Billy Cleans His Plate

Ketchup

2008-11-13T21:17:00.000-08:00

I do not like the condiment ketchup, we’re not friends. I’m also not fond of catsup. I know that this, along with my complete ambivalence towards football, makes me somehow un-American. It astounded my former roommate Raf to the point of him stating, “you’re the only white boy I know who doesn’t like ketchup.” I was astounded by his ability to lure fifteen-year-old girls into his skeezy clutches.

Anywho, some things that have happened since we last spoke:

America got all kinds of better (California somehow took a giant step backwards – I’m looking at you Orange County).

In trying to write lyrics to a song, I realized I was re-writing “From A Whisper To A Scream”.

I taught Kickers the joys of the Eskimo Kiss. Or is it Inuit kissing? Whatever, he digs rubbing noses.

I had an almost perfect Seattle moment when waiting for a bus in some unincorporated part of the city, in the rain, Modest Mouse came on the headphones.

I saw the latest Bond girl naked. Okay, that one’s a lie. It was Chuck Hunt I saw naked.

I went to see a show that had a couple former cast mates performing their brains out. The director asked if I would come do her next show, and I said sure. She then sheepishly asked if I would consider doing it in drag and I quickly realized she didn’t know me that well.

I had a quick flashback to my bachelor party where the stripper made me wear her dress – and no one was surprised.

I realized that despite my best efforts, I might be growing up. A possible and serious life change did not throw me for a loop. I took a deep breath and said, “Okay, we’ll make it happen.”

I let loose that deep breath in relief when that possible and serious life change turned out to be nothing.

I annoyed my friends showing them how friggin sexy my new iPhone is. Seriously, that thing’s gotta lightsaber.

Today Is A Good Day

2008-11-05T11:55:00.000-08:00

Emotional, tongue tied, proud.

Motorized Instinct

2008-10-29T21:12:00.001-07:00

When it comes to zombie movies, and man I love some zombie movies, you have to go with George A. Romero. The guy started it with his shot on the weekends in black and white Night of the Living Dead. It’s a simple story – the dead mysteriously begin to return to life to eat the flesh of the living. They cannot be killed unless the brain is destroyed.

The original is a great, tight little horror movie and all of the sequels have something to offer. They’re not progressing any story necessarily, just taking the viewer further along in the days of the zombie apocalypse. Dawn of the Dead takes off a couple of days, maybe weeks, after the initial night; humans are scattering to survive, fleeing cities for the country. Day of the Dead shows a world mostly overrun, hope for survival pinned on pockets of underground installations of stir crazy military and scientists hoping to train the zombies. Land of the Dead extracts it even further; the world has lost hope of this ending, humans are exiled to scattered, fortified cities and special units sent out to small towns to gather supplies. But the zombies are starting to learn and don’t like being used as target practice. Diary of the Dead takes us back to the first days with a first person camera approach.

For my money, you cannot beat Dawn of the Dead; funny, scary, tense and gory as all get out. Four survivors flee the city and accidentally end up taking root in a shopping mall. As with all of his Dead movies, Romero makes a point about the times they were shot in. Here it’s not as heavy handed as in some of the others because it doesn’t need to be. Shots of zombies strolling a mall, aside from the rotting flesh, don’t look much different from any other day in any other mall.

But more than that, and the point that most everyone seems to miss when watching Romero’s zombie epics, is the idea that we as humans will rebuild in our own image when things get hairy, but refuse to learn from the past. Invariably in his films, we as people build the same society only to fuck it up for ourselves do to greed, jealousy, ignorance…

Why Dawn though? It moves at a good frenetic pace, like a horror comic brought to life, and there’s this lack of gloss to it that makes you feel like anything can happen. Plus these guys hole up in a mall, it’s like an adolescent fantasy mixed in a missive from the end of times. Oh, and the soundtrack kicks fucking ass; great, liberal use of mall music to underscore the action.

While I did enjoy the remake on some levels, it just doesn’t compare. Why? There was no need to remake it, for one. As it was a studio release it had that safe, well produced shine to it. The original unrated Dawn of the Dead got away with horrifying zombie carnage as it didn’t have to worry about a studio or the sensors. Plus the remake had running zombies. Cool for a bit, but there is something absolutely overwhelmingly dreadful in the fact that these shambling, slow moving messes are inevitably going to get you – and eat you.

A mini, gory epic – with zombies. Eight kinds of awesome.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Tundra/Desert” by Modest Mouse.

Camp Blood

2008-10-28T21:26:00.001-07:00

The good news of the situation is that my stomach probably can still hold up to a couple slices of pizza and some whisky; I feared that my age was catching up and this cannot happen. The bad news is that stomach flu was the culprit.

On the mend, but now behind by a couple of days. What I wanted to do this week, in celebration of the nearing of Halloween, was go over a handful of my favorite horror movies.

Caveat 1: My favorites lists tend to switch up on an almost daily basis.

Caveat 2: I’m cheating from the get go as I’m starting out with Friday the 13th, parts 1-4.

Wait! How can you pick 1-4 of a cheesy ass slasher series? Well, because it’s my game. Friday the 13th was nothing more than a way for some guys to make a quick buck; get some young actors in the woods, a small arsenal of sharp garden tools, some latex and fake blood and this sucker writes itself. The rundown (and okay spoiler alert):

Part 1 starts out with the mother of a deformed and drowned young Jason Voorhees taking her revenge on camp counselors at a reopening Camp Crystal lake. Virginal survivor hacks off her head with a machete. Part 2 finds us 5 years later where traumatized survivor is taken out by a mystery man who turns out to be none other than the not dead Jason Voorhees. He makes his way back to Crystal Lake and through a handful of counselors in training. Part 3 (in super 3-D on it’s original release) finds Jason going on strong the following day. He’s no longer necessarily seeking revenge, just inventive ways to slaughter teens who drink, smoke pot and screw. Some nice 3D effects include obligatory bodies thrown through windows and an eyeball being popped out. This also marks where Jason gets his hockey mask to cover his deformed face. Part 4 (named The Final Chapter) again picks up the following day and again shows our man hacking his way through horny teens and a not so great Jason hunter until he is confused by a young make up wiz and whacked on with a machete a number of times. Part 4 is a well directed little number with some impressive effects – one of those effects being Crispin Glover.

No, they’re not great, but I still can feel the unease I had when I thought of these movies as a child. They’re a morality tale people will say – bad people, people who do drugs and have sex get killed. That’s crap. They’re fairy tales and they speak to something primal within us. There’s a monster in the dark woods that we have to face to get out and see another day; an unstoppable monster that will hunt you down and eradicate all kinds of bad 80’s fashion. And much like the old fairy tales, these movies are grisly. They pushed the boundaries of makeup effects and sensor boards. They were a strange roller coaster, a dare to get scared and see if you could watch someone get an axe to the head and not peek through your fingers. Plus you got to see some tame sex scenes, again primal…

After Part 4, things got weird and silly and got away from that basic and effective monster in the woods story. But the first four, bad or good, still hold a place in my young heart as Halloween favorites.

Oh yeah, Rocktober Song of the Day: "Web in Front" by Archers of Loaf.

Get (Off) On The Bus

2008-10-21T21:02:00.001-07:00

This has been a plain crappy Rocktober. Seriously Billy, what the hell? Let’s play a tiny bit of catch up.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Third Uncle” by Brian Eno.

It’s been some rough times kids, he said with a solemn look to his eyes, a sly smile to offset it a little. But I’m tired of friggin’ talking about it. I seem to be better in my head, and I’m hoping that throwing those words out don’t come back to slap me on the ass.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Strange” by Wire

Yesterday, I rode the bus into work, through the cold, through the dark, and not soaking in that rolling feeling in my stomach of desperation and hated anger. I was listening to some Virgil Shaw – so very nice. It wasn’t up terribly loud so I could hear the bus driver calling the stops. These calls usually begin with the amplified sound of the driver pulling over the flexi arm of the microphone, sounding like a metal Satan unfurling his metal penis. And yeah, after that you expect a bus stop called with some gusto: “California and Faunt – la – fuckin’ – roy bitches!” But the driver yesterday morning whispered out the stops.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Serpentine Pad” by Pavement

I thought this was funny at first. Maybe the bus driver was just putting a little style into her routine. Then as it continued to happen I began to think that maybe she was coming on to us, as if the subtext to a hushed “28th and Thistle” was “hey babies, who wants a good time?” I continued to think this was funny. I mean in my mind, she wanted all of us, possibly particularly the girl who wears short skirts even when it’s October cold out. Seriously, she was gonna pull that rig over for some serious good times, I could hear it in the excited sigh that was “16th and Roxbury”. For some reason, this whispering was really catching me as funny. Not so much when I think back on it and realize the rational was probably laryngitis and that she was in pain.

Who am I kidding, still funny.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Hang Me Out To Dry” by Cold War Kids

Southern Washington, Sunday Afternoon

2008-10-07T20:40:00.000-07:00

Driving back from Portland, windshield wipers deliberately set a bit slow. It was the big drops falling, the ones that are so swollen that they seem to have somehow shifted past being mere rain. I watched them hit the window. I watched the seventy mile an hour air brush them out along the glass and reflect the surrounding gray and green in a still life impression for a short, short moment. Wipers come in, do their gig.

It made me think of stolen moments in Northern California. Not really thinking of moments, it gave me the calm feeling of those moments, an all too brief moment of comfort. I tried to fit that feeling with actual memories the mind had stored; a wet walk up a windy and beautifully lonely road, roasting a chicken while the world outside was equally freezing and wet, the sound of a river full of itself.

None of them fit the feeling quite right, threatened to sully it, so I quit trying to make it work. I tried to just feel that comfort for a bit, watched the rain do its thing.

I wanted to sleep for a long time.

Rocktober Song of the Day: "I Turn My Camera On" by Spoon. Seriously, deny the sexiness. I dare you.

Gang Bands

2008-10-01T20:29:00.000-07:00

I was running full long into a day that was not starting well. John on KEXP played “Where Is My Mind?” by Pixies, and I thought, “well all right.” He then did “Pictures of Matchstick Men” by Camper Van Beethoven. Not my top choice for a Camper Van Beethoven song, but I’ll take it.

This for some reason got me thinking about that radio show Loveline. Now back in the day, Loveline was a local show in LA on KROQ, it was not syndicated. In fact, for those of you out there who are fans of Heathers, the show that Veronica and green Heather rush to the room to listen to while yellow Heather talks of suicide is based on the old Loveline. The DJ in the movie is in fact the Poorman, who used to host Loveline.

And all of that for this…

One such back in the day show talked about gangs. As much as the news would have us believe differently, us kids in south Orange County didn’t have much to fear in the way of gangs, so this seemed an odd choice. But some guy calls up to defend the idea of gangs, that he was in a gang and they weren’t thugs and didn’t go out to hurt people; his gang was a group of guys who supported each other in their musical endeavors.

This, by the way, is not a gang. This is called a band.

But, in honor of this, the first day of Rocktober, I say unto thee that I want to start a band and act like it’s a gang.

We’ll have initiation rites where we pummel a new member with a C and E combo two chord jam. We’ll get into tussles with other bands where we spank each other with cables, twiddle the knobs on some other guy’s effects peddle and effectively whacking out the tone on the distortion they’d spent so much time crafting just right. Other bands would write songs about our lifestyle.

And then those bands would eventually get arrested for possession; of song books probably, or at least tablature sheets. We would eventually do public service tours, talk to youngsters about how they don’t want to join bands, live clean, praise Jebus.

It tastes like glory good people, and glory tastes like banana popsicles.

Rocktober Song of the Day: “Debaser” by Pixies.

These Dreams

2008-09-25T16:57:00.001-07:00

I’m totally bogged down with work stuff that I have to do, but I’m taking a few minutes for me, right now.

Dig it.

I had this dream the other night, where I kept finding all of these extra rooms in the house I was living in. I found a door inside the washing machine, and when I went through it there was this huge room. The door off that room led to this short hallway where there was another door to this huge room.

I remember thinking in my dream, “man, I can put so much stuff in here.”

It was as if the former owner of the place had completely forgotten that these rooms were there – and no wonder, being you had go through the washing machine. There was a chest of drawers and a television; the random detritus of a quick move out where what’s not necessary gets left behind.

This dream left me feeling hopeful, I can’t say why. I also had the feeling that if I were to do some investigating into the meaning it might break that fragile little feeling of hope.

So you think that I would have known better than to go to work trying to hold onto that.

Yeah, blah blah work, blah blah you hate your job, blah blah some nimrod in another department did something incredibly stupid that will unfortunately effect you and your team badly, blah blah someone in charge, instead of going about fixing things rationally, is taxing you with fixing this problem in the most inefficient way possible as if you were the guy with the shovel made just to use when someone else poops. Blah blah…

So… I’m up and getting ready to head in at round abouts 5:30 this morning, already feeling the seething come in. It had rained last night, but was clear and cold. There was this sliver, this shaving of ice, this baby’s fingernail of moon hanging over a big, dark pine tree. It threw off enough light to just touch the clouds and excite ‘em a little bit. And a few bright stars, the light blending in with the cold air... It was shockingly beautiful. I could feel everyone asleep around me, and I began to wonder if wasn’t still sleeping as well, feeling the cold because I’d managed to kick off the blankets again.

Now, I don’t like to spend a lot of time up before the sun (and with the coming winter I don’t have a lot of choice), but if they could all feel like that, it wouldn’t be half bad. I put the seething away for a bit, tried to remember that early morning scene, and those extra rooms.

Zeptember Song of the Day: “Baby Come On Home”.

The Curse Of Lono

2008-09-15T21:19:00.000-07:00

I was standing in the backyard, waiting impatiently for that moon, way too large and bright for its own good, to rise up over the trees. I could make it out between the branches, I could make it dance when I swayed myself, but the damn thing just wouldn’t get any higher. But oh, that PBR tasted good.

I got to thinking about the last time that I had a backyard. It was back in the early nineties, when grunge was ripping through the world, and I was slowly realizing that Santa Barbara was not the place I needed to be at that particular time.

The backyard wasn’t ours necessarily, and it was long drop from the back porch. The downstairs neighbor claimed that part of the yard, we got the scrabble of dirt and the occasional pop up of wildflowers that came from a drunken toss of seeds one fine afternoon.

There was the three of us in the house, and Raf. Raf was an older, womanizing, Social Security cheat that didn’t partake in the inebriating excess that we did. The three of us were trying to figure out what it was we were. Part of me loves that devil-may-care, try anything attitude – part of me desperately needed to travel the road to get where I am – but mostly I feel like we were trying too hard.

I was spending a lot of time drunk and writing truly stream of consciousness pages when I could. What little money I could scrounge went towards whiskey. I once, at the daring of one of the others in a moment of figuring out if I was a shoplifter, stole a bottle of Jack Daniels from the liquor store.

One thing that Corado and I decided to try being was dog owners. We went into this with the same amount of preparation that went into most everything else we did at the time; none. “We should get a dog,” one of us said stonily. “We totally should,” the other answered. And off we went to the pound.

We got ourselves a black lab/pit bull mix and we named him Lono after the Hunter S. Thompson book The Curse of Lono. We were all Thompson fans as he made being an inebriated smart ass seem like a logical career move.

Lono ate my hat. Lono spent about ninety-five percent of the evening hours barking his face off. When I took him on a walk one afternoon after class, he went apeshit and tried to attack a Hispanic gardener up the street, the dog literally dragged me across the asphalt while the man ran for his life. Lono welcomed one of Raf’s aggressively under aged girlfriends with wagging tail and doggy smile, only to corner her in the doorway with bared teeth and the sort of emanating growl that spoke of tearing out a throat when she attempted to leave.

I guess it would have been a good idea to pay attention to the Humane Society’s warning that Lono had attempted to maul a kid when he was the dog formerly known as Lightning, but we figured hey, we don’t have any kids. We didn’t take into account Raf’s proclivities.

We also didn’t take into account that we were irresponsible, drug addled, wannabes who had no business owning a dog.

Zeptember Song of the Day: “Heartbreaker” followed by “Living Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman)”. I hate to seem them split up, it hurts a bit.

Dot Dot Dot

2008-09-09T20:55:00.000-07:00

This poor blog, it’s like I’m in a depression and this blog is my general hygiene and appearance – ignored.

Truth be told, I am fighting a depression, but this has nothing to do with why I can’t get it together to post something, it’s the job.

Again with the job, I’m tired of talking and writing and bitching and moaning about this job.

The funny thing about this depression, is that I seem to be getting better at handling them. Instead of months of closing myself off in a room with cigarettes and Cure albums, I go through a few hours, half a day, of absolute despair and then clue in that I got some pretty good shit goin’ on. Positive movement, right?

You’d think so, but each time I’m able to crawl out of my boiling pot of self pity, I think it’s over, that I’ve concurred this demon depression. Then the next day I’m cock smacked in the face by it all over again

It feels like falling down a hill, limping back up said hill, just to have some hairy stranger pee in my mouth.

It’s not really like that at all. But then I start to think that I only see the negative of this situation because I’m fighting a depression, and then I get dizzy with the vortex my head begets.

And then I think I might need a haircut. But then I think I sort of like where my hair is now.

Then I think about those fish deep in the ocean, with the glowing dangly things that come off their heads and lure unsuspecting fish to their mealtime deaths.

Then I think about getting all done up on Ouzo, laying out in a field somewhere and laughing.

Then I think about the fact that with fewer postings here, I hesitate in typing out something just off the cuff and bizarre.

Then I think about how we should all be in Greece right now.

Then I think about how it’s Zeptember, and the Zeptember song of the day is “The Rain Song”.

Song

2008-08-27T21:28:00.001-07:00

There’s a little ritual that I’ve been indulging in for quite awhile now that is pretty much my favorite part of the day - Oxycodone.

I kid of course. Seriously, I’m kidding.

No, it’s putting Kickers down for sleep every night. I’m sure this sounds dumb, and I’m way “kidding out”, so I apologize ahead of time.

The night will lead to dinner, and depending on the sauce quotient of said dinner, it may lead to a bath as well. There’s a diaper changing where we practice the alphabet or counting (it keeps him from getting upset with me for being all up in his junk), there’s the dressing in PJ’s which eventually itself leads a tickle fest of grand proportions. Afterwards, there’s usually some reading.

All of that’s fine and well, it’s the next step that’s the one. And understand, like most kids, this one is not one for just giving up the ghost and charging into sleep, he likes to fight, fight against the dying of the light. There have been some epic screaming fits, particularly when we rudely took the bottle away.

Like father, like son.

But the routine… We get the blanket, he wraps his little arm around my neck, sort of cocks his head on my shoulder, and man, if I have any say in it, that’s a feeling I want to take with me when I go. Then I start to sing.

I don’t know why, but “Ship of Fools” by the Grateful Dead has become the lullaby of choice. He doesn’t shout out requests, I don’t do encores. When I’m done, I tilt him down to get him into the crib and he’s usually either blinking long and slow as if the Baby Oxycodone has kicked in, or he’s smiling. I ask for a kiss, and get it. Then I say my goodnights and walk out to never a fuss since the singing started.

It’s nice that at least once a day I can do something that actually means something.

Rain

2008-08-26T20:17:00.001-07:00

I can’t say that it’s longing for fall, being we haven’t had much of a summer, but we got a metric shit ton of rain in the last couple of days and I was digging it.

On Sunday, the day started out with some promise; mostly blue sky, a fine and fresh smell on the cool breeze. I opened the kitchen window to get some air in the place and was reminded of green things and sunshine, a subtle and slow vitality. Then at some point I heard the raindrops hitting the corrugated fiberglass of the carport.

I was reminded of other times and other memories that weren’t mine, but felt close enough to have been passed down through the blood. There was nothing concrete, nothing visual, just a feeling of calm of having literal shelter from a literal storm.

Kickers went down for a nap and I stood at the window watching all of that muted gray shining through running water. I thought that sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and a book sounded like the best damn idea I’d had in a week. A damn fine idea it was, and the pot of red beans on the stove seemed like the perfect set piece.

A little later I was running errands, driving through washed out streets downtown, the wet and deserted, industrial and absolutely shining atmosphere kindly grabbed hands with the Tom Waits on the stereo with a smile and dragged it along for a great ride.

And yesterday there was more rain, heavy rain. There were lightening bolts that while attention getting, seemed almost ashamed to be here and so out of place.

The thing is, I don’t mind it, all this noise of a storm, all the compressed gloom of the clouds waiting to let loose their load, I'm kinda digging it. I know that summer’s leaving quick, that we’re probably in for a dark and wet and cold winter, but somehow my mind, my soul needed this.

I needed something to make me stop and stare the world for a minute, enjoy the quiet music already playing.

Home

2008-08-20T21:55:00.000-07:00

Sitting in a sideways seat on the old 22, coming home, I’m struck suddenly by a combination of things.

First, there’s Tom Waits’ “Come On Up To The House” in my ears. It’s a song that’s held a special place from the first time I heard it, a song that really foots the bill at the moment, a song that reminds me that even when it’s rough out there, there’s always a place of solace.

“When the only thing that you can see is all that you lack, you gotta come on up to the house.”

So I got that going on, caught somewhere between a goofy smile and tears. And honestly, that’s one of my favorite places to get caught; way better than between the moon and New York City. I’m noticing the mists and low gray clouds that have come to town in a coach of unseasonable storm patterns. I’m watching all that West Seattle green fold itself inside the gray and can’t help but think that they were meant to be together the way it works so well. They’re like lovers. No, there’s something volatile and fragile about that. They’re like old fiends who have more than once gotten drunkenly naked together – unashamed and still digging each other’s company.

Then the bus passes right by this little house. Nothing fancy, probably four rooms up in there. The front door is open and there’s a boy of about 5 standing in the doorway. He’s looking out at the yard, I’m assuming at the rain gathering in the yard. The look on his face as I quickly passed him by caught for a long second. And I’m totally reading into it, but there wasn’t this look of annoyance at not being able to play in the yard, no sadness, just this serene look of being caught in a moment unguarded.

I caught him, though he’ll never know it. And I held onto those things the rest of the ride, through the walk in the strengthening rain, myself caught once again somewhere between a goofy smile and tears.

Grain Of Salt

2008-08-19T21:23:00.001-07:00

The memories of my high school years get fuzzy as time continues to grow between then and now, as more drinks are consumed in that growing time, so I cannot remember if it was an ad hoc substitute Chemistry teacher, or Mr. Dempsey, the intrepid Physics teacher who barely let me skate by to graduate, who performed this experiment in class. The idea is that you have this salt water solution that is as packed with salt as it’s going to get and still be liquid. One more piece of salt will literally force all of the solid salt out of the liquid, it will change the physical composition. It’s a nifty parlor trick, it’s the idea of critical mass.

It’s also a great analogy for my work situation.

I can no longer keep up with the demand. I can rarely step away to go to the bathroom without trying make said trip more efficient by also printing up a document, possibly make a copy on the way to the john.

Here’s a funny thing, and when I say funny I actually mean bitterly sad; I’m a completely disposable and interchangeable middle management drone. As such, I’m subject to the whimsy of others. Let’s say that there’s a person I have to answer to that obsesses over details that should be invisible to someone at that height; oh, and is a friggin nutball made up of the worst kind of nuts – Brazil nuts, peanuts that are eight weeks old and found beneath a barstool, the elusive loco brain nut.

Here is a person who has a severe case of crazy eye, a person who I had to talk to when I went to work with a 104 fever and was pretty damn sure I was tripping balls because of the things they were saying, a person who will use this psychotic baby talk voice in business meetings, a person who says “right?” in a sentence roughly 27 times.

After said crazy face pointed out to me that they realized how busy I was at the moment, and even more so now that they were throwing a bunch more crap at me, decided to have me investigate a customer case that had gotten up to them.

Let’s say that I worked for a cookie company, and within the stores of this cookie company, along with cookies, the company also sold brightly colored sugar water. Let’s say a customer writes to this cookie company to let them know that when they went down to the ol’ cookie store, the store was out of their favorite colored sugar water. And this is not the first time this has happened, oh my no.

Now let’s extrapolate this a bit. Let’s say that’s one customer contact out of roughly 3000 that this cookie company gets daily – all contacts more or less playing on that same theme to varying degrees of “poor me”. Now, let’s say that after a couple of weeks this customer realizes that their colored sugar water (let’s say aqua blue, spicy cucumber flavor) is still out when they go to the cookie store. Being a the tricky bastard they are, the customer uses a friend to get a name higher up the food chain to contact. This customer bounces around the executive emails for a couple of weeks, like a .22 slug ricocheting off the inside of a skull and tearing apart the bubble gum upper management brain. Until Captain Baby Babble taps me to answer to why this customer wasn’t escalated correctly.

