saw

Kimmy saw Chelsea on the Moon.
Jim saw a girl who reminded him of Regan at school.
Victoria saw nobody, and still baked some cookies.
Carson saw Brooke's mom at work.
Dana saw Tommy at the Buffet.
Jessica saw Lizzy and Hayden and their 4 year old at Target.
Jen saw John and Carson at the mall.

O! Merry holidays,
Where we meet the bane of years
In our own old homes.
High school lunch room dropouts
Shop with eyes to the floor.
Career wielding exes.
Stragglers retreat under a banner
Of leavings soon
To their cozy go nowhere.
Palm Sunday December,
Glorious reappearing,
Merry awkward well-met.




Currently Listening:
The Greatest
By Cat Power

Jello J's Birthday Mix [mix seven]

01. Birthday - The Beatles
02. Getting Plenty - The Stone Roses
03. Blibberin' Blabbin' Blues - Gino Parks
04. Rock Lobster - The B-52s
05. This Town Ain't Big Enough For The Both Of Us - Sparks
06. Fa Ce La (fucked vers.) - The Feelies
07. Shake Your Rump - Beastie Boys
08. Authentic Hip Hop - Kali Wild
09. The Way We Get By - Spoon
10. Lola - The Raincoats
11. The Night We Called It A Day - Celso Fonseca
______________________

Track by track

Birthday by The Beatles
from "The Beatles (White Album)"
Well of course. I mean, duh. It's his birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YA! My mom had this track played on the local hits station the morning of my 13th birthday. It was rad.

Getting Plenty by The Stone Roses
from "Garage Flower"
Joel introduced me to the Stone Roses. I don't think he's heard this track before.

Blibberin' Blabbin' Blues by Gino Parks
from "The Complete Motown Singles Vol. 1"
I should have married Jimmy Joe. He owns a barbershop next door. The frank confessions in this jumpy, raggy blues freak-out make me smile. (Gino Parks is male.)

Rock Lobster by The B-52s
from Christine
She sent it to me via AIM. Apparently she's done the same thing with about 3000 other people in this town over the last couple of days because I keep hearing it. I wouldn't put it past her. I don't mind though. This song rules. LET'S ROCK!!!

This Town Ain't Big Enough For The Both Of Us by Sparks
from "Kimono My House"
Wacky. Like Joel-wacky. I like Joel-wacky. Yeah, Joel, you're wacky. I like it. (I link because who knew these guys were still around? If they can keep going this long how come we can't have more Weird Al Yankovic?)

Fa Ce La (fucked vers.) by The Feelies
from "Crazy Rhythms"
One Tuesday earlier this year, Joel and I rushed up to each other and said real quick all at the same time "OhmygodhaveyouheardthisbandTheFeelies??????" We'd both read the feature on AMG that morning, and were excited. Understandably so. This version is cut off funny, which is a total fuck-up on my part, but it's still damn good.

Shake Your Rump by The Beastie Boys
from "Paul's Boutique"
Who cares why? Dance, fucker! It's your birthday!

Authentic Hip Hop by Kali Wild
from Oh No's "The Disrupt Chronicles Vol. 2"
It's a pretty good track, a little choppy because it's hacked out of a smashed up mixtape by Oh No and I'm a lazy sonofabitch. I can't ruin a track this good in any case, so whatever. "Fuckin' up your brains with words."

The Way We Get By by Spoon
from "The Way We Get By EP"
"We go out in stormy weather. We rarely practice discern." & "...an' that's the way to my heart, the way to my heart."

Lola by The Raincoats
from "The Raincoats"
This is perhaps the song that is the most fun to sing along with of all time. Also, Jello J loves the women (and the women love the Jello) so it tickles my funnybone that it's a girl singing this track. Also also, more gender confusion = more better.

The Night We Called It A Day by Celso Fonseca
from "Natural"
Mood music, your after party, and a beach all in one song. Sets the stage for disc 2 (which you online folks will NEVER SEE).

documentary of a day in failure

Today I didn't do my laundry.
I packed the duffel bag I usually take to Wildcat Wash Well, scooped out four loads' worth of laundry detergent, and made sure to pack a crossword puzzle and some dryer sheets. The huge bag will sit directly in front of the door to my hovel all day because I won't even go outside today. I will wear dirty clothes tomorrow.

Today I didn't do my dishes.
This is a continuation of sorts, seeing as I haven't done all of my dishes (the sink hasn't been clean) in over two months. Oh, they rotate in and out of the stainless steel antfarm sunk into my kitchen counter, but never all at once. But usually I'm able to avoid the flatware alltogether and just order pizza. I got calzones from Magpie's last night. Unless something went horribly wrong last night that I'm not yet aware of, there's still half a 7 cheese calzone and some breadsticks I can eat right out of the box later on.

Today I didn't pay my student loan bill.
For a while I thought I was deferred until the middle of next year. For a while I thought I only owed so much. Then, like only a true moron can, I opened the Sallie Mae envelope I found on my stoop last night and found out I owe hundreds of dollars by the end of next week and a good 20% more altogether than I previously thought.

Today I fell asleep six times.
I'm not talking about nodding off on the bus or cat-napping at work or something. Today I crawled into my bed six times and fell into a hard sleep. It's hard to fail like that six times in one day.

Today I didn't apologize to Linda.
The monor who dropped off my calzones last night--despite repeated verbal warnings and precise instructions--knocked on Linda's door out front at 10pm instead of coming around back like she was supposed to.

Today I didn't talk to my grandfather.
He'll be gone soon, and my father is pressuring me to make like he's the most incredible person on the face of the earth just because he hooked me up with some hard cash when I graduated from high school. He's crochety, and always has been as far as I can remember, even when he wasn't sick. And he hates my mother, which shows whenever he talks to me.

Today I kicked over my space heater.
I woke up this morning to a campy, comfortable smouldering smell coming from the foot of my bed. Almost burning your house down but not is a pretty big failure in my book.

Today I didn't follow up on dubya's raincheck.
She was feeling sick the other night, so we postponed. But I've been moping all day and my tummy's been upset, so when she called I ignored it and didn't call her back.

Today I blurted out a big secret.
Boy, and right in front of the person I wasn't supposed to tell. There's no taking that shit back, short of reaching into the person's skull to lobotomy. Maybe I can forget it myself if...

Today I shoved the first three fingers of my right hand into my skull through my eyeball.
Now everything's really fucked up.


Currently Listening:
Chopin's Etudes Op. 10 & 25
By Maurizio Pollini
REALLY LOUD

my favorite poem about me

by Lars Bonerack

Well,
It seems to me
Miss Tiffany
That Carson is soon to be
What you so long to see:

There's certainly more of him around.

See?
Mind his face
And biking pace.
Outlined and traced
He's taking up more space:

There's certainly more of him around.

To him
Nothings better
Than raw batter
Dishes all a clatter
For MORE OF THAT RAW BATTER!

Can't you see? Carson's getting fatter.
There's certainly more of him around.
______________________
context: Tiffany wanted to see more of me around & Lars was feeling like an asshole.


Currently Listening:
...Arrive Having Eaten
By Pinback

one for John John

So I finally had the Cap'n'Crunch at Grill tonight. I'd heard about this phenom before: It's supposedly the biggest bowl of Cap'n'Crunch imaginable. If you haven't had it, go ahead and imagine the biggest bowl of Cap'n'Crunch you can. It was almost that big.

I was served a pasta bowl (you know, the kind that has the broad brim and the wide, wide bowl) piled high with crunchy golden nuggets and a tall glass of milk. It looked like they'd poured out an entire box of Cap'n'Crunch onto my plate. I opted to only pour a bit of the milk in at first, and dug down deep to get the drenched quickly mushy bits below. After ferreting out most of these, I added a bit more milk and proceeded in a similar fashion through most of the rest of the bowl.

However, as I neared the end I lost my concentration (hard not to, reading lines with such a talented and beautiful actress right across from me) and dumped the rest of the milk in with the rest of the cereal. Shortly thereafter I realized I was way past full and needed to quit spooning delicious mouthfuls of crispy golden treasure into my slavering maw. You'll please appreciate the courage needed to do this. To leave any Cap'n'Crunch in the cereal bowl and declare oneself finished is a hard-fought and ignobly won battle in a man's life. However I did stop shoveling, and at that point I was left with a small mound of near-chemically pure sugar quickly dissolving into a grainy mush six shades of yellow off white.

This concoction had all of the makings of a superb sculpting material, but it ran a bit thin. The realization dawned on me as I palsied through another five pages of sex montage that I shouldn't have used all of the milk made available to me. In an attempt to shore up my potential material I mashed up any remaining crunchiness with my spoon. I had hope that once the undissolved bits dissolved I'd have a better medium to work with. Though soon enough, as we tore through the last few pages of the surreal script, I was forced to accept that I would not be able to reduce my paste to the desired viscosity before we must up and leave.

Woe! On my night, the one where I asked her and she said yes and then she asked me and I of course said yes, where we got to walk and talk and eat and talk and drive and sing and read and act, I couldn't finish the Cap'n'Crunch. I left a big tip, a full ashtray, and what could have been the greatest ever work of Cap'n'Crunch art (in so many different ways) uncompleted on that damned table, and then I made her take me home.


