the sticking point

Big Knowledge, Part 1

There's a Friday 10 at the end of this thing, I promise.

In 1994, I was dating a girl who worked night shifts; sometimes the midnight to 0800, and sometimes 1600 to midnight. Usually I'd pick her up after work and drive her to her place in Brooklyn or mine in Yonkers. One night, we stopped for takeout at the Raceway Diner on Yonkers Avenue. It was around 1 AM, and we were walking back to my car when we passed a guy standing in the middle of the parking lot taking a piss. We glanced at him long enough to notice what he was up to, then looked away and kept walking. Then the pisser guy called out to me, "Hey, dude, sorry to disrespect your woman like this."

Here was a man with honor and great consideration for his fellow human being. Obviously.

After I let girlfriend K in the car and walked around to the driver's side door, I shouted a friendly reminder to the guy that there was a bathroom right inside the diner, not 50 yards away. I got in the car and before I'd even turned the ignition, pissboy arrived at my car door. Of course you know what he said.

"What the fuck did you just say?! Are you a fucking wiseass?!" I noticed that a girl he was with had stepped out of his Camaro and was telling him to come back and get in the car. He stayed where he was, right outside my car door.

What did I do? I got out of the car. Stupid, right? You have no idea.

Did I at least open the door real fast and hard, and knock him on his ass like they do in the movies? No. I stood up and immediately took two steps at him. I made a mental note that he flinched and moved back. I saw this as a good sign. I was exhibiting what some call "command presence," and maybe I could get out of this without a punch thrown.

He repeated his first question, so I reiterated: "I said there's a bathroom right inside. Hot and cold running water. A toilet that flushes. Everything you'd want." I was sizing him up, and I saw he was doing the same. I tried to watch his eyes while keeping his hands in my peripheral vision.

And then his friend (what?!) appears from nowhere. He's on my left side and wants to know what's going on. I never got a good look at this friend, because the very nanosecond I moved eyes left to look at him, pissboy clocked me in the center of my face. Nose shattered. At first, everything got really bright and then things went dark. My knees went out from under me and I tried to recover my eyesight, which was coated with warm blood.

I couldn't see a thing, I was down on the cement, trying to get up, and taking kicks to the head, face, and chest. I was completely at their mercy, and they didn't have any. One of them jumped on my chest and started hammering me in the face. I didn't feel anything anymore, couldn't tell up from down. I heard a girl yell, but it wasn't K. It was probably Miss Piss from the Camaro. Then I heard footsteps running toward us and hoped it was someone who could get these guys off me fast, because they didn't seem ready to quit.

The footsteps got closer and, without a single word spoken, the force and frequency of kicks and punches increased. Fresh troops had joined the fight against the poor, bleeding fuck on the parking lot cement. It got ridiculous. I was rolling from one foot to another like a soccer ball. I bounced off of parked cars, setting off all their alarms, and back into the hands and feet of the mob. I could only try to shield my face and groin.

But hold on.

I am going to share something with you now that I wish I didn't have to write. Not because it's painful or embarrassing, but rather stupid. When you read this, you will think, "Oh, come on; you had me believing the story until that part!" Trust me. This next part happened. As stupid as it sounds. As pathetically reminiscent of bad 1960s action films as it seems, it happened in real life. Mine.

One of the attackers said, "Let's finish him."

I know, I know. But remember what I said above. It happened. This was Yonkers, after all, and Rambo theatrics like that were the coin of the realm.

I don't really dwell on how close (or not) I came to being "finished." I just never wanted to go there. I just let it sit in a little place in my brain where I can pretend that a-holes like those guys weren't going to finish shit. It's better to leave it there.

Finally they went away. K came to peel me off of the ground. I was at least 50 feet from the spot where that first sucker punch dropped me. (Hey, you know what? I shouldn't weasel out like that. It wasn't a sucker punch, per se. No, I was not looking at the guy when it was thrown, but I did have some sense that a fight could happen; so I'll redact that description.) Annnywaaay, when I could finally wipe the blood out of my eyes, I could see that I was way away from where the thing started. I could also see all the diners at the window booths watching my tragedy unfold. I'm sure they saw it all. They might have heard all the yelling, but six or seven car alarms shrieking at once surely got their attention. To them, it was dinner theater. Thanks for the assistance, homies.

I remember K helping me into my car. She was trembling. Then and now, I think of how terrifying that must have been for her. I would rather take the pummeling every time rather than be the girlfriend in the car watching it all. God damn. I asked her what happened, how many guys was that? She told me there was the original two, then another of their friends came out from the back seat of the Camaro. And then four guys ran over from across the street, near the racetrack. They said, "Get him!" and joined in on the winning side of the battle. (Thanks for the assistance, homies.) Seven guys.

