I’m so far behind where I’m supposed to be and I’m trying not to panic, though that didn’t work out too well last night at 9:00 p.m.
Me: I can’t do this! I have nothing to say! I’m an underqualified blogging hack with no literary grasp, or scope, and this was all just a horrible mistake so you’d better FIND SOMEONE ELSE TO POST ON INFINITE SUMMER, OH GOD.
Matthew: Buh-wha?
A series of talk-her-down e-mails ensued, wrapping up with a YouTube video of Feist on Sesame Street, singing about the number four. Then I slept for ten hours. Hey! Things are looking up.
I may have several points to make here, but number one is: how the fuck are you people finding time to read? Do none of you have jobs? Certainly you don’t have families, or children belonging to an age group that is defined by its inability to successfully manipulate a fresh band-aid. Too many people need me for too many things, and I suddenly see why it’s all I can do to throw up a blog post and then run screaming to put out another dryer lint fire, or keep a neglected dog from peeing In someone’s shoe, or sadly buttoning up another unironed shirt as I dash out the door to a job where a minor office sport is trying to guess how old I am.
But let’s think about this sentence for a moment:
A veritable artist, possessed of a deftness non-pareil with cotton swab and evacuation-hypo, the medical attaché is known among the shrinking upper classes of petro-Arab nations as the DeBakey of maxillofaial yeast, his staggering fee-scale as wholly ad valorem.
SHRINKing UPPer CLASSes of PETro-ARab NAtions whose STAGGering FEEs are WHOLly AD vaLORem.
I feel like Rex Harrison ought to burst in and start singing that.16 And somewhere in Nova Scotia there’s a soundproof bunker where some poor b-list Shakespearean actor has been subsisting on Jell-O and hand-rolled American Spirits, recording an unabridged audio version of Infinite Jest for the last thirteen years.
“I don’t mind,” Hal said softly. “I could wait forever.”
I hope he wraps it up soon and turns it into an 80-gig podcast or this book is going to become a doorstop. Again.
Comments
78 responses to “Breathing Into a Paper Bag”
I think it was a rhetorical question.
I’m only managing to read before bed. Since my 10 month old goes down by 7:30, one would think this shouldn’t be such a difficult undertaking. Sadly, if I were to entirely devote myself to reading that early, my marriage would probably suffer. I have been going to bed roughly half an hour earlier (and leaving the dirty dishes ’til morning) to stay mostly on track.
I second (and third) a lot of the voices above on sneaking in reading after kid goes to bed, before kid awakes, and instead of T.V. And it seems silly to add to your reading load by posting a comment. Still, if it helps you know you’re not alone…
I work from home, so reading at lunch is impossible, as is reading during commute. But I sneak in several pages by putting the kid in bath early and reading on the john while he bathes (he’s old enough not to slip under too often). I also keep the book in the car in case he falls asleep on a drive.
Unwrap all the bandaids in the box—may be a bit unhermetic but saves enough time to read one quarter of a sentence.
My problem is I can’t stop reading the book. Help. me.
I had a list of about 10 things I hated about Infinite Jest. I had a considerable intellectual resistance that I even had justifications for. And then it just wore away at them like water on a rock and now I am helpless in its clutches.
Damn, it IS a good book.
I tried to sign up on the boards and I didn’t get any email approving me. At first I was like ‘not invited?’ But then I realized this was some really good luck. I need that like I need a hole in the head.
But you might want to check your system…or whatever it is.
Oh, to answer your question my job right now is to write. Which means this chips away at the time I should be doing that job. But I often work for 12 hours or more during the day and night and I have always taken breaks because that is necessary.
My technique for writing used to be to read something kind of boring that would not draw me in and then write. Because reading is a lot like meditating and it gets you in the right mindset. An encyclopedia or a textbook is the best thing. Fiction is not good. I thought IJ was OK because it didn’t carry me along and suck me in. At first.
Now it has.
Unfortunately, it is a long book so I can’t just be quickly released from its grip by finishing it. I need to give it to my husband so he can hide it from me until next week but I just don’t have the willpower to do that right now.
Plenty of time to read: Dr’s office waiting room, bank line, grocery store line, Starbuck’s line – I carry a GIANT totebag and IJ fits in nicely with the 4 Sharpies, balled up sock (?), small screwdriver, wooden giraffe (?), 11 paper clips, 5 lip glosses, 3 scrumpled-up post-it notes that will never be of any use because most of the sticky’s all squijd off, instruction sheet from my library on how to operate their on-line renewal system, 2 flash drives with god-knows-what on them, and a small chunk of something that may or may not have once been edible. LOVE getting weird looks/questions from the local illiterati “zatta dikshanury?”
It’s always summer somewhere, right? (I’m totally with you. I haven’t showered for days, my kids’ bellies are distended, and something is really stinking somewhere in the house. But for now, I’m on track. With that said, I won’t be terribly sad if I fall a bit behind and have to catch up after the kids are back in school.)
Just now got my book in the mail/ got to catch up, but doesn’t look good. I usually don’t read forwards because I like my books same as my food: not overly analysed before I start. Later on or afterwards I sometimes read the forwards if I really liked what I read.
Ok! Love the first paragraph. A painting that needs to be filled in with details before understanding comes to me. Had to read ot twice. Onward…
I’m reading on the train to work, on the train from work , and on my break. It’s not proving enough though. I’m neglecting my usual pretty hardcore podcast regime, skipping segments of the newspaper, not spending the time to actually get food at lunchtime… and I’m still behind!
