21 in paugh years


4 comments:

Jesse Fried said...

would i be on solid paughnalytic ground in observing that the only genuinely paugh element of this picture (except maybe for the text in the upper right) is the clock's placement?

Paughfan212 said...

Perhaps you are some sort of paugh purist, but I see much paugh:

The entire color palette is sort of washed out and late 80s/early 90s, and one can imagine strong fluorescent lighting illuminating these shades of dirt which are not meant to shine.

Funnyfont text (it says she is 29, talking about the woman, not the baby, by the way).

Baby doesn't know what to do with his (blue=his?) hands, at all, and he is wearing footie pajamas. The woman is also wearing a pastel floral pattern.

Bare walls, vast table, vast mulletudinous hair.

SHE LEANS in a counterlean with baby (look on, ye veriest of tyros, and despair: http://leaners.tumblr.com/ )

There are some other elements, and the composition, perhaps. I wish there was a more established rigor to paughnalysis and exaughgesis. It is easy to fall into the habit of listing without providing an account. Is it even possible to put a λόγος to paugh? Perhaps revaughlation is not enough for an account, and, instead, the best we can do is feel it and then nap.

lee said...

Interesting thoughts, Jesse and Paughfan212 (I must distinguish now that there is a Paughfan913).

As the primary contributor for the past couple of years, my philosophy has always acknowledged the multi-faceted nature of paugh and the variability of its expression. There are moments where it's full-blown, moments where it is just under the surface, moments where it has long gone but left its exhausting imprint.

There have been moments of clarity when we have attempted a more quantifiable aspect of paugh (see the Paugh Number here: http://paughflap.blogspot.com/2011/01/paugh-number.html), and certainly more work could be done in that area. Qualitative anecdotal work is the current MO, and I think that's appropriate, but would love to hear some more thoughts in other avenues of exploration.

Paughnalysis is a trade of sorts, one in which you must get your hands dirty. You have to collapse a couple of times in a fellowship hall or mineral society meeting before you can consistently discern paugh and its constituent particles. I must commend Paughfan212 on doing just that (even winning the past two Christmas contests!) and Jesse for taking a spoonful of flan by jumping in the conversation. I look forward to much more conversation as our understanding of paugh increases.

I must say, though, that sometimes paugh is known by contrast (white tube socks in a drawer full of argyle), but other times the homogeneity of paugh masks its full effect. That might be the phenomena we're observing in this photo. There is no single destructively paugh element, but there is a polyphaughnic symphony of washed out, bland, leaden notes seeping from every element, slowing electrons and destroying synapses in all directions. In this world, negentropy reigns. The clock is an appropriate focal point, Jesse, and certainly it is moving a bit slower from being in this scene.

Brett said...

Lee, I think your last point is worth emphasizing: that paugh can be discussed by talking about individual paugh parts but that it doesn't have to be. Paugh is essentially defined by its collective exhaustive effect, its overwhelming underwhelmingness, so it can be the case that looking too closely at details can mask the overall paugh effect, as when one can't see the wallpaper for the hearts and balloons on it for example.

On the subject of paugh analytics, I think we must keep in mind that part of what makes paugh glorious is that it cannot be deduced and must only be induced. Try to explain paugh to someone with a verbal definition and he or she won't likely understand. No, the only way anyone ever understands paugh (to the extent it can be understood) is through immersion.