December 30, 2005
You’re a Regular Disturber of the Peace!
So proclaimed my Examiner horoscope as my debut Ax Files column hit cyberspace last March. Good omen! As I learned right off the bat, all it takes to disturb some folks is a penis, or a baker’s dozen of them. As my first year on the ‘dog draws to a close, I can’t think of anything I’d rather be called. There’s nothing I like better than rousing rabble. That’s why I was delighted when Jim Hightower autographed one of his books “To a fellow agitator.” (I had told him, remember my name, you’ll hear it again. Why, who are you? he asked. “Just a fellow agitator.”)
Some updates on the past year of the Ax Files:
MORE DICKS THAN YOU CAN SHAKE A PRICK AT
Is it true you wrote a column full of pictures of penises? someone asked me at the Bulldog soirée, with the air of a boy whispering a naughty question in the schoolyard. Mea maxima culpa, however they were not pictures of actual penises I explained but merely artistic representations of same. Anyhow big deal! Dicks don’t get nearly the public exposure, pardon the expression, and attention that tits do. How would men like it if women checked out their package as blatantly as men eye their tits, if women couldn’t keep their gaze from below men’s waists as they talk to them? Let’s bring cocks out of hiding! Let’s get our Hanes on them! Or, er, off them.
“Dicks and Pricks” was nothing—my new friend Katarina thoughtfully gave me a gift of a Norwegian publication entitled The Penis Atlas inscribed “Enjoy yourself!” Try to keep from gagging! would have been more like it. If you’re a Dickophile, this is the coffee table book for you—if you want your guests doing “spit takes” with their coffee. This handsome volume comes with a paper slipcover on which the package is shown wrapped (in underwear), and then unwrapped (au natural) when you take it off.
This thorough, comprehensive 241-page treatise profuse with examples of every shape and size of penis in every stage of passivity and engorgement from multiple angles, overlaid with graphs in centimeters, should be locked away from your virgin daughter, lest she be scarred for life. Let her discover the nature of the “turkey neck” (a la Sylvia Plath) for herself. Hopefully it will be easier to take if it’s attached to someone she loves. Believe me, American women, at least, are not socialized to be aroused by such pictures. Why? Well you don’t see them around every corner, on billboards and magazine covers and beer commercials, like you do breasts, and they are not exploited as sexual paraphernalia independent of the people whose parts they are (in straight culture anyway). Are you likely to overhear a woman say “look at the bodacious package on that guy?” Do women pass construction sites wolf-whistling at the denim-encased cockage on display? Do men get ogled and harassed simply for walking down the street wearing clothes that fit their male anatomy?
Apparently, Norwegians are not big on circumcision. I think I recognized one of these dudes as the model for the Noah’s Bagels “pig in a blanket” advertisement. Though the text is in Norwegian, I ran across a handful (pardon the expression) of English phrases while turning its pages: “Use it or lose it,” and in the bibliography, a reference to a book called A Mind of Its Own. Sorry, I couldn’t find the Atlas on Amazon.con, but for your info the ISBN is 82-8071-061-2, the authors Benestad, Keller, Aakvåg and Hardeberg, the publisher Dinamo Forlag, Postboks 442, 1327 Lysaker, Norge. If you can’t wait call them at 011 +47 67 200 000. For I don’t know whom, it is the perfect gift. Gag gift.
In any event, oddly enough, I am not the only Alexandra Jones commenting on “cockular characteristics.” Check out this “gal’s take on the whole cock thing.”
http://flatplanet.net/articles/classic331.php
“SOME OF THAT STUFF REALLY HAPPENED...
word for word.”
“It’s just writing.”
(An exchange between Mr. Big and sex columnist Carrie Bradshaw, “Sex and the City.”)
I got an email from the Learning Annex advertising a seminar entitled “Leave Your Legacy” about writing personal memoirs. Among the topics covered were “How to conquer the voices that urge you not to air the family laundry” and “How to tell the truth and not lose your inheritance.”
Having gotten myself in various degrees and temperatures of hot water detailing the various adventures of my past self, I have asked myself, does anyone have the right to tell me…do not write about me? Yes, of course they have the right to. And I have the right to reply, “I simply cannot guarantee that.” And they have the right to get righteously p.o.’ed and swear me off for life. But don’t say iI didn’t tell you, if you’re talking to me, you know the score; I’m a writer. My theme is all of life. The chips will fall where they may. It’s not as if I don’t spill my own beans.
ARE YOU THE ALEXANDRA WHO…..