We went to the Lawrence Hospital ER, and hey -- they took me right away. Thinking back now, I wonder why I wasn't questioned by a cop. Maybe I was, and just can't remember. It just seems some sort of report should have been filled out or something. They would never catch the dudes, of course, but I would at least be able to read the account of it in the Police Blotter section of the Herald Statesman newspaper. That'd be a gas.

Good people in that hospital. They took great care of me. Cleaned me up, gave me pills, ice packs, heating pads, and a dark room to sleep in until the maxillary orthopedist arrived to fix my nose. I slept soundly.

Around 0900, the bone doctor walked in with my X-Rays and gave me a poke and pinch examination. He said, "Wow... someone was really trying to hurt you." (Oh? You think?) "Your nose is broken... up... and cracked back," he said, demonstrating both of these directions with the palm of his hand.

In the days of recuperation that followed, I felt less pain and more stupid. What did I do? I stepped up to a guy over nothing and got myself smeared all over a diner parking lot while my girlfriend cried, my face got broken, and my takeout got cold. Stupid. And not just because I got the snot beat out of me. On the flipside, if I'd have thrown that guy a beating instead, what would that have been for? Because he was pissing? Because he threatened me? Because he was an asshole? Jack Henry Abbott said, in short: "You are what you kill." If you waste the asshole, you're nothing but an asshole yourself.

I was a loser whichever way the blood flowed. I was a loser the instant I got out of my car. As I lay there in bed, waiting for cuts to close, bruises to fade, nasal bones to re-fuse, hospital bills to arrive, and my self-respect to return, I obsessed over my getting out of that car. A scene in one of my all-time favorite movies kept resonating in my mind.

In Apocalypse Now, Captain Willard has just listened to E2C "Chef" Hicks rant about the dangers of leaving the "safety" of their patrol boat, and he seconds the notion in a classic internal monologue: "Never get out of the boat. Absolutely goddamn right."

Today's Friday 10 loves the smell of napalm in the morning.

01 Speedy Marie - Frank Black: This is off the Teenager of the Year album, and if you don't have it, you are missing out on an amazing batch of music. It gets me every time -- how a near-perfect record like this one can be so largely unknown. This is Frank freakin' Black for god's sake! He can do no wrong and you know it. He goes in the studio and hammers everything out live with a live mix.

02 Smash It Up (Parts 1 & 2) - The Damned: There aren't many songs I listen to more than Smash It Up. In fact, if you look at my iScrobbler tracks chart, there are NO songs I've listened to more in the last two years. I've been playing this album, Machine Gun Etiquette, since I was in high school with Teddy Roosevelt. It's their third album, and marks the point where Captain Sensible took over lead guitar (after Brian James bailed) and handled a lot more of the songwriting. With MGE, the Damned made a shift in style from a dangerous-sounding, almost Stooges-like band to one that was more rowdy, kick-out-the-jams rock n' roll. This is raucous material, and this album was a big part of my teenage Friday nights.

03 The Perfect Me - Deerhoof: One of the best musical discoveries I made this year was Deerhoof's Friend Opportunity album, which this is song came off of. I have that one, and The Runners Four (from 2005) and there's not a bad track on either. Their work is hard to define and won't fit neatly into any typical genres, it's simply a treat to listen to what they do. Find them here.

04 Slow Motion - Blondie: From one of my two favorite Blondie records, Eat to the Beat. It was released in October 1979, right at the height of my pre-pubescent crush on Debbie Harry. She does things with her voice on this album that made me horny before I even knew that feeling had a name. The CDR copy I have is burned off my vinyl, like a lot my old stuff is. It's probably time to get one of the remasters on CD.

05 You're Not Blank - The Dils: The Dils were Chip and Tony Kinman from Carlsbad, CA. They released just three singles from 1977-79, and that was it. The brothers went on to form Rank and File. I like these Dils singles. I don't have the original vinyl releases, but between the Dangerhouse Records comps (1, 2) and assorted post-breakup releases I have a good handful of their output. Good left wing punk rock from SoCal.

06 The Way You Walk - Papas Fritas: Thoughtful pop music written under mostly sunny skies. I need that sometimes, and Papas Fritas is the band I turn to. The first I'd heard of them was somewhere online, when I read that Dean Wareham was a fan. So I checked into Buildings and Grounds, and was hooked. Hooked by the hooks. That one came out seven years ago. There's been nothing since, but they aren't broken up. Here's the PF website.

