Last year, when I suffered from a bout of anxiety, brought upon by spending too much time alone, smoking weed, worrying about my book and facing mid-life worries, I became obsessed with my health.
It was not pretty.
I did calm down. I just had to be with people again and I had to cease the weed and I did the ol’ “think good thoughts” thing and I was back on my feet in a great, productive way.
Now, whenever I feel funky about my stomach (which has never been the greatest) or my allergies (which have always plagued me. As a kid---I once went into a coma from a bee sting, another time, they had to put a needle through my chest and into my heart because of some bad reaction)--I simply say, “Well, at least it isn’t Cystic Fibrosis.” I let myself know that what I have isn’t lethal, and, the thing does pass, and I’m back with the greedy and the ambitious, trying to take over the world.
And I am glad for this grateful way of looking at things.
However, sometimes, I just feel like crap. And it so often has to do with the weather...
I’m like a barometer for bad air quality. And I have to say, the air is getting worse.
Every year.
So, I do all these things (Steam, salt water, some drugs) in order to be able to handle it. And I’m not even worried about it. I just take care of it. But I have to say, like the canary in the coal mine, something is up out there.
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
The Only Sane Thing You Can Do Right Now
Stop everything.
Go in your backyard.
Pick a global-warming ripened tomato.
And make a B.L.T.
Go in your backyard.
Pick a global-warming ripened tomato.
And make a B.L.T.
Monday, August 07, 2006
Visiting America
I have many friends who work at Disney. It’s just part of the collateral damage of living in Southern California. And though they suffer (having to be at work at 8 a.m., having to work the day after Thanksgiving, having to work Christmas week)—the manager and higher level employees get a bottomless free pass to the theme parks.
When California Adventure opened a few years ago, I thought, “A new theme park...just what the world needs. Oh wait, there’s a ride where you sit in this chair and fly over the major sites of California in an IMAX sort of situation, but all up close and freaky and the chairs tilt and sway in the direction of the movement of the flick so you feel like you are hang gliding over the ocean, desert, Yosemite, San Francisco Bay, Los Angeles, mountains and housing tracts while little vents across from your face blow air at you that smells like where you are—the pine scent worked best—and everyone says it’s pretty cool? Okay, take me! I wanna go on Soarin’ Over California!”
We went there. Today. Mary and Bardo, our friends who both work at Mouseschwitz, came by at noon in their Hybrid vehicle, Disney Silver Passes in hands, and we drove down to Anaheim in Hellish I-5 traffic, parked the car, took the very long, cool looking escalator down from the parking structure, got on the tram to the main entrance of Disneyland and California Adventure which are right across from each other, and smacked our lips in fun anticipation. You know which one is California Adventure by the huge cement free standing letters that spell California about twenty feet from the entrance.
First thing we did, we went over to Soarin’ Over California in the Golden State section of the park and got ourselves fast passes. These are basically reservations to get on the ride at a prescribed time so you don’t have to go through the line.
Then, we thought we’d kill some time and go ride on the Grizzly River rafting company. Big attraction, center of the park. You know, that ride where you sit in a big round raft and go up a hill and then through water slides and such. The company that makes it can set it up anywhere and you can cover it with whatever you like. This one was a kind of Sierra Nevada thing. The plantings were great. They got the trees right—pine and oak. And the fake mountain and streams and waterfalls were pretty cool in that, “Sure, it’s all plastic, but I’m in the mood...” kind of way. We were on line for about forty minutes. Five minutes away from getting on, and the whole Magilla broke down. We waited while repairmen scratched their heads, started it up again for a bit and then it stopped again. In the park for over an hour and all we did was stand in that line. Cranky. I looked at the kid with the C.I.A. printed T-shirt that announced and stood for “Christ is Alive,” and I wondered, “Can he fix this thing?”
We left because our fast passes were ready for using. And use them we did. The Soarin’ over California was cool and pretty much like I described it above. Glad to have done it. Worth the drive down. The cool pine scent. The dizzy heights. The grand California scenery.
After our visual ride experience, we figured we’d go on the huge roller coaster over in the Paradise Pier Section, the other big ride in California Adventure. This area was kind of the best looking part of the park. It was simply a remake of a boardwalk. Like Santa Monica or Santa Cruz. And the rides were very carnival. We got to the entrance of California Screamin’, the coaster, and it, too, like the Grizzly Rafts, was broken.
So, the two biggest rides were busted. We left the park.
We went to Downtown Disney, the open shopping mall connected to the theme parks, with a movie theatre, stores, Disney stores, and ridiculous theme restaurants. We ate at The Rain Forest. The one where every half hour there’s a rain storm and the plastic gorillas and elephants move and make a lot of noise? They must have one in Nanuet by now.
You can imagine how delicious the food was.
It was here, in the Rainforest, where I discovered the most abundant (excepting rodents) American mammal: The humanoid cow.
Now look, none of us are thin any longer. And ten, twenty, even thirty extra pounds on someone isn’t so awful. If you ever get cancer in that condition, you might get a few extra weeks of life. But these people, these people were all between sixty and a hundred pounds overweight. All those planes that flew in all these monsters from all across the land! It was like a horror movie.
And there they were, gorging on huge plates of corporate food that all tasted like sugar and oil, in a plastic Rainforest, swallowing their disappointment for all the broken rides. Can you imagine spending your life savings to take your family to Anaheim and all you get to do is wait in line and then leave because the rides are all broken? And then the consolation prize is heaping mounds of imitation food?
Everyone was enormous. Those poor children! Drinking high fructose corn syrup out of plastic cups that actually flashed with electric rainbow strobe jewels.
After the ogita slather, we escaped from the jungle. Bardo had to go into the Disney store to use his discount to buy a present for a relative. Adam and I waited outside. We sat on a benchy-wall of a planted area and at our feet was a small, round vent about six inches in diameter. And rising up from the slits was the foulest smell of half treated sewage. We had to move over. Who manages the sewage treatment that it actually wafts up into the middle of the Disney food court? Goofy?
When we all piled into the tram and back to the parking structure, the cool looking escalator that we took down was broken, too, so the Disney visitors had to walk down a three story high, stopped escalator. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that the broken escalator was only the beginning.
Can you imagine being from some burb-o-America, slathering your enormous, mis-shapened body into a jet only to land in Anaheim where you will spend what little money you have on entrance fees to a theme park that is broken down and then eat terrible food that does nothing but make you sadder so you then have to work even harder at Walmart so you can save more money to take another dysfunctional, plastic vacation filled with corn syrup?
If Christ is Alive, why the hell isn't he doing something about all this?
God bless America? Raze it.
When California Adventure opened a few years ago, I thought, “A new theme park...just what the world needs. Oh wait, there’s a ride where you sit in this chair and fly over the major sites of California in an IMAX sort of situation, but all up close and freaky and the chairs tilt and sway in the direction of the movement of the flick so you feel like you are hang gliding over the ocean, desert, Yosemite, San Francisco Bay, Los Angeles, mountains and housing tracts while little vents across from your face blow air at you that smells like where you are—the pine scent worked best—and everyone says it’s pretty cool? Okay, take me! I wanna go on Soarin’ Over California!”
We went there. Today. Mary and Bardo, our friends who both work at Mouseschwitz, came by at noon in their Hybrid vehicle, Disney Silver Passes in hands, and we drove down to Anaheim in Hellish I-5 traffic, parked the car, took the very long, cool looking escalator down from the parking structure, got on the tram to the main entrance of Disneyland and California Adventure which are right across from each other, and smacked our lips in fun anticipation. You know which one is California Adventure by the huge cement free standing letters that spell California about twenty feet from the entrance.
First thing we did, we went over to Soarin’ Over California in the Golden State section of the park and got ourselves fast passes. These are basically reservations to get on the ride at a prescribed time so you don’t have to go through the line.
Then, we thought we’d kill some time and go ride on the Grizzly River rafting company. Big attraction, center of the park. You know, that ride where you sit in a big round raft and go up a hill and then through water slides and such. The company that makes it can set it up anywhere and you can cover it with whatever you like. This one was a kind of Sierra Nevada thing. The plantings were great. They got the trees right—pine and oak. And the fake mountain and streams and waterfalls were pretty cool in that, “Sure, it’s all plastic, but I’m in the mood...” kind of way. We were on line for about forty minutes. Five minutes away from getting on, and the whole Magilla broke down. We waited while repairmen scratched their heads, started it up again for a bit and then it stopped again. In the park for over an hour and all we did was stand in that line. Cranky. I looked at the kid with the C.I.A. printed T-shirt that announced and stood for “Christ is Alive,” and I wondered, “Can he fix this thing?”
We left because our fast passes were ready for using. And use them we did. The Soarin’ over California was cool and pretty much like I described it above. Glad to have done it. Worth the drive down. The cool pine scent. The dizzy heights. The grand California scenery.
After our visual ride experience, we figured we’d go on the huge roller coaster over in the Paradise Pier Section, the other big ride in California Adventure. This area was kind of the best looking part of the park. It was simply a remake of a boardwalk. Like Santa Monica or Santa Cruz. And the rides were very carnival. We got to the entrance of California Screamin’, the coaster, and it, too, like the Grizzly Rafts, was broken.
So, the two biggest rides were busted. We left the park.
We went to Downtown Disney, the open shopping mall connected to the theme parks, with a movie theatre, stores, Disney stores, and ridiculous theme restaurants. We ate at The Rain Forest. The one where every half hour there’s a rain storm and the plastic gorillas and elephants move and make a lot of noise? They must have one in Nanuet by now.
You can imagine how delicious the food was.
It was here, in the Rainforest, where I discovered the most abundant (excepting rodents) American mammal: The humanoid cow.
Now look, none of us are thin any longer. And ten, twenty, even thirty extra pounds on someone isn’t so awful. If you ever get cancer in that condition, you might get a few extra weeks of life. But these people, these people were all between sixty and a hundred pounds overweight. All those planes that flew in all these monsters from all across the land! It was like a horror movie.
And there they were, gorging on huge plates of corporate food that all tasted like sugar and oil, in a plastic Rainforest, swallowing their disappointment for all the broken rides. Can you imagine spending your life savings to take your family to Anaheim and all you get to do is wait in line and then leave because the rides are all broken? And then the consolation prize is heaping mounds of imitation food?
Everyone was enormous. Those poor children! Drinking high fructose corn syrup out of plastic cups that actually flashed with electric rainbow strobe jewels.
After the ogita slather, we escaped from the jungle. Bardo had to go into the Disney store to use his discount to buy a present for a relative. Adam and I waited outside. We sat on a benchy-wall of a planted area and at our feet was a small, round vent about six inches in diameter. And rising up from the slits was the foulest smell of half treated sewage. We had to move over. Who manages the sewage treatment that it actually wafts up into the middle of the Disney food court? Goofy?
When we all piled into the tram and back to the parking structure, the cool looking escalator that we took down was broken, too, so the Disney visitors had to walk down a three story high, stopped escalator. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that the broken escalator was only the beginning.
Can you imagine being from some burb-o-America, slathering your enormous, mis-shapened body into a jet only to land in Anaheim where you will spend what little money you have on entrance fees to a theme park that is broken down and then eat terrible food that does nothing but make you sadder so you then have to work even harder at Walmart so you can save more money to take another dysfunctional, plastic vacation filled with corn syrup?
If Christ is Alive, why the hell isn't he doing something about all this?
God bless America? Raze it.
Friday, August 04, 2006
Who Knows Where the Time Goes?
Okay
Today was my birthday. Do I get a day off from blogging?
I’m sitting here, with a bit of a headache from drinking wine at the Farmers Market. I have this yearly party in the food court. It’s cheap. It’s easy. And you can buy bottles of alcohol at the wine bar. California is a wine friendly state. With my closest friends. Sitting near the raw meat of a butcher shop. Mostly chicken.
Very spirited. Very fun to be 44. Yes. 44.
I mean, who are they kidding?
I am listening to Eva Cassidy (who is now dead) singing Who Knows Where the Time Goes? Nice.
When I die, if I have a tomb stone (which I won’t) but if I do, it would read, “My sinuses never felt better.”
What I want for 44 is better air, lower temperatures and more people laughing and talking to each other on street cars. Maybe go listen to more live music.
Happy Birthday to everyone.
Today was my birthday. Do I get a day off from blogging?
I’m sitting here, with a bit of a headache from drinking wine at the Farmers Market. I have this yearly party in the food court. It’s cheap. It’s easy. And you can buy bottles of alcohol at the wine bar. California is a wine friendly state. With my closest friends. Sitting near the raw meat of a butcher shop. Mostly chicken.
Very spirited. Very fun to be 44. Yes. 44.
I mean, who are they kidding?
I am listening to Eva Cassidy (who is now dead) singing Who Knows Where the Time Goes? Nice.