Currently Listening:
Greasy Heart
By The Thin Man

Fenlason Flair [mix six]

DECEMBER 3, 2005
01. ?
02. ??
03. ???
04. ????
05. ?????
06. ??????
07. ???????
08. ????????
09. ?????????
10. ??????????
11. ???????????
_________________________

Ok, first of all, before we really get into the tracklist here we must consider the fact that the only physical copy of this mix is in the posession of my Human Resources Manager at work. I accidently gave it to him when he bummed me a smoke too early in the morning.

The copy he got was on a blank CD-R. Wait, that doesn't quite work; I hadn't written anything on the CD-R. Damn, that doesn't work either. Let's try this: I had not marked on the top of the CD-R with any sort of permanent marker, pen, or other handwriting tool, nor had I printed any labels to sticker on top of the CD-R. There. So he didn't know any of the track names, and he might have only recognized a couple of the bands by their sound.

That's the feeling I want before we talk about the mood and sequencing and all that. Got it?

I'm not really gonna say anything else about what's on this mix. The mood and sequencing don't matter because nobody knows what's going on here, not even me. Just listen.

PS -> if you really want to know, then find out.

Dear Mandy,

I find you attractive.

Now, that's a relatively vague statement about my (granted my humanity) obviously complex emotional state. Allow me to elaborate.

I enjoy spending time with you. The thoughts that I have when I'm around you are pleasant thoughts. They're often funny thoughts, and I find myself laughing out loud when I'm around you. You're wit is terribly attractive, and is indicative of your considerable intelligence.

Many times, however, the thoughts I have about you are lustful. You arouse a physical attraction in me that burns with ardent passion. Your form is graceful and beauty is defined by the look of your eye.

Perhaps similar emotions are aroused within yourself when you are around me, and perhaps similar thoughts are on your mind. If this is the truth, you should stop reading this right now and come over. We can then reconcile our shared metaphysics with our physical bodies.

Perhaps, however, you think about shoes when I'm around. I wear yellow ones, and they catch your eye and before you know it your mind has wandered about exotic high-heel knee-high red-soled boots or delicate calf sandals or even just a nice, comfy pair of Reefs. Perhaps you don't think similar thoughts to mine when we share company.

If this is the case, do not despair our relationship. This confession to you is temporal in nature, frozen throughout time from now until forever but representative of me only at one time--right now. My thoughts, they change. I grow, I develop, I am not the I of yesterday.

I resemble he (slightly stubblier, alas) in looks and good intentions alone. My thoughts are independent of his, and my feelings tortured one moment and serene the next.

I know your good nature is constant. If you despise this slip of mine desire please let me know, but do not make me go. Keep me on in good faith, and I will be goodly faithful to you. I respect you, and desire your company in any context.

You should read my weblog--I say this all much better there.

Truly,
Carson



Currently Listening:
ep_1
By Gescom

KAMP fire [mix five]

01. The Sea & Cake - Lamont's Lament
02. Kaada - Burden
03. The Talk - Worst Chest Pains
04. Call Florence Pow - 3 & 4 Part Tones
05. Built To Spill - Car
06. Camera Obscura - Eighties Fan
07. Vicious Vicious - Oh, I Would Do Anything For My Girl
08. Tangiers - I Don't Love You
09. Loose Fur - Elegant Transaction
10. Brian Straw & The 6/7 - Now Like Photographs
11. Destroyer - The Music Lovers
___________________________

My time hosting a radio show or two at KAMP was frequently spent browsing the stacks and reading dusty reviews of obscure college radio music when I wasn't in charge of the decks or abusing a microphone.

Usually, by the end of a browsing session I'd have a stack of "I want this NOW!" albums that I'd then get about halfway through burning before falling asleep or passing out or forgetting about them.

I'd take the copies home, and listen to them once through before stashing them carefully in one of a few large black CD binders. Except for the occasional alphabetical stretch, these binders are organized in no particular order.

Other times, when I wanted something cool to air for the show and I'd run out of my own stuff to play (hard to imagine, I know) or wasn't happy with the top 10 new albums, I'd browse the other new stuff. Not surprisingly, most of it was crap. On the rarest of occasions, I'd come across a gem of an album. Slightly more frequently, an album would have one track that was designated as must play.

Possibly my smartest idea in college was to collect these tracks onto burned discs that I labelled with dates and peppered throughout the binders.

My last source for this mix are the albums I wrote reviews for during this same period. Most of the time, I got the stuff that came highly recommended but nobody ever heard of before. Much of it was hype, but the occasional track was fun; those I pushed hard while touting the entire album as genius so other DJs would play my reviews.

Anyway, tonight I went through those binders and picked out the memories. This mix is the result, and I have no idea what to think about it. These tracks don't go together at all, and sequencing them was a real bitch. But they're all still intimately connected in my mind, sorta like how Rob reorganizes his albums biographically.

These songs are, perhaps, the quintessence of my taste in music. They're all just super-catchy pop songs, in and of themselves. Outside of that context they don't relate, they don't sound good, and they mean almost nothing. It irks me that there's no rap and no country and not really any electronica or any kind of variety between them, really.

There's no accounting for taste, I guess.

the new bike

Dad called tonight, to tell me that Gramps is through the procedure.

"They put two stents in through his leg and his groin. Can you believe they thread tiny pieces of metal through your grandfather's beat-up arteries, all the way from his ankle to his heart?"

"I read an article about stents today. Bypass specialists everywhere are worried about the technology. It's supposed to be a billion-dollar market in 5 years."

"Your grandfather is okay; he's still in the hospital, but they moved him out of the ICU."

"Yes, I'm glad to hear that. Thank you for calling me and telling me that."

"You should call him."

"Ok, I'll do that soon. Let me know when he's home and I'll call him."

"Well, son, how's your bike?"

"It's pretty good! The seat gel has dried up a bit, so it's like sitting on a rock and pedaling. I'll probably get a new saddle before long, but right now my main concern is replacing the handlebar stem. The one that's on there is too long, and doesn't rise at all. With such a long crossbar I can't reach the handlebars comfortably, and the seat's not as high up as I'd like. The drivetrain and shifters are top-notch, though, and the thing pedals like a dream. The chain's a bit rusty, so I'll probably have that replaced when I get around to having it tuned."

"I just paid two hundred dollars to have it tuned."

"Two hundred bucks??? Well, they didn't replace the chain, the grips they installed are crap, and the front rim needs to be trued. The brakes are terrible, but they'll serve for a while. And about half the hosing needs to be replaced."

"That's an eight hundred dollar bike, you know. Worth every penny when I bought it."

"You got it from Costco, dad. And you never rode it. And you wouldn't let me ride it."

"They have top of the line bikes there. And you're riding it now, aren't you?"

"Costco sells bulk, dad. My Giant was a nicer bike and cheaper, too."

"I knew a guy who built his own bikes. In fact, he did pretty well building bikes, if I recall. I think he turned it into a nice little business."

"Right on. I wish I could do that."

"Yeah, his name's Doc. He decided he wanted to be a woman shortly after I met him."

"Oh?"

"Went through the hormone treatment, surgeries, everything. He used to be this male Adonis, blonde hair, blue eyes, 6-6, everything. A guy. Now he's, well, gorgeous."

"Shouldn't you refer to Doc as 'she'? You know, now that she's had all that done to her, gone through it all and everything?"

"Well, I knew him initially as a 'he' and it's hard for me to just switch over."

"Isn't it a matter of respect? Like, this person needed to change their life in a drastic and difficult way to be happy, so shouldn't you respect their happiness at least and refer to them the way they want to be referred?"

"Oh, I can't respect him. He left a wife and two kids to do this. Just left 'em like that. I can't respect anyone who does that to their family. Anyway, I've had personal experiences with transvestites, so this isn't some preconditioned response."

"But still--"

"Look, I went out with a guy--this transvestite--and I didn't know she was a he until we were into some heavy petting. I freaked out. You don't do that to someone, fool them like that. So I don't like homosexuals and I don't like transvestites and if I don't want to deal with them then I'm not gonna do it. They can go live and I'm not saying anything bad, but I've had my bad experiences and I don't have to respect Doc's decision."

Sweat trails a thin line of irony from my ear to the end of my chin, and drips off onto the floor. I don't say anything.

"Anyway, he used to make bikes, but he apparently decided to go full-bore with this whole life change thing and he quit the bike business. But he got pretty wealthy building them while he was doing that."

I still don't know what to say.

"So you're gonna call grandpa soon, right? And wouldya do me a favor and call your two sisters to tell them the news. I have your number memorized, son, but theirs I don't know, and I'm driving so I can't get my book out."

"Yeah, dad, I'll call 'em."

"I still don't know what's wrong with the plasma, did you mess it up more when you were looking at it on Thanksgiving?"

"No, dad."

"The good news is I might make it through this winter. I just paid three thousand bucks to the credit cards, personal cards, and this child support thing is almost off my shoulders. Things are going to be tight this Christmas; good thing I've got you taken care of with the bike and your sister with her engine. It's just your other sister I'm worried about. Do you know what she wants?"

No mention of the woman's kitchen, and no bother mentioning the fact that he'll probably buy himself a new television before January.

