Jacobhofer22
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To read Infinite Jest (first 200 pa...
Star this Commitment
Day 19 of 19
Jacobhofer22 commits to:
reading at least 10 pages a day writing a brief summary.
10
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No more reports due
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My Commitment Journal
 Jacobhofer22
January 20, 2020, 5:54 AM
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59-89 I did miss a couple of days- but I have been catching up- going to still try to hit my 200 pages by the end of challenge. The story got a little dry and abstract for a bit so I haven't felt quite like writing a review until I get a larger perspective- but the last 10 pages or so have been infreakingcredible I haven't wanted to put the book down. Several pages following a psych assessment with a chick with depression and multiple suicide attempts and a green resident just making a rotation through psychiatry- the story is also starting to show links between a lot of the characters- she seems to get her weed through the same route as the guy with the marijuana problem from earlier in the book. Also, it seems that Hal's father produced Infinite Jest, I discovered this by skimming through a very long (3-4 pages) and tedious foot notes on his father's career, and I believe that is what the medical attache is watching as his wife comes home and he is still almost literally glued to the screen and soiled his chair and won't look away from the tv to see his wife. My favorite part of the book so far is the introduction of the head coach Gerhardt Schtitt and his talk with Mario- Hal's challenged younger brother. It goes through some very deep back and forth (although he is mostly talking to himself)- and he is able to relate tennis to life, to self improvement, limits, death and suicide. "You seek to vanquish and transcend the limited self whose limits make the game possible in the first place. It is tragic and sad and chaotic and lovely. All life is the same, as citizens of the human State: the animating limits are within, to be killed and mourned, over and over again." Mario goes on to ask "how isn't battling and vanquishing yourself the same as destroying yourself?" To which he responses "No different - 'except the chance to play." Also think its kind of ironic that I am using this site to try to vanquish my limited self who made using this site and experience possible. It's kind of like if we were all perfect already there would be nothing to do, life would be extremely boring. It also mentions this paradox in the text. |
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Jacobhofer22
January 16, 2020, 3:52 AM
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Pages 49-59 The story seems to jump around a lot in time, here Hal is 17 years old, YDAU, and is still attending ETA. It turns out Hal also likes to smoke weed and drink a little of alcohol, but he seems to like the elaborate covert mission of keeping it a secret more than the substances themself. I really like the quote “Like most North Americans of his generation, Hal tends to know way less about why he feels certain ways about the objects and pursuits he’s devoted to than he does about the objects and pursuits themselves”. It also goes to show that about half the students participate in elicit substances and how they are able to get away with it, being they are usually under the care of prorectors- which are depressed young ones that didn’t make it being an athlete and now must spend their time coaching and teaching laughable classes to adolescents, so they are usually partaking in substances theirselves. The story goes into GREAT detail about the layout of ETA, which I finally gave up and tried drawing a map myself based on text, it was actually pretty difficult to make the map work according to the text so I turned to the internet again- there was only one map I saw that someone created and it didn’t seem to fit the text 100% either, I finally got a map to work with some reading between the lines of the text- I spent way too much time on this, but I am trying to fully digest the story hopefully and not just skim past the tough bits that seem like filler at times, but even with all of that when the story talks about all the tunnels and pump rooms and his route- I really only have a vague image in mind. The story jumps to following a drug addict- Don Gately. He is a burglar by necessity, for drugs, and doesn’t wish to be malicious. It tells a really funny story about how he doesn’t get mad he gets even. A district attorney got him locked up for 3 months based on suspicion before he was found innocent and allowed to leave. Don Gately got back at him by breaking into his house, making it appear that he got spooked by the alarm and left most valuables by the door. The family was spooked by the close call but glad their alarm system worked. One month later they receive a piece of mail with a dental care pamphlet and a picture of Don and his assistant wearing halloween masks with each one of their toothbrushes up their rectum. After the bit of humor the story starts to follow him scoping out another job, he finds the perfect place with an easy alarm system, no one should be home. He cuts the power to the alarm system, breaks in, and realizes there is an old man still home (the old man is staying home from a family vacation because he has a terrible cold- rhinovirus- and can barely breathe due to head congestion), because he only steals for necessity he tries to not hurt the man and he takes him down stairs, the man pleading- but in french so it is completely useless, and ties him to a chair. He starts looking for a dishtowel to gag him with when the man realizes what he is looking for starts shouting that he cannot breathe through his nose so if he is gagged he will surely die. Don Gately not being able to understand gags him anyway and tapes it all the way around his head. The story goes into grave detail of the old man tearing intercostal muscles and bleeding from the mouth only to find temporary relief before his nose is clogged again, the hope from the doorbell ringing only for the person to leave, and the man finally dying. This man ended up being a VIP Canadian terrorism coordinator, and the same DA from before knows Don Gately’s MO of cutting power to the security system is hot on the trail looking for revenge. My summary, of course, doesn’t do that short story any justice- it was brilliant to read and I was screaming on the inside the whole time. |