When I die, if I have a tomb stone (which I won’t) but if I do, it would read, “My sinuses never felt better.”
What I want for 44 is better air, lower temperatures and more people laughing and talking to each other on street cars. Maybe go listen to more live music.
Happy Birthday to everyone.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Buy This Book: Coming to My Rescue
How often can one say, "My Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner's Mother wrote a book and it has just been published!"
After poking around the commercial publishing world, Judith took the matter into her own hands (rescuing herself again, having done so two other times, first, by surviving, second, by writing this book) and self-published. And here it is. You can buy it today. I particularly love the memoir pieces about growing up in the difficult 1930's and 1940's. Judith was half orphaned as a child but might as well have been completely abandoned. She survives to tell the tale. There are incredibly touching chapters about her relationship with her Aunt, the only adult who really cared about her. A particularly heartbreaking section about Judith visiting her before she died will make you want gentle, real love in your life.
I also very much liked the sections about Judith moving to Connecticut and trying to fit in, going to college and trying to fit in, marrying into a "family-with-lineage" and trying to fit in and never really fitting in.
Interwoven throughout the book is a call to a retro-feminine role of women as caretakers. Some hardass babes may wince at these sections. I found the philosophy pretty clear headed and refreshing.
Coming to My Rescue is about growing up. A young woman comes of age with hardly any support, and flails and sputters in the twisted world of Yankee coldness and survives by the warmth in her own heart and by seeing the warmth in others, especially innocent children. Check it out. Buy a copy for yourself or for your mother or for your favorite aunt or for your local library. This is a touching tale by an author who has examined her life. Published in the newfangled style.
Coming to My Rescue by Judith Malin Waring
This novel is about Mildred Cabell, a woman who, in late middle age, realizes she has always felt “too little”. In trying to understand why, she opens “a place in my head where I’ve kept all the sadness.” There she finds childhood memories of the thousand daily cruelties of a hurting family that has been passing its pain along for generations.
Mildred begins to feel a tenderness towards herself, as well as an anger at the culture for its ongoing blind disregard of the emotional needs of not only its children but also its entire citizenry.
And so her rescue begins.
After poking around the commercial publishing world, Judith took the matter into her own hands (rescuing herself again, having done so two other times, first, by surviving, second, by writing this book) and self-published. And here it is. You can buy it today. I particularly love the memoir pieces about growing up in the difficult 1930's and 1940's. Judith was half orphaned as a child but might as well have been completely abandoned. She survives to tell the tale. There are incredibly touching chapters about her relationship with her Aunt, the only adult who really cared about her. A particularly heartbreaking section about Judith visiting her before she died will make you want gentle, real love in your life.
I also very much liked the sections about Judith moving to Connecticut and trying to fit in, going to college and trying to fit in, marrying into a "family-with-lineage" and trying to fit in and never really fitting in.
Interwoven throughout the book is a call to a retro-feminine role of women as caretakers. Some hardass babes may wince at these sections. I found the philosophy pretty clear headed and refreshing.
Coming to My Rescue is about growing up. A young woman comes of age with hardly any support, and flails and sputters in the twisted world of Yankee coldness and survives by the warmth in her own heart and by seeing the warmth in others, especially innocent children. Check it out. Buy a copy for yourself or for your mother or for your favorite aunt or for your local library. This is a touching tale by an author who has examined her life. Published in the newfangled style.
Coming to My Rescue by Judith Malin Waring
This novel is about Mildred Cabell, a woman who, in late middle age, realizes she has always felt “too little”. In trying to understand why, she opens “a place in my head where I’ve kept all the sadness.” There she finds childhood memories of the thousand daily cruelties of a hurting family that has been passing its pain along for generations.
Mildred begins to feel a tenderness towards herself, as well as an anger at the culture for its ongoing blind disregard of the emotional needs of not only its children but also its entire citizenry.
And so her rescue begins.
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
Find the Cost of Freedom
Okay for me, it was all about David Crosby. Yeah, Neil Young still fashions himself as a rock star. And the unifying theme this evening was anti-war, freedom of speech, etc. and that was supposed to be powerful, and it was in a group cheering/short lived kind of way. But basically, when I go to a CSNY concert at the Hollywood Bowl, I’m only interested in the music, how it sounds.
Though I consider myself a protester, I don’t love protest songs.
But I did love Long Time Gone and Find the Cost of Freedom.
But really, it was all about Crosby. His voice. His cool guitar chords with the intricate picking. His solid stance, no bullshit, just playing music and singing really well. With his Yosemite Sam hairdo and his “I’ve been around, man, I’m just going to do this straight up as best I can,” I was blown away. Almost Cut my Hair. Shit.
When he and Graham Nash did Guinnivere, with only the guitar and the two of them singing, come on, it was frigging relgious. Crosby sings with full command of his voice. Up, plaintive and clear. The guy really is the Poppa Dadddy with the talent.
He was amazing.
But did I say, so was everyone else? The big deal about this concert tonight was really how good these guys still are. All of them. Sure, at times when the set switched to focusing on Stephen Stills or Neil Young, you could just hear the scratch of lawyers pens going over contracts that relegated performance time allotment. But hell, these guys did it pretty smoothly and with great ease and no ego. They took turns backing up the featured guy when he was the lead singer of his song.
Neil Young seemed to be the most preening. But he is a solid lead guitarist and maybe this is what is required to get this leadership thing across. Plus, it takes some good, solid Canadian balls to write a song about impeaching the president for being a liar. When he ended the night with Keep on Rockin’ in a Free World, with no encore, people were truly rocked out, even if we all were over forty.
Stephen Stills is still this blues guy. And he was greatly appreciated. Not my thing, but he was solid as hell and from what I can tell from looking around, he got to the bluesy heart of people in a very direct way.
Graham Nash, well, I mean, he’s amazing filler/sweetness.
Thirty-thousand people on a Monday night in the Hollywood Bowl. It felt like a very important event, what with the Iraq footage and network call letters at the bottom right in a font that looked quite cable TV authentic, the call letters being LWW, “Living With War”.
Exiting was difficult. There were so many people, it was kind of crushing and oddly suggestive of a refugee scenario. We survived.
We are in a redo of the late 1960's---in a stupid mess.
But this time around with this war and this terrible president, there is not the upswing of youth protesting. It’s just old people sitting around complaining and going to a concert on a Monday night for fifty bucks. And then exiting like cows in funnels.
But hell, we’re tired. The kids have to do it. They need to push back from their computers and their Blackberries and save the planet. There needs to be a huge swell. A real one.
It cooled off nicely outside. I was thinking... How great Los Angeles can be. Thinking...What a ridiculously special setting, this Hollywood Bowl. The oaks up on the ridge. The mountains all around.
Knowing...What a fucking amazing day it was when Mamma Cass was swimming in Peter Tork’s pool with these guys in the hills and suggested the formation of this band because she thought they’d do well together.
Though I consider myself a protester, I don’t love protest songs.
But I did love Long Time Gone and Find the Cost of Freedom.
But really, it was all about Crosby. His voice. His cool guitar chords with the intricate picking. His solid stance, no bullshit, just playing music and singing really well. With his Yosemite Sam hairdo and his “I’ve been around, man, I’m just going to do this straight up as best I can,” I was blown away. Almost Cut my Hair. Shit.
When he and Graham Nash did Guinnivere, with only the guitar and the two of them singing, come on, it was frigging relgious. Crosby sings with full command of his voice. Up, plaintive and clear. The guy really is the Poppa Dadddy with the talent.
He was amazing.
But did I say, so was everyone else? The big deal about this concert tonight was really how good these guys still are. All of them. Sure, at times when the set switched to focusing on Stephen Stills or Neil Young, you could just hear the scratch of lawyers pens going over contracts that relegated performance time allotment. But hell, these guys did it pretty smoothly and with great ease and no ego. They took turns backing up the featured guy when he was the lead singer of his song.
Neil Young seemed to be the most preening. But he is a solid lead guitarist and maybe this is what is required to get this leadership thing across. Plus, it takes some good, solid Canadian balls to write a song about impeaching the president for being a liar. When he ended the night with Keep on Rockin’ in a Free World, with no encore, people were truly rocked out, even if we all were over forty.
Stephen Stills is still this blues guy. And he was greatly appreciated. Not my thing, but he was solid as hell and from what I can tell from looking around, he got to the bluesy heart of people in a very direct way.
Graham Nash, well, I mean, he’s amazing filler/sweetness.
Thirty-thousand people on a Monday night in the Hollywood Bowl. It felt like a very important event, what with the Iraq footage and network call letters at the bottom right in a font that looked quite cable TV authentic, the call letters being LWW, “Living With War”.
Exiting was difficult. There were so many people, it was kind of crushing and oddly suggestive of a refugee scenario. We survived.
We are in a redo of the late 1960's---in a stupid mess.
But this time around with this war and this terrible president, there is not the upswing of youth protesting. It’s just old people sitting around complaining and going to a concert on a Monday night for fifty bucks. And then exiting like cows in funnels.
But hell, we’re tired. The kids have to do it. They need to push back from their computers and their Blackberries and save the planet. There needs to be a huge swell. A real one.
It cooled off nicely outside. I was thinking... How great Los Angeles can be. Thinking...What a ridiculously special setting, this Hollywood Bowl. The oaks up on the ridge. The mountains all around.
Knowing...What a fucking amazing day it was when Mamma Cass was swimming in Peter Tork’s pool with these guys in the hills and suggested the formation of this band because she thought they’d do well together.
Monday, July 31, 2006
Traveling to The Great White North
Lucky for me, I enjoy going to Far Northern Idaho for the weekend. My in-laws (most of them) live in Sandpoint, Idaho...a beautiful mountain town snuggled against a forty-mile long lake.
And, also lucky for me, I enjoy the company of the Warings. A fun bunch with big hearts and good minds.
And the huge plus side of all the flying around over such a short period of time is: I had a wheely bag! Made by Charlie Sport and purchased in Jackson Heights, Queens, for thirty dollars. This is the first time in my adult life that a trip has ended and my shoulders are not killing me. I have oft eschewed the luggage on wheels. It just seemed so weak. And whenever you go to the restroom, there your wheels sit, on floors of piss. The shoulder duffel is not that kind of victim.
But dirty wheels are a small price to pay for happy shoulders.
And, also lucky for me, I enjoy the company of the Warings. A fun bunch with big hearts and good minds.
And the huge plus side of all the flying around over such a short period of time is: I had a wheely bag! Made by Charlie Sport and purchased in Jackson Heights, Queens, for thirty dollars. This is the first time in my adult life that a trip has ended and my shoulders are not killing me. I have oft eschewed the luggage on wheels. It just seemed so weak. And whenever you go to the restroom, there your wheels sit, on floors of piss. The shoulder duffel is not that kind of victim.
But dirty wheels are a small price to pay for happy shoulders.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Points of View. Gathering?
The truth is out.
People are coming around to agreeing that we have an ecological nightmare on our hands.
Many religious people feel they have to take care of God’s Planet.
Businessmen are realizing that it makes good green-financial sense to be green.
And intelligent, conscious people have known this for years.
Why is it that it takes people so long to come around? (To Galileo, to Newton, to Darwin?)
My hypothesis of why the religious and the mercantile groups can’t agree with the academic-humanists and why they must wait until it hits them in an entirely different way.
1) The Religious find thinking people to be very cold. As awful as Religionsists are, there is a certain zing in their connection to God, Church and Man. These Religionists want everything to come to them through God—what really is nothing more that warm fuzzy opiate that Marx so often spoke of. If it isn’t warm and Godlike, then it can’t be real. Once they see God’s handiwork being destroyed, however, they start coming around.
2) Businessmen just find the thinking man to be lazy. If a thinking man was any kind of man, he would get off his ass and do something. Build something. Bully a widow into giving away her last fifty-thousand dollars. The businessman has no respect for the thinking man unless the thinking man is coming up with another widget that the businessman can sell. Once they see their empires crumbling because of unsustainable business practices, they start to come around.
Though thinking people are always reviled for challenging the status quo, would it not be so much easier for the Religionists and the Capitalists to accept that most change, at least before and after the dark ages, has been fomented by thinking men? But then, that would require really thinking about it.
I don’t care how smarmy out next president is, as long as he can bring these groups together under a platform of change. We wait.
THE SECOND COMING—William Butler Yeats
TURNING and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of i{Spiritus Mundi}
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
People are coming around to agreeing that we have an ecological nightmare on our hands.
Many religious people feel they have to take care of God’s Planet.
Businessmen are realizing that it makes good green-financial sense to be green.
And intelligent, conscious people have known this for years.
Why is it that it takes people so long to come around? (To Galileo, to Newton, to Darwin?)
My hypothesis of why the religious and the mercantile groups can’t agree with the academic-humanists and why they must wait until it hits them in an entirely different way.
