gotta wear shades

graduation ceremonies are just grueling. the air horns, my god the air horns. always signifying such a proud day for you and your family. i liken it to fat, cowboy boot-wearing, bolo tie-wearing, ten-gallon hat oil tycoons shooting revolvers into the air because they struck black gold (yelling yaaaaa-hooo!). the principal of my cousin's school gave an address in which she compared the graduates all to spinning tops ("you all are tops in my book" was in there a few times). it was so embarrassing. she even gave out little toy tops to everyone. i just sat in my very uncomfortable seat getting more and more embittered with every cliche i heard the various speakers utter at the podium.

the whole thing got me a bit nostalgically depressed, remembering those days of relative optimism when you thought a college degree would ensure success and everything was going to be shiny. and maybe i'm remembering high school as much better than it was. not necessarily high school itself, but the outlook after graduation. i was jealous, i think.


the picture is a little blurry, but so was i

i had a dream last night that i was doing an impression of marlon brando doing an impression of barbara streisand for a bunch of kids. they ate it up. i was really good in my dream, but i just tried to do it and wasn't quite as good.

i rented kill bill vol. 1 this weekend and i think i really like japanese surf music. it might be my experiment of the week.

album du jour: shonen knife let's knife

rock the what?

my mom's visiting this weekend for my cousin's graduation (high school). my parents always bring me dvd's when they come. i recommend things i know tney won't like that i know i would, and they just buy them instead of renting. i like dvd's.

also i got a european-issue double-cd greatest-hits-and-b-sides of curve in the mail yesterday. for some reason i can't bring myself to take the shrink-wrap off of it. i have no idea why. something about the phrase "limited edition" makes me nervous i think.

in my last post i mentioned the jerry springer show, and oddly enough i heard him interviewed on air america yesterday. he's actually very eloquent and has some pretty cogent ideas, one of which was making voting mandatory for all u.s. citizens. and really it's not as bad an idea as you might think, or as i thought initially. since most people who vote are the upper-middle class and corporate lackies and shills, the policy-makers end up only catering to those voting constituents. this is also why you see politicians coddling the elderly during election times - old people have nothing else to do but vote and complain about health care. if everyone had to vote then the politicos would have no choice but to actually act on behalf of people instead of corporations. it's just deplorable that the people who need government-sponsored programs the most are the ones not voting.

album du jour: the apples in stereo velocity in sound

soapy fat man

while flipping through channels i passed a jerry springer episode where this gigantic fat man was naked in a bathtub while five of the show's security guards were washing him down. the title of the show was "bizarre stories". on springer? whaaaaaaa? i would usually never even consider stopping on the show while channel surfing, but a lathered-up fat man in a bathtub was just too car-wreckishly fascinating.

i wonder if today will be one of those days we look back on in fifty years as a significant achievement in gay rights (coincidentally falling on the 50th anniversary of the brown v. board of education decision). i think it's more about human rights and the separation of church and state and equality for all, etc. than anything else. why are vertical improvements in civil rights always historically such a struggle? hasn't "liberty and justice for all" been around since america's inception? it's amazing how we can make advancements in our definition of equality but still continue to discriminate. and not just on the usuals (race, religion, gender, sexual orientation), but more and more on social class. it's all such a huge quagmire of hypocrisy.

and what does it say when u.s. athletes are advised not to wave the american flag too exuberantly at the olympic games? probable bush administration responses:

- people around the world are afraid of freedom.
- subterfuge? that's not a word.
- isn't it great that we live in a country where we can debate civic pride? damn!
- if we are boastful the terrorists win.
- we're sending the secretary of defense to athens.
- hey look at the kitty! look over there!


album du jour: the alpha conspiracy aura

simple life

my favorite people in the world, nicole richie and paris hilton, are on the cover of entertainment weekly. i just look at their faces and there's that old feeling of wanting to eat my own hand. however it does make good fodder for bathroom reading - very pavlovian. i try not to read my ew until my weekly shrink appointments on wednesdays because the reading material in his office really sucks. and like clockwork he always makes me wait at least ten minutes before seeing me. good thing i don't have abandonment issues.

sidenote: i subscribe to entertainment weekly because i'm trying to cut down on my television viewing but i still like to keep up with things. savvy?

i sleep at odd hours, today it was from three to ten p.m. (hereafter i will refer to my latest period of slumber as "last night", just rmember that it doesn't necessarily mean i slept during the night). i had a dream that my younger brother and i were astronauts and we flew to the moon on apollo 13, and wouldn't you know it the darn thing broke. we did make it back to earth though, and we visited kevin bacon who just bought a new condo and had started his own trucking business. we were hauling a load down i-10 in his brand new tractor-trailor, when he got out of the truck and made his way to the back to fix a rattling noise. while the whole thing was flying down the interstate at high speeds, he fell off and was run over several times. i woke up thinking, "wow, every time i go down i-10 i'm going to have to pass the spot where we killed kevin bacon". what do you mean i gotta fight city hall?

album du jour: black box recorder passionola

too multi media

i really can't be listening to talk radio anymore. if it's humanly possible i've gotten more skeptical of absolutely everything. i either want to throw my television away or lie in front of it and pull it down on my head, which, if you think about it, is kind of a metaphor for just watching it in the first place. the politics and frivolity and intolerance and ignorance are getting to be too much for my little mind. i just need to go to the library and check out some nice judy blume books and get under the covers with a flashlight and mister teddy. back to the womb.

my fleeting fancy of the day is to move to austin because of all the cool concerts that happen there. i would wait tables to pay the rent and become something of a bohemian (like you, yeah i like you, and i feel so bohemian like you, oo oo oooo). maybe be a totally different person and give myself a new name; i like re-inventing, it's the best. who's comin with me? who's comin, man... who's comin...

album du jour: ned's atomic dustbin god fodder

wave of mutilation

my pixies dvd arrived in the mail today so i immersed myself in all things pixies, which really just entailed me watching the dvd. it was very satisfying, although the included documentary called gouge was interspersed with a few live performances from the same concert that was already included on the dvd, so it was a little repetitively redundant. and they had interviews from everyone in the band except kim deal. but still, it's the pixies so how can i complain.

i've been hearing these really funny commercials on the radio for on-star, and in one a woman calls, frantic, because her house is on fire. would on-star really be first on your mind when your house is on fire? does 911 still work? you'd think the fire department would come to mind in such a case. nope, on-star. help from above. we don't need no water let the motherfucker burn.

we may be hearing alot about this incident in the coming days. and honestly, i get much more nauseous when i think of some of these senators' reactions and comments. and rush limbaugh is just a wretched excuse for a human being possessing no redeeming qualities in him whatsoever. judge for yourselves, this is what he said concerning the beheading of nick berg:

"You'll see an effort to get the Nick Berg's family in Philadelphia to go public and say, 'Yes, if it weren't for the Bush administration, our son, whatever, would still be alive.' This is the normal procedure that the left has taken on such matters."

if you read that article (linked above), you'll see that the family did not want their son's execution made public. it was, in fact, the state department that released the story (maybe to lessen criticism brought about by the prisoner abuse photos?).

interesting nugget of the day: for every $3 we spend on the iraqi shimsham mishmash, we spend $1 on homeland security. look it up, i promise.

album du jour: ash meltdown

as in "pull out" of the region, iraq, etc.

an interesting tidbit: yesterday was not only mother's day, but also the anniversary of the fda's approval of the birth control pill (44 years ago or so). what a coinkydink.

this is how lazy i am right now in my life. i have a book at the local library waiting for me, which is about a quarter of a mile away, and i can't make myself walk to get it. not just because i have to go there to pick it up, but because i'd have to eventually go back to return it. also when i'm on my computer doing whatever (surfing, spamming, identity theft, etc.) i avoid having to use my left arm to type with by saving various usernames, passwords, and other copy in a file so that i can just use my mouse to open it, then copy and paste. that has to be very close to rock bottom - i don't want to move my left arm. actually i'm just preparing myself for when i have a stroke. and i know i can just force myself to do things, i just can't exact change right now.

also i've gotten addicted to air america radio, which i guess is good and bad, becaus it keeps me informed but also gets me very flustered and stressed. yesterday i was even listening to re-airings that i had already heard last week. why can't i ever get addicted to normal things, like heroin or pcp.

i could blog and bitch about politics several times a day, but i won't because i know it gets redundant. isn't it nice that i think of my audience (both mom and dad)? one last thing though, i don't think i will ever get tired of hearing paula zahn say "pull out" on a nightly basis.

album du jour: ben kweller on my way

buttercup

today is the government-endorsed national prayer day. thoughts? i'm just going to pray to on-star, because their commercials are just great.

orlando bloom really looks like prince humperdink (the princess bride) in the previews to troy. i know the character paris who he plays is supposed to be sort of a charming, lover-not-a-fighter type, but mostly he just reminds me of an armored-up michael flatley (not that there's anything wrong with that). he's been playing these lead-hero lead-romantic roles but he just doesn't convey that intended manly-man hero mythos, to me anyway. he seems to always have more on-screen sexual chemistry with his male co-stars (depp, vigo) than the fems.