"No, dad. I can't afford to participate in Christmas this year, so I haven't asked anyone what they want."

Pointed silence while I don't ask my father what he wants for Christmas.

"All right, son. Well enjoy that bike. Call your sisters."

"Let me know when grandpa gets out of the hospital."

"I will, son. You should call your grandparents."

"Ok, dad. I have to go finish my dishes--this is the first time I've done them in six weeks."

"How long?!"

"Thanks for letting me know about grandpa. Love you, dad."

"All right. Love you too, son."





Currently Listening:
Thickfreakness
By The Black Keys

Thanksgiving 2005

What does it mean when whiskey tastes like the holidays?


Currently Listening:
Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey
By Savath & Savalas

"young man,

thy words are like the cypress, tall and large, but they bear no fruit."

history smacks me down again. damn you, Phocion!

but the pictures, bitch...my pictures fucking rule are pleasing to the eye:



Currently Listening:
Gizmodgery
By Self

O sole mio!

why give reasons?

does reason demand an excuse? (and, does nothing need a reason to exist?)

can one reason irrationality?
for example, if you were standing in line at the grocery checkout and the person behind you started barking loudly, could you ask them why they were doing it and expect a satisfying answer?

what if you turned around and were, like, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, buddy? and then they gave you a good reason for barking out of the blue? is irrationality context-dependent? or, in the right light can any irrationality be construed as rational? does applying rationality (asking why) to an irrational act automatically assume reason?

or vice-versa?--can any rational action be considered absurd?

or are there other perspectives, outside of ir/rationality? is there something other than sense to be made or left unmade? how does emotion factor into rationality & reason (and their respective opposites)?

Bueller?

Currently Listening:
Cats & Kittens
By de novo dahl

GOSSIP

Tom Cruise is potentially a monster factory.

You'll notice in this picture of Tom

that his incisors are all fucked up--the man only has 3 of them. According to this, Tom's condition is an indicator that he might carry a genetic disease that results in dead cyclops children. (he almost never flashed the pearlies when he was younger; his condition has been repaired with extensive cosmetic manipulation)

Oddly, Nicole Kidman miscarried right after Cruise divorced her. I wonder what kind of monster is gonna come out of Katie?


Currently Listening:
The Slickness
By Prince Po

I can see you.

My hit counter logs your latitude and longitude. Google Earth finds latitude and longitude to a precise resolution. Put these two fun little tools together, and I know where you live.

Scary, huh?


Currently Listening:
Broken Social Scene
By Broken Social Scene

A man becomes aware.

He believes he is dreaming. In his dream, he's naked and wandering around his apartment complex in the predawn light. He knows he should be back in his bed, snuggled in, where all his dreams occur. He walks to his door and tries it: locked. Well, if it's a dream, he should try something else, like walking through a wall or transporting to his bedroom.

Then again, why does he need to be in bed to dream? "Don't most of my dreams take place in crazy places and NOT my bedroom?" he thinks. The possibility dawns on him like the fiery sun creeping over the horizon that he might not be asleep. He might not be dreaming. He might really be walking around his apartment complex naked. He tries his door again. Still locked.

He begins to panic.


Later on, after getting back into his apartment (no outsiders necessary; he slit the window screen) he asks an online community why this would have happened. He admits taking a sleeping pill that may cause hallucinations and odd sleep patterns, and that he's stressed out and possibly depressed. The community quickly says back "YOU'RE TAKING A SLEEPING PILL THAT MAY CAUSE HALLUCINATIONS AND ODD SLEEP PATTERNS!!! Please see your doctor and we hope you're OK."

The next day, this man posts a link to a website on his community site for discussion. Appended to the post is an empty link--HTML that seems to go nowhere, and do nothing--consisting of an ellipses (...). He concurrently posts a "callout" of his post in another area of the community website, and assures everyone that he'll explain the empty link tag and everything, but he has to sleep right then.

The community is torn between ridiculing this man for his odd posting habits (self-callout, empty links, posting a basically empty thread, etc), excitedly speculating what the naked sleepwalker could be up to, and pitying him for his well-documented problems.

Two days later the callout thread is closed by site administration.

The day after that, another user of the online community posts a link to the sleepwalker's explanation of his empty ellipses. It's long, and interesting: he proposes a nifty trick to track the recent posts of users that incorporate similar code into their posts.

The community cries out that it's a dumn idea! WTF! All this nakedness and no pony!

...the ending needs some work.


Currently Listening:
Uneasy Listening Vol. 1
By DJ Z-Trip & DJ P

forget the implications

Ralph scuffed his shoe on the sidewalk, spat. Took you long enough, asshole. You said nine.

The guy sidling up to him outside the bar glanced up sharply, taken aback for an instant before his timid good looks re-presented on his face. He made to smack Ralph across the face. Shut the fuck up, dickwad. Suck on your little cigarette so we can go in. C'mon.

They embraced.

The bar was one of those chain places usually geared towards the college set. Before the lively decor and jaunty jukebox even had a chance to scuff up and get comfortable, the place was abandoned to a menacing crowd of lonely old drunks. It'd been an old gentlemen's club ten years ago. The non-smoking policy brought in with the chain name added a grumpy tone to the holdover clientele and regularly fostered a lively specacle just outside the doors. If you hit this bar up at the right time in 1998, like Ralph did, you came down with fifteen or twenty spare ashtrays for your home. Ralph had been going there since the club days, and had a hard time giving up his smokes at his bar. His mood outdoors was sharp and acidic with the rush of nicotine and night air. As if he needed more ashtrays.

He dropped the cig and they walked into a small, lowlit room through glass doors. They checked their coats and slapped away the saloonish swinging vest, entering the bar proper. Howya been, Mark? Still seeing that one girl, stole you away from me?

Mark followed Ralph across the room and sat down at the bar. Heads might have turned, over in the flickery booths and at the tiny cocktail tables. But probably not. I been alright, Ralphie. And I haven't seen that bitch since November. Actually, that's kinda why I called you up. Been to any weddings lately?

What? You're shitting me.

Naw, this gal's incredible.

You've been had, my friend. I can tell already. She may be great, but solitary confinement's a bitch. I thought you knew that?

I thought I knew that, too. But Nancy's something special.

Yeah, special. Right. Ralph picked up his drink as soon as the bartender set it down. So what? You want me to be in the wedding or something?

Fuck no! Think I'd let a prick like you within a ten mile radius of Nancy on her wedding day?

Fair enough. But, c'mon. Just one more, and I won't take any away from you ever again. Promise.

No way. She's mine. You can come if you want, I guess, but you have to wear the straightjacket and a mouthful of tongue depressors.

Damn! You know they think I'm fine in my strappy whites. Nancy, she'll...drifting off in wonderment, Ralph imagining and shaking his head.

Mark hunched over and shifted his stool a bit. The scraping of wood on wood piqued more ears than their arrival. Booths seemed to shrink inward towards their tables, the mason jar candles around the room eclipsed now by straining ears. What about you? Anyone you wanna bring?

Well, I been seeing this bird lately, but I don't think she'd do me well at a wedding. She's crazy enough as it is.

Crazy like what?

Fuckin' hard to get bullshit.

Sweet cheebus, Ralphie. She's pulling the hard to get bit out for you?

Ralph grunted, chomped on a piece of ice. Fuck off.

Of all people, who'd think you were worth the time? Smirking between the words.

Hey, look, I get it. I said fuck off.

Heh. She's playin you hard to get...And you're the one's been had. What?

Mark couldn't help flinching Ralph's head snapped up so fast. Fuck you. Ralph's stool tipped as he pushed back from the bar, clunking back and forth on pairs of legs. He was already fumbling for a smoke, shouldering out through the lobby and into the night.



Currently Listening:
Summerteeth
By Wilco

Fall MefiSwap [mix four]

November 2005
1. M. Ward - Duet For Guitars #2
2. Josh Ritter - Tonight You Belong To Me
3. Matt Sweeny & Bonny 'Prince' Billy - Lift Us Up
4. Nick & The Jaguars - Ich-I-Bon #1
5. Arizona Amp & Alternator - AAAA(4)
6. Wolf Parade - I'll Believe In Anything
7. Carl Henry Brueggen - Teen Jackpot
8. Sam Prekop - C + F
9. The Minders - Jealous Baby
10. Black Dice - ABA
11. The Go! Team - Hold Yr Terror Close
12. Erlend Oye - Every Party
13. Lil' Pocketknife - Disco Dancer
14. DangerDoom - Benzie Box (feat. Cee-Lo)
15. Mastodon - Blood & Thunder
16. One Be Lo - Axis
17. Yesterday's New Quintet - The Funky Side Of Life
18. Kid Koala - Roboshuffle
19. Prefuse 73 - Pagina Dos (feat. The Books)
20. The Bees - Chicken Payback
21. Boom Bip - Newlyweds

This is one of the longer mixes I've ever assembled, both in terms of # of tracks and actual playing time (1.4 hours). I broke a few of my rules putting it together--mainly because I have a specific audience in mind that wouldn't have heard/seen previous mixes. For instance, I usually try to keep my mixes distinct from one another, and this one shares a couple of tracks with some of the previous mixes I've posted here. Also, I believe I double up one of the producers (Prefuse 73), which is usually a no-no.

