Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 13

13. Every person you have ever slept with is invited to a banquet where you are the guest of honor. No one will be in attendance except you, the collection of your former lovers, and the catering service. After the meal, you are asked to give a fifteen-minute speech to the assembly.

What do you talk about?

15 minutes is not a lot of time in most circumstances, but I can guess that it'd seem like an eternity in this situation. I dunno, if I was going to attend something like this, I'd probably go all out, do a chronological slideshow about where I saw myself at the time, and then apologise for whatever stupid thing I did to hurt/sabotage/derail the relationship without having been man enough to say "I'm out, here's why..."

I've also debated on asking for each person to bring any photos that they might have of me on vacations, etc... with the aforementioned exes, as I was never really much of a photo taker back then and, looking back, would really love to have pictures of stuff like that.

I'd be getting a guest-list right? Do I have any say in the seating arrangements? I think it'd be fun to separate the room into three sides, and designate seating arrangements on something like "Still hate his guts", "I'd be friends with him if he asked", and "You'll have to be more specific, Alex-who?" just to see where everyone sits.

Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 12

12. You meet a wizard in downtown Chicago. The wizard tells you he can make you more attractive if you pay him money. When you ask how this process works, the wizard points to a random person on the street. You look at this random stranger. The wizard says, "I will now make them a dollar more attractive." He waves his magic wand. Ostensibly, this person does not change at all; as far as you can tell, nothing is different. But--somehow--this person is suddenly a little more appealing. The tangible difference is invisible to the naked eye, but you can't deny that this person is vaguely sexier. This wizard has a weird rule, though--you can only pay him once. You can't keep giving him money until you're satisfied. You can only pay him one lump sum up front.

How much cash do you give the wizard?

So, really, the question is asking how hard do you try to make yourself more attractive to people?

I notice that Chuck phrases these questions so that it could apply to almost anyone without getting bogged down into the minutae of what one person thinks is, for this instance, attractive, versus what attracts someone else.

The form of this question is really asking: How much improvement do you think you need? The monetary limitation just lets you quantify it in some kind of relative term. I have no idea why he picked downtown Chicago as the only real specific detail in this whole scenario.

I dunno, I'm gonna go ahead and say ten bucks. I'm not unhappy with the way I look (especially since I've recently lost about 10 pounds and looking to shed another 10) and don't really feel the need to be more attractive to others. This spell doesn't make you feel any better about your own self-image, so really, what's the point?

Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 11

You are watching a movie in a crowded theater. Though the plot is mediocre, you find yourself dazzled by the special effects. But with twenty minutes left in the film, you are struck with an undeniable feeling of doom: You are suddenly certain your mother has just died. There is no logical reason for this to be true, but you are certain of it. You are overtaken with the irrational metaphysical sense that--somewhere--your mom has just perished. But this is only an intuitive, amorphous feeling; there is no evidence for this, and your mother has not been ill.

Would you immediately exit the theater, or would you finish watching the movie?

So, basically, do you believe in intuition, especially if the barriers to acting on it are really low (you aren't really loving the movie, etc...) I'm not a big believer in ESP or anything, so I suppose I would probably finish watching the movie (and possibly stop for some Jujee Fruits on the way out.)

The analytical side of me says that, if for some reason, this feeling was affecting my concentration on watching a film I wasn't really into anyways, perhaps I would leave early.

I wish some metaphysical force had gotten me to leave early when I went to see Crank a couple of years ago.

Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 10

This is the opening line of Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City: "You are not the kind of guy who would be in a place like this at this time of the morning." Think about that line in the context of the novel (assuming you've read it). Now go to your CD collection and find Heart's Little Queen album (assuming you own it). Listen to the opening riff to "Barracuda."

Which of these two introductions is a higher form of art?

I'll admit, I have no idea of where Chuck is going with this one. However, that hasn't stopped me from providing critiques on things before.

I'm gonna go with the opening quote over the opening riff. The line grabs you, holds your interest, and makes you want to find out exactly what kind of situation our protagonist has gotten himself into. The fact that it's directed to you in the second person, instead of "Phil was not the type of guy who would be in a place like this..." That's imminently more interseting, as you're kind of interested in how or why the author would have pegged you for that type of person.

