20040227 
I appreciate your response, whether intentional or not, to the bodily interest post. You forgot, Like jiz (I don't ja . . . oh wait. nevermind).
Off to assay. Perhaps if I'm lucky, the girls will read this and come to my rescue. Speaking of which, and before I go. There's this interesting bidness about a "SLEEPOVER" that I really think you would appreciate. I: was propositioned, accepted, and was later informed that my idea of a sleepover was radically different than the one proposed. What do you think when someone says, "let's have a sleepover on X day"? Anyway, I imagine that any self respecting man thinks, ok, this person wants to sleep in my close proximity, whether or not sexuality is involved (as it isn't in this case, a la (now) almost defining feature of relationship(s)). Anyway, I was informed that it was to be a sleepover with junk food, movie watching, chatting, i.e. totally, and in all other ways immasculating, and that my version would not stand. That aggression just would not stand, man. So what do I say? Sounds good to me. Well, frankly sounds a little immasculating, a feature that applies to almost no activity left on this earth (for me), besides things such as learning specifically how to use a tampon. But who am I not to know how to use a tampon, right?
I wrote the girl tonight. A really good poem. Post it? Fuck it, why not. You need to know that she sold some clothes to pay her rent this month.
I am thinking, to be sure,
That it is no fun to be poor.
Even if it’s temporary,
I don’t doubt that it feels scary;
That it causes much distress
At least, if only, for your dress,
Or the alternate apparel
That must as well feel most in peril,
Who tremble with sartorial stress,
And fear you’ll sell them under duress.
And as I’ve noted, you’re a winner,
And I’d gladly buy you dinner
If you call and plan with me,
To redeem your dinner free.
But of virtues that abound
Patience is one that I’ve found
I’m less in need of, and thus I
Have none, (I don’t dare to lie.)
So call me soon, lest I weary
And settle for evenings a bit more dreary.
I gotta say, I'm pretty pleased with myself. It was in the context of a pretty relaxed note. The nice thing is that I'm totally confident of my mate value. As I've decided that she's worth persuing, nothing short of a restraining order would really dissuade me from the effort.
20040226
Subject says it all. How far will the U.S. Postal Service go ( you know, neither rain nor sleet nor snow will keep us from our appointed rounds) to deliver weird, disgusting, improperly packaged mail?
20040225
Save $2 on a Putting Other People Down Makes Me Feel Better hat when you use Promo Code WARMHEAD at checkout!
As you may notice I have two comment systems running right now. I'm trying to transition from the one ( squawkbox.tv ) to the other ( haloscan ) so please bear with me. Use the Comment system labelled "NEW HALOSCAN" and I will phase out the squawkbox.tv link as soon as all squawkbox comments drop off the front page (no one bothers with my archives, right?).
Thank you,
The Management
Lecture 3 - Blogging Consistency
The thing with blogs is that they're a constantly evolving revolving revolting reviving mass. Like a pile of worms. Constant squirming like there be ants in your pants or you have the pee shivers or something. Blogs don't like where they are. They aren't happy being way off the beaten mass-media path.. they want to be right on the edge of it. Not in it - because that would destroy their street cred - but right there next to it. Sort of in a "Hey, I'm not Michael Jordan, but I play on his basketball team with him" way. Blogs want to be the Indie Underground Cult Classic Hit that everyone knows about - even Walmart employees - in the sort of way that Weezer pulled off for the longest time. Blogs just keep trying more and more.
So when it comes to writing your own blog you have to keep this constant evolution and progress in mind and update like a motherfucker. And I'm not even talking about writing every single day or posting piles of verbal diarrhea transposed onto the screen. I'm not talking about making a mission out of the numbers game. I'm talking about consistency. Post once a week? Okay, fine then. Post once a week. But just do it every week like you mean it. My favourite magazine only comes to my house once a month and I don't get whiny about that, right? So there is nothing wrong with setting a time frame and sticking to it. It gives people a feeling of security that they need oh-so-badly these days. Knowing they can hit up your site every month or week or day or hour or year for one good decent post of thoughtful verbage.. also knowing that they can visit too often - too soon - and be scolded for their impatience by seeing the exact same post they read before. People need these reassurances in life. You have no idea.
It's about consistently good entertainment. Consistent laugh factor or awwww factor or drama factor or information factor or all of them wrapped up together. And I'm not talking about consistency in a boring repetitive way. I mean in a creative expect-more sort of way. People need to know they're going to get quality. There is tons and tons of space in this world for crap but that doesn't mean you have to contribute to it. Take a stand. Be consistent. Be great.
I want to bring in a guest to class today. His name is Tony Pierce and he's probably one of the most well known bloggers out there, aside from the politicos who I personally recount as not true, real, bloggers (why? cause I said so, so sit down and shut up). Tony Pierce has been doing the blog thing for quite a long time so he's come to know what true consistency is about. He cranks shit out faster than a cat on castor oil. Post upon post upon post never really saying anything or telling any particular story but hitting you upside the head with some wisdom or other every single time. He's the Snoop Dogg of blogging. Anyhow, I wanted to bring him in as a guest today so that I could show you one particular thread of his that he started way back in 2002 on December the 13th. Friday the 13th. The day he died.
It starts here
Without giving much away I'll just say that after Tony dies he is approached by Kurt Cobain, who leads him through the first few days of the afterlife attempting to explain the way things work.
It's an awesome model in consistency, both for all of the post's timely nature and for all of the post's entertainment value. It's awesome for it's experimentative nature - it's really something that couldn't/wouldn't be done in a print magazine or on tv. It's what blogging really should be about - creating new media. Doing new things. Being consistently good about it.
So your homework for tonight is to sit down and read it all through. Take what you can from it.
Next class: Female Bloggers - The Way of the Women.
20040224
I have been smelling the strangest things on my hands lately.
Like cat food. ( I have no cats )
Like turpentine. ( I do not paint )
This has been happening a lot in the last few days. Maybe since this weekend sometime. It is possible that I am, in fact, having a heart attack, but I don't smell burning. That's what you smell when you have a heart attack, right? Or is that a stroke?
(side act: wonder if there is a band called the 'heart attacks' as there is a band 'the strokes'. decided that, yes, there probably is a band somewhere called the 'heart attacks'. decide to hate said band site unseen for their clear lack of creativity. get in fight with friend who loves them. wash up blood and body parts afterwards, bury in woods.)
Note to self: Watch lots of Law & Order in order to understand the law. So I can avoid it. Avoid John.. John Law at least. I hate him.
If the smell continues - you know, the smell on the hands - I might have to think about that one. So far I've managed to ignore it. Until now.
(side urge: kill ants)
I often think that I have an urge to watch a movie I have seen before and I enter into a severe internal struggle over the time wasted to watch something before vs. the enjoyment of watching the movie. I learn to hate myself so good. Lazy bastard like you wouldn't believe. But, I realize I've had the thought before which is as tired and boring as watching the movie - yet again - for the hundreth time - one more time. So why not just enjoy the damn fucking movie?
Cause it wasn't that great the first run through.
I haven't written today because I've been fighting a bout of laze which is threatening to take over my entire being. These fights wear me down and will, inevitably, leave me weak and defenseless when the time comes to fight the good fight.
I will lose.
Whatever that good fight is. I haven't quite worked it out in my head yet.
I had a discussion the other day with someone about human thoughts. They listed some astronomical number which represented the average number of thoughts a human has in a given day as if the number could sum up life itself. They then told me that most of those thoughts - in fact 99.99% of them - are thoughts that human has had before. They essentially told me it's all been done before.. by me! I've already thought these things, considered them, discarded them, saved them for later.. who knows. But it's all been done before.
I suspect that should make me feel pretty crappy but it doesn't. I don't mind. But I do notice this phenomenon on a daily basis. The thought that I should clean my room or go grocery shopping... all the way down to the tiny emotions you almost don't even notice. The blanching at the hot coffee in the morning, the reactionary thought to put milk in it, the reply that I don't like milk in my coffee, the suggestion that I combine the milk with some sugar - make it sweet, the excuse that I'm too lazy to crack the creamer - I just want my coffee. Now.
These thoughts have all been thunk before.
Almost every time I write a post I have to hit the period <.> key a few times. Everytime I do I will pause at least once during that post, right after adding a period to the end of a sentence, and I will consider the complete and utter uselessness of my double-space. You see, back in the days of Bank Street Writer and the such, one was taught to add two spaces at the end of a sentence. For neatness? I dunno. Regardless, it was standard. MLA type shit. Then, somewhere along the line people stopped using the double-space. I haven't. I still double-space. After. Every. Single. Sentence. But HTML, that wonderful text decoration language, is rendered automatically to ignore multiple spaces. It doesn't matter. I can give you as many spaces as I feel like after a period and you will only ever see a single space. Just one.