07 No Money - The Evens: Just the other night, I had a dream where I was allowed to be a sort of "guest DJ" in a reading lounge-type place in my apartment building. The first record cued up was a 45 by The Evens. "No Money" is on their sophomore release, last year's Get Evens. (Wow, I think I just channeled a music critic with that last sentence! <shudder>) I like them both, but I connected with The Evens a lot when it came out in 2005, and it remains my favorite. You know the backstory by now, I'm sure. The combined résumés of the two members of this band, Ian MacKaye and Amy Farina, include Minor Threat, Teen Idles, Fugazi, Embrace, Pailhead, Egg Hunt, Skewbald, The Warmers, Lois, and The All Scars. A lot of punk and indie rock history from two people.
Dept. of Sidebars: I don't know if the band name has anything to do with the people of the Russian Far East.

08 Hip Priest - The Fall: From one of the best records any music fan can own, The Fall's 1982 Hex Induction Hour. It contains some of Mark E. Smith's best, most vicious lyrics, and the band really cuts loose. The record's been all spiffed up with a remaster recently and a second disk of bonus tracks including some Peel stuff, single mixes, and live versions. If you don't order it with Amazon's 1-Click, you're taking too much time. Hurry up and get one!

09 Bloody Jack - Serge Gainsbourg: From the Initials B.B disk, a collection of duets Gainsbourg recorded with his then-girlfriend Brigitte Bardot. She's the B.B. A couple weeks ago, with a lot of other things to do, I was ambushed by my A.D.D. and found myself typing "infamous" into the YouTube search box. One of the cool things I found was this 1986 clip of Serge Gainsbourg on live French TV with Whitney Houston.

"No. I said I want to fuck her."

10 Blue Spark - X: Great song from the great ones. That riff just blows by like a freight train. I have my Selachimorpha-obsessed three-year-old son convinced that the lyric is actually, "Blu-u-u-e sha-arrrk... shark!" So now we listen to it together all the time. It is from, of course, the got-to-have-it-in-your-collection, Under The Big Black Sun.

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I give and I give and I give to you people... Now give back: Put your mp3 player or digital jukebox on "shuffle all songs" and let us know (in the comments section) the first ten random songs out the chute.

[posted with ecto]

These Three Things

Thing 1:
I was at the supermarket today to buy diapers for the one son who still uses them, and I was a little surprised to see that diapers and "pull-ups" not only share an aisle with, but are indeed on display right next to, tampons and pads. This disturbed me. Is such placement offensive to women, or am I just being an overly sensitive wuss? (Again.)

Thing 2:
I have always believed that if MEN were the ones who shed a bloody lining for five days a month, things would be plenty different. For starters, tampons, pads, or whatever anatomically suitable products necessary to stanch our flow would not be sold in stores. Nope. They would be delivered right to our homes in government-issued packages, on time and free of charge. The fed would have an entire bureau set up in the Executive branch tasked with administering to the menstrual needs of male Americans. And there's no doubt in my mind this would be the most efficient department in all of government. Our leaders would put the men in menses, for sure.

Thing 3:
This is all I came to do. I wanted to mention that a Friday 10 is highly likely to occur this week. So, please -- strap on your iPods a couple days from now, then double back to The Sticking Point to share your results.

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On iTunes right now: Lovers Of Today from the album Pretenders by Pretenders, The

[posted with ecto]

Metropolitan Vitriol

The New York Times has a weekly section that you all know, called Metropolitan Diary. And what a pile of horseshit it is! It's a collection of short, supposedly reader-submitted, slices of life in New York City, but I don't really know on what astral plane these fucktard contributors are living. It seems the whole point of this stupid column is to bring a New York City brand of Leave It To Beaver-ism home to the shut-in segment of the Times readership. It describes a city I don't know, teeming with people I'd never want to meet. And each "contribution" begins DEAR DIARY.... How quaint.

The typical entry is something like this -- "DEAR DIARY: I was getting out of a cab on Park Avenue the other day, when a father approached with his son, about 6. As I stepped out of the taxi, the father held the door open for his son, saying, 'Let's see if this lady left some hard candy on the back seat, Trevor.'"

Or, believe it or not, something even more trite, like "DEAR DIARY: A new, hand-printed sign in the window of my corner bakery reads: 'You can have our cake...and eat it!'"

Har har. I think this shit is written by monkeys, for purple-haired ladies with white gloves, liver spots, and bed sores.

But, this morning something happened to me, and now I've got my own contribution to the Metropolitan Diary. And I think if they published it, it would mark a smart, new direction for that column. A direction that more of us New Yorkers can get our over-stressed, over-caffeinated brains around.