I am proud of the coherent structure, but sad to say that it encompasses no real storyline. I like the flow of the mix; It begins with a nice instrumental introduction followed by an incantation of sorts from Josh Ritter, Matt Sweeny, and Bonny 'Prince' Billy. The set really kicks off with a sweet (electric) guitar instrumental from Nick & the Jaguars. Local flavor from Howe Gelb off of his latest incarnation builds a great head of country/rock steam into the insanely catchy "indie rock" of Wolf Parade.

Another break follows; a nice bossa/samba track from Carl Henry Brueggen--who knew that Mount Shasta could actually make nice-sounding music? Sam Prekop picks up the pieces that Howe & the Wolves shattered, and hands them over to The Minders to slowly put back together. Black dice interlude once again, segueing nicely into the centerpiece, The Go! Team's surprising little ditty.

From there, the reformulated mix takes a bit of a harder edge. Try to not dance to Erlend Oye's collab with Scott Herren (there's the production repeat) or Lil' Pocketknife's profane insistence or Danger Mouse's fuzzy rhythm. The gears shift one higher in a surprising move from hip hop to metal. Mastodon's take on Ahab and the White Whale is excellent, a nice high-energy twist right in the middle of the mix's second wind.

One Be Lo raps about stuff that makes sense but that I have no right putting on my mix, being white, suburban, and not hard in the least. Still, he's got sick flow and something to say. Madlib takes the reins from there, jazzing up the set before Kid Koala scratches it all up.

From Roboshuffle on it's a jaunty kick in the pants to end the mix. Scott Herren makes another appearance under the Prefuse 73 guise, and The Bees (known in the states as A Band of Bees) come out of left field to get you moving one last time. Chicken Payback is that post-orgasmic spasm before you fall asleep, to Boom Bip's funky fade-out.

kelly kapowski

someone please disabuse me of the idea that that's actually Tiffany Amber-Thiessen. (I'm already convinced the other one's not Chynna Phillips, don't worry.)


Currently Listening:
The Lemon of Pink
By The Books

yeah, things changed

some choice memories:

1. middle of nowhere. we drove into the desert at 50mph for about an hour. cars passed us the other way, turned around and followed us. people congregating on nothing. cattleguards were crossed, miles of dirt road to a sandy, winding driveway/road packed with cars. we saw tiki torches and heard music.

2. the large bus at the driveway terminus raved, generated. over a slight rise the underbrush gave way to a cow pond. the fire pit and trippy projection screen rimmed the pond to the right. left was tents, food, drink, music, milling. pungencies fought for airspace everywhere.

3. after cajoling and teasing and head-faking the rave bus was braved. the two little girls posted outside followed us in, claimed a plywood platform, and danced the night away.

4. the firepit drummers beat damning dynamics. evident desire of the blonde to instigate, alter, and influence the rhythm pounded out amid a chorus of hearts via hands.

5. Rat Dog's Grateful Dead punctuated by visits from Josh, an impromptu apple pipe, Johnny on drums, then blown out of the water by the fire-eaters.

6. on the far side of the cowpond they twisted, twirled, hula'ed, swooped, and swallowed the flames.

7. mints as gifts. pockets of meat. cold, good beer. anonymous cups handed around, gulped from, and placed neatly in the designated areas.

8. Gates Pass, nearing 4am, bleary-eyed, crammed in a stick-shift truck. sick fear floating on a sea of bile we circled, climbed out, and plunged back into the city.


Currently Listening:
Arizona Amp & Alternator
By Arizona Amp & Alternator

my take on dating girls

prepare thyself, my family, my friends, my acquaintences, others.

DATING GIRLS IS LIKE POKING SNAKES.

if you had a bucket of snakes, and a stick, and if you were to poke those snakes with that stick, that's how I contextualize dating females. it is a fascinating enterprise, with surprising results.

please note that this is only a generalization of the issue, simply an exercise to explain through illustration a typical situation. perhaps a good dating experience illustration would include Samuel L. Jackson yelling at you while you're poking snakes with a stick (YOU ONE BADASS MUTHAFUCKA!!!). perhaps a bad dating experience illustration would incorporate a plane. that is, in that particularly bad case, dating girls is like poking snakes on a plane.

Currently Listening:
Superwolf
By Bonnie 'Prince' Billy & Matthew Sweeney

things will change

wow. I feel like I could write about fifty different posts under this heading.

anyway, the one for tonight is that dubya (of all people) invited me to a party in the desert. can you believe that in 24 years as a Tucsonan, I've never partied in the SNM? I've tripped to the woods, and near the ocean, and indoors, and on my patio, but tonight might just be my first time to this blessed, God-awful desert.

the boyfriend* is covering the event for his upstart newspaper. I'll be handing out quipped wisdom and maybe some kush all night long. wanna come? I don't know where it is.

*I may be an ambiguously gay superhero, but he's not my boyfriend.

Currently Listening:
Cul-de-sacs & Dead Ends
By The Minders

swanky

As usual, the plans were all a jumble. One group was meeting at one house with another group. They'd make their way to a second meeting house, acquiring a second car of people. Monkeys and llamas cohabitating in a third car trailed at a safe distance.

Pizza somewhere, where we finally ended up all together before the big show. Makeup for Carnie and Chynna and The Other One (Polly?), and gin for myself. And a shield! My only defense: a plastic lion-clad slab of armor, strapped to my forearm and worn over jeans, a red tee, and a blue hoodie. Max gave me a dog/lion mask, and I felt anonymous. Good thing, too. Finally, a van ride, twisty up between enormous enclaves and armadas of escalades.

A torturous uphill driveway stormed barefoot by half our party, so steep. But the top! The party! We showed up as Wilson Phillips and crew (allowed as a tagalong for providing preparty materials and lipstick), to warm, vibrating hugs from the priest, the host, the director, Marcos. His dildo wooed.

The party rocked. Open bar, the typical sparse, concrete-floored flat screen-paneled bachelor pad nee 70's hilltop party house filled with cross-dressed Kiss and Michael Jackson and Naughty Girlscouts and two friendly (and one sullen) dogs and a Whoopee Cushion and Kelly Kapowski* was there too, I think.

More gin. Wandering, talking, patiofirepitsitting. Poolgazing. Passing it around. Good music and good people. Whipped it out in front of the Moonman Toilet Paper Holder (Best Group Video, "All The Small Things") a couple of times, and before I know it we're stumbling back down the hill.

More van, down around the crazy hills and into the green haze at the end of the night.

It was a good Halloween weekend!

* It might have actually been Tiffany. She gave me a dirty look when I took the picture and asked her for a big, "Go Bayside!" I'll have to ask Polska for the documentation.

Currently Listening:
Set list
By The Frames

superbad

this has been around the internets for ages, but I'll risk boring you to mention

superbad.

sometimes for me, on days like today, navigating life is too much like navigating this website. I point and click blindly, am rewarded with grotesque and garish juxtapositions. Or I agonize over a stupid detail, to be rewarded with doubly stupid bullshit.

and it just goes on that way!

Currently Listening:
First Light's Freeze
By Castanets

tough cookies

Extra special super prizes for the best solution to this sticky situation:

How do you tell a man wearing a sidearm and cowboy boots that his fly is down?
[here's a hint: yes yes all, to the beat y'all.]

__________________________________


My bookcase is falling apart. Currently, the contents of the bottommost shelf are squished under what was formerly the shelf above and the contents of two middle shelves are stacked haphazardly in front of the case. The top two shelves are still intact, but sag ominously under what must be immense weight.

There are books, of course. Odd books with stupid titles and only so-so content, books that are really not worth mentioning. Books that, if they're not overt fiction, might be wrong. There's a picture frame (no picture in it), a sheaf of random snapshots--not even of people, just a backyard and a small tree-lined square and maybe a dog--and one of those squishy, squiddish kush balls that were ubiquitous sometime not long ago. Those green tentacles are crusted with dust and detrius just like a 10-year old sea anenome stuck to the bottom of the ocean would be. A can of Super Silly String, green. An empty tin that still reeks of the breathtakingly strong peppermint chewing gum it once held. [There might be a couple of green stems beneath the paper liner inside.] Incense.

Then there are the toys, my favorite part! There's Batman [Would you like to ride with Batman?] and the green alien Frank and the puppy dog and the bunny rabbit and another kush ball that's really a cute little duckie. He's held by Ahnold, the pighead-wearing, chainsaw-wielding naked bad guy from Manhunt, who is standing next to the panama hat-sporting floatie toy from Erin, Bruce. It's mainly because of Bruce and Ahnold you can't see the top of the closet over the bookcase. Below those guys and the Halloween Monster are some HotWheels and some Disney characters and The Angry Nun facing off with the Happy Valentine Squeeze Toy [You're gorgeous!] vs. Hingey the Anime Toy and his Menacing Dead BiC Lighter Squad.

The outer faces of the bookcase are stickered. It's sporadic for the most part, but a concentrated effort at covering the entire outer area is hinted at by the upper right side, which is thrashed with juxtaposed black, white, and red stickers. Lower parts of the outside still display my pathetic efforts to prevent the inevitable--brown packing tape wraps around the sides, disappearing to the back and conspicuously hacked over the front shelf faces. The whole thing has a bowlegged look, and cants to the right.