here's my prediction for the friends finale, keeping in mind i haven't watched it in about two years so i have very little knowledge about the current plotline. but i did figure out the basic formula some time ago, so here it goes: ross comes clean with rachel, who at first rejects him but then with about ten minutes left in the episode comes running off a plane or a train or another means of conveyance and professes her reciprocal love (audience does the predictable "wooo-hooo"s and cheering), and blah blah happily ever after. joey eats something with tomato sauce, chandler says "could this be any more predictable?" monica cleans stuff, phoebe (or "pheebs" as i like to call her) does a rain dance, and everything ends happily and safely, leaving the 700 trillion fans of the show feeling good about themselves. and friday morning every water cooler in the world wants to commit suicide to avoid the chatter.

rumsfeld going on tv tomorrow, i'm giddy. i'll be watching it drinking out of a big-gulp-sized jug of my pappy's homemade moonshine with a big fat cigar i made out of parsley, while going deaf from the high level of decibels blaring out of my surround speakers. it's gonna be great!

album du jour: the cranes loved

hail the conquering hero

this is how w's writers come up with his speeches: let's take into account everything that has happened in the past four years under our administration and say that the polar opposite has happened, and we'll come out sounding rosy (the absolute best is when someone from the commerce department tries to explain how exporting jobs to other countries is actually good for the economy. entertainment gold!).

do some fact-checking, i promise i'm not kidding. and please don't watch the news, or at least realize that it is all skewed. we see the story as interpreted by the media, whatever their political alignment (or misalignment) may be. observing the subject always changes it. so read, or watch cspan, because nothing you hear or see on any news network is true. this is not me being cynical, take any news story and google it, or whatever. find out for yourself.

something else that's interesting to do: go on cnn and read any particular global story and then go on al jazeera (or any foreign news network, bbc, etc.) and read their story on the smae thing. i don't mean to imply that either is more accurate than the other, but you can see how at least one is propagandizing the story. who's to say which is right? how can anyone be obtuse enough to believe that we get the straight story 100% of the time because we live in america and foreign news agencies spout lies 100% of the time because they don't?

and how much sense does it make that terrorists hate us because we are free and enjoy a better quality of life. does anyone seriously believe that religious jihads are undertaken because of jealousy? bin laden is (or at least was) wealthier than most of us will ever be. i can't imagine he had a very difficult life. why then all the hatred for america?

the people we went to "liberate" are now being referred to as "insurgents". and another interesting tidbit - one of saddam's former generals (jassim mohammed saleh) has now been made leader of iraqi troops (you have to check out the picture of him in this article and the article itself, it's eerie). but this is perfectly fine, i'm sure he was one of those top-tiered underlings of saddam that had absolutely no idea about the atrocities he committed (or ordered to be committed?), and was completely innocent of any wrong-doing. maybe he's one of those "nice" former iraqi generals with a heart of gold. "i was just following orders" comes to mind.

aside from the fact that saddam hussein was evil and inhumane to his people (and if that's our only rationale how many other countries can we thus "liberate"), i see no redeeming quality whatsoever in invading iraq. there's that whole "region-stablizing" theory that we can't know for sure about for several years, but that seems at best flimsy to me. maybe there's something i'm missing in all this; i honestly and truly hope so. if anyone can offer some semblance of a sensible reason why any of this is going on please let me know, because i'm getting exponentially disheartened in our country as the days go by.

this is why we shouldn't vote for kerry: he threw away two medals he was awarded for his vietnam service 30 years ago and owns an suv. i know these aren't the only arguments, but it's funny how they're the ones you hear being shouted most loudly from the peanut gallery.

sorry about the political tirade, i needed it.

album du jour: french kicks the trial of the century

canada here i come

i am so embarrassed to be an american right now. i don't blame the soldiers; quite the contraray. anyone being kept in that environment for so long with no end in sight and no hope of reprieve from their government would go crazy and do crazy things. it happened in vietnam (oh sorry, we're not supposed to make such comparisons). and we can't know the names and faces of those who gave their lives during the war and the year of post-"mission accomplished" because it would adversely affect public opinion of the war, i mean occupation, i mean "liberation". i don't understand - we can be proud of and recognize the soldiers currently serving there, but if they die we have to forget about them? why is the public so tolerant of such things.

album du jour: eisley marvelous things ep

pig vomit

last night i could not would not fall asleep. i was trying to avoid taking my nightly sleeping pill cocktail to stave off addiction. so up all night doing nothing. i watched american splendor which i thought was surprisingly depressing and hilarious. the actor playing the main character is a guy named paul giamatti, but i'll forever know and refer to him as pig vomit (from the howard stern movie). pig vomit is a good actor. pig vomit could easily play the lead in the life story of jon lovitz.

then i cut the grass at eight because it was supposed to rain late-morning and our yard was getting overgrown. our high-class next-door neighbors throw empty doritos bags in our yard and i like running over them. also ant hills. i always think about that part of honey, i shrunk the kids where the kids are all hanging on to a blade of grass trying not to get sucked up into the mower. i make sure to linger over ant hills, just in case some ants or annoying little shrunken kids are hanging around in there. smug, tiny sons of bitches.

album du jour: blind mr. jones stereo muscale

is donald rumsfeld mentally retarded? seriously.

this is the persuasive essay i wrote for my cousin. i was going to do the anti-teen abstinance topic but the word count thing was messing me up, so i wrote an essay expressing displeasure for length restrictions on writing assignments in school. i hope it sounds like a high school paper. i really don't remember what that is.

also, sorry for submitting what is essentially a bullshit filler entry, but i'm lazy. anyway, colon:

The writing proces is one depdendent on a person's creativity. Whether writing for journalism, school, or a magazine (among many others), the creative process is highly complicated. Difficulties run rampant during any writing process, even when no restrictions exist concerning the length of a work. Therefore, no writing assignment should ever be constrained by size limits, especially in an educational environment.

Often it seems criteria are placed on the maximum lengths of writing assignments in hopes of encouraging conciseness. Should not the length of a paper depend solely on the subject matter though? Setting a maximum number of pages or words only hurts the effectiveness of a body of work and the writer's ability to completely get his or her point across. Such is especially true when the work is of a persuasive nature.

Requiring a minimum word count is just as counterproductive as requiring a maximum one. If the writer is able to clearly and effectively state their position in, for instance, two pages, then forcing out an extra page (for a three-page assignment, in this example) would only encourage rambling. An extra page of drivel does nothing but take away from a case trying to be made.

Some would say that essay length requirements are not entirely detrimantal. Teaching students to focus on being concise with maximums or comprehensive with minimums can be an effective teaching tool, however, emphasizing subjects and making convincing arguments should be the top priority in a writer's education. Limiting the size should be a distant second, but is too often over-emphasized.

The various subjects taught in schools have in each of them layer upon layer of varying elements, and learning the key ones is not easy. Concerning English, and more specifically writing, subjectivity is something that is especially difficult to capture and put on paper. The persuasive essay by nature is difficult enough without having size constraints, which seem to be always over-emphasized.

album du jour: the quails atmosphere

domo arigatos mr. robotos

the inferno was a rerun tonight so i ended up watching the swan on fox. if you haven't heard of or seen it, the premise is that they take two plain-looking women and for three months put them through several plastic surgeries, exercise and diet routines, and counseling (some have mental anguish), all the while not being allowed to look at themselves in a mirror. the big climax comes at the end of their three months when they see themselves for the first time and are delighted or dejected. jimmy crack corn and i don't care about the contest aspect of the show (one of them is chosen at the end to go on to the final bauty contest), but i was thinking about plastic surgery. i've been passively against it for the most part, and i was about to go on a mental tirade to myself (as i tend to do often - remember though i can be preachy now because i'm a narcissist) about the ills of aesthetics and society and all that superficial jazz, but it came to me that if this rigorous identity-rape makes these people feel better about themselves, then what the frig. of course if everyone does it we'll all end up looking alike, and individuality will be stifled, and we'd be screwing over mother nature, and bra sizes will force us to come up with a longer alphabet. and then, after everyone's faces and bodies look alike, we can start mandating uniforms like they do in catholic schools (and a startling amount of public ones), that way no one will stray outside of the box and cause radical thinking/practices. hooray! the outliers will be gone! we get rid of the religious fanatics and mother theresas all at the same time - that would be super. so it would seem life, then, is just one big range of variables that somehow everyone wants to make less extreme. change is scary, we don't like new things, and we're most contented with seeing the same movies and plot lines all the time and the same characters on tv. so i should have been happy to watch my rerun of the inferno.

and since i'm on tv, how influential is its power of suggesstion?. everyone loves raymond? then i should love it too... must see tv? jesus, i really must see it then. american idol? must... worship... talentless... clods...

album du jour: lali puna scary world theory

am i larry clark?

i just finished writing an informative essay for my cousin, who is a senior in high school, and am now about to start another one for him, this one a persuasive essay. i'm wondering aloud about subjects. is teenage abstinance something worthy of arguing against (it's not like they'll keep him from graduating if the teacher has a dissenting opinion)? i just have to make some strong salient points, such as...for the girls, it makes boys like you. and for the rest of your life you'll be able to reminisce with friends about all the sex you had in high school, and that will make you seem cool and popular. also it gives you good experience for college, since you'll probably have to take biology, yes biology, sooner or later. and boning while in high school means that you're taking an interest in something other than drugs that entails exercise and hones your social skills. i see no downside.

although there is the possibility of pregnancy, std's, lawsuits, child support and death, but meh. i mean come on, syphilis? please.

album du jour: the siddeleys slum clearance

suck it polyphonic spree

never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.