So I think about this every time I write a post. At least once during that post. It's one of those fleeting thoughts that go whipping through your head so fast you almost forget you have them - almost become oblivious of the fact that you're having it even when you're thinking it. Pushed about as far back towards the subconcious as possible. And every time I think of how I could mention how this irritates me. Irritates me that we don't double-space anymore. Irritates me that I think about it. Irritates me that I have already, in fact, written a post about this very topic matter and may in fact have written two.. And every single double-space I tap out with my aging fingers.. every single time I pause to have that thought.. I am loosing time. Loosing precious milliseconds from my life. Precious. little. milli. seconds.
And it pains me. Pains me to think of the lost time and the screaming speed of the universe racing through my tiny little head as it pedals past the windows like the wicked wicked witch - which? - of the west.. wicked wicked witch.. cackling at my lost time like hansel and gretel in the oven. A funny delicious thought if you're a witch.
Fucking witches.
I mentioned it on the blog. I think those days are finally over. I forced the thing out just now. It kind of hurts, leading me to suspect I've just ripped out a scab (I'm not sure where it went, or I'd have a better idea), but perhaps that sensation is attributable to the hairs that surely were ripped out during the process. It wasn't so much pickation as it was exploration. Reparation, if you will.
I have an hour to finish this presentation before I get less than eight hours of sleep. Which would be a bad thing.
I got pissy at my kiting partner today. We went down to the beach, blowing hard, I went out on my smallest kite, I come back (not windy enough), offer him my biggest one, start with my medium, but within minutes, it's obviously to light for that. So, I tell him to go ahead on my big one, he goes and, perhaps an hour later, comes back. I have been on the beach, chatting. No big deal, I'm glad that he's out. Anyway, he comes back, we switch, but the wind near shore is really shifty (always is). So I'm struggling, drop the board as I'm about knee deep; it get pushed away by the waves. Meanwhile, he knows it really shifty, and is nowhere to be found. I get a little irritated, and just then wind dies, kite falls. This is hard to miss, so he runs over, helps me relaunch, and walks back to the people he doesn't really know talking on the beach. Once again I drop the board. Why the fuck didn't he stay to help me this time? I think. I call him over, but he is already too far away. Anyway, ended up dropping the kite again, wind dying,he comes over and I express my irritation with him. Do you know the anger paradigm?
If y takes (benefit) z in the condition: (X thinks that) Bzx * Fx > Bzy * Fy, X gets angry
read: benefit of z (item, event) to individual x multiplied by the formidability (ability to impose costs) of x is greater than benefit of z to individual y multiplied by the formidability of y
We will assume equal formidability. The opportunity benefit (him gong to talk to the other people, none of whom were chicks) meant that he took the opportunity benefit (helping me with the board) from me. I interpreted the opportunity benefit, or his time, to be more valuable to me than to him. He was, in my (subconscious) conception, 1) underestimating the value of his time to me 2) overestimating the value of his time to him 3) underestimating my formidabilty 4) overestimating his formidabilty or 5) being a little bitch. Any of which satisfy the above condition. So I got pissy and told him that I was irritated. And he apologized. Well, first he asked me if I was serious, then he apologized. This is a wonderful thing to be aware of, because it really explains nearly all anger. When I get angry that the girl isn't writing me, it's because of this. Underestimating the benefit I would get from her letter. It also predicts that the higher the discrepancy between benefit to me and benefit to you (you could help me get my taxes in on time just by letting me hand you the fucking envelope, and all it costs you is extending your hand even though it's 5:01), the angrier I will get. I hate that asshole.
I hate you, too. Not you, mike. Not you, girls. Some other person. Some other person that is reading this . . . someone who thinks in their black, ungenerous heart, this guy is a loser. Or maybe, this guy is a lobster. Just two little letters. A world of difference.
20040223
February, 2004
Dear Maine Music Purchaser:
As Attorney General for the State of Maine, I am pleased to enclose payment for your claim in the settlement of the Compact Disc Minimum Advertised Price Antitrust Litigation. This lawsuit was brought by the Attorneys General of 43 states and three territories and by counsel for Private Class Plaintiffs on behalf of purchasers of music CDs. In accordance with the terms of the court-approved settlement, payment is being made to music purchasers who filed valid and timely claims.
Whether you filed your claim online at the settlement web site, wwwMuiscCDSettlement.com, or by mail, the attached payment represents full payment of your portion of the Settlement. Please note that the attached payment instrument must be cashed by May 20th, 2004.
It is a pleasure to bring this matter to a satisfactory conclusion and to return value to consumers who purchased CDs while the challenged pricing policies were in effect.
G. Steven Rowe
Attorney General of Maine
-------------------------------
All I gotta say to that is ROCK ON Attorney General of Maine Mr G. Steven Rowe. Thanks for $13 bucks though I'm not sure why I get any money, when I signed up to the suit, or.. umm. yah.
Whatever.
$13.
rock on.
UPDATE: This link courtesy of raspil at bluecad.net
Blogging 101: credit where credit is due.
This is absolutely brilliant. Not brilliant because it's an original idea (I've had the idea a thousand times before and none of those times was it original, either)..but because he is actually doing it.. carrying it out. I love it. I love it because there is something in the black and the white of things that makes people look just so fucking real.
I like real people. There are enough fake ones out there to make the real ones special.
The face is the center of beauty because it's the physical embodiment of the mind. It's the obvious progression, really.
When we think, we think in our heads. Upstairs. Never are we feeling, thinking, emoting in our foot.. or our elbow. Never is our feeling of existence within our hand or even our torso. Sure emotion sometimes emits itself through the torso - through the heart in a tightness or a bleeding or in the stomach as nausea - but the real existence of us is in our heads. We always climb back upstairs with the baggage to do the real thinking. That's where the brain is.
Which starts to get pretty creepy when you realize how self-aware the brain is. Where it is. What it is. Thousands of years ago no one knew about brains, hearts, organs.. The insides of the human being was a pretty strange place - like visiting your uncle in Somewhere town and not really knowing where to go for lunch. But even back then I imagine people felt the same way. They thought from their heads. Faces - besides being one of the centers of physical emotion - is quite literally the face of one's brain. The facade on which ideas are expressed. The monitor of the computer mind. Like the keyboard, we never think of hands as the 'it'. They are peripherals. It's the face that projects.
In some Sci-Fi stories people's heads are removed and frozen. People's heads are placed on robots. People's brains are connected to computers. It's all in the brain. We ARE our brain. The body is a vehicle - a big mech-warrior that lumbers around carrying it's passenger as it's told. No, not as it's told - as it's driven. Somehow removing one's head - placing it in a jar or on a shelf to be talked to in passing, it all makes sense:
"Hullo head"
"Oh, hullo."
"How are you feeling today?"
"Oh, a little stuffed up.. but fine really. Can you take me off this shelf? It's an awful bore."
"No, sorry, I can't. You're for decoration only. Couldn't do it, you see?"
It's okay to think of the head alone as an existing being.
Hang a body in the basement and it ceases to exist as a person and immediately becomes a thing. Which is why the headless horseman was so fucking scary - it plays with our perceptions.
So the face is as close as we get to the real someone. The brain of it. Eyes, nose, mouth, brows. These are the best we can do. Which is why art of the body is technically beautiful but never more. It's the face that counts. How many millions of people have stared into the eyes of Mona Lisa and wondered about her thoughts, her cares, her worries.. How many millions of people have stared, eyebrows raised, loins astir, at David's buttocks. They aren't asking what he is thinking.
"Oh super", he thought. "They're lookin' at me bum again."
I don't think art as art means a whole lot. It's the art of recording that counts. Art as art falls under the one man's trash is another man's treasure mantra. Art as expression - a record of thought - a collection of meaning - that's where it becomes meaningful. Not so much in it's beauty but in it's existence. Sometimes the awe is in the creation, not in the work itself.
A photo a day - of a stranger's face - in black and white - now that's art.
And beautiful.
Fun with Flash: Mr. Picassohead
and as long as I am at it.. I've posted this one before eons and eons ago, but it's fucking rad so be prepared to waste oodles of time:
Sodaplay!
I gotta admit, I think about shit a lot.
No, really. Shit. Not "what do you think of this shit?" or "What the fuck is this shit?" but actual real shit. Poop. Duty. Deuce. The brown stuff.
There are two kinds of people in this world: Those who think shit is funny and those who don't.
I don't have to tell you that that is a big fat metaphor for life, do I?
If you can't laugh at the crap then what do you really have?
The last time I got high (on life) I was eating a big blue-cheese and buffalo chicken pizza with a few friends (Just writing that sentence made my saliva glands physically squish out piles like nobody's business). I was eating this pizza and talking about food (of course) and Dan the man told me the last thing he ate was Macaroni & Cheese & Hot Dogs.
Holy mother fucking shit, I thought. I didn't think anyone else ate that crap.