I feel that I shouldn’t have to explain that in the grand scheme things, there’s no reason that they should even be paying attention to something like this. I feel that I shouldn’t have to explain that sending a report to the store so they can adjust their ordering is the correct way to handle this pig fucker and not to send him on up to an executive (who should have way more important things to do) just because the customer has learned to whine more efficiently. I feel like I shouldn’t have to explain the reason why there’s a floor of disposable and interchangeable folks like me.

This person is Legion, and my job has become like a Captain Beefheart album; disturbing, surreal and in so many ways very wrong. It’s a little thing in the scheme of things, it’s my missing colored sugar water, but it’s enough to realize that a huge majority of my life’s energy is spent on it.

If this isn’t rock bottom, it’s a comin’ soon.

Today Is The Day Of The Day

2008-08-11T21:11:00.000-07:00

Because I’m in need of a celebration, and because I did a bunch today but accomplished nothing – I dedicate this post to a variety of “things of the day”.

Song of the Day: “As Sure As The Sun” by The Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

Ice Cream Flavor of the Day: Memphis King – Banana with peanut butter and chocolate covered bacon. This was actually the flavor of the day yesterday from my neighborhood ice cream vendor Full Tilt, but was good enough to slosh over into today. Thanks for coming along Mandy.

Everyday Word That Seems Like It Should Be A Dirty One of the Day: Proclivity.

Product That Should Be Ashamed To Be Around (Especially Because of the Commercial) of the Day: Pizza Hut Chocolate Dunkers with Chocolate Dunking Sauce - Some new desert that Pizza Hut is offering that involves a chocolate dipping sauce. The commercial features a delivery girl putting on a fake French accent to trick all these dumb white folks into thinking this Pizza Hut travesty is a French bakery travesty. Word to the wise: The French would never name something a "dunker". Fool me once...

Word To The Wise of the Day: If someone who is 8 kinds of high says to you, "seriously man, really think about Sesame Street for a minute" walk the fuck away without looking back.

Someone With A Case of the S'pose To's of the Day: Mark Spitz, former mustachioed Olympic swimmer, sounds like a friggin' child while talking about not being invited to the Olympics in these (admittedly out of context) quotes:

"They voted me one of the top five Olympians in all time. Some of them are dead. But they invited the other ones to go to the Olympics, but not me. Yes, I am a bit upset about it."
"I won seven events. If they had the 50m freestyle back then, which they do now, I probably would have won that too"
Speaking of visiting the Olympics in Athens – "They did not once put my face on television”
Speaking of Michael Phelps – "He's almost identical to me. He's a world-record holder in all these events, so he is dominating the events just like I did. He reminds me of myself."

What a douche.

Douchebag Who Could Still Kick My Ass of the Day: Mark Spitz.

Weekend Celebrity Death That Seems Like A Real Drag of the Day: While Isaac Hayes is a bummer, I’m goin’ Bernie Mac. The man seemed like a funny guy and pneumonia is no way to go.

The Voids Of Summer

2008-08-05T21:50:00.000-07:00

Today I felt another piece of my soul slide away for some chump change due to me on Friday. Whining about a job is a pretty ugly form of self-pity, duly noted. There are worse jobs out there to be sure, I’ve had some of them.

There’s just this cyclical destruction of the inner wall that I’m able to put up, that psychic masonry that doesn’t let me forget how this job is slowly making me into something I hate, but at least lets me ignore it for awhile. The wall cracked a bit today.

I didn’t flood out in a wash of anger as is typical, there was just this quiet and sad moment that I realized that our breaths are numbered, and I’m spending a good chunk of mine fighting pathetic battles against enemies that could care less in a war that means nothing.

So yeah, there’s a bit of an existential funk brewing; no sexy bass line, but I can hear some vibraphones trying to get through back there somewhere…

And this is precisely the mood one should be in to hear the two bits of news I did when I got home, both revolving around the baseball stadium downtown.

First, the city is planning on spending something like 5 mil to build an over-street walkway over the train tracks that run near the stadium, this will take the place of the typical sidewalk with traffic lights and those easily ignored crossing arms with flashing red lights and bells that you can hear two towns away. And I definitely see the need, as a handful of people – strike that – a handful of drunk dumbasses, have tried to beat the train getting back to their cars after a game. I gotta say, point blank and without clever, if you’re dumb enough to try to run across the tracks as the above mentioned arms of obvious are warning you not to, than you deserve to be someone’s sick fuck fodder on youtube.

Moving on….

There will now also be a “no peanut” zone at this stadium so people with peanut allergies can go catch a game. This will surely increase those flagging ticket sales. I know there are folks out there with life threatening allergies, and a drag that is, but having dealt with a number of allergy claims at the above mentioned job, and after listening to a middle aged woman the other night go on and on to a number of wait staff about how she was allergic to coconut which was apparently in the Pan Asian soup that she ordered (go figure), I feel like about 85% of people with food allergies just talk about them so that they can, in some sick way, show how “special” they are. It’s like vegetarians who can’t wait to tell you all about how they’re vegetarians. Shut up and eat already. I might need a special zone at work as I think I’m deathly allergic to my job.

Isn’t this where we came in?

One Flu Over The Low Budget Sci-Fi Movie

2008-07-29T22:41:00.000-07:00

I want you to think of a man sized sandwich.

Did you go Manwich? Did you go sloppy joe in a can - an idea that seems more dangerous than a methed out whore with a gun – a gun with a real loose trigger? I’m thinking 6 foot turkey and swiss on whole wheat, with arms and legs, but that’s me.

Moving on, seriously…

Since last I wrote, a flu invaded the house and ripped through it like the above mentioned tweaker looking for hidden cash. Riley fell victim, and while I was busy feeling sorry for him and freaking out about a crazy high fever (enough so that I had a shrieking, sick baby in a cold bath trying to break this fever) that it didn’t dawn on me that I would probably be fighting this off as well.

Two numbered points of interest about bodily functions that you might want to skip over (which is why I’m numbering them – for your convenience) if you’re easily bothered by that sort of thing, or eating over your computer.

1) Diarrhea is not fun - period. Add to that the idea of changing diapers full of it. No, yeah, I totally almost threw up too. Which brings me to number

2) Watching a baby throw up for real for the first time is both horrifying and humorous – much like the idea of Paris Hilton (i.e. methed out whore from above). While there is this unbelievable amount of juice and water plummeting from the baby’s mouth, there’s also this wide-eyed look of, “what the fuck is happening right now” that almost made it worth mopping up the living room floor.

Anywho, things are back to relative normalness. I remember thinking as I was coming down off my fever high, that I’m glad that flu hit when it did and not when I had the audition set up.

Yeah, that would have been a drag.

Some people overcome great hardships to attempt to do things they love, I overcome ridiculously mundane ones that pile up and become more annoyances than the sort of things people make movies about.

Here are some things that were trying to stop me from getting to Capital Hill for a film audition: I couldn’t find my shoes, I couldn’t find the resume I printed out, when I found said resume and tried to staple it to my headshot I realized the stapler was out of staples, couldn’t find staples, got on the freeway to find it was completely backed for no good reason, the Capital Hill Block Party attempted to thwart my secret squirrel back way in…

I persevered, I made it through the wilderness, somehow I made it through. I did not however get the part. And aside from the massive layoffs at work, that pretty much catches you up.

Who needs a drink?

Wild Ride

2008-07-16T15:41:00.000-07:00

Again, am I creating my own reality?

I walked to the bus stop this morning only to find that the empty field that sits serenely behind a chain link fence that the 22 line drives along, a field that is typically shrouded in early morning mists and visited a inquiring crow or two, is now filled with carnival rides. I saw The Octopus, The Scrambler, The Tilt-A-Whirl… The oft locked away emotional memories of childhood ran rampant for half a second. And then the logistics of getting down to this carnival fair shenanigan with a child at home not yet old enough to suffer possible soft tissue damage at the hands of traveling machines set in.

And that’s about as exciting as that story gets. There’s also the story of my panic when I discovered Kickers had a high fever last night and I was stuck at home with no phone, car, or sense at where the Baby Tylenol might be hiding. It ends fine, with a cold bath that was very much unwanted, the triumphant discovery of the Baby Tylenol hiding place, and the breaking of a fever. Honestly though, I can’t imagine the details being all that interesting to many outside of the house. Consider yourself spared for once.

What else do I got? I got Dick.

Speaking of feverish and wild rides, it appears Andy Dick was busted for being inebriated and mauling a minor. There are times when I think that Andy Dick is playing the role of Andy Dick. Sometimes I think he’s unaware of any social boundaries of good taste – which isn’t necessarily a bad thing unless you’re the minor being mauled. Now I don’t know Andy Dick, and I’m not sure that I want to necessarily, but that being said – I’m voting for bat shit crazy.

I was reminded of a fine time in the past with Mercedes and Buddy in New Orleans. There was drunkenness to be sure, but also a couple minutes of viewing the “Tom Green Show”. On this episode, Tom Green began impersonating Andy Dick and Andy Dick began impersonating Tom Green. All this involved was the two of them walking into unsuspecting offices, crawling all over desks and file cabinets, and saying in loud, nasally voices, “I’m Andy Dick, I’m Andy Dick” (or “I’m Tom Green” if it was Andy Dick) over and over again.

I laughed and laughed... I can’t remember if that was the same trip as the shoelace story; never mind, really boring and uneccesary.

Anyway, here the mighty have fallen (again):

Don’t look too hard, this picture is trying to steal your soul.

You Wanna Go For A Ride

2008-07-14T15:36:00.000-07:00

The computer died this weekend and with it went my sense of place within the world. That’s not at all true, it actually took away any sort of guilt I had at the lack of attention I have paid to the blog, or emailing friends. I was absolved, Macbook died for my sins.

My brother-in-law, sister-in-law and their two young daughters were staying with us this weekend. It was great to see Rog and Reena again (it had literally been years) and to finally meet my beautiful nieces and watch my son manhandle said nieces. There was a lot of talk about Southern California life over beers and bourbon and a chilled bottle of limoncello. And while none of this talk revolved around amusement parks, that is what had come out after I let thoughts and conversations steep in a steaming cup of sleep deprivation sweaty summer evenings.

So that’s what you get…

Also, side note, side bar, hush hush side to side… I am remembering at this very moment an idea for a short novel about an amusement park. I should really get on that. Moving on…

Knott’s Berry Farm filled my mind this morning. Knott’s Berry Farm is an Orange County institution. Knott’s Berry Farm is like the malformed and socially inept younger sibling to Disneyland that should be locked away in a basement room, but is instead let out into the general public by well meaning parents. If the world were right, there would be a made for TV movie where Knott’s Berry Farm escaped from its home prison cell to murder the pretty amusement parks like Disneyland and Magic Mountain; maybe the cops would arrive to some dingy torture pit just in time to save a shapely water park…

Knott’s Berry Farm is, as I remember it, much like a county fair that never packs up. There is an infestation of gaming booths where you can win stuffed Snoopy dolls, there are shops to buy jellies and jams, and there was one major ride; Montezooma’s Revenge! Montezooma’s Revenge was a roller coaster that shot you through one (count it, one) loop before sending you back through said loop backwards. It was probably king shit of roller coasters back in the day, but pretty lame when you take a minute to compare the mild amusement to the hour plus in line.

This also got me thinking about other misguided uses for the misguided term “amusement park”. Up in this neck of the woods, where fairly inclement weather keeps most Disney knock offs at bay, there was and is the Enchanted Village. The Enchanted Village is now connected to a waterslide park to make for a fun summer day jaunt, but when my brother and I were children it was as if someone had set up carnival rides and giant plywood figurines in their sizable backyard, started charging admission. The whole thing revolved around a big fiberglass slide that you rode while sitting on burlap bags. Not at all trailer trashy in the slightest…

I looked at the website to see how things had changed at the ol’ EV as the kids are calling it (they’re not). It looks like they have added some “exciting” new rides, and have written into their website exciting new description of said rides. I got the impression that EV’s web guru got sick of wading through delusion when describing The Scrambler.

The Scrambler by the way is one of those rides that you can find at most county fair/carnivals. It looks like:

The description of the ride on the EV website asks us to:
Enjoy the exciting thrills on this circular motion, back-and-forth journey.

Back and forth journey… There’s a “your mom” joke in there dying to get out.

I have to get back to work, and as I don’t have a good or clever way to end this, I want to share a quick thought about the Zipper ride.

I have never actually been on this ride, and not for any sort of fear for life or limb, but because this thing is apparently a vomit manufacturer. Anytime that I have been to a county fair or carnival and there is one of these, invariably, some irritated attendant is hosing down one of the cars and ridding it of the pungent combination of cotton candy and bile.

Long live carnival rides! And thanks for stopping by R&R, I miss you guys. It was good seeing you!

Confidential to Mo Money Mandy: Happy Birthday, you’re 8 kinds of sexy – mostly because you were eight when I saw Depeche Mode live at the Rose Bowl.

Childish Questions

2008-07-07T13:31:00.001-07:00

I had other ideas to write about; the battle at work with a coworker, camping, the nonstop barrage of illegal Chinese fireworks outside my house on Friday night… There’s even this Kenneth Anger piece I’m tossing around for kc!. But…

Round abouts 11 on Saturday night, Kickers woke up screaming his face off. This one wasn’t that sort of exploratory, “hey I’m crying – sorta” sound that he will occasionally make before dropping off again, something was not working out well for him. I went in his room, and on entering he quieted down a bit. I put my hand on his back and he seemed to drop off, but as soon as I started to leave he would kick up his screaming fit again.

I finally picked him up and took him out to the dark living room to lie on the couch together. He immediately poked his head up to check the street for passing busses, but I whispered for him to lay down and he did. He whispered “dada”, grabbed gently at my face and slowly sank back into sleep.

I laid there with him, listening to him mumble his musical language as he faded, feeling those impossibly little fingers stroke my face slower and slower, and suddenly the lack of importance in most anything else shone like a neon X-Ray.

How do you hold onto that feeling of peace, that clarity of calm? How is it that anyone who has held a child can forget it? How is there still this unending drive for power, for destruction of ANYONE? How does the president sleep? How is it that the only interaction I’ve heard with the neighbor woman and her beautiful little girls is through yelling?

How is it that anyone who has held a child can forget it?

Sure, words are easy and clumsy and dangerous. How is it that sitting here at my desk I’m 8 kinds of wrapped up in work bullshit? How is it that I have to close my eyes and block out the sounds around me to even have a slight impression of those fingers on my face, the sound of his language of the universe, the smell of his hair? It’s because everything beautiful and magical is fragile.

I want to lock it inside of myself like some biological compass, some blinding legend. I wonder if my father remembers this…

Words Like Violence

2008-06-29T15:21:00.000-07:00

A voice from the past has recently risen through the mists of the internet and called me out, bringing with it the sounds of tumultuous teenage days made harmoniously beautiful and epic with the addition of so many years.

I've had mixed feelings about my past come calling with folks I knew in high school. I have no interest in revisiting my high school days, curiosity can't even fan the flames of interest that would tear a path to a high school reunion (number 20 coming soon). There aren't regrets or juvenile hatreds that I harbor, it all just seems like a really extended run of a not particularly enjoyable show that I would like to go ahead and put behind me, look ahead to what's coming next.

But my grade school and junior high days... that's sort of different. I know that there were large sections of junior high that made me miserable, I remember it clearly, but there's still this heartfelt feeling of love towards them. I start to think that it's because the child wonder and wholesale innocence that marched around with very thin masks of adulthood on was suddenly torn away with the move to California. So much was abruptly ended that I am constantly left wondering how the years treated those that are perpetually 13 or 14 in my mind.

Anyway, Danny found me online. Danny was without a doubt, one of the sweetest and most positive people I have ever known. He constantly made me laugh and had an impish little smile that could make you forget you were locked away in the penitentiary of junior high, a prison full of the collected hormonally challenged, a concentration of humans during their most awkward years.

Danny and I were good friends, I think mostly because there was this shared non-fear of baring our weirdness. Somewhere in the middle of those years, Danny's family moved to Sequim (a pronunciation of this town is on the applicant's test to move to Washington). Sequim was only a couple of hours away, but to a 13 year old without a car, or parents willing to drive to Sequim, it may has well have been Botswana. Not long after, Dad's career whisked us away to Orange County and my pre-fifteen life was left to gather rosy color in my memory.

Interestingly enough, I met a girl in high school who knew Danny, heard news of him through her.

Now we have tossed a couple of emails back and forth and there's talk of a reunion of sorts with a handful of people I left behind about 25 years ago. And I'm down, I'm in.

I was heading to the store yesterday, and as it's clear and hot in this part of the world at the moment, I got a glorious view of the Olympic mountains out on the other side of Puget Sound (not a bad trip to Safeway, I'm just saying). I said to myself, "it looks like a good day over on the Olympic Peninsula, I hope people are enjoying it." And then I thought, "Danny is over on the Olympic Peninsula, I'm sure he's enjoying it." And as my mind is wont to do, it started making connections. I thought of our last email conversation where I had jokingly mentioned Depeche Mode, and he had answered back saying that later that day some Depeche Mode had popped up on his iPod. I began to wonder about what music had sort of spun his head as a teenager, as a young man in his twenties.

And then I thought about chocolate chip pancakes. I can't control what happens up in my head.

I cruised around the nifty Freon smells of the air conditioned Safeway, checked out the cornucopia of salad dressing options that I had before me, when I felt this little tickling in my mind. I stopped, I imagine with my head sort of cocked to one side like a confused dog, and tried to figure out what it was, and I realized that I knew the song playing overhead.

Depeche Mode's "Enjoy The Silence".

I laughed that sort of loose laugh you get when you realize that the universe is talking right to you; I laughed because I realized I'm not quite fluent enough to understand what it's saying.

Never Let Me Down Again

2008-06-18T16:03:00.001-07:00

Today marks the anniversary of a concert that, though it may not hold a high position on favorite shows of all time, has left a deep dent in the memory.

Depeche Mode was ending their “Music for the Masses” tour at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. It coincided with the birthday of Captain MIA, and he wanted to go bad. Dave and I had convinced him though that we had already made other plans. We had in fact convinced him that we were going down to Tijuana, but eventually surprised him with the tickets on the drive up to the show.

The line up was Wire, Thomas Dolby, OMD and, the impossible at the time to stop, Depeche Mode. Wire left little of an impression, which is a shame as I’ve become quite fond of their first album in the years since. Thomas Dolby left a bit more of an impression, but not enough of one to make me go buy a tape; OMD, still a little more – and I did buy a “best of” afterwards. Depeche Mode could have done no wrong, and did. No wrong that is.

There are two specific events that I remember quite clearly from this show. First, at some point during the day, between bands, I began to see the random cardboard food tray flying through the air. Sometimes there was an empty cup, or a popcorn container. Suddenly en masse, the air was filled with flying trash. There was a point where I couldn’t see across the stadium because there was so much shit in the air. I laughed and laughed…

Second thing was the rain.

June 18th of that year was a fairly standard June 18th for Southern California, it was clear and it was hot. That night, midway through the Depeche Mode set, it began to cloud over. As they began to play “Blasphemous Rumors” the rain started to fall. Partway through the song, lightning actually flashed as if these guys had the direct connection to the universe’s best lighting guy – and that connection was made by insulting him. I’m not a religious man, and if possible even less so at that time, but I remember freaking a little bit and wishing those guys would cut the song short. They finished though, and as they did, the rain stopped.

Even then, coming home from the show, that rain seemed unreal in some way, part of the show.

Here’s the kicker to this whole little trip down concert memory lane (at least for me): This Depeche Mode “Concert For The Masses” took place exactly 20 years ago.

Let me go ahead and repeat that, it was 20 frigging years ago. That does not seem at all possible, it seems like more stage magic, like some hypnotic trick of the light they played on me while “Everything Counts” blasted out over the Rose Bowl. It’s a number that’s way too big.

Anyway… Happy Birthday Captain MIA, wherever you are.

Change It's Gonna Do You Good

2008-06-17T16:26:00.000-07:00

Okay, you keep hearing about how bad things are going right now; the economy is like a Rob Schneider movie – terrible to behold, gas prices have jumped to an amount that seemed like a ridiculous impossibility not that long ago, and as a result the cost of every good and foodstuff that’s delivered by truck is jumping in cost too. We’re still in a war that seems impossible to get out of, the super wealthy still seem hell bent on screwing anyone within dickshot for a couple more bucks, and hatred and ignorance still seem to run rampant throughout this country.

And this little laundry list doesn’t help anyone feel better. I start to feel glad that I already know how to drink heavily.

But - and here’s the big, bright, shiny but – there’s some good out there folks, for real. Obama got the nomination. I sat watching Hillary’s succession speech awhile back and started crying. I was here to witness this remarkable force of change; my son, who was busy trying to eat the D string on my guitar at the time, would grow up in a world where it would seem ridiculous that a woman or an African American wouldn’t be taken seriously as a presidential candidate. I cried hard and happy.

And today folks, gay marriage is happening in California. Not that there isn’t a battle ahead I’m sure, but it gives you some hope doesn’t it? Don’t you feel like we might turn some things around, start celebrating love and the power of good?

And here’s where I make a sharp turn, poop on this big plate of happy.

George Takei, “Star Trek’s” own Mr. Sulu, got hitched today and his quotable response to this joyous day for him was.

"May equality live long and prosper."

And I guess this isn’t so much a happy poop plate as it is a personal note to Sulu: Dude, not everything you say needs to reference “Star Trek” in some way. Seriously. We know you were on the show, we know this because aside from a time or two doing a voice on “The Simpsons”, you haven’t done anything else. And anyway, that’s Spock’s line. Dude.

Audition Allergies

2008-06-16T13:54:00.001-07:00

I was starting to feel cocky. I was walking down to a theater audition a couple of weeks ago and thinking about how I had gotten a part in everything I had auditioned for in the last year or so. I was heading down to audition for a show I didn’t particularly want to do, in a theater that I didn’t want to particularly do it in. The director had asked me to come down, and I like her, I respect her, I’ve had a good time working with her in the past.

The audition went well, I ended up having more fun with it than I thought I would. The director gave me some kind words about how I’d done (and our relationship being what it was, she didn’t need to). She called the next day and let me know that she was going to cast the part in a “different way”. This is pretty standard theater let down lingo, but also true to a point – there are times when an actor (because of look, inflection, the way they hold themselves, whatever) is just not right for the part or for the show itself.

My first thought was, “drag dude – that sucks.” This was quickly followed up with my more reasonable side saying, “uh dude? You didn’t even want that part.” True enough, the offstage drama involved with trying to get a show done that I wasn’t that into was reason enough to be happy about not getting in. But still, you might not want to go to the prom, but you still wanna be asked.

About a week after that, I went in for a film audition. I went to the greeter and let him know I was here ahead of my scheduled audition time. The director came out and asked the greeter about me and what part I was to be reading for. “Bennet,” the greeter said, receiving only a look of absolute confusion from the director. “Who’s Bennet?” the director asked.

This does not bode well, thought I.

The director brought me a reading script, told me to read for Donovan, and about a minute and a half later asked if I was ready. Being a can do sort of guy, I said I was.

The director sat me down in front of a camera and began to tell me all sorts of things about seemingly every other character in the movie (except for mystery man Bennet), and very little about the one I was about to read for. I said okay, stated my name to the camera and began reading.

Before going in for a second read, I asked the standard, “is there anything that you’re looking for?”

Only to receive the standard, “I just want to see what you bring to it.”

It went well, the director began to tell me how I would be good for this other character and he would set up a “warm read” in the next week for me to come in and do. I received an email with a list of days they were possibly going to be doing the reading, a request for conflicts with this proposed schedule, and a list of actors who would be reading for which parts – I was listed as reading for Douglas Bennet. Again, a little knot of worry began to form in the back of my mind.

After about a week of not hearing anything back about my conflicts, I emailed the director and asked if there was any update as to the time for this “warm read.” About another week went by before I got a very template-like reply of a sort of “thanks for your time, but no thanks”.

It was as if I had been asked to the prom, but then watched the limo drive right on by.

