Why Bob Dylan won't be performing in France

 

In October, health providing, 85 year old Bob Dylan will begin touring in Europe!!!!

He is going to:

Norway

Sweden

Denmark

Germany

Belgium

Luxembourg

Switzerland

Italy

Slovenia

Austria

and...

England.

Did you notice any big European Countries bordering most of these other countries that he is not coming to? Big, big country, plenty of cities, kinda tucked inbetween all these other countries? North of Italy, just across from England, right alongside Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, and Switzerland?

Maybe a country where I live?

Yep, he is not going to play any dates in France!

Does Bob Dylan hate France?

Oh, no. He has been here twice since we moved here. He had "reasons" for coming, but it might actually have been to visit me, though maybe I'm dreaming that. It's possible he does have some kind of business here though I don't know when he would have done it. He once said to me in passing while we were drinking spritzes made with green chartreuse at a rooftop bar (let's call it an emerald spritz) "I almost bought a villa here in the nineties."

Since I live here now in decidedly not a villa, I was very interested in this story. "Why didn't you?" I asked.

"It's too much like Malibu." He said. Which is at once completely insane and I can see his point.

 

I know for a fact he likes my pretty belle epoque city though, and he was sad to hear we might move. Both times we hung out together here, when I wandered off drunkenly to go home and go to sleep after our lengthy night of drinking, I am pretty sure he, an extremely famous 85 year old man, some time after midnight, went for a long aimless walk on the random streets of this large city. Maybe that was his business.

Don't forget to put your little hoody up, Bob.

He says he gets recognized less now that he is so old. "Being old hides you." He said with a mysterious glimmer.

I realize this doesn't explain his not playing any dates in France. 

Well, that was my fault.

We were drinking pastis at a kind of pastis bar. It's not really how a person is supposed to drink pastis, but Bob and I have our tasting thing. I got an awful headache later though. Always remember to drink too much water. Anyway, I said to Bob "I read somewhere that Leonard Cohen said that you said 'As far as I'm concerned, Leonard, you're number one, I'm number zero.' And then Leonard Cohen explained it: 'Meaning, as I understood it at the time- and I was not ready to dispute it- that his work was beyond measure and my work was pretty good.'"

Bob suddenly looked very uninterested.

"From one Nobel Prize winner to another, what number am I, Bob?"

That made Bob laugh despite himself. Not only don't I have a Nobel Prize, but one day, surely far in the future, clerkmanifesto will be quietly landed without any number at all. Also Bob was a bit toasted.

"I'll tell you what." Bob croaked. "The next time I play a concert here in France I will announce what number I think you are live on stage."

I thought he was kidding, but I guess not. And so, apparently, his solution is to never play live in France again. 

Sorry France.

I gave Bob an obscure lyric just to see if he could pick it up. He's a genius you know. "It wasn't for nothing that they put me away." I said. "I fell with my angel down the chain of command."

I thought Bob might have nodded off, but he looked up at me through his one dying eye and quietly intoned: "There's a law, there's an arm, there's a hand." A bit of later career Leonard Cohen and one of Bob's favorites.

I almost said, but didn't: "Oh Bob.You'll always be number zero to me." I didn't want him to understand, or to not understand. 

One of the two.

Bringing things into focus

 

Trying to bring things into focus here in our life in France is hard. I think everytime we start to get a rhythm or maybe a sense of what a regular life might be like here and how to manage it in the best way, there's some accident, illness, change of heart, or slew of immigrant paperwork to deal with. The last of these, having to do with an application for the French health system, is currently rearing its head, and I am neither stalwart or zen in the face of these complicated paperwork and bureaucratic issues. I'm bitter and eeyorish.

Plus I have soccer to watch!

But neither of these are our subject for today. This morning I was missing my zoom camera with which I used to like to take wildlife photography and nature images. But I did replace that camera with a pretty good phone camera that has a powerful zoom that I don't often fully take advantage of, probably because I am not much in the wilds here. Also, this phone camera needs a bit of AI help to get its zoom fully up to speed, not that I too much object to AI photography, as you probably know.