He said he boiled up the elbows and chopped up a bunch of hotdogs but he said he boiled the dogs, too.. I fry 'em. I haven't boiled a hot dog since, god.. I don't know when. Used to get that a lot when I was a kid - boiled hot dogs - it was always horrible because the 'rents would put the rolls on the steamer ontop of the 'dogs and inevitably over-steam them and they'd be soggy and sometimes a corner of the roll would be drippy with dog water and here in Maine - if you didn't know - we have real hot dogs that are red with cancerous dye and use natural casings (that's piglet intestines to you) and they are FUCKING good but they turn the water a hue of pink and a shade of red and of course the rolls will soak that shit up like a tampon and well.. soggy hot dog rolls aren't all that fun. So I never boil my dogs anymore, I fry or grill 'em.
But Dan boils 'em and he did and ate Mac&Cheese&Hotdogs.. which at the time blew my mind, even though it was already about ready to burst from the blue cheese and buffalo chicken pizza. (there goes my salivary glands again, like clockwork, like a fucking automated sprinkler system.. I'm not even hungry).
So then we started talking about how good hot dogs are. Crap, really. I'm not even kidding crap. Scrap crap. If you've ever seen 'em made you'd puke on your own mother's shoes but you'd still eat them cause gosh their good. So hot dogs in everything, we said. Hot dogs and beans. Hot dogs and rice. Hot dog fried rice. We laughed a lot about that one... that was pretty much the first idea that set us down the slippery slope of what's the funniest thing to combine hotdogs with conversation.
Hot dog soup.
Hot dog stew.
Hot dogs and cranberry sauce.
We figured a full french dinner should have a hot dog course. That was pretty funny.
Hot Dog flavoured Doritos.
We lamented the fact that there wasn't a single national fast food chain that served the dog. WHAT THE FUCK is up with that, America?
But it all culminated with hot dog lemonade. Little dehydrated hot dog bits in your Country Time lemonade mix, just like the little marshmellows in the Swiss Miss. You'd mix it up with some fresh cold spring water and those little pink buggers would plump right up. Mmm. They'd have commercials - the kind where you count down the days of summer while the kids ride bicycles down country lanes..
"Only 20 days left in summer.. "
Then they'd show some old grandpappy sitting on a porch with his mopey beagle laying there and he'd be sipping at some deliciously refreshening hot dog lemonade. Mmmm Mm.
I know a lot of people who wouldn't think there was a single funny sentence in all of that. fuck 'em.
They are probably the same people who think it's weird to keep note of one's defecation habits so closely.. Like timing things to drop the cosby's off at the pool only when you're at work (hey, why not - you're getting paid for it). Or like the entire year I took a shower directly after every duty - probably one of the best habits I've ever had.
These are the same people who might think it's odd to work at 9PM at night or weird to brush your teeth at work or strange to not eat for an entire day. Or off to jerkoff more than a few times a week. People are sooooo normal it hurts.
And they don't think shit is funny.
The unfortunate part of blogging is that you can't always share everything you'd like to on your blog. Blogs are like open books. They lay around your metaphorical house just waiting for a passer-by to look down at them, catch a few ill-spoken words, and start yelling at you. It's really the equivalent of writing a journal on a big whiteboard in your living room - no, on your front porch. In big enough block lettering that people driving by on the street can read it.. even when they don't slow down.
Once you're out - like a gay man from a closet - everyone will know where to find your dirt. Think of it as if every special and secret emotional moment you share with someone will for ever onwards be shared while you are wearing a T-Shirt that reads "I'm blogging this".
Some people have attempted anonymous blogging. In bunnie's case she's done a mostly decent job of it but there are always creepy little ways to catch-a-tigre-by-the-toe. In her case I was there on her site reading away one day when she mentioned her "real, non-anonymous" website - one that was work-related in that it displayed a bunch of her art. When I saw her mention "This website is 100% original material and there is lots of it" I thought to myself hmmmm, michael, that sounds very much like a pre-constructed sentence.. like one she has uttered before.. many times.
(in fact, that is not what she mentioned.. but a good example of the type of thing she said, and since I'm attempting to preserve her anonymous nature, excuse me but bear with me)
So I dropped right down to google and typed in that very sentence.
Needless to say it wasn't too long before I was perusing her "100% original material".
Of course I let her know what happened and warned her that there were people on this here innernector that are far more creative in their detective work than me. And also far creepier. Though I wasn't worried about the creeps.. she can handle them.
A lot of people aren't so concerned with remaining anonymous but they sort of make assumptions that certain people will never read their blog. Like their moms.. Unfortunately, there is a something I like to call the batchelder certainty principle (you can like it to old heisenberg and his uncertainty): If there is someone you would prefer _not_ read your blog, they will.
This is so much a certainty that the blogger.com creators themselves have set up some tutorials on the matter like What to do if your Mom discovers your blog... and How Not to Get Fired Because of Your Blog. But I don't think you really need to read them. You're smart enough to figure out your own ideas about the whole conundrum, right?
Take it from a guy who got fired because of an offhand remark on his website well before there was any such thing as a blog.. it's no big deal. Remember, I'm a dinosaur in innernector terms, and I'm still kicking so you small and fast-breeding warm-blooded mammals don't have much to worry about yet.
At my current job I blog all the time. If you're doing the same start out by testing the waters. A few posts a week. A couple blog views a day. Don't over do it because you can always feign ignorance if you get scolded by your boss. Eventually you will find that no one cares because you weren't doing any work in the first place so they'll appreciate it when you at least _look_ busy.
Mean People Suck. Sometimes you'll find that people get jealous of you.. or they just dislike you cause of your beauty mark or maybe you stole their fruit cup from the company fridge. These people may try to sabotage your blog. They might try to out it for you. Sometime a year back or so almost everyone in my company received a short little note from someone at "britcoalsdemise@yahoo.com". It said something to the effect of check out what this guy is doing on company time, he is baaaaad and gave the address to my blog. No matter, just take it in stride. A few people at work checked out my site. Not many stayed to read even a few posts. A few people asked what the weird email was about. My boss, in fact, gave me the email and told me that someone seemed to be trying to "get me in trouble" but he was pointing it out as a favour, not to warn me. Bottom line was that NO ONE CARED. This is a good lesson because, despite everything I've said in this post about audience and watching what you write.. in the end NO ONE CARES. What really drove me batty was the curiousity. I really wanted to know who it was. Sure, I could have gotten in trouble but I didn't. I do good work where I am and if I waste a few minutes (okay.. let's be real.. a few hours) a day blogging then what do they care? They don't.
Do good work. Do your homework. Exceed expectations. Be generally unhateable and you won't have to worry about what you write on your blog. Ever.
When I got fired before I was in fact secretly happy about it. The fuckers were lame and I didn't really want to be associated with them anyway. I ended up spending the rest of my summer painting a friend's house.. in the wonderful out of doors.. in the August sun.
Believe me it was a blessing in disguise.
But enough about all of that. The bottom line is write. Tony has it right when he often preaches to write everyday, no matter what. Don't worry about who will read your blog and don't worry about why they're reading. Sure, it's good to consider your audience and why you are writing a blog in the first place but once you get over the fact that you are being incredibly narcissistic in posting what is essentially a personal journal online for all to see, you can start having fun with it. Everything else will come out in the wash.
This post, for example, is a good example. I didn't want to write it because after the idea was there, but before I actually wrote it I became aware that someone jestered at my original Blogging 101 post and by writing a second post I'm sort of pandering to the audience, in a way.. I guess it's nice to have an audience but I don't want to spew forth flavour-of-the-month vomit for the sake of a few site hits. Mainly what I'm saying is once you become self-aware, you're fucked..
and man became self-aware a long time ago..
So we're all fucked. So I just wrote this post anyway.
20040221
Poker did not treat me particularly well this evening. Not that it ever does, really, but tonight I was pretty much shit out of luck. Any decent hand dealt to me was purely false hope since the rest of the yahoos were pulling rabbits out of hats, so to speak.
But when you play with cheap friends like mine and have a bad night at poker it means you're only out $5. Funny what $5 can mean to someone. How it can have completely different meaning and weight given different situations. Buy a new car, for example, and you probably wouldn't negotiate over $5 on the price. You wouldn't walk out on the salesman because he wouldn't give you that last $5. In fact, you probably wouldn't even notice those five dollars. If you feel you got a deal on a car and the dealer walked in with the papers and told you he made a mistake - that in fact you had to pay $5 more - you'd probably be happy to pay it. $5, right? What do you care.
$5 at poker night, however, when ante is one cent and a quarter raise is outrageous.. Well, you start to care an awful lot about the five dollars. All of a sudden it's more important. Very important. So important you'll check your cards twice and fold with 2-pair because you're too cheap to pay a ten cent raise.