-margaret mead

may is going to be a wonderful month. noteable releases: the pixies dvd, ash, robert pollard, juliana hatfield (marry me juliana...i know i'm young but we can make it work dammit!), call and response, mirah, magnetic fields, komeda, the thermals, the mekons, the exploding fuck dolls (don't even know who they are i just liked the name), of montreal, the beta band, gomez, the unicorns, minus the bear, and, to counter all this wonderful stuff, the polyphonic fucking spree. tim delaughter wants to act like jesus (ahem marketing ploy) since his former tripping daisy bandmate od'd, but says their music is not religious. tim let me introduce you to scott stapp. scott, this is tim. yes, the one in the robe.

album du jour: godstar sleeper

getting nowhere quickly

i bought a treadmill today. this way i don't have to meander pitt buls, teenage gangsters, drunk drivers or the weather. my angel food cake already took advantage of its intended use. i've always thought treadmills were funny - alien visitors spying on us would have no idea what we're doing. i'm going to get a hamster and put a wheel in its cage, then put it right by the treadmill. no i won't, i'm way too lazy.

no caffeine in eight days, which must be some kind of personal record. it's nice when you don't have to get up for shit. i've been going through diet rite cola like heroin (no caffeine).

album du jour: the darling buds erotica

chronicle myself

i'm going to try to go from being hyper-self-deprecating to narcissistic in hopes of countering the former. i've already started taking megabyte upon megabyte of digital pictures of myself, doing things. mostly just sitting. my new mantra is going to be something akin to a certain right said fred song (i can't write it - you know what, "the-song-who-shall-not-be-named"). maybe some frankie goes to hollywood. now that i think of it the eighes were much more uplifting than the present. then you were walking on sunshine and feeling good and everyone got the beat. these days it seems like an inordinately copious number of people grew up on the mean streats of detroit and over-buy on razorblades, and can't sing the songs they didn't write yet still make the money.

so yes, i am now narcissistic. none of you are good enough to read my blog. you better recognize.

album du jour: sixteen deluxe emits showers of sparks

the role of street person number three

i'm thinking of going back to school in the fall. just to have direction and a goal. i tend to come up with passing fancies frequently though, so who's to say what this is.

earlier i was thinking i have no personality. the way i am is really just some random amalgam of different characters i've seen and admired. my lines and jokes and conversational styles are all lifted from flim and television, more or less. i'm not really a person, just an actor.

fitting, since all the world's a stage?

album du jour: tenki view of an orbiting man

there goes

my uncle and his family live next to us. not next door, but caddycorner behind us. they're the ones who spend the night every now and then (the children, not the uncle/aunt). the people who own the property right next to theirs recently moved the most hideous and obtrusive double-wide trailer into the lot, and utterly white-trashed down the property value here. this weekend though my uncle put up this huge eight-foot fence, which pretty much blocks out the view of the trailer, which first blocked out the view of what was a nice-looking pasture. the whole thing is a bit of a scandal around here (if that is any indicator of how dull things are chez moi).

album du jour: fonda the invisible girl

everyone should be voted off

right now i can't tell whether i'm bitter and envious at the good fortune and joy of others or genuinely resentful of the stupidity and alacrity with which they attain their successes. do i therefore resent not being stupid? maybe i am stupid and just don't realize it. there's probably some gigantically simple cosmic secret i'm not getting that enables all those countless others to function normally and not evaluate their own self-worth on saturday nights. how is it that the most inane and morally-skewed of us are rewarded with book deals and music careers and million dollar 30-second commercials and spots on regis. why is this culture so. how did we get to be such a supposed advanced people while functioning this way, with our values in such misappropriation? i should start saying hello when i leave and good-bye when i arrive. and probably watch less tv.

this may be one of those posts i delete later on.

and you know what else, i'm really starting to enjoy my junk mail. i even completely turned off my filter. maybe i could pioneer a new addiction.

album du jour: vancouver nights vancouver nights

what's this aboot

i think i want to move to canada. maybe montreal or britsh columbia. it's got to be much cooler/colder, and there seem to be so many good bands coming out of canada lately. maybe if bush gets re-elected in november i'll really do it. drastic notions of change are always easier to deal with in the sense of far-offness. procrastinating, to put it bluntly. idle threat, to put it another and more honest way.

my cousin and i stayed up late watching sort of a "too hot for tv" list of videos on m2. it brought back memories. it's hard to think that nine inch nails' "closer" video is now a memory. fuck it seems like yesterday. anyway i finally got to see the monkey tied to a cross that was behind the "scene missing" slides. i've known what it was for a long time but never seen it. now i can die a happy and fulfilled individual.

album du jour: modest mouse good news for people who love bad news

quote of the day: "fact-checking is for pussies. kronkite taught me that."

ed helms, the daily show

pimp this

there's a show on mtv called "pimp my ride" hosted by rap guy xzibit where they take someone's old p.o.s. automobile and fix it up real nice-like. well last night i had a dream that xzibit pimped my bicycle, which is especially odd since i don't have a bike. it was blue with sparkles, and for some reason a girl's bike. but they didn't do a very good job because i was riding it down pinhook and the brakes wouldn't work.

i tried to watch george bush's q&a session last night but it was too unbearable. it's always just so awkward when he tries to answer questions impromptu like that. and as much as i like to see him falter, it's just not right in so many ways.

album du jour: say hi to your mom numbers and mumbles

hoppity

crawfish boils really stink. i was walking around the block saturday night, the same time i walk every day, and there were two seperate homes on my route that were hosting crawfish-festooned easter vigils. it was unpleasant. plus every other minute some car would whiz by me speeding, screeching, peeling out, etc. in revelry. one car hit a tree not far from me. it's good to know that people hold easter in such esteem that they have to be drunken manly men (or manly women - i refer only to the mentality) and burn rubber. i can't throw stones (oooooo.....biblical), i'm not quite a religious zealot around religious holidays. come to think i'm not really a zealot about anything. i guess i could be an apathy zealot. am i? really? meh, don't care.

i took sleeping pills saturday night and slept all day sunday and today.

album du jour: komeda what makes it go

In an age when all music is free, dedicating yourself to just one specific genre or type only denies you the hedonistic musical bliss that is rightfully yours.

-pitchfork media

i watched 21 grams last night. it was one of the most emotionally draining movies i've seen lately. it's pretty much two hours of naomi watts crying and fucking and snorting. and i've had enough of sean penn for a good while.

pass over

my parents were supposed to come for easter but my dad is too busy at work so they're not. i was looking forward to a hassel-free family-free holiday weekend. but low and behold one of my uhcle-and-aunt sets is coming to stay with us on saturday night. they're very nice people and i really do like them. their children are mostly my age - twentysomething - and have jobs and spouses. it pains me to think how normal and good their lives are. two of the weddings were actually in october and november of last year. i didn't go to either. i opted out because i couldn't endure a big gathering with lots of rarely-seen family members asking me the same questions that the family member right before them asked, of course pertaining to what i'm doing with myself (if they only knew!) and what my lofty aspirations are, job-wise. it's like talkiing abou the weather with a stranger - talking about work with family. and now i can't just not go, because they're coming to me, and they'll either be cross that i didn't go, think i don't like them, or i can fess up and be further enmeshed in self-image deprecation (and i can't think of a reasonable lie, which i am very good at doing).

i could fake my own kidnapping like that wisconsin girl. that may actually be something i'd do anyway. it would be fun to create a crime scene.

album du jour: snow patrol final straw

and so few answers

the pentagon issued a press release saying that everything was "under control" in iraq. i'm glad i'm stupid and gullible or else i might not believe that.

also, earlier i saw a commercial for sargento brand cheese, and they said "our family's passion is cheese". what does that mean? how does one become passionate about cheese, and subsequently turn his/her family on to said passion? do they eat anything besides cheese? are they passionate about anything else? have they seen mel gibson's jesus movie? this all raises so many questions (some of which pertain to if and how exactly my thought processes work).

album du jour: phantom planet phantom planet

house of jealous lovers

the rapture and black rebel motorcycle club in houston on the 18th, i'm in like the rose

i was doing dishes and i decided to do some air fencing with the big kettle spoon, so i did a perry and a thrust and probably some other fencing moves i'm not aware of, and when i was done the spoon was dry. also i cut the grass and fed the cat and went to the post office and library. what is wrong with me today, i'm not usually this productive.

