Just Another Calendarman-ic Monday

(Your author, coming at you with all the powers he gained after being bitten by a radioactive page-a-day Far Side calendar in middle school.)

I've been thinking on and off about calendars since about 2015. That was a busy year. I needed to juggle two big projects: one usually on alternate Sundays, one roughly every 10 days, all year long, these alongside all the other normal activities constituting everyday life (food, work, family, art, uprising, etc.), and it was difficult to do such juggling. What worked for me that year was to: print out Bram Moolenaar's fold-and-stand-up desk calendar and

1. Circle my alternating-Sunday deadlines in red
2. Circle the every-10-day deadlines in green
3. Put it on my desk where I could see it

(Bram's yearly calendar. I recently discovered that this is pretty much the output of the Unix utility ncal with the -w flag! Unix can be pretty cool.)

It worked well for me! Obviously, this is not a tool that accepts a great deal of information, but for helping visualize a cadence of more or less regularly occurring events, it served effectively.

Over the next few years, unfortunately, the events to coordinate got less regular, less predictable, and probably more numerous. Bram Moolenaar's calendar stopped helping me organize things. That's whenDavid Malki stepped up. He has several long, interesting posts on calendars, and the high-end calendar he makes he is a beautiful, funny, and probably useful object. But what really fired my soul was his devastatingly simple "continuous calendar" idea¹, just a year's worth of boxes organized by month, fitting on six pages of printer paper.

(Malki's simple calendar.)

One reason for my soul's resonance with this object is context: at my work, a very common activity to to grab a blank piece of butcher paper, sketch out a grid representing a month or so, and calendar out some events in / for / of / constituting a campaign. This simple template of Malki's saved the drawing-and-adding-dates steps, and I used it a few times in different campaigns to help visualize timelines, deadlines, and possible conflicts. It worked well.

What didn't work well was trying to use the template to help organize my life. I had a couple problems with what he had made:

1. Squares too small to add significant information (70 squares on one 8.5x11 piece of paper is a lot)
2. Shading to indicate a month makes it hard to to write on with, say, a black ballpoint pen, or a Sharpie®|Pen., or whatever
3. I really hated having Saturday and Sunday at the end of the week: this was confusing because it meant that this calendar didn't match any other calendar I'd look at ever

So eventually I decided to stop being frustrated with a tool that didn't work for me. I decided to try to brew my own. I wanted bigger squares, I wanted weeks to start with Sundays, and I didn't want any shading. The best way to attain bigger squares seemed to be to move from portrait to landscape. I really liked Malki's insight about making the months flow into each other, so I kept that layout. I made a couple three-month templates and tested them, and they seemed to work the way I want them to work.

(My calendar looks like this. I like to mark it up with bill due-dates in red, and other notable things in black.)

If you would like to see if this tool will serve your purposes, you can download it and print it out and play with it. (Right now it runs from October 2019 through February 2021, so I recommend judicious use of the "print selected pages" function so as to save our mother the Earth from additional abuse.) If you find that you like using this tool, why not send David Malki a couple bucks: it was all his idea anyway! If you find that this tool doesn't work well for you, why not spend a little time figuring out why not, thinking about what you need, and go try to make something that will help you?

¹ What's hilarious is that Malki uses a different term, not "continuous calendar":

progressive calendar

By that, I mean a calendar that doesn’t have any breaks between months. I think I invented the term? By that, I mean “nobody else has ever used this term.”

Evidently, he IS the only one to use the term. Since I use a different term, perhaps I ... invented the idea? (No, no clearly I didn't.) Anyway, this is a long digression prompted by my inability to remember what words he actually used.

(Your author's ambitions when it comes to calendars.)

(Bonus Venture Brothers content re: calendars.)

Wow. That's like a nightmare.

[In which I indulge in overanalysis]

SLIDE ONE:

Doc Venture just finished (while wiping off his glasses) recounting his 16th birthday poolside party and an incident with a shrink ray. He is still in his pajamas and Hank is shirtless so both are unshielded and vulnerable and intimate in that sense. Hank is visibly distraut at his father's trauma. His eyebrows peak questioningly as he submits his judgment on his father's recounting. Doc's scowl and furrowed brow speak of deep, complicated feelings, and also a frustration that Hank has incorrectly but innocently misinterpreted his feelings on the experience.

SLIDE TWO:

Doc's eyebrow arches. His face still holds a sneer, his brow is still knitted. Observe his legs akimbo, as if he has scooted forward on his seat, or is leaning forward as he gives vent to his frustration.