1) The Religious find thinking people to be very cold. As awful as Religionsists are, there is a certain zing in their connection to God, Church and Man. These Religionists want everything to come to them through God—what really is nothing more that warm fuzzy opiate that Marx so often spoke of. If it isn’t warm and Godlike, then it can’t be real. Once they see God’s handiwork being destroyed, however, they start coming around.
2) Businessmen just find the thinking man to be lazy. If a thinking man was any kind of man, he would get off his ass and do something. Build something. Bully a widow into giving away her last fifty-thousand dollars. The businessman has no respect for the thinking man unless the thinking man is coming up with another widget that the businessman can sell. Once they see their empires crumbling because of unsustainable business practices, they start to come around.
Though thinking people are always reviled for challenging the status quo, would it not be so much easier for the Religionists and the Capitalists to accept that most change, at least before and after the dark ages, has been fomented by thinking men? But then, that would require really thinking about it.
I don’t care how smarmy out next president is, as long as he can bring these groups together under a platform of change. We wait.
THE SECOND COMING—William Butler Yeats
TURNING and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of i{Spiritus Mundi}
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Train those Punims!
What is it about traveling by train? Why does it make the heart beat faster, the eyes glow brighter, the fun seem bottomless? Here we go!
And look at the smug joy on Jeff’s face as he takes his first ride on the Gold Line to Pasadena. Does one not see god in that expression? The god of joy and mystery?
And look at the smug joy on Jeff’s face as he takes his first ride on the Gold Line to Pasadena. Does one not see god in that expression? The god of joy and mystery?
Me and My Curly Tale
Many fine people I spoke with today wanted me to get back into acting.
A very odd experience, indeed.
Someone I know is writing an Indie feature for me to be in. I don’t know if this person is just very foolish or afraid to find someone better or thinks I'm just the perfect bulldog for his picture. (Or if he will ever really get down to finishing.)
A very good director and associate of mine in The New Theatre asked me today, “When are you going to do your one man show again?”
And, a producer I had drinks with on La Brea, a lovely friend who has made some very good movies filled with deservedly famous people said, “It’s time for you to do another show like American Air (my one man joint). I’ll do everything I can to help you. You are dynamic, not many people can do what you do, you are a deep thinker with lots of things to say about our culture, and the type of performance that you do is very underrepresented. Plus, it will help sell your book. You should adapt your book.”
And I said, “Okay, I’ll do it!”
This is not the first time I’ve been in a bar and exclaimed, without too much reflection, that I would do something. Sometimes, I follow through.
It was one of those puffy ego days when everyone was feeding me. And oddly enough, I was just recently saying something along the lines of, “I’m so sick of being a brown haired, middle aged guy that no one notices.”
All comments from the you-oughta-be-in-pictures crowd are suspect. Who knows why people ever say anything? But that it came at me today so concentrated makes me think that maybe the hammy pig that lives in me might feel trapped and so he is subconsciously oinking. Does he need a little free range action?
Perhaps I should just go do some karaoke and be done with the urge. Come home and put my flat nose back in my laptop. Tap my cloven feet against the floor. Eat my own crap.
A very odd experience, indeed.
Someone I know is writing an Indie feature for me to be in. I don’t know if this person is just very foolish or afraid to find someone better or thinks I'm just the perfect bulldog for his picture. (Or if he will ever really get down to finishing.)
A very good director and associate of mine in The New Theatre asked me today, “When are you going to do your one man show again?”
And, a producer I had drinks with on La Brea, a lovely friend who has made some very good movies filled with deservedly famous people said, “It’s time for you to do another show like American Air (my one man joint). I’ll do everything I can to help you. You are dynamic, not many people can do what you do, you are a deep thinker with lots of things to say about our culture, and the type of performance that you do is very underrepresented. Plus, it will help sell your book. You should adapt your book.”
And I said, “Okay, I’ll do it!”
This is not the first time I’ve been in a bar and exclaimed, without too much reflection, that I would do something. Sometimes, I follow through.
It was one of those puffy ego days when everyone was feeding me. And oddly enough, I was just recently saying something along the lines of, “I’m so sick of being a brown haired, middle aged guy that no one notices.”
All comments from the you-oughta-be-in-pictures crowd are suspect. Who knows why people ever say anything? But that it came at me today so concentrated makes me think that maybe the hammy pig that lives in me might feel trapped and so he is subconsciously oinking. Does he need a little free range action?
Perhaps I should just go do some karaoke and be done with the urge. Come home and put my flat nose back in my laptop. Tap my cloven feet against the floor. Eat my own crap.
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
Dan Has the Coolest Job
So, my good friend, Dan, works at Southern California Edison in the internal communications department. He really knows what's going on. And truthfully, Southern California Edison really is trying, in a very public way, to help with this whole energy crunch. Interesting tip:
Consider unplugging consumer electronics when they are not in use. Even
when turned off, CD players in the U.S. consume enough energy in one
year to power the Las Vegas Strip for six months.
I cannot say that I've done this. However, I do think it's a good idea. Maybe just click that power cord for the whole mess of media boxes to the off position when not in use?
What a world.
Los Angeles is so hot and humid, it feels like New Jersey. Interesting. Many people are complaining. Honestly, I just find it very interesting. What's next???
Consider unplugging consumer electronics when they are not in use. Even
when turned off, CD players in the U.S. consume enough energy in one
year to power the Las Vegas Strip for six months.
I cannot say that I've done this. However, I do think it's a good idea. Maybe just click that power cord for the whole mess of media boxes to the off position when not in use?
What a world.
Los Angeles is so hot and humid, it feels like New Jersey. Interesting. Many people are complaining. Honestly, I just find it very interesting. What's next???
Monday, July 24, 2006
The Real and the Imagined
All of it, all of it, all of it, all religion and philosophy seems to be the tug between the material and the imagining that we are not material.
Now I have no idea what we are. A puppet show for Zeus? Highly evolved plankton? Aliens living in a war torn Matrix? Whatever.
But it does seem true that human beings are very sad that they are material entities who must one day cease to exist. And so, all these ideologies are invented in order to placate the pain of being temporary.
And what seems to be the mental construct that hits the center of this problem is a denial of the material. If the material world is denied, then one cannot be so upset if one is no longer in it one day. Religion certainly does this. It seems to want to deny the material world for some made up situation at the end. But as we all know, pushing an idea away only makes it stronger, so in the end, very religious people become extremely attached to real things, like land.
Extreme intellectuals try to deny the material, getting lost in a world of abstract thinking. This can only lead to anxiety, since the body does want to live a material existence. And usually, the person trapped in his own mind tries to use his thoughts to control others to do his bidding. Material bidding.
The human animal is a driven beast. Territorial. Competitive. Hungry. And all attempts to quash these drives, to deny our material nature, ends up causing ourselves and everyone around us so much pain. And certainly, by denying others their drives, by saying they do not deserve to have their needs met, like the poor or like others who don’t act and behave American, then, nothing but earthly conflict can ensue.
So, one must accept the material world. The material self. And live it. And to accept that life is material for others, too. And to not worry about the end of your particular living body. And to not worry so much about what you own, but to own just enough so that you aren’t miserable. And to hope that others own enough and have enough so they aren’t miserable either. And to stop imaging that one is so much more than an earthbound animal, albeit it, one with a sense of decorum.
The world is material. One must stop denying this. One must take care of the world. One must acknowledge that each individual is grabbing their own goods for their own use. But we can remind each other that each person needs a sense of proportion. And finally, one must understand that life is temporary, for sure, and nothing can be done about that. So, no need to worry, no need for all these religious and other alienating constructs. You weren’t here one hundred years ago, you didn’t worry about not being alive then.
Now I have no idea what we are. A puppet show for Zeus? Highly evolved plankton? Aliens living in a war torn Matrix? Whatever.
But it does seem true that human beings are very sad that they are material entities who must one day cease to exist. And so, all these ideologies are invented in order to placate the pain of being temporary.
And what seems to be the mental construct that hits the center of this problem is a denial of the material. If the material world is denied, then one cannot be so upset if one is no longer in it one day. Religion certainly does this. It seems to want to deny the material world for some made up situation at the end. But as we all know, pushing an idea away only makes it stronger, so in the end, very religious people become extremely attached to real things, like land.
Extreme intellectuals try to deny the material, getting lost in a world of abstract thinking. This can only lead to anxiety, since the body does want to live a material existence. And usually, the person trapped in his own mind tries to use his thoughts to control others to do his bidding. Material bidding.
The human animal is a driven beast. Territorial. Competitive. Hungry. And all attempts to quash these drives, to deny our material nature, ends up causing ourselves and everyone around us so much pain. And certainly, by denying others their drives, by saying they do not deserve to have their needs met, like the poor or like others who don’t act and behave American, then, nothing but earthly conflict can ensue.
So, one must accept the material world. The material self. And live it. And to accept that life is material for others, too. And to not worry about the end of your particular living body. And to not worry so much about what you own, but to own just enough so that you aren’t miserable. And to hope that others own enough and have enough so they aren’t miserable either. And to stop imaging that one is so much more than an earthbound animal, albeit it, one with a sense of decorum.
The world is material. One must stop denying this. One must take care of the world. One must acknowledge that each individual is grabbing their own goods for their own use. But we can remind each other that each person needs a sense of proportion. And finally, one must understand that life is temporary, for sure, and nothing can be done about that. So, no need to worry, no need for all these religious and other alienating constructs. You weren’t here one hundred years ago, you didn’t worry about not being alive then.
Friday, July 21, 2006
America's Year of the Museum: Spotlight on Sarah Schultz
Why not check out Sarah Schultz, one of my oldest friends on the earth? You know, these little Quicktime videos online are going to be gems twenty years from now. Like watching a Steve McQueen movie. I love the production of this little piece which is part of a collection of museum celebration promotionals for America's Year of the Museum. And I love that Sarah, the last museum official of the piece and the director of education at the Walker, is mostly in voiceover, starting with a visual of Jackie O., and they don't cut to her until she's almost finished when she mentions the importance of using the voice. You have to wonder why, though. She looks so great with that long hair.
Also, I love how the whole thing is very earnest and forthright, which makes it all seem so venerable. And the directness gives it the tone of a Saturday Night Live skit about ernest, forthright, venerable museum people. It reminds me of that little cartoon elk that walked in the snow with classical music playing in the background in the 1970's---promoting real estate in The Poconos. Bravo.
Walker Arts Center
Also, I love how the whole thing is very earnest and forthright, which makes it all seem so venerable. And the directness gives it the tone of a Saturday Night Live skit about ernest, forthright, venerable museum people. It reminds me of that little cartoon elk that walked in the snow with classical music playing in the background in the 1970's---promoting real estate in The Poconos. Bravo.
Walker Arts Center
Thursday, July 20, 2006
Midweek Party: Hollywood Whores
Tonight, our friend Randy had his going away party. He is leaving the Judge Judy show and moving to Chicago to go to film school.
As the night became more alcohol infused and the drunk karaoke girls became louder yet somehow more tolerable, someone pulled out Bradford’s Emmy from the Ellen Show, Bradford is the host and he was recently fired from being a producer on Ellen, and held it over his head while he wailed on the microphone Radiohead’s Creep.
Yes, Radiohead is now available in kareoke. And it made me very happy to see the silly Emmy used in this way. Those wings on the back of the Emmy are very pointy. Like letter openers or weapons.
As the night became more alcohol infused and the drunk karaoke girls became louder yet somehow more tolerable, someone pulled out Bradford’s Emmy from the Ellen Show, Bradford is the host and he was recently fired from being a producer on Ellen, and held it over his head while he wailed on the microphone Radiohead’s Creep.
Yes, Radiohead is now available in kareoke. And it made me very happy to see the silly Emmy used in this way. Those wings on the back of the Emmy are very pointy. Like letter openers or weapons.
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Congratulations to The House of Representatives
For voting against the ridiculous Federal Marriage Amendment. By a large margin.
No surprise.
But still, who would have thought Bush would be voted into a second term?
You have to be wary.
In this case, rational men prevailed.
Rest peacefully. A time is gonna come.
No surprise.
But still, who would have thought Bush would be voted into a second term?
You have to be wary.
In this case, rational men prevailed.
Rest peacefully. A time is gonna come.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Pedaling Against the Spiders
If it’s global warming, so be it. Let people die as they must for the culture to be shocked into understanding what we have done to the earth.
People only understand pain.
Los Angeles has become humid. This is very strange, indeed. And this change of climate has produced so many pests. When you sit in the backyard, you get eaten by mosquitoes. Huge cockroaches come into the house in search of a cooler place to be disgusting. Tiny gnats die in the dog’s water bowl. The refrigerator has dead gnats along the top inside edge of the door, above the butter dish.