album du jour: on!air!library! on air library

kill snow birds 5

why do they think that if they put perforations on all four sides of the letter it will make me respond to whatever bullshit publication contest that i've mysteriously already won. i didn't realize perforations were supposed to affect perceptions. anyway. gas bill, garbage pick-up, children international, something about fifteen dvd's for fifty cents, and the weekly pale yellow envelope (oddly not perforated). it was the only thing i didn't discard.

i usually get at least four days to prepare for whatever the following assignment is. the instructions come encrypted. there's this decryption software cd i have to use to decipher the message (oddly labeled "aol version 5.1 with extended features". how funny). more often than not it consists of only a name, an address, and a "preferred date of administration". the service is quite fond of using such euphemisms, presupposing such vernacular will aid in maintaining a certain level of discretion. my own creativity comes into play when figuring out just how i'm going to perform said task. personally i'm fond of mixing up my methods. who doesn't want variety in the workplace, right?

i didn't recognize this person's name. i never do, with the sole exception of dear old pa-pap last time. this time a woman, lving in tuscon, arizona. never surprising since most old people go there in hopes of prolonging life. cleaner air or something. i read once that doc holliday went there to help his tuberculosis. rather i didn't so much read it as saw the movie. lots of these old people flock to warmer climates, electric blankets in tow. those are the ones i especially relish working on. i really hate the elderly.

album du jour: lenola treat me to some life

my favorite quote of the day: "they say crack is the new cleavage"

o.p.e.c.-kers

while on my daily sojourn to the post office and local library i noticed an inordinately large amount of suv's on the road. my route takes me by the elementary/middle school here and it was 3:00, so i guess all the parents were picking up their respective johnnies and susies. i really started to ruminate on how much i dislike suv's, not just for the shitty gas mileage, but just the trendiness of it and all the frivolity. some people i'm sure really need that soccer-mom vehicle, but you know a great deal would do just as well (and probably better given the ever-increasing petrol costs) with a civic or something of the like, if they would just swallow their massive fucking egos and realize that material things are ultimately shit. i hate wastefulness. but maybe i'm just jealous of not having a vehicle of my own - like when you resented the popular kids in high school and chided and made fun of them to yourself and your friends (or in my case "friends" minus the -s) but really you just wanted to be one. regardless of how much self-analysis i do i can't tell which i'm doing in regards to suv's. but now i'm back in my hole, so who really gives a flibbedy flabbedy fuck.

album du jour: moonbabies the orange billboard

i am going to have an all-out throw-down fiesta may 3, the day the pixies release their dvd. they're doing a "world" tour, which is already sold out and whose only u.s. venues are in califuckingfornia. we should be grateful for what we get i suppose. also pj harvey has a new one coming out may 31.

chris rock has another hbo special on april 16 i believe. that's another party. nigga.

rx wallow and stew

being depressed is like walking around with a big wet carpet on top of you. it's during these periods that i keep myself on a steady diet of sleep aids - doxylamine succinate (25mg) or diphenhydramine hcl (non-habit forming) or, when i want an all-around xanax-comparable experience, i use acetamenophin (500mg) and dyphenhydramine hydrochloride (25mg) in conjunction with the two aforementioned. really these are all just over-the-counter sleep aids, but i like to be dramatic at times. when i come to these fight-or-flight situations i go with option inconsciousness, which i suppose really is a type of flight.

i got some posters in the mail that i ordered on ebay (about a month ago slow-shipping dicks!) of the dandy warhols, elastica, the rapture, blake babies, and the raveonettes. i'm not going to put them up while i'm still living with my aunt - only when i have my own place will i allow myself to put them up and enjoy them. motivation for the un-motivated.

album du jour: stereolab margerine eclipse

in general i'm not a huge fan of stereolab; their albums usually have one or two tracks that i like and the rest is borderline filler, but i really enjoyed this, their latest.

a penny for this?

this afternoon i dreamt about nascar (yes, the cars that do circles). for some reason i had an aerial view of the last lap of a race, and the winner won and got out of his (or her, do women race?) car and was congratulated enmasse. but then two men among the mob pulled out guns, a mix of rifles and handguns, and just started shooting people dead. the crowd started running and scattering but the guys kept picking off stragglers. the winning driver walked up to one of them to plead with him to stop but the gunman shot him in the face. this dream really wreaked of tranch-coatness, which is not me at all. i think maybe it's just some manifestation of my extreme distaste for auto racing, or sports of any kind really (except for most extreme elmination challenge on spike - that shit is redonkulous!). what i'm curious about is this: the day before i have a dream about something that i usually don't dream about i have a passing thought about the subject for roughly one to two seconds, and that's all. for many years it was tim curry and the movie it, because i remember that movie sticking with me for a while (mostly because i was probably too young to have been watching it and it scared the bejeezus out of me). i don't remember thinking about auto racing yesterday though. i don't think i even turned on the tv yesterday. the only thing i could come up with is that there's a song called nascar by this band francine that i really like, and i believe it was on rotation yesterday here in my one-room brothel. i should start listening to songs about fornication. 2 live crew comes to mind.

album du jour: air talkie walkie

i'm so emo lately.

current mood: postal service give up

i need to invent some really positively-aligned mantras to repeat to myself during what seems like the constant onslaughts of depression fits i'm plagued with. and definitely avoid the sad bastard music at said times - counter-productive. i love you all.

anna how did you do it?

i've been coming up with responses to comments about weight gain, and i think the best way to deal with such observations is to chalk it up to whimsy. thus, i've conjured the following explanations to the remark "have you put on weight":

- yes i'm training for the nfl
- i was stung by a bee and i'm allergic
- i'm auditioning for a part in the porno version of "whale rider"
- i'm auditioning for a part in the beastiality film "whale ride her"
- i am making a documentary about the effects of eating only mcdonald's food for a month. what? fuck!!!
- i ate a baby (no idea)
- i'm pregnant (oh feel those kicks, he's gonna be a soccer player. he is... he iiissss...)
- trimspa baby!
- yes i'm starting to fill out quite nicely
- lay off me i'm starving

no those last couple aren't mine

album du jour: polara polara

twist to open

i wish all plastic soda bottles would have messages under the caps. i almost even look forward to the "sorry try again" message. now i instinctively look under plastic caps whether there's a contest running or not. the marketers have trained this consumer well i guess.

pretty grils make graves are great. i have an andrea zollo signature on a napkin. i tried to get her phone number but she laughed at me....someone from the area must have warned her ahead of time. damn you! i'm going to go get drunk again.

album du jour: pretty girls make graves the new romance

kill snow birds 4

on the road three houses down from my house was a dead dog. i stared at it for ten minutes i think. i was still fucked up from the pine sol. it was just too pitiful not to look at, and made me sadder the longer i conceived it. and the blaring contradiction stared me in the face, of lamenting a dead stray yet feeling nothing at speargunning my father's father. the notion of being a hypocrite is very unappealing to me, but i figured if millions of church-goers could do it why not me. i'm no better than anyone, far worse in most cases.

so i finally went inside my shanty. i tripped over my fucking scooty-puff in the dark and kicked it into the kitchen. i turned on my metronome without turning on the lights, then took some red bull and vodka from the fridge. this day sucked. every day sucked, but this one in particular, what with having to kill a relative and the dead dog and all. not to mention my fucking scooty-puff, which i think now had pieces missing. i sat on the floor and opened my mail.

album du jour: midwest product specifics

for anyone with decent taste in music, and within reasonable distance to baton rouge (port allen actually), the band pretty girls make graves is going to be playing at 415 music hall on the 22nd, which is this coming monday. the constantines are playing the same night, which should also be good.

i'm summering in baghdad this year

it's really funny to watch scott mcclellan being interviewed in the white house on cnn preaching how wonderfully the progress in iraq is going and the democracy that is now flourishing there, while pictures of the latest bombing and the burning buildings, smoke, chaos, and body bags are shown in the background. it blows my mind. this entire administration bases its policy justifications on telling people that it's raining while pissing on their shoes.

album du jour: camera obscura to change the shape of an envelope

suck my ass maria menudos

i don't care how many internet sex tapes she makes, paris hilton can go to hell and die. famous for the sake of being rich is one of the most condemnable things i can call to mind. it's not entirely her fault (society you fuckers!), although she can be blamed for the flaunting and modeling and camera-whoring and nicole richie-ing she does. side note - if you never saw nicole richie eat it while trying to ride a harley on some pre-awards show red carpet, well, then you just haven't lived.

i need to quit watching et on vh1. everyone wears too many colors and accessories and denim and i feel stupid because i don't know what happened last week on the oc. afterwards i just feel old and crotchety and i have to drown my sorrows in antihistamines. damn you vh1!

album du jour: the loveless gift to the world

kill snow birds 3

anymore i can't lie unconscious and not have stress nightmares concerning the countless technical manuals i was force-fed during my education. the questions of morality that then plagued me dredge up feelings of guilt and worry that during my waking hours i do not have. but all fades away as i rise, this time staring at the barely rotating ceiling fan in pa-pap's shitty kitchen. it's missing a blade. briefly i forget where i am but then recognize the aftertaste of pine, and recall my current situation. my job is done, so i leave as sleuthly as i came, grabbing the bowl of antacids from the kitchen table for solitaire colon games later. i'm going to walk the nine miles home.