And if I didn’t occasionally fail to “(not his real name)” I would not have gotten this delightful email from Joe Puccio, Assistant to the Director, Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate at the Library of Congress and former coworker at only the second job I ever had in my life, who after a 9-year interruption in our friendship “googled himself” and found himself smack in the middle of the Ax Files. “There, in amongst the numerous hits about Joe Puccio the bass fisherman, were a few hits about Joe Puccio the librarian. And surprisingly there was one intriguing reference that led me to a document containing the line: ‘After all, as married coworker Joe Puccio famously said while I was still in my twenties: YOU'RE ALONE BECAUSE YOU WANT TO BE.’”
Joe did not remember uttering this line that has echoed down the corridors of my life like a basketball bounced in any empty gym, but in “looking through some of the Ax Files, there were references to Philly, the type of music you like and it was all imbued with an impressive level of histrionics.” Yep, that’s me all right!
I remember another line he came out with as a bunch of us were leaving a 4th of July fireworks display: “Boy, I am too pooped to pop.” And aside to his wife: “Did you hear that, honey? Too pooped to pop!” I found that pretty damn funny, but it may be an expression I had simply never heard before. It turned up in Hitchcock’s last film, “Family Plot,” delivered by Bruce Dern. Joe was the latest of us to quit the crappy bookstore job we all hated so much and strode out of the joint triumphantly yelling “Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty I am free at last!” Never again will I walk through that door!” Then five minutes later he had to go back for the umbrella he’d forgotten. A tad anti-climactic.
I’M IN LOVE! – AGAIN
The other night as I was having a schmoke and reviewing Ax Files 16 for the inevitable gaffs and formatting errors, I got Beethoven on the brain and put on the 5th. Then I put it back on. Then I put on the 8tth, then the 3rd, then the 7th, and then it’s 3 in the morning. When I get stoned, my sense of hearing becomes acute—I can hear spiders moving across the wall, my hair growing, conversations in the next county, that sort of thing. I physically felt the sound waves of the music moving right through my molecular structure and all that airy microscopic space we know the body is full of so that with the right dynamics you could put your fist right through someone’s midriff and come out the other side.
GOD WHAT A FUCKING GENIUS
While listening to the symphonies, I would every so often find myself saying aloud, “God, what a fucking genius.” And then when I’d say it again in 20 minutes, it would be with the same sense of discovery, like it was the first time I’d thought it, like it was the first time any one had thought it.
“God, what a fucking genius.”
So I did something the other night that I’ve never done before: I went to the symphony stoned. No aurgasms (aural orgasms, or “orgasms of the ee-ah”), though, the main effect being that I got distracted by thinking, wandering off on tangents and forgetting where I was. At one point I could have sworn I heard a dog bark, but I was the only one to turn my head. Instead there was a real disturbance that sounded like a ping pong ball bouncing on the floor, and
THEN THE GHASTLY THING HAPPENED AGAIN.
In 2004 I attended a live recording of Michael Tilson Thomas conducting Mahler and an announcement was made to keep in mind that the performance was being recorded, to turn off all pagers and cell phones, to please hold the damn coughing till you think you’ll explode. Well, not much into the first movement, a disturbed old man began mouthing unintelligible words in a monotone mutter. At first it was passing, then more insistent. People around him were staring, wondering why was no one taking care of this? He obviously didn’t know where he was, and had to be escorted out by his companion and an usher, but it was not easily accomplished. Before they could effect this MTT subtly turned his shoulders and head to the left in the direction of the disturbance. I froze. Someone was in trou-ble! I thought he might stop the performance. But he soldiered on. I was mortified.
This was so dreadful to me because an orchestra in performance, once the first note has sounded, is a closed world. It communicates within and amongst itself with its own language of gesture, eye contact, body language, and symbols on a page. The listeners are bystanders respecting this. Once the piece has begun, the dominoes are falling, and they don’t quit till the last note leaves the air. It is sacrilege to disturb this concentrated effort to act in tandem with up to a hundred or more other people.
So at this particular performance of Brahms’ Double Concerto for Violin and Cello, at least it was between movements that the alleged ping ponged. Nevertheless MTT did turn and stare in its direction before proceeding. And then we all went on with our lives.
THE NUMBER IS IN
Beethoven’s Grosse Fugue score went for 1.95 million dollars at auction, which was considered the low end, sold to an “anonymous bidder” whom I hope turns out to be Jim Irsay, the owner of the Indianapolis Colts, the fellow behind the purchase and national tour of the typescript of On the Road, which I saw at the Las Vegas Public Library last May (not to fret, it’s coming here in January). The score should certainly not be a miserly private possession but be on display somewhere, I don’t care where, I’ll certainly plan a pilgrimage around it, and I’ll drag John Beck with me, just as I once announced to him “You are going to East Germany with me to celebrate the 300th birthday of Bach.” That was before the man had a family, of course, but hey—bring them with!
