by Jarett Kobek
IF YOU WERE FROM CALIFORNIA and the year was 2013, and you were discussing the consensus amongst public intellectuals who supported the War in Iraq, you might say, “It was, like, so ironic¸ because, you know, like, all of America’s, like, public intellectuals supported a total, you know, disaster of a war and, like, thought, that there could be, like, you know, democracy in Iraq.”
You’d be wrong.
There was nothing ironic in the wrongness of a bunch of dumb assholes who offer bogus opinions for money.
Dumb assholes who offer bogus opinions for money don’t need to be right. They only need to be loud.
“I WAS VERY MUCH CAPTIVATED,” said Adeline, “by news of Sergey Brin’s affair.”
Sergey Brin was one of the co-founders of Google. He was married to Anne Wojcicki.
Over the summer, news had broken that Sergey Brin was having an affair with an underling at Google X.
Google X was an experimental lab that developed products like driverless cars, dogs that don’t need to lick their own genitals, and Google Glass.
Google Glass was a wearable computer built into a pair of ugly eyeglasses. Google Glass allowed its wearers to act out their social inadequacies. They could record videos with Google Glass and alienate everyone in their surrounding vicinity.
Sergey Brin’s sexual dalliance was with the Marketing Manager for Google Glass. He had internalized his company’s business model.
“I told you,” said Christine. “Google X is just picking up chicks.”
ADELINE DECIDED TO GO HOME. Christine saw Adeline to the door.
Adeline was in the hallway.
“There’s something I need to tell you,” said Christine.
“Yes, darling?” asked Adeline. “It’s not about Google, is it? Whatever will they solve next? Gravity?”
“Bertrand and I have been talking,” said Christine. “I think I’m giving notice on this place. After the wedding. I think we’re moving to the East Bay. There’s enough money to buy a house. You know, in case we ever want to start a family.”
“Good luck, kid. You’re gonna need it,” said Adeline. “I shall miss you.”
chapter thirty-one
In September, Adeline asked Minerva to help with a project. Minerva agreed. If for no other reason than to escape San Venetia and the hospital.
“Sure thing, bright girl,” said Minerva. “When do you want me?”
“Tomorrow afternoon,” said Adeline.
WHEN ADELINE VISITED SAN FRANCISCO in 1993, she stayed on Jeremy and Minerva’s couch on Steiner off of Haight Street.
By the time of Adeline’s arrival, Minerva had whittled away a year as the lead vocalist and guitarist in an almost all-girl punk band called Daddy Was in KGB.
Daddy Was in KGB had a gimmick. None of its members had eumelanin in the basale strata of their epidermises. Other than the drummer, all of its members were women and former citizens of The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
Which was also known as the USSR. Which was also known as the СССР. Which was also known as The Russians.
The Russians were the people who caused the CIA to fund literary fiction. There was the idea that literary endeavors could open up a valid front in the information war.
KGB stood for Комитет государственной безопасности, which translated into English as The Committee for State Security. TheKGB were the Russian equivalent of the CIA.
The KGB didn’t fund literary fiction.
Mostly, the KGB just kicked the shit out of Russian writers.
MINERVA MET THE OTHER MEMBERS of her band at Night Break, a now-defunct music venue on Haight. Night Break hosted Sunday events called Sushi Sundays.
During Sushi Sundays, local bands performed on Night Break’s stage while a sushi chef served spicy tuna rolls to punk rockers, metalheads, heroin addicts and tweakers.
ANYWAY, THE BAND’S FEMALE MEMBERS met on a Sushi Sunday. There was Minerva and there was Vasilisa and there was Galina.
They spoke Russian and discovered a shared love of three chord punk. They discovered a mutual desire to be in a band.
Minerva could sing, sort of. She had a guitar that she could play, sort of. Galina could play guitar, too. Sort of.
Vasilisa’s roommate had a bass guitar. Vasilisa couldn’t play bass but that didn’t matter. Bass guitar was punk’s least important instrument.
Most people ignored it.
MINERVA, WHO HAD ATTENDED the Parsons School of Design, designed a flyer stating that the band was in search of a drummer.
She took the flyer to a copy shop. She was friends with one the employees. She ran off about 300 copies of the flyer. The employee hated his boss. He didn’t charge Minerva.
The flyer was taped to lampposts across the city.
A HANDFUL OF PEOPLE RESPONDED.
The only decent applicant had four serious defects: (1) He was 16 years old. (2) He wasn’t a woman. (3) He was American. (4) He lived in San Rafael.
But Minerva liked the kid. His drum sound was primitive and crude.
She convinced her fellow ex-Soviets by saying, “What is problem? Making music with pubescent is perfect punk rock. He is dissonant note in symphony of disaster.”
DADDY WAS IN KGB lasted a few years. They recorded a demo and released two 7” vinyl records.
