In the Peacock Room

Little Dog A fears Big Dog B But what he should watch for is Little Cat C. I see this illustrated in post-war retro style, slightly mathematical, what say you? Reading IQ.org wonders me: Anderson Cooper and Julian Assange are both the same age (approximately), look very alike, yet it's as if they had their souls switched. You'd kind of expect a fellow from old money, a great university, and a world traveler, to talk about things with a learned perspective and to have some kind of depth. You'd expect a guy who spends most of his life bent over a keyboard and a lifestyle described as "monastic" to have little background in literature, be allergic to the outdoors, and have an inner life that's dull, dull, dull. However, " Dispatches " reads like...well, it sounds like the dutiful scrivenings of a college student trying to turn in a term paper. "Um, well...I'm Anderson Cooper, and my mom is Gloria Vanderbilt....yeah, that Vanderbilt...not l...

...but it gives me pause thinking about Foucault's remarks about asylums. You see, most asylums work by subjecting the inmates to a very rigid schedule (breakfast, 7 AM, group meeting, 9 AM, Arts & Crafts 10-12...). Most people would blench at the notion of making clay ashtrays as an avenue of self-fulfillment, and most patients do. But because that's not doing what the warders want, that's sick behavior. If you want to get out, you display "healthy" behavior, which is to make the ashtrays, talking all the while about how it's very creative and fun, and how the MSW is so great to have thought this up. Life here is similar: if you don't have a Program, school, or work, you have to go to meetings. Mostly, they're supposed to be useful stuff: how to apply for a job, how to look for "housing" (read: apartments), and suchlike. Some are semi-useful, or would be good to talk about in general, if you didn't know about it: birth control, nutri...