DEAR DIARY: This morning, during my habitual visit to the Pax on 57th and Broadway, I noticed an angry man at the front of the line. He was holding a cup of tea at brow-level and yelling at the kind people behind the counter. He looked like Lou Reed, but with more gray hairs. As I removed my earphones (the EM3 by Future Sonics*), I heard angry Lou Reed guy telling the young lady at the register, "I'm going to kill you." His accent sounded Middle Eastern, maybe Lebanese or Syrian. He was complaining, at high volume, about the quality of his just-purchased cup of tea. The counter help, two men and the woman he threatened to kill, were being very nice, smiling, speaking calmly, but not giving in to whatever angry, violent Lebanese Lou Reed's demands were. One of them began a sentence with, "Every day, you come in here and..." so I now knew the fellow was a regular. Just like me, Diary! By the time I got to the front of the line, he was still yelling. When I heard him say, "I'm going to kill you" to the woman a third time, a few things dawned on me: I had been in a foul mood already, I had not been feeling very good about myself lately (maybe bad biorhythms or something) and I had had just about enough of this guy, his voice, and his threats to the nice woman who sells me coffee every day.

"If I hear you threaten this woman one more time, I am going to break you in half," I said. He seemed, for a moment, shocked that he didn't have allies on the customer-side of the counter.

He said, "You go outside with me, right now, and make this finish?" Which is a pretty nice return volley, I'll admit, even if the English was not of much correctness. But he was taking me on; literally calling me out. I sized him up and figured him for all bark, no balls. (Do not try this at home. I shouldn't have. Because you don't want to get it wrong, which I've done a few too many times for my insurance provider's liking.)

I told him, "I'm going out there anyway. You're welcome to wait for me." He left. I got my coffee and told the register woman to have a great weekend, to which she reacted like that was the most welcome piece of happiness in her entire morning. Then I walked out. Thankfully, I didn't find my man, or anyone who looked like angry former members of the Velvet Underground, waiting for me.

I know this is anti-climactic, my dearest Metropolitan Diary, but life in gotham can be that way sometimes. Don't eat the hard candy on the taxi seat.

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Yesterday my wife logged on to IM, sent me the message "I just got peed on" and -- before I got the chance to type "me too!" -- logged off.

I don't know what that has to do with anything, apart from it being another great MetDiary entry, but I thought it would be a nice segue into the writeup for the first song that poured out of today's Friday 10.

01 Standing in the Rain - Hüsker Dü: It must have been a weird time in the studio, recording the album this song comes from, Warehouse: Songs and Stories. Major label pressures, plus Bob Mould going in one direction while Grant Hart was heading in the other. Warehouse never really felt right to me. Can't put my finger on why, but it just didn't seem to work its way into my psyche the way most of their other records did. It got solid reviews when it came out, but I can remember listening to it once and putting it aside.
Who Do I Have to Fuck, Dept.: When is Hüsker Dü going to get the full-on, box-set/outtakes/alts treatment?! They are inarguably one of the ten most important American bands of the last 25 years.

02 Can't Hardly Wait - Replacements: Hey, look at that! The two all-time best Minneapolis-area bands, back-to-back and belly-to-belly on today's Friday 10!** The version of this song that came up today is the so-called "Tim Version," from Nothing For All, not the album track from Pleased To Meet Me that we all know well. It's hard to imagine this track on the earlier album, but who knows; this one is so obviously unfinished. The lyrics are different in the first and third verses, but the "Jesus rides beside me" part has the same lyrics. (It's better here, I like the way Westerberg pitches the words out.) When you A/B the two versions of the track, you hear how Jim Dickinson's shiny, echoey production differs from Tommy Ramone's heavily compressed mix. (Though TR obviously hadn't yet set Mars and TStinson to click track on the Tim version.)

03 Disco 2000 - Pulp: I am a huge fan of the Different Class album. The songwriting and arrangements really came together on there. What a cool record! When it came out, I was working in London, and I would hear it all the time. The gym I'd go to off Camden High Street (really just a 20X20 room with some free weights, a bench, and a treadmill) had two cassettes that you can pick from to put in the player: Different Class, and a mind-numbing comp of songs from the "pop charts." I chose the tape with 100% less Boyzone.
When we were still just a-courtin', my wife and I would exchange mixed tapes. I don't have to tell you what that's all about it, because you've all made those tapes for the guy or girl or whatever it was that you were trying to kiss or date or bed or whatever it is you wanted to do with him, her, or it. But anyway, on one of her great tapes, she included this album's "Bar Italia," and on another, she put "Pencil Skirt." That woman, she knows her stuff.