But today I was looking out our window as I often do, over the tiled rooftops and out to the hills ringing the city. There is a ton of interesting stuff out there! But it can be hard to see. So I decided to pull out my phone, pick a likely spot, and see what I could find out about one of these distant, history rich hilltops.

Here then are my results:

A thrilling trifling anecdote

 

Standing in a multi story clothing store above the main street here, looking out the window, I saw a tram go by. It was festooned with advertisements for a museum up in the hills just outside of this city, near the glorious Saint Paul de Vence, possibly the loveliest village edging along the entire Cote d'Azur. It was for the Maeght Foundation Museum, a lovely estate-like museum we went to a few months ago. And all these ads reminded me of a trifling anecdote from there that I wanted to share with you because you adore trifling anecdotes.

You don't adore trifling anecdotes?

I could have sworn you were really keen on trifling anecdotes. Let me check my notes.

Oh, I see what happened.

It turns out you like something around here, but it's unclear what, so I guessed "trifling anecdotes".

You know what? Why don't I share this trifling anecdote and see how you feel about it.

I mean, you'll see how you feel about it. And I'll make up in my head how you feel about it, and, spoiler alert, in my imagination you are going to love it!

So there we were at this pretty museum way up in the hills overlooking the sparkling Mediterranean. The museum actually has gorgeous grounds and an amazing collection that oddly is just a bit less than the sum of its parts? Like, maybe if you took the best third of it, which would still be a lot, it would be the best modern collection in all of Southern France. But somehow it all seems a bit unfocused, and some of the lesser works can get a bit... off. 

Its curation is a bit funky.

But that's not what I'm here to talk about. That's just me, er, judging the world around me with an implacable tiger-like ferocity.

Anyway, I'm walking around this museum in the hills near Saint Paul de Vence, and, this is important, so don't shut your eyes, I was wearing the same t-shirt I am wearing right now! It features this picture:

 

Now here comes the trifling anecdote.

Wearing this I started walking into a new room of the museum, and as I was walking in there was a woman walking out. She looked down at the picture on my shirt, and, in a knowing sort of way, she laughed!

She laughed!

"Hmm," I thought. "She must be a fan of Clerkmanifesto and an admirer of trifling anecdotes."

But no. I mean, probably not.

So I sort of shrugged my shoulders metaphorically, and I proceded into the new room of paintings. 

There were sixteen paintings on the pale ivory walls of this one big, but simple, room. Some of the paintings were quite large too.

And every last one of them was of tigers.

What have we learned

 

Here are the top ten things we have learned very recently at clerkmanifesto!

10. The general titles and introductions in clerkmanifesto lately are just a thin disguise for more World Cup content.

9. It is too much work to watch four World Cup games a day and read and watch all its attendant commentary and yet write about anything other than The World Cup (see item "10").

8. While the "Ten item list" is a classic motif, it generally requires too many distinct points, causing most of these said lists to have a couple of filler items.

7. See "Number 8".

6. Round one of The World Cup demonstrated so far that the vaunted "greatest midfields in the world" (Spain, Portugal) are like absolutely nothing compared to "The greatest stars in the world" (Messi, Mbappe, Harry Kane, Haaland).

5. Brilliant and dedicated teamwork is essential and profoundly respected, but really so far only for the less talented, over-achieving teams (New Zealand, Cabo Verde, Congo).

4. It's possible for us to become insanely excited about tie games.

3. This actually should have probably been a five item list. It turns out that it is hard to learn anything when you just watch a lot of soccer.

2. For all this incredible amount we've learned (see items 10 through 3, but probably disregard items "10", "9", "8", "7", and "3") it is only round one that we've seen, and there is still room to defy what we've just witnessed: Messi could now show his age with Argentina then bogging down around him. Lamine Yamal could light fire and lead Spain to their expected brilliance, Ronaldo could weirdly start scoring goals like a man half his age, which, alas, according to form so far would be 26, Belgium could put in adored talisman Axel Witsel, Neymar could rise from the dead, maybe equipped with bionics?, and Mbappe could, er, Mbappe could, no, I can't say it. I think that Mbappe, and I am no great fan, might, at The World Cup, be inevitable.

1. The winner of round one was the highest and the lowest. Oh, and people tuning into clerkmanifesto thinking "Gosh, I hope he talks about soccer instead of shelving, or library management, or his weird France vacation which seems awfully long already! Who's registering library cards for him?