FAIR WARNING
At some point in the new year I am going to attend John Eliot Gardiner and the Symphonie Révolutionnaire et Romantique’s performance of Mozart’s Cm Mass AND Mozart’s Requiem, a monster double bill, at an undisclosed location. Just so you know, if anyone messes with me before or during the performance, I will take your head off.
WELL I DID IT
I finally went back to the Castro Theater. But only once in the entire year since they fired Anita Monga. Not to worry, she is alive and well and just programmed the 4th annual Film Noir Festival, showing this January at the Palace of Fine Arts and the Balboa.
http://www.filmnoirfoundation.org/
I never did go to see the benefit screening of “Helen’s World” I was conflicted about, but I still gave the Nuclear Policy Research Institute their $25 ticket price. Months later when my friend Kevin called and roused me out of the nap I take shortly after waking up on weekends, wanting to see some Harold Lloyd features at the theater, I was too weak to resist. Walking out of the theater after the show, we admired the huge moon and beautiful night and in doing so spotted a party in a second floor window, where a Sister of Perpetual Indulgence was mock humping a guy at the buffet. To be sure, “only in San Francisco.”
Kevin was going to dump me—er—drop me off home and head for Badlands. He’s not big on boycotts, apparently. He was belly-aching about the stupid drivers who were straddling the lanes and holding us up. The guy in front of us had a license plate holder from the University of Texas so I told Kevin to ram his Texas ass. Didn’t I see that in a porn movie? he asked. I can think of a Texas ass I’d like to ram but I don’t have handy the 11-foot pole I’d need to go near it. It was a lively lovely night on the Castro. And it was early yet, 10:10. Before long, I told Kevin, you’ll be ramming Texas ass at Badlands. And I assure you I’ll put that in my column. You’ll put it where? Ahem! Either my column, or my otorhinolaryngological cavern, I can’t decide which.
Kevin is of the opinion that business owners can hire or fire anybody they please. Anita herself said, "We managed to have [the Castro] function as an arts institution. That was an illusion. It is a for-profit business, and the business owner can do anything he wants with the business." I am of the same mind, by in large, but in this case the business owner’s decision was in flagrant disregard for what his patrons wanted. Is that smart business? Like I said, I, a loyal fan, felt betrayed and still do and the theater lost close to a year of my business. But perhaps after all it is true that only a vocal minority really cared who programs the Castro.
Kevin’s an attorney, a naval veteran and an upper management type at a respected institution. We used to feed each other straight lines on the H bus when we both lived in Berkeley and worked in the city. He’s always pooh-poohing my silly leftist ideas, but I like him so much I’m afraid to confirm my suspicion that he’s a Republican (though hardly a Bushite). And he likewise overlooks that I’m green around the gills. I told him that other than going there with this year I am still boycotting the theater. Get over it! he said, drop that liberal crap and look around you at what’s going on in the world. Who cares?
I do. For the same reason that Nicole Kidman gave when accepting her best actress Oscar for “The Hours” in the months following 9/11. Some thought it was irrelevant or disgraceful to proceed with the awards. But I’ll never forget Nicole, with her hair drawn tightly back, proclaiming she was there because “art matters,” and nodding in affirmation. Whatever else is going on in the world, art matters. Despite what else goes on in the world, art matters. No matter what else matters, art matters. People will still feel compelled to express the human experience through art—because people need to live, to be human, to experience joy and beauty and grace, whatever and in spite of the injustices of the world. People still have to create, to feel, to dance, to sing, to paint, to make films, to write, to believe that life is worth the trouble. Either everything matters, or nothing matters. So, yes, I care whether what was the greatest rep movie house in all the world is helmed by a for-profit enterprise or by a caring, passionate, knowledgeable, film historian. That’s just me.
Michael Franti’s “Stay Human” was the genius musical choice on “Lolita,” the Mexican bus that carried the posse, 40 of us gathered throughout the day, that Ross Mirkarimi led to San Quentin to protest Stanley “Tookie” Williams’ execution. “Every flower got a right to be bloomin’! Stay Human!” We need art, and we need it to stay human.
Nevertheless I do want the Castro to remain a repertory film palace, and to that end they need patrons. My indignation has been duly noted. Kevin and I just went to see some Busby Berkeley. It may still have been a typical Castro hoot, with that audience, but to me it all has a rather hollow feel.