album du jour: blonde redhead misery is a butterfly

my thoughts on wal-mart

it's a giant community-killer that cyphens the life out of local small businesses - pet stores (wal-mart now sells fish - live and frozen), grocers, etc. (we've all been to wal-mart, you can get underwear and liquor and fake plants all in the same place). while i disapprove of the wal-mart practice of undercutting smaller businesses and driving them under, and the whole illegal immigrant abuse thing, i'm poor and relegated to shopping there for now. but when i get a job, fuck you wal-mart.

lady friend came over last night and we discussed some things and decided that we're better off being friends. i am relieved.

album du jour: blonde redhead misery is a butterfly

my titles are sometimes way too random and/or way too obscure. sorry.

you're not that social, just a good drinker

yesterday while riding into town with my cousin there was a pretty bad traffic accident that made us about half an hour late for my appointment with my shrink, and i was thinking while waiting that being in line trying to get past an accident is like waiting in a line for some sort of exhibit. your reward for giving up your time is that you get to see some potentially real carnage and maybe even some raw human emotion. i'm not sadistic enough to say that i take great pleasure in the misfortunes of others (i would rarely actually wish such things on someone), but if it's there anyway then why not observe and feel a bit better that you're not that person? a traffic accident is also analagous to a pyramid scheme - if you get in early (see it right after it happened) you are rewarded with a scene, but if you're way back in line you may have to wait so long that all you get to see are skid marks.

as i said, i was late for my psychologist's appointment and really glad because of it. all he does is repeat right back to me whatever it is i say - no real insight there. he did give me a sample of some kind of artificial sweetener (how that topic came about i can't recall). three packets for a hundred bucks - not bad eh? there are several instances of these really awkward pauses where no one says a thing and i want to jump out the window or eat my own hand. i'm going to have to start coming up with material during the week to talk about so i'm not bored to death. i'd rather not go at all, but it's all to allay whatever it is my parents are thinking about me. maybe they should be in therapy.

album du jour: maxeen maxeen

look east young man

methinks i'm going to start working out in the morning instead of later in the day. it's not really morning. in the traditional sense i suppose it is. my sleeping pattern lately has been to crash around four in the afternoon and wake up at two a.m. so if i'm working out, say, at seven then really it's more like doing it in the afternoon (haha, i said "doing it". no more beavis and butt-head marathons for me on mtv2 saturday nights). except i almost feel like a normal person that gets up at the crack of whatever to exercise before heading off to work (robots!!!).

i should also cut the grass today. how wonderfully outdoorsy of me - i am such a man. my back even hurts.

album du jour: the rosebuds the rosebuds make out

what in the world 2

to be cursed with the title of elderberry-killer. it is a life sans compassion or love of any kind. there are only colors of black and red, and grey. my grandfather was a new low - never before had it been such a close relative. years ago i found a great uncle on the list, but he wasn't close, and i think he molested one of my second cousins at some point in the past. now that i think of it she always was a real cunt rag. maybe that explains it. nevertheless, spearing pa-pap in the gut ended up leaving my own stomach uneasy. i hurdled his now idle body and searched for the medicine cabinet. about the only benefit of this lifestyle was the bevy of booty at my disposal contained in most seniors' medicine cabinets. it almost made me look forward to old age. pa-pap, despite the respirator and wheel chair, was in surprisingly spry shape (excluding of course the two-foot steel rod penetrating his lower intestines). his stockpile consisted only of medamucil and some sort of generic multivitamins. angrily, i kicked his carcass en route to my secondary source. he had little else but pine sol under the sink. i made do.

album du jour: built to spill perfect from now on

bloody black laptop

my computer is giving me grief so i'm forced to wipe it out and start anew, which really is a good maintenance practice anyway. i've just been too lazy to go through the backup and restore process. plus i'm sure i'll forget to copy something, which make me nervous. but, what are you gonna do (so now i'm sounding like barbara streisand? what's up with that).

the cat has taken a shine to sleeping on my desk adjacent to my monitor. it's cute, but swiftly becoming annoying (what with the hair and floor crud near my laptop - probably not healthy). oh but look at that little punam, i couldn't make her move. pussy-whipped am i.

martha martha martha! bear in mind that a tossed salad means something entirely differen in the slammer (i mean the slam-her).

album du jour: ash 1977

a sadistic asshole i am

this new ph.d. counselor guy is pretty much a wall. a little while goes by and i forget that i'm not talking to myself. he has interesting waiting room material so i'll keep going. i would spend time in waiting rooms just for fun if i could get away with it, especially those of a psychological nature. i was thinking about acting out some nervous ticks in the company of other patients, or rambling to myself constantly in a very low voice. or do the jack nicholson "as good as it gets" floor crack evasion thing when walking, although that would only be useful getting to and from a seat.

the girl i've been seeing, as much as i do the typical "seeing" thing, has been cut off. specifically i can't say why, save for the fact that i felt like it. and usually i'm the polar opposite of a callous and mysterious person when it comes to relationship etiquette (i'm more often than not pretty open about things), but just not this time. a jackass thing to do, but there it is and here i am.

do i smell a sequel to the passion of the christ? possible titles:

the christ II: extreme resurrection
jesus and silent god strike back
crucifixion 2: die harder (includes pyrotechnics and cgi)
how jesus got his groove back

i'm only kidding religiosos.

album du jour: cave in antenna

what in the world

since my life lately hasn't provided much fodder for really quality blog matter i'm just going to start making up stuff in the style of a really trite novel.

he squeezed the trigger of the speargun, firing a piercing shot through the lower torso of his grandfather. the old man, unable to scream due to the respirator, slumped over and fell out of the antique wheel chair he loathed. he lay there motionless, save for the struggling rise and fall of his chest as he battled for air. the stagnant mutton joint he was gumming hourse earlier lay near him. the pet ferrett carried it away. young man walked to his grandfather and calmly whispered, "less filling, bizatch".

album du jour: moloko do you like my tight sweater?

cut me mick

lately i've had problems with inactivity and overeating that i can't seem to get over. more often than not i can get over these spuradic periods of sloth, but for some reason i haven't been able to of late. i was thinking about going to texas to stay with my parents until i lose about 50 pounds. kind of like rocky iv when he went to the ussr to train for his fight with dolph lundgren. my parents have a pool, lots of hills to run up, plus i could bring my chuck norris total gym (i'm a sucker for a.m. infomercials). then i could return to la in triumph wearing nothing but the american flag and a pair of black socks.

never say "back in the day"

album du jour: saint etienne sound of water

phizz on the aisle

i picked all the oscar winners. in the major categories anyway. i tried to watch it all but i fell asleep and dreamt that sofia coppola brought me to the oscars as her date and she won best director and i was there to congradulate her over and over again. then i had to cross the aisle and congradulate renee zellwegger a bit as well. i'm kind like that.

it is much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.

- grace murray hopper


PRETTY GIRLS MAKE GRAVES LYRICS

"This Is Our Emergency"

When you've finally throw up your hand
Poured your heart out, yet nothing stands
It seems out efforts are wasted
But yet it hasn't been in vain

Unfulfillment is killing you
Seems like no one shares the same view
We may have never met but
It might be you who pulls me through

Stand up so I can see you
Shout out so I can hear you
Reach out so I can touch you
This is our emergency

Baby you don't have to be
A picture in a magazine
Sometimes you're to blind to see
Anything objectively
Just keep on doing your thing right now

Listen here take it from me
We're gonna do it differently
They'll follow when you start the lead
Strength in numbers is our key
Keep on doing your thing you do now

Don't forget that when you doubt
That anyone will care about
A thing you do and when you're lost
Someone else is always found
A thousand voices, are you listening?

The tiny spare that you create
It can inspire and duplicate
And soon it spreads from state
To state from Williamsburg to Silverlake
A thousand voices, are you listening?

This is our emergency

word

to all white (and black - all this is really unbecoming for anyone) people - heretofore please refrain from using the following words/phrases as slang: da bomb, mad (as in "my boy got mad skills"), sick (as in "my boy's skills is sick"), props, mad props, no you didn't, don't go there, talk to the hand, hella. also, desist making the following gestures: raising the roof, air quotes, air fisty, crouching tiger hidden dragon. i don't know if that last one's a move. at any rate, when did jargon become so nauseating and obnoxious. it doesn't even come across as remotely cool, just borderline retarded. perhaps a little too much abbreviation. try to decipher a modern-day hip-hop song - it's like trying to understand kenny.

album du jour: death cab for cutie tranatlanticism

kiss the spiders

why should i be made to suffer through previews of every ashley judd suspense-thriller black-costar movie that comes out, at frequencies of about once a week. and the woman really can't act. she is easy on the eyes, which is the only thing i find endearing about her.

sometimes i'm almost glad when crappy videos come on mtv2 late at night, since otherwise i may never break myself away. a rare occurrence - finding that much good programming on either of the mtv's - but it does occasionally happen with the spuradic look-back specials. you can always count on hip-hop or pop to dissuade you though. and by dissuade i mean make you nauseous.

album du jour: the minders golden street

when we ask for advice, we are usually looking for an accomplice.

