fun is automatic, like poetry, and insomnia, even on 9-30-2008

[sara torres]
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quote: "in my replies, i tried to console him by pointing out how hard it is for human beings to think beyond their immediate situation. it is a matter of feeling and not of reason: prone to consider the present their abiding lot, they are incapable, so to speak, of seeing round the corner -- and that probably applies more to bad situations than to good ones." (thomas mann, doctor faustus)

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links:
1. Do you understand how this economy thing affects you? Me neither! Read this. Is My Money Safe? and Other Questions to Ask (@nytimes)
2. Regardless, we are moving to a treehouse, making our own jam, growing hemp blankets. The Greater Depression Can Be a DIY Renaissance (@lifehacker) (sidenote: I must point out that I did not find this article all by myself, A;ex found it and shared it. I cannot take credit for this great find, therefore probs also cannot weave my own baskets or find my way through the woods.)
3. This is where we came from, where we should be going. In Conversation: Gloria Steinem and Suheir Hammad (@nymag)
4. Also Jessica Roy talked to Tao Lin and discovered NYU Alum and Poet Tao Lin Does Not Care Whether or Not You Think Print Is Dead. It's chock full of words I wanted to cut and paste for you. Maybe you could just read it instead, because then you could read those words, and many other words too. Here's some of what I wanted to cut and paste for you: (@nyu loca)

I promise to myself that I will never get another real job for the rest of my life. In part because when I have no responsibilities or obligations my feelings of meaninglessness and confusion increase in quality and become more intense and “honed” and even “beautiful” in a way that feels good to me, and which I like to write about, and also which makes me feel more “original” and amused, as a person, treating my life as a “work of art” or something. I feel “I have gone too far” with this answer.

5. "Tag": Poem by Anne Carson. (@the new yorker)
6. The debate, a twitter play-by-play (@twitter blog)
7. Good News: Can Late Night Comedy Sink McCain? (@the nation)
7. The Sexy Puritan: Sarah Palin embodies a powerful new Christian right archetype. What could that mean for America? (@slate.com)
8. It's like great mysteries of life: Two and A Half Show: The Worst Show Everyone Else is Watching. (@gawker.com)
9. The "A" to this "Q": Sarah Palin is ruining my life -- I rant about her; I can't stop thinking about her, I cannot stand to look at her is actually quite illuminating. (@salon.com)
10. Nine People track their sex-related budgets for one month. (@nerve.com)
11. LiLo's publicist says they're just good friends. Ugh ugh ugh! (@tvguide.com)
12. Out in Hollywood: Starring Roles Are Rare (@nytimes)
13. Apparently there is a party in Williamsburg called "choice cunts," a "raw party for rare queers." I've looked at the photos, I still have no comment, don't know what to believe, etc. (@village voice)

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insomnia poem #14

the soft life is like sleeping in your palm and/or cheek
remind me why i fell so far for hard
like my teeth, which i learned today
are cavitied, present tense, chewing fence

remember when i broke all those wine bottles
and glasses, crunching careening full throttle
well i think there's still glass in my foot

remember when i had epilepsy
remember when i told you how to remember me
remember when i wanted to live in a tree
there's still glass in my foot and i carry it with me

remember when i woke up with blood on my hands
how i hurt myself for that and how we bleed
over everything, one long river
and my feet are spry wing'ed goldfish

a lot of blood is what i remember.
i mean blood as a metaphor
for life, but liquid.

goldfish forget everything
therefore i am the opposite of a goldfish
also i am the opposite of a band-aid.

this is just to say if you cut your hand
i have a plan to bail out the economy
and to save the world. follow me
one sec brb.