But what is the most disturbing is when you have to walk the dog. Spider webs across the sidewalk. It’s like something out of a scary ride in a bad carnival in the 1970’s. Every twenty feet, that sticky little string plants itself on your forehead. And all you can do is wipe.
I’m no arachnophobe, but I don’t like that feeling of spider webs on my face. This is my pain. For my part to combat global warming, I only use my car once each week. I blog about energy use and subways. I close the curtains in the middle of the day so the sun doesn’t turn my tiny bungalow into a solarium. Of course, I could do more, like figure out how to split the water molecule into Oxygen and Hydrogen gas without using any energy except for maybe what I can produce by pedaling a stationary bike. Wait, that’s it.
So, soon, I will be setting up gyms where you can split water. Please join one. It will be called The Hydro-Gym. And then, once all of our fat asses are back in shape and the earth starts cooling down again, then maybe I can walk the dog without that miserable thwack of spider silk sticking to my greasy brow.
People only understand pain.
Los Angeles has become humid. This is very strange, indeed. And this change of climate has produced so many pests. When you sit in the backyard, you get eaten by mosquitoes. Huge cockroaches come into the house in search of a cooler place to be disgusting. Tiny gnats die in the dog’s water bowl. The refrigerator has dead gnats along the top inside edge of the door, above the butter dish.
But what is the most disturbing is when you have to walk the dog. Spider webs across the sidewalk. It’s like something out of a scary ride in a bad carnival in the 1970’s. Every twenty feet, that sticky little string plants itself on your forehead. And all you can do is wipe.
I’m no arachnophobe, but I don’t like that feeling of spider webs on my face. This is my pain. For my part to combat global warming, I only use my car once each week. I blog about energy use and subways. I close the curtains in the middle of the day so the sun doesn’t turn my tiny bungalow into a solarium. Of course, I could do more, like figure out how to split the water molecule into Oxygen and Hydrogen gas without using any energy except for maybe what I can produce by pedaling a stationary bike. Wait, that’s it.
So, soon, I will be setting up gyms where you can split water. Please join one. It will be called The Hydro-Gym. And then, once all of our fat asses are back in shape and the earth starts cooling down again, then maybe I can walk the dog without that miserable thwack of spider silk sticking to my greasy brow.
Monday, July 17, 2006
The Future is in Trains
Having passed the weekend by subway and by foot, I feel happy to be a part of the ever growing possibilities of living in the future Los Angeles.
Who wouldn't want to go to Rosemead if you could get there from Silver Lake on the
Metro Silver Line?
And look at all the ideas people have come up with for the future of Los Angeles:
The Transit Coalition
I particularly like the Westside Smorgasbord However, I would move the Crenshaw line two blocks West to La Brea and let it go all the way North to the Red Line.
It's going to happen. The Expo Line opens soon.
I can't wait to take it to Culver City, and then stand there in the middle of nowhere and wonder, "When is this thing going to go all the way to the beach?"
Who wouldn't want to go to Rosemead if you could get there from Silver Lake on the
Metro Silver Line?
And look at all the ideas people have come up with for the future of Los Angeles:
The Transit Coalition
I particularly like the Westside Smorgasbord However, I would move the Crenshaw line two blocks West to La Brea and let it go all the way North to the Red Line.
It's going to happen. The Expo Line opens soon.
I can't wait to take it to Culver City, and then stand there in the middle of nowhere and wonder, "When is this thing going to go all the way to the beach?"
Friday, July 14, 2006
What the Hezbollah is Going On?
I mentioned the Israeli who sat next to me on the plane from San Francisco to New York. We talked about the house he was building, using Palestinian labor (“Because it’s so cheap, what other choice do I have?"), where he and his wife and four children will live very close to the future “wall” that is being built around Israel. It was clear to me that his Zionist ass is never going to leave Israel. He is one of many.
So, you just have to say to these Hezbollah-Hamas-Godzilla people, “The Jews ain’t leaving. Go home, eat your chick peas and thank Allah for whatever dust patch you have.”
These people.
In the early 1970’s, while attending the primarily Jewish public school, Bluefield Elementary (which is now a private Yeshiva for Hasidic offspring), sharp girls like Janet Diatlo and Julie Fishkin would give oral reports on the many wars of Israel. 1967, the ones in the 1970’s, on and on. And there was this reverence in their Ashkenazi miens. Their suburban parents taught them to have a strong melancholy sentimentality for their homeland...stronger than anything the Irish or the Italians had naturally, even though the Irish and Italians actually did come from Ireland and Italy. I sort of felt bad for these girls. They didn’t look quite convinced about their connected love of the homeland, but they acted all dewy and caring. They were filled with passion and confusion at once. But it was clear: they were going to obey the cult of Zionism. And, they were going to feel all tingly because they, too, had an “old country”. Note: The Jewish boys were too busy talking about boners to have any sort of idea of what Israel meant to them. Except for maybe Jerome.
The indoctrination of these post WWII minds, of the adults and the female children, was complete. This land was theirs. They felt it in their hearts. They taught it to their daughters. These daughters will become mothers and so the perpetual machine has been invented.
Now, I don’t give a flying matzo who lives there. You can have that strip of sand surrounded by angry lunatics. And I think we can all agree, these Israelis really did have a rough couple of thousand years. They have been pogrommed for eons, and they have an enormous need and they are never leaving.
And these Arabs---some hate that the Jews are there, but some actually don’t care. So, the Israelis, with their greater absolute value in caring, will always prevail. Especially with all of our American money. And frankly, I’m all for the state of Israel, if for no other reason than when all the Jews return to the homeland, all the Right-Wing Christians get to have their Rapture. What a party!
But until the Rapture, I do think this: The Israelis need to push the Palestinians out of their country and then completely close and militarize their borders. And they need to cease using the Palestinians for cheap labor. Because frankly, no matter what the nice Arab worker says to you while he’s hammering nails into the two by fours that are the skeleton of your new three-thousand square foot house right next to his olive grove, as soon as you turn your back, he’s going to call you a dirty Jew.
Oh you Jews, stop giving them work. Stop thinking you will ever get along. Even though you fled Germany as if there was a Holocaust going on there (oh, right, there was) it doesn’t mean you can’t learn a thing or two from the Germans: Hire Turks to do your dirty work.
You will never get along.
Stop mixing economically.
Build that wall.
And have your peace.
I've been listening to this crap since 1967. I'm bored.
Adonai help them all.
So, you just have to say to these Hezbollah-Hamas-Godzilla people, “The Jews ain’t leaving. Go home, eat your chick peas and thank Allah for whatever dust patch you have.”
These people.
In the early 1970’s, while attending the primarily Jewish public school, Bluefield Elementary (which is now a private Yeshiva for Hasidic offspring), sharp girls like Janet Diatlo and Julie Fishkin would give oral reports on the many wars of Israel. 1967, the ones in the 1970’s, on and on. And there was this reverence in their Ashkenazi miens. Their suburban parents taught them to have a strong melancholy sentimentality for their homeland...stronger than anything the Irish or the Italians had naturally, even though the Irish and Italians actually did come from Ireland and Italy. I sort of felt bad for these girls. They didn’t look quite convinced about their connected love of the homeland, but they acted all dewy and caring. They were filled with passion and confusion at once. But it was clear: they were going to obey the cult of Zionism. And, they were going to feel all tingly because they, too, had an “old country”. Note: The Jewish boys were too busy talking about boners to have any sort of idea of what Israel meant to them. Except for maybe Jerome.
The indoctrination of these post WWII minds, of the adults and the female children, was complete. This land was theirs. They felt it in their hearts. They taught it to their daughters. These daughters will become mothers and so the perpetual machine has been invented.
Now, I don’t give a flying matzo who lives there. You can have that strip of sand surrounded by angry lunatics. And I think we can all agree, these Israelis really did have a rough couple of thousand years. They have been pogrommed for eons, and they have an enormous need and they are never leaving.
And these Arabs---some hate that the Jews are there, but some actually don’t care. So, the Israelis, with their greater absolute value in caring, will always prevail. Especially with all of our American money. And frankly, I’m all for the state of Israel, if for no other reason than when all the Jews return to the homeland, all the Right-Wing Christians get to have their Rapture. What a party!
But until the Rapture, I do think this: The Israelis need to push the Palestinians out of their country and then completely close and militarize their borders. And they need to cease using the Palestinians for cheap labor. Because frankly, no matter what the nice Arab worker says to you while he’s hammering nails into the two by fours that are the skeleton of your new three-thousand square foot house right next to his olive grove, as soon as you turn your back, he’s going to call you a dirty Jew.
Oh you Jews, stop giving them work. Stop thinking you will ever get along. Even though you fled Germany as if there was a Holocaust going on there (oh, right, there was) it doesn’t mean you can’t learn a thing or two from the Germans: Hire Turks to do your dirty work.
You will never get along.
Stop mixing economically.
Build that wall.
And have your peace.
I've been listening to this crap since 1967. I'm bored.
Adonai help them all.
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Call Me Nellie Forbush
But I have this cockeyed optimistic feeling that my book will be published.
Hell, the first editor is still interested once I get an agent and a hook.
After the despair of a little rejection from some big hitters (with a lot of kind compliments about my writing, but not necessarily the book), I think I just need a good sit down with my manny. I just have to give it the clear-eyed once over with an open mind and just let the editing answer come to me.
Sure, I wrote a memoir with pieces of fiction interweaved and maybe that was a silly idea (though I thought of it as a being constructed like a record album). And I could take out the fiction and leave a straight up memoir and change the title to Open Trench: A Man Abandons Suffern in Search of Fame and Immortality and All He Gets is a Lousy Domestic Partner. A Memoir.
Or just leave it as it is.
But I bet I do a tweaking, settle on a descriptive title and then make sure the pieces relate to the title.
The publishing industry is just as hook obsessed as the film industry. Who knew?
This learning curve, however, is pretty fast. And I feel up to the challenge. Why not?
I think I’ll call my second book something completely unrelated to the pieces within, something like, How to Carve a Beaver.
Hell, the first editor is still interested once I get an agent and a hook.
After the despair of a little rejection from some big hitters (with a lot of kind compliments about my writing, but not necessarily the book), I think I just need a good sit down with my manny. I just have to give it the clear-eyed once over with an open mind and just let the editing answer come to me.
Sure, I wrote a memoir with pieces of fiction interweaved and maybe that was a silly idea (though I thought of it as a being constructed like a record album). And I could take out the fiction and leave a straight up memoir and change the title to Open Trench: A Man Abandons Suffern in Search of Fame and Immortality and All He Gets is a Lousy Domestic Partner. A Memoir.
Or just leave it as it is.
But I bet I do a tweaking, settle on a descriptive title and then make sure the pieces relate to the title.
The publishing industry is just as hook obsessed as the film industry. Who knew?
This learning curve, however, is pretty fast. And I feel up to the challenge. Why not?
I think I’ll call my second book something completely unrelated to the pieces within, something like, How to Carve a Beaver.
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Gems of Ebay: Your Future Restaurant Awaits You!
My very close friends, Mary and Dan, and I, have begun a little theatre company called The New Theatre. It's actually very exciting though occasionally daunting. But what has been interesting is the fundraising. I thought I would hate it, but I kind of like it. You gather crap and sell it. You send letters to your friends and beg them for ten bucks. It's kind of funny. And in this manner, we have raised about Six-Thousand Dollars. Which is pretty good, considering six weeks ago we had zero.
And now these incredible gems are for sale. I cannot imagine anyone living without them. Don't miss your chance to own this lovely Limoges swag from Judge Judy. It's so frigging gorgeous, you take one look at it, you wish I was selling the whole lot.
And when you're done putting your pills away while contemplating justice, you can invite your friends over for a friendly card game and use this wonderful Fancy Poker Chips and Game Set from Judge Joe Brown.
How do you measure up? Buy this Golden Ruler from Judge Judy and find out for yourself.
There are so many things to sell. Every day. Look around your house, you can sell all of it. At our garage sale, our friend Bradford brought post-its. Guess what? They sold. People will buy anything! It's fantastic.
If you want to start a little endeavor and need a little nest egg, do what we did. Sell stuff on your lawn and ask your friends for nominal sums. You can take advantage of the fact that Americans refuse to save money. Of course, this means we will all have to work through old age or end up in the poor house. But there will be so many of us there it will be quite social.
We're up to 6k. 4 more and we'll be in amazing shape. Maybe I should sell time shares to the guest house in the backyard...
And now these incredible gems are for sale. I cannot imagine anyone living without them. Don't miss your chance to own this lovely Limoges swag from Judge Judy. It's so frigging gorgeous, you take one look at it, you wish I was selling the whole lot.
And when you're done putting your pills away while contemplating justice, you can invite your friends over for a friendly card game and use this wonderful Fancy Poker Chips and Game Set from Judge Joe Brown.
How do you measure up? Buy this Golden Ruler from Judge Judy and find out for yourself.
