Who doesn’t love New York‘s Approval Matrix? Answer: no one. Despite my steadfast loyalty to them, I must submit for questioning the following item, which was labeled “Highbrow Despicable.”
Elizabeth Wurtzel scares me.
My question is as follows: is it despicable that they have to pay back the advances, or that they never got around to writing the books? Because if it’s the former, I think the AM and I need to have a little chat.
GUYS.
Guess what.
This is my 800th post.
I’ve had a lot of anxiety about it, actually, because while there have been a bunch of things that I wanted to post about, none of them seemed “special enough” for this milestone. Then I thought maybe I should just let it pass unmentioned, and finally I settled on revealing my anxiety so as to preemptively soften the judgments of my critical readers. It’s this type of psychological gymnastics that keep me going, folks.
What I’ve opted to do is make a little list about the number 800 and pretend that, because it’s a list, there is some interesting interconnectedness to all these random facts. Very Harper’s Index of me, I know. Anyway, let us begin:
800 is a Harshad number. A Harshad number, or Niven number in a given number base, is an integer that is divisible by the sum of its digits when written in that base. Harshad numbers were defined by D. R. Kaprekar, a mathematician from India. The word “Harshad” comes from the Sanskrit harṣa (joy) + da (give), meaning joy-giver. The Niven numbers take their name from Ivan M. Niven from a paper delivered at a conference on number theory in 1997. All integers between zero and n are Harshad numbers in base n.
800 is the first year that the Anno Domini calendar became the dominant year-numbering system in Europe. 800 AD was a leap year that began on a Wednesday, and on Christmas of that year, Charlemagne was crowned Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.
In numerology, the number 800 carries the energy of 8 only, which possess the following “energies”: material possessions, abundance, authority, leadership, cosmic awareness, self-motivated, prosperity, and infinity.
1-800-222-1222 is the toll free number for every poison control center in the US.
In some Biblical Gematria shit… well, I can’t think of how to segue, so here’s an excerpt from the Bible Wheel Archives:
The historic Christian Church has traditionally associated the Number 8 with the entrance into the Covenant of God. This understanding comes from God Himself who commanded Circumcision – the Sign of the Covenant – to be performed on the Eighth Day. God used the same language – אות ברית (Ot B’rit, Sign of the Covenant) – when He gave the Rainbow (Genesis 9.13):
I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.
Genesis 17:10f
The word “rainbow” (קשת, qeshet) used in this verse sums to the Number 800 which also is the value of the Greek words “Lord” and “Faith.” It also is the value of the final letter of the Greek alphabet, Omega (cf. Eight and the Resurrection below). This is the essence of Faith – trusting in the Lord who will see us through to the very end, signified by Omega. This lifts us above our present state to behold our Shepherd who is Lord above all.
Given the extreme significance of Circumcision as the Sign of the Covenant, it is no wonder that the Rabbi’s have long expounded on the spiritual significance of the Number Eight and its relation to God’s Covenant. For example, on page 134 of his book Alef-Beit, Rabbi Yitzchak declares:
The Torah prescribes that the circumcision of a male child take place on the eighth day from birth. These eight days always include at least one Shabbat, the seventh day, which corresponds to the experience of perfect harmony with nature. The eighth day of circumcision represents the power of the soul to contact that light which totally transcends nature. Through circumcision the Jew is given the power, throughout his life, to overcome all the obstacles nature may seem to place in the face of his service of G-d.
The transcendence associated with the Number Eight – recognized by both Jews and Christians – ultimately manifests in the everlasting New Beginning found in the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
For the Olympics this past year, the London-based design firm BarberOsgerby designed a torch that was 800mm heigh, weighed 800grammes and featured 8,000 perforated circles representing the 8,000 torchbearers who would carry it on its journey.
A random urine osmolality should average 500–800 mOsm/kg.
No social security numbers with an area number [first three numbers] in the 800s or 900s, or with a 000 area number, have been assigned.
The Book of Kells is generally thought to have been created ca. 800.
In Wolof, a language native to the peoples of Senegal, Gambia, and Mauritania, 800 is pronounced “juróom-ñetti téeméer.”
In California, the interim statewide Academic Performance Index target for all schools is 800.
The gardens of Versailles cover approximately 800 hectares of land.
In regard to the LIBOR scandal of earlier this year, the number Barclay’s fiddled with is used as a benchmark to set payments on about $800 trillion-worth of financial instruments, ranging from complex interest-rate derivatives to simple mortgages.
In the Dewey Decimal system, 800 numbers are Literature, English Literature, American Literature, Rhetoric and Criticism.
And last but not leasts (as you’ve probably realized, this could go on for 800 mind-numbing years), in order to get your tickets to the annul Faerie Festival, please call 1 800 922 TIXX. The 2012 festival featured “I-Knew-the-Maharishi-First” Donovan, Tricky Pixie, and what seems to be the incongruously named “Heavy Hammer.”
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?
And I don’t anymore, and I know that makes me sound like a stick in the mud, which I am, but also, like, I’m a grown-up, and so I can celebrate anything I want, as the Beatles once said, and Halloween just isn’t in the cards for me. However, IF I celebrated it, I would definitely go as a cloud, a la this courtesy of Oh Happy Day!
I know you guys don’t know what I look like, but trust me, it would be ADORBS.
Not to be totally one-track minded about my imminent departure from modern society, but here is a list that my bro and I composed of reasons to hightail it to that little island where that tiny naked Japanese guy lives eating coconuts and smoking cigarettes all day. I enjoy this. You don’t have to. I don’t care.
Reasons to Drop Out of Society –– in Some Particular Order
Me: Media Bistro classes on “Social Media”
IS: Fran Drescher’s fan base
Me: The fact that I got 7 out of 8 correct on the “Olsen Trio” quiz on People.com today.