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Jacobhofer22
January 16, 2020, 3:17 AM
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pages 34-44 The book starts on in yet another contextless place with new characters. It starts following a medical attache, ent specialist and consultant to prince Q——-’s personal physician. Prince Q is the Saudi minister of Home entertainment. He is frequently needed as the Prince has a diet heavy in Toblerone that causes an overgrowth of yeast, causing ulcerated sinus necrosis. He comes home from work and expects to put forth no further effort as his wife has entertainment cartridges preselected to his liking lined up, dinner ready on a tray right under his mouth so he doesn’t have to look away from the tv, and watches tv until he falls asleep and the recliner turns into a bed and plays calming sounds of the sea. However, his wife has obligations to a tennis club she is apart of on a Wednesday night, this usually isn’t a problem because Wednesday is the day fresh Toblerone hits the markets and he is usually needed by Prince Q late into the night. However, on this Wednesday night he was a little too aggressive and caused too much pain to Prince Q so he snapped at him and sent him home in exchange for this personal physician. He leaves to an empty house, no dinner prepared and no entertainment cartridges. He makes microwave dinner, and looks for something to watch, they are all terrible and unentertaining tapes, and he comes across an untitled tape that was mailed to them from the return address of “Happy Anniversary :)” even though it wasn’t their anniversary, he expected to turn it on to be annoyed by it and to toss it out. He turns it on and starts watching it, a few pages later it indicates that he is still watching it an hour later, a few more pages after that it indicates that he is still watching it 4-5 hours later- rewinded several times. The story swaps gears again and starts to follow Hal’s brother Orin. It seems to be a lot of background information, but it is still entertaining to read. He is in the NFL and plays for the Arizona Cardinals, traded from the NO Saints. It goes into detail the apartment building, and its roaches and how big they are (funnily enough I think a joke from family guy got influenced from this passage, the one with the gangster roaches) and how he learned the best way to kill them is by suffocating them with jars so he doesn’t make a huge mess killing them with a shoe. It goes into his lovers and how he can’t stand them being there when he wakes up (and how they are not very bright the example used is “Not real bright- she thought the figure he’d trace without thinking on her bare flank after sex was the numeral 8, to give you an idea”- I didn’t understand this so I looked it up online feeling dumb myself I understood how it could be an infinite symbol but didn’t know why Orin would be drawing one- and the internet pretty much said it was a wink at the reader and title- and there were a few theories that went really deep into mathematical theories that govern the whole book which I thought was all super interesting and glad I spent time to look it up), and how he usually buys them a gift and pretty much ghosts them. It goes into his nightmares (one of which is extremely graphic- depicts his mother’s dead head strapped to his and he cannot remove it) and fears- one of which being roaches- and how NO had an outbreak of flying roaches that fed on newborns eye mucus and caused blindness, coupled with a flood that caused dead bodies from a nearby cemetery down his road- after this he asked his agent to start looking for a trade. He is also scared of heights and spiders and it talks about how his nightmares got worse after he moved to Arizona- the same area their father supposedly has had a troubled past. I know this summary is all over the place and probably horrendous to read, but I read at work and didn’t have the opportunity to actually write this until after I have already read another 20 pages. |
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Jacobhofer22
January 14, 2020, 7:31 AM
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I was on call tonight and worked very long hours today- but I managed to stickk to it. Pages 24-34 The book then goes back to when Hal is 10 years old and is sent by his father to an appointment, Hal thinks it may be the dentist or something along those lines. The person he meets says he is a professional conversationalist and has booked this time to converse with Hal. The next few pages are brilliantly written in regards to Hal’s communication disorder. The conversationalist keeps talking about topics way off the wall, and you think he might be insane or delusional- however, the conversationalist isn’t actually responding or hearing Hal, even though it seems like that the first read through, he is merely trying to get Hal to talk. The conversationalist’s face starts to sag and Hal notices the clothes to be his fathers and realize the guy is wearing some sort of disguise that comes apart, and it is indeed his father. The father is just trying to connect with his son, especially because he never connected with his father. “Who used to pray daily for the day his own dear late father would sit, cough, open that bloody issue of the Tucson Citizen, and not turn that newspaper into the room’s fifth wall? And who after all this light and noise has apparently spawned the same silence? Who’s lived his whole ruddy bloody cruddy life in five-walled rooms? Praying for just one conversation, amateur or no, that does not end in terror? That does not end like all the others; you staring, me swallowing? Son? Son?” I loved reading this chapter, even though it seems like a crazy far off situation, it hits very close to home. The 5th wall for my father growing up was definitely the tv and conversation could definitely be as one sided as it is with Hal and his father. I hope I’m interpreting these situations correctly, as the book doesn’t really weigh in much on what exactly is happening. |
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