04 She's So Cold - Rolling Stones: Emotional Rescue deserves another look. When it came out, everyone dismissed it as a pale imitation of the great Some Girls album. Probably because track one on both records featured 4/4 dance rhythms. There are hardly ANY similarities between the two albums, and ER stands up just fine. I just wish my iPod could have shot out one of the eight or nine better songs  from it. "Send It To Me"? "Where The Boys Go"? "All About You"? All great. Whenever I hear Stones songs from this period, I remember Kerry F, who was my girlfriend from '78 to '81. This girl was insanely, unhealthily jealous of my natural teenage lust for Blondie's Debbie Harry. Kerry would hide my Blondie records, and with an eraser she'd rub Debbie's face out of all my rock magazines. She even tore up my favorite photo: this one of DH wearing a tight red-and-black striped sweater and a pair of Ray-Bans. She was leaning slightly forward in the shot, and the pose and the wardrobe appealed to me in ways I couldn't fully understand then and can't explain now. It was sublime. It got all shredded up after hockey practice or something. Of course, the more Kerry would behave like this, the more stuff I'd collect and the more I would fawn over the singer -- just to show Kerry that she could NOT keep me from my Debbo. It would get under her skin something fierce. I know this sounds juvenile, but we were 12, 13 years old. Anyway, by 1979 while I was still the self-proclaimed Biggest Stones Fan in the World, Kerry found a new way to get back at me. She started lusting for Mick Jagger. She went all out, too: kissing photos, writing his name on her notebooks, all that stupid shit girls do because they're 12. It was pretty transparent, though. She hardly listened to the music! I knew she was into Jagger only to spite me; that she was trying to take MY rock hero away.

05 High School Confidential - Jerry Lee Lewis: The Killer! JLL is hammering the keys on this track, one of my favorites of his. From Orby Records Spotlights Jerry Lee Lewis Sun Masters.

06 Death Is Not The End - Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds: From the great Murder Ballads, a CD I love to recommend, but it's just not for everybody. Some harsh stuff on there ("Stagger Lee," "O'Malley's Bar"), though the songs are all amazing, every last one of them. Listening to Murder Ballads is like walking through carnage. But in a good way. This song's a Dylan cover, done very well, with guest vocals from Shane MacGowan.
Also: Cave's Abbatoir Blues / Lyre of Orpheus double DVD comes out next month.
Here's a good one: It's been 10 years since he wrote that letter to MTV.

07 Burstedman - Mike Watt and the Secondmen: The man of the song title is Watt himself. The bursting was an infected perineal abscess. The Secondman's Middle Stand is a sort of Inferno-esque concept album about his illness and recovery. It's some good stuff, recorded with an all-San Pedro band (on B-3, drums, and bass).
Wikipedia has a comprehensive page on Watt, with plenty of stuff I never knew.
You can check out the video for "Burstedman" on director Mike Muscarella's webite. (It offers yet more fuel to the argument that rock stars shouldn't act in videos.)

08 Blue Moon Baby - Dave "Diddle" Day: I can't write with any authority about Dave Day, but I love this track, off the second volume of the Born Bad comps. That series is worth tracking down; a lot of cool raunchabilly stuff, the kinds of songs you'd hear the Cramps do covers of. You can almost always find copies on Gemm.com and eBay.

09 Sad Cinderella - Townes Van Zandt: (from High, Low, and In Between / The Late Great Townes Van Zandt.) I have to think Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy have spent some time listening to this guy.

10 Sea Cruise - Frankie Ford: This is one of those songs I can remember my dad singing along to, coming out of the radio of our family's 1964 Chevy Nova. I like this one. For some reason, the chorus sticks in my head enough to just start me humming it every now and then, apropos of nothing. The CD I have the song on is called 15 Greatest Hits on Ace Records, which is a really solid comp of some cool songs on that label. Frankie Ford is known as the "New Orleans Dynamo" and he's still at it. He lives in Gretna, Louisiana, these days, but still hits the road for tours. He's even got a suitably "dynamic" website. (Take Dramamine before clicking the link.)

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Now you! Set your mp3 player or digital jukebox to "shuffle all songs." Let us know the first ten songs you hear.
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* Because I think product placement will nudge this column into the realities of 21st century media.

**Are The Trashmen and Babes in Toyland 3 & 4?

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: 'Til the Stars in his Eyes are Dead from the album Buzzkunst by Shelley / Devoto

Link Dump

From SO'C:
Duh.

From Wallie:
Wow. This is awesome.

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Space Tourist from the album Fake French by El Guapo

The Type of Memories That Turn Your Bones to Glass

"Daddy, what did people do before weblogs," my older son asked me the other day.

No he didn't. He is 27 months old, and speaks in much shorter sentences, Hemingway-like in their directness. ("Mommy go?" "Roast beef?" "Gun show!") And, he's not even my "older" son quite yet. As I write this, he's still an only child, blissfully ignorant of how close to a change in that status he is.

But he did raise a valid question about life in the pre-Weblogian era. Remember when diaries were for girls, "journals" were just diaries for boys, and one's innermost thoughts were held most inner? Remember when you had to be arrested for a multi-state killing spree before your aggro-psychotic screeds would be published for the masses? (Sure, they'd be accompanied by a bad hair day photo and the headline THE LUNATIC'S RANTINGS, but still.) I don't have to go into the thousands of ways the Internet and weblogs have changed the way we share boring or private information, but I will contribute to the sharing of it.