SLIDE THREE:

Lot going on here. Hank's hands are shoved into his theighs, a vulnerable or unsecure gesture: his father is letting him into his inner life and Hank doesn't want to appear judgmental, just attentive. Doc's torso is now straight and tall. He uses finger quotes, typically a mocking or sarcastic tool (from a man who is commonly mocking or sarcastic or mean) but his upright posture and facial expression (grievance aired), and his on-edge legs akimbo stance indicate that he speaking quite seriously.

SLIDE FOUR:

Doc's arms fall between his legs. His torso slumps. The furrowed brow looks not so much frustrated (see Slide 2) or contemplatative (Slide 1) but rather inquistive instead. Consider his passive body stance. This is a confession, but the arched eyebrows and scowled mouth indicate that empathy or even sympathy is not sought.

ALTERNATE INTERPRETATION:

Not a tender confession and show of grudging acceptance by Doc, but rather an egotistical and selfish aggrandization of Doc's adolescent trauma over and above anything anyone else anywhere could ever have experienced much less comprehend. Consider the trials and trauma of Hank and his brother Dean (witnesses or participants many times over to death and violence, thier father's failures and shortcomings, abandonment by Brock): is Doc's public humilation at his birthday pool party truly any worse than what his own sons have experienced? But to follow this line of thought a little further, Doc's insistence of the greatness of his pain in the face of his own sons' arguably equal or greater traumas underscores the depth of Doc's damage. In other words, Doc is a man with ISSUES.

-d.d.

Note: The above sequence is pretty much my favorite sequence in the entire Venture Bros. so far. Nothing encapsulates the complete lack of irony for which I love and adore this program more than this incredibly adult and sincere conversation. Ever since I saw it I've wanted to write something about it, and the sort of slideshow presentation used above is what resulted and seemed to work best.

"Eeney, Meeney, Miney... Magic!" (Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 4)

 

Although 'Mid-Life Chrysalis' was the first episode to take place mostly at the Venture Compound, 'Eeney, Meeney, Miney... Magic!' is the first to entirely unfold at such. Indeed, in the cold open we find Hank and Dean playing Ouija board in their pajamas. We are also more fully introduced to the differences between Hank and Dean.



 

After mistaking Doc's new renter, the necromancer Dr. Orpheus, for a 'Dracula,' Dean goes to wake up Doc to report this sighting, but Hank goes to Brock. Doc is disproportionately irate with Dean. Brock proceeds to let Hank hang out in his basement room while he does push- and pull-ups, and the resulting dialogue is where Brock breaks out of his mold from the first two episodes, shedding the twitchy-rage-machine and gag humor so dominating in 'Dia de Los Dangerous' and 'Careers in Science'.

 Although this episode is the first to take entire place at the Venture Compound, it is not isolated from the outside world.  To the contrary, we are introduced to Dr. Orpheus' daughter Triana, who, other than having a necromancer for a dad and affecting a goth fashion sense, is the first 'normal' person to appear on the show (to be explicit, she goes to public school and has a life outside of the compound).  By comparison, previous episodes have only featured the 'normal' kind of people you would find in strip clubs ('Mid-Life Chrysalis') or Tijuana ('Dia de los Dangerous'), or have featured no ordinary people at all (i.e. astronauts Buzz Manstrong and Anna Baldavich in 'Careers in Science').  And they certainly have not featured anyone who could be conceived as a peer of Dean or Hank.

 

What's particularly fun about Triana Orpheus is that she can operate as a substitute for the audience by virtue of her normality – ergo her conversations with Dean are what it would be like if you or I talked to Dean.  And what is revealed from those conversations is that the Venture brothers live a very isolated life, populated by a few adults and more than occasional violence.

 

 

 Of course, based on the little we have previously seen in 'Careers in Science', Hank and Dean's experience is not that altogether different from their father's childhood and adolescence.  The difference, it would appear, is Doc's self-loathing compared to his father's confidence and legendary status.  The father-son relationship is not just replicated between Doc and the boys but actually exacerbated.  Dean's head-over-heels crush on Triana should come as little surprise, given its allure as escape pod from the drudgery of his otherwise lonely and violent existence. 

 

-d.d.

 

See also:"Dia de los Dangerous" (The Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 1)  "Careers in Science" (The Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 2)

"Mid-Life Chrysalis" (Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 3)



"Mid-Life Chrysalis" (Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 3)

The hooks for the puntastically-titled "Mid-Life Chrysalis" are two-fold: (1) Brock's secret agent permit is expired and he must take a test to renew it, and (b) an air force officer calls Doc "grandpa," triggering some textbook mid-life crisis coping (buying a car and deciding to seek a relationship).



Observe Doc's array of hand and facial gestures in the above sequence. His eye brows literally dance upon his brow! His speech is patently ridiculous, but his facial expressions lend it a certain seriousness. Is Doc so egotistical as to earnestly believe what he says, or he is simply playacting and enjoying the role?

