Loose Cans

First off he looks like a rodent. Apt name for an Apt Pupil, too: apparently he was a member of the Hitler Youth. I don't care if everyone else was. He was still a member of the Hitler Youth. Finally, wow, yeah, an archconservative. Super. Party on, dudes.

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Just coughed up a €15 library overdue books fee. Three books were two days late. Apparently, the Superfines! started on the 19th, the day they were due back. That day, I didn't get a chance to renew them because I was out rocking my department. I didn't know that exam period, so far as our beloved library is concerned, actually begins a month prior to exams. Really! So Superfines are €2.50 per book per day late. Three books, two days, €15. Zoop! There goes Abiyoyo. Zoop! There goes dinner.

Just kidding, Ma. I'll eat dinner. Got paid today, €233, first decent payday since February. Might be one of the last, too. Don't think I'll have a ton of work after this weekend. Most of the lobo regulars are quitting. Going to try to hold on for another few weeks, but it'll be touch-and-go for a while. Feel a bit sour, but at least there's not a burning need to amass capital before a profligate summer anymore. Maybe I'll try to keep mooching off lecturers.

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Carole Jones has replied, and I don't think I'm going to get very far. She reminds me that 40, at the very least, is not a failing grade (39 is), and that she has "been informed by colleagues that if a student fails to do a set question or fails to submit a question for approval that this is an automatic fail. This coupled with the 2000 word excess would seem to point this way." I don't really have a leg to stand on ("But I do this all the time!" isn't likely to get me very far, and neither is "It's not my fault she's got no sense of humor."), because the department is, of course, more likely to side with a teaching fellow with the remit on her side, than with an undergrad with a maverick tendency. I do think this line is highly questionable: "as I have asserted to you before, complying with a set remit is part of the skill of essay writing, and so is part of what we are assessing. I don't feel that I can give you special leeway to ignore this basic premise of the course." I hate the bullshit about word limits; it's not about writing concisely, it's about thinking small. Furthermore, 3000 is a terrible limit. 1500-2000 is fine, that's pretty much a blurb, 3000 is neither here nor there. And "special leeway?" Sarcasm. Real classy. Feh. Maybe I'll give it a shot. Matterson the Americanist might favor it more, I don't know. I'll think about it. But God damn, I hate it when teachers shoot down those who fly a little higher. It reminds me of Dr. Gellens.

Foul ball.

I hate Amanda Piesse's lectures because generally, they're so good they make me want to stay here. This one was on The Alchemist, the science of alchemy in particular, much of what I covered in my paper, and gobs of stuff I didn't. I wanted to ask why she didn't tell me some of these awesome books existed. One always comes out of her lectures pleasantly aglow. But then I picked up my Postcolonialism essay, Il Monstro, from the office, and regret vanished, "in fumo."

You've read it. It's not a disaster. Yes, it's 2000 words over the limit, almost entirely devoid of theorybabble (which you, I and even my tutor know I have a sound command of), and over half of it has nothing whatsoever to do with Postcolonialism per se. On the other hand, it's well-researched, draws on a wide range of material, from Wu-Tang to Franz Fanon, fairly focused, and, which I think is most important, does a thorough job of answering its guiding question.

40.

I don't really care. My technical transgressions fucked me before she even began to read it: "This is a well-presented essay that demonstrates a range of references and reading. However, I do feel that the essay has a journalistic tone and scope [horrors!]...you have not done one of my designated essay titles, or discussed this essay with me [that's because I wasn't in town, you jerk], or 'passed' the title by me for approval before embarking on it as I request of all students pursuing their own titles [I'll 'pass' you like water]. Indeed, the piece does not really have a title that points to its subject or method of analysis [um, A), yes it does, and B), Jesus Christ, it's only a fucking title, how are you the only one to have a bug up your ass about it?]. It is also way over the word limit of 3000 words, and one reason for writing essays is to display skill at fulfilling the remit [that is some bullshit. If you're invested in the subject, there's no way 3000 is enough. It reads like journalism because I don't have space for cryptobabble]. These facts alone bar me from giving anything other than a low mark."

Funny, most of the other people in the department have a sense of humor. Did you come without one? Try rooting around your ass; it might have got wedged up there along with your head.