I don’t know how I’d cope without the hour commute. I got off to a good start, but I was lulled in a false sense of security by the binary number of footnotes in the first 50 pages, but the floodgates opened at page 51. Thankfully my wife has also joined me in my obsession, and our pre-verbal kids are now getting to hear about the plight of a medical attache at bed time.
This was an absolute laugh out loud post and the comments are great. I’m also one of those cutting out tv, I happily live without cable and the digital switch cost me two stations – perfect timing. Just dogs at home who occassionally slobber on the book when I haven’t paid attention to them for a while, so I tend to read a couple of hours at a stretch at home, then read the forums/posts/etc. before work and at lunch. It’s taken over from reading the NYT on-line at lunch! I’m also trying to keep some other reading on my schedule since I order books from my library and several that had long hold lists are now arriving all at once – so very glad for the long weekend coming up. Who cares about housework? It will still be there Sept. 23. I’m ahead of schedule at the moment, but will come back to this post and all the comments when I fall behind – I’m sure I will at some point!
I just found this website and spent an hour perusing it, which is an hour I wasn’t reading the book, or doing anything to hold on to either of my two jobs, my spouse or my son. I wish I had a commute to help me get through this book.
Reading at night is a smidge hazardous for me–and since I’m a little ahead of schedule I don’t think I can explain why, but sometimes I hit the wrong chapter and give myself nightmares.
I resisted this guy for years, until I read the New Yorker piece on him this winter. Then I got sad for him and liked him. It has taken me me four months, a different book, and two re-ups at the library before I broke down and bought the thing and committed to it. After reading this site I feel like I need to read the first hundred pages again because I was so skimmy in the beginning I know I missed a lot, and now it’s bumming me out, but I can’t bring myself to go back yet. I also have a weird feeling that by August I’ll be hoping that Infinite Summer does a reunion reread…Oh God.
I am glad I came. This book is big, but it’s dense with no wasted space or inessential parts, like an iPhone – except it’s as big as the Titanic. And to anyone who calls this work schizophrenic or broken, I suggest letting your mind process it overnight. The themes somehow knit together in your brain as you sleep and you start seeing the links between slowly asphyxiated roaches and a theft victim inadvertantly drowned in mucus by a thief.
I managed to knock out about 50 pages on my flight from New York to Las Vegas. Normally, this would be a laughable achievement, but considering the circumstances, I’d say 50 pages is pretty damn impressive. Two rows behind me there was a baby who screamed for the entire 5-hour flight, I shit you not. Directly behind me was an old, half-deaf (possibly even three-quarters deaf) woman who, as far as I could tell, had a vocabulary that consisted of only a stentorian “HUH?!?!” any time anyone asked her a question. A lot of people asked her questions.
Also, the coach section of the plane also smelled like cat piss.
Started making headway as soon as I put the book in the bathroom…
I read everyday on my lunch break at work, I get a full 45 minutes of reading time in.
I got laid off and among my first thoughts were: aha! That’s how I’ll get to finish IJ!
I haven’t found a lot of time to read. I’m only on page 46. That’s sad. Really sad. I keep telling myself it’s only the second week in and I can catch up. I really like the book, and when I sit down to read I’m engrossed I just don’t have a lot of time.
[…] 1, 2009 · 1 Comment Contrary to Eden, my own available reading time has recently increased, and I find myself 10 or 12 pages ahead of […]
The only time I can find is after work (sometimes) and before bed. I don’t see how anyone could read it on a train unless it’s a surprisingly quiet/long ride. On page 110.
I have a question:
what does TP stand for? I’ve been searching all over the book to figure it out, thinking I’ve missed it. Or, maybe he hasn’t revealed what it means yet? Obviously it’s some sort of Television/Cartridge viewing device, but what does it stand for?
Thanks.
TP is an acronym for “Teleputer”, which is the thing that everyone seems to be using to watch their cartridges. I think it’s first mentioned in the “Erdedy waits for pot” section.
I’m a standup comic and have yet to drag the book to shows. When I do, I know I’m getting severely made fun of in public by my colleagues, so I guess posting comments online isn’t so intimidating after all.
First thing in the morning with coffee. At 1st 15 minute work break. At 1 hour work break. At second 15 minute break. And about 1 hour at night. I’m known as relatively antisocial while I’m on break at work anyway; that fact works in my favor.
In Maine on the lake. It is the only way to read IJ. Thanks to everyone!
Lots of plane flights this summer, including 4 international. Reading it on the Kindle really helps because 1) I hate carrying a brick in my briefcase, although I always do for long flights; 2) it leaves plenty of room for work papers, so I can look like I’m accomplishing something other than IS; 3) it tells me the % of the book I’ve finished so I know that somehow, improbably, impossibly, I’M ACTUALLY AHEAD OF SCHEDULE; and most important 4) it has direct jumplinks to the footnotes and to OED to decipher DWF’s damnable vocabulary.
On a half an hour subway ride each way I can knock off about ten pages, which gets me close to the (give or take) 70 a week. It’s more manageable when you break it down to 10 a day.
I also enjoy carrying a separate bag just for the book. I’d like to think I’m impressing people when I pull it out. Have yet to see someone on the C train reading it along with me. But I know they are out there…