What happened was the back fell out. My one room apartment has a hidden secret compartment behind my bookcase. It's a linen closet, I guess, but doesn't have any shelves installed. It's really shallow, too, and kind of narrow. With a bit more depth it'd be the perfect place to stash my TV. As it is I had no idea what to do with it, so I covered it up. I remember thinking about The Cask of Amantillado and suffocating screaming/laughing dust bunnies when I moved my bookcase in front of it. The bookcase is a piece of crap, one of those cheap jobs where the back is flimsy particleboard tacked to a tenuously doweled frame. Without solid wall behind it, the back gave way a bit each time I rearranged things, or tried to fit more books on each shelf.

Once that started happening, it was just a matter of time. The backing didn't just keep books and innocent toys from plummeting down into my hidden secret linen closet/dustbunny graveyard; it gave the whole case stability as long as it was tacked to all four sides. Over the course of the past year I've been slowly sorting and organizing the mind-boggling pile of crap that's accumulated on the bottom three shelves of this case. Little did I notice that each time I straightened my things, I nudged the whole apparatus closer to destruction.

Finally, last week, I went for broke. The whole thing was gonna look straight, books all lined up, Important Folders neatly arranged, I just had a little bit left to organize. It was then, just as I was finishing, that the house of cards came down. The third shelf crashed down, snapping cheap plastic L's into the air at an eye-deadly velocity and triggering an avalanche of shelves. The bottom half collapsed, burying me under piles of crap--pure crap--and clouds of dust.

And that's basically where I stand. I'm working up the resolve to move everything that didn't fall off of the shelves and scrap the case alltogether. I keep thinking I'd be better off with some bricks and lumber in the secret hidden linen compartment, but I can't bear to give up this case. Those stickers! those carefully arranged characters! those slowly sentinent massive piles of bunnydust cadavers! Plus, I think a pack of oreos fell behind the case at one point early 2003, and I'm not eager to see what's made of 'em. In the end it might be a sneaking suspicion that a portal to Narnia will open up in my linen closet that makes me move the damn thing.

Truly, everybody's living quarters should come with super-secret hidden linen closet escape routes guarded by gnarled figurines and dust-urchin bunny corpses. They're way better than plasma.

Currently Listening:
The Ephiphany of Glenn Jones
By John Fahey & Cul De Sac

the hits, they just keep coming

I just got some good news. It's inspired me to do a bit of a catch-up edition today, so bear with me.

First, the really important stuff. Here are some more albums up for consideration for 2005's top honors:

Purchased (I tracked down a few more around the apartment, too.)
38. Danger Doom - The Mouse & The Mask
39. Yesterday's New Quintet - Sound Directions
40. Andrew Bird - & The Mysterious Production of Eggs
41. Broken Social Scene - Broken Social Scene
42. Karate - In The Fishtank
43. Little Barrie - We Are Little Barrie
44. Constantines - Tournament of Hearts

Looking Forward To
45. Wolf Parade - Apologies To The Queen Mary (still!)
46. Deerhoof - The Runners Four
47. Jason Forrest - Shamelessly Exciting
48. Kanye West - Late Registration (fading fast, though)
49. Rogue Wave - Descended Like Vultures
50. Castanets - First Light's Freeze
51. Animal Collective - Feels (opened a copy and listened early at work last night...it's reallly good!)

Now, after that big, juicy, sloppy kiss of good music, here's a nice warm hug of financial love: Last night it rained. Thankfully, it wasn't raining while I was riding between work and bustops and home, but it gave pretty good for a while before I left work. A miracle, in Tucson terms. A nice, refreshing, cleansing farewell to summer. And finally! Days that stay below 90; breezes that don't scorch delicate lung tissue--hope for long sleeves. It's wonderful and all, but it's wonderful all over my mail.

So I get home to find a soaked letter in the usual spot. It's from Sallie Mae and thick. It looks important enough, so I peeled the envelope away and carefully separated the five pages. They dried in the shower overnight, and today I read 'em.

Lemme just say here how much happier my life is now that I've started reading financial information people find important enough to mail to my house. I didn't do that for a long time, and I was miserable as a result. Being financially responsible sucks ass according to the music addiction gremlin that has taken half my brain up as residence and wants to blow $400 on music every Tuesday, but he doesn't really know what's good for him. He just wants shiny jewel cases and cool liner notes and lots of good music.

Anyway, Sallie Mae sent me a letter to let me know that they've purchased my student loan debt from the regional lending service that's owned it since time out of mind. I just finished getting the payment details set up with the previous company, and have been stressing lately about the large monthly payments. But Sallie Mae says I don't have to start paying until halfway through next year!!! Also, they only want half of what the old guys wanted per month!

Call me dumn for putting it off, but if I can halve my student loan payment each month after not paying it for a year, I'll be extremely happy. Spread that debt out! Let the infinity of time bear the brunt of my poverty. [Pretty sure this is the gremlin talking, but whatever--more CDs!!!]

Kip's [BIRTHDAY] Party Mix [mix three]

10/11/2005
[It should be noted that, for reasons of convenience and coolism, in lieu of the usual plain track list original liner notes are reproduced here.]

 

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%%DNTEL%%%%%DANNY%LOVES%EXPERIMENTAL%ELECTRONICS%%%%%%%%
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%%DANGERDOOM%%%%%BIZZY%BOX%FEAT.CEE-LO%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%ERLEND%OYE%%%%%EVERY%PARTY%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%EDAN%%%%%FUMBLING%OVER%WORDS%THAT%RHYME%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%CONSTANTINES%%%%%ON%TO%YOU%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%LCD%SOUNDSYSTEM%%%%%DAFT%PUNK%IS%PLAYING%AT%MY%HOUSE%%
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%%!!!%%%%%TAKE%ECSTACY%WITH%ME%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%EL-P%%%%%THE%DANCE%(INSTRUMENTAL)%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%DANGER%MOUSE%%%%%WHAT%MORE%CAN%I%SAY%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%THE%BEES%%%%%CHICKEN%PAYBACK%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%PREFUSE%73%%%%%SMILE%IN%YOUR%FACE%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%WOLF%PARADE%%%%%I'LL%BELIEVE%IN%ANYTHING%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%THE%GO!%TEAM%%%%%HOLD%YR%TERROR%CLOSE%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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%%ADEM%%%%%RINGING%IN%MY%EAR%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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this mix kind of has a storyline, encompassing arriving at or preparing for a party, actually parting (dancing, drinking, swooning, singing along), and the after-party and compressed into about an hour. thus, while parts of it are in fact good party music, other parts are not necessarily meant to be played to a crowd or at high volume.

Step One: The Listing

I had my first best albums of 2005 discussion the other day. Out behind the loading bay dumpster, where the girls who work the cosmetics counters in Dillards enter and exit the mall, we batted around some rough sketches of our top 5, top 10, and top 20 albums of the year. There was a lot of disbelieving guffaws and derisive snorts tossed around, too, but no less appreciative nods and curt forgot-that-one-yeah's. In the end we were only very slightly closer to having an idea about our choices for best albums of the year, let alone what they actually were.

So, in the spirit of fairness and good music, tonight I combed my apartment for albums I've purchased that were released this year. Anyone who's had the pleasure of trying to find a seat in this hole I live in knows how daunting this task would be. I may've missed a couple. In fact, I'm nearly positive I have missed some. But I have all the ones I remember purchasing. They're right here, stacked next to the desk and coming up to my knee. Please keep in mind that I am including EPCDs (Extended Player CD Singles) and significant Singles in addition to LPCDs.

Now, seeing as I spent half the year working at a college radio station (not to mention conducting and participating in other, slightly less salacious musical enterprises), this stack of jewel cases and digipaks is not nearly representative of all of the albums I've acquired this year, let alone listened to. Keep that in mind, please, as this fact may bear upon my final list sometime nearer the end of the year. Chances are, though, if an album is good enough to make my top 10 list, it was worth purchasing. Hear that? When I actually get around to whittling a real list out of this catalog, the albums listed will be worth purchasing.

Also, please note that there are some 10 albums or so that I'm still waiting to purchase before the year's out. For some, the money situation wasn't right when it was released. Most of the remaining albums have yet to come out. I am positive that some of these will demand consideration come December. But for now, all I can do for the endeaver is catalog the known purchased releases of 2005.