- charles varlet marquis de la grange

a little latin loopy-lou

a friend of mine and i are seriously considering starting our own webcast, although i have virtually no idea what you need to do it. i'll do some googling later and check it out. if anyone knows anything i'd love an e-mail. i'm sure it involves setting up some sort of server capable of accepting connections, which my computer may or may not be able to handle. this would really give me an almost productive hobby. there are probably beaucoup licensing fees to deal with though, so i won't get my hopes up.

i sat down and sorted all of my cd's, taking the discs out of the flip-books i had them in and matching them up with the cases. consider that i have thousands of cd's and you can understand that it took me a while. i'm going to see how many i can sell, of those i want to sell. i have all of my music copied to my hard drive so really i could and maybe should just sell them all, but i think i would like to maintain a modest collection of my absolute favorites. it's important to have something for people to peruse when you have company over (aren't i suddenly optimistic?), that way they can scratch their heads at the titles and artists that they've never heard of, and i can feel secretly superior inside. seriously, i'm not a music snob.

the cousin kids spent the night tonight. i think two of them are actually still awake in the living room watching something they probably shouldn't. bless their hearts.

album du jour: poster children daisychain reaction

warning: this site is very abrasive to the ocular sensitivities, click with care.

prison break

i honestly don't want to feel a smug satisfaction at the fact that it will probably rain on everyone's parade for lundi/mardi gras. i want to be the one disappointed that my fun will be damp. i want to be the girl with the most cake. my new goal is to get to the point where i'm actually resentful when it rains. that should be a pretty good signpost.

as of now i own lost in translation and am whole-heartedly in love with one scarlett johanson (and am experiencing an odd emotion concerning bill murray that i'd rather not dwell on - kidding). it wasn't what i expected, but all the same i will still marry sofia coppola.

album du jour: damone from the attic

i'm up at 7 a.m. just let that sink in. 7 in the morning. and i don't know exactly why but it really feels like summer to me.

i haven't slept yet, and for some reason i suspect that mum/da will be upset if they get here and i'm sleeping this afternoon. all will be forvigen if they come bearing gifts.

laissez les bon temps dormir

for the second time in as many weeks i've ordered a dvd on ebay that never came in. i'm not realy pissed - paypal offers buyer protection so i will be reimbursed - i'm just curious as to why people think they can act fraudulently and get away with it on ebay. green-eyed monster i guess.

for about five years in a row, something dramatically terrible would happen to me over the mardi gras holiday. one year i totalled my car and got arrested, another year i got dumped, another year my apartment was broken into. as such, i have vowed to batten down the hatches and ride mardi gras out like george clooney in a hurricaine. it's not just my bad luck at this time of year, i also genuinely dislike the event. i've never enjoyed standing on the side of the road drinking and running over children for plastic jewelry or fake coins (which, i learned, you can get into trouble for trying to buy things with - bad mardi gras number 5), or being sassy to cops while drunk (bad year number 4). i'm aware that it's great fun for the masses, but the way i figure it i pretty much party like it's mardi gras on almost a weekly basis the rest of the year, so i'm not missing much. plus i really hate crowds (although i love gatherings).

album du jour: turin brakes the optimist lp

psychocandy

today i have an appointment with a mental health counselor of some sort here in lafayette, again at my parents' request. aside from the fact that i really hate having obligations (i.e. appointments of any kind) i have no real qualm with it. speaking of parents mine are visiting this weekend in anticipation of mardi gras, which i loathe even more than valentine's day. the whole mardi gras scene has just become a little too flirtatious with old testament-style deist aggravation (ala sodom/gomorrah). of course i'm not extremely religious, but why tempt fate, you know. more on my feelings re. mardi gras to come.

album du jour: the jesus and mary chain psychocandy

vroom

as long as i live i will never understand the vast popularity of auto racing. are circles really that interesting? or ovals, whatever. it's no surprise our plucky president attended, bless his heart. i think it's hilarious that the drivers have so many advertisements sewn to their jump suits and adorning their cars. i think all the other major sports should do the same thing; that would completely bottom out what little opinion i have of professional sports.

last night i had a dream that i killed these two dogs with a sword, but then felt so bad that i used my magic powers to bring them back to life. i woke up feeling guilty so i went to the store and bought a box of milkbones for the neighborhood mixed breeds (mutts). why would i have a dream like that - i really love animals.

album du jour: phaser sway

pump up the volume

i remember in the olden days how much i looked forward to sunday night and watching 120 minutes on mtv/mtv2. that, along with amp, were the only shows i would watch on the station(s). now the only decent show that comes on is subterranean, from eleven to midnight every sunday. and although it plays good videos (with the exception of the fucking polyphonic spree), it plays the same ones a bit repetitively, and only lasts an hour. my left nut for some quality programming.

requiem for a something-or-other

i realized when i woke up last evening that i only have about 3 basic dreams. one involves either my parents yelling at me or me yelling at them (very vulgarly, maliciously). the second is that i'm still waiting tables and i'm in the weeds (restaurant term meaning busy as fuck) with people pulling me in all different directions. the third is that i am still in school - ranging from middle through college - and i have some critical test coming up in a class which i haven't been to in months (often times graduation hinges upon it). i understand that these are probably the situations in my life which have caused me the most stress, but i haven't experienced them in quite some time (at least two years), with the exception of that first one. what's worse is that i almost prefer having these as opposed to the good dreams, when i wake up and am thoroughly disappointed at my comparative reality. it's like going to the movie theater and seeing a great movie and being taken out of your life for a couple of hours, then getting slammed back down to earth when the lights come up. not a great sensation.

album du jour: stars heart

i really wish i knew how to make music play when a website opens up. if someone out there is privy to said information please let me know and i'll send you a cookie.

fucking valentine's day

wow our president sure has had a bad week. the wmd investigation/continued questioning, military service gaps, medicare bill $100 billion miscalc, pointless space travel endeavors, and a virutally incoherent interview on meet the press...it all makes me smile :o) wesley clark said something about how the only people that george w. has united (remember the uniter-not-a-divider claim?) are the democrats and other opponents of his.

jesus i hate valentine's day. it's such a contrived holiday whose purpose is to force the male consumer to frivolously spend money on short-lived flower bouquets and overpriced candy. and it we don't do it what happens - the penis goes in a mayonnaise jar by the side of the bed. and if you don't have that "special someone" (that phrase makes me want to eat my own arm) then you just feel dejected and lonely. i fucking hate valentine's day. i guess there was too much fiscal space between christmas and easter and someone decided that this would be a good way to boost consumer spending during the gap. valentine's day sucks balls.

i really hate it when i have these wonderful dreams (wonderful in one way or another) and wake up to find things are not nearly so grand. it gives me absolutely no chance of have a good day. there's really nothing like waking up pissed off.

Microsoft: In the crapper?

Part 1 The PC in the WC. On April 30, Microsoft U.K. issues a press release touting a new product called the iLoo, an Internet-enabled toilet equipped with a Wi-Fi broadband connection, a plasma flat screen, a waterproof keyboard, and sponsored toilet paper festooned with Web addresses. According to the release, the iLoo will "allow instant logging on."

Part 2 Johnny on the spot. Twelve days later, after much snickering in morning newspapers and on late-night talk shows, Microsoft flacks back in Redmond come up with a clever strategy for damage control. The iLoo, says spokeswoman Kathy Gill, was merely an "April Fool-like joke."

Part 3 Something doesn't smell right. The next day, realizing that nobody's buying the April-Fool's-joke-29-days-after-April-Fool's-Day explanation, Microsoft calls back reporters and admits that it had told an iLulu: The project was indeed real but has subsequently been killed. "We jumped the gun basically yesterday in confirming that it was a hoax," says MSN group product manager Lisa Gurry. "In fact, it was not."

favorite movies

maybe putting in lists of shit is something of a cop-out when it comes to trying to write something pensive and creative, but just suck my asshole. i need to put stuff in the margin.

i'm not going to prioritize any more of my lists, it makes it too difficult to amend, which i can see happening in the future. here are my favorie flicks, again, in no particular order. and, again, check back when/if you would like because it will be added to. colon:

wonder boys
donnie darko
rushmore
american psycho
almost famous
sixteen candles
the house of yes
high fidelity
evil dead 2
o brother where art thou?
less than zero
heathers
clerks
as good as it gets
american movie: the making of northwestern
billy madison
kissing a fool
ferris bueller's day off
24 hour party people
chasing amy
adaptation
bottle rocket
the lost boys
laurel canyon
fargo
igby goes down
american beauty
say anything
a clockwork orange
the breakfast club
lock, stock, and two smoking barrells
swingers
all the real girls
national lampoon's christmas vacation
a christmas story
dazed and confused
permanent midnight
quills
weird science
fast times at ridgemont high

life in music videos seemse better than real life, and everyone wears denim

i want to have an asian girlfriend

why did the newton people decide to make their first flavor fig? why fig?