I feel that I’ve gotten to a point with auditions where I am generally okay with not getting something. I understand that, as I said above, I’m not always going to be right for a part, or that I might perform poorly during an audition and sometimes I just gotta let it go. This one though was like being told, in a sexy whisper, that I’m gonna get blown. I sort of shrug my shoulders and say, “awesome, if you want to, I like a good blow job.” It gets more promising as the blower sinks closer and closer to my groin, I undo my pants (‘cause I like to help) and close my eyes, and then I’m told, “no, I’m allergic to your cock.”

So, I’m okay with not getting the gig, as I’m really not digging how tings were handled, but still… I like me a good blowjob.

Adventures In Bus Riding

2008-06-10T14:01:00.001-07:00

Hello Good People, I miss you.

As a walk to work would probably be a 2-3 hour endeavor, I’m back to taking the bus. I haven’t been in a public transit place since the San Francisco salad days. And I was good man, I had my routes down. I knew how to get to some places. I had hopped on the 23 Monterey a number of times, I had made friends with the 43 Masonic.

More than once, Mercedes and I have tried to drunkenly recount all the SF Muni bus lines in numerical order. Sure it sounds boring, and is for anyone else listening while we try, but it beats the crap out of drunkenly singing “American Pie.” I’m not sure who is drunkenly singing “American Pie,” but they should stop.

My first day of riding the coaches was frustrating, mostly because of the familiarity of previous bus routes. The King County Metro website trip planner advised a convoluted path to work that included a wet transfer it some sparsely populated, unincorporated part of the county – where I wouldn’t been surprised to witness the slaying of a number of pretty, but poorly acted, teenagers at the hands of an inbred and deformed killer in a mask. It took an hour to get someplace that is maybe six miles away.

“I call bullshit,” I said to the King County Metro website trip planner. No response to that, but I did find a route that didn’t take me through the boonies. After the end of a Mariner’s game, said route began to flaunt its scheduled arrival time like a president denying responsibility – aggressively. 45 minutes after I was to leave work, I was finally standing towards the back of one of those extra long busses with the accordion section in the middle.

I like busses with an accordion section in the middle, partly because I like accordions. I also like circular stairways and revolving doors, I’m not sure why those things were linked together in my mind, but they were. Anyway, I like buses with an accordion section in the middle because these busses seem to defy physics sometimes. The bus may be making a turn and suddenly the back half is at a right angle to the front half. It’s like a horrible accident without the carnage, it’s like a pretty boring amusement park ride.

So I was on this bus, angry and frustrated that I was now going to be way late in getting home. I was standing there, with what I must assume was a scowl on my face, when the ol’ Deuce Deuce made one of those mind bending right turns. This girl that had been sitting on a seat that faced the walls of the bus, this girl that had a punkish hairdo and accoutrements but wore some nice slacks and a sweater, she was suddenly spun around so she was facing me directly.

Our eyes met for a split second and she smiled sort of slyly before my half of the bus caught the drift of the situation and swung around the corner as well. Sometimes those small little moments of connection can make up for some bad trip planner advice and a couple thousand drunken baseball fans – some of whom may have been singing “American Pie”.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “I’ve Seen All Good People” by Yes. But I have this live version stuck there that I heard once when I was flooded by classic rock in college where between the sung line of “I’ve seen all good people turn their heads each day so satisfied I’m on my way”, the lead singer would wail out a band members name – I always hear the falsetto cry of “Christopher Squier!” in my mind.

The Journey

2008-06-04T15:14:00.000-07:00

All right, so here we go…

We bid farewell to Capitol Hill and to apartment dwelling on Saturday, with an unceremonious loading of truck and friends’ cars. No more neon cat, no more drunken yelling or BB gun firing at 3 in the morning, no more drug deals from the apartment building across the street, no more police preparing a triangulation of cross fire just outside the building.

At least one would hope…

The whole thing is still a bit overwhelming. It’s overwhelming and surreal. And yeah, I know, oh poor you, living in a house must be such a heartache. But seriously, I’m out of sorts and waiting for things to sort of fall into place with a resounding, but reassuring, thud.

At one point on Saturday, Dougie Wagner came over with his son. He and his wife had just moved to a place not terribly far from our place. We stood in the back yard, drinking a beer and listening to kids running and crying and I looked at the reflection of my tired face in his tired face. “How did this happen?” I asked him. “We used to be drunken idiots, we used to go play video games in a North Beach arcade during our lunch break… I did not see this coming.”

And I think some of the fuzzy, this doesn’t feel real aspect of this whole thing is tied to this sense that I’m in a show. There’s this moment that happens in my mind before I come onto a stage that I sort of visualize as jumping onto the back of a tiger. It’s this idea that you’re about to throw yourself into a situation and the only chance you have is to just ride it to the end with everything you’ve got.

And so the journey continues, on a new trail I didn’t see back where I was – there’s so many of these new trails poppin’ my way lately. Always a tiger to ride, always riding with everything I got.

And super special thanks to the rock stars who came on force to help with the move, we owe you more than that pizza and beer. We can talk about forms of reimbursement later…

I’m hoping some normality will return to the proceedings when there’s a computer to use, or I can find things like my pants.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: The theme from “All In The Family” has been floating around up there for days, and I cannot say why; creepy and annoying.

Fraction Of The Sun Doesn't Even Make Sense

2008-05-29T13:17:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, a coworker asked how I was doing. And while I don’t remember the exact, sarcastic reply, it was a fairly common bumper stickerism. I realized this as I was saying it and pointed out that I do in fact gauge myself by information that bumper stickers give me. I told her that I was also imagining whirled peas, that not all who wander are lost, and that my other car was a broom.

I almost told her that my child was an honor student at Grass Lake Elementary, but she would not have bought that, knowing that my child has a vocabulary of about 5 words (6 if you count when he leaves the “L” sound out of “clock”).

It made me sort of focus on bumper stickers for the last twenty-four hours; which in itself is strange, as I start to lose interest in most things after about 3 ½ minutes. But on my way in to work this morning, I was taken for a moment by a license plate frame. The top portion said “Yea I’m A Bitch” and the bottom portion I skipped on as I figured the cleverness quotient wasn’t going to rank high enough to stop my stride. I’m under the assumption that this witticism ended with something along the lines of “So Deal With It” or “But I’m Super Fine” or “But So Is Your Mom”.

I’m also under the assumption that this particular bitch meant for the engraver to put “yeah” and not “yea”. I’m assuming there was no grand bitch vote and that the yea’s took it.

Which then reminded me of something kc! had sent to me. He sent a link that had a picture of Built To Spill lyrics tattooed on a young woman’s body. Again, they’re being thrown around all willy-nilly here, assumptions that is, but I’m assuming it was a young woman – the young part that is, the shape of the body made it fairly certain it was a woman. Now I love me some Built To Spill, I mean I do, if it were legal for me to marry Built To Spill and settle down and have a whole mess of children (that I would name Bill To Spill) then I would do it. What I would not do is have a line of lyrics tattooed to my body – but that’s me.

What I really wouldn’t do, is have the incorrect lyrics tattooed to my body. I mean I know that “sum” and “sun” sound a lot alike, but I would recommend that before going in under the needle for a few hours and having something permanently added to your body, you go over the lyric sheet once or twice just to make sure you’ve got it right.

Number Nine

2008-05-23T12:47:00.000-07:00

Nine years ago, coming off a Lebowski fueled session of late night bowling complete with Caucasians, we stumbled around the world’s biggest little town. Exhaustion, booze and years have left me with fairly hazy memories. There was the crazy lady a couple of lanes over who chucked her ball halfway down the lane with a thundering crash every time she rolled. There was scotch, Highland Park. “See, I told you!” (Or was that the next trip?) A walk down to the river that runs through town. Not being able to actually bowl inside the National Bowling Stadium. Was there an artificial limb in the party ahead of us? More scotch in the parking lot.

And now nine years of laughter and some frustration and excitement and fear and most of all mad love, all of it just seeming like an extension of everything that came before; that line of demarcation just another crazy scene as funny as water wings, as soul stirring as blowing cottonwoods accenting guitar notes reaching for heaven…

Till the wheels come off.

Life Lesson For Today: There is little that a bad mood can do against the mighty power of a little T. Rex.

Videobeard

2008-05-21T12:11:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone, once again my job keeps me from the regular sort of posting I would like. Therefore, I will be going into my next job with the expectation that I am allowed blog time.

But hey, how about this weather? I had something on my mind about the preview of summer we received this last weekend, but the return of standard papier-mâché colored skies have driven that out of me. So I will talk about a beard.

I enjoy having a beard, I feel that it adds something to my face – mainly hair. On top of this though, I’m a lazy shaver, so a beard helps to fulfill that laziness quotient. But, as with anything good and mighty, there are drawbacks:

Sometimes things get caught in a beard. Fallen bits of lasagna, pieces of fluff from the flannel sheets you were just getting ready to put away for the season until the muddled newspaper sky returned, homeless people covered in Velcro:
People make assumptions about you like you’re more threatening than your non-bearded contemporaries, you’re hiding something, you’re a lumberjack… And well honestly, carrying a double bladed axe around town doesn’t help this last assumption out.
On those hot, summer (or preview of summer) days, your face will sweat more than normal.
I occasionally end up with the stray beard hair in my mouth.

On this last point; I expect this to happen. I mean, I have a bunch of extra hair right around my ol’ mouth hole, sometimes it’s gonna wind up inside. Sometimes, and more often than one would think would be normal, I end up with a beard hair lodged in my gums. I’m unclear how the hell this happens. Sometimes, I think that I may actually be growing beard hair in my mouth. And then I stop and tell myself, “Hey you, you’re being crazy, knock it off.” But still, the thought persists.

What if I’m actually growing all kinds of hair inside my body? What if I become some oddly discomforting David Cronenberg movie?

Seriously, how about this weather…

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Cowboy Dan” by Modest Mouse. Extra nice as it has sufficiently driven out “Welcome To The Pleasuredome” by Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

Signs

2008-05-14T20:09:00.000-07:00

This is the ballyhooed neon sign outside my window:

The cat's tail wags.

As I was trying to take a picture of the sign I noticed a cop car pulling up onto the sidewalk across the street. I moved over to the desk and there's another cop car on the second street our apartment building sits on. I am in the middle of a triangulation of cop activity.

I watched two officers walk up the sidewalk, hands on utility belts. They entered into the apartment complex across the street.

And just now, a pizza delivery guy walked to the same front door. It smells like a set up to me. "Get out of there pizza guy!" I yelled. "The cops are waiting."

He looked around for my voice, double checked the address, and yelled, "Did you order a large Hawaiian?"

I did not. Pizza guy's on his own, I can't look out for everyone.

And this is the sort of thing that starts to happen when neon moves into the neighborhood.

They Typically Come In Threes

2008-05-12T15:37:00.001-07:00

I left work on Friday at about 7. Bif picked me up, which meant that drinking could get started all that sooner; yeah me. As we got near the apartment I noticed that a Jeep was parked in the spot in front that, because of the yellow zone painting but lack of sign, most people don’t realize they can park there without incurring the wrath of the parking gods.

“That looks like Manboy’s Jeep,” I thought to myself as I continued up on the hill to another spot.

It turns out it looked like Manboy’s Jeep because it was Manboy’s Jeep. As I neared the apartment, there was High Five Hickman waving hello, Manboy talking in low tones on his cell phone. I tried to quickly remember if I had made plans with them and then forgotten, but that seemed pretty unlikely as I rarely make plans with anyone anymore.

Nope, there was an accident. A car full of uninsured chumps had rolled back into the near brand new Jeep and dented the door. It was simply coincidence that brought them right to my front door. The chumps were occasionally coming back to Manboy with a new total of promised money to keep him from getting the police involved but he was holding steady. If he were a band, he’d be the Hold Steady.

I dropped my stuff off upstairs and come back outside to wait with them until the cops showed. It was four, tall, uninsured guys and the only defense Manboy and Hickman had going for them was Hickman’s rape whistle, which I poo-pooed at the time, but I don’t know what those guys had in mind. I mean I’m not any sort of badass, and am more likely to hurt myself than anyone else were we to get in the shit, but these guys don’t know that. I’m big and can scowl with the best of them.

The cops came and I left to get crazy drunk on whisky and Rainier. At some point I poured a mess of Cholula Hot Sauce into my mouth. These are the things that are bound to happen when grandma watches the baby for the weekend.

Saturday night (which is alright for fighting), there was another accident right in front of the apartment again. I awoke round abouts 1:30 in the morning to the sound of a serious collision and people yelling. I had passed out watching a movie on the couch and my first thought was, “what the hell did Riley do?” Then it was, “Do we have any ice cream?” Then it was, “Oooh, I bet that was an accident.”

I got up and looked out the living room window to see one car attached to another. First car was completely facing the wrong way in that lane, second car had a good portion of its front wrapped around the light pole on the corner. I took another look at the clock, realized that closing time was fast upon us and had probably had something to do with this here incident. “Bummer,” I believe I mumbled to myself.

Moments later, sirens came a calling. I laid down on the living room floor (which ironically is where I had found myself earlier that afternoon, pounding headache and uncontrollable sweating that I tacked up to chugging hot sauce) and watched the patterns that the red and blue lights made on the ceiling as they bent themselves around the light pole, pushed through the curtains, danced along the molding.

I’m beginning to believe that the newly placed neon sign outside the building is responsible for this mini rash of bad car karma.

Know Your Audience

2008-05-09T13:06:00.001-07:00

It’s an important lesson to learn, to know your audience. One of the benefits of tailoring your delivery to the audience is knowing you have a better shot of having your message listened to.

Yeah, knowing you audience… For instance, I don’t want to walk into a meeting with my manager, HR generalist, directors and VP’s and let loose with a barrage of dick and fart jokes. It works here at Billy Cleans His Plate (I feel I know this audience), but in the confines of the business world, it ain’t gonna fly.

Another for instance for ya, you might not want to, in a same sort of meeting as above, pretend to French kiss a coworker on a stage in front the entire group. As I did. “That’s how I roll, now they know that,” I said, a little cavalier to be sure. But in the back of everyone’s mind I will forever be the guy who practically dry humped a coworker in a meeting. Which isn’t necessarily the guy I DON’T want to be, but it might make me a questionable candidate later down the road.
Again, depending on the audience.

And here’s my point, well one point that I’m sharing with this audience; I feel Coors does not know their audience.

I was walking to work and spied a billboard designed to advertise Coors Light. Apparently, the good people at Coors have developed some sort of contraption on the top of their Coors Light cans that provide a “smooth pour”. Now I gotta say that the majority of Coors Light drinkers aren’t going to give two flying fucks alongside a bullfrog blowing an anteater whether or not they get a “smooth pour” from their can of beer water. It seems to me that the majority of Coors Light drinkers don’t much care about beer period; if they did, they wouldn’t be drinking Coors Light. It seems to me that there are only four reasons to be drinking Coors Light.

1) You don’t know any better.
2) You’re sixteen and it’s what your over 21 year old acquaintance, or friend with a fake ID, got.
3) It’s free.
4) You plan on steady drinking can after can of beer for an extended period of time and are still concerned with your girlish figure.

I might go so far as to say that anyone drinking a can of beer (and man, I like me a can of beer from time to time) aren’t concerned with how that beer comes out the can, except to make sure a majority of it gets down the gullet and not all over the ground.

Coors, know your audience.

Town Without Pity

2008-05-06T22:03:00.001-07:00

I’m trying to find a witty/entertaining/caustic/non-whiney way of stating that I’m feeling sorry for myself, but I’m failing.

The pisser is, I have nothing to feel bad about. It’s just one of those weird days where I can’t really cope with anything. I can make it look good from the outside, like I got it going on, but everything just seems to knock another piece off inside me.

Pity party? You bet. A bad, bad lame one, with no keg or chips. Not even a veggie platter.

I kinda want my brother to poke his head around the corner, Tecate Light in his hand and a smile while he says, “You’re doing it buddy.” I kinda want someone to call, tell me they’re coming with a sixer. I kinda want a hug.

I kinda wanna get over myself, I kinda wanna stop ending words with the letter “a”.

I’m upset for and by friends that I love.

I’m upset my favorite song by that little band Grandaddy, “AM 180”, is in a car commercial.

I’m upset to learn, this late in life, that the dream I had of living in an apartment above a store with a neon sign, is not that awesome. The brand new sign that the bookstore put up today shines right into the living room window, and the fact that the neon cat has a neon tail that wags ain’t making it better.

I’m upset with the reaction I got when walking down the street in this:

Kids these days have just seen everything.

Ooooh, and Jim Jarmusch Movies Too

2008-04-30T15:59:00.000-07:00

So it’s mid-year review time around work. These are the good times, the grand times, these are the days. I have written and delivered a number of reviews recently, and more importantly to me, received a review from my boss.

One bit of feedback that I received on my review was that during supervisor meetings there have been times where I appear angry and have outbursts. “Outbursts?!?” I screamed as I jumped up on the desk and slapped the man with my cock. “What the flippin’ F are you talking Jack?”

Actually, I said quite calmly, “Outbursts? Really? Do you have specifics on this? Because I honestly do not know what you’re talking about.” He didn’t. As it turns out, he compiled my review from information he had gathered from my reps and other sups. And I know which sup had these sort of things to say. I equate this with the guy going, “Hey boss, hey look, hey look at that bus that’s coming! Do you know who would fit right underneath that?” Anyway, I was told that I should focus on how I carry myself and how people might perceive this.

Well, I call bullshit. But for the sake of getting out of that room I nodded and carried myself in a way that would allow him to perceive that I was ready to move on. But I started thinking that maybe I do come across as angry and complainy, particularly here at Billy Cleans His Plate. So I wanted to go ahead and publish a list of some things I like. I will call it:

A List Of Some Things I Like:

1) Beer. And whisky. Typically they’re mutually exclusive (having learned the evil power they hold when combined), but I will occasionally go for a bourbon neat with a beer back.
2) Kickers’ smile, particularly when I do something that seems to amaze and humor him all at once. That kid will be the death of me.
3) A drunken feast of General Tsu’s Chicken, Szechuan Hot Sauce Noodles, Steamed Chicken Dumplings and laughter, so much god damned laughter.
4) The way the sun can sometimes sneak out and hit something just the right way, something that you see on a daily basis even, and make you hold your breath at the wonder of it all.
5) Being reminded of how much love I have in my life.
6) This.
7) Bodies of water.
8) A long drive, even with nothing to think about. Oh, and talking shit about a pretty sunset.
9) Doing twosies on number one up there.
10) The idea of a room filled with the folks I love, and music, and how everything else is would pretty much be frosting.

Here comes May everyone, hope you're ready.

Hostest With The Mostest

2008-04-29T15:03:00.000-07:00

They say that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. And while I do enjoy me some breakfast – particularly a nice lazy weekend morning breakfast at a great neighborhood breakfast spot with lots of coffee – I have to say, “Screw you most important breakfast people!” I feel the 2:30 AM meal of frozen pizza or Triscuits or an order of Nacho Bell Grande, whatever you use to soak up the alcohol you’ve inundated yourself with, is way more important than breakfast.

I have a knee jerk reaction to people telling me one thing is the best, or most important.

There was a moment in film school when one of my Film History teachers was about to say that Citizen Kane was often regarded as the greatest film made, when I groaned aloud. She asked if I disagreed, and I told her that one, best movie ever is subjective depending on who’s considering it and two, I get tired of people just repeating that it’s the greatest film ever without backing it up. She sort of gave me a sideways smile before saying, “Make a film that’s better and we’ll talk about yours.”

Touche. She did go on to say that she felt Touch of Evil was a superior Orson Welles film. I have recently been pulled into talks about Citizen Kane and how people who watch it for the first time, now nearly seventy years after it was made, are left wondering how it could possibly be considered the best film ever. A lot of that rating is based on the context of what had come before Citizen Kane and how revolutionary it was at the time in regards to story telling, camera work, scope, you name it. Without a fairly well versed knowledge of film history, you’re not going to get that. And if you’re now used to seeing films that have built on, and expanded on, what Citizen Kane brought to the table, you’re bound to be fairly under-whelmed.* I do personally feel that even without that knowledge, it’s a fascinating film and great epic story about the rise and fall of a man. Is it the best film ever? Not to me, but again that’s completely subjective.

I didn’t intend for this to be a mini film school lecture, sorry. I think that there are words and sayings and phrases that get thrown around so often, that just the sheer amount of times you hear them makes them become fact. That’s a shortcut to thinking, and it annoys me.

What I would like, what I’m tasking you good readers to do, is to repeat that “Reading “Billy Cleans His Plate” gives you amazing sexual prowess.” Say it enough so that it becomes fact. I mean hell, y’all know it’s true…

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Space Is Gonna Do Me Good” by Frank Black. I’ve been doing a little digging into the Frank Black catalogue with the recent Black Francis album Svn Fngrs, which by the way is eight kinds of awesome laid out on a tray made of awesome.

*If’n a little more film school jive is what you’re looking for: I had the same sort of reaction to viewing French New Wave films at first, particularly Godard’s films. It was difficult to put myself into the heads of viewers in the 60’s who had yet to see the sort of ways in which these directors were messing with form. Plus I was coming up in the grand Tarantino days, who was at the time basically standing on the shoulders of Godard.

"And Over Here Is Where I Compile My Expense Reports"

2008-04-24T13:22:00.001-07:00

There is a “Take Your Kid To Work Day” thing going on here at the Death Star. This always seems like way more of a Sitcom convention than something that actually happens in real life. Ah, but no, people do in fact bring their young ones here for a taste of the corporate Kool Aid. There may be those who thrill in sharing with their kids something that they love doing, but I have to believe that a greater number drag them in to show what sort of soul crushing hell they’re in for when the days of recess and summer vacation have faded.

Either that or they show off their offspring to coworkers, which smacks of some weird competition through children thing that is but one small step from toddler gladiators dueling away in the playgrounds of America.

People have asked a number of times when I’m going to bring my son into the office and, depending on the discretion needed with the person, I will answer with variation of the same sentiment: Why would I bring him into this place when I can’t stand being here myself.

I always tend to feel a bit jumpy when suddenly confronted by concentrations of kids where they don’t seem like they should be. I remember going into a short of breath panic attack when 30 grade school children suddenly poured onto the 24 Divisadero as I made my way to work down in the delightful Bayview/Hunter’s Point section of San Francisco. “What the hell are all of these kids doing on this bus?” I thought. It felt as though there were an invasion of sorts, an alien invasion. I felt claustrophobic, and I suddenly quivered with the understanding that I was going to have to wade through all of these 7 and 8 year olds just to get off the bus.

So today, when I walk into the restroom to find a young man, perhaps 11 or so, on his knees in the doorway of one of the stalls, something in my mind started screaming that there was something very wrong here. At once I felt that there really shouldn’t be a reason for this kid to be doing whatever he was about to do – again, he was on his knees in a men’s room stall. I just as quickly realized that my first instinct to ask if I could help him with something was going to sound simply awful were someone to walk in behind me.

I managed to throw an uno, I know you were worried, but I couldn’t help wondering just what the hell he was doing over there.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: It’s not really stuck, but “We’re Gonna Rise” off the new Breeders album is something pretty.

So Many Have Paid To See

2008-04-22T20:20:00.001-07:00

We finished up the show this weekend with a Sunday matinee, which is really the way you want to close out a show that has broken your heart a little bit in a big celebratory explosion of joy and booze fueled nudity.

It’s not by the way, Sunday afternoon just does not lend itself to the sort of debauchery I’ve come to expect from myself. We tried to jump in and F some shiznit up Saturday night, but it turned out to be far too sedate, a little melancholy. There was a moment of excitement when I got dragged into a conversation with crazy alcoholic stream-of-consciousness guy on the back porch. Example of conversation:

“Speaking of sports cars {no one was by the by}, on my last day of real estate school, I’m coming across the 520 and I see this guy pulled over in a Viper. Why do I pull over? It’s a freaking Viper! The guy’s test driving it and I take him to a shop. This gray daddy drops in with a rocket on his hip, and a leather NASCAR coat. I’m down in Daytona in a rental with this hotty who’s like I can’t drive on the sand, and I’m like, Yankee fucking blue, you can drive on the sand…”

Let those 3 little dots carry the burden of near twenty minutes of rambling, almost poetic, monologue. But aside from this, our show ended with a whimper, not the bang this cast is accustomed to. Which seems fine in a way, being it felt like it never fully belonged to us. I think we certainly did justice by this show, that we went out there and made some magic, but ultimately this is a tight and talented cast led by a talented director waiting for a show we love. It was like a dry run of sorts.

