Read It and Weep |
|
|
|
Saturday, May 24, 2003
Friday, May 23, 2003
En Fin I admit I spent a lot of time agonizing over whether I could really pass up Georgetown and all the opportunities it presents. Well, that's overwith. Thursday, May 22, 2003
Ten-Word Reviews of the Movies I've Seen This Week Cidade de Deus (City of God) - Brazil's slums are really awful. Become a journalist and escape! Rivers and Tides - Andy Goldsworthy is amazingly dedicated to making nature art. Zzzzz. The Shape of Things - Some people are bad. Some are victims. Who's Gretchen Mol? Tuesday, May 13, 2003
Like Stuff, and...Stuff Sometimes it seems odd to me that I can go days and even weeks at a time without posting anything here. There is something worth writing about every day, but I can't get myself to sit down and write it out. The reason is simple, and embarrassing: I am a slow writer. The grammar snob in me has to make sure that everything is technically correct--and even so, I make mistakes--without any relevance to whether there is any substance to what I write. The reason for that is that I'm a slow thinker. No, I'm not being modest. It's taken me a few minutes already to get this far, and I'm attempting to type this about as stream-of-consciousness as I possibly can. (Side note: I am a poor typist too. I have tried many times to get through one of those computerized Teach Yourself Typing programs so I don't have to stare at the keyboard while I'm typing. Unfortunately, my hands start to cramp up from the repetitive exercises every single time.) (Side note to that side note: I have further come to realize that I have a general aversion to computers. I can't think when I'm staring at a screen. Either I zone out and start clicking randomly at other things or my head starts to hurt. Maybe it's the poor ergonomics of my home setup. Maybe I just want to save my vision. Regardless, the obvious answer is that I should sit down with pen and paper and write things that way, then type it up. The only problem with that is that I can never seem to get my thoughts down in order and the paper soon becomes a mess as I draw arrows moving Section B ahead of Section A, or inserting New Idea C into whatever's already on the page. so I type it all up to have a clean copy, then mark that up with new ideas, do it all over again, repeat the process, etc. I go through a lot of paper that way. I feel bad about it. End of note.) Obviously--and with thanks to Anne Lamott, who made it so obvious--the answer to not being able to write easily is...to write more! (More often, that is.) Her advice is excellent: just let it all come out! Shitty first drafts! Whatever you think, you write. It's only if the text will be published (or is written to impress someone) that it needs revising, and even then, one has to start somewhere. (See how I did that? I went from "you" to "one" in those last two sentences, and I'm not caring!) Great. Wonderful. This is something I've known for a while. I'm still not writing, though, and it's not for lack of time. Oh, no no. The key is discipline, and that's something I'm finding entirely missing from my life. It's amazing I'm even paying my bills regularly. I don't think I'm the kind of person who can handle routine responsibilities well (the absent-minded professor type, yes?). Which reminds me of way back when I had a job, and my boss would say gently--for I was his favorite--that I needed to multitask more. Well, I can't. I admit it. I really need to work on that. As it is, I just get fixated on one thing, and it's hard to put that down until it's done. I guess I just don't like things open-ended. Weird, considering I'm kind of a capricious person--I expect the world to accommodate my disorderedness, but can't really deal with the randomness of the world. No, that's not it. I like the randomness of the world. I am bored by routine. I need novelty. But I don't alway know where to find it...and now I'm getting off track. It seems like what I enjoy about the world--its unpredictability in some respects--isn't what I like in myself. That's still not it, but I think I'm getting closer. When I write, I don't know where I'm going to end up. One of the biggest problems I've had throughout my writing life is in how to write a conclusion--or, first, how to come to a conclusion. I tend to leave things hanging, because I don't like to be repetitive. But at the same time, I really struggle to find something new to say to tie together all that has come before. I feel that too often I end up making things sounds falsely portentous. Or I've had trouble focusing on one idea and all the disparate elements of what I've written add up to a labyrinth of gesture and very little argument. And let's not talk about my powers of argument. They could use some help, too. But I will keep on writing. It helps me to know more about myself, and that's all I truly care about. Next: Less navel-gazing! (We--I--hope!) Wednesday, May 07, 2003