I recently opened a file folder packed with some of my moldiest of oldies, and found a ready-to-be-discarded pile of some random writings. Back when I wrote this stuff, I immediately recognized it as subpar, pointless, or silly. Reading it today, I see weblog posts. Go figure.

Here's a sample. I guess it's from around 1993, when I was already old enough to know better and be smarter. Though I'm tempted to re-write 95% of this before I post it, here it is, as I originally typed it up more than 13 years ago.

The Crotch Outlaw Rides Again
I've got a western outlaw in my shorts. It's not my sexual organ ("he" is the reincarnation of Kubla Khan -- but that's another tale altogether, bub). I've got a western outlaw living in my Loomies. Recently, he made me switch from jockeys to boxers as he desired more living space. His name's Ornery Clive, and he's got a long, shaggy gray beard, beady eyes of cold blue, and an itchy trigger finger. Clive's exactly four inches tall and wears a dirty red Henley, ripped brown trousers, pointy black boots, and a pair of six-guns on his hips. Clive stopped wearing a ten-gallon hat, as I bitterly complained of chafing.

I'm not sure why Ornery Clive took up residence in my pubic frontier, or exactly how. All I know is that one day I woke up and saw a large lump in my shorts. I figured it was early-morning timber, but then I heard a belch coming from my cottonies; the last time I checked, my penis didn't have a digestive tract. I quickly accepted Ornery Clive as my partner in life. I now value Clive's "down-home" advice and common sense -- sometimes the western outlaw is all that gets me through the day. "Now, Tom, I wouldn't be doin' that so soon after eatin' -- you'll get cramps," Clive cautioned me when I wanted to dive into the hot tub one day. "Tom, vote for him -- he's got a sound environmental policy," Clive would counsel in the polling booth. As you can see, Ornery Clive has proven useful -- and fun, to boot!

"Tom, ask the barkeep to make ya a Prairie Punch. Here's what it's got in it..." Then I'd tell the bartender what ingredients to put in the drink, and soon, everyone in the establishment would order one and I'd be a tavern hero. One day, Clive used his "frontier sense" to save me from stellar embarrassment: "Tom, she's a he! Get out now!!"

Don't start thinking that this was a one-way relationship; I taught Clive bundles about modern life. I taught his how to floss, what color pocketsquare to wear with certain neckties, the perils of using too much seltzer in an egg cream, when to downshift, and how to read and write. Presently, I'm schooling Clive in advanced hydro-thermal dynamics and the proper preparation of ceviche.

Women react to Ornery Clive in all sorts of ways: some run away in fear, some are more interested in him than me, and some want Clive to "watch" us. Actually, I like it when Clive watches -- he's a perverted little devil and gets such a kick out of it!

I think Clive and I will get on famously for many years to come. I plan to make my fortune in gold mining with Clive's help. We've all sorts of plans: the gold mine, the western fast-food places, the western-wear shops, the travel books, and much more. Yet, there's someone who might get in the way of our placidity. See, Clive just informed me that he discovered a miniature Sal Mineo in his drawers! I ask, What can Sal Mineo teach Clive and me? We shall see. We shall see.

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[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Freight Train from the album O.F.R. by Nitro

Our Third Pet Can Go F*ck Himself

Today, while doing what I do every Saturday afternoon -- Google searching for nude photos of Jeanne Zelasko -- I found something even more sickly seductive. The "personal web page" of her husband, sports anchor Curt Sandoval. It is simple and it's cheesy, in a "look at me, publishing on the InterWeb" / Koolgrrrl's Guide To Life!!! sort of way.

My favorite line: "Two of our three pets fit the sports theme."

Also? C-Sand is the kind of guy who writes "would of." As in, "...they would of gone broke..."

Really? Would they of?

Awesome.

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Catch Me Now I'm Falling (Original Extended Edit) from the album Low Budget by Kinks, The

Chronicles of Hernia?

I’m bummed. Bummed. Not only had I been making great progress at the gym for these last three weeks; not only have I been looking forward to each workout more than the previous one... but now I'm set back.

At the very end of last Friday’s workout, on my very last rep of my last exercise (triceps pulldowns), I felt something strain or tug in my lower abdomen. I could feel it down to my "business." (In particular, my right piece of business.) I skipped crunches, skipped stretching, and just walked right out of the gym.

The next day, I felt the same soreness on-and-off, but Sunday, I woke up and it was full on. I immediately began thinking it’s a hernia and of course went right to the internet to find out what could be wrong. I found no definitive or reliable diagnosis out there, but traded Sunday's workout for a hot bath and a handful of Tylenol. It’s one of the methods of treatment for abdominal/"business" pain that I found online.