Almost as if it weren’t ready to completely let go, the show came back to haunt me today, a mere two days after the close.

One of the actors in the boy’s dressing room brought his laptop in nightly. Some nights we would entertain ourselves by watching heinous videos from the 80’s. Some of these included 3 different Hall & Oates videos. “She’s Gone” is disturbing in ways I was unprepared for, like vicodin mixing really poorly with pot brownies, watch it and share in the suffering. “I Can’t Go For That (No Can Do)” was disturbing in that “shit I lived through the 80’s and all this seemed like a good idea” plus the added benefit of choreographed head turns to each call and response of “no no – no can do.” “Maneater?” all kinds of scary – again mostly for the 80’s pop video trappings but there was also the wandering panther to contend with.

How does that go step more scary? I was informed today that during a Vashon Island crafts fair sort of thingy, a coworker was accosted by a man selling his CD full of pan pipe renditions of pop songs – including, but not limited to, a pan pipe version of “Maneater” by Hall and Oates.

Fuck yes I want a piece of that.

The Thrill Is Still Hot

2008-04-17T17:10:00.001-07:00

On days that I I’m having a rough time getting through, let’s say yesterday for example, on those days where if I had the power to shoot poison fire (or fire that sounded like the band Poison, or if I could shoot out the sound of Poison covering Jimi Hendrix’s “Fire” – seriously, anything that would kill or maim) from my fingers, I would willfully do so and aim it at specific people.

On days like those it helps me to remember a face so full of mirth and smiles that that blast of happy somehow invades my soul. It helps me to remember the smiling faces of Ashford and Simpson.

I recently saw something on television, and I wanna say that it was on turning the set on round abouts 2 in the morning to some entertainment news show – so I will, that I saw a news story about Ashford and Simpson. They’re still together, still touring, and still apparently digging the shit out of singing “Solid As A Rock”. I was shown a clip of the two performing in what looked like a miserably small venue, smiling with abandon, and slapping high fives for every “hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot.”

At first I was a little saddened by this, but then I thought fuck that. If they’re still digging getting up on a stage and singing a song, and grinning and strutting like it was better that 12 coked up blowjobs, then shit yeah! Carry on you glorious bastards, carry on!

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Solid As A Rock” by Ashford and Simpson. This is a slight drawback to trying to keep in mind those smiling faces. It will soon be scrubbed out by “I Turn My Camera On” by Spoon.

Blatant Misuse Of Power

2008-04-14T17:29:00.000-07:00

We went from a quick flash of summer, a quarter’s worth of stripper boob through a peepshow window, on Saturday to today. Saturday was glorious, again one of those days that can make you forget the psychic trauma of winter in the “Pee En Dub” as the kids are calling it (PNW, or Pacific Northwest).

Again, no kids are calling it this, and if they are it should stop immediately. I recommend full scale street war if necessary; sling shots that fire bags o’ poo, Molotov cocktails in empty energy drink cans with the exploitive name of “Joose” printed on the side.

But Saturday, insanely clear and sunny and warm; I left the show Saturday night at ten something, walking out through the backstage doors to air that still felt way warm and inviting of delicious trouble. I was reminded of late summer nights in a Central California college town, of cheap booze and smokes and nowhere to go and little to worry about. It was an interesting next chapter to the remembered feelings of being twelve and in love for the first time that came earlier that day.

And today, filled with rain and lightening and thunder and hatred for the job I find myself doing. Almost as if on a psychic whim, I glanced up through the window in time to see a molten flash of lightning over the hills and past the freeway. I secretly wished for some anomaly in the air, in the radio and cell phones waves cruising through that air, to carry that lightning to me on buffeting pulses and charge it directly into my soul.

Then, through my fingertips, I would show those in the cubes around me that I am definitely done fucking around.

A Mystery, Wrapped In An Enigma

2008-04-09T17:09:00.000-07:00

It's a question that has plagued mankind for years now, and I'm beginning to think there will never be an answer.

Who let the dogs out?

Who? Who? Who?

It's a conspiracy of massive proportians, and I'm beginning to think Haliburton, in cahoots with the CIA, had something to do with it.

Perhaps the dogs let themselves out. Has anyone considered this? Considered what implications this holds for the rest of us?

I'm going to tell my young son to stay sharp, stay diligent, so that one day he may walk into the Hall of Records, head held high, and learn the awful truth.

Sacrilicious

2008-04-08T15:39:00.000-07:00

I learned recently that a rainbow is a symbol of God’s promise not to drown us in a raging flood again.

I never went to Sunday School as a tyke, so I missed little gems of knowledge like this. Thanks to a combination of my alcoholic grandfather finding God and my grandmother’s love of a good religious tract glued and varnished onto a piece of wood you can hang on the wall of a double-wide, I learned that when I’m having a rough time, Jesus will carry me down the beach.

It got me to thinking about other things that I understood about God. And again, I have to state here that I’m not a biblical scholar..

From what I can gather, God is eternal love. A large part of that eternal love though is smiting the shit out of people. To this point, God has a zero tolerance policy – don’t mess with God. But remember, God loves you – as long as you’re not Muslim or gay.

God apparently likes for babies to be angels.

Sometimes God seems like an alcoholic stepfather who will lose his shit with little to no provocation and destroy your town; or your action figure set up of Han Solo being lowered into the carbon freezing chamber, whichever metaphor you’re following.

These things that make God go all example number 3, are behaviors that God put in us. God apparently has a little self hatred to deal with.

War, killing in God’s name, things like that… God’s cool with. Anything fun like whoring and boozing, God’s not a fan of and will, again, destroy your town.

God only talks when you’re ready to hear. The same, interestingly enough, can be said about Radiohead albums.

God wears a robe and has a beard. This again seems like further examples of the alcoholic stepfather theory.

According to Roger Waters, “What God wants, God gets (God help us all).”

I’m sure there’s more, but that’s what pops up, top of the head like. I’m going to go dodge some lightning bolts, enjoy my pillar of saltness…

A Little Story About Billy Joe

2008-04-07T15:28:00.000-07:00

I’ve been neglectful of this blog here. I’m like an alcoholic, traveling salesman dad. “I’ll get to ya’ tomorrow kid,” I slur to my blog, exhaling the previous nights funk of bourbon and smoke. “Here’s five dollars, go buy yourself a birthday present. And get daddy a Gatorade.” Years later, I wonder why it is my blog doesn’t talk to me, call me on my birthday, why it can’t even sit in the same room with me long enough to watch Fellowship Of The Ring with me – and not even the Extended Cut, the theatrical version…

I’ve been busy. Again this work thing where I have to be responsible and do stuff and answer to people. Last week I simply did not have any time, today I’m making a conscious effort to not work. I’m also making a conscious effort not to feel guilty about it.

I’ve been tired. I tell the tale of a girl, but I call her a woman, she’s a little bit older than me; strong legs, strong face, voice like milk, breasts like a cluster of grapes. And okay, Pixies lyrics aside, seriously, I’ve been tired. And I don’t know if it’s because of the tired, or in spite of the tired, or if tired has nothing to do with it whatsoever, but I have taken to doing dramatic interpretations of songs. Currently, “Take The Money And Run” by The Steve Miller Band is my favorite to do. Following up a close second though is “Desperado” by The Eagles. Shitty 70’s music apparently makes for good dramatic interpretation.

I’ve been doing the show for what feels like nonstop, but in actuality has been a week. We’ve had some good shows, we’ve had a lackluster show that I hope was only obviously lackluster to the cast, and we had a great show Saturday that has me excited about getting back in there again this week.

Other than that, there’s not a ton going on last week. Saturday I finally got to spend more time at home than the hours I sleep. It was good to spend a little time with Kickers, playing ridiculous noise games and showing him how to crash two toy trucks together. He doesn’t treat me with that sort of passive aggressive bitchiness that I would have had I been away from me for a week, he smiles and laughs, and dances when I play guitar, offers up a kiss from time to time and only sets small fires.

And now it’s back to work.

Right Now I Feel Like A Dead Guy

2008-03-31T17:50:00.001-07:00

Busy today, it ain’t gonna clear up tomorrow, so I’m trying this typing as quickly as the words come into my mind thing.

Spent an insane amount of time in the theater this weekend for tech rehearsal, 10 AM to 10 PM both Saturday and Sunday. I’m tired. That sort of tired where you hear your own voice talking to somebody and then wonder just who in the hell that is talking.

Any good stories? Nothing that isn’t funny outside the haze of exhaustion and theater dust. A lot of shop talk and 6 weary cast members busting their asses to do a good show. There are some nightmare stories regarding this run that I will have to share with you all over whiskies as there are bridges I don’t want to burn.

We have a preview tomorrow, then an official opening night Wednesday, April 2nd. If folks in the area can’t be enticed to see this show by an amazingly talented cast, or by an interesting take on the reality TV phenomenon, perhaps you can be enticed by scene change music that is compiled mostly of Led Zeppelin.

It’s a far better thing to leave rehearsal with “Kashmir” stuck in my head than it is to leave with “Don’t You Wish Your Girlfriend Was Hot Like Me”, which has happened in the past…

Things We Lost In The Fire

2008-03-27T17:18:00.001-07:00

One thing I lost in the fire – any respect for the band Blind Melon.

I should point out that this is a metaphorical fire that occurred in and around my sense of cynicism. Said fire was also round abouts ’94.

I saw a flyer on my way to work this morning, advertising an upcoming Blind Melon show. Okay, what? First of all, the lead singer died like the fucking rock cliché that he was. Second, are there people out there clamoring for a triumphant return of Blind Melon? I don’t know who they have filling ol’ Mr. Overdose’s shoes, but does anyone hear echoes of Van Halen with the schmuck from Extreme? Do they sound like the screams of integrity being slaughtered? Thirdly, the flyer contained a picture of “The Bee Girl”…

I trail off because I cannot explain how… dumb this is.

Do you know what the remaining members of The Doors did after their lead singer took a trip down rock cliché way? Well, nothing really, except spend whatever camera time they could covet talking about their days as Doors. To be fair, Ray Manzerek did produce 2 awesome X albums. I’d heard that they were reforming with the guy from The Cult, or Danzig, singing for Morrison. I can’t remember if it actually happened, because it’s dumb. But at least with them it was The Doors, they were the dark lords of pop, they backed the Lizard King, they spoke to full legions of stoned and depressed college freshmen. Blind Melon’s claim to fame is an annoyingly poppy song sung with an annoyingly high and nasal voice whose video featured a girl dressed like a bee.

Okay, your singer’s got a little problem with the old cook cook shoot it up and rolls the dice one too many times, but you as a band aren’t ready to call it quits (over ten years later)? I’m not saying to stop playing, but seriously start a new band, and for fucks sake, use a new marketing gimmick.

Joy Division rearranged band duties and focus on keyboards to become New Order. Dave Grohl didn’t let a little self inflicted shotgun death keep him from starting himself a popular little band called The Foo Fighters.

But, I guess it’s gotta be tough to crawl out from beneath the shadow of Shannon Hoon…

At A Loss

2008-03-26T16:26:00.000-07:00

I’m not really sure what to write about today.

I’m at home today, a Wednesday, as I had to work on Sunday. “What’re you doing for Easter? Are you hiding eggs for your son?” a coworker asked me last Friday. I said no, I will be working.

“Just like Jesus,” replied another coworker.

“I’m no biblical scholar, but I’m pretty sure Jesus did not supervise a call center.”

There’s tortilla soup on the stove that smells spicy and fulfilling, there’s a baby talking low in the next room that makes me smile, there’s a wife who got to take a well deserved nap that I hope keeps her feeling good for awhile.

There’s some reason that the horror that is The Cutting Edge keeps cropping up to haunt me. I recently learned from another cast member that someone had the balls and lack of any artistic integrity to make a part three to this movie. Learning this felt like a combination of the onset of diarrhea, the continuing dread of knowing you will one day die, and the feeling of trying to chew a baby carrot that had apparently fallen into your shirt pocket a week ago and you are finding it now as said shirt has been hanging in the bathroom.

Here’s a picture of a baby carrot that had apparently fallen into my shirt pocket a week ago and I am finding it now as said shirt was hanging in the bathroom:

Mo Money Mandy? Your soul will one day whither and die for the love you harbor for the evil that is The Cutting Edge. But seriously, we should watch the shit out of Saturday The 14th.

Soup’s on…

#2 In The Model Home Series

2008-03-24T17:46:00.000-07:00

Okay, quick like bunny…

I had wanted to do a post about Into The Wild which I saw most of last night (I read the book, so I know how it ends), but per my regular poor time management skills, I have run out of time. It’s probably for the best, I need a little more time to think about it.

This is hell week for the show I’m working on, last week of rehearsals leading into two days of 10 hour tech this weekend. This tech weekend will very likely charge me up for an amazing run, or kill my desire for theater all together. It will be the first time we will be using some heavy duty technology that is necessary for the show, and rests solely on my characters shoulders – literally.

While there have been a lot of difficult and negative aspects to this show so far, I am really happy to be part of it. I’m working with a director who I really admire and respect, and a cast (all of whom I have worked with on different projects in the past) that I love being around and getting to play with. This gig does feel really collaborative in a lot of ways. Not only is there this sort “us v. them” feeling to it, but we also got to spend a weekend doing film shoots for fake commercials, one of which I recorded a cheesy, Hessian guitar theme for.

Other than that, just trying to keep in perspective what the day job is actually there for, spend what little time I have with the family and enjoying watching Riley be a beautiful force of nature and Biffy be a beautiful mother.

What else? I fought a huge impulse to force my way into a question and answer session with the CEO today, step to the microphone and do a dramatic reading of “Desperado” by The Eagles. I watched loudQUIETloud, a documentary about the Pixies reunion tour, which I enjoyed thoroughly and highly recommend. If you’re not a Pixies fan, this will probably not change your head, but I do feel it’s important to say that you’re wrong and should suck it. I’m wondering how long it will take before ABC has to officially use quotes around the “stars” in “Dancing With The Stars”.

I am also fairly heavy into the band Cold War Kids right now. And apropos of nothing, have dived into the back catalogue of Guided By Voices while at work yesterday and enjoyed the shit out of it.

That’s it, gotta run. Billy out.

Gerald Makes It To Seattle

2008-03-23T16:54:00.001-07:00

Gerald, the slow rotting Easter Bunny, shambled off of the Greyhound and into the rain slicked streets of Seattle. His exit from the bus was met with a rush of wind as the other passengers, en masse, exhaled sharply.

Reaching into his thrift store satchel, Gerald removed a bottom shelf flask of high octane rum and took a swig.

“I know white wine typically goes better with rabbit, but…” He looked around the dark sidewalk to see if anyone had noticed his biting wit. No one had.

“Seriously? Nothing?”

He squinted his eyes and attempted to focus to the East, noticing how the street climbing up the side of a hill appeared more like a wall from his vantage point. He had secretly been hoping that the “hill” in Capitol Hill was just a name. Tomorrow was the big day, and the syndicate and ordered him to this part of the world. He took another swig and slowly moved his head back and forth, looking for a local. A young Asian man approached and Gerald grabbed his arm.

“Which way is Capitol Hill?”

The young man screwed up his face and swung his head away as if something had just smacked him on the nose. He pointed to the wall road and roughly pulled himself away from Gerald’s grip.

“Fuuuuuuuuuuuck,” Gerald moaned.

Halfway up said hill, Gerald had to stop and lean against a mailbox. He began retching up the rum, as well as most of the 40 he had chugged once the bus got through Portland. Coming from down the hill, Gerald could hear the sharp reports of a whistle. He felt his jaw pop as he clenched it. He stood straight, and looked up at the leather dressed gent blowing on a silver whistle with a coked up glee.

“Hey buddy,” he said.

The guy stopped in front of him, curtailing the shrill sound long enough to say, “you smell like feet and wet dog.”

Gerald grabbed the front of his leather shirt and said, “This ain’t no party, this ain’t no disco, and maybe you didn’t notice from the apartment buildings all around, but it ain’t no fucking rave either.”

A dirt-caked paw smacked the guy’s awe struck face and managed to lodge his little silver whistle into the back of his mouth. He looked as though he was trying to say something, but all that came out was a noise that sounded like tin drowning in a swamp.

Gerald continued on up, smiling slightly at the wet and choking tweets coming from behind. He reached into his satchel and spinning with a grace that was unexpected, and pitching with a power that minor leaguer would have envied, Gerald hurled a hard boiled egg, the color of a clear and early spring sky, straight at the guys face.

“Enjoy your friggin’ Easter!”

Hey Liza

2008-03-20T15:50:00.000-07:00

I hate to be all Naggy McNaggerson, but uh... As we discussed before, there's a hole in friggin' bucket.

Time Keeps On Slipping

2008-03-18T17:25:00.000-07:00

When I perfect my time travel experiments, I will go back and visit the 16 year old version of me.

Knowing the 16 year old version me, he would probably first ask how I managed the time travel thing so he could then go back in time and pick up the out of print Last American Virgin soundtrack.

I would tell him not to worry about it, that a kindly used record store clerk in Tacoma would locate a copy of it in Portland for him 1989. I would also fret over whether or not to ruin the surprise of the Pixies soon to come his way.

I imagine that 16 year old version of me would ask how being a famous film director was treating me. I have the distinct feeling that when I describe what it his he will be doing for a job 20 years down the road, that 16 year old version of me would kick me straight in the nuts.

I know I would.

As I crumble slowly to my knees, I would whimper out, “you might rethink the film major…”

We Haven't Located Us Yet

2008-03-17T14:44:00.000-07:00

I like me some Wes Anderson. Rushmore really surprised me in a way that was exciting. He managed to make this charming, funny and touching movie in a completely stylized way that, when you stop and think about it, shouldn’t work. Typically that sort of stylization feels a little wankery in the hands of lesser artists, but there are those that can pull it off, artists that I respect immensely. David Lynch uses it to sing the signs of his demented dream muse. And I certainly get where people find Stanley Kubrick’s stylized vision distracting and off-putting, but I feel so much control coming through that I know I’m putting myself in the hands of a consummate craftsman. Wes Anderson’s work achieves this strange hyper-realism through its theatrical stylization, and it seems to be alive with a sort of innocence that’s infectious.

He took that stylization even further with The Royal Tenenbaums and again created something that knocked me for a loop. The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou on the other hand didn’t really work for me. I think I was expecting too much and walked away feeling like the emotional pay off he tried to give us in the end was not justified by what had come before. I’ve grown to like it more with further viewings, but it’s been a hard fought like, and not at all the jubilant dance of laughing love his other films were for me. It’s because of that feeling of let down that I put off watching The Darjeeling Limited.

I should not have worried.

I was drawn in and pretty knocked out. I let it sit and brew for a couple of days and then went in for a second helping, and sure enough, it was love alright.

Brief synopsis: Three brothers, still reeling from their father’s death, take a train trip in India to sort things out and to attempt to get close again.

Less brief synopsis: The trip represents a spiritual journey, which is, okay, obvious. In fact I think the characters make no bones about pointing out that they’re striving for a spiritual journey. But the characters self knowledge about this make it unachievable; they’re trying too hard. It’s not until they have been forced out of their schedule and forced into dealing with each other and each others way of grieving that they can begin the actual spiritual journey.

During the train trip, all of the brothers are holding onto base ideas of the physical world; Francis’ need to control every moment, Peter’s holding onto items of clothing and keys that his father left behind, and Jack mired in sexual desire and his father’s literal luggage. The whole ride, the brothers work against each other in pairs in this comical dancing triangle, and if that weren’t enough to derail them, they spend most of their time trying to stay inebriated with Indian pharmaceuticals; consciously or subconsciously trying to avoid this journey. It’s not until the brothers are forced off the train, and literally the moment that they finally lose the printer/laminator that has heretofore made their spiritual journey schedules, that they are set upon the path they need.

David Lynch once described a film as being like a duck, going further to state that with a duck, you couldn’t have the eye anywhere else than where it is. It would get lost if it were on the body, and if it were on the bill you would have two busy things too close to each other… I’ve never fully understood what the hell he was talking about, but I think I got close to understanding it with The Darjeeling Limited. All the moments in the story happened when they were supposed to happen, the characters go through what they are supposed to go through when they need to and when they’re ready for it.

When the brothers first leave the train, they each take part in this ritual with a peacock feather only to learn that they did not know how to do it correctly. Looking back on it, I thought, “well of course they didn’t know how to do it. They hadn’t gone through what they needed to go through yet.” There’s a flashback to a scene of the day of their father’s funeral that comes at the exact right moment of the film, when they’re figuring themselves out, when they’re ready for a second chance at dealing with the feelings they were left with.

This is a wonderfully put together film, and I’m amazingly enamored of it. It brims with this childlike innocence and I’m left gasping even at the fairly obvious symbolism near the end. I once again felt the dizzy combination of humor and drama and poignancy that Mr. Anderson’s other films gave. Most of all, I thought it was a wonderful reminder that life itself is a spiritual journey.

Live it accordingly.

The Devil's In The Details

2008-03-11T15:36:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I have a devil may care attitude, sometimes a devilish gleam in my eye. I have sympathy for the devil and, a friend of the devil is a friend of mine.

I never really considered The Exorcist a very scary movie; it creeped me out, but I was never really scared by it. I sort of wonder about the “scare” aspect of it now and wonder if people respond more to the fear of a person gone completely out of control – or more specifically, a young girl at the edge of those rebellious teenage years going completely out of control. I remember a conversation I had with a woman during a group dinner in Amsterdam, and she threw out the idea that perhaps The Exorcist didn’t terrify me in the way that it did her, and apparently many others out there, because I was not raised Catholic.

And maybe that’s why the idea of The Devil doesn’t really frighten me at all. I mean besides the fact that I have a hard time not believing that The Devil is a fictional, if not symbolic, character. When I think of The Devil I think of a charming sort of trickster, a dapper gent with a wicked sense of humor. He’s well educated, you bet (in fact, the name Lucifer comes from the word for “light bearing”, and I remember pointing out to one of my professors that there was a "light bearing" lamp in the San Francisco State University logo), a bit blasé about things, and he’s generally a guy I think I would enjoy sitting around and knocking back a few bourbons with.

And maybe that’s the inherent danger with The Devil, maybe he tricks you into thinking that he’s not that dangerous, that there’s nothing to fear. Maybe it’s one of The Devil’s tricks to make us think that he doesn’t exist at all. Maybe, if he wandered the world looking like this I would be more frightened:

But I would probably be more likely to tell him that I dug him more in Rocky Horror…

And maybe it’s dangerous to think of The Devil as a harmless trickster, like it’s dangerous to think of an American president as just moronic when that person is also inept, dangerous, irresponsible and possible a little homicidal. I find it interesting that war and strife for power and money done in the name of righteousness and of God, really seem more like the actions The Devil would dig.

And maybe, just maybe, I don’t have a fear of The Devil because in the back of my mind I have an idea that if this whole Christian end of times things goes down, I’m doomed to be spending a little knockin’ back bourbon time with Big Red. According to a charming little card one of our customers sent to us, I will not be saved for a variety of reasons, but some of the better ones:
“Ever looked with lust? Jesus said lust is the same as adultery. Ever had hatred? God sees hatred as murder of the heart. Ever used God’s name in vain? That’s called blasphemy.”

Have I done these things? God yes. Looked with lust? Three times today, and it’s on my calendar for tomorrow.

Personally, I view The Devil as a great, great fictional character. I mean the guy is used to represent absolute evil, and everyone loves the bad guy. The Devil is the dark side of The Force made flesh, he’s the one who forged the ring of power in the fires of Mt. Doom, he’s Kaiser Soze wrapped in Michael Myers wrapped in the horror understood by Colonel Kurtz.

And I’m not really sure where I’m going with this. Except straight to hell…

'Morning

2008-03-05T15:46:00.000-08:00

We seemed to fall back into the everyday nonsense of non-Mexico life alarmingly fast. It’s almost as if it were some hazy dream, a Tecate soaked story from the past now reinforced with lies and exaggerations in places where truth would have seemed too commonplace. Strangely, the act of noting it, of remembering it, of throwing it out to an audience seems to have made it fade that much quicker, as if the mind had deigned that I had spent too much time with it despite what the soul had to say about the whole operation.

