#bobby leight

I think I missed a post attending a funeral or something so here it goes.

The article "Bread Winner" in the December 3 issue of The New Yorker might very well be about my favorite personality in anything we've read this semester. Apollonia Poilane is the most forward, brutally honest person we have encountered and I love every second of it. In referring to the French habit of eating foie gras with gingerbread she responds "fucking disgusting", she criticizes the idea of people making breads with ingredients she deems as non-conventional or "useless". I loved every moment of her, except for the one about not being willing to drive above the speed limit, which upon reflection is pretty weak. I learned a lot from this article, this issue of The New Yorker covering food is an interesting contrast because usually the articles talk about some topic relevant to news coverage. What I mean is, the nuances of the food industry go right over my head on a daily basis so this was a nice break, compared to the drug-dealing-k-pop-justin-bieber-managing-super-aids-having-paul-ryan-hating-football-watching-pirates or whatever the other magazines are about.

Above all this article made me hungry. I padded into my kitchen and scoffed at the idea of eating my leftover Moranti's loaf bread or my lasts forever Wonder Bread. These breads are below me now, after reading this article I am a connoisseur, I might even be French. All in all the article was quite illuminating, and not too long, as I feared it may be. Bread is interesting, more interesting when it is being used as a symbol for money, but not that interesting. I'd probably marry Apollonia though, she seems kinda mean.

The article "Toques from Underground" in the December third issue of the The New Yorker confounded me, as I had never heard of people practicing as "underground chefs" and hosting these secret food clubs. The article was well-written, it did an excellent job of providing the feel of the atmosphere of Craig Thorton's den. The methodology behind this is perplexing, the secretive outlets to find information about even more secretive dinners. The rag-tag group of semi-professionals who put together these masterpieces are as interesting as the dishes themselves. An out of work heavy metal guitarist, an artist, a former skateboarder, all reflect the varied backgrounds needed to do what Wolvesmouth does. Craig seems to get all the glory, but I was almost more curious about his associates than I was about him, who comes across as the ultimate food-hipster.

Thorton's back-story however is thrilling (if thrilling was the understatement of the century), and his passion for food comes from a lack-thereof growing up. His stints working for celebrities are interesting asides, but I wasn't a fan of the "history of cooking" excerpts. As soon as a paragraph begins with '100 years ago' I'm over it (I don't even like listening to music from before the turn of the century). This piece does a good job of framing Thorton's life as culinary experimentation, and that a lot of the subtlety is lost when something like Wolvesmouth goes mainstream. For once I really don't have anything to lambast with criticism.

  Mildly Disappointed,

The article "Two Revolutions" from the November 12th issue of the New Yorker really triggered me to contemplate much of the social reform currently up in the air in the United States. Although the article is about Egypt and the backlash from the United States supported Revolution, and how Egypt can be in the midst of acquiring a even more extreme fundamentalist regime that would be even worse in the long run, it really made me think of home. Personally articles like this don't phase me very much because I think that American being the "world police" or whatever we fashion ourselves as is an entirely thankless job, and breeds dependance by weaker nations that in turn creates a level of commitment I'm entirely not comfortable with (marriage?). I appreciate people like Badawi standing up for what she believes in and suffering for it. However, this is the struggle of Egypt's people and if they don't do it on their own, they will never truly be free.

If I were a developing nation I would want American occupation like I would want a bullet in the back of the head. Not that I don't personally believe that America is the single greatest achievement that humankind has ever accomplished, but rather because the American ideal is so much different than everything else. Developing Nations need to hold onto traditional ideas and find support through their own desire to be free, rather than us telling them they need to be free. America only worked because people wanted it to work, if we occupy a relatively weak Nation and then say "deuces" (minus one) after a few years, all we did was open the floodgate for any radical regime to bully very a very corruptible populace. Not so great.

However, Badawi's struggle shows that to the people (in this case women) who want something they are willing to lose so much for it. In the United States we are currently debating what I consider the "dumb" issues of Politics. Gay Marriage, Abortion, Legalization of Marijuana are all dumb issues, not because of the subject matter, but rather because of how fundamentally obvious the answers should be.

