Archive for Keyser man of Mystery
Image of the Day: Off to Ottawa Edition
Posted by: | CommentsGonna be away for the next few days. Updates from the hotel possible but not promised!
Image of the Day
Posted by: | CommentsBusy day. Went and took for measurements for a medical survey about cancer (they’re tracking tons of people to find out variables for cancer rates, so it has nothing to do with whether Keyser has cancer), grabbed a quick dinner and then went to a bookstore for the filming of a demo to get the okay for the production of another documentary about witch hunting. (The main production company is headquartered in Ireland, but they have an affiliate right here in Iglooland, which was convenient for them. The demo is sort of like a commercial with sound bits from, in this instance, various daemonological talking heads. The shoot here seemed to go okay. We’ll see if this show flies…) On the move, on the move!
Heart of Darkness: High School Chums Edition
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So last year, Keyser found on Facebook somebody that he he’d been friendly with back in high school. (It seems that one of FB’s main purposes is to find people from grade school and high school and see if you look better at this age than they do.) This friend was on vacation at the time and posted fairly frequently. Then at the end of last August he got back home and stopped posting. If you do much FB, you find that some people are on all the time, some have accounts but never post, and the last category are on rather sporadically.
Keyser didn’t think much about this disappearance and let it slide. Then the other day, an entirely unrelated matter about another school acquaintance put Keyser in mind of the person from last year, so he decided to check out the friend’s account. Hmm, that’s odd, he doesn’t seem to be in Keyser’s list of “friends” any more. Somewhat retardedly, FB alphabetizes by first name, so Keyser tried by “real” first name and nickname, but to no avail.
Well, okay, let’s try out Google. Keyser knew the name, obviously, and remembered the home state, so type type type, and let’s see what we get. The first few “hits” were doctors, but clearly not him. Then… “Oh, Keyser’s fucking God!” A notice that someone with this name was arrested on felony child molestation charges last August! Later searching reveals that the person is now about to go on trial, being accused of having molested a 12-year-old. Now, being accused and being guilty aren’t necessarily the same thing, so we’ll have to see how things turn out, but… not only is the age of the accused appropriate for Keyser’s high school buddy, but the arrest photo they stuck at the top of the article seemed pretty clearly to be the same person, with the wear and tear of three decades added on to Keyser’s memory. (And, boy, you should see the reactions in the comment section of the article. No doubt people are influenced by the circumstances, but do they ever take a dislike to that image!)
Jesus Christ. A 12-year-old? What in the fuck is the matter with people? Perhaps more importantly, how do you look at people and hang out with them, not knowing that in three decades they’d do something so appalling? Not sure why Keyser finds this news so disturbing… Perhaps the idea that you really can’t know what goes on in other people’s heads? Or that people you interacted with so non-chalantly turn out to have some sort of awful black pit in their heart?
Anyway, whatever the legal outcome, let’s hope the accusation isn’t true. For everybody’s sake…
[Post scriptum. Good God, it's worse than Keyser thought. Not wanting to know too much about this, he sort of skipped over the details. The inestimable Dr. Phibes, however, is a veritable student of human depravity, so he carefully perused the fine print and has brought it to Keyser's attention that he was being a bit lenient with the perp. Turns out the charge was sex with a minor under the age of 12, and that this person was also charged with coercing the minor into having sex and then filming and shipping the footage. So Keyser's old chum is not just a pedophile but a filmer and distributor of kiddie porn. While Keyser is, as always, grateful for corrections, in this instance he can't say that he feels better for being better informed. Perhaps Phibes' darker understanding of the human psyche is more accurate than Keyser's somewhat rosier view. In any event, you'll have to excuse Keyser while he goes to pour a bit of lye into his memory's eye...
Post post scriptum. You'd think it couldn't get worse, but oddly enough, it did. Keyser just checked the latest news story, and the victim was age four at the time of the crime, and it's said to be unclear whether the victim will be called to testify in the upcoming trial. Four? Keyser can't take much more of this.