And then you'll go out and spend $13 on a pizza.
A bad pizza.
20040220
Okay Kids, today is Blogging 101 day. This is the day when, if you pay attention and do your homework, you will learn almost everything there is to know about the power of blog. Don't get too excited, because it's actually pretty simple. Just be excited to learn something new and we'll take it from there.
The first thing you need to learn about blogging is this:
These are only words. These are only words. These are only words. Fuck the Niggers and Crackers and the Whops and Krauts and the Japs. And don't get offended because these are only words. The written word is powerful and you must remember not to let it control you, but to control it. When you allow your words to be muted by the limitations of the masses then you've already lost the battle before you even opened your mouth. Frame of mind - frame it with passion but don't frame it with fear. Open. Honest. Build integrity through your truths. We'll forgive you your transgressions of moral and ethical character if you can just give us the truth.
After you've come to terms with this first lesson, you must accept that everything I said above is wrong. People get really worked up about things you say. People get offended and pissed off and angry. Especially when it comes to politics. Stick to 'your-mother' jokes and commentary on your daily horoscope's accuracy and you'll be all set.
Okay, now that you know what to write about - how to write it? Well, for starters you don't want to alienate your audience. If your blog is meant just for you - as a sort of journal - then make sure you don't hate yourself. It'll be a bummer of a read if you don't. If you're going for a broader group - which you probably are if you're publishing writing on the WWW - then keep that group in mind. Entertain them. Write clearly enough that they can figure things out. Don't refer to your invisible friend Jo-Jo the catMonkey without explaining to people that you have an invisible catMonkey friend. Don't refer to articles or other blogs without linking. Us reader folk are dumb and we need things layed out in front of us.. plus - more links mean more pretty colors to click on so you'll at least be able to appease the mental patient cross-section of your audience.
To Continue, post pictures. It has been shown through various scientific studies ( here, here, and here) that if you post visuals with your writing - whether off topic or not - you will increase your readership (or should we call it viewership). If you happen to be a female I've heard that photos of yourself scantilly clad or perhaps not clad at all tend to increase site hits.. but that's a bore, so try everything else first.
Dialogue! Dialogue is always a winner (e.g. here) on the blogs. Conversations. IM conversations. Phone messages. Whatever. Record them in the blog, because we like to see that stuff. Remember we are reading fairly personal stuff about strangers over the internet - clearly we have no social life - so show us yours! And to follow that up: interviews! Interview other bloggers. Interview yourself and your appliances. Interview your professor or local laundromat attendant. We think interview insignifcant nobodies is funny..
Which brings us to our next point: Be funny. Somehow there are a lot of mopey sad blogs out there that get a lot of hits but I'm not sure I understand why. Laughter is more universal than music. Self-deprecating humour is particularly funny and we like to hear about your failures in life and love because - heck - we're failures too. There is safety in numbers! Comfort in community.
Oh, and don't quote too many song lyrics. We've all read it before.
BritCoal: Alex says I should go with her... but she isn't really in the right frame of mind for that
BritCoal: normally I would
frosty34: would you really? all the damn way out there?
BritCoal: why not dude? I'm 25. Love doesn't come rolling down my street every day like the goddamn ice cream wagon
frosty34: well if you're gonna get away, GET AWAY. it'd be a hell of an experience
frosty34: but talk about being cut off
frosty34: and people in alaska are _WEIRD_
BritCoal: yah, I think they're all drunk chain smokers
Lucky in love
What does that mean?
Someone told me recently that they thought I "have a high chance of success in romance" because I write words on a page or type them on a screen. As if that's all it takes and - *poof* - someone you're madly in love with shows up on your doorstep. Well it doesn't. If I'm successful, as they say, it won't be because I'm lucky and it won't be because of any particular reason. It will just be. By chance. A mistake, almost.
See that's the thing with love: it doesn't discriminate. Assholes, murderers, martyrs, and maidens alike all can find love in their lifetimes. Love isn't a moral or ethical structure. Love does not operate like a law moving through congress. Love is. Just is. Love is a combination of millions of chemical reactions, synaptic responses, and neural reasonings. It doesn't exist in our higher abstract plain of society and culture.
Love happens as a vulcano happens as a hurricane or tornado or earthquake happens. Love happens just as vapours of water dance up through the sky, congregate into a community raindrop, and fall back down from the heavens. Love happens just as bread rises in the oven and milk goes bad.
Love is little to do with luck and everything to do with right time right place right catalysts set up to precipitate the appropriate reactions, responses and reasonings.
20040219
when no one thought about monospaced fonts.
Seems everyone is always about the end game these days. Finishing. Completion. Goal states. Can I win? Can I reach the peak the climax the bottom the end? Always looking to go one step further.
Life mimics art mimics life. Like that movie nintendo they put out back in the day. No joke.
Everyone is telling me they beat the crazy japanese flash game (link a few posts below). "It took me 40 minutes," they say, or "I did it in three tries". Mmmhm. Good for them, I suppose. Really. I don't mean that with even the slightest hint of sarcasm. I just don't seem to have the drive to beat it myself. Don't get me wrong, I played the game. I applied thought and reasoning and logic to it. I spent time trying to get a better score. But I wasn't worried about completely beating it. Not really, anyway.
Somehow I missed that gene as I was assembling myself in the womb. The various chromosomes untwirled themselves from their jumbled pile of person, stretching out like sleep-filled monkeys, and danced a little Sadie Hawkins dance - the one set lining up on one side of the gym, the others directly facing them on the other side. Divided by a line, a metaphase plate. They paired off like shy children and there in the dark, one child bumped into something - dropped something important, maybe: the finishing gene.
I'm all about winning. I'm all about stubbornly finishing whatever I start. I'm all about winning..
Except when it comes to video games. It's an odd phenomenon. I just don't care. I enjoy playing. I enjoy doing well, passing levels, gaining ground. I like to beat my friends..
I just don't care about winning the game itself. As a youth I don't think I beat a single nintendo game in all the hours and hours and hours that I played it. Not Super Mario Brothers, not Zelda, and certainly not Metroid.
Maybe, in the back of my head, I was thinking that if I beat the game then I would no longer ever have a desire to play it again.
I could make an analogy about women, here, but I won't. I'll just repeat what I said: I don't care about winning the game itself.
Of course the secret is: the game doesn't care either.
20040218
I am so funny, you have no idea. I am powerful. I am a laugh a minute comedy. I am compelling. I'll make you smile. I am filled with touching sweetness. I am filled with hilarious zingers. I am entertaining and silly. I am heartwarming. I am directed with brilliance and passion. I am a hard-boiled story with unexpected passion and dark humor. I am erotic, lush, transgressive, and with buried conflict. I am pleasure, if not satisfaction. I am a work of bold ambition. I can rouse and exhilarate you, I can affirm life.
I am one of the best films of the year..
..though my character exists entirely for the convenience of the plot.
Mike, I'll be very dissapointed if you don't at least propose going to alaska with her. How many chances do you get to propose something like that?
You know, I absolutely would if I thought there was even a 5% chance.. but there isn't. She needs to get out of here and live a little and travel and see the world and do whatever she needs to do.
I'm not so sure that me going with her would be the best thing for her,
and more importantly,
I'm sure that she wouldn't ever consider it as even a slight possibility. I think this falls under one of those "i gotta do this for myself" things.
So the result of me asking would be a) inviting myself, b) sounding desperate, c) sounding a little crazy.. I don't know if i can do that.
The working title of my unwritten book is called "Real Men Don't Turn Around"
If I could ask her in a way that she would take seriously and understand that I meant it seriously, but was at the same time light and with no pressure, I would do it. But I'm not sure it can be done. I feel the question would do more damage than good.
The way I know these things is because I put myself in her shoes. I've been there before - having someone infatuated. It's nice, but if you don't like that other person (whether because you aren't ready for them, or you just don't like them) then questions like these just make them sound weaker to me.. almost pathetic?
Believe me, I feel like the decision I'm making is the one that will give me the best chance at eventually being with her - as small as that chance may be.
I told her she had to make me one promise: That 1 year, 2 years, 3 years down the road, when she has done some soul searching and traveling and thinking and when she is ready to share her life with someone.. ready to love.. I made her promise that she would call me and at least give me six months - a _real_ chance - to win her heart.
That's a lot more of a cop out than moving to Alaska... It's the type of promise that only gets kept in the movies. But I don't think any part of her is having the fantasy right now that involves me going to Alaska with her.
She wants to go this leg of the trip alone.
easy as pie. got it on my first try today. congratulations.
20040217
have you gotten it yet? I can get eight . . .
Mike, I'll be very dissapointed if you don't at least propose going to alaska with her. How many chances do you get to propose something like that?
my lab partner has been doing it for the last hour as well. The music is awesome.