All people are equal. (See that, that was a period, All people are equal PERIOD) There is no discussion to be had here. Gay people are people so they are equal, woman are people so they are equal. Having children looks like torture to me, torture is illegal so there goes that. "But Bobby, children are the product of having sex and people choose to have sex so they should reap the consequences". Well people smoke cigarettes and lung cancer is a consequence so we just shouldn't treat them then, especially if they don't have insurance, they should have to rot. The logic behind anti-abortionists baffles me, everyone has a right to their OWN body but not the body of anyone else. Sorry for the rant but Christ I'm tired of hearing about this.If you like babies so much go adopt all the ones who are wards of the state, seriously, when there are zero orphaned children you can bring this issue up to me again.

As for Gay marriage, I would talk about it but this video sums it up amazingly.

http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6846855/gay-men-will-marry-your-girlfriends

We should give them what they want, no joke.

America is amazing, we have so many freedoms that we completely under appreciate, and that's awesome. Lets go back to having so much freedom that we end up being spoiled little brats for it. No more of this limiting social equality bullshit, people in countries like Egypt are going through some heavy stuff and we're over here trying to take liberties away for no reason. This is probably why the world thinks we are dicks. 

P.S. I challenge Todd Akin to 12 rounds in the ring, no rules, let's see how big of a deal rape is big guy.  #neverforget

For those of you who don't know.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/us/politics/todd-akin-provokes-ire-with-legitimate-rape-comment.html?_r=0

With Love,

Janet Reitman's profile of Anonymous Hacker Jeremy Hammond entitled "Enemy of the State" was one-half informative and one-half utterly insane. Reitman offered little to no opinion about Hammond throughout and this might be for the better as any sort of sympathetic statements towards him would have me totally dismiss the piece. I feel as though Hammond is exactly what is wrong with activists these days. People like Hammond who take the once noble practice of protest  to an extreme, borderline militant place hurt the reputation of protestors everywhere. Hammond is the kid who gets blacked out at the pregame.

As far as all the hacking is concerned in this piece, that stuff is pretty scary. I'm aware of Anonymous and this article just reminded me how dangerous computers are all over again. Usually when my dad wanders around saying "everything you do is monitored" I chuckle and move on with my life, but he is completely right. Beyond worrying about the Government, we now have to worry about guerrilla style hackers who oppress the average person or business just as much. They claim to target big companies but it's about the latent fear more than the act in my opinion. Who really decides "who" or "what" is bad? Hacking people to forward a radical agenda is the same as the police targeting radicals for arrest. No one should play God.

Hammond says he joined Anonymous because they "recognized who the bigger enemy was and how to fight them", by recognizing any enemy based on opinion, anonymous is doing what they are protesting the Government doing. All of this can only to a downward spiral, where they function like a online ghost KGB, bagging and tagging anyone's privacy who disagrees with them. Before this article my impression of Anonymous was doing things for the "lulz" or fun of it, but now that hackers like sup_g or Sabu use the resources to forward a political agenda, I don't really see the fun of it. In the same way the Lobbyists push their agenda through political channels for greed, Anonymous hackers push their agenda for some out of touch radical agenda. Hammond let his mind get programmed whether he likes to admit it or not, and not for the right reasons.   

Chaos for Chaos' sake just looks a lot better than chaos for political influence.

"Head Start" written by Ben McGrath details the up and coming tradition of nurturing quarterbacks at a unprecedented young age. Through the article McGrath follows the practices of California coach Steve Clarkson and his "Throwback Football League", the forefront of his winning tradition. Clarkson is responsible for grooming multiple professional backups and future local car commercial stars. To be honest, Clarkson deserves a lot of credit for picking his pupils solely on their ability to pay, capitalism at it's finest. Clarkson molds these would be tennis players into quarterbacks, which is on the same level as turning quarterbacks into any other position. I am not particularly fond of Clarkson's tactics as I feel the students are too young/small/pre-pubescent to be going through the type of regimes that Clarkson employs. No boy under the age of fifteen should be playing football twelve months a year.

Growing up I boxed and played baseball (the latter was replaced by basketball when I was about 6'). All of my sports injuries came later in life because I was groomed fairly slowly in a safe environment. What kids do today utterly amazes me, both in a good and bad sense. For instance I have a younger brother (Hunter!) who is twelve now and plays football and basketball year-round. He plays quarterback in two leagues and a summer camp and is being recruited to play for Iona Prep for high school. My brother began being scouted for high school when he was about ten and I thought even this was ridiculous. Coaches would ask for everything from live drills, to grades, to PROJECTED HEIGHT that had to be predicted by a licensed doctor based off of growth patterns and family members. Yes to rephrase, my height directly impacted my brother's success at being recruited (don't say I never gave you anything jerk).  