lend me some sugar like i'm your neighbor

shit about me (not on me)

- i like monkeys
- i only drink if i'm smoking and vice versa
- my favorite food is frozen food
- i will never take a wife - don't know why
- i am heterosexual
- i'm very perceptive and naive
- i still have all my wisdom teeth (embedded in my gums, not in a drawer somewhere)
- i take paxil and wellbutrin for social anxiety and depression, and recently xanax cr
- i am not proud of anything
- i leave my windows open and my fan on in the winter
- i hate sundays
- material possessions are extraordinarily unimportant to me
- i am cynical, but healthfully
- i like girls with glasses
- i hate self-pity, yet find myself immersed in it constantly
- i don't like having to answer to people
- my favorite weather is cold and overcast
- my favorite invention is air conditioning
- i generally dislike covers, re-mixes, or songs sampling other songs - be original robots!
- i do not watch any television
- i cut my own hair
- i write with my left hand, throw things with my right
- my earliest memory is of my younger brother of two years being born
- i blame my parents for my emotional problems, but don't resent them
- i forgive very easily, to a fault
- i'm probably going to die at an early age
- if i ever get cancer i don't want chemotherapy
- my ideal girlfriend would be an asian named margaret
- i can get along with anyone, although may have to act to do so
- i used to cut myself to relieve pain, and still sometimes do
- i don't talk to anyone i graduated high school with
- i play the piano and saxophone and would like to teach myself guitar
- i have rhythm

homework stinks

has there ever been a scientific study that pinpoints the time during a person's life at which you start being an adult? i remember when i was young(er) and looking ahead to being an adult, when somehow everything would seem different and i would have some profound sense of responsibility and purpose and cognizance that previously i didn't have. and now i'm 25 and drifting indecisively though life not having the slightest sense of what i should be doing at this point in time. i could (and probably should) get a job, etc., but i don't think that has anything to do with the matter anymore. a job doesn't make you an adult. my younger brother is flying fighter planes (ala top gun) while i sit here playing stupid repetitive computer games all day and listening to music. that would really fuck up my self-image if i had one. maybe i'm just trapped in that adolescent stage of life where not much is expected of you (relatively speaking) and you don't expect to do much. or maybe i'm just lazy and immature. jimmy crack whore and i don't care.

album du jour: symposium on the bbc

menutia

i saw on this program on the discovery channel yesterday about baboons, which are essentially large apes. did anyone know that they eat smaller monkeys? they showed one capture a spider monkey or something and just tear it apart like rush limbaugh going at a chicken wing (hiiiooooo). it was one of the most disturbing images i've ever seen - rather like seeing a big hairy human eating a smaller hairy human. some humans probably should be eaten though, and not in that good way.

why do i waste so much time playing these senseless word games. i bet i spend about an average of two hours a day playing fucking text twist on msn. i guess i'm just a natural born fan of mindless repitition. i don't like complicated computer games or playstation games (not really), just these simple card and word games. even in my recreation i'm lazy. how about that.

and speaking of the confounded playstation, i checked out some dvd's from the local library and the fucker won't play them. i get all situated in my bed with my tasty beveage, turn off the lights, looking forward to a quality couple of hours, insert the dvd and the fucker won't play. i don't take well to this ilk of disappointment.

album du jour: phaser sway

consolation prize

i just heard a news clip about a guy on a filght to south america somewhere who threw a cup of water at a baby that was crying. i don't konw what to feel abou tthat.

tonight i used up the last of a chapstick tube that i've had for almost three years. who'd a-thunk it. it's the longest relationship i've ever had. next time someone accuses me of not being able to commit i will just say "look to the chapstick".

for the second year in a row i tried to watch the superbowl but fell asleep. i think it's a new tradition. the only reason i watch is for the commercials, but i didn't like any of them (the ones i was awake for, anyway). you want to feel bad for the loser, but then just remember they get to go home to their mansions and fuck overpriced hookers all the live-long day.

album du jour: saloon (this is) what we call progress

valley of the blind

currently i am on the second floor of the lafayette public library, looking out over the rather delapidated downtown area. at least my view is delapidated. as i have little else to do, i decided to break out the laptop and write away as i wait for 5:00 (when cindy gets off).

after my vision tomfoolery at the blind center i should be getting some insanely powerful reading glasses (no doubt they'll be the height of fashion) and some peripheral device to hook up to my computer that will in essence woork like a closed-circuit tv (also to aid in reading). i can't say whether i'll actually use this stuff or not - alot of times they seem like good ideas when i'm testing them out but are later abandoned out of laziness. i really would like to be able to actually read the articles in my magazines instead of fumbling through titles and pawing at the pretty pictures.

this morning on cnn i watched nearly the entire length of some congressional hearing concerning iraq and supposed wmd's they had stockpiles of and when. david kay, the former chief inspector, discussed how no actual weapons were found to be in the ocuntry. yet several quotes were brought up from cheany, bush, et. al. pre-war proclaiming that iraq did indeed have the bombs. so now it's a question of whether or not the intelligencfe was bad or whether the white house exaggerated certain facts to gain support for the war. at any rate, it's a big quagmire of who-did-what (i just want to know what you knew and when you knew it senator). personally i think much of the hard evidence was skewed pre-war into pro-war propaganda by the bush administration, but of course my opinion is influenced by the fact that i hate them, and of course the fact that they're all liars hell-bent on self interests (as evidenced by the lucrative iraqi rebuilding contracts that went only to american companies with direct ties to rumsfeld and cheaney). i recognize the fact that all politicians are basically liars and crooks, republican or democrat, but bush and co. just seem so brazen and unconcerned with any type of consequences their selfish actions may warrant that it seems to me that they think they can wield free reign. it's always the lesser of evils with politics.

so it's 4:47 and almost time to skedaddle. i'll be a million bucks i'm going to have sex tonight. sex is a funny thing - if you hadn't had it in a while and you want to make that good first impression by being spectacular you can't perform worth shit (from a male perspective), but when you are getting it regularly and you know you're going to keep getting it regularly you have the capacity to be a fucking tiger, when really you don't need to. i think that's one of those cosmic practical jokes.

i feel a cold coming on. and fuck, i was just about over the last one. god damn you universe!!!! you and your twisted sex jokes!!!!!

album du jour: further seems forever the moon is down

chaunceboy send me your new site

this afternoon i spilled dr. pepper on my keyboard so i finally had to bite the bullet and hook up my wireless that i got for xmas. i was just being lazy, in re. not hooking i up. it really is pretty cool. i wonder how long it will be before i spill something on this one. watch this:

right now i'm on my bed lying down

now i'm sitting in front of my tv

right now i'm not even looking.....back turned to (on) all of you (all both of you)

i'm going to squat in cindy's apartment for a couple of days so i may be incommunicado. do you like avacado? she works during the day so i need to bring some type of arts & crafts projects. i was thinking of taking all my entertainment weekly magazines and making some pre-emptive collage christmas cards (past efforts have included "a ricky martin cailente crhistmas" and duran duran "hungy like the jesus" cards).

plus tomorrow i'm going to the low-vision aid center here in lafayette to experiement with all types of visual aids (at the low-vision aid center? get the fuck out...). maybe i will finally be able to learn how to read.

album du jour: doves the last broadcast

going to eat alot of peaches

i can't explain the lack of blog inspiration. everyone knows it's much easier to write when depressed and/or angered, but lately i've been neither. you'd think i would be awash with relief at being currently on the upswing, but really i almost miss the moodiness. i strangely take solace in the probability that i will sink again (everything is cyclical). how fucked up is that.

i'm thinking about writing a book. i haven't really read any good literature in quite some time though, so i think i need to do that first. writing well stems from reading a large quantity of quality books. of latei feel prettyreatarded - not being able to think of words/synonyms, forgetting things that i'm positive i used to know, etc. some of this may be attributed to the aging process and the binge drinking and aerosol abuse.

a friend of mine is moving to montana next week to live with her 22-year old boyfriend (whom we affectionately refer to as "johnny montana"). what is there in montana? is it big sky country? what is that? i understand wanting to leave louisiana, but for montana....it's too far from saltwater, and i think the further from saltwater you are the more inane the population gets. just look at the red versus blue states during election returns. it's like butter.

album du jour: the sea and cake oui

i am oprah winfrey

here's something i've never heard before. i was chatting with my good friend jill in arkansas and somewhere in our conversation she mentioned that at the moment she likes to live vicariously through me. let's all really pray hard to our respective deities that jill is happy and healthy soon.

did anyone see howard dean turn into the incredible hulk in iowa last weekend? it was such a scene. he's a good candidate but shoots himself in the foot repetitively it seems like.

my friend went to a henry rollins concert in new orleans last night. i don't know what to make of that, except that if you're going to go to new orleans there's usually several bands playing on the same night so i'm sure you could find something better to do than see henry rollins. but to each his own.

what does it mean that i've started to make time in the afternoon to watch oprah? am i turning into a middle-aged overweight black woman? should i buy some luther vandross cd's? shouuld i fake winning the ohio lottery?

