Ctrl+V Thread

[dilbertschalter]

ANC or ESPN2
Wow, UTexas not playing well
*ABC
depending on region
Here's Video Of Some Philadelphians Bathing In Soup To Make Some Sort of McNabb Statement: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOPeRB93dPc#
did fortune smile on miles yet again

[Grawwbear]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRCEY1gxv_I#

[Commi-Ninja]

Spoiler:

"The Things They Carried"
Date: 1990
Author: Tim O'Brien
From: The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition.

First published as a story in Esquire, "The Things They Carried" was later incorporated into the collection of related stories (sometimes termed a novel) of the same title, written by the Vietnam War veteran Tim O'Brien. It is a work of fiction in which O'Brien "invents and embroiders material based on his own experiences to make himself and his readers feel emotions of hatred, peace, love, loss, horror, confusion, anguish, and wonder" (Herzog 106). Of central concern to the short story is "how one might reconcile an active role as a soldier with a life entirely separate from that experience" (Smith 98). The story begins with a description of First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carrying letters from and a photograph of Martha, a girl from New Jersey: "The image bridges the gap between memories of home and war's brutal reality" (Smith 102). Cross fantasizes about Martha's feelings: "They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping." He holds the letters and falls asleep "pretending." He "would imagine romantic camping trips" with Martha (1). Here we see Cross hoping, pretending, and imagining, all human characteristics that he will eventually determine are not appropriate for a soldier. After Cross loses one of his men, Ted Lavender, he begins to believe such sentiments are a dangerous distraction from his duties. He blames the loss of Lavender on his preoccupation with Martha. So, in the end he burns the letters as a sign that he is "determined to perform his duties firmly and without negligence" (25). In order to do this, Cross plans to become a different kind of soldier. Among other plans, he "would be careful to send out flank security"; "he would impose strict field discipline"; he "would be a man about it" (25). Finally, "he would dispense with love; it was not now a factor" (515). Cross becomes a military man, but by doing so he loses all sentimentality; the question that lingers is, What does a man who dispenses with love do when he returns to civilian life? Critics see a religious symbolism in Cross, due to his name, his initials (J.C.), and his sacrifice for his men (Smith 103). However, the story is more than a mere tale of one man's sacrifice and hardships during the Vietnam War.

Through a description of the things the soldiers carry, the story raises questions about courage and dignity and demonstrates the futility of war. The second paragraph in the story begins to list "the things [the soldiers] carried" during their march. Throughout the story the narrator presents these lists with painstaking detail. At first, the narrator details the army supplies the men carry: weapons, tools for navigation, food, medical supplies. The flat, unemotional prose, listing what the men carry and why they carry it, emphasizes the way in which these men have become desensitized to the horrors of war. The narrator explains, "Because you could die so easily, each man carried at least one large compress bandage" and "Because the land was mined and booby trapped, it was SOP for each man to carry a steel-centered, nylon-covered flak jacket." He presents the horrific conditions of war in a distanced, journalistic-style tone. These lines illuminate the futility in the things they carry since a compress will not do much for a dying man, and it is doubtful that a flak jacket can protect a man from land mines.

The narrator tells us these things were "largely determined by necessity." In addition to the military tools and medical supplies the men carry, the narrator describes things such as Ted Lavender's dope, Norman Bowker's diary, Kiowa's "distrust of the white man," and Rat Kiley's comic books, suggesting that these men need more than weapons and food to survive; they need the things that make each of them a distinct individual. Furthermore, as the story progresses, the litany of items O'Brien lists evolves from physical items to things such as "grief, terrors, love, longing—these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangible weight" (21). The narrator informs that the "heaviest burden of all," the one that "could never be put down," was "the common secret of cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide" (21). In an interview O'Brien explains the problem with the Vietnam War: "These men are not the fearless, mythic cowboys America had come to embrace; they are real men, fighting for causes they can never fully comprehend, and the fear of death haunts them" (qtd in Smith 98). The soldiers in the story are torn between a desire to surrender, to lie down and play dead, to be wounded and get sent home, and a desire to remain courageous and maintain their dignity.