Once Doc and Brock have absconded to the local gentleman's club, we are introduced more intimately than before to the strange life of Hank and Dean At Home, where it is revealed that the boys exist in a state of never-ending arrested development, and also that Hank is prone to eclectic citations of popular culture.



Without Brock to protect him, Doc is easily drawn into a plot by the Monarch, and is administered a injection by Dr. Girlfriend which causes him to transform into a giant caterpillar.  The boys the begin to deviate from thier obvious mystery-gang and jet-age-boy-adventurer inspirations by revealiing thier callousness to weird and extraordinary circumstances, which is expressly discussed by Doc and Hank.

Despite this confession of sorts by Hank (noting that just last week they saw a dinosaur), Doc's response (that he wasn't the dinosaur) remains consistent with the egotism Doc has displayed in response to both the boys and other issues in the previous episodes. 

This is the first episode to mostly take place at the Venture Compound, the place this quirksome four call "home."  Perhaps that is why it is the strongest episode so far - Hank and Dean's bizarre uses of thier free time would seem out of place in Mexico (in "Dia de los Dangerous') or in the Gargantua-1 space station ("Careers in Science").  Similarly, Doc's mid-life crisis antics and Brock's moping about his expired license to kill require the comforts of home as a suitable stage.

-d.d.

"Careers in Science" (The Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 2)

The handful of themes established in Episode 1, regardless of whether they remain in place as the series progresses, are also present in "Careers in Science." Brock remains a surprisingly cardboard absurdity, only really buoyed by Patrick Warburton's priceless delivery of a few choice lines - otherwise there is another violent rage and more of Brock-as-ladies-man elements. As before, however, Dr. Venture and his problems provide the tale's meatier content and more subtle humor, mainly in the form of a double whammy of prescription drug withdrawal coupled with a concussion, resulting in the hallucination of Dr. Venture's father, whom appears as a giant.

Another theme is explored, which is the naive "mystery-solving" of Hank and Dean and their apparent deep experience with vaguely supernatural phenomena and jet-age era superscience (in other words, the 'Scooby-Doo' and 'Johnny Quest' patisches).  This element is fairly involved and fully fleshed out in this episode (which, based on the animation, is probably one of the first episodes produced - some of the animation looks almost like flash, and the title card is just "careers in science" imposed on a still from the title sequence - other episodes use a stylish unique title card more in line with Episode 1).  In later episodes it will still be present, but the naivty gets dialed down significantly.

Guest character Buzz Manstrong is well written and voiced as a middle-aged boyscout hopelessly crushed out on his counterpart, the oversexed Anna Baldavich, but Manstrong's problems are perhaps a little too predictable?  Its a fun vein to mine, poking fun at the 1960s superman of the astronaut, but doesn't gel well with the supernatural and jet-age influences noted above.  To compare to Doc's strengths which make him compelling as a character, its not that Manstrong doesn't have issues, its that they aren't complicated enough.

-d.d.

"Dia de los Dangerous" (The Venture Bros. - Season 1, Episode 1)

Let's skip the easy observations about this very first installment of The Venture Bros.: some of the voice acting is not quite nailed down yet in terms of inflection or tone (Dean, The Monarch), the animation is slightly crude at times; Brock always does this twitching eye thing, and also a more unhinged-murderous-rage thing going on (as the series progresses, Brock appears to be a bit more joyous in his combats).  All these things change, and Brock's violence has more than a certain absurd chuckle appeal, but as in all thing The Venture Bros., there is a seedier, softer underbelly that provides the tale's real pull.

These are characters with problems. Dr. Venture has a X-1 superjet, a bodyguard, and a talking robot, but he's strapped for cash, and inquires about payment for a lecture at Community University of Tijuana mere moments after the last student leaves and even fewer moments after casually referring to Dia de los Muertas as that "dead people Christmas."

To further underline Dr. Venture's selfish craven nature, he literally walks out of the building, shoves a wad of cash into the hands of Hank and Dean and dismisses them so he can go obtain prescriptions from a Mexican doctor, an exchange where he further asserts the backwardness and inferiority of Mexico.

Meanwhile, the boys are kidnapped by the Monarch, who becomes disturbed by the unresponsiveness of Dr. Venture to his ransom calls.  To Dr. Girlfriend he notes that Dr. Venture has never even told the boys he loves them. Contrast this with the end of the episode, where Dr. Venture casually refers to the "world's greatest dad" thing in order get what he wants from the boys.  Disfunctionality is writ large in the margins, and while other elements of the serial change as subsequent installments unfold, this undertow remains consistently strong.

-d.d.