Here they are, in no particular order:

01. M. Ward - Transistor Radio
02. Four Tet - Everything Ecstatic
03. Spoon - Gimme Fiction
04. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
05. Martha Wainwright - Martha Wainwright
06. The Fiery Furnaces - EP
07. The Books - Lost and Safe
08. Rogue Wave - 10:1
09. The Mountain Goats - The Sunset Tree
10. Iron & Wine - Woman King
11. Fruit Bats - Spelled In Bones
12. Aesop Rock - Fast Cars, Danger, Fire and Knives
13. Edan - Beauty and the Beat
14. Mara Carlyle - The Lovely
15. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
16. Matt Sweeney & Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Superwolf
17. Sam Prekop - Who's Your New Professor
18. Devendra Banhart - Cripple Crow
19. Holopaw - Quit /or Fight
20. The New Pornographers - Twin Cinema
21. The Go! Team - Thunder, Lightning, Strike
22. LCD Soundsystem - LCD Soundsystem
23. Of Montreal - The Sunlandic Twins
24. Prefuse 73 - Surrounded By Silence
25. Prefuse 73 - Reads The Books
26. Animal Collective - Prospect Hummer
27. DJ Z-Trip - Shifting Gears
28. Low - The Great Destroyer
29. Feist - Let It Die
30. Destroyer - Notorious Lightning and Other Works
31. Crooked Fingers - Dignity and Shame
32. Iron & Wine/Calexico - In The Reins
33. The Bees - Free The Bees
34. Stephen Malkmus - Face The Truth
35. My Morning Jacket - Z
36. Liz Janes & Create(!) - Liz Janes & Create(!)
37. MF Doom - MM..Food

Looking forward to:
38. DangerDoom - The Mouse & The Mask
39. Kanye West - Late Registration
40. The Double - Loose In The Air
41. The Constantines - Tournament of Hearts
42. Rogue Wave - Descended Like Vultures
43. Wolf Parade - Apologies To The Queen Mary

So far, this is what I have to choose from. I'll browse the albums I've heard this year but didn't actually (or don't intend to) purchase in Step Two. Please, if you feel there are any glaring omissions to this list do let me know after I finish Step Two.

Use Headphones [mix two]

10/05/2005
01. You Get A Horse's Hoe - Half Handed Cloud
02. Shoes - Akron/Family
03. The Tourist - The Robot Ate Me
04. Not For Sale - CocoRosie
05. 3-Shy-Cubs - Holopaw
06. Not Even Stevie Nicks - Calexico
07. Cotes des Neiges - Stars
08. Airport - Karate
09. The Will To Death - John Frusciante
10. In California - Neko Case
11. On The Mountain - The Angels of Light
12. I'll Be Yr Bird - M. Ward (the version from Duet for Guitars #2)

no purchase necessary

Meet Normal. He's an older gentleman, a real person (with a fake name). Norm--for short--is involved in a long-term relationship with a woman, we'll call her Judy--Jude is his for short for her (what the fuck, it's a nom de guerre (so to speak) too). How real is Norm? Oh, rest assured Norm is as real as anything Normal can get. How do I know for sure? I get his damn mail. What about Jude? Well, I've seen her naked, if that counts for anything. How long-term is their relationship? Hard to say from where I stand.

Some backstory is in order. Norm divorced his second wife, Asha (again, we gotta go with a false identity) in 1987. I was 7 at the time. Norm's first wife is not known, but it is known that she bore him one child, female, aged approximately 12 years older than I. Shortly after leaving Asha (which was a long time after leaving wife no. 1), Norm began rehearsing a multi-role part in a local business community guild olio show to be held at a local arts center. It is presumed that he first encountered Jude at some informal rehearsal. I can only imagine what it must have been like; office drones sloughing their weekday game faces to play like highschoolers putting on cheap, cheesy renditions of and tributes to last season's SNL sketches. What fun! I don't know if it's like this for every generation, but it seems like it must have been incredibly sexually odd to live your late 30's in the late 80's.

I see Norm back then, beard in full force and charm turned into the red, practicing his lines while he perfects his tongue-in-lip crochety old man impression backstage. Asha's kicked him out, and Jude's a peroxide blonde with an ass that's only just beginning to spread out and take the shape of her office chair. She wears black stirrup pants at every rehearsal, and Norm just can't resist the clingy material and the wicked gleam in her eye. He knows on some level that he should stand down, concentrate on working things out with Asha--if only for the sake of their three children--and even though he's got it on good authority that she's a psychotic bitch-monster. His kids mean a lot to him, or at least that's what he tells himself as he struts on stage. Struts keenly aware that Jude's somewhere in the theater. That all is how I imagine they met.

Out of my imagination and back into realtiy, Norm did try to go back to Asha once. It didn't work out. She really was a bitch-monster. He rued the blow he and his soon to be ex-wife were dealing to their children, but moved on nonetheless. And how! He persued peroxide Jude immediately and persistently. She was charmed--of course--and soon enough they were definitely together. His kids had to know at some point, so Asha found out too. Whatever.

Soon enough he had another kid, when he moved in and had to deal full-time with Jude's young son. Soon enough after that he had another daughter, his and Jude's own.

While it is known when Jude and Norm began living together, it is not known when--or even if they ever got married. When probed on the matter, Norm mentions two things in close succession: 1) That even if they never did bother with the whole church-ceremony-cake fiasco, they'd be married by common law by now anyway and 2) He's not telling either way. Suffice to say they've been living together for a long time.

Long enough that knowing Norm as I do and as long as I have I'd say maybe he's become restless, just a bit. He's an active guy, gets around town on the job and doesn't slouch on the social end of things either. He's notorious for eyeing off the occasional young woman, and any middle-aged to older woman is a given target of his considerable charm. He could carry on a relatively coherent conversation if we had a cute waitress, say, but when my eyes peeled back to him from off her ass his were always still glued. I wouldn't be surprised if he copped the same looks and flirted the same ways in other areas of his life, and that it paid off for him at least once.

Accordingly, I'm also not that surprised to get mail at my home from Victoria's Secret with his name on it. I guess I don't mind much that Norm's gettin' some on the side, and I most certainly don't mind the free panty (plus $5 off any bra) coupons.

You go, Norm!
Keep 'em coming!

Currently Listening:
The Best of The Beta Band: Music (live disc)
By The Beta Band

the traveling ironies

this weekend (we'll define this term as friday evening through monday morning) I went outside of my house exactly once. for that short period of time, which constituted about four hours on saturday night, I felt alright. beer helped, if only because it made me think I was vomiting because of the alcohol and not whatever the fuck was infesting and attacking and pukifying my body the rest of the time.

the remainder of this weekend was spent in the confines of my humble abode, consuming what little food I had, and consummately regurgitating it into my humble commode. i was sick, booo. my theory (keep in mind that theories and the wonder of WebMD.com are all I have to work with here due to the ambiguously conscious "choice" of living below the poverty line and eschewing healthcare for its prohibitive costs) on how I got sick is thus:

sprouts.

you see, I forgot to ask the hot 19-year old waitress at Bison Witches to hold the sprouts on my full-sized green turkey. I ate half the sandwich fresh on thursday, and the rest of it friday afternoon. very shortly after that friday afternoon--really just minutes on into evening friday--I got started on painting every restroom I encountered. the project lasted until yesterday afternoon.

I blame myself entirely. after all, I am the one who chose to bike home my leftovers, then bike them to work the next day. I am the one who forgot to pass on the sprouts. I am the one who actually ingested the broodwich. maybe if somone else ate it, I could have found some excuse to leave off being sick. as it stands, I blame myself entirely.

moving on, there are a couple of interesting happenstances from this weekend that resulted despite my illness. for one, I got to see Dan Bejar live and in person. for another I got to see Neko Case live and in person. yet another is that I got to see Carl Newman live and in person. one more is that I got to see Mr. Fancey (I can't remember his first name) [5 minutes later - Todd. Todd Fancey. I think....] live and in person. That is, I saw my favorite band, Destroyer, open for the New Pornographers. Hooray! Someday I'll write up a show review. Look forward to it.

the other half of the previously-mentioned couple (if you can dig) is that I booked a flight to the city of angels. that's right, my west coast-flavored friends, I'll be in LA friday the 28th through monday the 31st of october. I honestly believe that the only reason I was able to book a flight out of tucson is that I was flat-on-my-back ill and hermited by disease. it must have been some reaction to the feeling that I couldn't move that made me want to skip town. otherwise, I think I would have put the purchase off and off and off until it was almost too late. now, I'll take this opportunity (among others) to solicit rides to and from the airport(s). If you're interested, let me know and I'll provide the details. I already have a place to stay, and am working on a Halloween costume.

finally, I'll note that I am feeling better today. the fever's down, and I actually downed some solids. I plan on leaving my house today. I plan on existing on a similar (if slightly skewed) plane as the rest of you for the next while or so (as opposed to the plane I existed on this past weekend, which was covered with vomit and not at all as pleasant as the one I suspect you folks hang out on) so keep an eye out for me.

finally finally, the guitar hook for the Jim Yoshii Pile-Up's The Mind of God sounds exactly like the vocal melody of Love Will Tear Us Apart and makes me want to sing those lyrics.

Currently Listening:
Now You Know
By Doug Martsch

Pop [mix one]

9/24/2005
01. Something - Sam Prekop
02. Fear of Drowning - British Sea Power
03. Parallel or Together - Ted Leo
04. Is This Love? - CYHSY
05. Oh Fine - French Kicks
06. Lives of Crime - Fruit Bats
07. Gideon - My Morning Jacket
08. Farrar, Straus & Girous - Destroyer
09. Punchdrunk Lovesick Singalong - Radiohead
10. The Stars & Stripes Forever - Matmos
11. I Felt Your Shape - The Microphones
12. Don't Forget To Breathe (Demo) - Beulah

masturbation

I'm a mystery wrapped in a connundrum swaddled in a riddle. I'm a belugah whale belched into twelve hurricanes sunk to the bottom of a sea hung out to dry. Where I come from you gotta play it straight. You gotta dress smart, stand tall, and always take your eye off the ball. Where I come from there ain't no bologna, no tussle, no malarky, there ain't no colorful ribbons, no top 40, no brown hullabaloos, there aint no snakes! where I come from. I'm tougher'n nails tipped with dragon poison brewed in hell. I'm longer than forever twice over. I'm susceptible to falling in love.