I’m still finding their programming, farmed out to some guy in LA, pedestrian. They did a festival of my favorite director, Alfred Hitchcock, but stuck to popular films everyone ís familiar with. If I’d programmed it, I’d have included “Rope” as they did, but showcase older films less often shown on the big screen: “The Skin Game,” “Lifeboat,” “Jamaica Inn,” “Number 17,” “I Confess” (what would you do if you knew what he knows?), “Juno and the Paycock” etc. A Fellini round-up was similarly predictable. Oh but hey, be sure to catch the “Disco Roller Skating Extravaganza” at the end of the month!
FIVE SEXY MEN JOINED BY SIXTH
He didn’t come to mind at the time of Ax Files 8 (“San Francisco?!”) and 9 (“So Sexy It Hurts”) wherein I subjectively named five of the sexiest (straight) men in town, because to me the sports world is virtually nonexistent—even if I sit through it on the news (while I’m doing something else) the announcer might as well be saying, like the Far Side cartoon where the dog listening to his owner hears only “blah blah blah blah Fritz”—but a column of h’s reminded me that 49’er’s coach Mike Nolan is indeed one class act, “even though we suck on the field,” said a fan (I wouldn’t know).
Having formally ended the above sentence with a hard return, I will offer, for those of you with short memories or who never read 8 and 9, a brief refresher:
San Francisco is home to five of the sexiest straight men anywhere, any time, any place: Gavin Newsom, Matt Gonzalez, Ross Mirkarimi, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Barry Gifford. There’s nothing sexier than brains, and these guys have got them to spare. Brains and charisma, eloquence, social consciousness, and that old standby you never hear about much anymore because there’s so little of it going around—animal magnetism. One more thing—they’re all too busy doing their thing to be aware of how sexy they are. And how sexy is that?
I haven’t had enough exposure to Mike Nolan to know about anything like his politics, but whatever lack might exist in the above characteristics may be made up for by raw sex appeal. I just looked at the 49’ers home page at his bio, but all it said was “blah blah blah Mike Nolan,” which told me nothing. I don’t need to be told, all I need is to look at this guy to know he is a clean-cut American male in the Gary Cooper vein, the Sterling Hayden vein, the Robert Ryan vein, the varicose vein (got carried away).
AND SEVENTH
Though the original purpose of the columns was to point out that in the gay capitol of the world there are plenty of sexy straight men, I hereby remove the “straight” qualification and open the field to Michael Tilson Thomas. Here’s someone in the public eye who has used his power, artistry, energy and influence in the name of culture worldwide. He has terrifically enhanced the musical life of the city for 10+ years, at home and on the international stage. I’ve had my eye on him since the early ‘70’s when I first saw him play a “prepared” piano on TV, when he struck me as ahead of his time, and he is still on the leading edge of bringing contemporary and premiere works to the orchestra and keeping the SFS world-class. Plus he has the special “aura” of passion for music, my own greatest passion. If there is anyone in all of San Francisco I would like to trade lives with, it is he—and I’d still get to sleep with men! An idea: if you know nothing about classical music but are curious, I have a suggestion: get a hold of his DVD “Keeping Score: MTT on Music”
http://www.shopsfsymphony.org/item.jsp?item=04046&category=39
which documents the orchestra’s preparation for a performance of Tchaikovsky’s 4th Symphony…and then go hear them perform it live in January. I’ll be there on the 25th in the second row. Do it! Just to be different.
JUST SO YOU KNOW
There’s no formula for who is or is not sexy. Anybody can be. Aside from a subjective set of attributes you might look for in someone, it can come down to that je ne sais quoi visceral response one has to a person—her “way,” as in the Billy Joel song, “She’s got a way about her, I don’t know what it is”—or the “mmmmph” factor, as Joan Crawford put it in “Sudden Fear.”
One reader wrote to say she disagreed with my Fantastic Five and that Mike Casey [Prez of UNITE HERE Local 2 hotel workers union] “has it all over anyone on your list.” Well I can’t argue with black Irish passion! Others mentioned were the “rather delectable” Felix McNee (an artist unknown to me, referred to by h as a “combo of an old Rembrandt and a young Picasso”), erstwhile City Attorney Ted Lakey and none other than…h brown. Apparently he’s got great legs. You devil, h! (I haven’t seen them, in any context.)
Some other sexies in my own book are Kramer—yes Kramer from Seinfeld (I loved his sensitive performance in Diane Keaton’s “Unstrung Heroes”)—Anthony Hopkins (finger-lickin’ good as the cannibal Hannibal and everything else he touches), Evander Holyfield, Mikhail Baryshnikov, actors Josh Lucas, Richard Jenkins (the dead father on “Six Feet Under”), Al Pacino in all phases and all ages of his life, American maverick Sterling Hayden, the great Tatsuya Nakadai, and DO NOT FORGET Bruce Lee (mmmmph!). Just a sampler. Incidentally, naming a man as sexy does not automatically mean I want to have sex with the guy. It’s more of the aura of the man than a fantasy about him. But I wouldn’t say no to Kramer.