Post post post scriptum. Among his many skills medical and otherwise, Dr. Phibes is an expert at forensic medicine and he created the following imagine of what the accused would have looked three decades ago.
Good God, that's him! Modern scientific procedures are truly astounding. Who would think that you could take a picture of a 48-year-old pervert and recreate the spitting image of a 17-year-old would-be pervert?
And for those who think that joke is in bad taste, that's probably true. But some things are so awful that all you can do is laugh (or at any rate, the alternative isn't very appealing). And it really does look like him now. The whole thing is just too much to think about.]
Oy Image of the Day
Posted by: | CommentsTerrible day. Bunch of personal stuff no one would be interested in… God knows Keyser just wants to forget it.
Keyser Cheats Death: 100k Edition
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Many moons ago, Keyser drove from Chicago to California, and on the route took in Mt. Zion National Park in (not inappropriately) Utah. Keyser was looking around at whatever there is to look around at, and there’s a path upwards, with a sign saying that it’s 5000 feet up. “Hmm,” thinks Keyser, “that doesn’t sound so bad.” Well, it was. Turns up that a path 5000 feet up is a big deal. Somewhere above 3000 feet, Keyser thought he was going to die. But as this blog proves, anything’s possible when you’ve got Satan blowing your tail wind. (Hmm. Somehow that may give a not entirely appropriate image.)
So, anyway. Today Keyser participated in the annual 100k Tour du Iglooland. Actually, it wasn’t too bad. Keyser’s muscular legs (ain’t no fat on them!) were totally pumping away. The main problem was the lack of fat on Keyser’s ass. Even with those biking shorts, Keyser got the impression that the blood supply was being cut off to his legs and that gangrene might result. DId that slow Keyser down? Not on your life. Not with Satan blowing him along! (Hmm. Another potentially disturbing image.)
Keyser did have one minor mishap. His three-piece suit got caught once in the penny end of his penny-farthing, but he picked himself up, dusted himself off, and went back along his Satanic way. Ha, just joking. No mishap at all, and the suit and the p-f looked great (though the pros with their fancy bikes with the teeny little tires and their snooty biking jerseys looked someway askance at your otherworldly Pannonian)! Five hours and ten minutes later, including four stops, and Keyser came across the finish line. (Hmm. Another dubious image.) It’s not a race but a non-competitive event, but nonetheless Keyser can say that he came first in the “48-year-old full professor at Igloo U. with a doctorate in Daemonology from Harvard (1994)” category. (Hmm. Really gotta work on the lubricious imagery.) Truth be told, Keyser also came in last in that category, but as any good instructor in the humanities can tell you these days, there ain’t no such thing as “truth,” so fuck it.
Keyser got off and greeted Mrs. S. Oh, wait…
Translation Glory: Polish Edition
Posted by: | CommentsAfter much travail, a copy of the latest translation of Keyser’s magnum opus finally arrived (the publisher owed Keyser two copies, but was rather dilatory about producing them). Unfortunately, considerations of National Security preclude a picture of the cover, but here’s the inside. It’s in Polish! Who knew the Poles had such an interest in daemonology?
Ah, Those Were the Days: Family Edition
Posted by: | CommentsNot Keyser’s. They’re lost to time on the fertile plains of Pannonia.
No, we’re talking about the Keyserlings’ ancestors courtesy of the ex-Mrs. S.
First, we have their great great grandfather about to head off to round up the peasants during the Boer War:
Now, here he is ten years later (ca. 1910) with his kin:
The young boy is the Keyserlings’ great grandfather, who eventually joined the Indian army and squandered the family fortune through poor investments. The old man (the boys’ great great great grandfather) is actually the founder of a famous brewery, from whence came the fortune that the boy would squander.
Just look at them! Now those were the days. Dignity, poise and self-respect. Not a t-shirt to be seen! Quite the beard on the patriarch, too. Only an Amish would wear such a thing nowadays. (Truth be told, Keyser can’t abide facial hair. It’s hot and messy, if you ask him.)
