How to Steal DVDs From Your Public Library

Due to the recent bout of thefts at the library of our DVDs - most notably of our Dragonball Z DVDS – I thought my next post should be addressed to those responsible, the thieves who are costing us hundreds of dollars worth of library material. Thus I have created a guide, a step-by-step manual if you will, of How To Steal DVDs From Your Public Library.

Step 1: Download the program DVD Decrypter. It is free - I know that is important to you - and can be found easily through a simple Google search. Installing it is the work of a moment.

Step 2: Go to your local public library. Here you will be checking out two items: a DVD and a book. (Books are those strange rectangular objects you walk past on your way to the DVDs.) If you have trouble with this step, this is how you do it: instead of opening the DVD case and ripping off the RFID tag, and leaving the case and tag strewn about the library for the pages to find later, you take the whole DVD, intact, to the circulation desk, ask to check it out, and hand the DVD and your library card to the clerk attending the desk. As a side note - it is FREE to check out a DVD. I bet you didn't know that.

Step 3: Return to your humble, slimy, guilt-ridden abode.

Step 4: This would normally be the part where I tell you that you should never rip a DVD unless you own the DVD and are intending to make a backup copy, but seeing as this is being addressed to you based on your infamy as a library thief, I believe such a sentiment would have no effect on you. So, start up DVD Decrypter and insert the DVD into your computer.

Step 5: There are three things you need to check before you continue: (a) Make sure you have sufficient free space on your hard drive. (b) "Source" must actually point to the correct DVD drive. (c) And finally, under "Destination" it will say "Please select a folder". Click the icon next to that and choose where you would like your stolen movie to reside. Since movies are made up of several files, it would be advisable to create a new folder per movie to contain them. Might I suggest calling it "too cheap to buy DVDs" or perhaps "Dragonball Douche"

Step 6: Click on the image of the DVD and hard drive. This will start the ripping process. It will take about twenty minutes, but if it for some reason takes longer - if, for instance, you purchased a stolen computer from the back of a truck and it has the speed of a one-legged pony - this is where the book comes in. You can partake of the book while you wait for the DVD to rip. Books can be enjoyed by opening the cover and reading the words therein.

Step 7: You are now the proud owner of completely illegal DVD. Congratulations. Go brag to all your acne-ridden teenage friends.

Step 8: THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP! DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP! Remove the DVD from your computer, insert it back into its case, and return both book and DVD to the library.

The brilliance of this means of thievery is that while you could repeat the process a thousand times, the library - a notoriously underfunded institution - will never lose a cent. Enjoy.

Beaten by Poetry

Probably my favorite quote regarding poetry is by the poet Muriel Rukeyser, who said, "If there were no poetry on any day in the world, poetry would be invented that day. For there would be an intolerable hunger."

Nothing expresses the joy of language quite like poetry, and neither does anything tap into the root of emotion with the same tender brutality. One of my favorite forms of poetry is beat poetry, or spoken word poetry. The words themselves are brimming with ecstasy and tragedy, but then to have them screamed in your face by an impassioned wordsmith adds a new dimension of power to them. It makes a chill of recognition run up your spine; a shiver of familiarity, and you think, "Oh yeah, this is why we invented language."

Words may have first been made in order to squabble over the mundane, yes, but once we began to play with those words, to arrange them in new and unexpected ways, I believe our species realized then that this is what it had been missing.

Through my perusal of the internet I have come across several astonishing spoken word performances. Here are three of my favorites:

"Hir" by Alysia Harris and Aysha El Shamayleh


Def Poetry by Rives


"Slip of the Tongue" by Adriel Luis, video directed by Karen Lum

Jonathan Safran Foer to arrive in East Lansing

The city of East Lansing has a program called One Book, One Community which, as far as I know, is a kind of city-wide book club. A single book is selected and for one year events and learning opportunities are centered around it. It is required reading for incoming MSU freshmen. The author makes an appearance for book signings and talks and the like. It's not something I ever paid much attention to.

Until now.

A day or two ago I was idly perusing the paper when my eye was caught by the compelling cover of Jonathan Safran Foer's fantastic book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Since my fandom of Jonathan Safran Foer is beyond measure, logic, or sanity, and his other novel, Everything is Illuminated, is one of my top ten favorite books of all time, I read the attached article.

I learned that Extremely Loud had been selected as this year's One Book. I learned - and my stomach dropped as I read the words - that Jonathan Safran Foer himself would be visiting in August.

All the rest of the day I found myself overcome by a confusing conglomeration of emotions.

To fully appreciate my feelings, one must understand what, exactly, Foer's writing does to me. To say it is a sucker-punch to the gut is a weak metaphor. He shatters me. Breaks me into a million shard-like fragments and then reassembles me, piece by piece, into a different shape, and I don't quite fit into my life anymore. Like a jigsaw puzzle piece that has grown distorted from being dropped in water, and now does not fit in its space. His writing is so raw, so heart-wrenchingly beautiful, that it almost hurts to look at. He turns over and reveals the tender underbelly of humanity that most writers only hint at. And then he tears it open with a blunt scalpel to bare the beating heart within.

Foer writes, in other words, exactly as I only dream of writing.

He is one of those authors - one of many, admittedly - that paradoxically both encourages and discourages my own dream of being a writer. His writing reminds me why I want to write, how I want to affect people with words; and yet at the same time, I feel as though I will never be even half, even a quarter as excellent as him.

His forthcoming arrival in East Lansing fills me with similar paradoxes.
On the one hand, I am excited at the opportunity to meet not only one of my favorite authors, but one of my favorite human beings. So excited, in fact, that I feel as though I may shake out of my skin with nerves. The day cannot come fast enough.

But on the other hand, I have built Foer up in my mind as such a superior soul, and I'm terrified to face him. Am I even worthy to stand before this literary god?

And on the other hand (this is a three-armed dilemma), I will have mere moments to speak to him as he signs his books. How will I impress him with the power his words have over me? How will I appear to him as anything more than just another slobbering fan? Because when I read his books, I feel like more than that. I feel connected with him.

I will be lucky if I am able to choke out words at all, or anything more than, "I love your books." I will be lucky if I do more than stand before him, sobbing like an idiot.

My roommate has reassured me by reminding me that I will have several months to think of something to say to him, but I remain worried. I'm not sure my feelings can be properly expressed in words. Because I'm no Jonathan Safran Foer, literary god.

His talk and book signing are on August 28th. I have 156 days to think of something to say that is brief, poignant, and expresses in even the smallest amount what his writing does to me. It is not enough time.