I on the other hand enter the new year retaining my title of Biggest Waste of Womanhood in the Western World. It’s a good thing my life doesn’t depend on a date for the prom because I couldn’t get one to save it. Not if I wait for the guy to ask. Which is why I seldom do.
BY THE WAY, CONGRULATIONS MTT ON THE BUSINESS ARTS
COUNCIL’S CYRIL MAGNIN LIFETIME ACHEIVEMENT AWARD
“honoring his many decades of contributions to the arts as conductor, composer, educator and visionary.” And even better, Gramophone's 2005 Artist of the Year, anointing him “perhaps the US’s most ‘complete’ Mahlerian.” It hadn’t occurred to me that such a title existed, but a great big congrats on behalf of all of SF. It may have been his childhood dream. Oh yes and then, the SFS was granted the ASCAP First Place Award for Programming of Contemporary Music for the 2004-2005 season. There is no end to MTT’s achievements…that’s why I wish he would use his influence to prevent the good will mission of the Symphony’s going to Shanghai in February, in protest of the Communist Chinese Party’s treatment of the Falun Gong. Would be a diplomatic nightmare, to be sure; Shanghai is a sister-city and 20% of our population is of Chinese heritage—but isn’t anyone going to step up to the plate on this one? I think it would honor San Francisco’s Chinese to have a civic leader (ahem, Gavin) decry this persecution. But the City needs China’s business and the Symphony needs people’s support. Tough choice? Yes, but one that has to be made worldwide if this travesty is ever to end.
http://www.faluninfo.net/DisplayAnArticl.asp?ID=9299
Will one or all of you Supervisors at least sponsor a resolution to let the Falun Gong march in the Chinese New Year Parade? What in God’s name is the problem here and who’s applying the pressure? Apply it right back, please.
GOD, WHAT A FUCKING YAHOO
I don’t know all that much about Tys Sniffen except that he seems to be a caring and thoughtful community activist, but I do know Tys Sniffen reads sfbulldog.com because in the following letter to Art Bruzzone which was printed in The Sentinel, he praises h brown—but I will not assume that he looks at my column or was referring to me either intentionally or unconsciously when he echoed, in the following passage, my mission statement in AxFiles No. 1, “I am here to write whatever I want, whenever I want, for whatever its worth.”
…our 'media' are simply self-appointed. They hold no license, don't 'officially' even need any training, don't need to proclaim their philosophies or bias, can write about whatever they want, whenever they want. This ends up with a bunch of yahoos…
Well, here it is, with The Sentinel’s summary headline:
NOT LICENSING THE MEDIA RESULTS IN YAHOOS WRITING
ABOUT WHATEVER THEY WANT
Dear Arthur Bruzzone:
I just saw your interview with Pat Murphy, and appreciate you having such a 'quiet hero' of SF politics on.
I'm compelled to write to respond to a question you asked Pat about the lack of critical media in SF, which I think is a good question, but I think, was focused in the wrong direction.
Pat began to take the conversation down the path, but I don't know if he would have asked the follow up questions that I want to point out: 'who is the media?'… Pat started talking about the guy with a flyer to bloggers to our corporate media friends... but I think your point was an honest one: our current media is really just those that get read and heard: The Chronicle, The Ex, the Guardian, the Weekly, the TV stations, maybe KQED.
Where is the criticism? It's not there because our 'media' are simply self-appointed. They hold no license, don't 'officially' even need any training, don't need to proclaim their philosophies or bias, can write about whatever they want, whenever they want. This ends up with a bunch of yahoos who start to hang out in the same circles as politicians, easily succumbing to the charms and foibles of these 'leaders' who are just in the game to be in the game, to stay in the game.
In other words, the media is just like our current politicians: working hard to stay exactly where they are. This means, of course, not pissing off your pals, the folks you cover, the politicians. We've seen this on the national level with the White House Press corp [sic] being easily manipulated by the administration, and we can see it play out right here in SF. Worse, it generally leads to corporate/consumer driven content, worrying about what sells and how not to piss off the corporate sponsors. In my opinion, this is one of the fundamental issues with the United States that gets constantly ignored.
On the other hand, we do have moments when the media here in SF shines through, such that it is. You asked Pat where the critical media was; I'd suggest Matt Smith at the SF Weekly is probably doing the best job out there… his research and writing and subject matter deserve MUCH more attention than they get. There are minor players: H. Brown at sfbulldog.com and Robert Anderson at district5diary.blogspot.com and I suppose Beyond Chron at beyondchron.org none of which I agree with much, but there they are.
