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Last August, a group in Sweden flew me over to Stockholm and Malmo for a week, to tour me around the country’s biotech industry, so that I could write about it in my magazine. I wrote all about it and posted some good pix:
here, here, here, here, here, and here.

What I didn’t write about at the time was my first day touring the businesses. I talked about social conditions in Sweden with my guide, a friendly, middle-aged woman who represented the economic development council that was sponsoring my trip. We talked about the social support network of the state, the economic incentives for IP/IT industries like bio-drug development, and generally chit-chatted.

Then I said, “In my guidebook, it mentioned that there’s a pretty significant percentage of immigrants in the country. Is that an issue, with integration and such?” Actually, I was even more polite and diplomatic in my phrasing, not wanting to come off as the cowboy-Amurrrrcan.

She replied plainly, “Arab immigrants are destroying our country and we need to deport them.”

I didn’t write about this at the time, because it would’ve wrecked the otherwise pleasant mood/mode I was in, bloggging from Scandinavia. But it prepared me for the responses I got when I asked the same question in Amsterdam in December. At the time, I was surprised by the plainspokenness of her response, that it was such a matter of course by now.

At the Weekly Standard, Christopher Caldwell writes about Sweden’s immigration issues:

Not all of these things are necessarily threatening. It is important to distinguish between, on the one hand, cultural shifts (like the presence of a mammoth mosque that stands across from the ice-skating rink in Medborgar Square, smack in the middle of southern Stockholm, or Bejzat Becirov’s Islamic Center, or the “Rosengard Swedish” that linguists detect among the urban newcomers, from which the sing-songy, heep-de-deep-de-doo intonations of the language have been purged), and civilizational outrages on the other. The latter include the dispiritingly steady stream of “honor-killings” that occur among the country’s immigrants, most of them committed by Kurds. These have generally involved girls executed by their brothers or fathers for wearing short skirts or dating Swedish men. Stockholm and Malmö both have a number of safe houses, of the sort that have long existed for the wives and companions of violent men, but which are now mostly inhabited by Muslim women fearing honor killings or domestic violence.

But in a country where, as the sociologist Ake Daun puts it, “people like being like each other,” there is evidence of profound exhaustion with immigration, whether the reasons for this exhaustion are rationally well-founded or not. In the moral-superpower context, it is the equivalent of “imperial overstretch.” Swedes tell pollsters they want no more asylum-seekers. (A common complaint is that prospective arrivals have figured out how to “game” the rules of asylum applications, and that the best way to render one’s story unchallengeable under the law is to destroy one’s identity papers.) A very low rate of mixed marriage is an indication that Swedes may not have been crazy about this immigration in the first place.

Read more.

I read an article in the NYPost [link defunct] detailing the story of a woman who cut off her boyfriend’s schlong:

The attack occurred around midnight Saturday, after the 44-year-old man argued with alleged knife-wielder Kim Tran about their impending breakup.

It seems he was already married to her aunt, the Anchorage Daily News reported, and apparently made the decision that three’s a crowd.

At some point, he agreed to have sex — and allowed his soon-to-be-ex to tie his arms to a windowsill.

The 35-year-old woman severed his penis with a kitchen knife, cops said.

She then untied him, drove him to a hospital and was cleaning up the scene when police arrived.

Part of “cleaning up the scene” appears to have involved flushing the severed organ down the toilet.

No one’s ever accused Alaskans of being the smartest people in the world, but “I’m having an affair with you; I’m married to your aunt; I’m breaking up with you; sure, you can tie me up for one more round of sex” should put you in the stupid hall of fame.

Hunter S. Thompson shot himself to death yesterday.

I enjoyed some of his writing, but a lot of times he was a figure I appreciated more in theory than in practice. Terry Gilliam’s adaptation of his work generated a frustrating question for me: What causes a really talented journalist to pursue such a bizarre life-path?

That is, coming out of an era where there were pretty respectable careers to be had in his field, what made this guy go ’round the bend in terms of drugs and guns while still working as a journalist?

Gilliam’s answer, very briefly, seems to be contained in a few flickering TV images of Vietnam, but that raises the question of why so many other talented journalists didn’t pursue that path.

Anyway, my condolences to his family.

Superman is a dick.

I didn’t like Kurt Andersen’s novel, but he wrote a pretty good piece in this week’s New York magazine, about the conflict between liberal ideology and honesty in New York City:

If partisanship makes us abandon intellectual honesty, if we oppose what our opponents say or do simply because they are the ones saying or doing it, we become mere political short-sellers, hoping for bad news because it’s good for our ideological investment.

Music (of all kinds, but particularly yesteryear’s dumb pop variety) is a huge part of my life, so I’ve decided to launch another blog to host my musical ramblings. So if you’re interested in this sorta thing, head on over to the blog of my DJ-wannabe-alter-ego, Mad Mix. I’ll write about new music discoveries, any books I read on the subject, and provide an update if I ever get around to learning how to play either of my two favorite instruments (the accordion and the banjo).

Even if I don’t post any writings about music for a while, I promise that, every Monday, the site will feature a recent Mad Mix CD, with track listings, explanations, and some musings about just what goes into making a good mix for friends, relations, loves, and ex-loves (but not too much about that last one, because I’m not Nick Hornby).

I’d love to read your comments about these, and maybe some of you could share the contents of your own favorite mixes with me (and, by extension, everydamnbody).

PS: If you’re using an RSS/Atom reader, set it to www.chimeraobscura.com/mm/madmix.xml

The most disturbing thing about this new study on binge-drinking-by-region isn’t that North Dakota has the highest rate in the country. Nor that Oregon residents prefer pot to alcohol. Nor is it the relatively obvious point that Utah has the lowest rate.