Nice Work if You Can Get It
Posted by: | CommentsSome say that it doesn’t pay these days to be a professional daemonologist, and by Goldman Sachs standards that’s probably true. But here’s the latest royalty check. Last year we sold 1316 copies of the daemonology textbook, 1425 copies of the daemonology translation, 251 of the specialized history of daemonology (the one about Grover Cleveland), and even another 36 copies of the really expensive two-volume daemonology bilingual. Maybe that wouldn’t sound like much to Dan Brown, but it’s best seller territory in daemonological circles!
No doubt, Kenny Blankenship, the CEO over at GS, uses things like this to wipe his hands (or worse) with, but for academics it’s not bad. Keep us in cat food for another month, at any rate.
Wonder who CUP needs those first two digits for.
Keyser Hits the Airwaves
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Keyser’s a regular blood donor (any good daemonologist knows the value of blood!), so Keyser braved the snow to keep his appointment this morning. He got there slightly late, which set him down at the end of a long line of “corporate sponsor” donors. This annoyed Keyser, as he makes appointments to avoid exactly that, but regular donation (this was number 60) has its privileges, and Keyser got bumped to the head of the initial line.
Well, eventually Keyser wound up at the interview, where they take your blood pressure etc. and ask a bunch of questions about sex and drugs and sodomy. (Inter alia, they ask you if you’ve ever had sex with anyone who’s sold sex for drugs or money. Keyser has remarked to Mrs. S. that logically that’s an impossible question. She always reacts with indignation, remarking “How can you say that about me!” Well, in the first place, Keyser is sensible enough to know that they’d react rather badly if he replied with, “How’m I suppose to know that? You know, you can never prove a negative proposition.” Keyser assures Mrs. S. that as far as moral certainty goes, Keyser is happy enough to act under the presumption that she hasn’t sold sex for drugs or money, but since he hasn’t been around 24/7, as they say, there’s no way he could assert that from direct knowledge. Somehow, this doesn’t seem to assuage her.)
Anyway, the nurse dealt with Keyser the last time, so he told her that he remembered her story about how her father was appointed as a school teacher in the middle of nowhere in Saskatchewan and when he showed up at the job during the summer, they informed him that he had to teach some aspect of daemonology about which he had no knowledge at all (some sort of ensorcelry, if memory serves). So the nurse says, “Now that the term’s over, what are you doing to do?” Keyser figured that it would be best not to make a flippant remark about bon-bons and soap operas, so he said he’d write a book. Big mistake! This then led to inquiries about what sort of books Keyser has written.
You know, Keyser presumes that most academics must be a-personalities and love to go on about themselves. But as Keyser once remarked to Mrs. S., Keyser isn’t your average anything. And that includes fame. Keyser is incredibly embarrassed when it comes to describing to “regular folk” what it is that he does. Somehow it always involves lots of elaborate descriptions of the obscurantia he studies (“And in fact there are many applications of daemonology in modern industrial production…”), and Keyser hates having to explain what exactly the books are about. It all seems very personal, and Keyser would really rather be left in peace. Not that Keyser minds being famous (after a fashion). He just doesn’t like to talk about.
So Keyser was all set to post about his reluctance to be famous, but what does he find in his email when he gets back to the Daemonology Dept? Why, notification that the television show that he was interviewed for last fall is about to turn up on the airwaves (or at any rate cables) across the nation this weekend.
Sadly, Keyser can’t tell you what it is, as that would be a breach of national security. But if you happen to see a show about the use of daemonological principles in the pursuit of certain “enemies of the state,” then you never know. You may hear words coming directly ex ore ipsissimi Keyseri!
“Viewer discretion is strongly advised!”
Keyser had a draft for a post about US Supreme Court Justice Anton Scalia that had something to do with one of his children. Keyser went to the same high school as his many children (being a good Catholic Scalia has fifty-two of them or something). To tell you the truth, Keyser can’t even remember what exactly it was about the justice that rattled Keyser’s memory of days long gone by, but it had something to do with one of his children who was reputed to be a pot-head. Not having been a pot-head himself, Keyser couldn’t say for sure, so he decided to abandon the post.
