I fear those big words which make us so unhappy.

Posted by Marco Sparks on June 16, 2009

History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.

BLOOMSDAY!

It’s today and it rhymes with doomsday. It’s a special day for the truly ridiculous and hardcore literary nerds, fans of James Joyce’s classic novel, Ulysses. I’m one of those geeks so I find just a bit of silly enjoyment in this day, I’m not going to lie.

They name comes from the novel’s main character, Leopold Bloom, and June 16 is the day the novel is set on (it all takes place in one very long day). But the date also comes from…

Nora Barnacle, who was, and I love the way that Wikipedia words this, “the lover, companion, inspiration – and eventually – wife of author James Joyce.” An episode from her real life would inspire the epiphanic moment from “The Dead” and the date of their first romantic liaison with Joyce – June 16, 1904 – would be forever immortalized as Bloomsday.

I’ve talked about the novel before here on Counterforce, but mostly focused on my favorite section of the book, the last one, which is the infamous Molly Bloom soliloquy.

I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will yes.

from here.

The day is much more of a big deal in Dublin itself, where it is all out celebration (and I think we all know that the Irish hardly need a reason to celebrate, so when they actually have one… boy, watch out!) and a wide range of cultural activities, including readings and dramatizations. And, of course, pub crawls and and crazy fun merriment.

Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes actually got married on June 16, 1956 in special honor of Bloomsday.

Richard Linklater seems to have a special affinity for the day himself. a character in Slacker throws his copy of Ulysses into the river at one point and Before Sunrise is actually set on the date.

from here.

You can follow Bloomsday on twitter, of all places. Or, if you have just a little bit more patience, you can always enjoy Slowblogging Ulysses, a site devoted to sharing one word from the novel with you a day. It’s an ambitious little art project, and one that should take you well into the year 2741 if you’re planning on sticking around for a while. But you could always just go read it now if you so chose.

Thanks to Oh Grow Up and Elvira on tumblr for some of those heads ups.

Anyway, that’s enough out of me for a bit. I’m going to go find my copy of the book and do a little catching up over a Guinness or two. If you get the chance, feel free to join me.

from here.

Talk nerdy to me.

Posted by Marco Sparks on March 17, 2009

So when I returned from vacation the other day, tired and weary, dreading the return to work, I discovered some books waiting for me on my desk. Normally, this would be a great thing. I’m a big fan of books as a present for just about any occasion, along with knowledge, money, and sexual acts (for gratitude, naturally), but books is probably the most useful long term out of all of those, if you think about it realistically (and if you’re wondering what the worst gift you can give someone, it’s simple: a McDonald’s Arch card because that just says matter of factly that I hate you, get fat, and then die, please).

So there I am, looking at all these books, and excited. “Books, fuck yeah!” is what I believe I said. Then I saw the books, which were:

Nerd In Shining Armor.

Nerd Gone Wild.

Nerds Like It Hot.

Gone With The Nerd.

And last but not least, my favorite of the bad puns as titles, The Nerd Who Loved Me, all by an author named Vicki Lewis Thompson.

Apparently I need to go do some work on my image and what people around here think of me. Fuckers. But I’m also amazed that someone found a niche in the usual harlequin market of trashy romance novels for a little nerd lovin’. There’s two other books in the series that aren’t pictured above (nor were waiting for me), including My Nerdy Valentine and Talk Nerdy To Me.

But in actuality, this nerd thing being fetishized in such a manner kind of bothers, me probably the same as anytime a cute girl with glasses goes to bed with a guy and he tells her, “Leave them on.” Just… different. This idea of the nerd, this very Rick Moranis-esque/Revenge Of The Nerds type idea of the guy who looks like Rivers Cuomo and has shitty social skills and questionable hygiene and zero to no luck with girls is outdated and tired. Especially in a world where Rivers Cuomo is a rock star and probably gets a lot of action, when he’s not chasing down and being scary to Asian girls or going celibate. Or especially in a world where if you have enough cash then then, and let’s face it, you get whatever the fuck you want.

from here.

To me, as annoying as he was, Seth Cohen from The OC made a kind of sense, but that show Chuck or The Big Bang Theory doesn’t for the very same reason. Everywhere you go, there’ds nerds. Everyone’s a nerd these days. You’re probably sleeping with a nerd right now, or relishing in your own happy nerd tendencies. The idea of the nerd as a lonely outsider is ridiculous, and the eccentric, eclectic obsessive type is becoming far more prevalent these days in our society. In fact, the other day I was talking to this beautiful young woman I had just meant who told me she absolutely loved Quentin Tarantino and couldn’t wait for Inglorious Basterds. It took me a while to politely say that I didn’t want anybody in my life who was looking forward to another film from that guy.

This super nerd came up when I was google image searching a Sixteen Candles quote earlier.

My feelings on this subject are not easy to articulate or define, especially growing up pretty much as a nerd, but I’m glad to see that the nerds haven’t so much taken over, but they’ve gone corporate. It’s cool to be a nerd now, to an extent. Humanity’s getting faster and stupider, and they’re doing it in a nerdier style (it’s important to establish here that the word “nerd” doesn’t neccessarily connotate “smart”). And if there’s one thing that the nerds, the whatever the not-nerds call themselves, and the Irish all have in common, it’s alcohol, so…

Happy St. Patricks’ Day!

A stronger loving world.

Posted by Marco Sparks on March 11, 2009

Ugh. Lost is a repeat tonight . Wasn’t the whole point of these 24-style super runs in bunches that there would be a signifigant lack of repeats? Guess not (supposedly there’ll be another break week after episode 12). But now I can’t wait for next week’s episode, entitled “Namaste,” not so much for the reunion of Sawyer and Kate, but for the continuation of the 1970′s Geronimo Jackson dance party!