the death of rap

A sad article came to my attention after those happy descriptions of the Academic Elf's students. This writer seems to think rap is a dying genre:

"Such profanity once drew attention to ghetto life, forcing conservatives, policymakers and critics into sociological debate; now hip hop is more likely to suffer admission into the American literary canon."

Art moves on, I guess. It would be silly to compose like Haydn in 2004 or to write like George Eliot. Thomas Kinkade is trying something like that. People feel sorry for you.

But are there genres that don't go stale? We still get excited to see some really good musicians go crazy when the summer jazz festival comes to town. And what about narrowly prescribed games like basketball that people play again and again to ever-admiring crowds? Maybe I am getting off track here with the sports example.

It seems like what we admire in the young Arizona freestylers (and in the Dixieland band and the basketball team) is their performance within the constraints of an existing genre, not any new contribution to the definition of art. Creativity exists within genres, although we seem to admire most the people who invent or redefine genres: Cervantes, Beethoven, Elvis, Fosbury.

Happiness and purpose

This is only barely related to the discussion about money and contentedness, but I haven't said anything in quite a while so I thought I'd say something. In War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning by Chris Hedges, which I recommend, he says that both (1) happiness and (2) a sense of purpose are important to a balanced life. Happiness without purpose ends up being boring and empty, while a strong purpose without some sort of happiness becomes a mania or obsession, which is the main thing he's concerned about in the book.

As I try to choose between two positions that offer me $15,000 a year in two of the most expensive cities to live in in the United States, I wonder about both. Will graduate school really give me a sense of purpose, and will that even be enough money to subsist in Boulder or Eugene?

about money

I think the mistake comes from thinking either one is desirable: poverty or money. Poverty is not noble because you spend all that time in misery obsessing about where your next meal comes from. Riches aren't noble because you end up obsessing about how to impress someone completely unworthy of being impressed with the meal you're going to invite them to. Money is not evil in itself, just like the meals aren't evil in themselves. The evil is in caring about the wrong things. Not being able to respect someone else because you're hungry and crabby and working all the time, or not being able to respect someone else because you're so busy and full of yourself and deluded about what's important.

So the key is to be happy where you are. Easy for the rich person to say!

Voila the Tree's two cents' worth.

Suggested research topic

Has anyone done research on the average distance between a person and their automobile? This seems like it would be interesting to study. In America, at least, when a car is seen, it is safe to assume the owner is nearby. We don't really think about this. When we sleep at night, the car is in the garage. When we're at work, the car is in the parking lot. Vehicles are necessary appendages.

It's time to end the bondage! Sell your car now!

Spy notes

The manipulator of likenesses finds herself recognizing people she has never met. She's scanned them in, sharpened the contrast in their faces, removed their blemishes, traced the outline of their hair, blown them up, sized them down, and slid them all around the pages of publications. Then she runs into them at the oil change place and stares at them a little too long before she realizes she's a complete stranger to them.

The Tree sings of spring

The Tree of Valinor wonders if errant tongues are still in danger of sticking in Chicago. Is the city hiding its Big Shoulders under copious coats? What color is Lake Michigan?

It's been exactly a month since the last, lone snow in Dallas, a legitimate wintry symbol to the Texans for half a day, appreciated by the leisurely Tree as a lacy Valentine rain. Now the fruit trees are shedding petals on the sidewalks and spraying perfume in the air, along with the lilacs and hyacinths. Many little colorful things are out, but the Tree disdains tulips.

Green leafy vegetables that are preferable to lettuce

Spinach

Memorable phrases from Dallas

The two key words are: caution and flammable.

Do they do worship, or do they just sing hymns?

Now write this down. What God desires, he wires. And what he wires, he inspires.

Bubba Hotep

Bizarre is the best and probably the only way to describe this film. It strikes me as precisely the kind of thing bored college students would dream up late at night when they should be studying, but beyond that it is difficult to describe. To say that's it about Elvis and JFK who are both still alive in a nursing home in East Texas and have to fight an Egyptian mummy who is destroying the souls of the other nursing home residents is to completely fail to do the movie justice. If you like bizarre movies, see it; otherwise, stay home.