax. Alan likes to get there as late as possible and doesn't mind if he misses the beginning of the game. I had no choice so I went on Alan's schedule. I took an earlier train than he did and waited for him at Shea. He did make it before game time and I sat down right before the first pitch. Alan had a bag with him and had to go through security so he missed the first few batters.
The game wasn't a classic but a delight for Mets fans. They won 7-0. They are on their best roll of the season. They've won four games in a row and everything is falling into place. Their starting pitching has righted itself. Pelfrey after a disappointing start has won five games in a row and is finally showing that the scouts were right and that he is a top prospect. Sometimes it takes a while for a young pitcher to put it all together. After a miserable start of the season my favorite player, Oliver Perez has not allowed a run his last two starts. He has more potential than anybody. All his problems are in his head. If he ever finds himself watch out; we are talking Cy Young winner. It isn't like he has never shown it either. Last year he was 15-10 and tenth in the league in ERA. Pedro Martinez last start was his first good one since coming off the DL. Put those three together with Santana and Maine and the Mets have the best rotation in the league. They are only a game and half out of first despite playing so poorly the first half. Simply regression to the mean will put them on top the second hand of the season.
Alan left the game in the seventh inning when the Mets took the big lead. I of course stayed to the end. As soon as Alan left I did what I always do, moved down to better seats. I ended up in the loge right behind the plate. I wish Alan would do that. It is so much better watching the game from there.
Wow I'm on page two and haven't started writing my planned entry. I don't usually write so much about a game.
So what did I want to write about? My writing things like "What did I want to write about." While I sometimes come across as conversational that is artifice. I attempt to make these entries works of art. That isn't to say that it is good art. It isn't to say that it is bad either. I am in no position to judge that. Well actually I am and I like what I write but I want to come across as modest. That was artifice too.
I am not a huge devourer of blogs but I read a decent number and none of them seem to share my view of blogging. Mine entries are far longer and more developed than most. This is probably the opposite of what you'd expect if you knew me and my friends. I'm the nuts and bolts math geek who avoided writing as much as possible in school. Many of my friends are English geeks or something else in the arts or humanities.
I am never satisfied simply saying what I want to say or recounting my day. I always want to inject humor if possible. I want there to be structure. I like an introduction, a statement of the theme, a development of that theme, and conclusion. I deliberately write in different voices. I can go from conversational, to academic, to journalistic. I'll also satirize all those styles. I can be incredibly pretentious then make fun of my being pretentious. I'm doing that right now. I love deconstructing the entry as I write it. You have probably noticed me doing it in this entry. I just did that.
I use self-conscious literary devices. If I take a break in writing I'll often make believe that you are sitting there reading this in real time and talk about my walking away then coming back to writing. I obviously don't have to do that. I could make everything more seamless but choose not to. I try to have a style. Now I don't sit there and say, "what can I do to make this distinctive?" What I do is not edit myself when these ideas come to me. As I've said from my first entry the idea of keeping this diary is to let you get to know me. I try and reveal how my mind works and strangely enough the way that works for me is to use literary devices and artificial styles. For me that is more natural than writing naturally.
I don't know where that came from. My literary hero growing up was Isaac Asimov. He always prided himself on simply trying to write clearly. Writing is a window to another world; some writers make beautiful stained glass windows, Asimov always tried to make his glass crystal clear. The thing is though that he used style all the time. There is no greater influence on Wise Madness than Asimov's essays in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. He would start each entry with a personal anecdote then segue into the topic. He used a conversational style complete with self effacing humor. He'd deconstruct his own writing. He always addressed his "Gentle Readers." So I guess I do know where it comes from. Throw in some Cabell and some Thoreau and you have Wise Madness
The International Jewish Banking Conspiracy - October 07, 2008
On the Road to Westchester County - October 06, 2008
Inside the Madison Square Studio - October 05, 2008
I'm a Bosniac and I'm debating like I've never debated before - October 03, 2008
Islands in the Stream of Consciousness - October 02, 2008
Email me: GordonLew at gmail
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. Horvendile July 09, 2008