Feh. I should have known better than to imagine the ClitLitCultStud malevolent queer-theorist to suffer divergence from convention. Jesus. Feminist theorists especially. They just can't take a joke.

Furthermore her comments just tell me she really didn't read it, and definitely didn't make an effort to understand it. What do you mean, "no analysis of language?" It's all over the fucking place. She calls my use of the phrase "the Man" an "unglossed colloquialism." What the hell? How do you gloss "the Man?" Why would you need to? Academic numbnuts. Also the fact that I went with Hip-Hop at all screwed me: "It reads like a survey, primarily of an aspect of the culture of the United States [my point was that it occurred in a culture that felt it was NOT of the US, and I made that very clear], a geographical region that is not even considered on the course, for very good reasons." You know, that's funny, because, like, I know this guy, Aidan, right? And he, like, wrote his essay on Hip-Hop, too, and somehow, like, totally hauled in a first? Forget it. I'm going to get it reassessed. The technical crimes will probably keep me from getting anything better, but since I can't go anywhere but up, might as well try.

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This, too, on the heels of last night's riotous success. Blew off the PoCo lecture (so not sorry about that now, either) to attend Philip Coleman's (he of last year's 78, which, he told me last night, could have easily been higher, only it was his first year as a lecturer and he was nervous because he saw no one else giving those notes--so FUCK YOU, Carole Jones) postgrad seminar/presentation, titled "American Letters." I was, of course, the only undergrad there, but Philip Coleman was glad to have me. It was 15 people in all, I think. Deirdre had set it up (she runs these things weekly), along with this American Ph.D student, Katie Brown, who came out of Notre Dame, and is here working on Joyce and music. It was about half lecturers and half postgrads. Five people in that room had taught me. He was talking about his new project, which concerns the particular significance of epistolarity in American literature. That is, the mail. He said it was a hunch. It was interesting, ranging from de Crevecoeur's Letters From an American Farmer to Ginsberg's "Up all Night Writing Letters." He was just getting started. The Pony Express, I fancy, is where you begin; being the subject of so many dime-store cowboy novels and westerns, it has an undeniable mythic status in America. They were just so bad-ass. They'd ride pretty much until the horse keeled over, so there would be outposts across the west, and the riders would gallop through at full tilt and someone would ride out to meet them and gallop alongside. Then, without breaking stride, they would switch horses, and the Pony Express rider would continue on astride a fresh horse. How cool is that?

Anyhow, he lectured for a half hour, then we went into discussion. He wanted advice on how to proceed, really. I stayed quiet, mostly, because I was pretty clearly out of my league. I only opened my mouth when Brendan, my Fables tutor, asked if anyone could think of an instance in American lit where a letter was forged. Everyone sort of blanked, and I suddenly remembered All the President's Men, where part and parcel of CREEP's method of "ratfucking" opponents was to forge wildly incriminating and false letters and leak them to the press. Thing was, in my nervousness, I accidentally said All the King's Men, and had to correct myself. Whichever. Afterward, we adjourned to Kehoe's pub: Philip, Deirdre (yes!), Katie, Carole Stewart (my Hero tutor from last year, who remembered me quite well for my execration of Pamela, which, of course, I never read), a lecturer named Ben, big and sonorous, and two more postgrads, Kit (Philip's woman) and Hilary, and myself. Drank handily from departmental pockets. Philip sure likes his tipple. Yee haw. Said he'd sworn off it after the weekend he'd had. The Irish like to swear. He's an Americanist, a Stephen Matterson acolyte. He's apparently the go-to guy on John Berryman. He knows his widow and daughter, has reams of his papers, everything. He spent a lot of time up in Minnesota living where Berryman did. He's got manuscripts and letters galore. It's kind of awesome. He laments the ravenous charge of Cultural Studies, and their displacement of good old criticism.

Three and a half hours we dawdled there, boozing away. Had a lovely time, never felt out of place. Heard all sorts of gossip and invective and praise. Terribly entertaining. Lots of encouragement and confirmation of my notoriety. I was thrilled to find I'd achieved something akin to maverick status. Deirdre and Katie had to leave, having work to do. Pity, that. But it was, apparently, clear to everyone that I was a very big fan of Deirdre's work, and I was urged by all to go for it. I felt she was out of my league, but they said No, no, you should give it a shot. Doubt I will; I'm shy that way. I'm happy just to bask.