There are so many things to sell. Every day. Look around your house, you can sell all of it. At our garage sale, our friend Bradford brought post-its. Guess what? They sold. People will buy anything! It's fantastic.
If you want to start a little endeavor and need a little nest egg, do what we did. Sell stuff on your lawn and ask your friends for nominal sums. You can take advantage of the fact that Americans refuse to save money. Of course, this means we will all have to work through old age or end up in the poor house. But there will be so many of us there it will be quite social.
We're up to 6k. 4 more and we'll be in amazing shape. Maybe I should sell time shares to the guest house in the backyard...
Monday Night at The Movies: Water
Sometimes, when we're feeling all rebellious and wild, we go to the movies on a Monday night. I've been wanting to see WATER for a while now.
"Deepa Mehta's Water is a magnificent film. The ensemble acting of the women in the widows' hostel is exceptional: intimate, painful, wounded, jaundiced, corrupted, tender, tough. The fluid lyricism of the camera provides an unsettling contrast to the arid difficulties of the characters' lives. The film has serious, challenging things to say about the crushing of women by atrophied religious and social dogmas, but, to its great credit, it tells its story from inside its characters, rounding out the human drama of their lives, and unforgettably touching the heart."
- Salman Rushdie
It start's off very slow. I had a feeling it was going to be good. Basically, these women who are widows in India, because of financial reasons, get thrown into a widow's flop house where they are expected to live until they die. Based on some ancient Hindu tradition, a woman may not marry if she is widowed. And often, these women were married at the age of 7, so they could easily be pushed into living in this awful place for most of their lives. It was a devastating movie. It starts with a little girl being hauled off to live with these ancient, bitter widows, and a few sympathetic widows who help her out.
The story takes place in 1938. And Ghandi even makes an appearance. What is so interesting is how the women get small bits of information from the outside world, mostly through local gossip.
The filming is beautiful. The soundtrack is a delight. The story, by the end, is so powerful, you just kind of have to cry. It's summer. There's not so much to see out there. If you have this playing anywhere near you, check it out.
"Deepa Mehta's Water is a magnificent film. The ensemble acting of the women in the widows' hostel is exceptional: intimate, painful, wounded, jaundiced, corrupted, tender, tough. The fluid lyricism of the camera provides an unsettling contrast to the arid difficulties of the characters' lives. The film has serious, challenging things to say about the crushing of women by atrophied religious and social dogmas, but, to its great credit, it tells its story from inside its characters, rounding out the human drama of their lives, and unforgettably touching the heart."
- Salman Rushdie
It start's off very slow. I had a feeling it was going to be good. Basically, these women who are widows in India, because of financial reasons, get thrown into a widow's flop house where they are expected to live until they die. Based on some ancient Hindu tradition, a woman may not marry if she is widowed. And often, these women were married at the age of 7, so they could easily be pushed into living in this awful place for most of their lives. It was a devastating movie. It starts with a little girl being hauled off to live with these ancient, bitter widows, and a few sympathetic widows who help her out.
The story takes place in 1938. And Ghandi even makes an appearance. What is so interesting is how the women get small bits of information from the outside world, mostly through local gossip.
The filming is beautiful. The soundtrack is a delight. The story, by the end, is so powerful, you just kind of have to cry. It's summer. There's not so much to see out there. If you have this playing anywhere near you, check it out.
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Rejection
Interestingly, my book has been rejected by a publisher and an agent and though, at times, I feel like throwing myself off a bridge would be the most appropriate response, I have decided to live, instead.
Why, I thought the vicissitudes of the publishing world would not apply to me is even beyond my basic artistic narcissism. Somehow, I thought I would not have to deal with the agony of rejection, rewriting, possible failure, etc. Ah.
So here I am. Human, with all the other people who are writing, hoping to get published. I have decided to make the rewriting and the continuation of submitting a positive experience as opposed to the affirmation that what I have to say is without value.
Here I go.
Despair is not an option. Okay, maybe a resting place, but not the ultimate destination.
Why, I thought the vicissitudes of the publishing world would not apply to me is even beyond my basic artistic narcissism. Somehow, I thought I would not have to deal with the agony of rejection, rewriting, possible failure, etc. Ah.
So here I am. Human, with all the other people who are writing, hoping to get published. I have decided to make the rewriting and the continuation of submitting a positive experience as opposed to the affirmation that what I have to say is without value.
Here I go.
Despair is not an option. Okay, maybe a resting place, but not the ultimate destination.
Friday, July 07, 2006
Norbert: Welcome to Hollywood
Jeff, our very close friend who lives right down the street, picked his rescue cat at the Pasadena shelter and now Norbert has a new home on lovely Sycamore Avenue, right across the street from Petco and Ralphs. Should the cat food at Petco become tiresome, there are cans of tuna at Ralphs. Should the cans of tuna prove to be boring, then right across the street is salmon from Trader Joes.
Cats, as we all know, sleep a lot. Norbert is very sweet and when he isn't resting or sleeping off the sedative used to aid in removing his ear mites, he is extremely affectionate. Norbert is a mutt of a cat, and in the mix is Manx. Apparently, Manx cats are very friendly. Norbert, not being completely Manx, has a tail. This is good. It means he should not have spine problems later in life.
Nobert lets you rub his chest. A true sign of a dog-like cat. And of course, Norbert plays hard and then goes right back to sleep.
Welcome to the neighborhood, Norbert.
Cats, as we all know, sleep a lot. Norbert is very sweet and when he isn't resting or sleeping off the sedative used to aid in removing his ear mites, he is extremely affectionate. Norbert is a mutt of a cat, and in the mix is Manx. Apparently, Manx cats are very friendly. Norbert, not being completely Manx, has a tail. This is good. It means he should not have spine problems later in life.
Nobert lets you rub his chest. A true sign of a dog-like cat. And of course, Norbert plays hard and then goes right back to sleep.
Welcome to the neighborhood, Norbert.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Orwellian Time Zones
This, I do not understand. When I travel to the East Coast from Los Angeles, I set my laptop computer and my pocket PC handheld three hours ahead. I leave the setting for both computers as Pacific Time, otherwise, appointments in the handheld get changed.
So, for a few days everything is fine. Then, somehow, either the computer or the handheld figures out that the Pacific Time is actually three hours earlier than what I have set. And the laptop adjusts itself to the real Pacific Time.
How in the world does it know? From emails that arrive? From the cell phone being attached to the laptop as a modem? From government spies sending signals into my computers, into my brain?
Whatever happened to being able to control the time on the devices that you own? Are those days over?
Also, isn’t it amazing that when you walk through security at the airport, the pocket PC is automatically switched to Flight Mode so that its wireless capability is disabled?
Who sets these things up? Where’s my papyrus? Where’s my stone tablet and chisel?
So, for a few days everything is fine. Then, somehow, either the computer or the handheld figures out that the Pacific Time is actually three hours earlier than what I have set. And the laptop adjusts itself to the real Pacific Time.
How in the world does it know? From emails that arrive? From the cell phone being attached to the laptop as a modem? From government spies sending signals into my computers, into my brain?
Whatever happened to being able to control the time on the devices that you own? Are those days over?
Also, isn’t it amazing that when you walk through security at the airport, the pocket PC is automatically switched to Flight Mode so that its wireless capability is disabled?
Who sets these things up? Where’s my papyrus? Where’s my stone tablet and chisel?
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
Liberty and Justice for All
Happy Independence from Independence Day. We had our first little dinner party in the apartment tonight with none other than the Chrissy (of Chrissy Caviar fame, Google) and her boyfriend, Dave. Both, Right Wing. Moderate. Not crazy. No more racist than I am. But, Dave IS in the Marines Reserves. And Chrissy, well, she’s Republican by birth.
From our fourth floor window, facing west, we could see the random fireworks over Manhattan and the even bigger (yet smaller appearing because of distance) fireworks over New Jersey. And eventually, listening to all that booming and since I do have the actor gene and I can play the moderate, I dove in!
The big questions to the Marine: Why didn’t we put enough people in Iraq to get it done? Answer: We did have enough, the Turks just didn’t let us use their country and so we couldn’t clean up the Northern Rebels.
Next: Why did they show us some stupid trucks and pretend they were filled with WMD?
Answer: The French and the Germans and the Chinese all agreed that they had WMD.
Next: Bush is so hated, and I admit, it’s mostly a gut reaction from people, they can’t stand looking at him. So, really, I think people are more against his style than his actions. He’s loathsome and plays so stupid. Don’t you think?
Answer: Clinton was a great speaker. After him, anyone would not look so good. Plus, half the country believes he stole the 2000 election so no matter what he does, they hate him.
Next: It’s quite a swing from LBJ’s Great Society to Neocons. It’s been hard to swallow. Don’t you think?
Answer: What is a Neocon? If Wolfowitz’s name was Smith, no one would call him a Neocon. He’s a genius. Saying that the government is controlled by Neocons, it’s the extension of the Jews controlling the media. Neocons are the new Jews.
Next: Well, I’m not Jewish, so, I didn’t go looking for the Jewish thing.
Answer: It’s there.
We did not get heated. In fact, I kind of respect the idea of the grand gesture, the Neocon bluster. Why not? It’s refreshing if not ridiculous. Go blow up a country, sure, why not? Have a great time. See where it ends up. End of empire, maybe?
We landed on a subject that we could definitely agree upon: the poor black folks and how are they ever going to change. And we both agreed that it had to come from within their own community.
Then, we packed up all the leftovers (If you are ever in Jackson Heights, order the chicken from Pio Pio. It’s Peruvian, it’s tasty, it’s cheap, it’s on the corner of 85th and Northern Blvd.) And Chrissy and Dave left the apartment with the food in a big bag, plus the bouquet of carnations Adam bought a couple of days ago.
It’s nice to stay home on Independence Day.
From our fourth floor window, facing west, we could see the random fireworks over Manhattan and the even bigger (yet smaller appearing because of distance) fireworks over New Jersey. And eventually, listening to all that booming and since I do have the actor gene and I can play the moderate, I dove in!
The big questions to the Marine: Why didn’t we put enough people in Iraq to get it done? Answer: We did have enough, the Turks just didn’t let us use their country and so we couldn’t clean up the Northern Rebels.
Next: Why did they show us some stupid trucks and pretend they were filled with WMD?
Answer: The French and the Germans and the Chinese all agreed that they had WMD.
Next: Bush is so hated, and I admit, it’s mostly a gut reaction from people, they can’t stand looking at him. So, really, I think people are more against his style than his actions. He’s loathsome and plays so stupid. Don’t you think?
Answer: Clinton was a great speaker. After him, anyone would not look so good. Plus, half the country believes he stole the 2000 election so no matter what he does, they hate him.
Next: It’s quite a swing from LBJ’s Great Society to Neocons. It’s been hard to swallow. Don’t you think?
Answer: What is a Neocon? If Wolfowitz’s name was Smith, no one would call him a Neocon. He’s a genius. Saying that the government is controlled by Neocons, it’s the extension of the Jews controlling the media. Neocons are the new Jews.
Next: Well, I’m not Jewish, so, I didn’t go looking for the Jewish thing.
Answer: It’s there.
We did not get heated. In fact, I kind of respect the idea of the grand gesture, the Neocon bluster. Why not? It’s refreshing if not ridiculous. Go blow up a country, sure, why not? Have a great time. See where it ends up. End of empire, maybe?
We landed on a subject that we could definitely agree upon: the poor black folks and how are they ever going to change. And we both agreed that it had to come from within their own community.
Then, we packed up all the leftovers (If you are ever in Jackson Heights, order the chicken from Pio Pio. It’s Peruvian, it’s tasty, it’s cheap, it’s on the corner of 85th and Northern Blvd.) And Chrissy and Dave left the apartment with the food in a big bag, plus the bouquet of carnations Adam bought a couple of days ago.
It’s nice to stay home on Independence Day.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Konijn Eiland
Apparently, Coney Island was once an island with nothing on it but a whole load of rabbits. So, the Dutch named it Rabbit Island or Konijn Eiland. The English sounding equivalent was Coney Island. That's how it got its name. This is true.
Martha, my oldest best friend Megan's girlfriend, and I, went to Konijn Eiland today, not to chase down rabbits or trade with the Dutch, but to enjoy a day on the tawdry boardwalk and to get on those rides!
The new subway terminal at Coney Island is swanky. Like an American version of Gare d'Austerlitz. The first thing you see when you get off the train is Nathan's. So, you just have to eat, immediately. (Notice the Steeplechase above Nathan's. That used to be the parachute ride.)
After shoving down the dogs and cheese fries, we decided to play a little Skeeball. The game was in disrepair. Martha's Skeeball had trouble keeping score. I actually got a ball into the 100 hole in the upper left hand corner. It didn't register. While the fix-it lady was taking care of Martha's scoring lights, I told her what happened to my unscoring 100, she said, "Oh yeah, that one does that," and she gave me a few tickets to make up for it. After we amassed our huge sum of Skeeball tickets (about 80) we headed for the rides. Time for the Scrambler.
