So a number of things this fine day...

Ran into my ex at The Hole in the Wall the other day (during the all night happy hour,) which means that she has violated one of the key rules of a breakup: let the other person have their space. What made it notable was-I don't know if it was the beer I'd had or what, but I started feeling really broken up about the whole thing. Two weeks ago, I was ready to break it off with her, a week ago I was cool with the whole thing, and then the other day, I'm feeling like a wreck. No wonder friends of mine recommend a minimum 1-month breakup time.

In other news, I had a minor revelation the other day while listening (oddly enough) to Speakerboxxx. In one of the tracks, Big Boi raps about someone buying a $100 pair of heels while there is no food in the house. I recalled an NPR report I had heard about an Indian inventor who was saying that it would be possible to market a combination TV/DVD/Web-box that sold for US$50-US$100 because "people care a lot about entertainment. They would be willing to give up a couple days' worth of meals for it." Now, I know you're wondering where I'm going with this. In the novel Infinite Jest, one of the key plot points is an "entertainment" that is instantly and fatally addictive-people forgo all else for continued viewing. In The Society of the Spectacle Guy Debord says

Understood in its totality, the spectacle is both the result and the goal of the dominant mode of production. It is not a mere decoration added to the real world. It is the very heart of this real society’s unreality. In all of its particular manifestations — news, propaganda, advertising, entertainment — the spectacle represents the dominant model of life. It is the omnipresent affirmation of the choices that have already been made in the sphere of production and in the consumption implied by that production. In both form and content the spectacle serves as a total justification of the conditions and goals of the existing system. The spectacle also represents the constant presence of this justification since it monopolizes the majority of the time spent outside the production process.

It occurred to me that the "entertainment" in IJ is the spectacle itself, and we are all addicts.

Last bit: got google ads. Yes, baby needs a new pair of shoes.