Housekeeping

I've made a couple changes/additions to the kombucha post to reflect the latest advances in knowledge, accuracy of instruction, and spelling. Just one of the many services I provide to you, the dedicated reader. You're welcome.

Cultural Detritus

To make up for my infrequency in posting I bring you today, not one but two (2) elucidations of random things I've come accross that make me both laugh and weep a bit for the future of our species. [Okay, I wrote that and then ended up sitting on this post for ages and then not including the other bit I promised. I may get to it]

First off we have the invitation I recieved in the mail to sign up for a credit card. Typically these are referred to as credit card offers. This one however is an invitation.

Observe

Quite a lovely black envelope, yes? With gold(ish) formal writing upon it. Let's see it from the front shall we?
Well, isn't that lovely? The Black Card. Let's look inside shall we? It doesn't matter much what your answer to these questions I keep asking actually are, I'm just going to go ahead anyway with my little plan here. They are what is known as rhetorical questions. Asked merely for the sake of style, not to elicit a response. English lesson over.

They have a director of Customer Experience... This should make you nervous right off the bat. It's never a good sign when people redefine corporate positions. Take human resources as an example. Just the term is disturbing and, funnily enough, dehumanizing. I mean, you could use the same term in an organ harvesting operation... if that doesn't give you pause you obviously haven't been watching enough bad thrillers on late night television.

Alright. Enough of that, lets see what this Black Card actually entails. Are you feeling the anticipation? Are you as curious as I was to see what all this is about? I hope so. Moving along, we find the meat of the matter:
Ah! Wonderful! Here we see (though in fact if we were reading carefully we also saw it in the letter from Customer Experience Director) that the Black Card (should follow suit with the Visa folks by putting it in boldface type I guess) is "not for everyone". Well certainly. Not everyone is worthy of such a fancy invitation... only the very best of us. In fact, only 1% of U.S. residents. A pretty elite group I must say, us 1%ers. The few, the proud, the holders. Apparently we get high caliber personal 'concierge' service. I envision a tuxedo clad, Jeeves like figure to personally deliver the card, or indeed, simply to accompany me on all my acquisitional excursions, carrying the Black Card in a metal briefcase handcuffed to his wrist, which will be unlocked when I am ready to make my purchase. You get that kind of service with the Black Card, for it is not a mere piece of plastic. Oh, no. Oh, no no no no no. It is a patent pending carbon card. As we know from the world of bicycling, everything is made better by making it out of carbon. It's lighter and stronger than conventional credit cards (it seems tawdry to even use such a term in reference to this "the ultimate buying tool" [in actuality, the ultimate buying tool is the one who gets this card]). It is laterally stiff and vertically compliant. It is the card of choice of pro racers world over, or would be, but you see, it's limited to only 1% of U.S. citizens, so those damn Belgians can't have one. Even Lance Armstrong may not have gotten one of these exclusive invitations.

Well, besides a personal shopping valet and a high-tech carbon fiber rectangle, what do we get?
Well, oh yes, the limited membership, so we know we're special. That's very important. We are indeed, those special few who demand only the best of what life has to offer.

Exclusive Rewards Program. No further information about what rewards are on offer, but they've gotta be pretty damn good don't you think? I'd expect a Lexus at least. Not right away of course, but after a few years of using the Black Card I think I'll have earned it.

Luxury Gifts. Geese that lay golden eggs, singing harps, that sort of thing. Not to be confused with the rewards, which we get in return for a job well done, these gifts are given to us simply to show that we are loved and valued, unconditionally... well okay, one condition, there is a small anual fee, a mere pittance. See it up there?

$495

a year

This is a damn special card. The APR isn't even that great. I think it starts at 13% or something. You pay them for the privilage of using the Black Card. If you're special enough to join the exclusive club.

Do me a favor all of you who work in retail. If any customer of yours pays for something with this card... just punch them in the face. If you are uncomfortable with violence, simply tease them mercilessly. Be sure to bring up the $495 a year, and the fact that the card is made of carbon (we're glossing over the fact that plastic is also made of carbon, but it has not escaped our notice. I know what they mean by "carbon" in this case).

The Dehumanization of our Heroes

Tomorrow is Columbus Day in this country (it's Columbus Day in Spain too I've learned, but that's just a coincidence, since they always observe it on the 12th). This, naturally, got me thinking a bit about Christopher Columbus. This began as the usual "why do you hate America?" style of thinking that certain talk radioists regularly deride. Typical stuff: he didn't actually discover anything, since there were folks there already; he never even landed in North America where we so revere him; he neither revolutionized the way the Earth was envisioned at the time, nor even ever realized he had discovered a new continent; he brought european diseases to the New World, and new world diseases back to Europe; he instigated the centuries of murder and oppression of the folks who were already here... all that stuff.

I then realized that, actually, none of that matters. Not, at least, as regards the holiday of Columbus Day (which most folks only think about inasmuch as it's a day off school, and you can't get mail or do any banking that day). It's the myth of the man that we are concerned with on Columbus Day, not the real human who thought he found the Indies and was convicted of brutal torture in his governorship across the water and all that. The image of Columbus in the heads of schoolkids, and most adults (even those who know better) has more in common with Paul Bunyan that with the man himself.

Columbus, in 1492 sailed the ocean blue (of course), because he was off to discover America! He lashed together his three ships, the Niña, the Pinta and the Santa Maria, and set forth all by himself, having, through force of will convinced the Imperial rulers of Spain that the Earth was indeed round (some confusion here with the discovery of a new continent and the search for a western route to the Indies and their lucrative spices). He quite probably hooked a rope each to the three ships and strapped planks to his feet and became the first water-skier, blowing up a wind for himself to fill the sails when the ocean winds would not provide. He landed... oh, somewhere up around Plymouth Rock I'd guess, and said "Aha! I have discovered America! Go me!" And he proceeded to make friends with the natives who had no quarrel with him saying he'd discovered America (imagine walking next door, sticking a flag on your neighbor's porch and saying "I've discovered your house, and all its riches belong to Spain!"). He returned triumphant to Spain (though possibly a lot of folks envision it as England even if they know better). From that began 600 years of peaceful european colonization of the New World.

This is the folk hero version of Christopher Columbus, and he his unassailable with mere facts. There is a folk hero version of George Washington (with his cherry tree), Abraham Lincoln (without the depression) and a few others. The founding fathers are less crucial to our self-image as Americans than our founding mythic heroes. In this sense, in spite of his Genoese birth, Columbus is as American as apple pie (made with apples that originated in Central Asia, with a crust made of middle eastern wheat, since I'm being contrary here). Our folk heroes are not allowed to be real human beings. Paul Bunyan never lived through a hard winter, or got drunk and disorderly on a Saturday night, this could not be concieved.

So... I'm not sure exactly what the conclusion here to be drawn is. I think I feel a bit softer towards Columbus in a way. Toward the folk Columbus in any case, and I realize that the real guy didn't participate in this mythmaking, he just did some stuff, like we all do, and he got co-opted, warts removed and be-pedestaled. Can't blame a guy for that. Can blame him for stuff he actually did of course, or allowed to be. But that's a different issue. Perhaps the point is just to be aware, if you're going to talk about Christopher Columbus, there are two persons of that name that you can be talking about... and there may even be some value in the folk hero version, bravely defying the established wisdom of his time and discovering new frontiers. Not to say we should simply ignore reality in favor of usable myths, but maybe we can use the myths if we keep in mind that that's what they are. Columbus certainly has more to offer as a folk hero than does Paul Bunyan, who teaches us... if you grow up to be...um... really big... you can create the Grand Canyon.