Done
Everyone has seen this, right? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47LCLoidJh4 There are two teams of four players each, one team dressed in white and one in black. Each team has a ball. You’re asked to count how many passes the white team makes, as all eight of them mill around and toss two balls back and forth. So, did you see the moonwalking* bear who sashayed among the ball-throwers? Well, yes, but I was watching for him.**
This is supposed to be about how people don’t notice things. Well, maybe. It was pretty striking as a newspaper story*** (they didn’t see a moonwalking bear?) but after watching the video I’m not so sure. Maybe it’s just watching it on those teeny YouTube screens on an already-not-large laptop screen but . . . he’s not all that obvious as a moonwalking bear. He looks like a slightly rogue black player who favours going backwards.
And the other big question is, what have the people who are taking the test been doing with their brains recently? Because this is the other thing I was thinking† as I peered at the screen: I’ve been working and I haven’t got very many brain cells left: about the only thing swishing through my peripheral vision that would catch my attention is chocolate.†† A moonwalking bear wearing a sandwich board that said ‘Free Green and Black’s this way’ would grab me instantly. But a writer††† who’s just come off work has no attention left. Hellhounds can stuff sticky, disgusting dog toys down my shirt front and gnaw up and down both forearms and I will say, wha’? Nice doggy. . . .
I sent in the extra words for the planned reissue of WATER about six hours ago. You may happen to remember that this was on? They’re going to reissue WATER with the new FIRE next autumn. But to make WATER a more attractive proposition‡ they suggested we write something new for it. I blanched violently at the idea of producing another short story . . . we know what me writing short stories tends to produce‡‡. But then it turned out they only wanted 2500 words. What the freaking blah can you do with twenty five hundred words?!?‡‡‡ They suggested we interview each other, but we know from rich, full experience that our dog and pony shows tend to be funny § which doesn’t suit the tone of the book. So after a lot of passing Word files back and forth on memory sticks§§ and losing track of who’d done what with which and to whom, and a lot of small delicate crunching noises as the authorial voice was handed back and forth like a slightly cracked egg . . . this afternoon I sent the result off to Merrilee.
It’s . . . ahem . . . 6000 words. But it has two new stories in it. (One each. Mine’s longer. Surprise.) Little teeny stories! And a handful of teases. All in 6000 words. Aren’t you impressed? Truly a bargain.§§§ It’s people sitting around in a Hampshire pub, telling stories. It takes everything you know about stories, and us, and these particular stories, and how stories get made at all, and messes with it. ¤ We like it. I hope they, as in They, as in the publishers do. We hope you will too.
* * *
* Word doesn’t recognise moonwalking. What, no Michael Jackson fans at Microsoft?
** I was watching for him hard enough that I only saw ten of the thirteen passes the white team made.
*** http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/nov/16/transport-invisible-bear-cyclists-youtube It’s a clever advertising campaign to make drivers more aware of cyclists, who are the moonwalking bears of modern traffic. In the context it is perhaps unfortunate that the London Transport official is quoted as saying ‘we’re delighted at the number of hits’ even though he’s referring to people watching the video. I also think they’re being just a trifle disingenuous not to mention an additional reason why cars run into cyclists, which is that cyclists are the bottom of the vehicular food chain: if a pantechnicon^ is bearing down on you you’re going to change lanes first and ask questions later. But if that bicycle that you and your SUV just ran into was another pantechnicon, you would have stayed where you were–grinding a hole in the road surface with your brakes and praying–not only because a pantechnicon is easier to see, but also because it’s going to do you damage if you run into it. I remember this vividly from my motorcycle days. The decent drivers, decent human beings, and people who cared about their paintwork gave you space. The rest of ‘em Could. Not. Care. Less.
The real eye-opener of the article to me however is the news that the era of passing interesting web addresses around among friends, colleagues, and blog readers is over. Behind the wave again, McKinley. Please don’t stop sending me links just because it’s the virtual equivalent of wearing socks with your sandals.^^
^I should start keeping a list of words I want to see either reinstated or added to the working vocabulary: pantechnicon. Klutzim. Fubsy. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/22/wordsandlanguage
^^ Depends on the socks.
† sic
†† Quote of the week: ‘You have to be lacking in something not to want to eat chocolate every day’.^ Damian Allsop http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/16/foodanddrink
^ Yes I know there are people who don’t like chocolate. It’s still a great quote.
††† Or a composer. Or [insert fabulously exciting and exhausting vocational or avocational choice here].
‡ To book junkies and other pathetic completist collector people who may also wear socks with their sandals
‡‡ Novels
‡‡‡ Write one and a half blog entries, approximately.
§ Somewhere there is a photo of me at a convention over here with Peter^, dragging the corners of my eyes and mouth down with my fingers, and sticking my tongue out. Maybe this is why I never made much professional headway in England.
^ Peter, as I recall, is looking in the other direction. This has nothing to do with poor Peter, except that I was feeling silly because we’d just been doing one of our riffs.
§§ And screaming. With me, you know there will be screaming
§§§ You can wait for the paperback if you prefer.
¤ Heh heh heh. Actually there’s a third, framing story too. More heh heh heh.
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