No, the most disturbing thing is the study’s definition of binge drinking: “Binge use was defined as consuming five or more drinks on the same occasion at least once in the last 30 days.”

No, seriously: Five drinks in a night is a binge?

This story about stars shopping at the Apple Stores in LA is a hoot. Especially when Levar Burton goes bananas:

“I finally caved in, only because I could see a vein pulsating in his forehead and I didn’t want to be the one responsible for causing the blind dude from Star Trek to have a stroke.”

On Thursday, I went up to Burlington, MA, near Boston, on business. Here’s what I wrote during the train rides there and back.

Taking the train up from NYC to Boston today to cover a pharmaceutical facility’s ribbon-cutting. I was supposed to drive up, stay over, and visit another site tomorrow, but there were all sorts of dire predictions of monstrous snow up here. Thursday’s company offered to put me on the Acela to get me up here, then send me home tonight.

No snow at all, naturally. Still, there’s been lots of rain, which would’ve made the drive pretty miserable.

My most recent train story involved that trip from Brussels to Amsterdam, where I encountered Thai prostitutes and some joint-rolling soccer fans. This ride’s been less eventful (just passed Providence, so there’s still time, I guess).

Watched Crimes and Misdemeanors on the laptop, and I’m listening to one of my favorite Mad Mixes (Big Bad BIO, which I listened to about 50 times during last June’s drive from San Francisco to San Diego) on the iPod.

I boarded the Acela at Penn Station, and we stayed underground for a bit. There was the customary ear-popping as pressure changed, and we came up out of the tunnel. A funny thing happened then; I had no idea where we were.

For a moment, I thought we might be by the West Side rail-yards, but surely we’d been underground too long for us to be that close to Penn Station. The heavy clouds and high walls made it tough to get a perspective. I looked west to see any NJ landmarks. In a few moments, I saw the Citi tower and realized that Manhattan was to our west. The train had gone under the Harlem River and come emerged outside Manhattan.

We went north, across the river from the FDR Drive, the route by which I usually bring Amy back to her apartment on Sundays. A few weeks ago, stuck in southbound traffic (the Triboro Bridge exit usually brings things to a halt), we noticed a facade for Icahn Stadium over on Randall’s Island. We’d been driving this road for a year, and neither of us had ever seen it before.

Today, the train was on the other side of it. The letters were backwards, and it felt for a moment like being backstage, as if this world was oriented for the view from the east side of Manhattan.

I’m not making profound observations about NYC, memory, or anything else. For that, you need to look to some of the work of Ben Katchor, a cartoonist best known for the “Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer” strip. About 7 years ago, I attended “Carfare City,” one of Mr. Katchor’s slideshow/performance pieces. In it, he invented a travel agency that booked tours for people in their own neighborhoods. He was trying to convey how we need to make ourselves unaccustomed to our surroundings, how we need to become tourists in our lives, so as to find new depths, new mysteries, by approaching a familiar intersection from an unfamiliar direction.

Through this trip, there have been stretches where the rail line runs closer to Rt. 95. Amy & I drove up that highway on Saturday. Now the landmarks come at different angles, different speeds. I don’t have to pay attention to the cars, or my speed. This train reaches 150 mph at some points, but I don’t know if that happens during the NYC-Boston stretch.

A few years ago, I told my friend John that it’s a real achievement to see what someone else sees when they see you. Try to understand someone else’s impressions of who you are.

I first saw Crimes and Misdemeanors in an art theater in New Orleans, when I was a student at Tulane. Years later, I saw American Beauty in that theater, then got stuck walking the streets of NO,LA till 6am (don’t ask). This Mad Mix I’m listening to includes a song by an old girlfriend. Last night, I think I put the nail in the coffin of a friendship I’ve had since 1988. A week ago, I was in the Strand Bookstore, on the newly opened second floor. On a table, I saw a stack of copies of an art-book that another ex-girlfriend edited.

Once upon a time, the sight of it would’ve filled me with nostalgia, or longing, or something. But I just smiled and thought, “That’s funny,” and headed over to the Cedar Tavern for drinks with my buddy Elayne, before visiting Amy. My brother likes when I write ex-girlfriend stories, but I don’t really have any anymore. That’s a nice part about being happy and in love.

* * *

Coming into South Station in Boston today, I remembered that I took the train up here one other time, for the Drug Discovery Technology show back in 2000. The Big Dig project was still in effect, and there were construction tunnels near the rails as we closed into the station. The entry points were ladders, with official signs reading, “Glory Hole #[xx]” for each. I marveled. No signs this time.

On my way home now. Just passed Bridgeport, CT and just finished Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. The plant visit went well. I interviewed the company’s president and got some good material for my parenteral manufacturing article.

A bunch of the attendees at the ribbon-cutting were readers of my magazine. Several knew my name and told me how much they like my editorials. That feels good. I imagine it’s not the same as having a guy come up to me and tell me that my novel changed his life, but I haven’t written a novel, so I don’t know.

I also made the acquaintance of a couple of people who may be able to write for my magazine. Plus, I met a guy who used to run a website about the World’s Strongest Man competitions (I think it was strongestman.com, which seems to be inactive). He told me some funny stories about how he and his buddy decided to “rank” (subjectively) the top U.S., Canadian, and international competitors on the site, and how the list instantly became the authority in that sport.

My cabdriver for the ride from Burlington back to South Station insisted that the U.S. needs to blow up Mecca. He wore a Red Sox cap and asked me my favorite baseball team. I said, “TheYankeesIcan’ttalkaboutit.” He understood.

I need a ton of sleep, since I didn’t get much last night and I’m in the midst of my 6th hour on trains today.

(or, Basquing in Stupidity)

You’ll never guess where I’ve gotta go for a conference this fall.

And I’d still rather go there than the original venue for the show, where I attended an expo last fall.