 

The town heats up

 

The first really warm weather since we moved to France is headed our way. The sun has often been strong here, but the cool air rolling off the ocean has always made it pleasant underneath. But now I feel it starting to turn as we quickly approach Summer.

And so perhaps with that weighing on my mind as I've wandered the city the past day or two, I seem to catch a sense of something out of the corner of my eye. Hurriedly I would pull out my phone and try and caputre it. Sometimes I'd just get a blur, but sometimes there is something a little clearer...

Volume 14 is finally available at your local bookstore

 

Yes, Volume 14 in the annals of clerkmanifesto is finally here. And you can pick it up at your local bookstore. It should also be noted that it is, like everything related to clerkmanifesto, completely free!

That doesn't mean valueless though! That's just how we're programmed.  Remember: 

Capitalism nibbles at the brain.

Anyway, if they tell you they don't have Volume 14 at your local bookstore, I urge you to make a scene.

 The whole "Karen" thing has given quite the stigma to making a scene, but sometimes is simply has to be done.

Just, it's better if it's done right. And over something super important.

You know, like Volume 14.  I mean, wouldn't you like to be able to sit down in a comfy armchair with a nice cognac and be able to read stuff just like... this?

Or, maybe not this exactly, but many posts in clerkmanifesto are slightly better than this one!

So go ahead and create a fuss.

Don't worry, though, the store will probably have it.

My art career takes off in europe!

Maybe seeing all my interesting artwork you were wondering, like that one guy with the long grey hair always did at the library, why am I not a successful professional artist?

Or as he put it "You should do something with your art!"

I know.

I really should.

Mostly what I do is make art, and then occasionally I dip into thinking that a lot more people should like it. But I haven't gotten a ton further than that.

Until now!

Check out my exciting upcoming shows!!!!

Welcome back, welcome back

 

Having issued forth hundreds of mildly amusing quips at the front desk of my library, or perhaps thousands, or possibly millions, over thirty-one years, I am aware that the number still to come is dwindling into the double digits, and maybe even soon the single digits. I have few clever quips to issue at the front desk of my library left in my life.

And so, as the curtain comes to a close on my career here, while I am still saying ridiculous things at the front desk of the library, I am eager to report each one of them.

And so it was that today a woman came to the front desk of my library to pick up her interlibrary loan copy of the DVD Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. As I handed the DVD over to her, in the process of checking it out, she said she was surprised that her local library didn't have a copy, and that she had to request it through interlibrary loan.

I was non plussed. I said that what surprised me is that the guy playing the Sweathog Vinnie Barbarino was starring in an actual movie!

The person checking out the DVD seemed to find this somewhat amusing, so I added:

"Did Arnold Horshack also go on to have an illustrious career?"

Over the top?

 

We start off the Sunday morning of our "Quotation" series by testing the limits. Last night's "Elephant" was easily one of my favorites in this collection, and, as these are shown in the order they were made, this image followed the adventurousness of the last in the spirit of: Anything is possible! 

And certainly the quote we are working with today encouraged this approach.

But, the absurdity of the image made it a little bit less grounded for me.

Nevertheless...

The post I did not write

 

It is always much nicer to write my daily clerkmanifesto essay at the library. That way I can enjoy the evening with my wife without having the writing project hang over the night, ending up causing me to venture into the wee hours to get it done instead of properly sleeping. But here I am at the library with just 15 minutes to go before the library closes and I've got nothing! 

Nothing funny or interesting has happened today at work.

Oh, there was that one person at the front desk who had to tell me her library card number and did it like this:

Four....

Two....

Eight....

sixnineeightfivethreeohninetwofive.

And I thought seriously about writing on that incident. 

But I like to think you expect more from clerkmanifesto. 

I do.

Behind every door: The endless journey part one

 

Because we are taking you on the first part of an endless mystical journey today, we couldn't fit our video here, so it's off to YouTube land for you again. I am not certain the first link will work, so you can also hit the second one by clicking through. They both go to the same thing. 