Maybe I've listened to too many classic rock radio stations over the course of my lifetime, but Barracuda doesn't really represent much in the way of progressive/high "art" for me.

Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 9

A novel titled Interior Mirror is released to mammoth commerical success (despite middling reviews). However, a curious social trend emerges: Though no one can prove a direct scientific link, it appears that almost 30 percent of the people who read this book immediately become homosexual. Many of these newfound homosexuals credit the book for helping them reach this conclusion about their orientation, despite the fact that Interior Mirror is ostensibly a crime novel with no homoerotic content (and was written by a straight man).

Would this phenomenon increase (or decrease) the likliehood of you reading this book?

Seemingly philosophical, all this question is really asking is: Are you a homophobe? The answer to that is no. The answer to the actual question he poses: would it increase or decrease your likliehood of reading the book, is also no. Commercially successful, poorly reviewed crime novels (like, say, The Davinci Code) are tough to get through, believe me.

I bet the 30% crediting the book for showing them their true self is probably just them saying, after finishing the crappy book, "I don't have time to waste on useless books like that, life's too short, why am I pretending to be straight too?"

Klosterman's 23 Questions - Question 8

You meet the perfect person. Romantically, this person is ideal: You find them physically attractive, intellectually stimulating, consistently funny, and deeply compassionate. However, they have one quirk: This individual is obsessed with Jim Henson's gothic puppet fantasy The Dark Crystal. Beyond watching it on DVD at least once a month, he/she peppers casual conversation with Dark Crystal references, uses Dark Crystal analogies to explain everyday events, and occasionally likes to talk intensely about the film's "deeper philosophy."

Would this be enough to stop you from marrying this individual?

Probably not. We're talking about the same person who would be quite happy to quote the entire screenplay from The Hunt for Red October whenever they play it on TNT, regardless of whether or not there are friends or family in the room.

So, I understand that, shockingly, there are probably a few pieces of my personality that people would regard as less-than-desirable.

...and that's the point of this question, right? Are you the type of person who's going to look at the whole picture, or focus on one small character defect. It was basically the premise of every date Jerry had in the final few years of Seinfeld. But in the real world, nobody's going to admit to being so shallow as to not continue a great relationship with someone based on a movie preference...

Then again, I once made a decision to break up with a girl because she yelled "Woo Hoo!" a few too many times at a New Year's Eve party, but that's another story.

What's the shallowest reason YOU ever broke up with someone?

Klosterman's 23 Questions: Question 7

Defying all expectation, a group of Scottish marine biologists capture a live Loch Ness Monster. In an almost unbelievable coincidence, a bear hunter in the Pacific Northwest shoots a Sasquatch in the thigh, thereby allowing zoologists to take the furry monster into captivity. These events happen on the same afternoon. That evening, the president announces he may have thyroid cancer and will undergo a biopsy later that week.

You are the front page editor of The New York Times: What do you play as the biggest story?

Sasquatch all the way. Here's why: All these events are considered plausible, with the cancer diagnosis being the most likely from a statistical standpoint, and so we should be looking at impact on society as a whole. Sure, the president *may* have cancer, and it *may* threaten his ability to govern, but the US at least has a contingency plan for these events (thank god Palin didn't take that seat, hunh?)

Clearly this can't be the biggest story.

Now on to Nessie: A deep lake in a remote(ish) part of the world could, plausibly, provide the right environment for a prehistoric creature to survive undetected for thousands of years. Longshot, but within the realm of possibility. Now, what happens when it's captured? Man studies it, learns a bit about the Dinosaurs, confirms some suspicions, debunks others, but the impact is minimal since you can't really project the characteristics on all dinosaurs, just ones similar in physiology to Nessie. So, limited impact on society, can't lead with that.

And finally, the Sasquatch: Many feel that this being would be the missing link between primates and the modern human, a physical specimen that demonstrates how we as a species moved out of the animal kingdom into a more evolved state. The potential for learning about ourselves as a species has to outweigh the statistically probable, potentially cancerous president and the statistically unlikely, but limited societal improvement of finding Nessie. This discovery would affect every single human on the planet and could lead to understanding about ourselves that could unlock secrets behind cancer, evolution, and a million other questions we've never been able to confirm.

Something that big's gotta lead, right?