Anyway, life continued on while I tried to hold onto those barren roads and sunsets a little bit longer.

Kickers has been battling a tag team foe of incoming molars and a flu/cold coughing bonanza that has him upset and throwing tantrums that would be comical if you didn’t simultaneously feel bad for him and want to sell his crying ass to the highest bidder. He would wake himself up coughing, which would start him crying, which would naturally not be conducive to sleeping, and so he would spend the following morning grumpier than papa with a bar brand whisky-beer back hangover on a Tuesday. Not cool.

I already felt bad for the guy. It makes me far happier to see the little man laughing, trying to show you where all the clocks are in the room and dancing up a storm just ‘cause it moves his groovy little soul to do so, than to mope around and stand in a corner crying. Then when I came home from a Sunday work shift, feeling an unholy fire burning in my lungs like I’d inhaled off a pipe filled with wild boar hair, poop and sickness, my sympathy slid slyly to empathy. A fever kicked in, quickly followed up by a soreness and a bad, bad tired. I felt awful and I knew what was going on, it had to suck to have no understanding of why you feel like crap. I wanted to pick up my crying son and somehow find the way to explain to him that it was going to be okay. I tried lying on the couch with him, rubbing his head and humming softly. That was all fine and well until he started coughing so hard he threw up the juice I’d just given him to soothe his throat all over me.

Moving on.

The return to home also brought the start of rehearsals for a new show I’m in this spring. I think it’s going to be an interesting and fun show for people to watch, but it’s a challenging one for me personally for actory-schmactory reasons that few others would probably find interesting. It’s great to get back out onto a stage and be working after taking a couple months off, but it was definitely thrown an already fairly precarious household schedule all kinds of out of whack. Biffy’s handling it like a pro, but I miss her, and I miss the little man (even with the crank and possibility of an unasked for rainbow shower).

But… For as quick as that below the belt hitting sickness came on, it fled almost as fast. I’m not 100%, but feeling damned good compared to Monday. Kickers seems to be feeling better too. As I got dressed for work this morning, I could hear him in his room talking quietly to himself, using a soft melody to chase away the fog, brewing up his own morning song. It makes me want to cry sometimes how beautiful and fragile the world can be.

Last night I watched our director get just angry happy as a scene we were working came together; the timing and movements and characterizations meshing in that way that makes you feel like magic is indeed a real thing. He was up on his feet and in one of those spaces of blind artistic rage that he would have pushed us past all hours of decency to keep this feeling alive and working. And had we not had a rational stage manager to be reminding him of the time, damn it, I think we all would have followed him.

And spring, fuck you, you slinky little, irrepressible whore. You’re a flirt, and lord knows I love to flirt. You had me colder than an ice rectal thermometer this morning, but the sky all pale blues and green shoots scattered around just makes me want to do a little jig down Pike Street, not caring second one how tired I was (or how the Red Red Meat on my headphones was not necessarily something one would jig to).

Sometimes I feel like I’m waking up to the world.

Obviously, You're Not A Golfer

2008-02-29T22:22:00.000-08:00

Golf; I’m not a fan. Do I appreciate that to play well it takes skill and discipline? In the same way that I appreciate how much it must suck when you ruin a pair of panties while on your period – it will not effect me personally.

Dad likes golf. Dad gets off on golf. Golf is like wicked crazy sex all done up on weed, coke and nitrous to my dad. Kind of, I personally wouldn’t want to invite my son to the above mentioned metaphor, but Dad was pretty insistent on my doing some golfing with him in Mexico.

I tried to make it pretty clear that I wasn’t into golf. I had played it once, and again I can see why people would dig it, but I get what some people get from golf from other things: that sort of zen concentration from artistic endeavors, self delusional idea of “exercise” from bowling, massive beer drinking from going to bars. It was as if Dad couldn’t hear me say that I did not enjoy golf.

So I was a bit miffed when I ended up on the empty road to the golf course, on an unfinished resort, after several days of subtle, and not so subtle, hints that I was not going to enjoy golfing. And while I was trying to remember that I was there for Dad and celebrating his birthday, it turned out I did not in fact enjoy golfing.

Bless his golf porn heart, Dad was trying to give me pointers on how to improve my game. I finally had to look at him straight and tell him that this was definitely not something that I would be doing again, and that he could stop. Things improved a bit when my brother was able to back track to the car round those standing guard on the empty dunes of Paradise Perfected and bring us back some Tecate. And then there was the tooling around in the golf cart, and talking about how much fun it would be to roll that cart.

It’s very difficult to roll a golf cart, my brother tells me knowingly.

Did I get anything out of the day? There was a perverse giggle issued when I slammed a ball across a water hazard, skipping it across the water like a stone and almost making it to the other side. And this sense of frustration that the trip was about over and I spent a full day doing something I do not like.

Which brings me to this: I was telling Biffy about how this part of Mexico would not make my vote for Most Awesome Place. She let me know that I was hard to please. I don’t necessarily agree with that, but it makes me think of the postings about this trip.

I certainly don’t want to make it seem like I didn’t appreciate the opportunity to be able to take a vacation like this, or that I didn’t have a great time. I find it often more entertaining to write with a smart ass, biting tone.

As a whole, the trip was relaxing and I will hold onto the great stuff for so much longer than the petty complaints. I’ll remember the nice, subtle sunsets and the sunrises even more glorious in their unshowy hues. I’ll remember trying to point out stars to each other in the utterly clear skies by making an imaginary clock in the sky, and laughing intensely when the clock’s center continued to change depending on the person. I’ll remember switching cooking shifts, cooking together, drinking together, being a full family together for the first time ever. I’ll remember my brother meeting his nephew for the first time, a meeting that I knew meant a lot to me, but I did not realize how it would somehow lock something intangible together inside of me. I’ll remember sitting with my brother, joking and egging each other on and eventually talking like close friends who had literally known each other forever.

I’ll remember how difficult it was to end that goodbye hug when he left for town, for a bus, for a plane back to Costa Rica; how tired it would make me.

Feb(r)uary Song of the Day: With the mini Built to Spill epic seeming to finish this thing up nicely, I want to throw your way one more song to echo the extra day for the month. For this leap year day, I bring you “The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)” by Tom Waits.

Short Shrift

2008-02-28T17:23:00.000-08:00

Ran out of time for a posting, damn this work straight to the bowels of hell. I started the day off with a mad desire for more sleep and then an argument with my boss (which had nothing to do with sleep). I have since been tying to focus on happy things. Things like:

The gray drizzle burned off to give us one of those fairly glorious, early spring days – you can hear the crocus’ sing (thankfully they sound nothing like the band Krokus).
The Sasquatch Festival line up this year.
The news that there’s to be an Arrested Development movie next year.

Tomorrow, I’m coming back with a story about golf. Who’s excited? I know I am.

Feb(r)uary Song of the Day: A twofer Thursday with “Jed’s Other Poem (Beautiful Ground)" by Grandaddy and then “Untrustable/Part 2 (About Someone Else)” by Built To Spill.

Just What Does He Say

2008-02-27T21:41:00.000-08:00

One of the things that may happen when you make aluminum cans look so desirable that you continually have your mouth to one - more often than not sucking at it like a $500 whore - is this:

Don't let that sly, "I'm so cute" look fool you, that kid will drink all your beer, trash your pad and take your car and sell it in Stockton for candy.

Feb(r)uary Song of the Day: "Undone (The Sweater Song)" by Weezer.

No Comprende, It's A Riddle

2008-02-26T17:20:00.000-08:00

We came back to the house to discover that our uncle had filled a cooler with Tecate Lights. There was some scoffing and some derision tossed out our uncle's way (playfully, but we were being quite clear at the same time that if he pulled shit like this again there would be righteous pain). But I like to think that I am one who likes to make lemonade out of lemons.

Or in this case, quick alcohol delivery systems out of crappy light beer.

My brother and I began to shotgun Tecate Lights as if the heathen gods of the Gulf of California demanded it. Until that case was done, there were fairly constant sly looks from one to the other, to be quickly followed by, "you know what your problem is? You're off balance by about 12 ounces of fluid." To which the other would reply, "I know a really quick way to fix that."

This tin can puncturing, open topped guzzling didn't even stop for a family wide fishing trip. I think Captain Mike was a bit shaken to see two grown men challenging each other to a chug off at 10 in the morning, but as it would turn out, I wouldn't really care what Captain Mike thought.

The last time I had been fishing on a boat in Mexico, I was seventeen and taking full advantage of the lax ID checking going on at all beachside bars outside the Puerto Vallarta hotel we were staying in. I was 8 kinds of hungover the morning my dad woke me up and insisted I get on a boat with everyone else. Already queasy from the margaritas and the pina coladas (and I do like getting caught in the rain, by the by), spending 5 hours on a rocking boat seemed like a great Roald Dahl-like punishment for my illegal drinking. For years I thought my father a near brilliant strategic mind, come to find he had no idea when I told him about it this trip.

But Captain Mike... Captain Mike... Captain Mike was like one of those guys who takes on as his direction in life the teachings of Jimmy Buffett. Shaggy hair, t-shirt and shorts, owns a boat that he charters to the likes of us for a day of fishing, has a fiancé out of the country and a puppy named Tequila that he bought at a bar.

Fine, I don't have an issue with the lifestyle per se, but there was something about Captain Mike I didn’t like, some douche baggy ticks that I couldn't quite collect as a valid character assassination; just a feeling.

There was the fact that he started getting a little too chummy with my female cousin (who, while simply trying to be friendly, comes off as a little too friendly). Throughout the trip he continued to ply her with margaritas from inside the boat and ignore the rest of us. When she stated that he should come by later (which was a dumb idea, but she was all done up on tequila, sweet and sour and god knows what else) he took her up on it.

Captain Mike showed up to the house later that night while we were cooking up the fish we had caught. He walked right on into the house and started conversating. When the bad vibes finally got to be too much for his stoned head, he retreated. But before leaving he managed to get out the "booty call" description of how to get to his house; that is, enough landmarks to ensure that said booty can find its way over.

It did not. Captain Mike is a douche bag. I did not miss Captain Mike.

Feb(r)uary Song of the Day: Another twofer Tuesday with "Whenever You Breathe Out I Breathe In (Positive Negative)" by Modest Mouse and "(I Got A) Catholic Block" by Sonic Youth (as do I Thurston Moore, as do I).

The Touch Of A World That Is Older

2008-02-25T16:30:00.000-08:00

The house where we stayed had colored tile everywhere. It was as if the house had a rare and festive form of cancer where ceramic tumors grew and metastasized into all the colors of the rainbow. It screamed party.

The house where we stayed used whale vertebrae, shells, and what was possibly a porpoise skull as decorations in the beach sand.

The house where we stayed was surrounded by houses of similar size and build; which is to say large and cement. They clung to an exclusive section of the beach like some gringo city state preparing for a battle against poverty.

The road between the house and town was twenty minutes of mostly empty sand and scrub. Here there were the billboards that seemed conspicuous in their absence before, advertisements for the new resorts and condo complexes whose cranes were already there like the sniffles that are the coming attractions for the flu on its way.

The road between the house and town was empty for the most part, but if you looked far enough off the road, you could make out the small, corrugated tin shacks that served as the houses for those who didn’t vacation in Puerto Penasco.

The main part of the town didn’t seem to feel like a Mexican seaside town, but felt like the American idea of a Mexican seaside town. Enough Latin feeling for the waddling and sunburned retirees from Idaho to feel like they’re on vacation, but not too foreign to make them feel uncomfortable.

The main part of the town was made up of shops that sold some fairly tacky crap. If you’re looking for shot glasses, or blankets, or sombreros, cheap silver jewelry, or clever T-shirts which feature a cartoon Chihuahua drinking or puking or humping someone’s leg, then here is where you find it my friends. It only takes a short while to realize that all the shops essentially sell the same things; not so different form America actually.

The main part of the town was filled with people trying to get you to buy things, or charter a boat, or come to a free breakfast where they will then talk you into investing into one of the resorts currently being built by the above mentioned sniffle cranes. While I didn’t notice it, my brother and his wife were bothered by the sense of the people not being overly nice. I seemed surprised by this being the two of them spoke Spanish fluently, but this didn’t seem to make a difference.

The road back to the house was a good place to discuss things we had encountered in town. My brother and I discussed the gregariousness of the denizens of Puerto Penasco. I told him I understood why people wouldn’t be too into visitors. For years the place had been a playground for the students of the colleges of Arizona, a place to wallow in irresponsibility and cheap tequila, streets used to puke and piss in. And now older, richer white people were buying up all of the beach property and building ostentatious houses that the natives could never afford. And they were probably being treated as if they were dirty, ignorant and Spanish speaking obstacles in front of the next thing to purchase. I understood a lack of niceties.

The road back to the house had a billboard which seemed to bother me more than it should have. It showed an artist’s rendition of a new condo complex to be built with a suitably Latinized English name. Below this illustrated monstrosity were two simple words: “Paradise Perfected.”

And I had been living under the notion that paradise was perfect by definition.

To be continued…

*Musical note: I was completely unaware that Huey Lewis and the News had made so many albums, but my dad cleared me up of this misconception. I was completely unaware of the ills that an hour and forty minutes of HL and the N can cure (which is for the most part dissolving the plague of anger and apathy the hour and a half of James Taylor had created just before.)

Feb(r)uary Song of the Day: “(Red)” by Califone (following up the Giant Sand, Califone is the brittle wind that erases the street signs and makes the journey raw.)

I Feel A Hot Wind On My Shoulder

2008-02-20T18:28:00.000-08:00

Spent the night in the Hotel de Gringo, ate breakfast there with a group of twanglicious dove hunters who behaved pretty much as I expected they would and then hit the road for another five hour drive out to the coast on Mexico's finest asphalt.

As I mentioned, it's some arid country out there in the thick of it. There's a lot of sun, sand and wind that will wash away the most stubborn road sign you put in front of it. Thankfully it was a straight shot out to the Gulf of California so we wouldn't have to pay attention to these whited out signs.

Or so the map would have you believe.

Somewhere near... I'm not sure, I couldn't read the sign, but there was a detour in the highway that brought us to a thinner two lane highway that passed long empty train stops and windblown bull fighting rings. We lost all track of where we were or how we were to get to where we were trying to get to. The Rand McNally map of Mexico was as useless as Jimmy Buffet singing to us about "way down in Mexico." Screw you Buffet.

We finally came upon a small town that had a sizeable square of grid patterned streets. We pulled over at a corner liquor store/bar with a great big Tecate sign (looking back on it, it's interesting to note that it was a Tecate sign – more on this later (maybe)) where my brother asked directions with his fluent Spanish. We finally finagled a route to some other highway and it was more or less smooth sailing to Puerto Penasco.

There was the confusion as to which signs for which luxury condo complex we were to use as directions, and there was the brief moment of panic when I pulled the truck over for my dad to get his navigation shit together and ended up spinning wheels in the desert sand, but we got there.

"There" was a 4 bedroom house on the beach, literally yards from the water. I got in, kissed my wife and son hello, congratulated my mother on a fine choice of rental, and made it clear that I was gonna shake the desert heat and hit that water post haste. The response from my mother was as if I had told her I was gonna go find a diseased cow, kill it with my bare hands, eat it, poop it out, then finance its run for president of a local condo committee.

"Really?!?!?!?!"

There probably weren't that many punctuation marks with the question, but it seemed odd she was so shocked by the idea, when most anyone who knows me knows that I can't spend a couple of minutes near a body of water without getting into it if feasibly possible.

Cold, that water was. Not snow melt in Northern California on New Years Day cold, but colder than I was expecting from the sunny shores of Mexico. And that's where the shock lay for me madre. It seems that my folks acclimated to Phoenix, and my brother and my sister-in-law acclimated to Costa Rica, were freezing their asses off in the 70 degree weather.

Coming from 35 degrees and wet in Seattle, it felt pretty damn good to me.

To be continued…

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: “(Well) Dusted (for the millennium)” by Giant Sand (The balls on these guys to smuggle the title of the song between two parenthesis, like the balloon full of coke inside the pretty young thing muling it on in).

I'm On A Wavelength Far From Home

2008-02-19T16:30:00.000-08:00

Here I am, back in the north where people around me don’t give two craps about my relaxation (honestly, people in the south didn’t either) and all entrees do NOT come with a side of rice and beans.

As briefly mentioned below, the start of this Mexican adventure began with my father and I hightailing it through the border at Nogales (where the border agents didn’t even turn away from their conversation to watch us pass) and on into some not so tourist visited towns in Northern Mexico.

The main highway through this part of Mexico is a two lane affair with a definite lack of shoulders to at least set ones mind to rest. And for a freeway, there are a large number of speed bumps laid out to slow one’s progress to Hermosillo. There are speed bumps to slow you when you reach an agricultural check, speed bumps to slow you down when you reach a drug check post and speed bumps to slow you down when you reach any number of small, poverty stricken towns that cling to Mexican Highway 15. An admirable market has arisen in these towns. When a car is forced to stop at said bumps, a flock of people approach the car from both sides and attempt to sell you any number of things, but mostly what appeared to be tortillas.

There’s a rumor that in some of these places, if you’re true of heart and lacking of any form of common sense, you can buy bags of “fresh” shrimp while you travel this magical highway.

The landscape in these parts is desert to be sure, but not the fun “Wile E. Coyote” desert, nor the biblical lose-and-find-yourself-in-a-trial-of-the-soul desert, but a long stretching, wasteland of desert. There are saguaro cacti growing in some places, but more often than not there is dry and empty spaces filled with scrub brush and wire fences gone to disrepair – but there is not a billboard clogging the view of nothing.

Except… I did see, as the only form of billboard out there in the desert, a couple of little red squares (about the size of a typical stop sign) with familiar yellow arches and two simple words: “me enchanto.” It definitely sounds far more sexy than “I’m lovin’ it”, particularly if you say it all slow and breathy with a come fuck me look on your face.

All of this empty desert would be great for letting you mind roll undistracted, if it weren’t for being forced to listen to the playlists your father is so gosh darned proud of creating on his iPod. *More on this to come – all week I would guess.

On realizing that we were probably going to be late in reaching Hermosillo to pick up my brother from the airport, your main man driver Billy here fell back on lessons learned driving the mean streets of Southern California. I reached speeds of 110, severely unsafe for the state of the roads, the state of the other drivers on said roads, and ultimately all for naught as we were late picking my brother up.

Hermosillo? Nice town, but having spent a large number of years in Southern California there was something very familiar about it. I did notice that for the most part, all of the buildings were single story affairs, except for those built specifically to deal with the infestation of Americans feeding at the NAFTA tit. Such as the gaggle of Ford reps who were also staying at the high rise hotel Fiestamericana. See what they did there with the combining of Fiesta and Americana? It’s like a taste of being in a Latin American country without the discomfort of being outside of what you’re used to.

To be continued…

*Musical note: Dad explained to me how he had made these playlists on his iPod as if he didn’t already know that I myself have an iPod. Proud as a new parent, he explained that he had taken all of his Jimmy Buffet songs and put them on a playlist without a single repeated song. He had also done a “Super Eagles” list where he included the entire Eagles catalogue, as well as solo songs from Don Henley, Joe Walsh and Glenn Frey. This was the sort of thing that I was forced to sit through as I cruised the arid countryside of Mexico – save for the hour and half respite where I specifically requested that we listen to The Band. Some things I learned from this musical journey that first day:

Elton John has recorded several versions of “Candle In the Wind” and all them can bite my ass and call it candy.
That the audience captured responding to the live version of “Hotel California” I heard were so frigging stupid they couldn’t realize the song for what it was – and cheer at the recognition – until about 4 minutes in. That being said, this audience was at an Eagles show.
Kenny G has recorded a version of Celine Dion’s “The Heart Will Go On”. This is like shit covering shit. This is like a shit burrito drowned in shit sauce. This is shit meeting shit head on and causing a massive shit vortex that pulls anything in the vicinity into it and turns it to shit.

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: Another twofer Tuesday with “Pigs (Three Different Ones)” by Pink Floyd and “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” by The Beatles (I love that there are essentially only those words in The Beatles’ song and it’s one the heaviest (also in the title) songs they made).

Goin' Southbound (A Slight Return)

2008-02-09T17:17:00.000-08:00

Due to the power of wireless internet and laptop computers, I am posting to the world from a toilet in a hotel in Hermosillo Mexico. I'm sweaty and tired, but still amazed.

Here's a picture of my doing it:

Goin' Southbound

2008-02-08T22:27:00.000-08:00

Hey all,

I'm finally doing something I had always intended to do before - post with a good buzz on.

What makes this one a little weird is that I am currently at my parents' house in Phoenix, doing twosies on a shot of Bud Light.

Tomorrow (man that took a lot of times to type correctly) we head to Mexico. What I did not realize until we arrived here in Arizona, is that my father and I will be spending the night in Hermasillo after picking up my brother and his Costa Rican wife at the airport there. Apparently it's harder to get a visa to enter the (again, that one took multiple times to type and it's 3 friggin letters) states than it is is to see a good example of Paris' acting abilities.

Anyway, I'm off for a week, drinkin it up beach style in a rented house in Mexico. Feelin' the need for a break big time.

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: As I have not been to Mexico since the 80's, I'm going to leave you with a weekful of 80's treasures -
"Nothing To Fear (But Fear Itself)" by Oingo Boingo
"(Don't Go Back To) Rockville" by R.E.M.
"(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding" by Elvis Costello and the Attractions
"(Nothing But) Flowers" by Talking Heads
"(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais" by The Clash (for the love of Jesus with the "j" as an "h", don't take (that one took a lot of attempts as well) these all at once, spread 'em out over the week.)

The One Where CoWorkers Kill Each Other

2008-02-07T18:19:00.000-08:00

So I took the day off yesterday as the sickness that has made Kickers a snotty, crying mess finally waylaid me. It took over despite all the work that I had done in making my body inhospitable through booze and fast living. I feel this reacted poorly to the work I had also done in trying to live longer by eating well and getting some exercise.

So I spent yesterday in headachy, fevery, sleepy fog. Completely to the side, they’re playing Guided By Voices on KEXP right now, the combo of that, the bare tree shakin’ its shit in the big wind outside and the sound of Kickers talking gently to himself makes me pretty danged happy.

Anyway, I returned to the workplace this morning to find my team still frazzled from the fit they had worked themselves up into yesterday. See, they had apparently processed all of the emails they were charged with processing, thus not only doing their job, but doing to a degree a success. For most people this would be a good thing.

To hear it spoken of today, in the sort of shocked whispers that are reserved for legend, you would have believed that under the red glow of massive fires, the team had set upon each other and eaten the weak – somehow also managing to firebomb Tacoma in the middle of it all. I kept expecting to trip over ribcages and slip in the cast off inner organs of former correspondence reps.

Despite the graphic “when two tribes go to war” tales I was told about, someone still had the time and wherewithal to email all of us with the info that Heath’s death was due to accidental overdose on prescription drugs.

But I already knew that, I had been privy to the news yesterday. I saw it reported twice and was confused each time by the breath of relief the newscasters issued when they reported that it was prescription drugs that had done him in. It was as if the shadow of street drugs would besmirch the life he had left behind.

I’m not sure that it’s better that he had five or six “legal” drugs within reach. That still smacks of being in touch with a dealer, even if said dealer has a medical degree.

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: Again, feeling bad for missing yesterday, here’s a Twofer (this time) Thursday – “Bang A Gong (Get It On)” by T. Rex, followed closely by David Bowie’s “Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)”

Poop

2008-02-05T17:32:00.000-08:00

Poop.

I feel like it, I wanna say it a lot, and I’m reminded of a scene in Grizzly Man where senor bear lover goes all weak kneed and girly touching the fresh poop from a bear.

Grizzly Man, I say watch it. If you don’t know about it, it’s a documentary about a man who spent a number of years camping in the Alaskan wilds, taping himself mere feet away from Alaskan grizzly bears. You want my opinion? Doesn’t matter, I’m running this here post. I’m bothered by this guy for the same reason I’m bothered by a lot of people; hypocrisy. This dude maintains that he’s selflessly protecting these bears that he loves, but spends 90% of the film time we’re privy to talking about how much he does for the bears (I’m a little unclear what exactly he does to protect the bears; check that, I’m a lot unclear), about how he teaches children for free and we also get to see him enacting different entrances for his diatribes with different bandanas. This doesn’t spell out the acts of a selfless individual to me, it smells like fishing for attention.

