Whatever else could be said about me (such as that I’m a “whiny, pathetic buttwad,” for example), I think that most people would agree that I am, at the very least, a bit odd.
The most obvious aspects of my personality to betray signs of oddness are, of course, my behavior and the things that I say, but of course the oddness goes much deeper than that.
Among the odd behaviors I exhibit, which is especially apparent here, is a tendency to be rather self-absorbed. As such, and since I’m not self-absorbed to the extent that I’m completely oblivious to the world around me and how other people behave, I can’t help but notice just how odd I really am below the surface as I find myself lost in frightened wonder amid the swirling carnival sideshow of my thoughts.
Sometimes I can understand, at least a little, how my mind works, or why it works in a certain way, but there are other times in which I’m completely baffled.
As a case in point, when I listen to the song “Brompton Oratory” (I apologize for the pop-up ad, but I can’t find another site that has the correct lyrics) by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, which is a wonderful song, by the way, I find my mind traveling back in time to late November of 1984.
Not to any specific memories of that month, but just a general impression of that post-Thanksgiving period, of a cold dry wind and a winter that was already well underway as the British pop stars of Band Aid wondered whether or not the people of Ethiopia knew that it was Christmas time on the Canadian music video program “Video Hits,” which we picked up, fuzzily, on Channel Two, as broadcast by our neighbor to the north.
(For the record, if I recall correctly, Ethiopia has a predominantly Christian population, so it seems likely that they would be aware of the fact that it was Christmas time, though as it is primarily a form of Orthodox Christianity that’s practiced, it’s likely that December 25 means very little to them, since I don't think that's when Christmas is celebrated in Orthodox Christianity.)
As to why this particular song, which makes no reference to anything even remotely similar, nor sounds especially like any songs from that period, should elicit this response is utterly beyond me, and, I’m forced to admit, is more than slightly odd.
In any case, on the topic of a winter that is well underway, winter, or what passes for it in these parts, came to Northern Virginia over the weekend.
It was, naturally, greeted by raw panic, food-hoarding, and frequent car accidents.
The total accumulation of “as much as five inches,” amazingly, didn’t seem to cause any deaths in the area, though. I say “amazingly,” as a simple dip in temperature often seems to be enough to kill people around here.
Because I grew up in the Mid-West near the shores of the lake-effect snow-inducing Lake Superior, I’m accustomed to nature’s fury being considerably more furious than it is here, and as such am more than a little puzzled by the sheer idiocy of the average Northern Virginians response to what, to me, is nothing more than a light dusting.
Don’t get me wrong; there is legitimate cause for concern when it snows here, but not because of the snow itself. The idiocy is so widespread and deeply-ingrained that when you take to the road when it snows (or even when it rains), you’re in a great deal of dange from other drivers.
When driving conditions turn less than ideal, most drivers in NoVA tend to fall into one of two categories: Frightened Children or Total Maniacs.
The Frightened Children are dangerous because their fearful over-cautious approach to driving actually manifests itself as a form of recklessness. They’re so intent on making it to their destinations alive that they don’t care who else they take out in the process.
They are also inclined to panic at the slightest sideways motion of their vehicles, and their panic only makes the situation worse as they mindlessly slam on the brakes and jerk the wheel in the opposite direction of the skid.
It's not much fun to be on the road behind Frightened Children.
The Total Maniacs, on the other hand, exercise no caution whatsoever, thinking that they can drive through a snowstorm without making any concessions to the conditions.
Often these people have some sort of SUV and feel that this makes them invincible.
The rolled-over Hummer that Brian spotted on the side of the road when he was on his way to work during the worst of the storm stands, or rather, lies, as a testament to the fact that if you don’t know what you’re doing your vehicle isn’t going to know either, no matter how much you spent on it in your vain attempt to prove that you’re better than everyone else.
The biggest question I have for both kinds of drivers is “Where are you going anyway?”
Just as most people around here aren’t accustomed to winters that last run from October to May in which five inches of snow falls in the time it takes you to sprint across the cold floor from your bed to the shower as I am, they also don’t work as “essential” personnel in a 24x7 operation.
So given that most places will announce their closure and most events will be cancelled as soon as anyone even hints that it might snow, where is there to go? When you don’t have to drive in bad weather, why do it, particularly if you fall into the Frightened Child category?
On the topic of preemptive closures, though, that’s another thing that (no pun intended) really frosts me. I can’t help but get pissed when I hear about school closures the night before when it hasn’t even started snowing yet, and I think back on all of the white-knuckled bus rides to school I went through as a kid and teenager during which I genuinely feared for my life.
Compared to those scary mornings, the absolute worst weather I’ve seen out here doesn’t even raise the slightest glimmer of fear in me.
That is until I think about how everyone else is going to react to it, at any rate.
In any case, basically any time it snows I launch into this same rant, and I’ve been accused of being unfair.