Going to his games I get to see my brother who is about 5' 5" (although a licensed professional predicts him to be 6' 6") or so get chased all over the field by kids who are three times his weight which is both frightening and hilarious. On occasion he turns on the gas and scrambles for a first down, more frequently he ends up with Rick Ross' son on top of him. I think kids expose themselves to a lot of injuries at an early age that can really affect them negatively going into the future. I was pretty good at boxing and my parents had me do it all the time but eventually it got to the point where I was so banged up I wasn't having it anymore. I wake up almost every morning with my jaw locked in place and my boxing trophies don't make that less annoying. I've seen my brother sprain, fracture and break things and it's just too early to have that going on. Clarkson, who played football his whole life should understand this better than anyone and divert his students into playing professional golf, but as always, it's all about the Benjamins.  

Ian Parker's profile on J.K. Rowling entitled "MuggleMarch" put Rowling in her element, showing that regardless of reality or fantasy she remains an author who is entirely immersed in the world she creates and the one she lives in. Rowling comes across child-like, lost in the adult world of self-comparison, an artist that puts everything on the line to give the world what she does best. Rowling at this stage in the understatement of the century "can pay the bills" and doesn't have a need to publish anything ever again. However, there can't not be a J.K. Rowling in literature, meaning regardless of whether she publishes her name will continue to be a staple in modern literary discourse. Classes are taught about her at University, lectures are given on her, fan-fiction is written in the boat-loads, texts are interpreted, re-interpreted and re-re-interpreted. However, what Parker does best in his article is place a human being at the bottom of four-hundred-and-fifty million copies sold.

Rowling has a husband, she has children and she goes to the same places she went before she was famous. Reflecting upon her greatest character, Harry Potter, Rowling gives us a good impression of her own life in being a "Galahad like figure" unable to "embrace a normal existence". There are the people who dig themselves so deep into a branch of culture that they end up having responsibilities and for literature Rowling is one of them. She isn't merely someone we know, or someone who gave us something great, but she carried our hope and dream and desires for ten solid years. Stephanie Meyer may very well be able to return to normalcy after "Twilight" but Rowling won't ever have the luxury, as she carries the burden of universal greatness. People don't talk about Harry Potter as being bad (minus the Catholic Church), it simply doesn't happen. You can't write something that defines a generation and receive criticism that makes any sort of impact, it isn't realistic. For every naysayer there are a million white knights rallying at your defense ready to thrown their lives down in the blink of an eye. However, there is a lack of humanity in figures such as Rowling because we elevate them to a status that is incomprehensible to those who aren't living it. A crown may look beautiful, but it certainly must get heavy after awhile. However, there is a place in history for those who live up to their reputation and those who don't. So with the whole world watching just "try not to fuck it up" Ms. Rowling, we all wish you the best.

Hunter Moore is hilarious. In my own opinion, I feel that modern society takes itself far too seriously, in the sense that we are born, we fall into our routines and we never ever get out of them. I distinctly remember being in elementary school and having kids say "I want to be a doctor" and they are actually doing that, still, and I have no comprehension of how people can be so sure of themselves. Why do I have to go to church, or school, or work because it is the "right thing to do". What even makes their morality better than mine, or yours or anything else. The world simply exists and nothing more, and as a person "I"(we, you, us, whatever) are no better or worse than anyone else. So in a sense we should each be able to interpret the world as we like and do with it as we please, minus all of this "finger wagging" bullshit.

Now this does not mean anarchy, social structure is great, guidelines need to exists, role-models need to exist but there is a huge difference between providing a good image and cramming rules down someone's throat. Every parent will hate me but I have no problem with my children doing anything they want, I mean I will hope to guide them in a certain direction but PREVENTING them from being the person they want is worse than murder (even if this means prison). Everyone has one life and that's all she wrote, so trying to steal another person's makes you a monster.  I feel as though Society breeds us to be timid, there are consequences for everything, a morality to uphold, words you can say, words you can't, words you can only say if you are a certain color or race... utter insanity. The world needs someone like Moore to "dominate it like the white P. Diddy" and if/when he does I'll be laughing the entire time. People don't laugh enough really, everyone is so formal and stuffy and boring that maybe a "picture of a penis with cats Photoshopped in the background" really does help us out in the long-run. Hunter Moore lives in public the way that we live in private and that's really admirable. Everyone makes dirty jokes, everyone has seen some crazy shit on the internet and sent it to their ten closest friends because it is so much easier to suffer in a group.

