Considering David Foster Wallace

I am one of those whose world was changed when I stumbled on "Infinite Jest" in 1996. Before IJ, the only place I'd seen lengthy footnotes as text was in law review articles, and they were generally much less amusing. Also, in 1996 the idea that advertising would be everywhere, that even years would change from a numerical system to one of sponsorship(1), well, that seemed more fanciful than prophetic.

DFW covered topics from porn to tennis (as befits a Macarthur fellow) and I recommend "Consider the Lobster" to blogfish readers for its contemplation of the ethics of seafood eating. The book of the same name also contains "Up, Simba", DFW's story of travelling with McCain during his 2000 presidential bid, which you may also find a useful essay at this particular moment.

RIP, David Foster Wallace.

(1) Wherein years no longer have numbers, like 2006, but names like "The Year of the Trial Sized Dove Bar"

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Today's news of the ethics scandals in the Interior Department raises more questions about who would benefit the most from increased domestic oil production, as government employees in the oil revenue program took trips, hotels, drugs, and other, um, "favors" from the oil companies they were supposed to be watching. Here's a quote from the IG as reported in the Houston Chronicle:

"These same ... marketers also engaged in brief sexual relations with industry contacts," Devaney wrote. "Sexual relations with prohibited sources cannot, by definition, be arms-length."

Blogfish is trying very, very hard to resist the "drill here, drill now" jokes. Okay, not that hard.

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