David's response

What was with the “Jim” part? The dad calls Jim “J. O. I.” And says that their last name is Incandenza so this must be Hal’s grandfather. I’m guessing, which would make Jim Hal’s dad (since the dad’s name is James O. Incandenza).
I felt really bad while I read this part because I just imagined this drunk guy trying to explain all this stuff about grace and respect to a huge, retarded kid (even though it seems like he might be smart since he likes reading).
If Jim is Hal’s dad then he must have somehow passed tennis to his children from his father. There’s a part when Wallace is focusing on Mario and he says that Mario would be the only one of the Incandenza men who wasn’t a successful athlete or something. So does this mean that Jim was a famous tennis player in addition to a failed filmmaker?
Also, it seems like there’s something going on with Jim. We never focus on his character and all we know is that he killed himself with a microwave. It seems like he’s a really nice guy who loves his family, but it seems like he’s got something else going on that we haven’t seen yet. Like he’s a serial killer or tortures himself or something.

There’s also Steeply and Marathe. On page 137 Hal talks to Orin about Separatism in Canadia but the conversation ends before we see why Orin cares about this. I’m not sure yet how the Incandenza family is connected with this but later on it seems like it’ll become more important, especially with the list of Canadian Separatists on page 144. There’s also the article written by Helen Steeply about the woman with the stolen heart, so it seems like the Steeply’s will become important later possibly.

On a final note, I have no idea how the teleputers fits into anything.