Then the drummer made a pass at Galina, which was rebuffed, and then he went to college.
Then Vasilisa got pregnant after a one night stand with the guitarist from another band called DRUNK PEOPLE R LOUD.
And that was weird because Vasilisa was a lesbian.
But whatever. People are complicated.
The band broke up.
MINERVA COULDN’T REMEMBER who suggested it, but someone said that she should look into nursing. Which she did. It turned out that she loved it.
She believed that the confrontational aesthetics of Daddy Was in KGB were not about offending or hurting people but about healing them from their personal and social traumas.
Now she was healing bodies from physical trauma.
It was all the same thing, really. It depended on your point of view.
MINERVA PICKED UP ADELINE.
“What do you need, bright girl? Why do you need car?”
“Darling,” said Adeline, “I can’t fathom whether or not you’ve made the acquaintance of my friend Christine, but I have simply accepted her crackpot theory that the Bay Area is nothing but a very great monstrosity of advertising. What I want to do is drive out to the airport, and then as you drive back, I will photograph every billboard as we approach the city. Perhaps we can know San Francisco’s unconscious thoughts.”
“Sure thing, bright girl,” said Minerva.
AS THEY DROVE TO THE AIRPORT, Adeline told Minerva about the latest Twitter scandal.
A journalist named Caroline Criado-Perez had started a campaign to get Jane Austen on the ten pound British note. Thousands of people signed up and supported the effort. Caroline Criado-Perez’s WaNks Index Score was 2.577861406696081.
Jane Austen was a writer from the Nineteenth Century who had written books about marriage and money.
The Bank of England acquiesced. The Bank of England announced that Jane Austen would appear on the ten pound British note.
After the Bank of England announced that Jane Austen would appear on the ten pound British note, certain users of Twitter were outraged.
They were furious. They were frothing at the mouths. They were dumb assholes. Nothing is more odious in a society that hates women than a woman who expresses an opinion.
The more that people tweeted about Caroline Criado-Perez, the more that Twitter could serve advertisements. Nothing made people tweet like outrage.
So Twitter made money off of rape and death threats sent to Caroline Criado-Perez.
Adeline watched with fascination.
“Darling,” she said to Minerva, “If I keep on, I am rather sure I am going to receive my own threats of rape and deat
h.”
“Fuck all bullshit men,” said Minerva. “Fuck them until they die. You say what you want. Fuck them all.”
MINERVA ARRIVED at San Francisco International Airport. She turned off the 101 South and then merged on to the 101 North. She drove all the way to Market Street.
Adeline was in the passenger seat with her camera. Her camera used actual 35mm film. She made Minerva drive in the right lane at 45 miles per hour.
Adeline took pictures of every billboard along the highway. These advertisements were the first thing which travelers saw upon entering the city. They were premium messages of the moment.
THIS IS WHAT SAN FRANCISCO was saying in September 2013. This was the message of the streets, if only it could be deciphered and interpreted. These were the pieces of a puzzle:
(1) Giant Sweep
This billboard advertised a public service campaign spearheaded by the city of San Francisco and the San Francisco Giants. The San Francisco Giants were a baseball team which generated the illusion of meaning by winning the 2010 and 2012 World Series. Giant Sweep was a campaign dedicated to keeping San Francisco clean by guilting its citizens into performing services that should have been financed through taxes on the obscene wealth of its residents.
(2) iPad
This billboard advertised the iPad. The iPad had changed everything.
(3) Distributors Run NetSuite
This billboard advertised business management software, which was a tool for middle management boors. It allowed them to craft the illusion that their jobs had purpose in large, bureaucratic institutions. NetSuite was co-founded by a billionaire named Larry Ellison.
(4) Corporate mobile data will double this year. Are you in control?
This billboard advertised a company named Druva, which offered secure data integration across computers, tablets and mobile phones. Druva had raised funding from the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.
(5) Oracle Open World, Sept 22 - 26, San Francisco, #OOW13
This billboard advertised a conference dedicated to the products of Oracle, a company that sold database management software to other companies. Oracle was co-founded by a billionaire named Larry Ellison.
(6) NetApp is the world’s #1 storage OS? Yes, NetApp.
This billboard advertised NetApp, which was a company that offered remote data storage to other companies. Back in the 1990s, NetApp had raised funding from the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.
(7) #1 for a Reason
This billboard advertised Trend Micro Inc, a Japanese company that sold consumer and enterprise level security software and services.
(8) IMAGINE 30 YEARS OR MORE OF DOING WHAT YOU LOVE. Let’s get ready for a longer retirement.
This billboard advertised retirement and money management services with Prudential Insurance Company of America.
(9) iPad
This billboard advertised the iPad. The iPad had changed everything.
(10) New Homes at Candlestick Cove With 2-Car Garages
This billboard advertised condos for sale in the low $700,000s.