Yeah, that's right. The only way someone is going to fall in love with you is because of your fabulous internet pictures. That's what I was suggesting.
That game was fucking worthless, though I did get pretty good at it. Irritating as fuck, though.
Suck my butt.
And he said hmmm . . . is this about mate value? I saw your picture is up here . . .
And I say Hey, are you suggesting that someone needs to see my picture to fall in love with me? Am I that shallow? Do I not have non-physical worth? Could no one fall for me if I were a hunchback with no-dame?
Harsh dude.
This, via the aardvark, turned my brain to mush and drove me insane in no more than 30 minutes.
For you Mainiacs out there (the Maine native kind, not the insane kind) this site, via matt, allows you to check out a ton of aerial photography of the state.. interactive maps are fun, woohoo!
One day sales can go fuck themselves.
Something, everything, always,
will be on sale.
Somewhere.
Don't get sucked into it because you believe it to be true.
(I was going to give a reason to get sucked into it here, but couldn't think of one)
Ignore the hype.
New shoes only because you
need them/want them/can afford them/
can't afford them but who cares?
Not because they are on sale.
Not because your brain,
fueled by the drugs of commerce,
is falling falling falling into that shit.
No.
Where is the love?
Ain't in a box of white tissue paper
and cowhide leather, no sirreee.
Amen.
He asks, Is this about the fantasy, not totally crazy, that some chick wil read this blog and fall totally in love with you?
And I have to respond, quite truthfully, absolutely not.
The fantasy, if that is in fact what you'd like to call it, has never crossed my mind. I can't imagine, in fact, how that situation would even precipitate. I don't know how anyone could contact me in such a way that would both peak my interest and retain a level of aloof distance - not enough so for me to desire it, anyway.
Grass is always greener. It needs to be on the other side.
Do you believe it? Do you see it as the human condition? Not the inevitable going-to-happen but the here-now- in fact IS of life? Do you accept? Embrace it? Endure it?
It is. It is always always greener so when the grass is delivered to my doorstep - to my inbox in the form of an email from some secret soul (to quote weezer: I've got your letter, you've got my song.. so to speak, anyway) - then this is forbidden love, is it not? It's no longer on the other side, the grass. It is here, right in my lap.
I guess I don't believe in throwing oneself at someone. I don't believe in the "you have me heart and soul completely here I am do with me what you want".. at least not before I meet someone.
The act of the giving of one's heart and soul is a process of time. The selfless act, if made out of desperation, out of need, out of an attempt to fill a hollowness, well it's not truly selfless anymore, is it?
It's been said that If you've found someone special you should hold onto them as tightly as possible for if you let them slip away too easily you might never get them back. It's been said that if you ignore your heart, you will take a tremendous risk with your happiness. It's been said that if you love them, set them free.
Which is all easy enough to write when you think any of it makes sense. Easy enough to buy when you have a need to believe in something. As if words written on a page will strengthen your emotional house of cards. They won't.
Again, Weezer
everytime i pin down what i think i want it slips away
How solid, how true.
For anyone who is interested: She is gone. In a month she will be in Alaska - which is pretty damn far away from me in Maine. I love her dearly and I'm letting her go. Setting her free (as if it were my choice and I was making a selfless act, yah right). Setting her free in my mind, more like it. Trying to anyway. Let her be what she has to be, do what she has to do, go where she has to go. Believe that, spiritually speaking, she will return or I will go to her or we will find eachother someday, somewhere, in a place that we both want to be.
When travelling with a companion in this life sometimes your road diverges in the wood. Sometimes, though one path may be less travelled than the other, one of you will take it and the other will not be able to - whether due to fear or inability to handle the rough terrain. Perhaps - as if a canyon-road-overpass ala duke's of hazard - those two paths will re-converge right over the next hill.. or on the other side of that mountain.
One can hope, no?
Gosh, Hope is such a four letter word.
hmmm . . . is this about mate value? I saw your picture is up here . . . Is this about the fantasy, not totally crazy, that some chick wil read this blog and fall totally in love with you? Because that's a possibility, n'est pas?
The girl just wrote back. I'm such a pathetic loser, it hurts me inside. But not as much as her leaving the other night . . .
Jesus. I have accomplished something today, but to characterize the day as having been spent waited to hear from her would not be all together absurd.
Ah yes, I remember what I was going to write . . . Last night, in order not to write to her, I wrote a letter that I would not send. Just wrote a letter for the future. In the style of "Once things have turned out ok, I will give you this." It was really beautiful, actually. Very sweet. And it made me feel much better. I even think that this is a therapeutic technique about that I've heard about, oh sorry, about which I've heard [read: SMB Rachel], but never tried until last night. It was really good. I will do so for the next two days, and then perhaps I will I will call her and invite her for dinner. Call on wednesday evening for dinner on thursday. So planned. So calculated. But be that as it may - lesser evils for the greater good. Right. Perfect.
Yeah, you have a new audience. A SB connection. Write interesting stuff, and they might learn from it. Give them a password, and you will rue the decision forever.
I really am a bad person. I am a fucking leech. Money is given to me, and I fucking squander it. This is embezzlement. I am embezzling money from my fellow man's taxes. I don't really feel bad. What have I learned today? That I can squander money and get away with it. That I can wait pathetically for a girl's email all day and there are no repercussions. No fucking retribution. That's the fucking problem. Really, that's it.
Dude . . . Ween . . . Fucking incredible. I must have some of their albums. And I got some Frank Black and the Catholics. It's raw, but good.
20040214
What a mess of a post. Jesus. I didn't actually HAVE five girls in the car . . . I HAD earlier in the evening. And yes, they were girls. And I never specified who "my girls" are. They are the same girls with whom I posted that post long ago. Right.
Going on a date. Not going to get excited. Going on a date.
Here's an excerpt from the email she sent me tonight,
big al-
well i wouldn't want to be responsible for anyone's assholiness, so dinner
sounds super. (supper sounds dinner? that was SO bad... i apologize...
She sounds funny, right. So Here is an excerpt from my letter.
Yes, yes. It is so late, and I am so cold. I am walking back from dropping
friends off at home. I decided to stop and check my mail. It's a good story.
Here's goes. I said, "self, it's time you stop and check your mail." Suddenly,
like a flash, I realized that I was walking by my office, and that I COULD stop
and check my mail. "Thanks self," I said.
> because this whole situation is pretty damn funny. lets meet at the dolphin
> fountain on cabrillo/state.
"Pretty damn funny" is my middle name. I eat "pretty damn funny for breakfast."
Mmmm . . . Nothing beats a bowl of pretty damn funny. Hits the spot.
Right. Everything is under control again. Really it's just the nerves. Haven't
been quite the same since the accident. Might not want to ask me about that tomorrow,
it's pretty damned sensitive. No, no, actually. You go right ahead and ask.
It goes on. I don't know if it's just my current state, but this email has made me hurt myself laughing. It's gotta be a little funny anyway. So I hang out with my girls all the time. It's so great and non-sexual. Obviously, I don't refer to them as sisters, but they could be. And we end up hanging out all the time. They'll miss me if I busy with a girl. They'll think of the happy days when Alex was sad and lonely and pathetic and they were nice to him. But really. If I'm here for four fucking years? It'll be so nice to be these guys' friends. Right.
Love
Alex
You know what else? Hanging out has been so FUN tonight! Because I haven't for a second been thinking about getting it on with anyone. Totally and uterly desireless. You wanna know what? I have five 18 year old in the car. How creepy older guy is that? You know why? Because of the girl. But that's also how I'm going to meet the girl. If she's cool, cool. If she's not (though, I'm pretty confident) whatever. No big deal.
Nice. Nights like these are good living. Better living through intoxication. No kidding. Doing much better feeling human than I have in a long time. Looking really excited towards the future now. Right. Summer. Reading. Studying. Preparing a research question. Getting shit done. So exciting. A whole change. My advisor will be like, wow. It's a whole new Alex. Poor woman. She has no one to call her on Valentine's day. I'm going to stop and drop off flowers at her house tomorrow. Would that be fucked up? No. I think I will. Why not. She deserves it. I will do so. And it was done.
Dude. Give some of this poetry to the girl. For real. She needs it. To get out of her funk. You need to play the card. The SHBAMP card. Also, I'm geting rock hard pecs. What now.
you mean coco the talking monkey?
20040213
When a man loves a woman
Can't keep his mind on nothin' else
He'd trade the world
For a good thing he's found
If she is bad, he can't see it
She can do no wrong
Turn his back on his best friend If he puts her down
It's amazing what can make me fall in love with a girl. It's the simple things. Far more simple than even everyday occurances like death and taxes. It's the sound of her voice all low and gravelly yet with an airyness to it - like Kim Deal of the Pixies.
- aside -
The Pixies will indeed be getting back together, at least for awhile. The original lineup has come together and they are currently rehearsing. They're headlining some desert music thing, cochalla(?), with radiohead. They're planning a European tour. Fuckin' A man.