And of course, Pat Murphy is at least covering everything, so we can always keep up with what's going on, whether there's spin by the politicians or not.
Tys Sniffen
September 23, 2005
YOU CAN CALL ME AX, AND YOU CAN CALL ME AXEL, AND YOU CAN
CALL ME SASHA, AND YOU CAN CALL ME JONESY,
BUT YA DOESN’T HAVE TO CALL ME “THE MEDIA”
The American Society of Interior Designers has been lobbying around the issue of who can call him- or herself an “Interior Designer.” There are people with formal university-level training who are Board-certified and want to protect themselves (and clients) from the threat of simply talented upstarts who did not have that training, but still want to call themselves by the same title and put themselves out on the market with the heavy hitters. Suppose one has only “design sense”? And connections? You can have a B.A. and an M.A. in Architecture, but you can’t called yourself an “architect” until you’ve passed the California Board of Architecture State Licensure Exams, only an “intern architect.” So who gets to call themselves the media?
BUYER BEWARE
Basically it’s a case of caveat emptor. Murphy said it too, in the Bruzzone interview. Whomever you go to for information or services, it’s your responsibility to perform due diligence. Find out for yourself what a person’s credentials are before you hire, or trust, them. Caveat emptor and caveat lector. Whatever news or commentary source we go to, it’s entirely up to us to determine their credibility, veracity, and whether they are worth our time and respect. I loved what Murphy had to say about this:
I’ve always thought the power of the press [to form opinion] was overrated. I think the only thing that we can do…is to frame what people think about during the period they watch this 15-minute segment or during the period that they read a story that I write. After that they’re completely on their own…San Francisco is still a town where just everybody gets so upset and takes so much as important what they read somewhere, and it’s always just going to be that one writer’s, that one producer’s, that one…host’s...perspective…what you bring to it that day with your prejudice, with your ignorance, what you know, with your insightfulness.
WHAT GIVES ME THE RIGHT TO WRITE WHATEVER I WANT, WHENEVER I WANT?
Part of my paying job is to prepare presentation boards featuring the award-winning projects of my firm. I jokingly call them “glory boards.” So I guess, like Ken Garcia, I could put out a full-page glory board of myself bearing the legend “THE TRUTH.” But until my head is inflated to the size of a hot-air balloon, that’s not my m.o. (Pat Murphy, laughing, to Bruzzone: “The Truth? Oh, you’re one of those people who want to touch and feel The Truth!”)
But OK, say I go to the New York Times and I don’t have a degree in Journalism. I have no experience on a newspaper staff. Here’s my entire resume: “Born to write.” Well, guess what, the editor likes my style. The other applicant, with a graduate degree from Columbia, is simply not as imaginative and provocative as I. Does that qualify me to be a “media” writer? That “qualified” professionals judged me competent to write professionally?
ALEXANDRA JONES, B.A., 1977
Or: I have a degree in English, cum laude, with departmental honors. Is that training enough? Does that make my thoughts eligible to be published at large? And does that makes my thoughts more legitimate, credible, incisive, than one who does not?
Do these judgments from my professorial mentors qualify me?
You sure can write.
Said straight, you are the best writer I’ve seen in my 8 years of reading student papers. You have a really fine talent…do become a writer to give the rest of us some pleasure at clever, powerful prose.
THE READERS WEIGH IN
How about the comments from my Ax Files readers:
LOVED IT ! VERY RAW ! A +!
You're hysterical! Thank you!
Good job heating up cyberspace. I hope you have fire insurance. And an asbestos suit, you'll need it.
It's like you have this wild life in the deep forest…we all live in a deep forest, it's that you have the voice to articulate the experience
I love your stuff. Aside from the free booze and pot that comes his way, you're the best thing that's happened to [h brown].
you have an "in-your-face tongue-in-cheek kind of subtlety"…
you’re getting to be like…actually I can’t think of anyone you’re like
out there & straight to the point.
sex, romance and depleted uranium
pretty good stuff
creative insightful and fun…smart and smart ass…good work
And my favorite (from h)…
You've added a booster rocket up our tired asses.
Or at least up your otorhinolaryngological caverns.
A QUALITY JOURNALIST SUCH AS MYSELF
Then there’s this email I got from Ted Broomfield, CEO of Changester.com, who is inviting “quality journalists such as [my]self” to contribute San Francisco news stories.” As he addressed me as nothing but “axfiles,” I imagine this was kind of a first-round cattle call, but I hastened to thank him and point out that as far as S.F. politics go, I am more color commentator than pundit. I think of myself as a columnist, not a journalist, but even more basically as a plain old writer, someone who is compelled to manipulate the English language, whatever the topic at hand. I take every opportunity to do so, and was given a forum to do so by h brown. To date, he’s the best thing that ever happened to me. I’ll stand him a drink anytime, anywhere. I think that’s him at the door.