However, the story questions what constitutes courage and dignity. The narrator explains, "They were afraid of dying but they were even more afraid to show it" (20), and so they told jokes about death and treated the dead with mockery and scorn (20). Moreover, after Ted Lavender is killed by a sniper, Lieutenant Cross leads them into the village of Than Khe, where they indiscriminately kill animals, trash the well, and burn the village to the ground (20). The destruction of this village is neither courageous nor dignified; it is one more pointless action in a pointless war: "By daylight they took sniper fire, at night they were mortared, but it was not battle, it was just the endless march, village to village, without purpose, nothing won or lost" (15). They go from one village to the next, destroying all they come across without any sense of strategy or purpose. The only thing they are sure of is "that they would never be at a loss for things to carry" (16). Steven Kaplan explains, "Almost all Vietnam War writing—fiction and nonfiction—makes clear that the only certain thing during the Vietnam War was that nothing was certain" (170). Cross abandons love in order to guarantee his men's safety, but the story suggests that there are no such guarantees in war.
Further Information Further Information
Herzog, Tobey C. Tim O'Brien. New York: Twayne, 1997.

Kaplan, Steven. Understanding Tim O'Brien. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1995.

O'Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried. New York: Broadway, 1990.

Smith, Patrick A. Tim O'Brien: A Critical Companion. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2005.

Citation Information Citation Information
Text Citation: Werlock, Abby H. P. "'The Things They Carried'." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=1&iPin=CASS812&SingleRecord=True (accessed September 30, 2010).

How to Cite
Record URL:
http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=1&iPin=CASS812&SingleRecord=True.

Working on research for an essay.

[PT]

Working on research for an essay.

Yuck. Essays.

Which reminds me that I need to write that report/narrative/whatever on how I'm a failed experiment... But I'm thinking that'll have to wait til tomorrow cause I'm about to fall asleep. (...and it's only 10 PM?!)

My ctrl+v: [nothing]

[Edogawa4869]

I, (Groom’s/Bride’s name), take you (Bride’s/Groom’s name), to be my wife/husband, my partner in life and my one true love. I will cherish our friendship and love you today, tomorrow, and forever. I will trust you and honour you, I will laugh with you and cry with you. I will love you faithfully, through the best and the worst, through the difficult and the easy. What may come I will always be there. As I have given you my hand to hold, so I give you my life to keep.

Me saying the vows at my wedding!

[Edogawa4869]

C-3PO: "The ship has been destroyed."
Padmé: "Battle droids?"
C-3PO: "No."
Padmé: "Jar Jar?"
C-3PO: "Jar Jar."

.....XD

[Detective Tommy]

*nothing*

[itsashleylove]

-carrying water in empty milk gallons 

[PT]

*hits ctrl+v* (which, incidentally, isn't "ctrl+v" on my phone)
*reads*
*deletedeletedeletedelete*



...forgot that was still copied on here.

[Callid]

*moves in slow-motion as his Internet speed is currently about 1/1000 the normal speed *
*tries to congratulate the couple, but fails cause he's too slow to get to them *

Yeah. In addition to slow-motion internet I encountered an 500 Internal Server Error. So I copied what I wrote the next time.

[Edogawa4869]

Itadakimasu!

Copied it to google to remember what it meant... XD

[KainTheVampire]

Itadakimasu!

Copied it to google to remember what it meant... XD

.... Ahou! xD

Ctrl+V: 53,675 Sek

[mangaluva]

New Topic- Comedy movie duos

1. Rush Hour - Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker
2. Wayne's World- Wayne (Mike Myers) and Garth (Dana Carvey)
3. Leathal Weapon- Mel Gibson and Danny Clover
4. Dogma- Jay (Jason Mews) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith)
5. Beavis and Butthead
6. The Princess Bride- Inigo (Mandy Patinkin) and Fezzik (Andre the Giant)
7. Shanghai Noon- Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson
8. Shrek - Michael Myers and Eddie Murphy
9.



Game on another forum, "Baker's Dozen"

[PT]

http://forums.dctp.ws/viewtopic.php?p=251638#p251638

Showing Yuriko how I'm a failed experiment.

[Grawwbear]

http://www.buyhotdvd.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/柯å