- aside -
It's the way she flips her hair - good hair, shiny and bright but tangled in the morning and rich rich rich brown in colour. It's the twinkles dancing in her eyes. It's the smile, oh god I'm a sucker for a smile.
When a man loves a woman
Spend his very last dime
Trying to hold on to what he needs
He'd give up all his comforts
And sleep out in the rain
If she said that's the way
It ought to be
Girls think they have it tough with me, sometimes.. and if I'm not interested I suppose that's true - true as with anyone, really - but if they're in.. they're in like flynn and I'm just hooked. That simple.
There is a reason the words crush and crutch are so close together. It's no accident. They mean practically the same thing. A crush has the ability to bring your world crashing to a halt. A crush can ruin your day, make your day, make your bed, and make you sleep in it.. Sometimes all without even knowing it.
It's when they know it and tug at your heartstrings like a puppeter at a play - that's when things get really rough. They can make your heart jump and dance and sink down low as if your pounding pumping lump of flesh and blood and arteries and valves were in fact a marionette. Things get dangerous. And the shit of it all is that no one can cut their own binding strings.. Like a baby from the womb we are unable to cut our own cord. We have to rely on another. Ironically that other is sometimes a new crush who prances along and, like a teenage car jacker, snips you free of one crutch and re-attaches you to another.
When a man loves a woman
I give you everything I've got (yeah)
Trying to hold on
To your precious love
Baby please don't treat me bad
No one owns me.. but someone does.
As much as a person can own a dog or Coco the gorilla can have a kitten.. a crush can have me because I'm stupid with love. Hopeful. Some might even say romantic.
It's all in the way she touches my knee and sips from my drink without asking. It's in the smell of her neck and the curve of her back.
Love, I claim, is the closest a sane person will ever get to being crazy. Love is unsure, often unrequitted, recanted, lost. It's a big horsepill that's hard to swallow but we'll gulp it down nonetheless because somewhere deep in the neural base the chemicals say yes yes yes this is it this is why you're here. Fuck the existensial fuck the what? why? how? reasons fuck the death, the taxes, the job and the wife, because I'm in love here now right now do it. See? Love is crazy. It's illogical.
Love is illogical because the perception of love always involves two people. The perception is of a two-way street with traffic flowing back and forth freely and without toll. The reality is much more often a one-way road. With potholes. And traffic congestion.
Reality is that love is as lonely an emotion as you can find.
True love - love that lasts the test of time and holds strong and climbs against the obstacles of life - true love isn't even about love. It's about respect. Understanding. Accepting an alternate perspective - not grasping it as your own but accepting that it exists and working with it. It's about caring.
If there is no respect, there is no love - the real expansive love. There is only hope.
And as hope springs eternal, another fool is born.
When a man loves a woman
Deep down in his soul
She can bring him such misery
If she is playing him for a fool
He's the last one to know
Loving eyes can never see
20040212
It's funny that at almost the same time bunny and bunnie are struggling with the ever familiar problem of email-watching. Sure the situations aren't the same (I have a sneaking suspicion that bunny does not, in fact, really care if she hears back from Dave Coulier) but it's indicative of our culture now. Constant access to everything, everyone, makes for a sometimes difficult time as we go unfulfilled.. knowing we can reach anyone anytime - and more importantly, knowing they can reach us.. well, makes reality a little more starkly cold and harsh when you find out people don't, in fact, want to/ need to/ will reach you. Fuck 'em.
In the end you get more out of rambling along in your blog like a bad Nabokov novel (which Bunnie very much sounds like right now) and venting frustration at the insanity and unfairness of the human condition than you'll get out of waiting for an email that will never come.
And do us all a favour - don't apologize. We're all adults here. We get it that you "shouldn't really complain" because you "don't really have it that bad" so don't remind us. If you're going to bleed your heart out on the keyboard then just do it.. No apologies.
That was a heck of an email you sent me. I was waiting for it though. I kept refreshing this damn page every thirty seconds or so. she said. Yah, how does it feel? Some people are a little too self-absorbed to realize what they're doing to other people but they are, ultimately, the ones that need it the most. They are the ones to feel the most slighted. They always think they deserve something too, whether concious or not, that the rest of the world has already gotten over taking for granted.
Never mind that I've been refreshing my proverbial email page every thirty seconds for months now. Nevermind that at all.
Girl: I'm thinking of making dinner for him. What kind of food screams valentine's day?
Boy: In a book once somebody added a drop of menstrual blood to a man's coffee in order to make him fall in love with her.
That just SCREAMS romance.
You could always say I love you.
But by then, it is too late.
I took a step down and as politely and calmly as I possibly could said: "Look, I don't know you. I've never met you before. Whatever bullshit you perceive the world has dealt you -- all the shit that has lead up to this very moment -- all of it has nothing to do with me. I'm not responsible for your crappy life. So take your misery out on someone else and shut the fuck up, okay?"
...
As I stood waiting for the light to change, I thought to myself: Well that settles that. Now if I could only take my own advice.
20040211
Somewhere, out there.
I am truly suffering the consequence of disbelief
and carrying the monkey of adam
upon my back.
Life has a way of presenting you with problems you didn't really stop to think of. If you saved money to fix your car just in case then your girlfriend dumps you. If you applied to a safety school then your friend dies. If you plan an outdoor wedding then you foreclose on your mortgage.
Alanis would try and tell us it's all a little bit ironic but I think she's kinda cronic herself so forget that.
I spoke once a few months ago about my current crutch. I said the dependance on that crutch will slow the healing process and that, ultimately, I was looking at what would become the hardest emotional trial of my life.
A few months in now and I believe it more than ever. and I still believe it. and I still believe it.
to be the hardest
trial.
Life: These are things we can't plan for. Retirement accounts and insurance policies are pacifiers, not contingency plans. They help in the here and the now. They ease our minds and make life less anxious - now.. or we wouldn't buy them. Life, though, is unplanned.
and hard.
like running heartbreak hill - always as if the 25th mile - always as if strung out and wasted on the effort of it all.
If you're lucky
you can get a runner's high.
20040210
I started hearing all this shit about a sci-fi book called Ender's Game. I heard it from a few people - "simple amazing" they said - and I also saw it mentioned in print a few places.. Just like those things always happen. Whenever you become aware of a new word or an idea or idiom, all of a sudden there it is in every article you read, mentioned on every blog.. used in everyday conversation. As if it had always been there in front of you but you were not allowed to experience it until something clicked. Like seeing the forest for the trees.
So I ponied up the $5 it cost me to buy a used copy off of Amazon's marketplace and I powered through it in a few days - really easy reading in that simplistic way that most widely-influential books are.. like Ayn Rand's stuff. Full of boring old ideas that people grasp at as if new just because she explains it enough times and simply enough for people to get it.
I felt like I was reading a see dick run.
I finished it up last night and I lay there in bed staring at my blank white walls and I tried to grasp at the ideas. They were all hollow. I didn't see the allure. I couldn't get it. Then I thought, "maybe people will grasp at anything. Maybe people need others to provide them with hope?"
I don't know. I found the whole thing a bit pedestrian.
I guess that makes me a dullard.
In the most recent email from my pal Alex (regarding women):
I actually feel very much like john favreau from swingers. But I will try and not fuck up these ones. They are nice. Probably butt . . . but who cares. Not I, anyway.
And I just saw Along Came Polly, the newest Ben Stiller movie in which - as usual - he makes a complete fool of himself with a girl. I have to ask myself how realistic these movies are until Alex bumbles along and reminds me that there are, indeed, some struggling dudes out there. In fact, I am probably a struggling dude myself.
And I have to ask myself how realistic these movies are because, well, what the fuck? Ben Stiller always gets the girl. How does that work, anyway?
Ben Stiller is not what I would call an attractive man. Perhaps, as a man myself, I have never really looked very hard at him.. perhaps I have not truly seen him for the sexual being he is.. but fuck, the dude is not what I would call attractive. Well, to each their own I suppose. Somewhere out there is a young teenager with Ben Stiller posters on her wall dreaming dreamy thoughts about him everyday.. maybe.
Or not.
This makes me feel good, somehow. Both that there may be, and there very well may not be, some young teenage girl completely infatuated with Ben Stiller. I figure either options give me hope - just in different ways.
Alex goes on to say (in regards to a girl who blew him off):
It also makes me feel good that I did not bow to the near irresistable temptation to write her a nasty message. Damn that's
difficult. I was nasty to her each night this week though. I wanged her good and proper lest she escape the punishment of the evening's flog.
Whatever that means.. but gosh, he is right. The temptation to be completely nasty to people is a difficult one to fight. Especially when they have slighted you.