EVERYBODY’S A CRITIC
Though I work for an architectural firm, I am not particularly knowledgeable about architecture, I’ m not particularly interested in architecture and I certainly don’t have a degree in architecture—but hey, guess what, I live in buildings and I purchase buildings and that makes me a consumer of architecture. I can judge architects and their work as I please, subjectively, and dismiss from my consideration any architect whose work does not interest me. Tys Sniffen is a reader who like every other, determines the worth of what he reads.
FOR WHATEVER IT’S WORTH
You! Hyocrite lecteur! You know damn well it is up to you and to every reader, to judge the merits of every writer, every commentator, every orator out there. No writer, self-appointed or not, flying the banner of The Truth or not, is immune to criticism from any reader. I never encourage people to write, because the world is heavy with words, and if you don’t have the drive to motivate your own self to write, I will not coddle you and the world will not miss you. A famous violinist said to a student auditioner, “I’m sorry, but you lack the fire.” The student took this to heart, and went into business. He encountered the famous violinist and thanked him for his advice that had spared him the futility of continued study, and made him a wealthy man. The violinist said, “If you had the fire, it wouldn’t have mattered what I said.”
TRY TO SHUT US UP
So now any old anyone who has the fire to set words down and send them into the world has a forum. I pay no attention to nor do I desire to investigate 99-44/100ths% of the blogging clogging cyberspace. Why? Life is too damn short. There’s a world out there that doesn’t have a glowing computer screen in front of it. It happens though, like it or not, that once technology stepped up to the plate, the internet evolved as a natural platform for democracy in action. Writers of all stripes compete on a level playing field. That, I once said here, is the genius and power of the web. You don’t have to make it to the top of the agent’s pile, get edited, or submit to your editor’s or publisher’s whims or agendas. If you’re worth your salt and make an effort you’ll find your readers. If not, you still get to have a website for your and your friends to mess with. Therefore I write not only what I want, when I want, but for whatever it’s worth to anyone who may read my words. If I don’t please you, tune me out. I want you to. You have other things to do.
WHAT DO YOU WANT, TYS?
I found your letter vague, confusing, cynical, disingenuous and at times way off base. Corporate influence is hardly an issue that gets ignored in America! To reduce political and journalistic motive to being and staying where you are ignores the call to public service and the human needs for these services. And to whom do you refer as our corporate media “friends”? What’s friendly about them, if they’re corporate-influenced? You don’t agree with Beyond Chron “but there they are”! What kind of endorsement is that? And The Sentinel? They just fired h brown in order “not [to piss] off their [frightened] pals, the folks [they] cover, the politicians.” As was their right, like it or not, as it is their enterprise, not h brown’s.
I’m not really sure what your point is. After all, here you are, sounding off on the web. What are your qualifications to be heard? Who is to be the judge of what you have to offer? Or of what level of training is or is not “officially” acceptable? Is there to be a certification board, a minimum level of education and experience, a test to pass, a license issued, as you seem to call for?
Basically, you’re objecting to citizens exercising free speech. What gives you the right to do it? Same as me. Just that little ol’ yellowing piece of parchment, The Constitution.
IT WAS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME
I’m not going to say I told you so because it’s not what I mean. I’m not glad, for h’s sake, but I also am glad, for my own, that h brown got fired by The Sentinel, because he apparently could not write for them and remain involved with and loyal to the Bulldog simultaneously. As a ‘dogger I found this disheartening if not insulting. But the man was, ironically, star-struck, seduced by the increased readership! It addled his brain. Listen to this ass-kiss, only weeks before they fired him for the third time:
I have to hand it to Patrick Murphy and Luke Thomas who host the Sentinel. For the past 3 months or so, they have graciously offered their readership an actual array of opinions regarding the mayorship of Gavin Newsom. They both think he's doing great. I think he's pretty much a pre-fab phony. Yet, they print both sides. You don't get better than that, folks. The New York Times, for instance, doesn't publish Bill O'Reilly. Would the Universe as we know it collapse if they did?!
Jesus h Christ, h! Were you in some kind of trance? I similarly doubt that the Universe will collapse if you don’t write for The Sentinel. In fact you have probably attracted more readers to the Bulldog who will miss your weekly dose of bile. Looking back on the birth of the Bulldog you wrote:
After the Harris thing [which previously got h fired], a couple of friends gave me the Bulldog as a Christmas gift (thanks to Deby & Frank who post from Oregon now) ... a gift so that my voice couldn't be stilled by any star-struck publisher who got leaned on by contributor or favored politician.
