Drifty Doesn't Do Titles

I can't shake the feeling that the cute quote on the page header is lifted- in part, or in its entirety- from someone like Mae West or W.C. Fields. I don't know why this impression persists with such vigor; maybe it's because the maxim - or dictum, if you will- has a vintage sassy bite to it, as though it had first been uttered in a gas-lit saloon by a raffish bon-vivant. (Drifty, old fruit- people know these words or can find them in a dictionary if they don't. -Ed) Yeah, thanks, Ed. Not that I believe it for a second. Is the word maxim used anywhere outside a literary dictionary these days, except in reference to a glossy magazine or the inventor of a machine gun? What was I saying... Oh, right- the knife and the corkscrew. Could this be from the lips of Nick or Nora Charles? I don't know whether I truly originated the saying or not- if you do, please drop me a note. Speaking of notes, the editor doesn't read for spelling, grammar or style- that's my job, and I don't do it either, at least not very carefully. You can, and if you see something you don't like, drop me a note about that too.

If you like sock monkeys, you may get a kick out of this. I did, and I'm not even all that wild about sock monkeys. The first picture, even though the label clearly states the height as six feet, doesn't quite give the full impact- it isn't easy to get the scale right without reference points, and I was distracted by the chair, which I really like. The next picture, with the artist holding the monkey is the one that knocked me down. Of course, having a very dirty mind, I immediately began to harbor impure thoughts inspired by her sexy hair and glasses- you don't even want to know the things I imagined her doing with the monkey. Some of them involved the chair, which I maintain is a very attractive piece of furniture. If she reads this, I'll be probably see myself mercilessly lampooned in some future work. The rest of the artist's stuff, while not at all bad and pretty interesting, doesn't really grab me in a strong way. But don't let that stop you from looking around her neat and easy-to-navigate website, you may see something that really gets you going. (Drifty- please don't do this sort of thing. -Mgmt) Yeah, thanks, Mgmt. Don't count on it. You know what I wish? I wish I was six feet tall and hung like that. I wouldn't even mind being a sock monkey, if it came to that.

I've just read Imperium- the first book by Ryszard Kapuscinski I've tried. It's a history book, what you might call an extended essay- part social biography and part retrospective travelogue- about the far-flung elements of the Soviet Union, particularly in Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Central Asia (the -stans), and Siberia, and concerned mostly with its ultimate exhaustion from over-reach, moral chaos and socio-economic suicide. While it is a thoughtful and provocative critical work with quite a lot to say about what didn't work in the USSR, it is perhaps more notable for the light it sheds upon the ongoing post-Soviet struggle between the morphing (and fading?) authority of the CIS and the resurgent nationalist bandit governments over natural resources, a shadowy puppet-play in which almost everyone is an ex-communist claiming to be a reformer and yet no one is willing to let go the inherited reins of totalitarianism. Just before beginning Imperium I had read Robert Conquest's Reflections on a Ravaged Century, and noted the similar view both books take not only of Stalin's purges and the starvation of the Ukraine, but of the inevitability of serious conflict between and within former republics in the post-Soviet period. I found Kapuscinski quite readable, and credible overall though I had some minor reservations about his style, which occasionally veered into the kind of irresponsibly delirious lyricism that I feel mars otherwise sound political history; for another example, try Claudio Magris in Danube. Let's just say I don't care to hear the sound of waving hands in a serious book- it makes me wonder whether I can believe what I'm reading.

Folks, for the purposes of this blog I'm Drifty Leftwright, a nom-de-mouse designed to free me from the restraints of my other phony web identities. I have no set agenda, and anything I say is open to the widest range of interpretation. Your comments are welcome. So is your hate mail, though I don't promise to feel anything.

I'm just feeling my way into blogging in general, and here at blogger.com in particular, so please bear with me as I fumble with content, style and features. I would like to establish an external links sidebar pretty quickly, so you can see what I've seen, go where I've gone- in the meantime, I may occasionally employ contextual hyperlinks; once I have a home for my semi-permanent links, I expect to be able to use contextual links only when I wish to point out something that may not, in my opinion, merit repeated visits.

From time to time, my better nature may appear as an interlocutor known as Ed (for Editor) or Mgmt (for The Management), usually when my Drifty nature is a little out of control, or isn't being clear about something. Let's try that now, in the form of an introductory interview:

Ed: Drifty, what is your history? How did a clown like you decide to become a blogger?

Drifty: Ed, I'm not really a clown- in fact I don't even look like one. The face you see before you is just a mask the art department put together for me. My shoe size is proportional to my height, my clothes are relatively somber in color, my handerkerchief is of regulation length- I'm just a regular guy, though I do try to ride mass transit when I can, which can be a bit like cramming into a tiny car with a bunch of other clowns. I was asked to start this blog by our mutual employer (name withheld -Ed), probably as a way of getting me off that person's other blog, or so I suspect, which is hosted on a family-safe server belonging to another Internet giant. I wasn't really given any reasons. If there's a deeper purpose behind my blog, I haven't been informed of it yet, and I may never be. As far as I'm concerned, I'm here to have fun and piss people off.

Ed: Pissing people off- is that your thing then?

Drifty: Naw, I'm a sweetie. But if controversy arises... Heh-heh. And there's more to it than just pissing people off, you know. I'd like to piss off animals too, if I could find a way. They don't seem to surf the web, though. Or maybe they're out there, browsing, but not leaving comments- I don't know, it's difficult to gauge the animal response to my work.

Ed: What is your work, Drifty? Do you have a message?

Drifty: If I can make just one person smile in painful self-recognition, I'll feel I've done my hometown proud.

Ed: Tell us a little about where you grew up- I understand you come from a small town?

Drifty: Small? Hardly- San Pronto may be sleepy, but it's anything but little. The sign at the edge of town says there are thirty thousand permanent residents. Of course, a lot of them commute.

Ed: Residents commute to San Pronto? Do you mean seasonally?

Drifty: No. There aren't really any seasons in San Pronto- it's always either nice or nicer. I'm talking about the people who drive in for the day, maybe mow the lawn or rake the leaves, that sort of thing. Run a fruit stand on the street corner, hawk flowers on the side of the road. Y'know, enjoy life in town for a few hours, then off they go.

Ed: Off where? Do you mean they have other residences, homes in other towns?

Drifty: I wouldn't know- my interest in them ends at the town line. But it wouldn't surprise me- even in a place like San Pronto there are lots of people who can afford to have more than one home.

Ed: Are you sure we're not talking about laborers?

Drifty: Well, of course they work! We all have to work, don't we?

Ed: Then they're not really residents, are they? I mean in the traditional sense of the word.

Drifty: Try telling them that. They attend the town hall meetings and campaign for politicians. They use the banks, the libraries, the parks and the public restrooms. They're in town every day, and I know they can't be homeless, because there's an ordinance against that-

Ed: Thanks for talking with us, Drifty. We'll all be watching out for your next posting.

Drifty: Thank you, Ed. Nice to chat with you.

This Is The Birth Of A Blog

Drifty is trying to get his head together- check back in a day or so.
-Ed.