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Get On the Bus

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I seem to spend most of my life idly: waiting for the bus. And when one is boarding a commuter bus, it is apparently customary to step aside to allow members of the female gender to board ahead of you, if you are male. Having spent the majority of my life in engaged in such idleness, i am well acquainted with this traditional practice. Generally, I regard all the trappings of what is commonly referred to as "chivalry" to be actually a form of patriarchy: a set of subtle methods to subjugate women and deprive them of their agency. However, I do typically assent to the practice of "ladies first," simply to avoid an inconvenient transgression of minor social mores. But lately, when i'm preparing to board the bus and entirely willing to adhere to traditional practice, women will just walk right in front of me, as individuals or in groups, coming from all directions and usurping my place in line as if they enjoyed a sense of entitlement to public transportation. Is this where our society is headed? And does chivalric tradition still apply if the woman in question is a lesbian?

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Curb Your Enthusiasm

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There are two young women I notice from time to time, in the course of my daily activities who stand out in a crowd of commuters. I always see them together; as far as i can recall, I have never seen one without the other. What so intrigues me about them is the manner in which they walk. It's not the form of the walk, although they move in lockstep, shoulder to shoulder with their arms bent at the elbows such that if you caught them in the corner of your vision you might conceive of them as walking arm in arm. It's not the pace, although they walk quickly, but not with the sense of urgency one typically identifies with the hurried commuter. It is that they move with a sense of anticipation. They walk as if something is going to happen or is already happening, perhaps just around the next corner, that they are anxious to get to: some novel experience, some new fun for which they must, for now, try to contain their excitement, but they can't quite conceal it. The staccatto rhythm of four spindly legs slicing through the air reveals a hint of some lighthearted mischief on the horizon. And as I stand and observe them as they saunter past, I wonder where they are going and what happens when they get there.

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Boss

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Hey, they arrested my hero, the self proclaimed "Mayor of Baghdad". What law has he broken? What law even exists in Iraq? Oh, sure you can loot all the palaces and museums you like, but don't even think about holding imaginary committee meetings in your hotel room. I didn't realize there could be such dire consequences for giving yourself a false title. I guess I ought to stop going around calling myself "The King of the Jews." A person could get into a lot of trouble for that.

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New Favorite

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All last week i listened to Allison Krause + Union Station's New Favorite which is an outstanding collection of music. It has been said that some of the seminal rock recordings in history made kids go out and buy guitars. Listening to AK+US makes me want to rush out and get a banjo.
And listening to Lyle Lovett makes want to... i don't know, be married to Julia Roberts for six months.

There is a movement afoot, or if there isn't then i'm starting it, to refer to U.S. Cellular Field, nee Comiskey Park as "The Joan" in honor of U.S. Cellular spokesperson Joan Cusack. Also, Esteban Loaiza should henceforth be known as E-Lo.

The NFL draft is this weekend so i want to know "Who's Your Guy?" in this year's draft. A draft eligible player you have taken notice of for your team or any team, for his athletic ability or lack of it, for a weird name or personal characteristic, or whatever has attracted your attention.
And be careful if you're doing the NFL Draft drinking game. Referred by: Troy

I thought i would have something more substantial to say today, but to hell with it. I'm sick. I may have SARS. But then again, that's extremely unlikely, especially considering i haven't traveled outside the state of Illinois since the Clinton administration. Ah... the Clinton administration: those carefree days of simple economic imperialism.

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Movement In Still Life

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Did you hear about the guy who declared himself Governor of Baghdad? How does that work? I want to declare myself governor of something. Maybe i can declare myself Mayor of Beijing, considering that the job is open now. (look at the picture: he's thinking, "yeah, i deserved to get fired.")
Or perhaps i can declare myself the junior Senator from Illinois, since Peter Fitzgerald is not running for re-election. When was the last time an incumbent Republican couldn't raise enough money for a re-election campaign? I'm going to miss Peter Fitzgerald. He's a man of integrity and candor which made him a maverick in the Senate.