“After all,” I’ve been told, “we’re just not used to this kind of weather.”
Of course, this is my third winter out here, and I’ve heard that same refrain every year.
Guess what? We’ve had “this kind of weather” during each winter that I’ve seen. You think maybe you might start noticing a pattern and start learning to adapt to it? After all, there’s at least the slightest outside chance that it might snow again next winter.
The people who argue “we’re not used to it” also frequently cite the fact that winters "didn’t used to be this bad." It’s a spurious argument, since, again, I’ve observed the weather that sends them into such a tizzy three winters in a row. Maybe it didn’t used to be this “bad,” but it is now. Deal with it.
The biggest problem, though, is that this overall inability to adapt to harsh weather conditions that really aren’t all that harsh extends beyond the ordinary populace to the people responsible for the administration of services vital to helping the ordinary populace deal with the not-so-harsh weather conditions.
Specifically, I’m talking about the morons driving the plows and salt and sand trucks who sit on the side of the road eating donuts waiting for it all to be over before they finally decide to take a crack at clearing the roads.
The overall wimpiness of winter weather in this area isn’t really reflected on the roads, as they usually look like a disaster area after a light dusting. You’d think we lived on the tundra, simply because no one among the people who are paid to know how to remove snow seems to have the first fucking clue as to what needs to be done.
Again, it’s not like this sort of weather is a completely rare occurrence, so there’s no reason why these people can’t become seasoned road-clearing veterans, and it is rare enough that cost shouldn’t really be an issue either, especially considering, as I mentioned last week, the state and local government have plenty of tax dollars to spend.
But, as I complain about the inability of natives and transplants from areas outside of the Snow Belt to adapt to something that happens fairly regularly, I suppose I should learn to adapt to their inability to adapt.
In other words, I should quit my bitching, since it’s obvious that nothing is ever going to change.
Tomorrow I begin my ten-week expedition into the world of culinary arts. Or rather, I think that I do, as I haven’t gotten any confirmation about my registration being accepted (and my check still hasn’t been cashed).
Assuming that I am enrolled in the class, I hope that it proves to be useful and interesting.
I don’t really have any hopes on the meeting someone front, though. Even if there are some cute, single women there, I’ll still be exactly as charming, interesting, and attractive as I always am, so unless they’re cute, single women who are also incredibly desperate, I don’t see that improving my odds any.
Still, since hope does spring eternal in the human breast, I did go out to get my hair cut in a misguided attempt to improve my looks ever so slightly in anticipation of miraculously stumbling onto a nest of that most mythical of creatures tomorrow night: the hot, desperate single chick.
Besides, I was getting a little too shaggy, and I had to venture out into the world anyway, so I figured I might as well get it done.
While I was aware of the fact that she existed prior to her relatively recent commercially successful album, I’d never actually listened to Liz Phair prior to hearing her popular hits on the radio. Despite my aversion to most Top 40 music, I did find her sound appealing and decided to check her out. Since that time I’ve gotten all of her albums and enjoy her music a great deal.
I especially enjoy her older, less polished work, often described as “low-fidelity.” That’s a rather nebulous description, but it is apt, and can easily be understood when the music is actually heard.
One of the things I did know about her prior to hearing her music, thanks to Playboy, who loved her, by the way, for obvious reasons, was that she was a little on the “saucy” side, with a very frank and uninhibited approach to the topic of sexuality in her songs, and I can say now that I’ve gotten to know her work, it’s definitely true. That young lady has a potty mouth!
She also has a great voice along with some great songs, with lyrics that I think most people can relate to.
In particular, in her song “Fuck and Run” (I told you: potty mouth) she talks about her desire to find love and a serious relationship, a topic with which I’m especially familiar.
Where she and I differ, though, is that in the song she talks about how despite this desire she keeps making the same mistakes over and over again, falling into a continual pattern of waking up to remorse-filled "mornings after" on the heels of temporary “relationships” that aren't going to lead anywhere, a problem that I am decidedly not familiar with, either fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective.
Still, despite this major difference in personal experiences, there is a line that resonates with me:
I can feel it in my bones, I'm gonna spend another year alone
Later, she repeats the line with an important change that increases its overall resonance:
I can feel it in my bones, I'm gonna spend my whole life alone
That’s something that I can feel right in my marrow.
The song that I find myself listening to most often, though, is called “Divorce Song.” It’s not so much the lyrics alone that I enjoy (though the line about the license is a really good one), but the overall sound of it.
The song is particularly demonstrative of the “low-fidelity” sound, particularly with its just so slightly discordant opening strains that sound very much like, for those of you old enough to remember, a 78 being played at a 45’s speed, or to put it in (only slightly) more contemporary terms, a tape being played in a Walkman with dying batteries.
In any case, that’s it for today’s entry. Perhaps tomorrow I’ll report on my first night in class.
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