Me: The fact that people actually get smug when they figure out an answer to a question by Googling it, as if they really have the knowledge.
IS: [included in earlier post] Pet Reiki
Me: Alice Dellal is the new face of Chanel
I ain’t asking her shit.
IS: That people are suspicious of you of you aren’t on Facebook
Me: That there is an app you can download with which you can play a virtual game of A&E’s Storage Wars.
IS: The meme “there’s an app for that”
Me: Those commercials for smart phones in which the owners of said phones are bragging about how something is “so five seconds ago” –– obviously the thrust being they know about everything before it happens
IS: As a general theme to that: our culture’s general attitude towards all things NEW: Mesmer
Me: Siri
IS: “Crossover artists”
Me: The fact that Gmail has “personalized advertisements,” and because of our conversation here about the horrors of our society, Gmail thought fit to today post this for me:
搬新家需要转电话号码吗？ – http://www.iTalkBB.com – iTalkBB新家庭电话号码随身带，搬家也 不用担心要换电话号码，省钱超过70%
IS: This article.
Me: The fact that episodes of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills aired feature a living, breathing Russell Armstrong after he committed suicide.
IS: The likely probability that the episodes of RHWofBH featuring the since-deceased husband garner the highest viewer rating.
Me: The term “tanorexia”
IS: Dick Clark appearing on the annual “Rockin’ New Year’s Eve” post-stroke, slurring his words, and with a bad spray tan.
Me: The movement to add “Passive Aggressive Personality Disorder” to the DSM-V
IS: This.
Me: The fact that Zooey Deschanel’s blog is called Hello Giggles.
Zooey Deschanel.
IS: That President Obama sent a letter to Zooey Deschanel on her birthday.
Me: The fact that there is an outbreak of “mass hysteria” in upstate New York, aka Salem Witch Trials Part Deux: Beelzebub Comes to Ithaca.
Me: The fact that according to Harper’s index, 92% of Americans two years of age and younger have an “online presence.” The fact that money was spent gathering that statistic.
IS: People who, in a professional context, do not respond to your inquiries for a week, then e-mail you asking if you can show up somewhere within two hours time to do work that THEY want.
Me: The growth of the “adult fantasy” genre of entertainment.
IS: The meme “Shit ______ say”
Me: The meme “Fuck Yeah ______”
IS: the recent New York Times article titled “Young, In Love, and Sharing Everything, Including a Password”
—
Sorry it’s Monday, and you’re here.
As I’m into Hasids, I’m also into Hasidic architecture in a so-bad-it’s-good way. I was thinking that this would somehow figure into my Religion PhD program, but it turns out there isn’t a whole lot of information out there about Hasidic architecture, perhaps because it’s not really a subject worthy of study but also maybe, just MAYBE, no one has thought to look into the ways the architecture reflects the faith –– until now. There is, however, one blog that I stumbled upon in my searching for topical resources that is just. fucking. hilarious. You can find it here. Below are some selections:
L
O
L
Z
Unfortunately this blogger went the way of many others in the -sphere and abandoned his great works. I thought of contacting him and asking him to relocate his faith, if you will, but I figured the email address he gave –– fudgepacker [at] yourmom.com –– was likely fake.
“Extenuating circumstances” could have caused you to tear up at an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond.
Was it patently obvious to anyone else that J.K. Rowling’s book for grown-ups was bound to fail?
“It’s easy to understand why Ms. Rowling wanted to try something totally different after spending a decade and a half inventing and complicating the fantasy world that Harry and company inhabited, and one can only admire her gumption in facing up to the overwhelming expectations created by the global phenomenon that was Harry Potter. Unfortunately, the real-life world she has limned in these pages is so willfully banal, so depressingly clichéd that “The Casual Vacancy” is not only disappointing — it’s dull. The novel — which takes place in the tiny, fictional English village of Pagford, and chronicles the political and personal fallout created by the sudden death of a member of the parish council named Barry Fairbrother — reads like an odd mash-up of a dark soap opera like “Peyton Place” with one of those very British Barbara Pym novels, depicting small-town, circumscribed lives.”
–– In the Times by… guess who?
You know you’re living a sad modern life WHEN you get a $5 coupon to Delivery.com and you don’t think you’ll ever use it because your favorite sushi place doesn’t accept those kinds of deals and that’s the only place you really use Delivery.com for, and then you wonder if you should archive the coupon in your Gmail inbox or if you’ll risk forgetting about it and never using it then, and then you realize, “Holy fuck, I’ve been worrying about this for ten whole minutes.”
Eat a lot tonight, folks. You’re gonna need it.
Puff, puff.
Many of you (okay, 2/3 of you) know that I’m a big fan of tiny poetry –– i.e. poems, like Kay Ryan’s, that look like toothpicks laid out across the page, or ones that, like Ogden Nash’s, are quip-sized morsels of verse. That’s why I was so pleased to stumble upon the work of Opal Miller, who it seems is a recluse with a checkered past to boot! My favorite! Below is a Ryan, a Nash, and a Miller, just because it’s Monday and I know it’s been tough for you. (I’ve staggered them as well. I thought that might be helpful for you. You’re welcome.)
Eggs
We turn out
as tippy as
eggs. Legs
are an illusion.
We are held
as in a carton
if someone
loves us.
It’s a pity
only loss
proves this.
(Ryan)
Always Marry an April Girl
Praise the spells and bless the charms,
I found April in my arms.
April golden, April cloudy,
Gracious, cruel, tender, rowdy;
April soft in flowered languor,
April cold with sudden anger,
Ever changing, ever true —
I love April, I love you.
(Nash)
The Balloon
What happens if the black balloon
bursts as the tide goes out and
the wax drips and
she falls?
(Miller)
