The Foscovian Update: Still Here, Still Queer.

It's been over a week since Fosco last blogged (did anyone win the betting pool?). But that doesn't mean that Fosco hasn't been thinking, Dear Reader. He's been thinking up a mess o' somethin'! And what thoughts have been rattling around in his gigantic gourdic cranium?

• Just like my third grade teacher always said, California seems to be the likely location of the coming apocalypse (although I think she meant it more eschatologically--and no, that doesn't mean what you think it means). And while all those insatiable wildfires were nowhere near Fosco's beloved Bay Area last week, the local media didn't lose an opportunity to remind us Northern(ish) CA residents that our doom is imminent, whether from a nearly overdue "tectonic time bomb" or our own giant flaming holocaust. The End is near! Whee! Even so, I'd rather die in a flaming crack in the earth than from getting lung cancer in a casino boat while losing my social security check in the slots.
  
  But seriously, if you want to read about the SoCal fire experience, check out my friend Ted's blog.
  
  
• Hey, did you hear that Dumbledore is gay? Fosco had known this for years, ever since he was fellated by the wizard in a Minneapolis airport mensroom. Even so, Fosco isn't quite sure what to feel about this whole story. To some extent, he'd rather let his friend Ted do the blog work for him (thanks again, Ted. At this rate, Fosco Lives! will eventually just be one big hyperlink to your blog). Fosco would like to raise two questions about the story that seem worth considering:
  
  1. Does a gay Dumbledore make up for Rowling's repulsively heteronormative epilogue to the seventh book ("Seventeen Years Later..."), in which everyone is happily married (heterosexually) with kids?
     
  2. What is the status of an extra-textual author's statement about a character? Could Dr. Seuss (from beyond the grave) tell us that the Lorax is gay? Would we have to believe that?
  These are the problems that a gay Dumbledore raises for me.
  
  
• Fosco was planning to spend most of this month in a blissful Jimmy Eat World coma. See, they're one of Fosco's favorite bands and the last three albums have been amazing. The previous release, Futures, obsessed me for several months. Plus, the first single ("Big Casino") from the new disc was the soundtrack to Fosco's September (because it rawks). But here's the thing: the new disc is TERRIBLE. With the exception of "Big Casino," there is no song on the disc that this Jimmy Eat World diehard fan ever wants to hear again. Fosco is sad.
  
  So what has filled the musical void in Fosco's month? Things have been a bit weird, to tell you the truth:
  
  • Radiohead's In Rainbows, which upon first listen sounded inaccessible and boring, but really gains by repetition. And I'm not just saying that because I paid £5 for it. Good tracks: "Reckoner," "All I Need," and "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi."
    
  • a short but excellent Bach chorale: "Heilig, heilig" (BWV 325). Bach is usually too boring for me, but I like the calm this month.
    
  • a trance track: Agnelli and Nelson's "Wear that Dress." Trance is great for driving and paper-writing. Really!
    
  • "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want," The Smiths. I could revive a different Smiths song every month and be happy. Well, actually, sad. I wear black because that's how I feel inside.
    
  • Bruce Springsteen, Magic. I've mentioned this one before.
    
  • an amazing work by my blogpal John Mackey called "Kingfishers Catch Fire." It is seriously one of the most amazing compositions I've heard this year. The CD comes from Japan, so it might be easier to hear it streaming on his website (under "Works" on the main page). The first movement is gorgeous, but the second movement knocks it out of the park. I've been listening to it a lot in my car.
  
  
  
• Has anyone else noticed that the New Yorker section "The Critics" has become the Harvard Faculty Lounge? I suspect that it's the influence of longtime New Yorker contributor (and Harvard English prof) Luke Menand. In addition to reviews by Menand, Fosco has recently run across reviews by Professor of History Jill Lepore, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History Niall Ferguson, and the (oddly-titled) Professor of the Practice of Literary Criticism James Woods James Wood. Their ambition has lead them beyond traditional academic publishing and I, for one, welcome our new Harvard overlords.