I wanted to shoot for a workout today, but it's a no-go. I'll just have to cool my heels until at least Friday, which is the smart thing to do, but pisses me off nonetheless. (As does using the word "nonetheless.") For now, I'm having some dull pain, or rather – extreme discomfort. I'm walking around gingerly, like Little Old Man Himself; with my fingers pressed firmly into my abdomen for support.

.

Far less icky (hopefully) than all that info above: I'm looking into turning the Friday 10 into a semi-regular podcast. I'd share all the music, but to pay for that privilege you'd have to listen to me ranting and raving about all of it between songs. Sound like a deal?

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Druggachusetts from the album Sea To Shining Sea by Love As Laughter

Boulevard of Broken Bones

The cops here in Forest Hills have no balls. It’s pissing me off. At every intersection, about twice a minute, I see cars speeding past red lights, well after they’ve turned to red. Like, five-Mississippi red. This neighborhood is sick with moving violations. Today, walking home from the gym, I was nearly hit by a car turning a corner. I silently cursed myself for not watching what I was doing, but wondered how I could have missed seeing that car sooner. Here’s how: it was going the wrong way down a one-way. Must have pulled out of the garage under the apartment building, and the driver didn’t want to waste his precious time making a left and three rights to go around the block. So he sped the wrong way down the street and just swerved around this stupid bastard who didn’t think to look that way before he crossed.

And here’s why I think the cops around here are ball-less pieces of shit: They see it all and they do nothing. Wait. Check that. They actually do take action. They walk and drive their beats along Queens Boulevard, Yellowstone Boulevard, and Austin Street writing out bundles of tickets for parking violations and expired inspection stickers. Fucked priorities, I reckon.

Walking along the street and writing up tickets for parked cars is easy. Fish in a barrel. With no driver around, there’s no one to question you, no one to raise any contention. But pulling over a driver who’s past a red light at 65 m.p.h. in a 40, pulls out a one-way street, or throws it in reverse to race down an entire block to grab that parking space… that takes nerve. The cop would have to come face to face with a living being. There might be confrontation. There might even be an argument. Hell, the driver might even have a criminal record!

What a fucking insult to the community this is. I’ve read the newspapers and seen the stories on the news; I know the neighborhood where I live has a weird confluence dangerous roads. (Go Google “Queens Boulevard of Death.” Go ahead. I’ll wait.) I know that before I move away I will see some people die on these streets. And I know they won’t be killed by parked cars.

The next time I see a cop ticketing empty cars while tires screech around him or her, I have to say something.

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Say Mama from the album Rebel Heart by Vincent, Gene

Harvard Author Faces More Plagiarism Charges

Has anyone coined the term "Frankenbook," or am I first? How about "Plagiariffic"?

Related stories here.

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Zebulon (L) from the album Warfield Theater San Francisco, 1998-12-09 by Einstürzende Neubauten

Smile, You're Traveling!

1100 Hrs. LaGuardia Airport
I am enroute to Houston via a connection in Chicago. But it rained a bit this morning with some lightning, so they closed down airport fields and now all the flights before mine are backed up. They have pushed mine back by 45 minutes, but there’s a lot of metal to get in the air before they move flight 325 out of here. (Or, as I overheard some too-cool-for-the-boardroom guy tell his friend, “Flight three and a quarter.”) This puts my connection in Chicago in jeopardy. Why should I care so much? This is someone else’s dime, someone else’s time. I just don’t want to spend all day in these malls of human confusion.

Where I’m sitting – in a gate area that is not mine – I am surrounded by a gaggle of semi-good looking human forms (church group? hand models?), in a rush to get to where they’re getting. The melodramatic small-talk and posturing is worth a chuckle.

This mission to Texas makes me feel like the character in Reservoir Dogs to whom Travolta and Jackson go to fix things. I can’t remember the actor’s name, but I think they called the guy “The Wolf.” I am being brought down to fix things, prevent problems, and get this event up and running. I've got so much experience at this by now I can do shows like this with my eyes closed and one ball tied behind my leg.

This fucking plane had better not crash. Due to a glitch in communications that still hasn’t been explained to me, my ticket was inadvertently canceled Saturday night. The über-boss on this project, Nina, had to go online at 2200 hrs last night and get me a new round-trip ticket. At a cost $250 higher than my original booking. So, I spent about 24 hours (unknowingly) un-booked. I was NOT ON THIS flight for awhile. It had better not crash now. I don’t want anyone to have to deal with that set of “what ifs.”

1409 Hrs ORD – Chicago
I’m in O’Hare now. Just as I thought, we landed about 25 minutes after my connection to Houston took off. Now, I’m booked on another flight, that won’t take off for another three hours.