album du jour: catherine wheel chrome

stoli stoli stoli

my apologies for being lax in my blog upkeep, but i tend to need a few days rest after a night of binge drinking. i guess i can't use that as an excuse - i sleep for days on end generally without reason. but it was an interesting weekend, frought with drama which, thankfully, had nothing to do with me, but unfotunately i had to bear witness to. not a fan of the drama. especially drama involving drunk whores who like to tell stories (ala taxicab confessions). but luckily drunk ranting whores can be dropped off and quickly forgotten, especially when your alcohol consumption converts much of the night's unfortunate experiences into what i like to call "blackouts". demon liquor my ass.

i had a very nice martin luther king jr. day, watching many movies (none of which were very spectacular), laughing and lying. i watched the mothman prophecies last night and it really scared me, which is a good thing because i rarely get frightened by movies anymore. it definitely now carries my seal of approval.

another day of movies with cindy tomorrow. it's nice to find someone who can sit through eight movies in a row with you, with occasional sarcastic comments insterted where necessary (and other things inserted where unnecessary have i said too much oh my god?).

album du jour: the stills logic will break your heart

phone call most foul

ding dong the chickens is gone. i was feeling litigious this morning so i called the police to report a noise disturbance as a result of our neigybor's poultry clucking, and low-and-behold the chickens is no more. words can't quite describe my elation at the newfound sounds of silence. and just ask me how guilty i feel about it.

it's supposed to rain all weekend, but there's a party i want to go to tomorrow night so i'm conflicted. i may just compromise and stay in my room and get drunk. happy mediums.

i'm selling 14 of my vhs tapes as a lot on ebay for nine bucks, so if anyone is interested then just click here. if you don't want to pay nine bucks make me an offer i can't refuse. these are they:

South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
Scarface (2-VHS)
The Matrix
Swingers
The Shawshank Redemption
Less Than Zero
Traffic
Pollock
Desperado (w/ Antonio Banderas)
Reservoir Dogs
Angela's Ashes
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Memento
Wonder Boys

not a bad lot of movies, i'm just converting to dvd. if you buy within the next ten minutes i'll throw in some crack rock and toilet paper free.

album du jour: helium the dirt of luck

across the street today there was a tree removal company cutting down this giant oak tree, which i believe was dead anyway, in our neighbor's yard. when they cut the main trunk and the behemoth toppled over it shook the ground rather vehemently. at the time i was here at my computoer doing god knows what, and i about pissed myself. it was like that scene from donny darko when maggie gyllenhall enters her house at the beginning of the movie and you see the entire house shake (which we later find out is a plane engine falling on the house). it was pretty weird, but definitely cool post hoc.

poor, cheap and lazy

the chickens hang around outside my bedroom window. i don't know how i feel about that. hungry maybe.

my lady friend is almost nine years my senior. i rather like that. you hear alot these days about younger men dating older women, since i care so much about what the rest of the world is doing, especially hollywood...

i woke up and went walking this morning (by which i mean noon) then cut the grass for my lovely aunt, although there was very little grass and very many leaves. i don't ask questions.

riddle me this - do i have to pay to put pictures up on here? i know it's only about five bucks a month, but i'm cheap and poor.

i'm going to sell all my vhs tapes as a lot on ebay. tired of dealing with clutter.

album du jour: her space holiday young machines

nepotism

my twin 11-year old cousins are sleeping over tonight. i'm always happy when they do since it offers me an opportunity to corrupt their young minds with various inappropriate media (for instance, i showed them american psycho one night. isn't it a classic though? shouldn't kids watch classics?). the way i see it, i'm giving them the knowledge that will help them in social circles that i never had, and still don't in many ways. that way they don't just act like an amalgomation of their parents, as i was relegated to doing in my formative years. psycho-babble.

speaking of parochial misadventures - our allustrious ltg (little teenage gangster) neighbors somehow procured a chainsaw with which to amuse themselves. odd, since their yard is roughly twelve feet by twelve feet and contains nothing in the way of plant life. i should just buy a gun from a pawn shop and leave it on their doorstep. sooner or later they'd have to do themselves in, accidentally or otherwise. social darwinism at it's finest.

my friend cindy and i are having a movie night tonight. she's bringing children of the corn, which i have never seen and am very much looking forward to. on the subject of movies, i bought the following dvd's today, despite my resolution to curb my spending habits of late:

less than zero
better off dead
swingers
jawbreaker
freeway

most were from the $5.88 bin at wal-mart, which you really can't beat (if i were a richer man i would boycott wal-mart forever - corporate bitches). i've only seen the first three.

album du jour: royal trux cats & dogs

-insert title here-

ohh all you poor bastards who have to work on such a nice rainy day such as today. take solace in the fact that i am quite comfortable laying in bed while all others are braving the cold world outside. who really wants a job.

ohio lottery woman - cry me a river. life sucks and we all die penniless, welcome.

is anyone else getting soured on howard dean? the further this thing goes on the more i think he'd have absolutely no chance against george bush. i'm almost starting to root for wesley clark actually. it's not that dean has bad ideas - quite the contrary - but there are things he says that someone campaigning for a presidential nomination shouldn't say (i hearken back to the confederate flag remarks, and others). clark just looks better on paper going against our fearless leader, and frankly i'd support the person who has the best chance of beating him. nibb high football rules.

album du jour: happy mondays pills 'n thrills and bellyaches

sick like dog. can't talk or swallow. must.....finish...sentence...

another man's treasure

i sold about twenty of my old cd's on ebay this past week. going through my old collection really makes me wonder what the hell was wrong with me way back when (i had a dave matthews band and jesus jones cd in there). then i wonder what the people who bought them from me present day are like - perhaps just like me about 10 years ago? musical taste is a curiously indicative hobby. it's always good to discover artists you really like and then go back to listen to their earlier work, so i have to applaud the retroactive sensibility of the thing. and i guess i can't really throw stones, since after all these are my adolescently archaic cd's which at some point i thought were worth buying (or scamming a music club for). and even though i'm glad someone wants this stuff, i have to mourn the fact that there is want for such crap. but imagine what i'll consider crap ten years from now...

album du jour: pussy galore dial m for motherfucker

not an easy task when you google "pussy galore" looking for a decent band website. bunch of perverts in this world (only kidding - i bookmarked everything)

shake it like a polaroid picture

ever notice how, no matter how low your self-image, when you see yourself in a photograph it's always worse than you think. especially with a flash - it's not as if i look pale like a vampire as it is, but i think my complexion actually reflects the light causing my face to look...well...illuminated (which it never does otherwise. usually i'm try for very dark and brooding - the whole byronic thing). i just need to get my hands on some adobe photoshop and i'll be sated.

speaking of satiation, i just bought donnie darko on dvd, in an effort to beef up my somewhat paltry dvd collection. i also would like to unload some of my vhs's, although i doubt i could find buyers for some of them. i really just want to free up space on my desk, so i have a clutter-free space upon which to bang my head when the mood strikes me. i don't think that's unreasonable. goddamned clutter. makes me want to hit my head on the.....oh. fuck.

album du jour: burnside project the networks, the circuits, the streams, the harmonies

lament

it's not the end of the world, but if it were the sky outside would really be appropriate - very ominous and brooding. it's just raining slightly and is eerily sans thunder. it reminds me of ghostbusters 1.

yesterday i just realized i can score (check out) movies from our local library, which is easily within walking distance. i suppose i could also check out some of these new-fangled "books" that you hear so much about these days. we here in milton don't take too kindly to them wordy-words though. i'm such an ignorant bastard sometimes.

the thing i regret most about 2003 was the lack of any kind of personal inertia.

the thing i liked most about 2003 was the over-indulgence, which i also hated.

album du jour: the butchies are we not femme?

this is a really cool site, surf even if you don't care

where does he get those wonderful toys

so many of my christmas presents require a usb port on my computer - my canon, my external hard drive, scanner (not a new item - just one i happened to find in my old closet), mp3 player, and wireless keyboard/mouse receiver. and since my desktop is somewhat old it only has 2 ports, so i'm using my laptop's as well (the two are networked). i feel mad.....delightfully, whimsically mad (sometimes i smell my hands because they remind me of my mother!)!

and also i feel a bit out of control - buying dvd's like they're going out of style. i also bought these really boss leather wristbands (rockstyle) to go with the leather condom i bought. all studded, naturally.

is louisiana really that disagreeable that it has to be 80 fucking degrees in january? isn't it unpleasant enough?

album du jour: the cranes population 4

litter critter

while away from the house we left five litterboxes and a huge pile of food for the cat, and today i was cleaning this shit out of the boxes while the cat was sitting atop the dryer staring at me. she had this look on her face like "yes, you'll clean up my shit and you'll like it bitch". it was not one of my most dignifying moments. probably the worst of the year so far, although the initial hours of 2004 are a bit hazy.

i was up until 7 this morning, and consequently slept the first day of the year away.

why am i hearing about the "word of the year" every other minute lately? is it that slow of a news period? there's an election coming up. do something with that.