Mktg Being hard up for cash and in search of something new, I went to a focus group last week. The topic was energy drinks, or rather, an energy drink. Despite my almost total lack of interest in or experience with anything more caffeinated than tea, [Company] had seen fit to let me have a go at it. (I was surprised to find out that, not being a coffee drinker, I was not alone in my group of eight 18-to-30-year-old peers.) The session took place in a windowless room with the requisite mirrored wall and microphones on the table and ceiling. Our effusive host laid down a general outline of the evening's agenda started us out asking which drinks already on the market we were familiar with. The general consensus was that [Product] was the best-known. How did we drink it? Mixed with vodka, mostly. (Not its intended use, but the innovative drive of America's youth cannot be underestimated!) I was the only one who had heard of [Other Product], which caught Effusive Host's attention--it turned out that [Other Product Spinoff] was to be our main topic for the night. [Spinoff] is apparently a revolutionary idea in the world of energy drinks: a get-up-in-the-morning-and-go option meant to combine the attributes of orange juice and coffee. With carbonation. Yeah, I know: yuck. We were first asked to appraise a design for the can. My fellow groupies immediately won my heart by sniffing that it gave the impression of its contents being totally artificial (and it looked rather like a box of detergent, one pointed out). We went on to compare other can designs--always referred to as "ideas" by Effusive Host--then discuss a short block of text ("[Spinoff] has the goodness of guaraná and maltodextrin!") that EH claimed was not ad copy. The word "ignite" figured multiple times in the mystery text, and "fire" seemed to be the theme of the can designs. This will be important later. EH presented a number of different colors for the drink itself (from Day-Glo yellow to persimmon orange), and further ideas for package designs. I have to admit the clear plastic can was pretty cool, but the silver bottle ("it looks like...hair mousse!") and tallboy just elicited snickers. After much buildup, we were presented with four samples. Somehow I thought they'd already decided on the composition of the product, but...no. The first was, um, pungent--I could smell it from six feet away. Oh, yeah. Not a good sign. Tasted horrible. Horrible. I imagine the first sample was presented in order to make all the others seem much nicer by comparison. And they did. One tasted like Sunny Delight (ordinarily not pleasant, but in context quite refreshing), one tasted like Orangina, and I found the last sample intermediate, although some others in the group likened it to [Parent Product], the logo of which was featured prominently and rather uglily on all package designs. I have to admit that after tasting the latter samples, I wasn't quite so opposed to the product idea as I thought I'd be. It didn't have the nasty caffeinated taste I'd expected, and was rather refreshing. Still, I wouldn't give up orange juice (healthier and cheaper) that easily. The most telling moment came when we were asked to rate alternate names for [Spinoff]. Some were clever, some were silly...and then there was "Urgent Orange." A couple of my groupmates laughed--OK, I initially laughed too--and said it was so ridiculous that if they saw it in the market, they just might try it. Any negative comments? "Yeah," I said. "It borders on offensive." EH's blank stare told me all I needed to know about why I was glad I didn't go into marketing. It's not exactly esoteric knowledge that Agent Orange is a defoliant used in Vietnam and now linked to various diseases; a product that puns (poorly) on it and incorporates a sense of "burning" in its ad campaign would be in bad taste. Monday, May 05, 2003
Cinque di Maggio So I decided on Hopkins, which in common parlance means 'Italy.' I then wrestled with myself for a few days after, just to get all the insecurity out. I think it's just about gone. Feels good. Have started picking up bits of Italian; am amused to find the odd pairing of Germania 'Germany' with tedesco 'German.' I guess it's about as reasonable as our 'Holland/Dutch' conflation. I've also figured out that arrivederci is based on rivedere 'to see again.' It's kind of cute. In other news, one of my roommates moved out on Friday, taking with her the cable and DSL (and a small piece of my heart). I am adjusting fairly well to my new, technologically-backward life. It's for the best, I guess. More time to clean...and exercise...and read...and go out and do stuff...and stuff... |
