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Some overachiever video game startup probably, mixing land art with retro 8-bit nostalgia.  Doesn’t realize that we’re all over-saturated, over-stuffed, and want only for the days of a tabletop Ms. Pacman and a cupful of rootbeer with the good, crunchy ice.  Simple times were never simple, but we were younger then and that was all we knew.  The illusion of simplicity is just that.

This fall on CBS, the most powerful people in The City aren’t in City Hall, they’re  REALTORS Jen, who parties in the Mission but longs for a Pac Heights mansion to call her own. Christopher, the belle of the Castro who knows what he wants and how to get it, especially if it’s a pre-quake Craftsman. Robb, living down past failures to become the man his father thinks he is. Shelley, new in town and hungry for a piece of the action. And you, in your rented room, with the painted-over wallpaper but “lots of closet space.” REALTORS.  This fall, Reality TV gets Realty: only on CBS. 
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This fall on CBS, the most powerful people in The City aren’t in City Hall, they’re 
REALTORS

  • Jen, who parties in the Mission but longs for a Pac Heights mansion to call her own.
  • Christopher, the belle of the Castro who knows what he wants and how to get it, especially if it’s a pre-quake Craftsman.
  • Robb, living down past failures to become the man his father thinks he is.
  • Shelley, new in town and hungry for a piece of the action.
  • And you, in your rented room, with the painted-over wallpaper but “lots of closet space.”

REALTORS.  This fall, Reality TV gets Realty: only on CBS. 

No one can remember when the practice started, but in the slowly warming days of Spring, the men came out and secured the cards to banisters, gates, or whatever bit of architecture lent itself to speed and ease. 
Wishes of wellness, cleanliness, political harmony: what was written upon them did not quite matter as much as the thought that was behind them. 
Left alone, they would spin out their intent on the wind, and only the most curmudgeonly would immediately take them down, cursing the uselessness and waste. 
The Japanese have something similar in Tanabata, but here, no one ever thought to call it anything, and so it has no name.

Man-Moth: Newspaper misprint for “mammoth.” Here, above, cracks in the buildings are filled with battered moonlight. The whole shadow of Man is only as big as his hat. It lies at his feet like a circle for a doll to stand on, and he makes an inverted pin, the point magnetized to the moon. He does not see the moon; he observes only her vast properties, feeling the queer light on his hands, neither warm nor cold, of a temperature impossible to record in thermometers.                      But when the Man-Moth pays his rare, although occasional, visits to the surface, the moon looks rather different to him. He emerges from an opening under the edge of one of the sidewalks and nervously begins to scale the faces of the buildings. He thinks the moon is a small hole at the top of the sky, proving the sky quite useless for protection. He trembles, but must investigate as high as he can climb.                      Up the façades, his shadow dragging like a photographer’s cloth behind him he climbs fearfully, thinking that this time he will manage to push his small head through that round clean opening and be forced through, as from a tube, in black scrolls on the light. (Man, standing below him, has no such illusions.) But what the Man-Moth fears most he must do, although he fails, of course, and falls back scared but quite unhurt.                      Then he returns to the pale subways of cement he calls his home. He flits, he flutters, and cannot get aboard the silent trains fast enough to suit him. The doors close swiftly. The Man-Moth always seats himself facing the wrong way and the train starts at once at its full, terrible speed, without a shift in gears or a gradation of any sort. He cannot tell the rate at which he travels backwards.                      Each night he must be carried through artificial tunnels and dream recurrent dreams. Just as the ties recur beneath his train, these underlie his rushing brain. He does not dare look out the window, for the third rail, the unbroken draught of poison, runs there beside him. He regards it as a disease he has inherited the susceptibility to. He has to keep his hands in his pockets, as others must wear mufflers.                      If you catch him, hold up a flashlight to his eye. It’s all dark pupil, an entire night itself, whose haired horizon tightens as he stares back, and closes up the eye. Then from the lids one tear, his only possession, like the bee’s sting, slips. Slyly he palms it, and if you’re not paying attention he’ll swallow it. However, if you watch, he’ll hand it over, cool as from underground springs and pure enough to drink.
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Man-Moth: Newspaper misprint for “mammoth.”

Here, above,
cracks in the buildings are filled with battered moonlight.
The whole shadow of Man is only as big as his hat.
It lies at his feet like a circle for a doll to stand on,
and he makes an inverted pin, the point magnetized to the moon.
He does not see the moon; he observes only her vast properties,
feeling the queer light on his hands, neither warm nor cold,
of a temperature impossible to record in thermometers.

                     But when the Man-Moth
pays his rare, although occasional, visits to the surface,
the moon looks rather different to him. He emerges
from an opening under the edge of one of the sidewalks
and nervously begins to scale the faces of the buildings.
He thinks the moon is a small hole at the top of the sky,
proving the sky quite useless for protection.
He trembles, but must investigate as high as he can climb.

                     Up the façades,
his shadow dragging like a photographer’s cloth behind him
he climbs fearfully, thinking that this time he will manage
to push his small head through that round clean opening
and be forced through, as from a tube, in black scrolls on the light.
(Man, standing below him, has no such illusions.)
But what the Man-Moth fears most he must do, although
he fails, of course, and falls back scared but quite unhurt.

                     Then he returns
to the pale subways of cement he calls his home. He flits,
he flutters, and cannot get aboard the silent trains
fast enough to suit him. The doors close swiftly.
The Man-Moth always seats himself facing the wrong way
and the train starts at once at its full, terrible speed,
without a shift in gears or a gradation of any sort.
He cannot tell the rate at which he travels backwards.

                     Each night he must
be carried through artificial tunnels and dream recurrent dreams.
Just as the ties recur beneath his train, these underlie
his rushing brain. He does not dare look out the window,
for the third rail, the unbroken draught of poison,
runs there beside him. He regards it as a disease
he has inherited the susceptibility to. He has to keep
his hands in his pockets, as others must wear mufflers.

                     If you catch him,
hold up a flashlight to his eye. It’s all dark pupil,
an entire night itself, whose haired horizon tightens
as he stares back, and closes up the eye. Then from the lids
one tear, his only possession, like the bee’s sting, slips.
Slyly he palms it, and if you’re not paying attention
he’ll swallow it. However, if you watch, he’ll hand it over,
cool as from underground springs and pure enough to drink.