Meditating On Furry Balls

Little breakthrough in tennis today. As an experiment I tried not thinking about how I was hitting the ball, and just focused the whole time on which way the ball was spinning. Each time the ball flew towards me I focused only on determining which way it was spinning as I moved into position and swung. The result was that I returned more consistently than... well maybe than I ever have. We had some long rallies going there. A few times I thought to myself, is this "the zone"?

Today I Handed a Pretty Girl a Note

I'm playing a game with my friends that I have to walk up to five girls I don't know that I find attractive and talk to them, by Wednesday, because this is for some reason my greatest fear in life. I could stare down Dick Cheney but I can't go up to a girl with great legs and ask for her number. I've been afraid of this since elementary school.

So Day One: I didn't exactly talk to a girl today, but I handed one a note on the subway. There was a pretty girl sitting across from me at an angle, and we made eye contact once, and it wasn't anything big but whatever, it was eye contact. She was listening to an iPod and looking at her lap, and I was terrified to talk to her anyway so the iPod kind of helped. I got out my notebook, wrote on a blank page "You're beautiful. I'm awesome. Call me. - Jake", with a smiley face and my number. It was difficult to control the pen, and I had about 30 seconds to write the note before my stop.

So now I had this note, and now I had to actually give it to her. I think I was literally shaking a little. This is a killer fear of mine. But when we got to my stop I ripped out the page, got up, crossed the aisle, and held out the note under her face while everyone waited for the door to open.

It took her a minute to realize someone was handing her a note, but she took it, read it, kind of smiled and almost-sort-of laughed, not really in an 'ooh I'd love to go to bed with him' way, just an amused and understanding and sympathetic way - which made me think she might also be a good person - but didn't look up, just at the note. I looked at her a few times while waiting for the door to open, trying not to shift uncomfortably or spontaneously urinate. The door took about three days to open. She didn't look up, just kept her eyes on the piece of paper, folded it a couple times and put it in her bag. But she was sort of smiling, so it couldn't have been horrible. Then the door opened and I shuffled out in the crowd.

And I felt great. I know girls don't call guys, and maybe I seemed like a freak, who knows, but the important thing is that I handed her the friggin note and stood there. I was shaking, my heart was hammering, and it took me until less than one subway stop away to actually stop making excuses and write the damn note. But I pushed through my fear, communicated directly, stood there and took what I got. A little breakthrough.

Now I just have to do it in person, and this time ask for the girl's number because who are we kidding.

Bonfire Of The Spitzers

When I saw that photograph of Kristen in the bikini, I wanted to have sex with her. I then envied Spitzer's money and power. And then Kristen's. My envy destroyed Spitzer's life.

I'm not alone in this - the world gleefully and efficiently brought down the man enjoying such privilege. It's no different than if we'd stormed his house and burned it down while reading aloud choice phrases from his diary. The media were well aware of the reaction they'd produce with the story and that photograph.

If everybody cared so much about prostitution, and actually thought it was evil, or even criminal, why hasn't anyone gone after the Emperor's Club, or the Mayflower Hotel, or even Kristen herself? She's going to be a millionaire from this. We don't care at all about prostitution. We just wanted to feel self-righteous and destroy a privileged man's life, I'd say out of envy, and the government and the media used this to take down an opponent, make lots of money, and scare everybody out of using the phone to discuss anything illicit. The facts are Spitzer's destroyed, the hot girl's a star, lots of newspapers and magazines and commercial spots have been sold, and we all continue about our business after a few days' entertainment. No one will remember the event in six months, except the Spitzers.

It is dangerous that much of the law is constructed to reinforce this sort of theater and mass catharsis.

It's also dangerous of me to become self-righteous about everyone else's self-righteousness. I'm only feeding the problem. The truth is I want the money and power and sex with hot women like any other man with a pulse. But I don't want to take away Spitzer's life and family. I really feel the longterm winner here is the federal government, which has demonstrated that it really does tap our phones.

What Does Bear Sterns Do In the Woods?

It shits on the middle-class!

The Times article puts it this way:

Hoping to avoid a systemic meltdown in financial markets, the Federal Reserve on Sunday approved a $30 billion credit line to engineer the takeover of Bear Stearns...

The New York Times, "Fed Acts to Rescue Financial Markets"

truthout.org begs to differ:

There are two points about this bailout that should be clear. First, this is a bailout - we are handing money to Bear Stearns. Second, we don't have to hand tens of billions of dollars to the country's richest people to save the financial system.