Currently Listening:
Cripple Crow
By Devendra Banhart

one thread

have you ever tried to take one aspect of your life as it is today, and trace it as far back as possible through your memory? admittedly, it's not an easy thing to do. for one, many aspects of our lives at any given stage are only remotely connected to who/what/where we were, say at 3 years old. how many threads of the tapestry of your life are woven from the one end to the (rapidly expanding, sorta ragged, unfinished) end you're at now?

I found one a few days ago.

it's a picture. I just pulled it out from under two large boxes of VHS tapes that I keep under my desk. before that, it was pinned to a stained, blowzy, disarrayed bulletin board I have up on the kitchen counter to give the cockroaches their own little back alley. before that, I think it might have resided on my mother's refridgerator door for quite some time.

in the picture, which you can see in my collection of images on my profile, two children embrace. the little boy in the green pants and snazzy striped shirt is me. the little girl in her daddy's tube socks and a precious lacy dress (with bloomers!) doesn't need to be named. I'm not sure I'd be able to pick her out of a crowd or recognize her at lunch somewhere today.

but I knew her when I wore diapers. I after-schooled at her house my entire kindergarten year. I crushed on her in high school. I saw her occasionally around town during college, always in passing. and now she makes me smile from all the way back at Thanksgiving 1983.

she's a memory, an entity, a thread through almost my entire life. whether she was present in person, or just represented (like in this picture), she's been around since I was two. perhaps what gets me most about that is that how you see us in that picture is probably the closest we ever were. I was never friends with her after kindergarten; I moved to a different school for first grade. then another school for the rest of elementary. we ended up at the same high school, but there was 670 kids in the graduating class, so the chances of us having a single class together out of four years was rather low (also, I suspect we just ended up on different tracks), and we never socialized. sure, I knew her in HS as the girl I hug in the picture, and as a really cute blonde who wouldn't give me the time of day at age 17. but nothing ever came close to that hug.

anyway, I like tracing cracks in asphalt. I'm fond of fractals. and I like remembering between mes; conjuring up the emotions and connections of a self that I am no longer to the me I am now. that cute little girl in her red and white dress is a big connector.

while I'm at it, I'll mention that I have the picture in question available for ranking. I do so only because it's been ranked twice, to the composite score of 4.6. that, in and of itself, is hardly worth mentioning. however, I did mention it to a myspace friend back when the picture had been ranked only once, to a composite score of 4.6. weird.

Currently Listening:
12 Etudes, Op. 10
By Chopin
Performed by Cecile Licad

shorter, but as fucked up as the one with two girls

I get a little giddy when I can tell if a person's unsure of my sexual preference. I think I'm just entertained by the idea of ambiguity.


Currently Listening:
The Glow Pt. 2
By The Microphones

oddmatch

If you've scanned my profile at all, you'll have noticed that I'm currently reading a book entitled "Metamagical Themas" while taking shits. If you didn't know, it's an annotated collection of articles written by Douglas R. Hofstadter for Scientific American back in the late 70's and early 80's. The subtitle of the book provides some context for the content within: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern. It's pretty dense reading, stuff written by a really super-dooper smart guy for an intellectually active adult audience.

In other words, it's over my head most of the time. But I make my way slowly, reading and re-reading until I understand what the fuck he's talking about, and I find myself totally enrapt with this guy's thoughts. His brilliance is, well, illuminating. So far one section of the book has been about self-referentiality ("self-referentiality is hard to type!" works better with "self-referentiality"), which quite obviously influenced some earlier posts on this blog. The second section of the book works through perception and people (it's called "Sense and Society"), and in it today I read an article called "World Views In Collision: The Skeptical Inquirer versus the National Enquirer."

This article addresses the issue of knowledge and skepticism, specifically mentioning things like tabloid articles, ESP, and paranormal happenings. At one point it mentions the idea that humans have a really great time of noticing oddmatches, or coincidents. We pick 'em out with ease, as if we were a super-awesome car stereo that can pick up pop stations loud and clear in the middle of nowhere on some lonely interstate. But when you think about it, the probability of hearing one certain continuous pitch of static is essentially the same as hearing a crystal clear broadcast in the long run. What us humans suck at is recognizing how high long-term probabilities of those oddmatches are. As Tyler Durden (maybe, almost--I'm paraphrasing here) said, "on a long enough timeline the survival rate is 0." Everyone dies, there's lots of static on the radio, and weird shit is bound to happen.

So, odd enough, some weird shit happened today. Thing is, it's really only weird because I spent the day reading that damn article (or dozing off with it in my lap) during the slow moments. I should mention that I took it to work with me, so the time spent reading the several-page article was not all on the crapper. Only some. Another result of the article (which I recommend reading to those who poop) is that I am uber-skeptical today, and tempted to accept only very solidly common-sensical things. I'm having a bit of trouble sorting out all of the contributing issues, so I'm going to try to sketch them out here and ask for your input:

1. The first girl.
- Some time ago we start hanging out in a socially neutral setting, and to get to know one another a little bit.
- We hook the intarweb thing up. She knows I'm interested in seeing her in non-socially-neutral settings, and I (naively) only suspect the same of her.
- She accuses me of being Martin, and when I tell her I have no idea what she's talking about she forwards me a love letter that ended up in her mailbox. It's a sappy, head-over-heels, tongue-in-cheek sort of affair that reeks of spam. Unfortunately, Martin's writing style is similar to mine own.
- I guess I finally convince her I'm not Martin (I'm really not), and we hang out on occasion in honest-to-god socially-active situations. I think I might kinda, you know, like her.
- And so on, but things are currently awkward on my end (it could only be because most anything you could think of--like grating cheese or riding a bike or sock drawer reorganizing--is fairly awkward on my end).

2. The Article.
- Keep in mind I've been reading this article all day, and it has me in a skeptical bent. I'm watching out for odd matches, being wary of finding signal in the noise where there isn't one, that sort of thing.

3. The second girl.
- I get a charming message in my MySpace inbox from this second girl, whom I don't know. She's new to Tucson (she spelled it Tuscon, heh)--wait! coincidentally, Girl no. 1 is also new to Tucson! what's going on here?
- Her charming message has all of the ringers of a spam-type situation: no MySpace buddies, pretty skeletal profile.
- In Hofstadter's article there's a paragraph that's a description of you. That is, when you read the paragraph, it describes you just like, oh i don't know, a horoscope describes you. Her profile is like that, in the sense that she seems pretty ideal and the guy she says she's looking for sounds just like what every guy will believe about himself when told the same.
- But I don't get the same bells and whistles I had when I read Martin's love letter. Martin came off like some asshole who would send a love letter to random girls on the intermanet just to make 'em wonder.
- Girl no. 2, given my reading choice for today and a little natural innerneb paranoia, comes off like Girl no. 1 getting ideas from Martin.
- Girl no. 2 proposes to continue to "chat" online via email (oh, that's another thing: her email is spammy-smelling too) and maybe hang out in her initial message. The just friends thing, you know, which is fine by me. Meanwhile, as honest and objective an evaluation as possible hints that that is exactly what Girl no. 1 might want.

Putting all of this together, what I'm left with is a few questions:

1. Is Girl no. 2 really Girl no. 1? They have different pictures, yes, and there's no way I could really be sure based on the evidence currently accumulated; I don't know either near well enough.

1.1 Could Girl no. 1 be both Girl no. 2 and Martin?

2. Do I respond to Girl no. 2 at her word? That's a good question even without the article and Girl no. 1 fuzzing shit up. I'd hate to be taken in by spam and made the fool. I'd also really like to get to know more people in this town. I need friends. Like, tangible ones that'll knock some sense into me when I get paranoid. On the other hand, Girl no. 2 could just be Girl no. 1 offering the same thing as a way to clear up any awkwardness that might afflict our current relationship.

3. Should I take this whole situation in all its glorious paranoia to Girl no. 1, the way she took Martin to me? Like I said, it's awkward even without me bringing up this weird shit.

4. Or should I just make light of it in a post, get drunk, and wait for everyone to read about it? The intarmanaweb shitstorm would be awesome.

I can answer the last one myself, but any input on the other questions or the situation in general would be greatly appreciated. Also, there's one more question from a previous post that I really would like some feedback on, and is sort of related to all this shit:

5. Am I a moron any longer if I recognize and accept the idea that I'm a moron, then factor that information into my action reasoning? Does pre-supposing moronness obviate it?

I think the answers to those last two are "yes" and "no" respectively, but I'd like to hear what you have to say on the topic nonetheless.