Philip invited me to come for a curry with them, and I initially declined, worried about wearing thin my welcome, but eventually I was pressganged. At 11pm, we found a particular favorite of his, no idea what it was called, but it was totally empty. They were about to close, but we got there just in time. We were apologetic, but shit, this happens to me all the time. Pretty expensive--minimum charge per person €20. Delicious, though. Korma because I'm a huge pussy when it comes to Indian food.

Finally at midnight we let them close up. We had now been together six hours. We went looking for a nightcap, but on a tuesday in Dublin, no pub is serving after 11:30. It's infuriating. We were all a bit drowsy anyhow, Philip especially, as he'd gone on a major piss-up over the weekend. So we went our separate ways. It was just one of those most excellent evenings. Made grad school look more appealing. I'm a glutton for validation. I think sometimes praise cannot be given excessively, and that moreover it's senseless to husband one's superlatives. They don't really lose their potency; feeling you have provoked someone to effusiveness never gets old. If you mean it, the laudatory is even easier to compose than the vituperative. Of course if you don't, forget it. I don't know. I just dig being told I rock.

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One unrelated piece of information. Plans for this summer are gelling. I am not going to Hong Kong. Fragrant Harbor is off. Der fliegende P-uddenhead got shot down through no fault of his own, so he and I will be in New York most of the summer. He'll take up lodging in the basement and work 9 to 5. I will, with hostility if necessary, retake my room, and work 9 to 5 as well. PM to AM, of course. This is the summer of money, because I likely won't be able to work in a Chicago bar. They're nutty as squirrel turd about their alcohol laws (fun fact: it takes 45 days for a liquor license application to be processed there), so even bartenders probably to be over 21. Although I checked this one site, which says only that its numbers are believed to be accurate, and it lists the ages in both Illinois and Massachusetts as 18. I think the city of Chicago probably jacks that up. I'll look into it.

In any case, I'll be around until mid-August, at which point we will indeed be taking off to the other side of the world, and going on a three-week-or-thereabouts whirlwind tour of Asia. Shanghai, Tokyo (briefly, Kaychan), Hong Kong, and then to Hanoi and down the Mekong river (though I still have reservations, Mike--middle of August, subtropical, monsoon season, stuck on a boat on a river aswarm with mosquitoes the size of hang-gliders? What am I, Iron Man? You want I should bring my suit of armor?). P-ongo then wends his way to what, South Africa? I come home with welts like marbles. Yee haw, baby.


UPDATE: I should also mention that I am not much broken up about the Hong Kong thing; it would, of course, have been thrilling beyond compare, but I'm fairly relieved to be going back to New York for a while. Three or four weeks is enough. Either way this summer promises brilliance.

Additionally, just sent off a rather pointed letter to the PoCo tutor:

Dear Carole,

I am writing to let you know of my intent to submit for reassessment the essay
which I wrote for you on Hip-Hop and dub poetry. As such, I'd like to schedule
a time to meet with you for a discussion of the essay, prior to my resubmitting
it. To be frank, and because I would rather explain this in writing, I am
extremely dissatisfied with the mark of 40, which tells me in no
uncertain terms that I have here produced something of no merit whatsoever. I
am hearing that there was nothing, no insight, no connection, to mitigate the
technical transgressions you enumerate. A tremendous amount of work went into
this--clearly, too much, as the intended third section dealing with the Jews,
which was my original intent in working on diaspora peoples, was left off
entirely--and I do not think the result in any way suggests a lack of
familiarity with the material. I think I have over the term done passably in
your class, and given some evidence of comfort with the subject and its
vernacular (which is not wholly absent from the essay, either). I disagree
flatly with some of the commentary, in particular the insinuation that Hip-Hop,
because it is "an aspect of the culture of the US," is not an appropriate
subject of study in a Postcolonialism class. I feel the commentary is
unreasonably harsh . I do not mind being put in my place when something is
amiss, but I think the issue in this essay is less things being amiss, than
simply missing. Most of the comments are concerned with what was neglected,
what questions I didn't ask. I can accept that, so long as some attention is
paid to what is included. The main question of the essay, "if you can't beat
them and you can't join them, what can you do?" is, I think, a question central
to Postcolonialism, though it may not be dressed up in terminology. I also
think the question is answered satisfactorily. The implication that by virtue
of their lacunae, the essay's 5000 words are essentially canceled, I find
unjust. I understand the commentary, and accept much of it, but to feel the
evaluation of my work to hinge not on what I wrote, but what I didn't write, I
consider to be reason enough to resubmit the essay.