And that my friends, smells like burnt popcorn – and bear poop.

Learning that this guy was an actor – even going so far as to invent a new history and fake accent – doesn’t do much to dissuade me of this thought. But, that’s just the way I see it, please watch it, it’s worth a whirl on the Netflix queue.

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: It’s a twofer Tuesday with “(We’re A) Bad Trip” by Camper Van Beethoven and “Free Radicals (A Hallucination Of The Christmas Skeleton Pleading With A Suicide Bomber)” by The Flaming Lips (The two seem to go hand in hand quite nicely).

Without Even A Cow To Trade

2008-02-04T14:30:00.000-08:00

Sitting here and trying not to get mired down in frustration, which is an area of opportunity for me. I have become so brainwashed in the corporate PC jargon that it is now automatic for me to say “area of opportunity” instead of “where I suck”, or “how I typically fuck up”. All those great single syllable “uck” words going to waste…

Anyway, I’m trying to let other people’s frustrations flow through me instead of latching onto the small chunks of crisitunity already being harbored in my system until I’m rife with frustration tumors, giving birth to devil spawn frustration pupa.

I’m trying to focus on the vacation to come next week and not on the teething, cold infested, 14 month old that’s going to have to sit through a 2 hour plane ride. I’m trying to ignore the same cold that’s trying to take my body down. I’m feeling a little overheated, a little feverish, so I laid my forehead down on the coolness of my desk for a moment. From this vantage point, I could clearly see a little green thing on the floor of my cubicle.

I thought it might be a pistachio or something, but I picked it up and discovered it was a dried bean of some sort. It looks like a lima bean perhaps. It does not belong to me, I have not eaten anything at my desk that resembles this.

Perhaps it is a magic bean. I almost hate to say anything about it, for it seems to me that magic is a pretty fragile thing and words can break it like ice, but I’m holding onto it, my magic bean.

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: “You Don’t Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You’re Told)” by The White Stripes.

Feb(r)uary

2008-02-01T09:03:00.000-08:00

Welcome to February, the freak month, the odd duck month, the “one of these kids is doing his own thing” month.

It’s a month that has fewer days and an extra “r” to make up for it. Seriously, that “r” after the “b” makes me nervous, it makes me feel like a secret agent in there, perhaps a secret agent that has forgotten its cover and no longer realizes that it’s a secret agent.

Not long ago, we were having a discussion about music, and Kimberly let it be known that she doesn’t like song titles with a parenthetical in it. The example that she gave was “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”. She really doesn’t like it. I really don’t have a feeling about it one way or the other, but I can say that I love me a good parenthetical. I feel like I can’t get through a day without using a parenthetical. I feel a parenthetical is like a rabbit hole in a sentence (sometimes a dirty little rabbit hole (sometimes a clean one, but those don’t always amuse me)). And when I see things like that, sly little parenthesis stacked up against each other at the end of a sentence, it reminds me of good things like a conservative falling from grace, they remind of Falwell’s tears which makes me smile and smile.

So in honor of Kimberly’s dislike for parenthesis in a song title, in honor of a month that I feel should have a parenthesis in it, I bring you the:

Feb(r)uary Song Of The Day: “2+2=5 (The Lukewarm)” by Radiohead (When I brought up to Kimberly that all the songs on Hail To The Thief had two titles, one in parenthesis, she found this particularly irksome).

With One Hour Of Television

2008-01-31T21:39:00.000-08:00

Sweet Mother McJuggles, what an effing day.

It’s getting a bit old, this work thing, I’m sure almost as old as hearing about it. Wanna hear about a baby crazy cranky with molars coming in? Molars that apparently take 3 and a half months to make their appearance? Neither do I.

I will say that as The Simpson’s keeps the Kickers placated for half an hour, I had the TV on for a bit. And in just a half an hour, I learned such things. Oh, the things I learned.

Firstly, there’s the Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus concert coming to theaters in Disney 3-D. I’m not sure what many of those words mean when they’re strung together like that. But by the sound of the voice over actors voice, I should be really freakin’ excited about it. You might say it’s a once in a lifetime sort of thing this Miley Montana 3-D thing.

Excited, me, for sure.

Second, guess what’s opening on Valentine’s Day? Don’t really guess, I won’t hear you. Step Up 2: The Streets. I am completely unsure what Step Up 1 is, but from the commercials it appears to be partners from either side of the economic divide coming together, learning something about themselves, and dancing their asses off. It’s directed by Jon Chu, the commercial goes on to excitedly tell me. The commercial tells me this in the same sort of hushed, excited tone that I feel a commercial would tell me that the long lost actual first Orson Welles film had been found.

Jon Chu? Jon Chu! Do you know what Jon Chu has done besides Step Up 2: The Streets? Silent Beats. What? You’ve never head of Silent Beats? You’re not alone.

And before I was finally able to extricate myself from the pull of the TV, there was one more commercial.

WalMart, that bastion of all things American, informed me via their marketing folks that there will be all kinds of women all over the country making food and putting snacks into bowls this weekend for their burly men who will continue to sit on the couch watching the Superbowl. Afterwards, I’m sure the women will go back to the kitchen and clean it up, ‘cause well that’s what women do – they don’t watch football.

Sometimes I get so tired…

Sperms Of Endearment

2008-01-29T21:58:00.001-08:00

Speaking of 4 and a half minute cum shots…

Wait. Sorry. No one was, but I’ve already started down that path.

A weird thing that I was talking to some friends about the other day; when I was in high school, me and a bunch of my friends – male friends – would all get together and watch porn.

It was typically at Damon’s place as his mother was typically either out of town or so out of it she wouldn’t notice 6 or 7 teenagers in her place, and there was typically beer. Well, there were typically wine coolers the first few times as we hadn’t developed a taste for anything that didn’t resemble Fanta left to ferment in a Southern California garage. At the time, nothing seemed strange about a gaggle of guys, done up on illicit booze and hormones, sitting around together and watching people acting poorly and fucking hard. It was this strange thrill of doing something you weren’t supposed to be doing. Now, looking back on it, it seems a little odd to me, a little strange.

I would like to end this with some teenaged misunderstanding – a sexy misunderstanding – but there’s nothing. I wish there was a tale of one of us discovering something about ourselves…

Wait. There was that guy John. You know, the 22 year old hanging out with a bunch of 17 year olds. I don’t remember how he ended up orbiting our circle except that he at one time dated our drum major. On one of these porn nights, while if I’m not mistaken we sat on Damon’s couch and watched some guy getting blown in a hot tub, John suddenly busted out with:

“You guys only hang out with me because I can buy you beer.”

We all sat looking at him for a minute, no one refuting it, but no one brave enough to admit to it for fear that our alcohol supply would dry up. After an uncomfortable silence, we all went back to watching Intergalactic Hookers, or whatever.

And so that sad day John learned a little something about himself; that he had no friends and we only put up with him as he would occasionally show up with a half rack and a bottle of root beer schnapps.

I guess I also learned a little something that day; I no longer watch porn with my friends.

Week In Review

2008-01-28T14:38:00.000-08:00

I have been an awful blogger lately, last week’s output was embarrassing and I beg your forgiveness. If I had a picture of myself on my knees to post here, I would.

And let me make that clear, if I had a “clean” picture of myself on my knees…

My last week was fairly miserable. I mean it started off fine enough, but then things just continued to slide. There was a moment on Wednesday when I could feel a crack in my composure that I was trying to mend (and by mend I mean ignore), but then as things started piling up, the cracking just kept happening.

It was like that scene in The Lost World: Jurassic Park where the RV is going off the cliff and Julianne Moore hits the back window and as she stares through the glass and into the tremendous fall down a cliff, stress cracks start radiating out underneath her with every move. It was exactly like that, without the T. Rex and without Jeff Goldblum saving me by grabbing onto my lucky backpack.

Where were you Jeff Goldblum, you with your stylized speaking cadence?

There was no big issue, just a bunch of little ones; all of them fantastic examples of the ridiculousness of holding an office job. On Thursday I walked out of the middle of a meeting. On Thursday night I got to one of those points where I couldn’t see past the big Monster Truck of Anger that was gunning its engine in front of me, it felt like all the blood vessels inside of me were going blow. On Friday it entered my mind, albeit briefly, that I could just walk away from this gig and not come back.

Which brings to mind a number of questions, like: Why did Heath have to die for Britney’s sins? And what does this say about the poor timing of Brad Renfro? Does anybody else suspect an Olsen twin of performing murders that look like suicides? And seriously, where were you Jeff Goldblum?

Yeah, it all seems pretty petty and ridiculous now, particularly when you get home to a little man who’s so excited to see you that he starts jumping up and down and clapping. How are you gonna beat that? You’re not, not with a ten foot stick made out of crappy office job.

So, I’m hoping to prioritize my time a bit better and get more posts in, realize this job is what it is and get on with doing what I need to to get on out of it.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Rockit” by Herbie Hancock. Don’t ask…

The Mood And Australia

2008-01-22T07:54:00.000-08:00

I’m in an all day class today and I’m really excited. Read “excited” as “bored by the prospect of” and “really” as “really”.

I’m going to learn about the power of my career. I’m hoping it’s the ability to breath under water. Or super heated laser beam eyes.

I’m a little beat as I spent a better part of last night tossing and turning. Part of me was worried about not being able to post today – seriously. Part of me was obsessed with Australia coming up with knock off versions of everything in the world. This seemed funnier when I was losing sleep over it.

I’m going to recommend that you read the Australian Billy Cleans His Plate today. If I had the time, I would totally build one and fill it with stories of vegemite. And marsupials, man you cannot go wrong with marsupials.

I’m off for class, books in hand. I’m still really excited (see above)

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “My Iron Lung” by Radiohead

The Moon and Antarctica

2008-01-21T12:06:00.000-08:00

Cold one this morning. It was absolutely clear out, which is honestly a nice break from the recent weather. I realize that being a denizen of the Pacific Northwest (or the PNW as the kids are calling it – they’re not by the way) I’m gonna see some rain. I’m okay with it, I don’t like to complain about it, but when it comes down to it, I’m ready for a break. But with the clear sky in January, comes the cold.

Not the kind of Antarctic cold that will freeze your eyelashes or anything, but certainly the sort of cold that will turn every exhale into swampy condensation on your mustache – if’n you have a mustache. I do, connected to a beard, so I imagined that I must have looked like some sort of rabid mountain man by the time I climbed off of Capitol Hill and entered downtown.

All of the puddles were iced over giving the city hundreds of mini ice fields that grabbed onto whatever light was being tossed their way and held onto it like a secret. All of them shown like scratched up magic; the trapped neon looking particularly, beautifully tarnished. I had this mad, childlike desire to run to every one of those surfaces and crack them with my boot, let that frozen light out. I was almost stopped completely by the icy reflection of the moon.

It was a cold and lonely, pale silver, but somehow it was calming. I looked up and noticed for the first time that morning the nearly full moon up above the dark buildings. I immediately thought of Kickers looking for the moon outside the living room window and, unable to see it from his already tiny vantage point, bending his knees, squatting and tilting his head to try and catch it. I thought of all the chaotic change soon to be entering my life and laughed in its face.

It felt good.

The Earth itself seemed to feel an accommodation to change, and had begun to begrudgingly turn a bit differently, allowing the sun to show up a bit earlier than it had been. The last third of the walk was beneath a predawn blue sky that is a color that seems pulled from my very dreams. It’s seems like a blue created by the right combination of words in a Pixies song, a shade of blue that evades any camera or painters brush, a blue that feels like your first solo drive in a car – and you’re gonna take that ride all night and find yourself in a small and empty town when the next day comes to shake your hand.

If you gotta go to work, this is not a bad way to do it. Not at all.

What I've Got

2008-01-17T15:35:00.000-08:00

Nothing.

I’m bogged down in work and bothered to no end that I have to concern myself with the end of the fiscal month. I’m bothered that the combination of the words fiscal and month were ever put before me.

I’m bone tired, dog tired, I’ve been tired. T-I-R-E-D spells it. I keep looking at things on my desk as if I’m expecting an answer, as if the stapler will tell my future with its black, boxy, body. I feel that in response to questions I’m turning my head slowly, that I’m moving in dream time. I find myself resting my head in my hands when I read an email. I’m yawning so long and hard it’s almost erotic.

I’ve got an empty coffee cup. I’ve got a bag of almonds. I’ve got a little, green plastic mermaid that’s designed to hang of the rim of a cup holding a cocktail and I wonder why I don’t go to bars that serve their drinks with little plastic things hanging off of them, or piercing food that’s in them. My typical bars don’t have little plastic cutlasses or monkeys or ring tailed lemurs. And as I yawn another porno yawn, I realize I would probably just choke on it in my mad rush to shove alcohol into my waiting maw.

I have a mad desire to walk up to a coworker and start writing on their face; perhaps the preamble to the Constitution. “We the people…”

I like that a preamble comes before a good regular amble.

I’ve got “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)” by Whitney Houston stuck in my head.

Negativity Just Makes Me Stronger

2008-01-16T14:56:00.000-08:00

I’ve been, again, being slapped around by some coincidence lately. Typically, as I’ve written before, I start to notice a trend for coincidence and will wait for 3rd occurrence to call it such. This one is new, a new trend in forecasting coincidence, not multiple examples of the same coincidence, but multiple coincidental anomalies stacking up.

I have been spending way too much time at work looking at spreadsheets. Yet on I charge…

Instead of a big, massive, “something’s going on in my world” coincidence, it’s like being in a swarm of coincidences. But unlike bees, which would hurt, this is more like say a swarm of hummingbirds with tickle feathers.

It started with Nikki 2 K’s and me talking about “Bone Machine” by the Pixies. He had it stuck in his head and was digging it fierce. I told him how much I loved that it starts out with this strong and almost backwards drum beat, and then the bass comes in all sly and understated, and then you get slapped in the dick by the guitars. Around about an hour later, we’re in a supervisor check in when, just to shake some shit up, the assistant office manager starts playing a guess the song by the lyrics sorta game. We’re given a “I was talking to preachy preach about kissy kiss” straight outta “Bone Machine”. I almost won that round, but unfortunately left out one “he bought me a soda.”

Later, we’re having some lunch and talking about 80’s movies. We were specifically talking about 80’s movies that we may have loved when we were younger, but should not be revisited. Footloose may have come up, but Footloose comes up in this circle a lot. I mentioned Fletch and how I feared going back to watch The Breakfast Club, not wanting to sully the fond memories I have. At some point Singles came up – not as a movie to avoid seeing again, but because it also comes up in this circle a lot. Talk then naturally turned to the Singles apartment building which is up the street from where I currently live. Y’know, the Singles apartment building:

And the next day, what did I pass on the way to a staged reading? I passed a Safeway. But, soon after I passed the Singles apartment.

There was a third one that I cannot remember unfortunately, completing this coincidence by three rule I seem to have. But today, in the middle of quality scoring some of my reps work and listening to my iPod, I decided I needed to look at something else for a couple of minutes. I went through some blogs that I check on a regular basis, including Dave’s. He is currently playing the shit out of The Basement Tapes by Dylan and The Band. I read this while The Basement Tapes by Dylan and The Band were playing in my ears.

So what, if anything, does any of this mean? Not a damn thing, it’s just a hummingbird ticklefest that will hopefully stop before I pee myself.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Sick Of Goodbyes” by Sparklehorse.

Billy's Sense Of Snow

2008-01-15T16:49:00.000-08:00

On the way home last night, there was a delightful rain/snow mix; those fat and frigid drops that feel like they’re made of some sort of metal from the future that will eventually learn of their own mortality and turn on the human race. It wasn’t terribly surprising as it was pretty frickin’ cold out, but I begin to become wary of possible snow because of what will inevitably happen, like what happened this morning.

Later in the evening last night, it cleared up. It was no longer raining, but still ass cold. It seemed like a good opportunity to get Kickers out the house for a couple minutes and walk up to the record store. Nothing really happened saved for an arm that felt on fire after lugging a toddler around the used CD section and further evidence that the kid loves a good drum beat.

Soon though, it began to snow. The two of us walked out into it for a minute, the streets and sidewalks collecting the stuff in a manner that seemed pretty fast. It was a really gritty snow, like small chunks of hail that quickly lost any charm. I was reminded of that clichéd fact that people with little imagination often throw out about Eskimos and their 812 words for snow. Great, hurray for the Eskimos.

It stopped snowing and cleared up, which leads the way for a good freezing of the compacted snow into treacherous ice by morning. Did this happen? Oh my, yes.

A precarious walk to work this morning. I was reminded greatly of just last year, at about this same time, when on after throwing my back out I ventured out to the roads only to slip on the sheet of ice that was Pine Street, throwing out my back again, ripping open a brand new pair of jeans and trying to roll out of the road before a car was sent out of control on this very same ice.

I spent a bulk of 3 miles walking a prissy little step meant to keep me from a slapstick, banana peel pratfall. With the exception of the occasional slide, this mostly worked; until the feet decided to betray me horribly and shoot out in front of my body. I managed to wrap my arm around a handhold to keep myself from a full body smack down, but there was the comic effect of those betrayer feet doing a spastic dance skating routine.

I knew it was eventual, so chalked it up to the fall that was due to me and kept going. I guess as the next two miles were without incident, I got cocky. Crossing the street in front of a line of cars looking to get into Interstate 90, I was offered the chance for a full on, face down in the sharply iced pavement, fall – and took it I did. I felt a digging into my knees and watched the cloud of steam that my harshly barked “fuck!” produced float out of my mouth as carefree as, as… I don’t know, something carefree. And I am apparently unaware of a graceful way to lift oneself from an icy street, mere inches away from many cars waiting on a light. But after a few false starts I was up and on my way, David Bowie still playing loud and proud in my ears and no rip in my pants to boot.

Sometimes I feel like life should offer hazard pay.

It's All Hating Faces That I Have To Chop Up With A Machete

2008-01-10T14:40:00.000-08:00

And seriously, speaking of Chuck Norris – yesterday - what has happened to this guy?

I was watching some political coverage with pictures of Huckabee looking religiously triumphant and spouting words that I frankly blocked with my patented Ignore-O-Shield.

P.S. I cannot hear the name Huckabee without in the back of my mind hearing Naomi Watts harshly whisper “Fuckabees,” which makes this pre-campaigning more entertaining for me.

But I’m looking at the joshed-up visage of Huckabee, the will of God shining in his eyes, and notice what appears to be the grinning face of Chuck Norris. And no, I know that Chucky has thrown his lot in with the guy, when I’m saying it appeared to be Chuck Norris, I’m saying that it was unlike any Chuck Norris I’m used to seeing. Which granted is not a lot, but…

At first I literally thought that there was a plastic cut out of old Chuckles Norris back there, no joke. It looked as though it might be a life sized bobble head version of him. Well, the head being life sized. Being a bobble head, that would mean that the body is considerably smaller, and I didn’t see his body in this footage, but the head appeared to be made out of cast plastic.

I seriously focused on that floating, tanned face with all the attention I could muster, waiting for a sign of movement; and waiting to ascertain if that was in fact really a person. Nothing moved. There was no sort of reaction to anything, no movement, just this shiny stare into the crowd and a wide smile made up of teeth so white that it burned black spots onto my retina just looking at them; teeth that looked like they might eat the face. This mannequin version of Chuck Norris, this Mannequinorris, finally nodded slightly at some word or phrase, sending out the approval message to his legion of Jr. Texas Rangers, and allowing me to realize he was in fact there.

And what sort of message does having the backing of The Mannequinorris send?
“We will single handedly return to Vietnam and free the prisoners of war.”
“We’re the most karate-choppingest team on the planet!”
“Fear us, or we will kick you repeatedly in the throat!”

I know that you don’t necessarily pick your celebrity endorsers, but I’m a bit puzzled. And a lot of that puzzlement comes from people who might think that The Mannequinorris would be a good judge of presidential candidates.

Direct Action, Pure Prairie League And A Jar Of Garlic Pickles

2008-01-09T15:54:00.000-08:00

Yesterday's post being… well, posted, I sometimes dream of living in a world where I only watch movies available from Stop'n'Shops in podunk towns; only listening to cassettes purchased at interstate truck stops.

I revel in a world where I pick up a copy of any direct to video release while I pick up a twelver of Schlitz. I long for a world where my film viewing options are limited to DVD’s with covers that have a lot of flames as their artwork, to movies with robots – lots and lots of robots. I roll in the stink of desire for diving into the filmography of Chuck Norris, Chuck Zito… all the Chuck’s. I positively make my pants wet and sticky thinking about a wide selection of movies starring former NFL players, current/former/current again WWF wrestlers, all within reach of the no name brand snack chips on the shelves behind this spinning wire rack.

I wanna lose my shit to Stone Cold, starring Brian Bosworth.

And think about it, think, think about it: All those dollar cassettes that flood the counters at gravy smelling truck stops all up down the arteries of interstates. Life is a highway, and I wanna ride all night long listening only to TV’s Greatest Theme Songs, The Best of Frank Stallone, some stuff by the guy who sang “Somebody’s Knockin’ At The Door (Somebody’s Ringin’ The Bell)”. I’m feeling the need for all kinds of Conway Twitty, 8 kinds of Alabama, and a sprinkle of The Oak Ridge Boys.

Whew!

By the by, GarageBand on the Mac is my new porn. Older porn included Legend of Zelda on the original Nintendo system and… well, just regular porn.

Land Of Confusion

2008-01-08T14:03:00.000-08:00

So I was doing some shopping, standing on line for a register when I took a quick look at the discount DVD’s on the shelf to my right. I can’t help it, I’m constantly looking for a bargain copy of I Love Trouble… There were some movies that I had heard of, Minority Report and Runaway Bride (thank the lord we finally got the Pretty Woman dynamite duo of Richard Gere and Julia Roberts back together), but there was also an ass load of some penguin movie.

Penguins On The Move, or Penguin Insurgence, I don’t remember the exact title unfortunately, but the cover made it pretty clear that this company was trying to jump onto whatever glow remains with the success of March Of The Penguins.

And I realized that this is a gambit that will work on a lot of people. Someone will surely walk by and say, “Hey it’s that penguin movie everyone was talking about. And it’s only $7.99!” Said person may then buy it and (maybe) watch it, never the wiser. Which I guess is fine. If said person had a burning desire to watch March Of The Penguins, they would probably make an effort to remember the name of the movie; probably…

It just made me think of all the chatter out there, all the television shows and mindless movies and overly produced and unoriginal music that we use to block out our lives. "American Idol" may be a fun show to watch, I don’t know I haven’t seen it, but I’m against it philosophically. My issue with it revolves around two women I used to work with who watched the show religiously so they would know what to listen to when a winner was announced.

So this is what was bumming me out under awful florescent lighting while the person in front of me tried to return or exchange some tacky brass candlesticks. Then, as if to illustrate my point, a young woman behind me grabbed a DVD case and explained to her friend:

“It’s that [Interchangeable Young Actress’ Name] movie. I think we saw it. You know? The one where she has a best friend and the mom? Someone gets pregnant?”

I fear leaving this life remembering only a list of vague notions.

Took Flight, First Light

2008-01-03T16:02:00.000-08:00

I may have me a coincidence brewing. I typically wait for at least 3 occurrences of something before I consider it a coincidence – and I may be pushing this one a bit. It’s a stretch, but bear with me.

Seriously? It’s “bear” with me? It seems a little strange to me, and it seems like it would leave the door open to polite misunderstandings over honey, and to mauling.

So I was walking in to work along a route I don’t take every day. It’s a route that’s a tad shorter, but involves a little more uphill than others, so I typically just use it on those days I’m running a little late. Say a day I had to have a big boy sit down before leaving, perhaps a day where there was a misunderstanding with the bear with me – a sexy misunderstanding… But on the way in I’m passed by a bus whose advertisement covered side tells me that my job’s in Wyoming. I didn’t know this, and frankly was unprepared for the trip.

Wyoming’s trying to gather itself a workforce thought I. Good for them. Then I sort of stopped walking so quickly (I was running late) while I tried to yank something out of my memory that was tickling back there.

I remembered the week prior, walking the same route in (just didn’t want to get out of bed that day) and at the same block had been listening to the Calexico song “Sunken Waltz”. “Sunken Waltz” tells the story of Carpenter Mike who sets aside his tools and leaves for the empty spaces of far away where he begins listening to his dreams and builds a flying machine. I remember this clearly because as I was focusing on the words, I felt like Carpenter Mike took off to Wyoming – I don’t know why, I just did. But I looked up to check the traffic light, saw the Alaska Building, and realized that this here city was once the fabled far away West. I guess it was the idea of all that empty space that made me think of Wyoming.

