um, hello again....

I started this blog with the admittedly ridiculous notion of documenting my transformation into a "European." In the last few months, I slowed down then finally stopped posting to it, but not because I've finally, irrevocably, become a Euro-like me. Instead, it's just that, to paraphrase Big Daddy Kane, bloggin' ain't easy.

For instant gratification and quip exchanging, Facebook is better, more zipperless. Maybe Twitter is better still, but I'll never know--I just can't stomach the idea of joining a revolution which could elect Ashton Kutcher king. Magazines are so old hat (so why do I still drop everything else when I have a chance to contribute words or pictures to them?) And having a website is just dopey. (So why am I building another one?)

In short, I am mediacentrically mixed up. If this is an Attention Economy, I've confused my paper money with my small change.

I've also been really fucking busy.

Anyway, I definitely am more Euro-like now. I believe, for example, that lo-cost, hi-quality childcare is a right. I don't drive. I appreciate good bread and smelly cheeses.

But my friend Rich will be glad to know I also still shower or bathe regularly. (He must have had a traumatic encounter with a French person.) And I think about the USA a lot. I miss my homeland terribly. I just don't miss the bullshit....

Speaking of the Tea Party, I was thinking of them the other day as I read The Downfall of Fascism in Black Ankle County. That is a short chapter in the most excellent Up in the old Hotel by Joseph Mitchell. It was writen in 1939, as Americans were really coming to grips with the nature and implications of Nazi Germany. Mitchell documents the very short career of the Ku Klux Klan in his small North Carolina hometown. In just a few pages, he paints a picture of the KKK as hilariously inept and almost pitiable douche-lords, and he goes a long ways towards draining them of all of the fearsomeness they so clearly desire. This is a lesson I hold close to my heart: humor is the Death Star for assholes.

I'll try to remember that when I see pictures of Rand Paul and Governor Rick Perry.