I look forward to meeting with you to discuss this further, and apologize if I
have appeared overly contentious here.

Sam Ashworth


Put THAT in your pipe and smoke it.

Finally happened. I showed up to work at 9pm, my last-ever lobo shift. Crepuscular Saturday evening, the sky deepening blue and streaked with glowing red clouds. Doors at 11. Meaghan and Cristina show up. Two Caipirinhas, in retrospect a little rough for tender palates. But at a clandestine €4.40 don't complain. They don't stay long. Sadie and Caleb walk in. Two VIP's (bourbon, cointreau, dry verm). High volume, but not unmanageable. We section up, dividing the bar between four. I take the left of the draught range. Three joyful Manhattans, administered with love and met with surprised smiles (told I make the best ones in Dublin, for what little it's worth). Mostly cocktails tonight, thank God, a relief after Friday night's dreadful, wine-sodden drag of a private party, though somehow evading the dreaded Mojito order, a rare achievement. Sadie and Caleb belly up for round two; this time it's a bit of Jäger, the master hunter, and a duet of Guinness. Emboldened by I know not what, I try for the shamrock pour. It's goddamn hard. Have to move very quickly, and can't correct a mistake. Weeks, months I've been trying it off and on, but as the end of my time at the Morrison draws near, I am practicing it more often, because returning to a New York bar after two years in Ireland and not knowing how to draw the shamrock into the head of a pint would bring great dishonor on my family. It's easy to draw three little ovals and a stem. The trick is cleaving those ovals into heart-shapes and adding a little flourish to the stem. It's got to be one smooth motion. I'd never gotten it right before. But something clicked in Sadie's pint. Don't know what it was. The planets aligned. The aurora borealis burned brighter. A pentecostal wind swept across Ireland, flung flaming hail, and put the weathervanes to whirling. Pick up the glass, already 5/6ths full, surge settling from swirling brown to glossy black. Hold the edge of the glass to the nozzle. Push forward the tap, it comes out slower that way. Drop the glass down and raise it again, that way the imprint will stay clear. Start moving the glass. Concentrate. One cleft. Turning the glass cautiously. Two clefts. It's filling fast. Quickly, third cleft. Nearly full--flick the tip of the stem and cut off the pour.

Breathe. Take a look. Three leaves and a stem curling cleverly. Hand it over. Feel epic.

I'm just glad it was for someone who mattered. This way she has to believe me. First time she'd ever come in, meant something. Not much time to celebrate, though, take it in stride, for the surge of custom is unabated. Plunge back into the maelstrom.

Erdinger guy was in that night, of course. Have I mentioned Erdinger guy before? I must have. Well, if I've forgotten, I imagine at least some of you have, too. He's this middle-aged man, big, but not fat, just tall and solid. Balding gradually. Comes into lobo every night it's open, always alone, orders Erdinger. Actually doesn't even order anymore; we see him and lunge for the fridge. He never asks for a glass, which makes him even more our friend (the elongated, bulbous Erdinger glasses are often in short supply). Tips phenomenally. He takes his beer and stands at the periphery of the small dance floor, a crammed space alive with undulation. He never wades in, just stands and watches. He always wears a tan corduroy jacket. Never removes it. Sweats a little, lending a faint glimmer to his olive, weathered skin. Holds the bottle and watches. When he finishes he returns to the bar and it's a race to see who can refill him first. Usually goes through about four or five a night. His name is Michael, but I only call him that to his face. In the book, he's going in as Erdinger guy. We're buddies, he and I. We all know him, but only Kelly (whom he invariably calls by her chinese name, Sai Si Hua--only one that does) and I regularly spend time talking with him. He's very intelligent, a scientist, apparently, born in the US but transplanted to Ireland. Doesn't have a US passport and doesn't want one. He comes to lobo flatly because it's a superior meat market--he's trying to find a woman. Every so often, he'll talk to one, but we've almost never seen him do anything but strike out. And he never pursues it. He knows when he's bound for disaster. The fact is, to someone who doesn't know him, he's just creepy. Who goes to a club alone? Who just stands and leers? He's socially inept beyond description. That night, he told me he wanted to buy for the woman on the opposite side of the bar. I wasn't going to tell him No, that's a terrible idea, she's with a hen party, and you couldn't pry her loose with a crowbar. The fact is, usually the only guy that the hens are interested in is the bartender. Presumably because the bartender implies no consequences, no tomorrow. Still, the cajoling for freebies, though usually futile, gets real fun, real fast. But there are children reading this. Anyhow, she ordered an Erdinger. Couldn't stop myself from grinning. Match made in heaven. Tell her the gentleman across the bar has taken care of it. She looks over at him.