I can assure you, this woman started to look much happier once the ride got going. We loved it. The torque was wonderful. The air breezy. We followed it with The Tilt-a-Whirl. You pull on the lap bar, and that thing twirls like a dervish. Pukey. Off. The Cyclone beckoned.
Look at happy Martha daringly making her way through the quaint painted chain link entrance to the ride. This roller coaster is so old and rickety, you have to wonder how many people have died on it.
Up the Hill.
Down the Hill.
And that was one of the smaller downhills. The Cyclone is a world wonder because it's really compact. Every track is right next to each other. The drops feel vertical. The bumpy factor is high.
And look at these ancient tracks, all wobbly and bent. Supported by salt-air weakened wood.
We played some in the arcade, cashed in our Skeeball tickets for very cheap stuff and took a rest.
Lest you think our day was all hot dogs, cheese fries, games and rides, one must not forget, this whole thing began because of the Atlantic Ocean for the Dutch, the English and for us. You can take the D or the F or the N or the Q trains to the sea. Do it. It's invigorating.
Martha, my oldest best friend Megan's girlfriend, and I, went to Konijn Eiland today, not to chase down rabbits or trade with the Dutch, but to enjoy a day on the tawdry boardwalk and to get on those rides!
The new subway terminal at Coney Island is swanky. Like an American version of Gare d'Austerlitz. The first thing you see when you get off the train is Nathan's. So, you just have to eat, immediately. (Notice the Steeplechase above Nathan's. That used to be the parachute ride.)
After shoving down the dogs and cheese fries, we decided to play a little Skeeball. The game was in disrepair. Martha's Skeeball had trouble keeping score. I actually got a ball into the 100 hole in the upper left hand corner. It didn't register. While the fix-it lady was taking care of Martha's scoring lights, I told her what happened to my unscoring 100, she said, "Oh yeah, that one does that," and she gave me a few tickets to make up for it. After we amassed our huge sum of Skeeball tickets (about 80) we headed for the rides. Time for the Scrambler.
I can assure you, this woman started to look much happier once the ride got going. We loved it. The torque was wonderful. The air breezy. We followed it with The Tilt-a-Whirl. You pull on the lap bar, and that thing twirls like a dervish. Pukey. Off. The Cyclone beckoned.
Look at happy Martha daringly making her way through the quaint painted chain link entrance to the ride. This roller coaster is so old and rickety, you have to wonder how many people have died on it.
Up the Hill.
Down the Hill.
And that was one of the smaller downhills. The Cyclone is a world wonder because it's really compact. Every track is right next to each other. The drops feel vertical. The bumpy factor is high.
And look at these ancient tracks, all wobbly and bent. Supported by salt-air weakened wood.
We played some in the arcade, cashed in our Skeeball tickets for very cheap stuff and took a rest.
Lest you think our day was all hot dogs, cheese fries, games and rides, one must not forget, this whole thing began because of the Atlantic Ocean for the Dutch, the English and for us. You can take the D or the F or the N or the Q trains to the sea. Do it. It's invigorating.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
The Cult: Old Bricks and Big Windows
It’s all Federal Greek to me. I had a nice dinner with old friends, Kathy and John and their lovely daughters at a Japanese restaurant in the Village and afterward, I walked West on 11th Street. Come on. These Federal-Greek Revival buildings are frigging gorgeous. I stopped and stared at almost every one.
Okay, people in New York are insane and stupid over real estate. They obsess about it night and day. It’s the predominant subject you overhear in conversations on the streets. But last night, having been on the edge of Chelsea Square and tonight walking past all these four and five story buildings built in the West Village, I see the allure. Everyone gets their property addiction. I guess these beasts in this style would be mine.
Could it be because they, like my body, are shaped like refrigerator boxes?
Or, is it because of their super simplicity with their subtle ornamentation that reminds me of what exercising restraint might be like?
Or the huge, long windows, where everything can be seen, nothing hidden from view, the size of a full adult who can stand there and look out and feel they are not boxed in, at all?
Lovely buildings. You can imagine the Nineteenth century, what it must have been like. All those windows wide open. Girls in poofy dresses playing the piano. Men smoking. Horses walking by. Suffragettes. Anarchists. Carpet Baggers about to go South. More horses. And the sweaty noise in beautiful architecture!
As I walked up Eighth Avenue to get to the subway, I passed by a real estate storefront advertising their properties for sale. There were lofts and condos for 1-3 Million. But the picture that grabbed me, that struck me as a bargain, and a great beautiful one, was a completely renovated Federal-Greek Revival townhouse for 4.9 Million. Worth every penny.
Okay, people in New York are insane and stupid over real estate. They obsess about it night and day. It’s the predominant subject you overhear in conversations on the streets. But last night, having been on the edge of Chelsea Square and tonight walking past all these four and five story buildings built in the West Village, I see the allure. Everyone gets their property addiction. I guess these beasts in this style would be mine.
Could it be because they, like my body, are shaped like refrigerator boxes?
Or, is it because of their super simplicity with their subtle ornamentation that reminds me of what exercising restraint might be like?
Or the huge, long windows, where everything can be seen, nothing hidden from view, the size of a full adult who can stand there and look out and feel they are not boxed in, at all?
Lovely buildings. You can imagine the Nineteenth century, what it must have been like. All those windows wide open. Girls in poofy dresses playing the piano. Men smoking. Horses walking by. Suffragettes. Anarchists. Carpet Baggers about to go South. More horses. And the sweaty noise in beautiful architecture!
As I walked up Eighth Avenue to get to the subway, I passed by a real estate storefront advertising their properties for sale. There were lofts and condos for 1-3 Million. But the picture that grabbed me, that struck me as a bargain, and a great beautiful one, was a completely renovated Federal-Greek Revival townhouse for 4.9 Million. Worth every penny.
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
NY NY
There is a transition when one is in New York. I arrived and I had this nasty back pain, so I was feeling vulnerable. New York seemed sinister to me. Like, it was a place that really wanted to mow me down. Of course, it’s never fun to have any sort of illness when you are alone and “traveling”.
So, all I could feel was the harshness of the environment. People were too close. The air was too thick. The subway was too dirty. Queens was too filled with immigrants.
But then, my back got better. And suddenly, the perception has changed. The people seem fun. The air seems breezy. The subway seems convenient. The Indians and Peruvians in Jackson Heights seem like the best people on earth.
Chronic pain seems like a bad thing. But if you can ride through it, the other side gives you a different glimpse of living. So, a little chronic pain, as long as it eventually goes away, is actually kind of interesting.
Sidebar: The Indians have hooked up with the French and they are making wine. It’s very good.
Another sidebar: Susan Golomb, a very good agent, passed on my book today. She liked the writing but can’t seem to find the “hook” or the “universal appeal”. Well, who ever can, really?
Honesty, in its most un-mucked-with form, seems to be so hard to sell. This American culture seems, to me, so silly.
I love my Danish Modern Desk.
So, all I could feel was the harshness of the environment. People were too close. The air was too thick. The subway was too dirty. Queens was too filled with immigrants.
But then, my back got better. And suddenly, the perception has changed. The people seem fun. The air seems breezy. The subway seems convenient. The Indians and Peruvians in Jackson Heights seem like the best people on earth.
Chronic pain seems like a bad thing. But if you can ride through it, the other side gives you a different glimpse of living. So, a little chronic pain, as long as it eventually goes away, is actually kind of interesting.
Sidebar: The Indians have hooked up with the French and they are making wine. It’s very good.
Another sidebar: Susan Golomb, a very good agent, passed on my book today. She liked the writing but can’t seem to find the “hook” or the “universal appeal”. Well, who ever can, really?
Honesty, in its most un-mucked-with form, seems to be so hard to sell. This American culture seems, to me, so silly.
I love my Danish Modern Desk.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Gay Pride
Feeling like a vulnerable old man with my bad back (damn luggage), I did manage to get out today for a couple of hours and caught the tail end of the gay pride parade at the bottom of Fifth Avenue. I felt so old and not quite present. Luckily I was with my closest and most awesome friend, Megan, and my new friend, Martha, Megan’s amazing girlfriend.
There I was, kind of feeling like I should not be standing, but rather, safely wrapped in a full body cast, when floats of fit, tight, barely clad young men (and some hot women) slowly rolled by.
I was proud of them, sure, but more than anything else, I wanted a time machine.
(I did see a woman across the street with a sign that read, “The Rosary cures all spiritual ills. Perhaps, she should do a Novena and learn how to be more accepting?)
There I was, kind of feeling like I should not be standing, but rather, safely wrapped in a full body cast, when floats of fit, tight, barely clad young men (and some hot women) slowly rolled by.
I was proud of them, sure, but more than anything else, I wanted a time machine.
(I did see a woman across the street with a sign that read, “The Rosary cures all spiritual ills. Perhaps, she should do a Novena and learn how to be more accepting?)
Friday, June 23, 2006
What is it about the Middle Seat?
Hilarity on Flight 20 from San Francisco to New York. I had to connect through SFO because of a frequent flyer situation. When I got on the plane, and I was happily sitting in my aisle seat in the middle section, a yarmulke-man maniacally stuffed his bag in a compartment that was already full, the whole time tossing pillows onto his seat that would soon be his, right next to me. He got in the middle seat, put a pillow on each arm rest and mumbled, “I need them for my elbows,” and took over way too much space for a man his size. The guy to his right (I was on his left) was annoyed, pushed the pillow off his arm rest and looked to me for support in disliking this man. I actually found the little pillow nut amusing.
We began to talk. He was very warm, this Orthodox Jew with the light blue eyes and sandy colored hair and small hands that almost looked like they were deformed. He is a venture capitalist for digital start-ups, “Some rise, some fail, it’s what I do.” He lives in Israel, between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. It’s only thirty minutes in either direction. He lives in one of those settlements that if the wall is built, it will cut off Palestinians from their olive orchards. Completely Zionist and having moved to Israel for ideological purposes, I found him fascinating. I liked him. But I did notice that he was a little nutty.
I fell asleep and I woke up to his rustling. Apparently, it was time for him to pee. Instead of asking the guy to his right to get up so he could go, he just jumped up onto the arms of the seats and crawled right over the guy. This woke me up. The crawled-over guy stood there in the aisle and looked at me for support in thinking this guy was an annoying fool. I had to give him the eyebrow lift, “Yeah, he’s whacked.”
But I still liked that wacky Israelie. He was open and articulate. And, he was pretty calm, though firm, in his Zionism.
The kicker at the end of the flight---the woman behind us in the middle seat got very drunk. To the point of passing out. When we landed, a fireman escorted her off the plane. On the gangplank, the airline made sure she was helped. As she was wobbling into the portable hallway tube, the flight attendant said to her, “We just want to help you. Sometimes the exit can move and we don’t want you to get hurt.” From the tone, I could tell the flight attendant was trained to avoid lawsuits.
We began to talk. He was very warm, this Orthodox Jew with the light blue eyes and sandy colored hair and small hands that almost looked like they were deformed. He is a venture capitalist for digital start-ups, “Some rise, some fail, it’s what I do.” He lives in Israel, between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. It’s only thirty minutes in either direction. He lives in one of those settlements that if the wall is built, it will cut off Palestinians from their olive orchards. Completely Zionist and having moved to Israel for ideological purposes, I found him fascinating. I liked him. But I did notice that he was a little nutty.
I fell asleep and I woke up to his rustling. Apparently, it was time for him to pee. Instead of asking the guy to his right to get up so he could go, he just jumped up onto the arms of the seats and crawled right over the guy. This woke me up. The crawled-over guy stood there in the aisle and looked at me for support in thinking this guy was an annoying fool. I had to give him the eyebrow lift, “Yeah, he’s whacked.”
But I still liked that wacky Israelie. He was open and articulate. And, he was pretty calm, though firm, in his Zionism.
The kicker at the end of the flight---the woman behind us in the middle seat got very drunk. To the point of passing out. When we landed, a fireman escorted her off the plane. On the gangplank, the airline made sure she was helped. As she was wobbling into the portable hallway tube, the flight attendant said to her, “We just want to help you. Sometimes the exit can move and we don’t want you to get hurt.” From the tone, I could tell the flight attendant was trained to avoid lawsuits.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Salty and Sweet
Off to New York tomorrow to our little place in Queens.
For ten days.
There is something fun about this bicoastal life. Ever since we got the place in Queens, I’ve come to like Los Angeles a lot more. Probably because I know that at any time I can escape to another dimension.
Seems like the mind needs things to be mixed. The pretzel always tastes best right after the chocolate. The salty and the sweet go very well together.
