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31.8.04Colonize AntarcticaAntarctica is international territory. You can start your own country there.
1. Before the Antarctic Treaty of 1959, seven nations made territorial claims in Antarctica and the sub-Antarctic Islands. Under the Treaty, recognized by 45 countries, 'no new claim, or enlargement of an existing claim, to territorial sovereignty shall be asserted while the present Treaty is in force.' But most nations, even among the signatories, do not recognize the existing claims (for example, the U.S.) or care about new ones. All the same, don't neglect to take a Norwegian with you. 2. Pick your desired general location, bearing in mind the question, Where will I supply myself from? (Claimed territory will likely be better; unclaimed territory will be smoother politically.) There are no claims between 90° W and 150° W, on the Pacific coast. 3. Reconnoiter. Find a suitable harbor, keeping in mind that it may be on an ice shelf, not land. McMurdo (in the New Zealand zone) is Antarctica's only usable harbor for large ships, and for only a few months a year. Rely on small ships and plan on a small colony for a start. 4. Provision. You will need esp. fuel (mining is prohibited de jure and there are no trees) and food (hunting and collecting are prohibited without a permit). Almost all resources will be scarce or off-limits. (U.S. nationals are bound by the Antarctic Conservation Act.) Build with fabric where possible, if space is at a premium, but note you will need steel platforms on stilts for permanent structures. Do not build with ice except in emergencies. This is not the Arctic, and you are trying to be civilized. 5. Land. The end of winter will allow you to take advantage of the all the warmest parts of the year. Oddly, though, the Antarctic summer is not ideal for growing plants, because they respire at night (you've got no night). The warm weather can be good for fishing and exploration. 6. Devise a fisheries infrastructure (fishing is fine) for a small fleet and shoremen. Coordinate waste collection. Set up hydroponic, artificial light greenhouses, bearing in mind to allow at least a season (of course) for things to grow. Meat from domesticated animals may have to be imported for some time as feed will be limited. But when your agricultural product is sufficient, stable herds and graze flocks. 7. Don't forget to keep importing supplies: you don't have any there. 8. Summon the Pope to crown you Emperor. 9. Reproduce. 30.8.04TodayJust a thought: I'd like to see a jar of pasta sauce hit by a train.
28.8.04More PoetryOld poetic forms doing not a lot.
27.8.04Feeling a Bit NumbIs it John Ashbery or the DayQuil? (I'm sick.) I'm re-thinking the former. He's more than a chatty bard strolling aimlessly (& often) in his NYer 'Versailles of the imagination,' I think. I already liked 'Illustration,' 'And You Know,' 'The Painter,' 'Into the Dusk-Charged Air,' that poem about a view of Delft, etc. But I still didn't understand why his last 10 books exist. And someone mentioned he's a lowering bore (even though he has a poem 'Something Similar'). But about 20 years ago, he selected some of his own poems for a book, which was nice of him. It has more of his poems like Frederick Seidel's, fewer like James Tate's. It has all the astonishment and peculiar locality I never thought about before. So what if his songs are never songs? Or you can take the word of a reviewer who writes like a pinball machine thinks.
And Ashbery's playing laureate for New York, not New Jersey. 26.8.04Where Can We Live But Days?Anniversaries today & tomorrow: seven months (blog), seven years (Amy).
On to the only thing anyone is interested in, my 'act of self-creation by which a man recovers a critical element of his public masculinity': our helpmeet was at first a bit surprised (apoplectic), but in time has come to accept it (wait for it to grow back). 25.8.04UnconventionalWith security increased in & around Penn Station, maybe we can skip the part where the BBBW trying to ask me a 'quick question' as we go to the train calls Amy a 'flat-bootied bitch.'
19.8.04ThoughtHaving drunk one too many bottles of Vitamin Water, Professor Butts leaks an idea to shake up friendly competition:
-'throwing' should be an Olympic sport 17.8.04The Last Word, I PromiseSo this is what I meant all that time.
16.8.04Then You'll Be a Man, My SonI've returned. I was happy there & am happy here. There are a number of things I will not miss about France (the sorry-it's-Sunday-Monday-August attitude towards running businesses, the walking in the middle of the goddamned sidewalk, hallway, etc., *every* time, the French?). But I must miss the deference to men. At the airport security counter ('Oh? Your *boyfriend* is here!') I was given Amy's passport (after all, with her boyfriend around, what business could she have with an identity?) and was told to check my bags. Amy's bag was checked by a security agent with hands and a gadget on the ground.
But now: if I have underwear with a Metro map on them, that's metrosexual, right? 10.8.04Automated ResponseI have problems keeping regular, anyway. An apology, then, for this interruption to your service. I and others shall be going to Nice to get stupid today, &, if we're not stupid, Monaco, as well, the next day.
9.8.04Jardin du LuxembourgHaving been won over by the slick downiness of a paddling of ducklings nibbling bread crumbs on the central pond, I was irritated to see their place taken by a squabble of seagulls. Which irritation disappeared when one of the seagulls gagged down a whole fish.
3.8.04Ennuyeux et MaladroitHalf of Paris having gone on vacation (jail) for the month, the doings are odd (few). But we are pleased to finally understand what it means that our completely similar friend is a Blodgett alumnus. But is he combating the heresies of Voltaire, Darwin, and Ingersoll? Is he sheltered from the wickedness of the universities? Is he tensely stalking the thing called General Culture? Whatever, he probably isn't breaking unopened bordeaux bottles in the kitchen.
2.8.04My LifePursuant to the laurel-strewn intellectual biographies of some of our poets (#1, #2), I've decided that I ought to have a mockup of mine ready to go, as well, for the next time I publish in a catchpenny zine, or wow suburban Jewesses with my Brahminic delivery of my own verses. It seems reasonable it should go a bit like this, including pseudo-theosophy, pointlessness, and making shit up:
Erik Kennedy is one of the most famous Anglophone poets in the world. He is the author of eight poems, and has recently published in The Bathyspheric Review, VOiCE, and Spunk! Recent winner of the Priority Projects Consultancy Prize, his new book, John Drinkwater and Other Poems, is forthcoming in the fall (Riga, 2004). He lives in Forteviot, Perthshire, where he channels the mysterious stuffs of the universe into four-beat quatrains. |
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