And here I was, almost exactly a week later, being again reminded of Wyoming. Why?

Maybe no reason, maybe because it’s where Captain MIA, my drug addled ex-roommate on the run, was last known to be. Maybe next week, when I sleep through my alarm, I will see him standing on a corner across James Street.

By the by, Kickers loves him some Calexico. He dances a mad, crazy dance to some Calexico. No that you should base what you listen to on an infant necessarily, but why aren’t you listening to Calexico?

It Still Has That New Year Smell

2008-01-02T15:36:00.000-08:00

I’m feeling a bit out of sorts. And I’m feeling like I’ve been feeling a bit out of sorts for awhile. I’m unsure what sort of recharge is necessary, what sort of reboot, but it is apparently not frozen egg rolls and a half rack of PBR. I feel like I’m in a bit of a quandary, like I’m unsure how to go about this post. Do I do a year in review sort of thing, or do I look forward into the new year?

2007 (quick, but with feeling): A tough and rough year in spots, but generally the payoffs were better than I had guessed they would be. I got to watch my son take his first shaky steps into the person he will continue to become, watched him laugh, watched him figure out the joy of cheese, watched him shake his booty to pretty much any music with a beat, watched him live. I did my first role in a full length film and got to do a play that I’m crazy proud to have been a part of. I got out of this year with an amazing lady still by my side and some great friends who held me up from time to time (even if they didn’t realize I was starting to fall).

Enter meandering guitar solo with tasteful distortion, maybe a little flanger…

We welcomed in our own Rockin’ New Years Eve on the couch with the above mentioned PBR and eggrolls, a few episodes of "Arrested Development" and the last half of Poltergeist (starting where dude eats maggot chicken and then tears off his own face). At a couple minutes to midnight we cracked open a bottle of champagne and went outside our front door where you can see the Space Needle. They typically shoot fireworks off the Space Needle, and started to again this year.

We watched the show start and stop after about 45 seconds. We stood there thinking that the displays were a tad longer in years past, a tad more impressive, but we were also under a far deeper influence in years past. We didn’t find out until the next day that there was a computer glitch that kept the show from going on until someone went out and manually lit the fireworks; we had already retreated inside. I also learned that when the news cameras didn’t have fireworks to show, they began to wildly tune back into whatever newscasters they had stationed around our fair city – including going back to a couple of them who were caught passionately kissing. Awesome.

Resolutions? Aside from being resolute in finishing a couple more PBR’s before 12 rolled around, I didn’t make any. It begins to be a bit grating to me when people make a big deal out of not making New Year’s resolutions. It reminds me a lot of vegetarians who spend an inordinate amount of time talking about the meat they don’t eat. I don’t care, just shut up and don’t do it.

Top of my head resolutions for 2008:

Stop being so hard on people who make a big deal out of not making resolutions. Same goes for vegetarians
Stop trying to convince my son that crying just means he’s doomed to go to Hell.
Eat more Brussels sprouts. And more sweet potatoes. Not necessarily together, I just feel I’ve come to them late in life and I have some catching up to do.
Try harder to mock my own sense of self importance.
Plant a tree.

I hope everyone had a great start to Aught 8, let’s go…

Three Seven

2007-12-27T13:13:00.000-08:00

Something about that 7 that I just don’t like… I’m pretty okay with aging, I’m resigned to the fact that it’s the price we pay for getting to live. An unfair price? Probably, but it’s one that’s built into the lease.

Still, that 7 is a sharp and jagged number, it doesn’t feel lucky. I think that that 7 is an angular little signpost that points out the now short slide into 40. And seriously, how the fuck can I be that close to 40? I feel that I’m still walking around with an adolescent mind most of the time. I feel like I’m just getting started.

Some age related things that have, coincidentally enough, come up in conversation with friends that are considerably younger:

For the majority of my high school years, the music I listened to was on cassette – CD’s were brand new. The first CD I ever bought was Echo and The Bunnymen’s self titled.

I remember when John Lennon was shot. I also remember my babysitter hysterically crying when Elvis died.

I saw Return of the Jedi in the theater when it was originally released. Also The Empire Strikes Back. Also Star Wars (the second time I saw it was at a drive in, in the back of an El Camino).

The first computer that I used, in grade school, had a cassette tape drive.

My best friend’s older brother taught me how to Do The Hustle when I was 5 and disco was still quite the rage.

Anyways, another year down and a pledge for striving to hold onto at least a little childishness for the duration.

All That Glitters Is Gold

2007-12-26T15:44:00.001-08:00

Christmas was pretty low key and nice. I slept in a bit, but did get up with that same sort of prickly excitement in my belly that I once got with opening presents as a child. We made some breakfast, put Kickers down for a nap after he beheaded a pop-up book chicken that besides being pop-up has the added benefit of a crowing sound effect, and then lay on the couch and watched The Simpsons Movie.

We also got a taste of a white Christmas when it snowed for about an hour, never accumulating, but somehow striking that perfect Christmas string.

We then went on over to Mandy and Jason’s for Christmas dinner and more than a few holiday shots. Good dinner, good drinks, good friends, no family to thoroughly mess things up; a pretty awesome day all said and done.

Coming back to work this morning was a bit of a thorn in my side, if said thorn got to my side by being first shoved down my throat by a greased up fist and then pushed through the system by a razor wire toilet plunger until wiped up by a paycheck and daintily placed in my side. I was telling someone earlier that I have been in the workforce for nearly 20 years at this point, but school has ingrained it into me that the week between Christmas and New Years should be an absolute shut down. One thing that did sweeten the morning was a forwarded You Tube clip.

I watched an 8 year old play the outgoing solo of Stairway with an accuracy that put any number of dorm room stoners to shame. But then for hours I’ve had “Stairway to Heaven” stuck in my head – and then the opening keyboard lines to “Misty Mountain Hop”. It reminded me of a story from when I was working at a gas station back in those early days of the above mentioned years in the workforce.

I would like to tie it up and say it’s a delightful example of a Christmas miracle, but I would be a liar.

At the gas station, there was an older Iranian man named Fazol who worked the full service pumps. He was a kind man who would occasionally let his passions get the better of him, but a sweet man. One day I was listening to the wonderfully originally titled “Get The Led Out” on one of LA’s rock format stations when Fazol came in with a customer credit card. I looked him in the eyes and said, “There’s a lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold, and she’s buying a stairway to heaven.”

Fazol looked at me with questioning eyes for a moment and then said, “is this Shakespeare?”

“As close as we get here Fazol,” I replied.

Fazol took it upon himself to learn this little gem, and would often enter the snack shack section of the station and do his recitation with a heavy Farsi accent and it always sounded something like, “starvay to hauven.” Oh, how that made me happy to see a sixty-something Iranian immigrant quote Led Zeppelin with such measured dedication.

Then It's Love

2007-12-24T14:47:00.000-08:00

A gentleman with an impressive fro stopped me on the way in this morning. Well, technically he stood staring at me with a stony grin at the corner until I removed my headphones and looked at him.

“Jesus loves you,” he said. He then put out his hand and seemed ecstatic when I shook it. He put his other hand on mine and wished me a Merry Christmas.

I began to wonder if there was something about me that signaled this guy that Jesus loved me, perhaps something in my aura, or a look on my face, maybe the way I walked in time to The Cure’s “Speak My Language”. Then I wondered if maybe Jesus told this fella that he loved me. Something like, “Hey, that guy in the headphones and long coat? I love him. Go tell him I love him.”

It was a nice gesture, a bit presumptuous, but nice. And the guy spreading the news had a smile that made me a bit glad I could a recipient of the news he wanted to tell me.

Have a good Christmas y’all, if’n you’re into that sort of thing.

Lost Boys

2007-12-21T11:27:00.001-08:00

The train of thought that took me to Alex and B: I was listening to “Drugs” off of Talking Heads’ Fear of Music and made me think of Jimson Weed. That’s odd in itself as there are so many other drugs to go to first, but in the sort of half sleepy state I was in, I was thinking that the song did a good job of conveying the sometimes startling come on of some drugs, and from what I hear, the mighty and dangerous Jimson Weed has a serious come on. I’ve never partaken and the only person I know about that has is Alex.

Alex and B were a pair of brothers who lived a couple of apartments down from me in Chico. They were from Bremerton, the town of my birth, and they looked nothing alike. Alex sort of looked like a young Kurt Cobain, lost eyes, longish blond hair. B (or Brian) had short hair, a much darker complexion and always wore a baseball cap. Their behaviors matched their appearances in a way that was almost comical, that in some of my stonier moments made me wonder if they weren’t picked out by sitcom casting.

B was into watching some sports, drinking some beer, smoking some weed. He was loose and comfortable with the ladies, loose and comfortable with everyone. He would have been a great example of a nice, basketball playing, frat guy had he been in a frat.

Alex seemed a little uncomfortable being Alex. Also sweet, but seemed to hide behind whatever crazy amounts of inebriation that he could find. Painfully shy in some ways, when he stood next to B’s comfortable social interactions it made that stand out even more; something I’m sure Alex could feel in an almost physical way.

All done up on something, Alex and a friend of his visiting from out of town had bought a beef tongue at the Safeway, drew a face on it and nailed into a patch of grass that divided two sides of the apartment’s parking lot. There was also a sign that said something like, “Beware of Doctor something or other!” But the “something or other” was a name. Anyway, the point of that story, much like the original act itself, is questionable.

During spring break that year, when nearly the whole of a college town evaporates, I was alone in the apartment. Alex was also still in town and came over one night to sit and smoke on the patio, drink ourselves silly. At some point Alex went over the Drunk County line and into All Kindsa Fucked Up Land. He looked at me with clouded eyes that begged understanding. “You know what I’m talking about,” he slurred. I told him that unfortunately I did not know what he was talking about. He then began a rant that had the same amount of coherency as I do medical training; none. I tried hard, head full of Henry Weinhard’s, to make out at least a couple of key words, but language for him had moved onto some sort of freeform jazz babble performance. He stood silent and swaying for a second, again giving me look that seemed to plead for me to get what he was saying, before he took a header into the wooden planter box that held Amy Lou’s precious Iris’. I picked him up, made sure his head wasn’t bleeding, and carried him back home where I put him in a chair. Realizing there was a chance of him John Bonhaming himself to death, I then moved him facedown on the couch and went back home.

There was also the drunken mountain bike trip he took with my neighbor Rob. Rob called me and asked if I could drive out to Bidwell Park and pick up Alex as he’d crashed his bike. I drove out to the more remote and unpaved portion of the park to find Alex leaning against a fence with a windbreaker draped over most of his shirtless torso. I checked to see if he was okay, he removed the windbreaker to show a number of road rash patches, a nice divot of flesh missing from his side, and what appeared to my non medical trained ass as a broken collarbone. We got him loaded into the car and I headed down from the park and over to the clinic when in a hysterical panic he made me promise not to take him to the clinic. “We’ll just go home and put hydrogen peroxide on everything,” he said all wide eyed and shaky voiced. Trying to remain patient and calm, I let him know that hydrogen peroxide wasn’t going to reset that bump on his shoulder that was most likely a piece of broken bone. The more I insisted on taking him for medical assistance, the more wild and panicked he became. I decided to calm him down and take him home where B and his friends could help me talk him into going to the clinic. He eventually did and came back to my place later, complete with reset collarbone and opiate glazed eyes, and apologized for bleeding in my Honda.

I left Chico after a year of formidable debauchery and lost track of both Alex and B. I’m sure B’s out there in the world doing it fine and easy as always. I hope Alex is out there doing okay. I hope he made it through rough patches to find that sweet and funny man that he was.

How I Met My Sister-In-Law

2007-12-19T16:09:00.000-08:00

I once again ran out of time for a proper posting, so instead here's a picture of yours truly that was sent to me last night. It made me laugh after an audition that felt less than spectacular. It was much needed, thank you Terri.

Yeah, that's me in a sparkly blue dress and pigtails. Moving a bed... The first time my sister-in-law laid eyes on me it was while I was onstage in this get up.

Hope to be back tomorrow.

This Wheel Shall Explode

2007-12-17T09:39:00.001-08:00

You can probably file this under too much information, a TMI if you're abbreviation minded. Be warned, and put down that bagel dog, there's about to be some potty humor.

So Saturday, Beth was going out, I was going to stay home with Kickers and I'm thinking, "What do I want for dinner on a home alone Saturday night?" Then I thought, "If they knew the Death Star was coming, why didn't they evacuate the Yavin Rebel base? I understand the logistics of moving an entire base, but at least get the people out of there." And then I thought, "I'm really into "This Wheel's On Fire" off the first album by The Band. I mean I like the bluesy, sort of dirge-like take Dylan does, but there's an energy to The Band's version that is palpable." Then I reigned it back in and thought about dinner.

A salad, thought I, a glorious salad with red bell pepper and cucumber and toasted pecans. Perhaps some parmesan, and some breaded white meat chicken. So I went to the store and picked up some breaded chicken for this glorious salad of mine, but unbeknownst to me at the time, I picked up the blazing hot, Buffalo wing style chicken tenders. "No problem," I continued to think to myself, sidelining myself long enough to think that there may be a need for medication with all of this inner monologue, "I'm not a baby. I can handle the heat." And handle it, I did.

And then came Sunday.

Sunday morning I awoke with a little condition I like to call "Hot Ass in the Morning", or HAIM, again for those of you who are abbreviation minded. Coincidence that the acronym is the same as the last name of one of the Corey's? I think not.

Now, I used to get a little Hot Ass in the Morning after drinking Henry Weinhard's in college, but you expect some collateral damage after drinking a case of cheap, "hand crafted" beer. But this... My god, Sunday it was like crapping broken glass; broken glass made of lava and sharks - small sharks to be sure, but bitey and all aflame. That'll learn ya to go for Buffalo spice chicken tenders as a midnight snack while you're home alone watching The Departed, I thought. Then I started singing "This Wheel's On Fire" just to distract myself from the pain.

This case of HAIM added a little unpredicted zest to my audition Sunday morning, which coincidentally enough was for a stage adaptation of the Corey Haim film Prayer For The Rollerboys. I decided to use it as a character trait.

All Shook Up

2007-12-13T14:10:00.001-08:00

It was a nice domestic scene; Riley was in his chair, chowing down on Cheerios and little Satsuma orange slices. I was going all Brando on him, putting the Satsuma peels in my mouth and grunting like a gorilla. It took it as far as to get up from the chair and stumble into the tomato patch we keep in the kitchen, falling down dead. Riley then charged me with a pump spray can of DDT that I was unaware we even had, or that he could lift and operate.

While I lay there being coated in harmful pesticides, I overheard on the TV some Elvis facts. I was told that about the Christmas trees in Graceland and from what I could hear they were showing us pictures of them, including one where the star on top touched the ceiling. “Holy sweet freakin’ Jeebus,” I said to myself. “All the way to the ceiling?”

I was having a difficult time trying to figure out what Elvis product they were attempting to tie this into. Is there a newly packaged version of Elvis songs coming out conveniently at this Christmas season?

And then I learned that Elvis loved Christmas soooooooo much, that he would put up his decorations right after Thanksgiving and leave them up until his birthday in January. It’s funny how history gets rewritten when it comes to the much loved and famous. The folks at entertainment news may see a love for Christmas, I see lazy and whacked out on Percocet.

I mean they never talk about how Graceland used to be decked out as an all terrain hunting ground, a safari in the south, where Elvis would set legions of people to run free just to hunt them down with all manner of rifles and blow darts. They never talk about how he made clothing and furnishings out of his victims’ skin and bones. It’s never mentioned how he bred rats in his Graceland laboratory and tried to nail down a bigger, better Black Plague.

No, it’s always this hip swinging, Cadillac buying, velvet painting model version of Elvis that we’re told about.

Damn revisionists.

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Paint A Vulgar Picture” by The Smiths.

Frustration Row

2007-12-11T15:48:00.000-08:00

Work’s a bear right now. Literally, I am being paid to roll around on the floor with a great big, clawlicious grizzly bear. Trying? Sure. Time consuming? As if work were the lead singer of Quiet Riot and time was cocaine. And if I were to write SAT questions, man the world would be a different place. I try to make a game of this job: for every time I get away from Rusty the Bear without a chest full of snarling snout, I get a point. For every head of cabbage I toss into his mouth, another point.

Well, that was a complete fabrication. I do not get the pleasure of bear wrestling for a paycheck, I try to cushion the blow of incompetence above me to those below. But work is particularly busy right now, thank you well placed holiday shopping season.

I feel that I don’t hide my frustration well. Actually it’s difficult for me to hide many of my feelings, if I’m excited by something you will more than likely see me jumping up and down on someone or something – more than likely having dropped trow. But it seems sometimes folks can’t see the frustration.

Not that other people should necessarily care when I’m frustrated. Why the hell would they? But I think that large parts of my frustration are fed by not being able to properly express my frustration. Say at a staff meeting your ADD addled boss is tossing out ideas and plans and processes that are annoying, uncalled for and/or dumb, and your frustration level is getting to be as such that exaggerated sighs aren’t going to vent it enough before you rough up a coworker with the business end of a Pentel EnerGel pen.

I’m suggesting a device.

I’m suggesting one of those helmet’s with the flashing lights on top, like a one man (and granted, bad) rave. My thought is that once that frustration gets close to a breaking point, I flip a switch, everybody’s made aware that I have hit a limit and I get up and out before the yelling and flailing fists happen. The light helmet does its thing with what I imagine to be a red light, but green could be quite nice, and that’s the cue for others to think, “Hey, condition critical for Billy. I’m lucky it’s not the bad old days where he’d jump up on the table a knee someone in the face.”

I think this would be less distracting in meetings than my initial ideas of the bullhorn or giant steel gong.

And back to work…

Song Stuck In My Head Right Now: “Polly’s Into Me” by Black Francis.

More Songs About Buildings And Food

2007-12-06T14:51:00.000-08:00

We did a little house hunting yesterday afternoon, and I feel that I learned a few things about myself. One of these things being that I really like “Mess With Time” off of Built to Spill’s You In Reverse.

That was something I kind of knew already, so not a great example.

Perhaps a better example would be learning that I do, in fact, know the things I like; and one of these things is not townhouses. Also realizing about myself that I may say things that people take personally, I feel that I should say that I do not find the liking of townhouses a personality flaw – if you like them we’re gold, we just disagree.

The journey started with a fairly forgetful house, one story box with a roof, which is in the price range we can work with – which is to say small and in a semi-questionable neighborhood. It was small to be sure, it felt smaller than our apartment, and had pretty low charm factor. What it did have was a sizable backyard and a separate 2 car garage that was roughly the size of the house. I wasn’t thrilled, but I thought to myself, “If this were all there was in all of Seattle that we could afford and move into, I could definitely make it work.”

Not exactly resounding praise, but I feel positive.

Then we looked at townhouses. They were nicely appointed with pretty kitchens and hardwood floors, but no character whatsoever. It felt like taking any sort of charm out of the apartment we were living in, and then piling it into 3 layers. The view from the bedroom on one of them was actually the construction site of what will no doubt be more shitty condos, no less than ten feet away. No yard… The third townhouse, complete with beige carpet, a fireplace that would have been smoking hot to a swinging bachelor round abouts ’72, and a nailed in 2x4 keeping the door to the garage closed as the current owners meth-head son had been squatting in there, was giving the two of us bad flashbacks of Orange Country. The realtor gave a look of bemused curiosity when we made it clear that our memories of Orange County weren’t all blow jobs and donuts.

I was depressed, very. The prospects seemed to be getting as dim as the 4 o’clock winter sky. The realtor had mentioned showing us a place that had cropped up in the listings, but was too small. She was waving it off, but the consensus was that we were out already, let’s take a look.

A none too crowded street and small bungalow set off from it by a good sized front yard. Cute from the outside, but going in knowing it was small I wasn’t terribly excited. I got inside and just on entering the door got the feeling. You know the feeling? The feeling that this is in fact home?

It’s something that I can’t explain easily, but when I see it in my head, the perfect house, it’s pretty close to this. Built in the 30’s/40’s and everything about it I just fell in love with. And if it were just Bif and I living in it, it probably would be home. It was just too small to make it work with the baby – and it breaks my heart a little bit. Those walls of fantastic texture due to years of painting and repainting, those window frames, that tiny little eating area, the wooden deck down to the back, the unfinished basement… It’s not meant to be mine, but felt like it may have been in another life.

Over beer and tots at Six Arms, I did feel hope - mixed in with the bittersweet taste of losing a place that was never mine. It gave me hope that there will be house that works for us with the right size and yard and character, hope that again I would walk into a house and already be home. I realized about myself that I will sacrifice a fair amount of comfort for character.

Ask Me

2007-12-05T13:10:00.001-08:00

Why I think Journey sucks so damn hard, go ahead and ask me. And I will present to you:

Exhibit I.

Which stands for the internal bleeding I feel like I'm suffering when I see this picture.

Moisture Is The Essence Of Wetness

2007-12-04T15:50:00.000-08:00

It’s an odd feeling to see the national news talk about how bad the weather is where you are. We got some rain up in here yesterday. And some mudslides, some city streets opening up under cars, some major flooding, some 100 mile an hour winds on the coast. We remained pretty okay up on Capitol Hill, but it was, without a doubt, one of the wettest days I’ve ever witnessed.

*Insert “your mom” joke here.

I was reminded, as I watched the parking lot outside my work window turn into a white capped wading pool, of a temp job I had in San Francisco. It was during the winter of aught two and SF was getting a nice hit of wet winter itself. We were living in an apartment that had the fun little amenity of a bathroom sink that made like a geyser of cold, dirty water whenever it rained with some intensity. Combine this with a less than useful landlord who was upset that they couldn’t charge us $1500 for rent when they bought the place as we were already living there, and I had a lot of late nights, ankle deep in runoff, trying to mop up a bathroom.

But I digress. After being laid off, I scored a posh temp gig (and by posh I mean, well, not posh) at a self storage facility. Duties were to include: filing, answering phones, renting spaces and apparently calling renters whose units had been flooded when the biblical deluge hit 13th and Duboce.

Man, it was messy. This place started taking on water like it had hit an iceberg (and my heart did, in fact, go on). The owners, who I had never seen before this time, came rushing in to shout orders to poorly paid minions with wet/dry shop vacs. They decided it would be a good idea for someone to call the soon to be upset renters, with treasures so cherished they were locked away from home, and let them know that their belongings were probably now ruined. This would be a good job for the temp they decided.

This is probably a good place to mention that the day prior to this, I got the phone call informing me of a real job. This day, Wet Friday I like to call it, would be my last there at the self storage place.

So I started calling people. I got a lot of sad stories about record collections and files and grandma’s goose down quilt, I got to talk to some very upset people. And then one guy who was bat shit pissed. He screamed, he swore, he made vague and unpleasant accusations about my mother’s good standing in the community.

I have dreams, I do, about my final days at jobs I don’t like. Most of them involve telling off people that I’ve had to keep quiet to for too long. There was a customer I had to deal with at a company in Florida that was so awful that it made me want to throw up when I had to call her. I promised myself that on my last day at that job I would call her up and make liberal use of the C word until she either began crying or someone drug me away from the phone, cackling and shouting obscenities. But I never actually do or say the things that I dream of. But:

After listening to this guy rant at top pitch for a good five minutes, I quite calmly said to him, “Sir, I’m a temp here and it’s my last day. You are yelling at the wrong fucking guy.” I then hung up the phone, walked out to the swamp that was the bottom floor of the units and told the owners good luck and good bye.

It still feels good…

Talkin'

2007-12-03T15:06:00.001-08:00

Let’s talk winter. We got the first snow of it on Saturday while the apartment was crowded with well wishers for a one year old. In that crowd were four little ones just hittin’ the low end of double digit months. It was like having a troop of chattering monkeys scampering about, cute monkeys to be sure, but I kept expecting them to bust out roller skates and cigars.

‘Cause that’s what monkeys do, which makes me wonder where they saw it. It doesn’t really and I’m already derailed two lines in.