Well, that’s not the only fleeting association with supreme court justices. A partner of Keyser Sr.’s once rented the country house of John Paul Stevens. (Keyser Sr. took Keyser along to the opening of the season party there. The partner’s wife took something out of the oven, which purported to be bacon wrapped around a Triscuit, and solicited Keyser’s opinion. The exact words were (if memory serves), “What does it taste like?” Back in the day, Keyser was even more gauche than today and he told the truth: “Not much of anything” (in fact, it tasted like fatty cardboard). This was apparently not the desired answer, so Mrs. Partner went off to find a better one. Why does one remember such things?)
And at graduate school at Harvard, Keyser met the brother of Potter “I can’t define it but I know it when I see it” Stewart. Had a big bald head with liver spots. The brother, not Keyser!
Now, Keyser never set eyes on any of the justices, but occasionally when he’d think of one of these incidents, it would put him in mind of the others, and Keyser thought it odd that he’d come into some sort of contact with three of the nine justices. How many people have anything to do with even one of them?
Then Keyser learns today that Prez. Barry is thinking of nominating for the soon-to-be vacated spot of J-P Stevens the dean of the Harvard Law School named Minow (Martha, to be exact). As soon as Keyser read that name, he thought, “Oh, that’s like Newt Minnow, but it’s spelled different.” Newt(on) Minnow was of course the FCC chairman under Kennedy who gave a speech about television in which he called it a “great wasteland.” Except that Keyser was was wrong about Newt’s spelling (presumably having figured that anyone with the first name of a lizard should have the last name of a fish). And she’s his daughter! (It would seem that Keyser wasn’t the only one to be confused by the spelling. Someone claims that the S.S. Minnow on Gilligan’s Island was named after him. Go figure.)
Well. Keyser has never been keen on Newt Min(n)ow. Something like forty years ago, Keyser would accompany Keyser Sr. downtown to work on Saturdays. Keyser would buy a plastic model to build while Keyser Sr. worked, and if it was a boat, he’d float it in the firm fountain. The details are now somewhat elusive, but at some point, Young Keyser got shouted at by the estimable Newt Min(n)ow, who was one of the senior partners of the joint, for these faux-naturical activities and the attendant mess. After that, Keyser never liked the man.
But it should be noted that this was nothing compared to Keyser Sr. He loathed Newt Min(n)ow with the blazing passion of a thousand bad-tempered suns. In fact, Keyser Sr. would not infrequently fantasize about going postal and walking from office to office with a an Uzi and a silencer, ridding the world of lawyers named after fish. There was another one about a retirement party in which he would go around advising the few people he liked to avoid the poisoned hors d’oeuvres. And another that had something to do with surreptitiosly tying the people he didn’t like to cast-iron lawn furniture, which he would then shove into the pool. These little vignettes were always recounted with a certain malicious verve that would strike Keyser as hilarious. Like so many things in Keyser Sr.’s life, they proved vain inasmuch as Newt is still with us, while Keyser Sr. is not.
Small world, no? It would be odd if Keyser wound up having some passing knowledge of four of the Supremes. As Keyser has noted before, he was born with an honorary membership card in the Left-Right Coast Elite, but wantonly tore it up and cast it to the winds. Maybe it’s that innate perversity he picked up from Keyser Sr.
Still, Keyser thinks he’s much more good-natured than Keyser Sr. Don’t get Keyser wrong. Keyser Sr. wasn’t entirely devoid of good qualities. But they certainly were equaled with a bountiful supply of bad ones (and if you scratched not far below the surface, some pretty awful ones). Keyser’s got a few counter-productive qualities of his own, but nothing (or so he hopes) like Keyser Sr…
Anyhoo, Keyser gathers that Martha would make a pretty awful judge, so he’d be happy to keep the count at three. Then again, any other pick of Prez. Barry’s is likely to be just as bad (if not worse). Hey, maybe he could even try Joe Biden!