What is sweet about New York and what is sweet about Los Angeles---well, it’s all very sweet. The people in New York are more interesting, more open, and can be instantly warm. The subway is a better way to get around. It’s a nighttime city. People are not embarrassed to go watch musicals. The feeling of the sea and the Hudson River is all around you. It’s a place of old friends and great art. And then, there’s Central Park, probably the most civilized outdoor space in the country. You can hop on a train at Penn Station or Grand Central and be deep in New England, or well on your way to the deep South in just a few hours. And, you can always go shopping in Paramus. This is all very sweet, very enlivening.
What is sweet about Los Angeles is the Mediterranean weather and having a yard that really is a garden where you can sit, at sunset, and have a Campari and soda and feel like you are the luckiest person alive. You can have a dog and just let it out in the yard. Your friends are all great hosts with special recipes for guacamole and Margaritas. Live oaks and sycamores have this magical way of letting you know that nature still exists amid the asphalt. In some neighborhoods, you can hear the coyotes yapping. You can go to great places like Mendocino, Napa, Palm Springs and Yosemite. And then, there’s the Arclight, the best movie theatre in the country, if not the world.
What is salty about New York is people are just more obviously sexual.
What is salty about Los Angeles is people are just more obviously into their hair.
What is neither sweet, nor salty, but merely unbelievable is the amount of square miles of hell between these two places.
For ten days.
There is something fun about this bicoastal life. Ever since we got the place in Queens, I’ve come to like Los Angeles a lot more. Probably because I know that at any time I can escape to another dimension.
Seems like the mind needs things to be mixed. The pretzel always tastes best right after the chocolate. The salty and the sweet go very well together.
What is sweet about New York and what is sweet about Los Angeles---well, it’s all very sweet. The people in New York are more interesting, more open, and can be instantly warm. The subway is a better way to get around. It’s a nighttime city. People are not embarrassed to go watch musicals. The feeling of the sea and the Hudson River is all around you. It’s a place of old friends and great art. And then, there’s Central Park, probably the most civilized outdoor space in the country. You can hop on a train at Penn Station or Grand Central and be deep in New England, or well on your way to the deep South in just a few hours. And, you can always go shopping in Paramus. This is all very sweet, very enlivening.
What is sweet about Los Angeles is the Mediterranean weather and having a yard that really is a garden where you can sit, at sunset, and have a Campari and soda and feel like you are the luckiest person alive. You can have a dog and just let it out in the yard. Your friends are all great hosts with special recipes for guacamole and Margaritas. Live oaks and sycamores have this magical way of letting you know that nature still exists amid the asphalt. In some neighborhoods, you can hear the coyotes yapping. You can go to great places like Mendocino, Napa, Palm Springs and Yosemite. And then, there’s the Arclight, the best movie theatre in the country, if not the world.
What is salty about New York is people are just more obviously sexual.
What is salty about Los Angeles is people are just more obviously into their hair.
What is neither sweet, nor salty, but merely unbelievable is the amount of square miles of hell between these two places.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
The Secret to Enjoying a Hollywood Movie
Go infrequently.
I haven't been to a movie in many weeks and I really needed to sit in a dark theatre.
So Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, and I went and sat through The Omen.
It was not great. But it was fun. And if you do something that's fun that you don't do that frequently, it seems like a real lot of fun. They say, the road to enjoying something is to do it infrequently. The French know this. They just love their monthly baths.
The Omen was shot beautifully. The acting was serviceable. The camp factor was huge. The overblown rain was silly after a while. But I loved all the hounds of hell and 666 stuff going on. The adrenalin rush, you know.
Also, and this is true, I happen to live next door to the son of Lee Remmick, the actress who played the mother in the original movie. Could I be living next door to Satan?
I haven't been to a movie in many weeks and I really needed to sit in a dark theatre.
So Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, and I went and sat through The Omen.
It was not great. But it was fun. And if you do something that's fun that you don't do that frequently, it seems like a real lot of fun. They say, the road to enjoying something is to do it infrequently. The French know this. They just love their monthly baths.
The Omen was shot beautifully. The acting was serviceable. The camp factor was huge. The overblown rain was silly after a while. But I loved all the hounds of hell and 666 stuff going on. The adrenalin rush, you know.
Also, and this is true, I happen to live next door to the son of Lee Remmick, the actress who played the mother in the original movie. Could I be living next door to Satan?
Monday, June 19, 2006
Garage Sale
Mary and Dan and I had a huge garage sale on Saturday to raise money for The New Theatre. It was ridiculous. In a great way. Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner and John, Mary’s husband, and Bradford, our great friend, were all there plying their incredible talents.
Thank you to everyone who donated all that stuff they no longer needed:
John and Frances and Marcia and Dan and Leslie and Bart and Susie and Mary Walsh and Adam and Maggie and Gary and Dan’s big family and Trish and all the other people who donated that I haven’t yet heard about from Dan and Mary.
WE MADE $1,612.00 And another $200 from a previous sale of Dan’s and about another $300 should be coming in from Ebay sales. So, useless crap brought us $2,000.00
Some call it landfill. I call it cash. A photo tour:
The street view in Monterey Hills at Mary’s house. You may very well recognize some of your wonderful garbage up on that hill.
I’ve moved Bart’s bed at least four times (Oregon, Valley Village, to my house, to Monterey Hills). I say, if you move someone’s bed that many times, you eventually get to sell it in a garage sale. It fetched $90. After it was sold, but continued to lay there on that hill until it was picked up, people were salivating over it. Man. The joke is, during the final move of this bed from our house to Mary’s, the headboard broke. We rested the curvy part against the wheel well in the pickup and laid the mattress on top. The pressure did it in. After that piece broke off, I simply wood-glued it back on. And, there it is.
Adam used to work in retail at Boston University to pay for his clubbing at 80’s Fenway clubs. He put his talents to great use. He was the haberdashery department. I’ve never before seen him make so many latin ladies so happy. And can he fold! He gets a lot of practice at home. I think he’s really cute in that hat.
Look at Mary up on that hill (in black) cheerily selling to a customer. Far right, you can see all the dining room chairs and office chairs that were donated to us by Frances, Mary’s sister. They were sold in a frenzy.
Our great friend, John, who also happens to be Mary’s husband, is a natural salesman. He could sell ice to Eskimos. Oh, wait, that comparison may not hold up any longer, poor waterlogged Eskimos. John was amazing. He really knows the value of things and he could read people very well. He moved the most product. An expert. Every time I would ask, "What happened to the--" The answer was, "John just sold it."
Bardford is a genius in merchandising. He runs a garage sale every year at his house. A great boy from Wisconsin, he is loved by everyone. And look at what he did with those Academy screeners donated to us by Marcia. At first, we sold the big collections for about ten or fifteen bucks a box. Later on, they went for about two dollars. By the end of the day, well, read on.
While Mary Walsh was hiking to the top of Mt. Baldy, we sold her old television stand. This was another hot item. Furniture is a must at these things.
After a few hours, a lot of the best stuff sold. Bed-o-Bart, Trish’s brand new mountain bike, all those Frances chairs, the skull ring of John’s, Bart’s old ski jacket, the boom box, the dog gates, the Maggie and Gary air compressor and stereo stystem, Margot’s dog bed, Louise’s old carrier, the best Marcia screeners, the best CD’s, the Perry Ellis hat, the knock-off Louis Vuitton bag, the Judge Joe Brown Knapsack, Dan’s relatives’ unused expensive Italian shoes, the old Panasonic microwave, all five of the old phones, the watch, the pretty tea pots, the beautiful plates, Dan and Leslie’s black decorative shelf, the French horn case, the dinner napkins, all the kiddy stuff, Bradford’s grab bag of little office and household goodies (stickers and sponges and glue sticks, Oh My), wooden spoons, large covered glass jar, brand new gardenia candles, a comforter with duvet, scarves, Still Standing bags and a Still Standing camping chair, the wine bag picnic thing, the nice table runners, all the art work, the wonderful Mary and John frame and of course, pounds of clothes.
Look at Dan count the money. At the end of the day, we sat there at Mary’s kitchen table all sweaty and I said, “Look at us. A greedy Armenian and a greedy Wop.” And Dan responded, “Acting like Jews. I know that’s what you want to say.” And I said, “Well, sure.” But what I was really thinking was that there is nothing more disgusting yet somehow life affirming than watching people of Mediterranean descent counting money.
See that little gray box on the left. That’s Margot’s camping television. Somewhat bought it, we brought it inside to plug it in to show that it worked. It didn’t. Margot wins for donating the most broken and stained crap. We joked about her all day long.
My two favorite things that happened that day (besides counting out $1,612.00):
1) During the morning rush, a very lovely woman with a medium Mexican accent finished buying the knock-off Louis Vuitton bag and she was a bit flustered by the ten bucks or so that she spent and I said, “That bag is brand new. It was my mother’s. It's never been used. You got a great deal.”
And she responded with the bag on her shoulder, twisting her kittenish self in my direction to show it off, her eyes all lit up like the beautiful woman that she was, “And it’s just my style, too!” I almost cried.
2) By 2PM the sale was dead. It was very hot outside, some sort of soccer was on television and what we faced was the island of misfit garage sale junk. Like an angel, a sweet man in a pickup arrived and he started pawing at the leftover Academy screeners and bought a few at rock bottom prices. He was about to leave, yet I saw that he was still interested. I cut him a deal, “You can have the rest of the stuff on that table for forty bucks.” He bit. He cleared off the entire table of DVD’s, CD’s and books (and my complete Elton John set of four tape cassettes). After we boxed those up, I tried to push the brand new Epson printer with three new ink cartridges on him (which I hawked all day with no success) for twenty-five bucks. He wasn’t so interested. I then said, “You can have everything on the electronics table for forty bucks.” He cleared off that table.
Then, we had two tables left, you know, of plates, candle holders, what-have-you’s. He was happy to have cleared off two tables. I looked at him and he looked at me and we both knew where this was going. I said, “Forty bucks for the other two tables.” He said, “Thirty.” I said, “Thirty-five.” Sold. Mary and Bradford and Dan and I wrapped those breakables up in no time at all, like we had all been working at the Fulton Street fish market for years. He hauled away our leftovers for $100.00
The sale was over. (Well, once Adam got the final woman out of the clothing department: A drunkard talking about her innocent son in the pokey, "He's innocent.")
I learned from John: People need to feel like what they are buying is of value, that it will enhance their lives. This value must exist in a monetary way, yes, but also in a humanistic way.
I learned this from Bradford: Display and location of items is everything. Make it so people see it. And, as soon as you start moving something, people want it. Objects in motion catch the eye. As soon as I moved the art work to the main area, it was snatched up. As soon as the dinner napkins were nicely folded into a wooden holder, GOODBYE.
I learned about Adam: The Bitch can move used Schmatas. If he ever gets out of television, there’s a job for him on Seventh Avenue.
After the magic angel drove off with $100.00 worth of garage sale leftovers, and Dan and I counted out the money like diamond dealers, Adam and I brought the remaining clothes to Out-of-the-Closet. And then, we all spent the afternoon swimming in Mary’s and John’s aqua-marine pool.
Thank you to everyone who donated all that stuff they no longer needed:
John and Frances and Marcia and Dan and Leslie and Bart and Susie and Mary Walsh and Adam and Maggie and Gary and Dan’s big family and Trish and all the other people who donated that I haven’t yet heard about from Dan and Mary.
WE MADE $1,612.00 And another $200 from a previous sale of Dan’s and about another $300 should be coming in from Ebay sales. So, useless crap brought us $2,000.00
Some call it landfill. I call it cash. A photo tour:
The street view in Monterey Hills at Mary’s house. You may very well recognize some of your wonderful garbage up on that hill.
I’ve moved Bart’s bed at least four times (Oregon, Valley Village, to my house, to Monterey Hills). I say, if you move someone’s bed that many times, you eventually get to sell it in a garage sale. It fetched $90. After it was sold, but continued to lay there on that hill until it was picked up, people were salivating over it. Man. The joke is, during the final move of this bed from our house to Mary’s, the headboard broke. We rested the curvy part against the wheel well in the pickup and laid the mattress on top. The pressure did it in. After that piece broke off, I simply wood-glued it back on. And, there it is. 
Adam used to work in retail at Boston University to pay for his clubbing at 80’s Fenway clubs. He put his talents to great use. He was the haberdashery department. I’ve never before seen him make so many latin ladies so happy. And can he fold! He gets a lot of practice at home. I think he’s really cute in that hat.
Look at Mary up on that hill (in black) cheerily selling to a customer. Far right, you can see all the dining room chairs and office chairs that were donated to us by Frances, Mary’s sister. They were sold in a frenzy.