Currently Listening:
The Unseen
By Quasimoto

every other post

I'm not sure what it bodes stylistically, but I think apologizing for each post in the next is a pretty good way to keep writing here. i never change or remove anything i may indulge every once in a long while by slightly (really, just barely) changing a post a bit later on after i'd "finished" it, but for the most part I like to leave things be and just try to explain away any, um, odd instances of my writing after the fact.

I'll probably also wind up using most posts to set stylistic rules to break, or awkwardly point back at some linguistic quirk i employ (in case you miss it on your own), or to explain everything in fuzzily exacting detail. I'll probably tell you what I plan to do (and how I plan to do it) instead of actually doing it. I'll probably never use simple sentences (there'll always be parenthetical--or break-in urgent--ideas to tack on/plug in). And, oh, the self-referentiality and contradiction will be ridiculous.

anyway, to this post's apology (about the last post): that wasn't really meant to sound like bad poetry (does one ever aim for that though?). I understand that it does. but look, can you really write something expansive and explanatory about a love for small complexity? you just gotta be terse. gotta be terse. be terse. terse. .

Currently Listening:
Home Is In Your Head
By His Name Is Alive

hollow happy words

there are mini highlights in every moment, movement, mount. small joys enjoyed in small parts. wonder in the smallest, innermost.

to have miniature highs and monumental lows. to be happy with the random wrinkles, and angry at smooth surfaces for secreting their smallest interesting parts behind a facade. to eat and be digested. disgusted. regurgitated.

grandiose is not expected, except of the sky. (fiery sunset)

Currently listening: Holopaw By Holopaw

fair warning very early on

having started this whole web log thing again (if any of you remember the ubps days, you'll kindly also recall that you're probably considered a friend and forget them immediately), I think there are a few things I should set out right here at the beginning. Ground rules, for myself as much as anyone else, listed in no particular order of importance, and conveniently located here very near the beginning of this--if I may--"blog" where those reading in reverse chronological order might never find it.

call it potential hindsight correction. you know, in case someone else later on reads this whole damn log in reverse chronological order. I imagine some woman I'm interested in down the line settling down at her computer, all dolled up in her comfy clothes on a lonely, tipsy Saturday night and doing a little standard background checking. she finds this blog in some Google cache--or better yet, still going!--and starts with the most recent post. of course, it's witty and wry and ironic and oddly twisted and annoyingly self-conscious and she's intrigued. she keeps reading.

keep in mind, it's a long way back to this post, the one you're reading; these ground rules, this explanatory manual of painstakingly assembled context specifically to be referred to in the future, as the blog ages and matures and grows and blossoms. before that lady ever gets all the way back here, she reads all the fucked up ranting and idiotically lurid mind wanderings of this tortured soul.

she's really freaked out now--but she can't stop reading--when the insight calvary rides in and saves the day(/night/potentially positive nature of the relationship): she finally comes back to this post...

hang on one second, I smell something burning.

(10 minutes later)

JESUS FUCKING CHRIST. I was talking about ground rules at some point. Well, here's number one, the first: No blogging while making dinner. I just freakin' scrubbed down my stove a half hour ago (down being a key word here; I removed a layer of "flavor" about a quarter-inch thick) and now here I am letting the pot boil over. And now here I am letting my dinner get cold. And now here I am still typing, dammit.

Fuck ground rules. Let's eat!

Currently Listening:
Songs On Radio Idaho
By The Actual

wherein every sentence is like battery cables to the brain

This sentence no verb.
Cette phrase en francais est difficile a traduire en anglais.
"yields falsehood, when appended to its quotation." yields falsehood, when appended to its quotation.
What is a question that can serve as its own answer?
In order to make sense of "this sentence", you will have to ignore the quotes in "it".
This is a sentence with "onions", "lettuce", "tomato", and "a side of fries to go".
This is a hamburger with vowels, consonants, commas, and a period at the end.
A ceux qui ne comprennent pas l'anglais, la phrase citee ci-dessous ne dit rien: "For those who know no French, the French sentence that introduced this quoted sentence has no meaning."
I am not the person who wrote me.
I am jealous of the first word in this sentence.
I am simultaneously writing and being written.
I am the thought you are now thinking.
Do you think anyone has ever had precisely this thought before?**
The reader of this sentence exists only while reading me.
Say, haven't you written me somewhere else before?
Thit sentence is not self-referential because "thit" is not a word.
No language can express every thought unambiguously, least of all this one.
When you are not looking at it, this sentence is in Sanskrit.
If this sentence were in Chinese, it would say something else.
If I had finished this sentence,
What would this sentence be like if Pi were 3?
because I didn't think of a good beginning for it.
This sentence was in the past tense.
In the time it takes you to read this sentence, eighty-six letters could have been processed by your brain.
This sentence has cabbage six words.
You may quote me.
Does this sentence remind you of Agatha Christy?

** these are all cribbed from the first article in Douglas R. Hofstadter's Metamagical Themas. How does it hurt?

Currently Listening:
Loose In The Air
By The Double

justification

I buy a lot of couches. I mean, A LOT of couches. I'm into the comfort thing, lounging around my apartment (it's big, to fit so many couches). On a good Saturday night I find myself at the furniture warehouse with all the hip kids in town. The door charge is totally worth all the great couches I get to laze about in. But lemme tell ya, a couch is expensive. It looks even more so when you spend the percentage of income that I do on couches. So I carefully evaluate every couch I'm interested in before I buy it. I sit in it, make some time for the cushions to mold to my ass, get up and walk around for a bit, then sit down again. It takes a bit of time, but the people who sell me the couch understand that I'm seriously considering investing in their couch, and that if I like it I'll recommend the model to everyone I meet at the next warehouse blowout or online. If it fits, I buy it. If not, next couch! Some couch retailers don't understand my situation, and I just don't buy couches from them. Anyway, I can't just buy every couch I sit on. That would make for some awkward situations at friends' houses, or in hotel lobbies, or at the arthouse cinema down the block. But I do buy couches; not as many as I try out, true, but a lot of couches nonetheless.

Currently Listening:
Homesongs
By Adem

love schemes

I'd forgotton how nice it is to have this kind of outlet for my whimsy. And, I don't have to set anything up! Sweet!

Anyway, I got some spam today that wasn't automatically redirected by hotmail, but because I'd posted an email address on my profile I thought I'd give it a look. Boy, am I ever happy I did! Zowee! Here's a snippet of the email I got:

Hello,

Do 
accept my sincere apologies if my mail does not meet your 
personal ethics. I will introduce myself as Mr.Robbin Kuuk,
a staff in the accounts management section of the above 
firm here in the United Kingdom.

One of our accounts with holding balance of �15,000,000
(Fifteen Million British Pounds) has been dormant and has 
not been operated for the past four  (4) years.

From my investigations and confirmations, the owner of 
this account, a foreigner by name Kurt Kahle died in 
July, 2000...

It goes on, of course, but I think you know what it says. I enjoyed the fresh plot of a British businessman dealing in Pounds Sterling instead of the usual hereditary prince of BFA, so I thought I'd reward them with a reply. Here it is:

Hello Mr. Robbin Kuuk -

Do you believe in love at first read?

I sure do. Having received your email regarding what, I don't know, and having read the glorious prose through which you set forth some fraudulent scheme, I instantly became wholly infatuated with you.

Will you bear my children? Will you blow alternating hot and cold? Will you make sweet, sweet, love to me and my family while we discuss financial balderdash and evil identity theft plot schemes? Oh, I do hope so.

Ethics need not be considered. My steaming pile of love for you transcends ethics, travels deep into and well beyond the cold, desolate realm of scruples, envelopes and destroys the concepts of money, power, and sexuality, whizzes at lightning speed by the flesh-eating morass of politics, government and soverignity, and leads (hopefully) to your soft, wet cavities.

Pleasure me with your English Pounds. Load your ridiculously improbable amounts of money onto my hardened, thrumming sex drive, and let us fuck away our cares. I'll do you first, and once I've had my way with your hidden Kuuk, we'll see about you getting yours.

If there is any possibility of us meeting in person, so I can fill you with my hot bank deposit and you can wear my identity like a mask over your bulging, deceased assets, please reply and let me know. I am eager to feel your skin on my sharpened objects.

Please, please do not ignore my fantasy. If you do, I'll tell my daddy who works at Fox News. I know you.

Peace,
Ted

The last time I replied to one of these (he was "African" with a poor command of the english language), we went back and forth discussing the possibility of burying the money he had access to in my backyard. I'm hoping for some more exciting fireworks this time.

Currently Listening:
Leviathon
By Mastadon

wine

Jesus, I'd almost forgotton. It's been a long while since I've sat down and had a few glasses of wine. Beer and whiskey at the bar plenty in the past few, but a cheap bottle of corked red and a sofa has long been absent from my life. If only for the hot lovin' that used to come afterwards. That would round things out nicely, I think.

Alas, though I wasn't alone, I certainly wasn't with anyone, and that makes for a bit drier experience. Oh, and HBO dramedy season finale programming is a bit of a mood killer, even between friends. But I'm still drunk, and in a pleasanter fashion than I've been since almost a year ago. There's a lot to say in favor of that.

Instead of going on at length on the topic, though, I think I'll just drift off to sleep amid the meandering strains of Mick Turner's guitar.

Currently Listening:
Marlan Rosa
By Mick Turner