Music is essential with this journey so please set up your state of the art sound systems. Thank you, and I hope you'll come to the Planetarium "Behind Every Door Experience" when it arrives your town. Drop me a comment and I'll make sure you get comped tickets and some edibles.

Peace.

My evil policy

 

I make no secret that issuing library cards is probably my least favorite desk task. It has some nice, social elements if one wants to make a production of it, and it has a beauty in its partaking of ancient library traditions, but it is too rote and data entry heavy to really be satisfying. And anything with data entry feels increasingly dated to me these days anyway. There has got to be another way! Also, I would maybe feel more tolerant of library card registrations if people treated them with more gravity. Why would someone drive 40 miles across the metro area to try and get their first library card here? And I suspect that many people also get library cards just to get a library card, and not because they want check out a book or use a service that requires a library card.

Honestly, if library cards weren't so tedious to issue, these little peculiarities wouldn't get to me at all. Library cards for everyone! Open the floodgates! Let flow a river of library cards!

But after explaining all the library card... stuff, and typing in:

Location

Patron type

Name

Birthday

Scanning a barcode

Address line 1

City, State

Zip code

Check email

Check preoverdue

Email address

Phone

Type

Stat class

Pin

A few dozen times, my mind wanders down darker paths. And here is the horrible policy I've come up with:

If a person gets a library card and in the next week does not check anything out or access any of our services, their account will be locked and they will be denied all future library service forever!

Not that they'll care. Let's face it, we're never seeing any of these people ever again.

Big event

 

Acclaimed children's author Katherine Applegate is coming to my library!

Tonight!

And not just for a casual visit. Not just to get a library card and then mysteriously leave the library without checking anything out. Not just to ask me if I can help her fax something.

No, it is for an author event.

Katherine Applegate wrote a very popular book called The One and Only Ivan which was a major motion picture (never saw it), won the Newbery Award, and will possibly come to be considered a classic, though after only 11 years it's hard to tell for sure with that sort of thing. 

I liked it, and isn't that all that's important?

Katherine Applegate also wrote a popular series of books called "Animorphs", which were ubiquitous around here a quarter century ago. They all had strangely compelling pictures of young people turning into animals on the cover. I don't believe I ever managed to read through a whole one of those, but I have been known to work in a similar photographic oeuvre to the cover art for them.

So we are expecting three billion people to come to this event.

That sounds like a lot, but we've brought in several extra chairs.

Many people wonder how we managed to score such a magnificently famous big time author.

It wasn't pretty.

It looked like the Saint Paul Library system was going to get Ms Applegate to speak at one of their libraries, so we sent some burglars in to their administrative offices in the middle of the night to plant bugs to give us an advantage.

Then our burglars got arrested!

There was a bit of a scandal, a shameful cover-up, and there were resignations. 

The whole thing came to be known as...

Applegate.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

And that is how we came to have Gerald Ford as our library director.

Here is the commemorative picture of Katherine Applegate and her main charcter I made for this event. I'm too shy to show her, but if she wanders into our break room, or reads clerkmanifesto every day before breakfast, then she can see it.

Our millionth subscriber

 

At 2:11 a.m., on Tuesday morning, clerkmanifesto welcomed its one millionth subscriber. I got the Google Blogger Plaque just this afternoon and have hung it in a place of honor in my library. Having a million subscribers reading clerkmanifesto is a great honor, and, as promised, I will be donating $100,000 to the home for forgotten bloggers.

As few as 17 years ago, blogging was the second biggest money maker in the entertainment industry, and thousands of talented writers, eschewing their best novel writing years, made ample incomes writing personal columns on an Internet oozing with personality.

Now, sadly, those days are long gone, and famous bloggers that were veritable household names, like Neal the Pat Peterson, The Divine Doreen, and Let's talk Pickles, are all but forgotten.

What do you mean you've never heard of The Divine Doreen?

Whatever.

I'm not bitter.

I just want you to know that if my $100,000 can pay for just one, vintage, lower east side pickle barrel to remind Let's Talk Pickles of his glory days, then all my work here will have been worth it.

Yes of course he still loves all things pickles.

Lord, the Internet is fickle!

For instance, my subscriber count that just a few days ago hit one million, has now dropped back down to four!

I hope I can keep my plaque.