Much tougher when people are honest and up front with you. Hard to hate someone when they say it like it is.
but the more important question I need to pose right now is how do you get rid of a crazy roommate who talks to himself?.. Especially when he is essentially a nice guy? How late does rent have to be before you tell them to skeedadle?
How do you spell skeedadle?
(p.s. he really is crazy.. he really does talk to himself.. not at all like I am doing right now, I mean in a crazy way!)
because I'm enjoying myself a whole lot these days watching Bush fall from the grace of the nation.
Finally someone is telling the simpletons not to like Bush so they aren't anymore. Finally the press is impressing me. Well, not enough for me to watch but enough for me to listen with one ear cocked at the door. Enough for me to smile and think of a Democrat in the Whitehouse.
I don't have to remind you who the last President to fail to get re-elected is.. His name starts with G and ends in ush.
And that's what I'm going to do when our current president shuffles off his pedestal of power: Gush.
20040209
president bush is in office, i work for pennies a day, and dave matthews wins a grammy for Rock over dylan tom waits david bowie and lenny kravitz.
why should people even try if thats what youre going to do.
and justin wins two motherfuckers?
and tom waits wins nothing?
If time meant anything to me then today would be an important day for me. It would mean a substantial block of time has passed - a nice round number of a block of time - since a certain someone has come into my life.
6 months.
But people have a way of letting you down and time doesn't mean anything to me but how long I have to wait till the next restful sleep or the next trip into surreality - whether it be killing people in Halo or reading a good book.. because lately this life hasn't been all it's cracked up to be.
If you didn't know you'd think maybe I sound like a whiner but that's not it really. I like to call it logical cynicism.
The logical part comes from it being backed up over and over and over again by real-world examples. Reinforced with actual data from the field.
People suck.
Sometimes I lay in bed at night trying to read and the words drive in through my eyes and down into my brain and mill about but I don't really absorb them because I am too busy wondering how many people out there have been slighted by me. I know I've gotten it plenty good from plenty of people so I must have handed it out quite a few times so far, no?
We're all in this together. I'm as much at fault as the next guy.
But that doesn't keep people from letting me down and that's what really eats at me cause I'm a selfish bastard just like you.
It eats at me so much that I have a big black hole in my heart now, where once there was love.
and the result is a big fat lie I just I told
putting me smack dab
square in the middle
with the rest of them.
When you're trying to tighten the screws down and put the hurt on someone maybe it's about then that you should step back and look at your life and your situation and ask yourself if it's at all worth it. Is your integrity worth the moral slight?
I wish I could take the moral highground right about now but I can't. I'm down in the trenches and there isn't anyway to get there from here. I just have to trudge my way through this slop first and gain a little ground before I can find a suitable place to start the climb back up. I'm too weak right now to attempt it - especially in this weather. I need time to rest.
bagel
creeeeaaaaam cheese
it's no wonder this country is fat
...when you're left with nothing
no need to work
no toil
no real hardship
no love
no true relationships
...in the end
food will never turn it's back on you
our outward persona's are never as grandiose as our inner thoughts
outwardly we are meak representations of what our minds are truly capable of and, as a group, we suffer because of it.
we are afraid.
20040206
This site is anything but "pea soup green".
If you think this looks like pea soup then you either need your eyes checked, your monitor adjusted, or your peas checked for radioactivity.
The green on the unvisited states below seems closer to pea-soup green to me.
Also, there is nothing particularly daring about a right-hand side bar versus a left-hand side bar. I guess I put mine on the left because I'm a westerner. The whole left-to-right thing. I've actually been considering a second blog running down the right side but haven't put enough thought into it to say.
For the time being I have changed the layout so that posts by Ross will have grey backgrounds and posts by Alex will have yellowish backgrounds so you can more easily and quickly realize when the piss poor writing and spelling is in fact not mine, but theirs.
Hurrah.
I give a big "here here" to this:
I have never had a post fail mid-post because my "session expired".
Until now.
I guess you all lose cause I ain't re-typing it.
there goes 10 minutes
of my pitiful life
down the
drain
1. What's the most daring thing you've ever done?
Voted Democrat
2. What one thing would you like to try that your mother/friend/significant other would never approve of?
Vote for Buchanan
3. On a scale of 1-10, what's your risk factor? (1=never take risks, 10=it's a lifestyle)
I'd never vote Libertarian, if that's what you are asking.
4. What's the best thing that's ever happened to you as a result of being bold/risky?
Clinton
5. ... and what's the worst?
Bush
(no, i did not vote for bush)
Okay Mike..
I count on you to entertain me...
Says a regular reader of this blog.
I am stuck in an office so I have to sit around and surf the net for hours on end... Anyway...last year when I had a lot of free time and spent about 30 minutes a day on the web i always read your site, and I loved it, it always entertained me. I look forward to reading what you have to say and it is always entertaining.... not so much lately...could you pump out some more material, perhaps a
bit more commentary on things that interest me and could you plug Dennis Kucinich in as well?
Well a big F U C K - thank you very much to that regular reader. I have to fucking sit on the goddamn internet all day too. I have to surf the web and try and find things to entertain me to maintain some sense of sanity too. I don't see YOU doing anything to entertain me.. and I don't see Kucinich doing anything to entertain me, either.
Unfortunately, I can't plug Denny cause he has no hope of winning. I'm not saying Clark or Kerry or any of the others are a better choice but like I have said before: anything to get that fucking wanker of a Alfred E. Newman look alike out of office - even if it means voting for my least favorite Democrat.
If the conspiracy theory about the Democrats fielding a shitty field of nominees so that Hilary can Be Great in 2008 is true, I might as well get it over and move to Canada right now. I don't think the risk of another four years with Bush is worth anything..
I don't want to sound paranoid - cause I'm not really - but I do worry sometimes. People are simple. They like to believe what they are told. If it's in print they think it must be true. People have been buying this Bush crap like a carton of cigarettes on sale for $15 for a few years now and it's getting downright scary. People wonder how it is ever possible that a Hitler type can rise to power. People wonder how the Nazi party could take over and perpetrate one of the largest genocides in history.. well, this is how. People are sheep. SHEEP.
I'm not saying Bush is Hitler. I'm not saying he wants to wipe out an entire region and turn it into a big American controlled oil company. I'm not saying he would break international law as well as U.S. law by holding people in prison without trial... all while way over-spending his financial bounds..
Oh wait. Yes I am.
Bush has been playing off of people's fears ever since 9/11. Heck, he might even have planned the whole attack himself - what better way to gain as much power to change things as possible without any cries of opposition?
Well.. Bush.. I am afraid. I do fear. But not the Afghans.. not the Muslims.. not the Isrealis or the Syrians or the Iranians or the English. I don't fear the Mexicans or the Haitians or the Saudi's (although they are probably distrustful little buggers) or the Iraqi's. In fact, I've never met an Iraqi I didn't like.. though I have met a few Americans that offended my better senses.
I am afraid, though. I am afraid of YOU, George W. Bush. Your fiscal responsibility offends me. Your inability to speak in public makes me cringe. Your flippant disregard for civil liberties worries me. Your singlemindedness annoys me. Your petulant attitude towards the rest of the world scares me.
I am afraid. Very afraid.
And to think, I used to be Republican.
Tony is still pushing his new Lick magazine thing like it's going out of style and he is starting to sound more and more like a bad verizon commercial everyday. It's not so amazing that everyone sells out cause it's a slippery slope, sure, but the more deceptive part is that it's a really short slope. I'm not saying Tony is selling out.. I'm just saying it's pretty easy to fall into the producer-consumer relationship which, inevitably, results in marketing.. I guess Tony has been marketing his ass for quite some time now but I'd say the mental budget has certainly doubled or tripled in the last 6 months or so. I'm not sure but maybe it's because that weird sense of urgency I've been hearing in his voice lately. Like something has got to give or happen or change or else. You know what I'm talking about.. we've all been there before.
Anyhow, his latest teaser is the beginning of an interview of raymi the minx as interviewed by bunny mcintosh. Personally, I'd be a heck of a lot more excited if it was the other bunny doing the interview. I think that would be more fun. I'm pretty sure bunny and I would hate eachother on contact if we ever met.. but somehow I get her on the 'net and I think she gets me.. well.. sort of. We're civil to eachother, how's that?
Poutine, by the way, is yummy french fries smothered in gravy and cheese curds. If that doesn't make your mouth water and your sphincter muscle quiver, I don't know what will.
20040205
Aquayonex1: so im sitting online
Aquayonex1: and there is a banner ad
Aquayonex1: says "what are you doing right now"
Aquayonex1: i figure
Aquayonex1: hey, ill click it
Aquayonex1: its a u.s. army site
Aquayonex1: i click on the jobs section
Aquayonex1: and search for
Aquayonex1: "kill people"
Aquayonex1: and get a full page of results with job listings
Aquayonex1: one of which is a recruiter
Aquayonex1: hmmm... the irony
As the current leading democrat in the bid for presidential nominee, John Kerry was already the guy I would probably vote for. Not because I like his platform (I'm not even that familiar with it) but more because I hate Bush and I'm willing to sacrifice potentially better candidates for one more likely to win..