...

When the government makes a loan at below market interest rates, it is giving away money. People on Wall Street know this very well, that is how they got to be fabulously rich: They borrow money at a lower interest rate than they lend it out.

...

We know how to keep banks operating even as they go into bankruptcy. England just did this with Northern Rock...

truthout.org, "Bear Stearns in Bankruptcy: Can You Feel Their Pain?"

We are giving tax money to short-sighted and/or criminal bankers so they don't have to accept the results of their short-sighted and/or criminal banking. This little cartoon presentation illustrates the bad banking in question and exactly how this sub-prime mortgage thing went down, and it seems to border on the criminal.

As usual, the last sentence of the Times article leaves us with a bombshell of truth without elaborating on the implications:

Although stock investors initially cheered the announcement Tuesday of the $200 billion lending program, the credit markets showed little reaction — an indication that investors were still dubious about the mountain of mortgage-backed securities that companies like Bear Stearns were holding.

The New York Times, "Fed Acts to Rescue Financial Markets"

In short, we know we're screwed, but in the meantime we're making sure the people that screwed us come out alright when it's time to accept reality. We're on a ship with holes in it, and we keep bailing water to keep the captain from getting wet, but the rest of us in steerage are getting soaked, and soon...

"Onnnnnce mooooore, you oooooopen the doooooor...."

I have a lot of credit card debt, because I used to spend money out of the infantile perception that I needed to compensate for who I was. One game I'm playing lately is paying this debt off soon, before this ship really starts tanking, because the Fed probably won't do much to bail me out.

"Neeeeeear, faaaaaaaar, whereeeeeeeeever you aaaaaaaaaare..."

That movie, by the way, was like being beaten in the face with a boat. At the end of that thing I looked like a melting red water balloon. My date had to fetch me out of the men's bathroom herself after I'd been in there 20 minutes trying to decide if I should escape out the window.

Julia Allison Didn't Come To My Party And That's Okay!

I had a karaoke birthday party this weekend, and the day of the party I was calling everyone I know to invite them, when I saw the issue of Time Out on my couch with Julia Allison on the cover, wearing a red dress and holding out a note with her phone number on it and the words "Call me!". So I invited her to my party. First I went to her website in case I actually spoke to the woman, because the only thing of hers I've read so far is that article on dating in Time Out. I saw on her blog that she made a lip-sync'd video of "Don't Stop Believin"*. Perfect! She'd have a ball at my karaoke party! So I called and left a message.

I haven't heard back from her yet. I'm sure it was too last-minute, but that she's feeling awkward about having missed it. And since it's been a few days she might be feeling even more awkward about not getting back to me about it, and in her mind it could be spiraling into a little hell of awkwardness and she doesn't know what to do, and maybe doesn't even realize that missing my party is what's really bothering her at the heart of it - she thinks it's the copy machine freaking her out. So I just want to say it publically: It's okay Julia! Just call me and we'll have a laugh about the whole thing! It's okay that you missed my party, and it's okay that you didn't even return my call about it. I think you'd feel a lot better in general if you called me back.

*It turns out they didn't have "Don't Stop Believin" in the songbook, so perhaps it was fate that Julia didn't show up, but that's nothing in the face of a potentially beautiful friendship.

Eliot Spitzer Should Not Resign

I'll just quote my mom, whom I just spoke with: "The day Ted Kennedy resigns over Chappaquitic is the day Eliot Spitzer should resign over this call girl." Seriously - we're calling for someone's resignation over THIS? Is life so boring and pleasant that we're resorting to Monicagates again for fun? Why is NO ONE mentioning the wiretap as a big deal?! It's the only relevant piece of information in the entire story. RED ALERT!

Fascism Wins Big With Spitzer

In today's news, the NSA took advantage of the country's addiction to self-righteousness, in order to scare the hell out of them, by destroying Eliot Spitzer's life. It's all in the first sentence of the Times article:

Eliot Spitzer ... has been caught on a federal wiretap arranging to meet with a high-priced prostitute ...

The New York Times, "Spitzer Is Linked to Prostitution Ring"

What's your first reaction? Mine was "Whoa, they really are listening, and they really will destroy my life if they want to." This isn't a story about Spitzer, it's a warning shot from the NSA to the country, i.e. watch it folks, don't mess with this government. It's a huge score for fascism in America. And all the media took the bait. They're having a huge party making fun of Spitzer, and the NSA and Cheney are laughing their asses off at what brainwashed morons they're dealing with in the media.