All Hail

And on page 328 of Infinite Jest, DFW used the word "irregardless" (and italicized it!) and it was glorious.

Yes, I've been reading this book extremely slowly, what of it?

Feeling Infinite

Welp, I'm back from the US, so it's back to posting in ye olde bloggie. My trip to the US was fabulous--thanks for asking. I ate many a breakfast taco.

Now, back to biz.

I started reading Infinite Jest. I'm on page 42. Here are my impressions so far.

Reasons DFW and I will be BFFs in the afterlife. Or, things I like about Infinite Jest up to pg. 42:
1. DFW often uses the word "creepy."
2. His first footnote describes crystal meth.
3. His characters say "like" in dialogue.
4. This paragraph: "I tend to get beat up, sometimes, at the Academy, for stuff like that. Does this bear on why I'm here? That I'm a continentally ranked junior tennis player who can also recite great chunks of the dictionary, verbatim, at will, and tends to get beat up, and wears a bow tie? Are you like a specialist for gifted kids? Does this mean they think I'm gifted?" (pg. 28)

And these are the bad seeds of the book so far (It's okay, they're not TOO important, and who knows? Maybe I'll end up loving them.):
1. Who calls their parents "the Moms" and "Himself"? Too twee. What is this, a Diablo Cody film?
2. That Hal calls his brother(?) "Boo" and "Booboo." Shut it down.
3. The (seemingly) random chapter in badly written ebonics.

More to come.

DFW I<3U

David Foster Wallace makes me want to write so much fiction! And I suck at writing fiction. (My last attempt at it was a story about a bird who speaks in a Southern accent and its stalker raccoon who speaks in a faux-Shakespearean manner. Enough said.)

When I say David Foster Wallace inspires me, I actually mean that this article in the New Yorker about him inspires me. I have already read this article twice.

I mean, he was compulsively second-guessing everything he wrote! And he was interested in characters who do extremely boring work, and how out of that work they suck meaning into their lives! I am also interested in these things! Wow!

My Annabel Leigh Moment

So you know how I wrote that post the other day about my deep-seated desires of being a '90s Israeli teen? Well, here's a confession.

In 4th or 5th grade, when I was still living in Israel (moved to Texas in 6th grade), I read this book, which became my favorite book. Not Eva-Hoffman-favorite, but close. I'll tell you about that book in a sec, but I'd also like to note that that same year, I read a choose-your-own-adventure book where I was a knight, but I quickly "died" because I chose to go to some "sweet-smelling flowers" that were actually POISON. I still haven't recovered from that. Anyways, the favorite, non-choose-your-own-adventure book (though I certainly would have chosen its adventure!) was about this 17-year-old girl who has a blue streak in her hair (which I soooo wanted to get), whose parents move to the US right before she starts her senior year of high school. But instead of going with them, she stays in Israel and lives on her own or something? I don't remember who she lives with. She is a badass, though.

She says she doesn't want to move to the US because she doesn't want to date some "Brandon Walsh" type dude. THAT IS HER REASONING. Obvi, homegirl didn't think that DYLAN is also in the US, but WHATEVER. Steve Sanders might be a counterargument to the argument I just made, so carry on.

At one point, she goes to visit her parents in the States and has to go to some benefit for Israel (?) with all these rich Jewz. And she narrates that she doesn't understand why all these rich Jews just throw money at Israel and pretend that they love it so much even though they DON'T LIVE THERE! A.B. Yehoshua, is that you?

I wish I could find this book! I'd write in to Fine Lines at Jezebel, but unfortch, Israeli young adult novels are not their specialty.

I hope that sharing my affinity for this book has given you more insight into who I am. And if you know the title of this book, you know what to do! (Find it and read it. It'll "change your life," in a Zach-Braff-film kinda way).