But now that I know he once owned a Ducati 900SS ( AMASuperbike.com :: Kerry Rode Ducati) it makes it that much easier to cast my vote.
This evidenced by my complete inability to get to work at a reasonable hour - even if you call 10AM reasonable.
This evidenced by the fact that I will eat next to nothing for days on end and sustain myself with multivitamin pills because the grocery store - which is about 2 miles away - is just too much hassle to get to.
This evidenced by the fact that I have on more than one occasion 1) considered peeing out of my bedroom window because the bathroom was too far away and 2) layed in bed with severe lower abdominal pain for hours due to an overfull bladder.
This evidenced by my failure to complete most projects I start - including (in rough chronolical order) building a model train scene, restoring a sailboat, passing ordinary differential equations the first time without attending a single class, writing a complete piece of software for myself, changing the oil in my car at least once every six months, and last but not least, getting a life.
This evidenced by my lack of effort in remastering the punk album a friend and I recorded once (back when I wasn't so lazy).
This evidenced by my inability to finish any of the short stories I've been working on for the past year.
This evidenced by my failure to make this post interesting and my lack of interest in doing so.
20040204
Some people hated 28 Days Later because they said it was a direct rip off of Dawn of the Dead. Maybe so, but the opening sequences of the young english lad wandering the streets of London with nary a soul in sight.. well that's worth at least a nod, in my book. It quickly devolves, but who cares?
I took this picture recently and played with it a bit and I thought it came out reminding me a lot of those infected with the Rage in 28 Days Later.
Get the Rage
A few of my friends insist that The Manitou was a good movie. If you've never heard of it, there is a reason for that.
A good synopsis would go something like this:
A woman in San Francisco grows a tumor on her neck that eventually turns into a 400-year-old Indian witch doctor. The doctor proceeds to wreak havoc. Boobies are shown, as are weird time portal type things with lots of effects - made special by how awful they suck.
But apparently action figures were made!
20040203
But seriously.. this really makes you think. Everyone knows parrots can talk.. but can they think?
20040202
Out at the bar these days drinking beer , see, and I don't even know what is going on around me. I walk in, walk to the bar, slap my money down and drink a beer. I'm not sure whose sitting to the left of me or whose to the right but I just know that someday someone's gonna put it all right. I miss people that know me and eye people who don't through it all, the big sea.
And someone said 'Howie Day' and I said 'who?' And they said 'you know, Howie Day' and I said 'no, I don't'. They said 'MTV'. I said 'oh'. They said 'musician'. I said 'oh'. Then there at the bar, sitting next to me, he drank his beer and said to me: 'I'm Howie Day I'm on the MTV'
But not really he said to me, he didn't even see me. He was busy the girls were calling 'take me home take me home' they begged and plead. The cute one went, the night was spent, she hooked his arm, no need for alarm.
Just one more night out in the sea. The beer was flowing down into me. The sky was dark the sky was glee. The milky way a cup of tea. And from it all I could see, it was the MTV that was his key.
Yah, he looked like a dweeb.
Least she wasn't for me.
Barely knew her A to Z
Is the layout on this site boring?
Does it suck?
Does it offend you?
Does it make your eyes bleed?
Tell me. Cause I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you if it did. I need a re-design.
This is boring.
You never know when you'll click the wrong link and end up looking at something like this..
And let me tell you.. the last thing I need to see on a Monday morning after the superbowl and a marathon night of Halo deathmatching with only 3 hours of sleep is Anti's chesthair.
HUuyuack
But that's okay. I'll live. I'll live cause it's the easier, lazier, and generally more complacent way to go about things: just livin. I could, if I wanted, go off and kill myself or get a new job or fuck some HAAT (that's hot with an emphasis on hot) women but you know.. it's easier just to live. Look at some chest hair. Cringe. Swallow the vomit down with a mouth full of coffee.. move along.
The problem with life is that it's work. You have to get out of bed and move around. You have to work - manual labour, mind you - to put food on the table. I'm not talking about going to work and earning a paycheck, I'm talking about getting food out of the fridge. Real Work. Fuck. And they say we have it good here in America. They don't know shit. Last night I almost snapped a tendon mixing the orange powder into my mac and cheese - I went thick with not much milk - but jeessus, I ain't getting any worker's comp for that injury. Fuckin' hell.
The dude, now he got it right. If I could live like the dude - mentally stomach it - I think I'd be right there with him. Bowl a few strings. Drink a few caucasians.. fuckin' a man, call it good. Done. I just can't do it cause the mind is like a fucking roller coaster that won't stop. It's the ride that you can't get off.
Fuckin A, man.
I hate myself. I hate myself for the person I am - the inabilities, the fear, the choking inacation. I hate myself for the spot decisions. The mistakes. The wrong choices. I hate between a rock and a hard place with the cross hairs of a catch-22 pointed squarely at my forehead.
But I don't feel particularly special. I don't feel like I'm worse off than anyone else. I feel like everyone hates themselves, in some way or another. It's what makes us try harder.
When you start talking to your friends it's amazing how many people you'll learn jerk off at work. In their office. In the storage closet. In the bathroom. Humans have sex on the brain like fly on shit and it's amazing we're so confused about it.. seems pretty cut and dry to me.
How long before laws against large families in the United States?
How long before the one-child rule?
It wouldn't surprise me to race into the future and see bethrothels coming back. It wouldn't surprise me if we went back to arranged marriages.
My good friend insists the rain forests will be gone in 50 years. Burned to the ground. Harvested. Cleared. Gone. I beg to differ. We're both die-hard environmentalists.. we just come at it from opposite angles.
We are a destructive race, no doubt. But we're selfish, too. The rain forests will still be around in 50 years. The rain forests will be around, the ocean will be around.. The temperate forests will be around. Maybe not all of them. Maybe not most of them.. but at some point, somewhere, it will click.
Rivers full of the blood of industry able to peel paint off houses do not clean themselves up in 20 years without effort on someone's part.
I guess I'm saying I'ma gonna bet on the intelligentia. I guess I'm gambling on the good - as cynical as they might tell me I am.
You'd never guess it to look at me on a day to day basis but I'm a raging romantic.
Like a raging alcoholic I am not always able to admit it - can't always see the forest for the trees - maybe I need to visit a clinic.
It'd be nice if they had clinics for that sort of thing.
Maybe I'm crazy but rehab clinics seem as self-indulgant as the addiction they are supposed to cure. help? riiighhtt.
kinda like this blog.
rigggggghhhht.
right?
I thought this bit that my pal Ross left in response to this post on killing was pretty interesting:
Killing animals...Nature or nurture?
About killing animals... after working in an animal lab for a year and a half, I became desensitized to "sacrificing" animals. Maybe more interestingly, I became accustomed to thinking of animals as things. A friend of mine who has worked in animal labs many more years than me, describes himself as "messed up" ...he has regular nightmares about it.
Animals like to socialize, they clean themselves, they cry when they're in pain or lonely, they like to be touched, and they like to play. How could we not be "messed up" when we kill?
I had to develop a mindset that animals are just "things", so it was easier for me to treat them as such? Maybe just like you look at the animal your dinner plate.
I feel bad when I kill ants sometimes. One of the most amazing things I've ever done was resuscitate a bee that was drowned in a pool. It sounds stupid, but my argument is that WE ARE inately programmed to think killing is bad, and I'll go further to say that humans inherently want to do just the opposite...nurture and keep things alive.
I argue that we learn that killing certain animals is okay, adapting to the idea over time so that we can survive. Each person..yes..even after all the generations before us who have killed to survive...each person has to adapt to handle the harsh reality of death and killing, because I don't think it is in our blood.
Good points, I guess. I'm not so sure he is wrong, quite frankly.
That being said I would like to say that I really enjoy the word Scramjet. A Scramjet is essentially a really rockin' jet engine that has no moving mechanical parts. Essentially you cram an assload of oxygen into a tube with fuel and ignite it.. of course, this is how jets work in general.. the difference is that a normal subsonic jet compresses the air with fans. A ramjet, on the other hand, simply uses the speed of the aircraft to scoop air fast enough to feed the jet - although they only work well at supersonice speeds.. The problem is that in a ramjet one still has to slow the air down enough inside the engine for good combustion.. A scramjet takes all the above advantages - AND allows for combustion without slowing the air down. They tell us it could help us build shit that'll crank at Mach 10 or more. How cool is that?
Regardless, it's fun to say. Scramjet. Scramjet.
Sounds almost as cool as Dork, huh?
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the guys: philogynist jaime tony - the gals:raymi raspil