"Actually, I think I'd like to pay for it myself."

Oh, shit. Panic. Devastation. Riots in the streets, I see it all. Damage control time. Just let him, Ma'am, there's no harm in it. He's a good man, trustworthy, take my word for it. She is adamant. I stop short of saying, For Christ's sake, don't put me in this situation. I resort to, Look, I know him, let him take care of it, I'll deal with him, if you insist, then pay me later. Knowing of course that that's not going to happen. Thankfully she gives in. I don't tell him her response, but he's smart enough to know rebuffal when he sees it. €7.55 is the damage.

Later that night, when we stop service, when the rest of the staff retreats to the kitchen to eat, I talk with him for a good 15 minutes--over the still-blasting music. He's bummed about lobo's closing. He's been coming here for years. I'll miss him, he'll miss me. Quite out of nowhere he announces that despite appearances to the contrary, he is a heterosexual. Appearances never implied anything else, I tell him. He's more upbeat than grim about his women woes. I try to extract a promise that he'll come visit upstairs in Morrison bar, but it's not the same. He tells me more about his women issues, and I try to equivocate, console, more than counsel. He knows he face-plants every time he goes out. I tell him he should find himself a wingman, but he replies that he doesn't really have any friends that he's that close to. He talks animatedly, repetitively, as people who've taken a fair amount of drink do, and seems to be relieved to be making conversation. Likely doesn't happen a lot. We talk about me, about him. The fact is I don't want to know that much about his outside life. I think I'd avoid him on the street. It's not that I don't like him. I do. It's just that he is of more use to me as Erdinger guy, a template character on the tableau of lobo, than as Michael, a real person. I don't want a real person. I know plenty of real people, know them the same way everyone else does. As Erdinger guy, he's my own personal archetype, mine and mine alone. To me, he has no external life. He doesn't exist outside of club lobo. He possesses axioms and dimension, certain laws, I've observed tics and tendencies, but these are character details. I don't want certainty and reality penetrating because I don't want my observation corrected. I don't want to know if he's ever been married, if he has kids, because I don't want him to have a past. I don't want him to have desires, hopes, fantasies, because he doesn't get a future. Erdinger guy is mine to mold.

Cleanup finishes at 4:30am, with Antonio, the manager, helping out. Time to relax. The after-work drinks have finally returned to lobo, after a hiatus which resulted in a lot of grumbling. We're trying to clean ourselves out of Bavaria, which we stock but don't sell--imagine the W hotel hawking Schlitz. On top of that we order up a round of whatever. I go for Captain Morgan, which we finally got back in stock. Whoa. That isn't rum. That is molten gold. What a brilliant liquor, good God. Don't fuck it up with Coke, just take it neat. It's liquid glory. Magic in a bottle. Five stars, wow. We all hang around merrily, about nine of us, until 6:30. At last we reemerge from subterranea as the breakfast staff trickles into halo. It's dawn.

I knew it was coming for a few weeks now. Qiang and I would walk home together, and in the eastern sky we could see the blue of dawn creeping in. But this morning, dawn must have dispensed with formality. By the time we came upstairs it was daylight, graylight, chill and stark, night having been shaken off like bedclothes. The air was smooth and cold as stone.