[Newspoetry] Missing Hat!

[William Gillespie]

Bill, I actually don't mind Urbana news, and am actually delighted that I
have recieved up to three complaints. Delighted because it means that these
people are resigned to be on the Newspoetry listserv or they would just
unsubscribe and subscribe to a more cosmopolitan list, like the SF Webzine
list, from which I recently unsubscribed due to the large volume of Burning
Man-related messages. But it wasn't that I felt alienated from San Fransisco
computer professionals with an aggressive independent publishing rhetoric
which, curiously, could never embrace Newspoetry, even though Newspoetry
seems in many ways more independent then Webzines, which are chained to
hipness and frequently run banner ads and sell merchandise and proclaim
themselves political and an exercise of the first amendment that seems
several tangible notches below Newspoetry's flagrant ABUSE of our first
Amendment rights and freedom of the press; but rather because I felt that my
presence as a Midwesterner on the list alienated THEM, and at any point I
might mention cornfields and cause their world to crumble, and they might
suddenly blink and realize: "Wow. A big party in the desert. Naked people.
What's up with that? Incredibly high rent. Wow." But more to the point, I
think we at Newspoetry are building the foundation of 21st Century Literature
and, in so doing, are establishing Urbana as the Dublin of the Midwest. Yes,
just as with Joyce's Ulysses, there will someday be books of literary
criticism containing maps of Urbana with significant areas highlighted, such
as the dance studio at Lincoln Square from whose window Joe Futrelle stole
the line "Irish Hip-Hop Jazz." And with Urbana the Dublin of the Midwest, I
guess that makes Ireland the Illinois of Europe. Which I guess makes the
Midwest the British Isles of the United States. Which I guess makes Europe
the United States of Eurasia. Which I guess makes North America the Eurasia
of the Western hemisphere. Which I guess makes Earth the Earth of the Solar
System. Which is irrefutable. Therefore, Urbana is Dublin. It's inscrutable.
Except that that makes Berghoff the Guinness of Illinois, which is admittedly
a big disappointment.

Foaming again,
William

Bill Wendling wrote:

> Hi, William,
>
> Yeah. Sorry about that. I forgot about the people outside of Urbana when
> posting the message. I didn't think, no matter how paranoid I may be,
> that someone came from half-way around the world to a quaint college town
> in the mid-west, sneaked into my house while I was sleeping (perhaps
> under cover of a thunder storm), and made off with my hat which now plays
> a key role in the Ralph Nader campaign. Nor that they had colleagues
> working in Urbana who collected hats from unwary Embassy goers to ship
> off to third-world sweat shops so the managers there could feel a sense
> of power such a hat would embody.
>
> I thought it would be the easiest way to dispurse my message through my
> friends...Sorry to those who aren't from this area.
>
> --
> || Bill Wendling                        wendling at ganymede.isdn.uiuc.edu
>
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