(11) puppetconf 2013
This billboard advertised PuppetConf 2013, a conference organized by puppet labs. puppet labs was a company that had raised capital from Google’s venture capital firm Google Ventures. puppet labs offered software that automated routine tasks performed by systems administrators, leading to a market environment in which automation had rendered most systems administrators inept and moved them ever closer towards obsolescence.
(12) Join the Learning Revolution
This billboard advertised a product called Litmos, offered by CallidusCloud. Litmos allowed companies to create videos and training materials that worked along the moronic and ill-conceived principles of e-learning, which was an ephemeral system of pedagogy designed by people who hated teachers and formal education.
(13) RingCentral. Many locations. One cloud phone system.
This billboard advertised RingCentral, which was a company that offered cloud-based phone systems. RingCentral had raised funding from the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.
(14) TAKE A BREAK FROM HAVING IT ALL TO ENJOY IT ALL.
This billboard advertised the Bay Club, a chain of private fitness clubs and spas located throughout the Bay Area.
(15) TechCrunch DISRUPT SF 2013
This billboard advertised the TechCrunch DISRUPT 2013 San Francisco conference. TechCrunch was a website that provided biased, pro-industry pseudojournalism about developments in imaginary technologies. DISRUPT was the name of TechCrunch’s many conferences, after disruptive innovation, a popular Silicon Valley concept developed by a Mormon who believed, literally, that he was in verbal communication with God.
(16) The All New Droid
This billboard advertised the Motorola Droid, which was a smartphone. Motorola was a company owned by Google. The brandname Droid was a trademark of LucasFilm and licensed to Motorola. LucasFilm was owned by Disney.
(17) #1 for a Reason
This billboard advertised Trend Micro Inc, a Japanese company that sold consumer level and enterprise level security software and services.
(18) iPad
This billboard advertised the iPad. The iPad had changed everything.
chapter thirty-two
It came to pass that J. Karacehennem and The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter had packed up their lives. The movers had come and taken everything away.
Their apartment was empty. They were moving tomorrow.
J. KARACEHENNEM spent his last night hanging out with Adeline. The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter didn’t mind.
She had her own plans. She was going to a dinner party full of people for whom she didn’t particularly care.
“It’s your last night in the city,” said J. Karacehennem. “Why would you spend it with people you can’t stand?”
“I agreed months ago,” she said. “Before we knew we were moving. I can’t just cancel.”
“Sure you can,” said J. Karacehennem. “Just don’t show.”
“That’s not how I am,” said The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter.
So she sat around eating mediocre vegan food while listening to the inane babblings of people for whom she didn’t particularly care.
The topic of discussion was Miley Cyrus.
MILEY CYRUS WAS A POP STAR.
You could say MILEY to almost anyone anywhere in the industrialized world and conjure a vague neurological image of Miley Cyrus.
Her songs were about the same six subjects of all songs by all pop stars: love, celebrity, fucking, heartbreak, money and buying ugly shit.
PEOPLE WERE TALKING about Miley Cyrus because she’d spent the summer changing her image.
Miley Cyrus’s career had started as a teenaged actress on the Disney Channel, a cable network owned by the company founded by Walt Disney.
Miley Cyrus produced a great deal of intellectual property for Disney. All of this intellectual property was targeted towards children. It dripped with sugar and tasted of bubblegum.
By the Summer of 2013, Miley Cyrus had grown into a young woman and adopted a public image resting on conspicuous consumption, drug use and open sexuality.
It was hard to remember, but there’d been a time when the Political Left had considered drug use and open sexuality as tools of liberation.
Then it turned out that Republicans liked to fuck and shoot smack, too.
ANYWAY, MILEY CYRUS appeared at MTV’s Video Music Awards with an unmemorable pop singer named Robin Thicke, who had no eumelanin in the basale stratum of his epidermis.
Robin Thicke had stirred some controversy over the summer with his hit pop song, “Blurred Lines.”
Social activists on Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook had taken issue with the song’s lyrical content, which they believed promoted rape.
The song’s promotional video featured a gaggle of half-naked female models sporting glazed expressions and an inability to dance on beat. The models looked, basically, l
ike they were full of heroin.
Social activists wrote many long screeds and tweeted heavily about Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines.” They were challenging the prevailing social trends that they found mirrored in the content of the song.
Their social activism occurred on mechanisms owned by the Patriarchy. Their social activism occurred on platforms designed for the sole purpose of advertising.
So all they did was advertise for Robin Thicke. The sum total effect of the protest was to make Robin Thicke richer.
THERE WAS MILEY CYRUS at the Video Music Awards. She was on stage with Robin Thicke. She was engaged in a form of dance known as twerking.
Twerking was characterized by the twerker squatting low while thrusting their hips back and forth. This thrusting caused the twerker’s buttocks to shake in a manner that many moral scolds considered sexual but actually just looked goofy.