Party was called on account of the birthday boy wearing himself out running laps around the apartment. The gates of the baby corral were thrown wide and he was taking full advantage. So much so that the tiredness came on all out of the blue and he began spontaneously falling and half crying and sort of lamely punching the floor – which is exactly what I do when I’m tired. So with the combo of an early nap time and snow that began to come down as if cloud giants in nighties were having a pillow fight, people filed out.

I took it upon myself to get out a couple of times for walks in the falling snow. I like being out in it, not driving in it mind you, but strolling. I like that almost painful cold. I like that those flakes seem to absorb sound. I like that the snow takes the leafless, dormant trees (which honestly can get a bit depressing) and turns them into something majestic. By morning the accumulation had been turned back to water, like a really lame magic trick, and the slightly entertaining snow has been replaced by not at all entertaining driving rain and the promise of 50 mph winds.

Now, let’s talk Chez Gaudy. Fuck Disneyland, CG is the happiest place on earth. It’s a heady combination of cozy, warm, good food, phenomenal cocktails and friendliness that makes me love it always and forever. You walk by it, and if you didn’t know you would not think it’s a restaurant. It’s almost as if someone turned a good sized apartment into an eatery and it works. The food: explosive goodness with every bite. The drinks: carefully concocted and designed to get you a little fast and loose with your clothing and sense of tact. The staff: all kinds of awesome. And if you’re lucky enough to be there when Greg is, you’re in for a good night. Here’s a guy who gets off on making sure you’re having a good time in his place. He’s like a mad, roaming stand up and it feels as though he’s been your friend for years. He’s 8 kinds of inappropriate, has sat at our table to have drinks with us, and was the other night telling a story of how he was playing a drinking game which involved smacking one of the patrons. I sort of have a man crush on him.

Now, let’s talk Spinach Artichoke Parmesan dip. Has nothing to do with the others above, but I love it and how. I have had numerous conversations about filling up swimming pools with substances not meant for swimming pools (corn chips, jelly beans, Jello brand pudding), but seriously the thought of filling a swimming pool with Spinach Artichoke Parmesan dip and diving into kind of gives me a stiffy.

I’m also all hot on balsamic reduction right now. It’s time to sign off.

366 Days

2007-11-30T15:59:00.001-08:00

So, a year ago I walked out of a hospital room while nurses did some statistical type data gathering on a newborn boy and into the cold, snow smelling air. I walked a couple blocks away and stood atop a hill looking towards downtown. I stared at the Smith Tower, a building that I had been infatuated with since I was a wee lad, and focused on the green light on top.

“It all changes now,” I told myself.

I remember knowing that. I remember that bitter cold air stinging my face, my eyes. I remember that sort of rush that comes with heading face first into the unknown and would like to imagine that I looked down on ol’ Smith Tower with a cocky grin (but I imagine it was more a panic stricken look somewhere between realizing that it was now time to jump out of the plane and that of realizing you had just crapped your drawers).

Some things that I have learned in the last year:

You can function on a lot less sleep than you think you need.

There are some deep stores of patience I was unaware had been buried.

I am actually able to look outside of myself for awhile, realize that there are bigger things than me out there.

How fragile life can be, but paradoxically how damn strong it is.

The laughter of my child rivals even the most soul stirring song in terms of joy it brings me; that smile is better than money.

It hurts my heart sometimes how beautiful the world can be.

All the roads I’ve taken led me to this unexpected place, and now there’s a whole new journey I couldn’t have predicted.

I get a chance to show my father how much amazement there is in having a baby son, something he himself was possibly too afraid to know.

The fears that I had, that I wasn’t going to know how to do it, were unnecessary. I should’ve spent more time eating dinner out.

So, here’s to keeping the Kickers alive a year, to not fleeing to Costa Rica, to doing our damndest to keep a little style and vulgarity in our parental lives.

Thanks for a great year buddy, here’s to so many more.

Life Will Find A Way

2007-11-28T09:03:00.001-08:00

Down here in the drab, gray, industrial part of the city; in the low slung buildings, train track choked area of town, I passed a torn apart car.

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary on these streets and avenues, there are plenty of grime covered campers and station wagons made when Journey was top of the pops (complete with tarpaulin curtains for that extra homey touch) that stay permanently parked down here. This car looked as if it had taken a good hit to the backside, there was no bumper, no rear lights and no trunk lid. The trunk was still there, a gaping hole where there was once probably a spare tire, maybe an umbrella, bottled water if the auto owner was earthquake safety conscious; but no lid. Reaching from the carnage and up towards the dark and cloudy sky, with what felt like an anger at the violence played out here, were the spindly, metal arms that once kept said lid in place.

I walked past, looking in to the uncovered trunk, maybe they left a flashlight or a roll of fruit leather behind, and thought, “Wow, it looks like a T. Rex took a bite out of that car.”

That’s the dinosaur, not the band. Marc Bolan was a powerful man in his time, but I doubt he had the wherewithal to rip apart an older model Nissan with his teeth, even if he was all kinds of coked up.

Then that image began to run rampant as, from what I understand, T. Rex’s are wont to do. I imagined how difficult the commute into work would be had dinosaurs survived. I would definitely consider the bus option if I had to add velociraptors to the list of things to keep my eyes open for (topping the list of potential muggers and random puddles of bodily fluids).

I imagined pterodactyls swooping out of the cloud cover to snatch up slow and unarmed pedestrians, homeless folks. I imagined those spiky armadillo looking dinosaurs with the club tails chasing automobiles and smashing in store fronts with their… club tails. I imagined a triceratops asleep in a parking lot, I guess I just hate to think of a triceratops mauling business people and reeking havoc on our socio-economic foundations.

Then I started to think about how if dinosaurs survived, our work climate would be considerably different. We would probably be living in even more centralized cities, walled cities, perhaps with netting over the top to keep out the swooping of afore mentioned pterodactyls. There probably wouldn’t be a lot of customer call center gigs as people would have bigger problems to deal with then how some poor wage salve didn’t put up with their abuse and derision with the amount of grace one would like; problems like body parts being eaten by giant predatory lizards.

I imagined there would be a lot of people set to the task of defending our walled and caged cities, developing new technologies and weaponry. There would be legions of foodies coming up with recipes for allosaurus with blueberry compote. There would be plenty of people for the ethical treatment of dinosaurs. There would be a blockbuster movie about an amusement park gone awry when scientists clone prehistoric marmots that were selected out when the dinosaurs survived.

Girls Rock Your Boys

2007-11-26T15:19:00.000-08:00

I remember this kid from my 7th grade gym class, Andy. We lined up by alphabetical order and his last name started with an A. Otherwise I would never have spoken to him as we ran in pretty different circles. I can still see him in his gym shorts and T-shirt. He had Hessian hair, wore a denim jacket and his eyes were permanently lidded with cannabis weights. He spoke like Spicoli and while doing warm up stretches would occasionally bust out in a high Gedde Lee voice some heavy metal lyric or other.

It was through Andy that I learned of the wonder of Quiet Riot.

Today, the Riot has been made even more quiet as lead wailer Kevin DuBrow has passed on, found dead in Vegas like any respecting heavy metal singer should be.

I remember my cousin Michelle being into the Riot, listening to Metal Health on her cassette Walkman – the kind that in order to rewind the tape you had to flip it and fast forward. I remember being skeptical, I mean heavy metal? Plus Michelle was in with that rough and tumble, smoking, roller rink crowd. I remember listening to her copy on her crappy Walkman. I remember being pretty instantly taken by “Bang Your Head” and by “Slick Black Cadillac”. I remember feeling a little dirty at their suggestive spelling of “Cum On Feel The Noize” – I liked the Z. I remember being both a bit bothered and excited by the album’s cover.

Shiny satin straight jackets do that to me.

And I mean, cum on, they’re right: metal health will drive you mad.

So, good journey to you Kevin. I can’t say that you have made a huge impact in my world, but I will say that your cover of someone else’s song made me happy for a couple of days.

T Day

2007-11-23T15:11:00.001-08:00

Thanksgiving was spent with the family this year which pales significantly in comparison to the ones I’ve been lucky enough to spend with friends, or running around the empty streets of San Francisco trying to catch 3 movies before a luxurious feast of turkey burritos. I’d complain about the family, the walls, the lack of honest communication (from me as well), but why bother. I’ve got it pretty lucky in the family department, if all I can complain about is surface stuff then I end up sounding like a spoiled little douche.

However, I will say that having not seen my father in a number of months, and he having not seen his grandson in the same amount of time, his decision to spend 6+ hours locked in a reclining chair watching football was disappointing. My memories of my grandfather are filled with nothing but an old man sitting in a chair and ignoring everyone else. I’m hoping that my father wants more for his grandson.

Moving on. Some things I’m thankful for you ask? Well, I’m glad you did:

I’m thankful for irresponsibly sleeping in an extra half hour this morning. I was able to walk into work as the sun was cresting this part of the world and it was one of those glorious winter mornings where the sun is so pale and fragile you think that crystalline cold air is going to break it.

I’m thankful for a heater in the apartment that works.

I’m thankful for being surrounded by some pretty damn amazing friends.

I’m thankful for a happy and healthy son who makes me smile more than I have any right to.

I’m thankful for a wife who, after all this time and after the added stress of being first time parents, can still make me laugh and feel right and who I can call my best friend.

I’m thankful for Cuba Gooding Jr. but I am unclear as to why.

I’m thankful for whisky, and pizza, and for Arrested Development on DVD.

I’m thankful for the feeling that I can follow my own voice, and more often than not that it’s saying, “screw you if you can’t take a joke.”

I’m thankful for a pretty good year of getting to do my thing on stage and film.

I’m thankful for T. Rex.

It's Been Travelling Twenty-Two Years To Get Here

2007-11-20T15:45:00.000-08:00

I love me some Coen Brothers. If pressed to make a list of my favorite 50 movies, most of their stuff would be high on that list, especially Miller’s Crossing, Barton Fink and naturally The Big Lebowski. I do have to say though, that of late my opinion of Joel and Ethan’s talents has been a bit tarnished. Intolerable Cruelty is a pretty funny movie, but seems to lack that Coen Brothers’ sparkle. The Ladykillers was awful, it pained me to get through it. So, I went into their new one with more than a little trepidation.

I will say that No Country For Old Men is, in my opinion, one of the best films they have ever made.

Much like Blood Simple, it is for the most part an exercise in tension. It opens with an off screen, dry Texas drawl over wide pictures of dry Texas landscapes. You are calmly introduced into this world, but in a moment the story is off and running and you are at its mercy until its end. The basic line of story is a Texas hunter stumbles upon millions when he stumbles upon a drug bust gone bad. He is soon being tracked by a psychotic killer with his own form of morals and a can of compressed air. Soon there enters in an elder country sheriff who sets about in his stoic way to make sense of what has happened and what continues to happen. In the film worlds of Joel and Ethan Coen, all bets are off. There are no guarantees that the good guy will prevail, or that the bad guy will prevail for that matter. There’s no guarantee that the good guy is the good guy.

Tommy Lee Jones plays the sheriff precisely as It needs to be played, with a heartbreaking intensity just below the resigned, old Texan. And Javier Bardem, playing the obviously dressed man in black to Jones’ sheriff’s whites and looking like Emo Phillips gone way, way wrong, is so effectively creepy as to make you nervous just knowing he’s in the scene. He’s not a typically over the top psycho, he has a rationality that grounds him and makes him that much more frightening. He is a man with a strong work ethic, it’s just that his job is tracking people down and fucking them up.

Underneath the tightly constructed Western/Caper Gone Wrong film, beneath the chases and the shootouts and country logic, is a primary idea of how the roads you take lead you to where you are. Visually throughout the film there are roads, and the dialogue subtly points this out a number of times, all without banging you over the head with the idea.

Ultimately, I was enthralled with this film from beginning to end, even during the slower moments of simple character dialogue. I feel that the Coen’s have remembered something that many filmmakers forget; there is sublime drama in simply listening to, and watching, people talk. The film ends like a meaningful whisper in your ear. When the credits came up I felt this whirlwind of emotions and a realization that I was not breathing, I was on the brink of crying, of laughing, of giving a loud cheer for the realization that film is not dead.

I cannot recommend this film highly enough.

The Crowd Screamed "Sacrifice The Liver"

2007-11-19T14:42:00.000-08:00

So this bar that I’ve mentioned before, a bar where things can turn evil in fairly quick clip, a bar that on first glance seems to be an odd mix of David Lynch and Bukowski coughed up to life in a cloud of generic cigarette smoke and bar brand gin fumes is officially one of my favorite places.

The Baranof is not necessarily a dive bar, it’s crusty to be sure, but dive implies to me a dark and dingy, “no way out” feeling that isn’t here. There’s a vitality and passion to the Baranof. It’s easy to dive on into that working class vibe and feel that by proxy you’re living the Bukowski life, but that’s not the right way to go into the Baranof. I think that the right way would be to man up, shut up, drink up – maybe do some karaoke if you’re not too drunk to stand.

As we sat down on Friday night, already obviously out of place with the rest, we witnessed what was about to become a bar fight. The bar stool kicked back, one man grabbed the other and warned him of leaving in a body bag, and the fifty-something barmaid came around the bar to put a cooling hand on the instigator saying in warning tone over and over again, “Joe, Joe, Joe.” These two guys were more than likely in their seventies.

Our waitress looked as though she had recently been on the losing end of a fist fight. She also appeared to be more than a little bit drunk and forgot that I had ordered a Philly Cheese Steak. A damned good Philly Cheese Steak and some pretty tasty fries when it finally did arrive.

There was this ancient Asian woman perched on a seat near the door that leads to the smoking patio, eating something out of a Styrofoam cup and apparently unable to form understandable words. This would be excellently highlighted when she went up to karaoke “Groovin’”, shaking her hips and smiling as if everything good in her life boiled down to this moment.

And I feel like I’m walking this weird line, like I’m presenting the clientele of the Baranof as a show that they most certainly do not want to be. I want to set the scene a bit, let you know what is surrounding me, and also let you know that it is this backdrop that made me feel more comfortable in this bar than I have ever felt in any other “classier” place.

Human drama and human life, unadorned and unafraid; I love it. I didn’t feel superior to it, I felt lucky to be witness to it and all the sadness and humor and love that goes along with the package. Like Cheryl, I know Cheryl, I have been Cheryl. Cheryl was watered up to the eyeballs on house chardonnay and was having no problem expressing her love to people in the group I was with. Cheryl, who nicely grabbed my ass in passing, taught us all the secret Cheryl handshake and told one Sarah she was tabloid beautiful and another Sarah that she was Mademoiselle beautiful – a difference only Cheryl understood. There was a struggle to get Cheryl out of the bar. One man was doing his damnedest to pull her away from a random dance partner while a woman followed in a tight circle relentlessly offering a carnation. Cheryl simply didn’t want the evening to end, and man have I been there, my own prolonged goodbyes a record to reckoned with.

I left after 4 Makers, a pint and a sans pants version of Fred Schneider’s parts of “Love Shack” on the karaoke stage. I finagled about 9 people to come outside and wait with me a long wait for a cab, and as I climbed into the backseat I remember thinking, “I wish I could live there.”

I'm Afraid Of Americans

2007-11-16T14:34:00.001-08:00

I think it’s generally well known that most people in other countries hate Americans. I don’t really blame them; if said people are in say Iraq or Afghanistan, to quote Camper Van Beethoven, “shit blows up when we’re around.” There are Americans who get angry over the fact that people in other counties hate us, but this is more than likely because they are the type of people that make Americans look bad.

It seems that many Americans, those with enough money to do some traveling, have a habit of behaving like arrogant pricks who believe that whatever country they’re visiting should be Americanized enough to make them feel comfortable while they’re abroad.

What brings this up? Well, I had a 25 minute, fairly unpleasant conversation with an older and affluent woman from the Palm Springs area of California who had had her purse stolen in Barcelona. She went to this American restaurant because, “it reminded us of home, and Europeans don’t make good coffee.” Already I was fed up. I read this as it’s impossible to get a high fat, coffee flavored Slurpee anywhere in Europe, therefore their coffee is awful.

She was also extremely put out that the people assisting her, assisting her in Barcelona Spain mind you, did not speak English. She began to rant about some more vaguely racist things when I cut her off with, “so that I’m clear, you’re service expectations are that in a store in Spain, employees should be speaking English?” I was told that yes, as “all those people over there” take English in school, and as this is an area frequented by many American tourists and businessmen, they should be speaking English.

There were also the expectations that people would be rude in France, but she was surprised by how rude people were in Spain. There was the assumption her purse was taken by Romanians. There were the constant reminders that she was staying in a very exclusive part of the city, in a very exclusive hotel. It really nailed it in to me how “exclusive” is a form of “to exclude”.

While she was going through her litany of missing and expensive gadgets, she let slide that she had so much shit that she couldn’t lock it all in the hotel safe. And the reason she had to take it with her is that the maids will steal it if she leaves it in the room. She again pointed out the exclusive street the restaurant is on as it has neighbors the likes of Chanel and Gucci and Cartier and blah blah and pretentious talking and who fucking cares. It took every ounce of self control, and I don’t have a lot of it, to not blurt out, “why do you even travel?”

Seriously. If you are made uncomfortable by anything you cannot find in the strip malls that surround your home, why would you go to a foreign country? Isn’t the point of travel to explore a place you’ve never been? To see and hear and taste and live things you’ve never seen, heard, tasted or lived? Isn’t the point of traveling to learn something about other places and peoples, to learn something about yourself?

I remember traveling through sections of Europe a few years back and seeing a lot of Canadian flags on backpacks. It was an easy way to make it known that though they look like us, they’re not Americans – don’t hate us. Not a bad idea at all.

And speaking of Canadians: There are a lot more complaints’ coming from our neighbors to the north since the Canadian currency is now worth more than American. We’re hearing from all sorts of angry Canucks about how that US/Canada pricing is now unfair. One thing that I love about Canadians is that even if they’re livid pissed, they remain polite and fairly rational.

I saw a news report recently of a restaurateur letting the local news folks know that she could no longer accept American dollars in her Canadian establishment as she couldn’t afford it. It seemed a bit silly to me as I highly doubt she was accepting American currency to begin with, so I laughed at the funny little point she was trying to make to a Seattle news team. I laughed at how our oil based economy is sliding into dire straights (not the band), and in knowing that I had nothing to do with letting an ignorant and murderous man into the White House so he could slowly sell off our country to his rich acquaintances.

God bless us…

Body Functions

2007-11-14T07:20:00.000-08:00

Do you ever sometimes get all wrapped up in doing something, and you know you have to pee, but you keep pushing it off? Like work, let’s say you’re in the middle of doing some menial work task and you have the sort of mental wherewithal to ignore the natural pangs your body is producing. So, when you finally go to the bathroom, probably a good hour or so after you should have to begin with, you pee hard and long. And here’s where the question part comes in. While having one of those long, feels good in an immense release of pressure kind of pees, do you ever wonder for a second if you’re not actually having one of those dreams where you have to pee so damn bad and you’re rushing around to find a toilet in your dream and when you finally find one that release of pee feels so good until something in your mind says, “hey dude, you’re dreaming – you may actually be pissing in your bed right now”?

I think I sneezed out a sesame seed the other day. It reminded me of those weird days in the early 90’s when I was snorting a lot of California rolls.

There are things about getting older I’m not a fan of. The larger number of vague aches and pains that occur as my body continues to slowly shut down is on the list, as is the much longer recovery time that now comes with a night of abuse that my twenty-something body could shrug off. One new thing that I find equally annoying and fascinating is the sprouting of what I call Jeff Goldblum Fly hairs from the sides of my ears. They sprout along the edge of my ear occasionally, not where hair should be anyway, and they seem to be made out of some plastic-nylon polymer that would be manufactured by a company that the Bush’s hold major portions of stock in. It’s fun to think that all of the processed food I ate as a child could be partially responsible for this.

When I got out of bed this morning – at 3:30am – I felt as though I was not only lacking water, but had unknowingly eaten a herd of tiny sponge animals which had gone to work pulling water out of me. It was as though the cat, ala that pretty awful Drew Barrymore movie, had gotten too lazy to shuffle out to the water bowl and mystically yanked my water supply. I attempted to remedy this by chugging two glasses of water, which only managed to make me feel a little “sloshy” when I walked.

This is coming off a little complainy, I’m sorry. I will say that it was an amazing sunrise this morning in this part of the world. And if you have to walk through a city at 4 in the morning, you could do worse than to listen to the Black Francis album; much worse.

Waiting For The Flood

2007-11-12T14:28:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I’m disappointed with how the job keeps me from posting as regularly as I would like. I realize that I’m not being paid to write blog content. I also realize that I could do some at home, but honestly I’m reticent to jump on the computer after spending a lot of my work day doing the same.

Had me a good weekend where not a lot went on. Had some drinkies, had some nap time, baked a little bread… I watched my favorite weatherman, eyes shining with a methamphetamine intensity, tell me about the ensuing storm I would be facing come wake up time. While he did mention the chance for rain later in the day, he saved his satanic energies for the catastrophic winds that would be coming our way – winds that would rip the roofs off of buildings, send cars careening to their dooms, sail small farm animals so far and fast as to beak the space time continuum. I was excited, I like me a good blustery day. But there was rain Walter, there was rain.

It’s possible that I have been made wetter on my travels through the city, but I don’t remember it. It’s like that same sort of phenomenon where memories of high school are painted a sweet and nostalgic sepia tone, my mind remembering those happy days of innocence, when I logically know that I would rather hack off my right foot, by removing and sharpening the left one, and then eating it.

So yes, wet, fantastically wet, but I really didn’t mind it. I was remembering the days when Captian MIA and myself would head out to the beach when we knew a good storm was coming. We’d sit on the beach, smoking and talking nonsense, reeling in the excitement that came with those heavy black clouds rolling in over the Pacific. Hopefully, we could withstand the cold and wind long enough for the deluge that is Southern California rain to pelt our upturned faces and we would return to the car and our ramshackle apartment feeling as though we were witness to something still impressive.

I also remembered one evening as I child where my neighbor and I set up lawn chairs in the middle of the street during a fairly spectacular lightning storm. There’s something about sitting in the street in patio furniture that seems so excitingly rebellious, the same sort of thrill I’m sure that surrealists got out of their activities. Add to that this odd feeling of peace that comes to me with being absolutely enveloped in pounding rain; I would assign the tired metaphor of the rain baptizing me anew, but I don’t think that’s it – I think there’s a calm in submitting to nature. Add to that thunder and lightning that, had I experienced it at that time, I would have said rivaled Laser Floyd as show stopper.

A few minutes into this street audience, my mother came shrieking out of the house calling me all sorts of ignorant and telling me to come inside. I thought about what I would do if a few years down the road I saw my son doing the same; camped out on the Avenue, soaked to the bone and wide eyes to the sky. I would probably smile a knowing smile.

Then I’d run out and tell him get the hell in the house. I would tell him that not only is sitting in the middle of street, when cars can barely see as it is, less than bright, but lightning likes little better than aluminum patio furniture.

Fun With Four AM

2007-11-07T07:06:00.000-08:00

We're doing this fun new thing at work where... I'm not going to go too heavily into it, it bores me and it's my life it effects. Suffice it to say, today I have to come in at 5AM. This means, what with walking into the office, I need to leave my house at 4AM.

And if you're keeping up, and I know you are, you're a smart bunch, that means I get out of bed round abouts 3:30ish. Yeah, I know, things could be worse; I could be the daughter of Courtney Love.

And just for an extra kick in the dick, it was raining.

I realized this morning that I have this internal programming that tells my body it's insane to be walking city streets at 4AM, unless I'm five types of drunk and stumbling around with a partner in crime; more than likely looking for a place to pee and craving some form of pizza.

I also realized, four lines ago, that fun is a pretty subjective term. Think about the Verizon Wireless "Can you hear me now" guy. Go ahead, think about him. I'm guessing that when he started that gig he thought, "Yeah, it'll be fun to do a commercial - get this acting thing rolling." Now forever this guy will be the Can You Hear Me Now Guy. I'm sure he's constantly being approached by oh so clever people who oh so cleverly manage to slip a "Can you hear me now" into their conversation. I'm sure his hearing impaired Great Aunt Gladys is a hoot squawking out the famous catch phrase at family reunions. Can you imagine this guy showing up on *pick a crappy sitcom* as anything other than a not so sly nod to his commercials?

This poor guy may never work again. Unless he goes without the glasses and changes his hair; maybe a chestnut brown with bold highlights.

I'm tired.