You may have read this article: "Rumsfeld Calls for Regime Change in Iraq". There have been a series of government leaks and seeming missteps over the last ten years whenever diplomatic steps are taken toward North Korea. Here's one example. Another is referred to in the last paragraph of this article.
What could explain this pattern of ill-timed government leaks? It could be that there are people who have been and continue to try to scuttle any notion of a diplomatic resolution to the N. Korean issue.

Finally, i have in a past post called the local PBS program Chicago Tonight something of a mess, but last night i was watching host Bob Sirott interview John Malkovich. At the end of the interview, the cameras stay on, a music bed begins to play, Bob and John stand and shake hands, the lights dim, Bob Sirott becomes a silhoutte, Malkovich carefully removes the microphone from his lapel, Silhoutte Sirott starts to walk away then looks back over his shoulder and says something to Malkovich, Malkovich nods, the camera pulls back slowly and swings ahead to another part of the set, the music continues, Bob takes a seat at a table across from a man who is already seated there, the camera moves in, the music fades, the lights come up, a voice somewhere in the background says, "Here we go," and Bob introduces the next segment with his guest. It was beautiful. The transitions alone are worth watching.

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I Could Eat Your Words

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So, how have you managed to cope without my didactic musings for an entire week?
Well, i have brought you, from the cloud enshrouded mountain of my mind, two stone tablets, each containg a new word to add to the english lexicon.
At some point in history, i found it necessary to use the term political economy as an adjective. I invented the term "poli-nomic" to accomplish this. It is, i think, a failure as a word. Just look at that awkward spelling: "poli" as a prefix is so confusing and "nomic" is not a suffix at all. The roots of both of the original words are mutilated. I was trying to improve my linguistic mutant when i came up with the word: econocracy. Econocracy describes a political system whose main purposes and methods are economic. For example, Singapore is an econocratic country. Its political system is organized for the purpose of generating economic growth; its social policy is indistinct from its economic policy. Fundamentally of course, the external power or prestige of any society is determined by its human economy, but an econocracy is organized specifically for the purpose of maximizing its economic potential.
The other word is anthrosystemic. I suppose it could be used as a noun: "anthrosystem", but i prefer the modifier. Its meaning is less clear. Perhaps it is just not as useful. It could be used to apply to any man-made institutional or organizational system, but i think that would make it kind of a Pop term rather than a truly meaningful word. I would like it to be more specific in its usage.
So there you are. Use these words liberally, in your blogs, in your interlocutions and in your idle thoughts so that they may seep in like moisture into arid soil and enrich your discourse. Yes, you too can be as prolix and pedantic as i.

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Things Fall Apart

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My theory is: Saddam Hussein has clones.
And of course, each successive clone is a little dumber than the previous. One clone decided to attack Iran. Another thought April Glaspy said it was okay to invade Kuwait, and yet another was running this war.
What happened to the Circle of Death? The oil trenches dug aroung Baghdad and then set ablaze? What happened to the night vision goggles Rummy was so concerned about? What happened to flooding the Karbala gap, sabotaging oil wells, attacking Israel and making the Tigris and Euphrates rivers run red with the blood of infidels? What happened to the chemicals and the red line outside Baghdad? What happened to "I'm a crazy MoFo with nothing to lose and i'll fight to death..." blah, blah, blah? At least make them put on a good show when the troupe comes to the big city. At this rate we'll be invading Syria by July and Iran by next January, and i'm not ready for the Pax Americana yet; I still have laundry to do.

Does this mean that Ted Koppel has to put away his oversized fatigues and dusty pith helmet now? He looks like the knock-off army man action figure you would get for your birthday when you wanted a G.I. Joe, but your parents were either broke or deferring your desires until christmas, or just didn't know the difference. But we know, Ted. We know.

Thank you for visiting alpha charlie bravo. Especially if you got here by accident via a Google search. But if you did you probably aren't sticking around to read this far. But if you have, we welcome you. Poke around for a while and feel free to come back again.
alpha charlie bravo will be going on hiatus next week, but will return a week from Monday with all new episodes.
Until then, please check out some of the other blogs linked on this page, there on your left, no point your mouse up a bit, there you go.
And click here to read the original press release that announced the auspicious debut of this blog.