Beyond all this Moore convinced that it's possible to be a sex-addict, drug using, party animal and maintain your humanity. For god's sake this guy has a hot girlfriend who he doesn't have sex with because he likes her TOO much (Nice guy Steve ain't got nothin'). Moore might very well be changing what becomes socially acceptable, rather than this "crazy sober living". I wouldn't care if I opened my computer to see the guy who does my taxes doing coke off strippers. Actually, I would totally put my money in the hands of someone who had a personality like that instead of one with a stamp collection.

This may be a little unconventional as it has nothing to do with a "large" article, nothing to do with a politician or a national news story, but in my opinion at least it's more important. Next week Mitt Romney will still be waffling, Justin Bieber's manager will still be an idiot (though he did sign that Gangnam Style guy), Matt Taibbi will still pretend to be good at finance, and I will still not respect the concept of yoox.com. In a week I will probably go back to writing pretentious blog posts and all will be right in the world (you're welcome), but for a moment I shall humanize myself and write about something I care a lot about. Next week everything that happened this week will still be there to talk about, something rarely moves from recent to obscure in a week. However given the time and length of the mention in Rolling Stone, this may very well be the last chance I have to talk about LCD Soundsystem. This may very well be the last time LCD Soundsystem is ever mentioned in an issue of Rolling Stone (barring the release of a 'greatest hits' and even thinking about that irks me). Next week my life will pretty much be where it is now and LCD Soundsystem still will not be together anymore and dammit that sucks. To anyone who is really a fan (or even an acquaintance of Mr. Murphy) my blog post will not be breaking the news to anyone, as the final concert occurred many moons ago. This is merely a chance for me to share my thoughts about LCD Soundsystem, James Murphy, dancing, and nothing more.

    Earning a pitiable amount of space in the September 27th issue of Rolling Stone to talk about the release of their final concert DVD, the write up does not seem to capture the gravity of the situation. For me LCD Soundsystem was a movement, a chance to listen to a bunch of noise that was so eloquently put together that it made it OK to dance again. I'm not sure what the party scene was like anywhere else, but where I'm from it was all about the concept of "posting up" where guys would just chill while music was playing and it was awful. There were underground raves and such but that was a lifestyle more than a night out, and there was a whole other culture thrown into the mix ("Take this and drink plenty of water"). LCD Soundsystem created a indie dance scene that brought movement to those of us that wanted to move. It's been god knows how many months and I'm still not ready to be over this. For all of you who don't know LCD Soundsystem I really recommend you expose yourself to the barrage of blaring synthesizers, clever wordplay, and bi-polar vocals. Most people know LCD Soundsystem by their hit "Dance Yrself Clean", a song measuring eight minutes and fifty six seconds of pure bliss. The song starts with a mix of muted drums and hand-claps, with Murphy crooning lines like "talking like a jerk, except you are an actual jerk" and "present company, excluded in every way". The repetition of the melody and lyrics sets the listener up for the absolute banger that rips out of the song at 3:09, and sets the tone for the last five minutes. Heavy synths, hard snares fill the head while Murphy's vocals go from gentile curiosity to targeted question. "Don't you want me to wake up? Then give me just a bit of your time" is the first line uttered after the transition, the song attacks life while posing dance as the solution, and that works for me.

Going to the University of Pittsburgh gave me an unusual insight to James Murphy, as his nephew actually attends school here. Meeting him was accidental and he actually described his uncle as pretty normal and quiet in real life, and he never would have thought of him as moving into music so late in life (Murphy is currently forty-two). Murphy's nephew doesn't see him as often as one might think, but they share every thanksgiving together and James Murphy is pretty inconspicuous at family gatherings. For me, just the thought of James Murphy being surprisingly boring at Thanksgiving dinner was amazing, to me it means that his role in LCD Soundsystem is just that: a role that gets turned on and off making it possible for any accountant or teacher to let loose on the weekends and drown their emotions in disco-fever.To be honest, I'm glad Murphy isn't just another celebrity who actually thinks they deserve the pedestal fans place them on (it's cool when we do it, not when you do it) and that he chose to retire because it felt like it needed to be done. LCD Soundsystem could very well have been the coolest mid-life crisis to ever occur, the desire to escape real life to one created from sound and seamless re-assumption of normality. James Murphy became super-man saved millions and went back to being Clark Kent just because he could. He found the holy grail and took it home as paper-weight to keep his W-2 forms and Sunday paper from blowing away.