While I was wandering around this sun-bright terminal a short time ago, trying to figure out where I was and where I needed to be, I stopped in front of a bank of arrival/departure monitors. Eleven of them had the proper information on their screens, and one was showing Jeopardy. I tried to snap a picture with my phone-camera, but it came out blurry, so you’ll just have to trust me.

I have already eaten. For some reason, I walked right past Wolfgang Puck’s Airport Café (a safe bet for safe food) and about another hundred yards later wandered into some Fox Sports theme restaurant. Hear it again: A Fox... Sports... theme restaurant. There were about nine food items on the menu, and each of them will come to your your arteries' house, pull them out into the street, and choke 'em till they're good and dead. Sports grill food in Chicago is a redundancy.

The menu was well-appointed with caricatures of Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, and the other wife-beating, child-hating dunces from that football programming. I sat at a table near the "Bears Helmet/Black Hawks Hockey Stick" display. There was one of each. If you’re thinking of coming to Chicago, you really should plan on seeing it. It’s amazing. And so unlike any other hockey stick or Bears helmet you’ll ever see.

I ate a bacon-cheddar burger and listened to the wonderful disco/rave music on the in-restaurant sound-system. At one point, a disco/rave version of “Livin’ On A Prayer” came on. For reals, yo.

Harvey Keitel. That’s who I meant before. Harvey Keitel was the actor in Reservoir Dogs. And you know what? I just realized – it wasn’t Reservoir Dogs that I meant. It was Pulp Fiction.

1913 Hrs en route to Houston
Here we are, up in the air, crossing the heartland at 33,000 feet. My rowmate invading my armspace and footspace.

I’m thinking a lot about today being the anniversary of our first miscarriage. First pregnancy, nearly three months in, and it ended just like that. On 4-24-01 S had seen the signs that something might be wrong and we went to the OB/GYN.

S was on the table and the doctor began the sonogram. I was in my usual seat in front of the screen. Because it was my usual seat, I knew immediately that what I was seeing was wrong. I’d been used to locating the blinking LED blip that was our baby’s heartbeat. On that day, it wasn’t there. The doctor didn’t say anything right away. But I knew.

Right there in the middle of my life came 10 seconds where my time stopped.

The world stopped moving. Everything froze. I’m sure I wasn’t even breathing myself. I knew the horrible truth, S didn’t, and everything in the world stopped as ten seconds took an hour. I looked in her eyes and I wanted her never to find out. I didn’t want her to ever feel what I was feeling.

I don’t remember exactly how the doctor told us, just that she began with, “OK.” She spoke briefly, and said to meet her in her office after we’d had some time to be alone and S got dressed.

The next day, 4-25-01, we had to go back for a D&C. Brutal. When I was finally let into the exam/procedure room, I found S resting on the table in a paper robe. On one side of the room was a garbage bin overflowing with bloody towels, discarded paper, and used disposable instruments. My wife has never looked more young and vulnerable than at that moment. I lost my shit. I don’t know which of the 75 or so painful thoughts I was processing did it to me, but I kneeled down and cried with my head gently resting on her chest.

I’ve never gotten over the pain of that day and the suffering of the weeks and months that followed. I don’t think I ever will, nor do I think I’m supposed to. Pain like that doesn’t let go of you. It holds on. Life goes on and life gets better and good things (even great things) happen, but that kind of thing stays on you. It’s a battle scar.

It’s especially weird to process this now, knowing that if none of that had ever happened we wouldn’t have H. That’s just the way it is. Without that, no this. I am not an “everything happens for a reason” guy, but knowing how H is the one boy in this world who could possibly have fit our family and become our son leaves me at once shattered, healed, confused, and resolved about all the pain that came before.

I don’t know if those are the words I’d choose if I were thinking things more fully through before typing. I’ll get it right later.

Anyway, that’s what I’m thinking about, on old 4-24.

When I get to Houston, around 2130, I’ll take the $50 taxi ride to the hotel, and have just enough time to check in, get to my room, and throw my bag down before heading to one of the conference rooms for a 2230 meeting. I was told they’d order me some food when I get there, so cheers to that. I could kick myself in the ass for not getting out to GNC yesterday or Saturday for my MET-RX bars. That shit I ate at the FOX Sports place has left me feeling hungry again, yet with a greasy ball of something sitting in my stomach. Coffee please! I have been traveling for eleven-and-a-half hours already, the day is almost over and I haven’t started working yet.

And this time, when I get to the hotel, I’ll remember to get out the Sharpie and write my room number on my hand. No more wandering the hallways of huge hotels, cursing my A.D.D. and crappy memory! This dunce has learned.

[posted with ecto]

On iTunes right now: Someone's Gonna Die from the album Burning Ambitions (A History of Punk) by Blitz