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Ars Poetica

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Presently, i'm listening to Donald Rumsfeld, one of our nation's greatest poets, at a D.O.D. press conference get agitated at a reporter's question about the humanitarian conditions in Iraq. I don't know about the rest of the country, but my information tells me that all the city of Nasiryah needs is one mic.
(I'm sorry. I am truly sorry.)

WBEZ had a contest to find a poet to recommend as the next poet laureate of Illinois. Considering that there have only been three Illinois poet laureates and that two of them were Carl Sandburg and Gwendolyn Brooks, I think having a public contest to find another is misguided. None of the contest offerings that i heard teribbly impressed me and maybe because of this i began to reminisce fondly on some of my own past scribblings. I have pages of verses i composed from around 1995 to 1998 scattered about; not in any particular order or even in one place. Some of them have probably been lost. I consider this to be no significant loss to the world of literature as the majority of them are so bad as to be unreadable and the readable ones are probably incomprehensible. Take a look at the staggering volume of awful, awful "poetry" that litters the electronic landscape. When i was writing, i was writing to get good. I certainly wasn't interested in subjecting the world at-large to these practice sessions. But, some point of discussion during that on-air contest caused me to consider the question: what was the best single line i ever wrote? and could it stand up to a line by one of these contestants? It was probably a line in poem a i wrote for class in college. I rummaged through some old academic documents, found a couple of poems from that class, an essay from another, a syllabus, some lecture notes on Kant, but not what i was looking for. I remembered a couple of other lines from the poem and thought i could improve them, but not unless i found it on paper. I found some others and tweaked them a bit, stayed up late into the night to fix a line here and there, but i never located that assembly of ten lines that became the night's obsession.

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Tanto Tempo

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Why was i wading through snow this morning? And where the hell is my atm card? I should have stayed embedded.
I had completely forgotten about daylight savings time yesterday, but the only clock i really ever look at is the clock on my VCR which is set to do DST automatic for the people, so i knew the right time even though i was caught unawares on the time change. That is of course, until i got out of the house and looked at my watch and had no idea what time it was.

There are times when one is struck by a mysterious and compelling desire for a particular food. I myself may only consume 'freedom' toast only a few times a year, but if i don't i may not be able to maintain the functional level of mental instability that is fundamental to my existence. (Mmm... freedom.) Perhaps this is overstating the matter. But recently i had such an experience, strangely enough, with guacamole. I acquired an inexplicable and irrepressible urge for guacamole, all the while not being entirely certain that i even enjoy guacamole. I was unable to find any guacamole at the local Jewel (i realize it's the ghetto, but even so, guacamole is fundamental) to which i had made a special trip just to procure the elusive condiment. However it is not uncommon for me to stop at the Chipotle on Jackson downtown on a Saturday afternoon, in fact is uncommon for me not to stop there on a Saturday afternoon, so i purchased some chips and guacamole with my order. After successfully attriting the burrito force i set my crosshairs on the chips. I would eat some and mutter contemplatively, "mmm... guacamole." Then i would eat some more and think, "eckh, guacamole." I had the expericence of both liking and disliking it in real time as i consumed it. Now, at this retrospective juncture, my attitude toward it is more favorable than unfavorable, but who knows what will happen the next time i have a strange culinary urge.

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Considering that this is Friday, this will probably not be widely read, so i will simply offer you some samplings from the random thought generator:

boy, there sure are a lot of retired generals.
is it just me or is Aaron Brown a moron?
Do you think "coalition" forces put "X's" in the runway at Saddam Hussein International Airport?

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Enjoy the Silence

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Warm weather. Doesn't it almost make you want to be happy? And it's associated reminscences! But, nostalgia is dangerous.

I realize that i am doing damage to my market presence by not providing my product and/or service on a regular basis. I was posting yesterday, but blogger was futzed at the time and subjected my composition to brutal liberation. And it had been my intention to post today, but at the moment i'm wondering if it isn't better simply to live in silence. I will consider this nonsensical proposition without acheiving resolution and i may post tomorrow, but regardless i will definitely post on Monday.