The Bulldog’s not looking so provincial now, is it? Back in November it rubbed me the wrong way when h forwarded me an email to The Sentinel asking if they wanted to publish his “anecdotal political gossip” that people email him that could possibly run as a feature on how a column gets put together. Why beg their permission? I replied:
I don't know why you're asking Luke or anybody if he's interested in publishing your tidbits when you have your own website you can publish any damn thing you want on, which you seem to have defected from for the preening showcase of The Sentinel…Just remember [your own words]: “Of course the people are reading us. We don't have to go through a gauntlet of compromised editors to publish a story.”
Including Pat Murphy and Luke Thomas! They are not free from money concerns and it's up to them what they run. You are still subject to being fired when the honeymooon's over. Why wait for their approval before your stuff sees the light of day?
Needless to say, the Sentinel did not publish my own open letter to h brown: “Welcome back to the kennel, doggy!”
What happened to h. brown? Is he really an anti-Semite or was he just oblivious to the inappropriateness and fallacy of attributing character flaws to people’s ethnicity? It’s his temperament to be sneering and challenging. But I’m sure he’s examined his own behavior from every angle and come out the loser. I’ve got to hand it to h (and Chris Daly) though—they sure don’t mind being hated. I wrote here once that if you’re going to put yourself out to the public you’ve got to be fearless—and that h certainly is. I love that rough-and-tumble little gnome! Keep it comin’ pardner—shoot ‘em up till you’ve shot ‘em down. Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The gnome knows. And 2006 bodes well for the ole’ Bulldog. After all, we’ve got the fire!
WELCOME TO THE WORLD
little Zazu and Zzyzzy. Though Jackson was the pet love of my life, I thought it was time to give a home to two needy kitten kaboodles, brother and sister, abandoned in a box in Brisbane, whose lives were saved by Wonderdogrescue.com. I had originally planned to adopt their sister Daisy who’d lost an eye due to an infection, but Daisy wasn’t having any of me and she went to another home. Only four months old and about four pounds each, these little hellions have the run of my flat and wreak havoc everywhere they go. Right now they’re in the living room moving furniture. Now they’re dashing down my bowling alley hallway like the cavalry on crack. Now they’re creating a commotion hanging from the woody stem of my yucca plant. And how is it that together they produce more poop than the volume of what they eat? Now they’re trotting across the floor with their little stomachs full of Friskies bulging their sides out like a snake that swallowed a hedgehog.
Zazu, the sister, was a Zazu at first sight, and throughout my childhood the last entry in the Philadelphia phone book was “Zzyzzy Zzyzzy’s Ztamp Ztudio.” (It’s pronounced “Zizzy.”) And so Ziz and Zaz found their way into my home. They didn’t have any mothering, and so I have another compulsive chin licker in Ziz, who braces his paws against my face and kneads it while he licks away like one possessed. I’m slowly breaking him of this excessive behavior, but the little guy never got the mother love he needed so I can spend up to half an hour just lifting him off my chest and moving him away and he’s back in a flash for more of the same. Eventually I have to pull my turtleneck up over my nose before he gives up. The genetic mandate to be a cat is all-powerful. Moments after these frenetic furballs are loosed on the world, they begin to claw, chase, stalk, climb, groom, wrestle, pester, beg, run, jump, mew and sleep. They’re a handful, but it’s good to have their little engines purring in the house.
PRETTY SOON IT WILL BE 2006
2007, 2008, 2009 and counting American men and women killed by their own President. Take a look:
http://theunitedamerican.blogs.com/Movies/2000A/2000.html
Learn more about the fallen at:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2003/iraq/forces/casualties
It’s up to 2,175 American dead as I write these words at 3:28 a.m., Friday morning, December 30th. An awful number, but only a fraction of the estimated 100,000+ Iraqis who have been killed.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7170.htm
So here’s a toast to 2006 and the impending impeachment of George Bush and Dick Cheney. The countdown begins.
And as long as we’re counting…
www.costofwar.com
But I would like to close out the year on a lighter note. My sister sent me this. After it loads, click anywhere and enjoy the action. Happy New Year!
Stay human.
http://albinoblacksheep.com/flash/jah.php
Zazu and Zzyzzy kick back in their beloved boot box.
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Short Attention Span Poetry Corner
A forlorn puppy
Tied to a post
Sporting a sad Santa’s hat
A red-jacketed Chihuahua
Collar turned fashionably up
Leaps for joy on San Pablo Ave.
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You Disturb Me
December 30, 2005
axfiles@sbcglobal.net
Please email if you want to be, or do not want to be, on my 2006 blast list.