Our great friend, John, who also happens to be Mary’s husband, is a natural salesman. He could sell ice to Eskimos. Oh, wait, that comparison may not hold up any longer, poor waterlogged Eskimos. John was amazing. He really knows the value of things and he could read people very well. He moved the most product. An expert. Every time I would ask, "What happened to the--" The answer was, "John just sold it."
Bardford is a genius in merchandising. He runs a garage sale every year at his house. A great boy from Wisconsin, he is loved by everyone. And look at what he did with those Academy screeners donated to us by Marcia. At first, we sold the big collections for about ten or fifteen bucks a box. Later on, they went for about two dollars. By the end of the day, well, read on.
While Mary Walsh was hiking to the top of Mt. Baldy, we sold her old television stand. This was another hot item. Furniture is a must at these things.
After a few hours, a lot of the best stuff sold. Bed-o-Bart, Trish’s brand new mountain bike, all those Frances chairs, the skull ring of John’s, Bart’s old ski jacket, the boom box, the dog gates, the Maggie and Gary air compressor and stereo stystem, Margot’s dog bed, Louise’s old carrier, the best Marcia screeners, the best CD’s, the Perry Ellis hat, the knock-off Louis Vuitton bag, the Judge Joe Brown Knapsack, Dan’s relatives’ unused expensive Italian shoes, the old Panasonic microwave, all five of the old phones, the watch, the pretty tea pots, the beautiful plates, Dan and Leslie’s black decorative shelf, the French horn case, the dinner napkins, all the kiddy stuff, Bradford’s grab bag of little office and household goodies (stickers and sponges and glue sticks, Oh My), wooden spoons, large covered glass jar, brand new gardenia candles, a comforter with duvet, scarves, Still Standing bags and a Still Standing camping chair, the wine bag picnic thing, the nice table runners, all the art work, the wonderful Mary and John frame and of course, pounds of clothes. 
Look at Dan count the money. At the end of the day, we sat there at Mary’s kitchen table all sweaty and I said, “Look at us. A greedy Armenian and a greedy Wop.” And Dan responded, “Acting like Jews. I know that’s what you want to say.” And I said, “Well, sure.” But what I was really thinking was that there is nothing more disgusting yet somehow life affirming than watching people of Mediterranean descent counting money. 
See that little gray box on the left. That’s Margot’s camping television. Somewhat bought it, we brought it inside to plug it in to show that it worked. It didn’t. Margot wins for donating the most broken and stained crap. We joked about her all day long. My two favorite things that happened that day (besides counting out $1,612.00):
1) During the morning rush, a very lovely woman with a medium Mexican accent finished buying the knock-off Louis Vuitton bag and she was a bit flustered by the ten bucks or so that she spent and I said, “That bag is brand new. It was my mother’s. It's never been used. You got a great deal.”
And she responded with the bag on her shoulder, twisting her kittenish self in my direction to show it off, her eyes all lit up like the beautiful woman that she was, “And it’s just my style, too!” I almost cried.
2) By 2PM the sale was dead. It was very hot outside, some sort of soccer was on television and what we faced was the island of misfit garage sale junk. Like an angel, a sweet man in a pickup arrived and he started pawing at the leftover Academy screeners and bought a few at rock bottom prices. He was about to leave, yet I saw that he was still interested. I cut him a deal, “You can have the rest of the stuff on that table for forty bucks.” He bit. He cleared off the entire table of DVD’s, CD’s and books (and my complete Elton John set of four tape cassettes). After we boxed those up, I tried to push the brand new Epson printer with three new ink cartridges on him (which I hawked all day with no success) for twenty-five bucks. He wasn’t so interested. I then said, “You can have everything on the electronics table for forty bucks.” He cleared off that table.
Then, we had two tables left, you know, of plates, candle holders, what-have-you’s. He was happy to have cleared off two tables. I looked at him and he looked at me and we both knew where this was going. I said, “Forty bucks for the other two tables.” He said, “Thirty.” I said, “Thirty-five.” Sold. Mary and Bradford and Dan and I wrapped those breakables up in no time at all, like we had all been working at the Fulton Street fish market for years. He hauled away our leftovers for $100.00
The sale was over. (Well, once Adam got the final woman out of the clothing department: A drunkard talking about her innocent son in the pokey, "He's innocent.")
I learned from John: People need to feel like what they are buying is of value, that it will enhance their lives. This value must exist in a monetary way, yes, but also in a humanistic way.
I learned this from Bradford: Display and location of items is everything. Make it so people see it. And, as soon as you start moving something, people want it. Objects in motion catch the eye. As soon as I moved the art work to the main area, it was snatched up. As soon as the dinner napkins were nicely folded into a wooden holder, GOODBYE.
I learned about Adam: The Bitch can move used Schmatas. If he ever gets out of television, there’s a job for him on Seventh Avenue.
After the magic angel drove off with $100.00 worth of garage sale leftovers, and Dan and I counted out the money like diamond dealers, Adam and I brought the remaining clothes to Out-of-the-Closet. And then, we all spent the afternoon swimming in Mary’s and John’s aqua-marine pool.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Pastrami, Garage Sale, Exhaustion
Good King Jeffrey is off to visit the inner Southwest tomorrow. So we went to Langers for a Bon Voyage Lunch. I got the #19: Lean Pastrami, fresh coleslaw, melted cheese on this rye bread with the crunchiest crust you've ever had. Jeff got a classic pastrami on rye. Spirits were high. Pie holes were filled.
Pretty much delicious. Langers is super old world. Near MacArthur Park in a funko neighborhood. It's only open from 8-4, Monday-Saturday. Worth the lunch trip.
And, this theatre company that's begun that I've rustled up with some friends called, The New Theatre--is raising money this weekend. We've been doing real well with fundraising. We're having this garage sale...but the problem is, it's gotten way out of hand. There are literally MOUNTAINS of shit. Bags and bags of clothing. A microwave, stereos, Boxed DVD sets, CD's, a heater, suitcases, trays, poker chips, all kinds of electronics, an air compressor, baby clothes, a dining room set, a huge bed with headboard and footboard, a mountain bike, skis, all kinds of unused Italian shoes, kitchen items, books. Mary's house is filled to the rafters. It got bigger than us. I hope most of it sells, because man, it's a huge load.
GARAGE SALE ENORMOUS
Pretty much delicious. Langers is super old world. Near MacArthur Park in a funko neighborhood. It's only open from 8-4, Monday-Saturday. Worth the lunch trip.
And, this theatre company that's begun that I've rustled up with some friends called, The New Theatre--is raising money this weekend. We've been doing real well with fundraising. We're having this garage sale...but the problem is, it's gotten way out of hand. There are literally MOUNTAINS of shit. Bags and bags of clothing. A microwave, stereos, Boxed DVD sets, CD's, a heater, suitcases, trays, poker chips, all kinds of electronics, an air compressor, baby clothes, a dining room set, a huge bed with headboard and footboard, a mountain bike, skis, all kinds of unused Italian shoes, kitchen items, books. Mary's house is filled to the rafters. It got bigger than us. I hope most of it sells, because man, it's a huge load.
GARAGE SALE ENORMOUS
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Calling All Pharma Sleuths
Someone gave me this pill. I can't remember what it is. It has HYL engraved on one side and CM engraved on the other. It's light brown (beige), a bit speckled.
The only memory I have of this little thing is that someone gave it to me and my reaction was, "Hm, I'll try that."
It sits alone in a bottle waiting for ingestion. Yet, I do not know what it is.
Anyone have any ideas?
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Where IS Love?
My parents were visiting and the subject of my playing Oliver in the Eighth Grade came up. My father, ever the nostalgic Irishman said, "You had the voice of an angel. Whatever happened to that tape of you that I had? I bet you took it."
Of course, I did take it. My brother taped the dress rehearsal with my cheap little cassette recorder and this tape is among my things hidden in the file cabinets in the back of our guest shack. I thought, "I'm going to make a CD for my father for Father's Day."
I have this at-home-recording-studio (M-Box with ProTools) and it's pretty easy to use. You input the analogue plugs from your source into the M-Box. The M-Box digitizes the source material into the music software, ProTools. You then tweak it and bounce it from there into iTunes in a wave format and from iTunes, you burn it to CD. I had to get adaptors so the RCA plugs of the cassette deck (the red and white ones you see at the back of your stereo spaghetti mess) would fit into the microphone inputs in the back of the M-Box. What would we do without Radioshack? I actually used a series of two adaptors...but I ultimately realized I only needed one. The M-Box inputs actually take a variety of plugs. Then, I spent a couple of hours figuring out how to pay for and download and utilize the MP3 Option for the Protools software so I could make an MP3 file. But the website was under maintenance and was very slow and annoying to use. And finally, the download was just some coding with instructions to reload your original software with a certain box checked and then the code was to be entered at the bouncing point. It went on and on.
I realized, late in the game, that I didn't need the MP3 option for the CD I was making for my father. The free Wave option is what you want for the CD Burning format and I had that. But having the MP3 option is good for other things, like, you know, for making MP3's, which, of course, don't play on CD Players. It's the Tower of Babel out there. All the different plugs, formats, machines. I don't know how these recording artists do this. But, I was able to figure it out. And I have a CD ready for my father. And I posted the song.
It's actually fabulous and sort of sweet. I was thirteen. I was very little. I had a thin, soprano voice. And an amazing Cindi Lauper New York accent. Girls loved me. Boys called me faggot. I wore very heavy eye makeup in this production, I guess because that's what orphans did in those days. I smoked cigarettes and pot and loved Led Zeppelin and the soundtrack of Jesus Christ Superstar. The girl behind me is Dara, who was my girlfriend. We're still close. The doctor taking my pulse is Vinny Stanzione. He now lives at the Jersey shore and my brother is still friends with him. The guy in the white wig is the character Mr. Brownlow. He was the rich man who saved me from a life of thieving with The Artful Dodger. This was all just a wee thirty years ago.
Click Here, Click on Listen--Where Is Love--But not in public
Of course, I did take it. My brother taped the dress rehearsal with my cheap little cassette recorder and this tape is among my things hidden in the file cabinets in the back of our guest shack. I thought, "I'm going to make a CD for my father for Father's Day."
I have this at-home-recording-studio (M-Box with ProTools) and it's pretty easy to use. You input the analogue plugs from your source into the M-Box. The M-Box digitizes the source material into the music software, ProTools. You then tweak it and bounce it from there into iTunes in a wave format and from iTunes, you burn it to CD. I had to get adaptors so the RCA plugs of the cassette deck (the red and white ones you see at the back of your stereo spaghetti mess) would fit into the microphone inputs in the back of the M-Box. What would we do without Radioshack? I actually used a series of two adaptors...but I ultimately realized I only needed one. The M-Box inputs actually take a variety of plugs. Then, I spent a couple of hours figuring out how to pay for and download and utilize the MP3 Option for the Protools software so I could make an MP3 file. But the website was under maintenance and was very slow and annoying to use. And finally, the download was just some coding with instructions to reload your original software with a certain box checked and then the code was to be entered at the bouncing point. It went on and on.
I realized, late in the game, that I didn't need the MP3 option for the CD I was making for my father. The free Wave option is what you want for the CD Burning format and I had that. But having the MP3 option is good for other things, like, you know, for making MP3's, which, of course, don't play on CD Players. It's the Tower of Babel out there. All the different plugs, formats, machines. I don't know how these recording artists do this. But, I was able to figure it out. And I have a CD ready for my father. And I posted the song.
It's actually fabulous and sort of sweet. I was thirteen. I was very little. I had a thin, soprano voice. And an amazing Cindi Lauper New York accent. Girls loved me. Boys called me faggot. I wore very heavy eye makeup in this production, I guess because that's what orphans did in those days. I smoked cigarettes and pot and loved Led Zeppelin and the soundtrack of Jesus Christ Superstar. The girl behind me is Dara, who was my girlfriend. We're still close. The doctor taking my pulse is Vinny Stanzione. He now lives at the Jersey shore and my brother is still friends with him. The guy in the white wig is the character Mr. Brownlow. He was the rich man who saved me from a life of thieving with The Artful Dodger. This was all just a wee thirty years ago.
Click Here, Click on Listen--Where Is Love--But not in public
Orange-ina
The Orange metro line gives me a little angina. I was driving out in the valley today, doing unusual errands, when I crossed Chandler and also the BUSWAY of the Orange Line. What a treat! To see this odd alley-type road that is designated solely for busses does a heart good.
But weird thing is, this line has been open for months and though I've been in the valley many times since the fall, this is the first time I have crossed the busway. Why?
Because it's so damn North of the main commercial spine of the valley, Ventura Boulevard.
Oh friends, friends, friends. Just dig up this city. Dig it up like the sewer that it is and bury trains under the real sections of town. Shoot under Fairfax and Santa Monica Boulevard and Ventura Boulevard and Wilshire and Sepulveda and do a circle line all around the South basin and another circle line all around the North basin.
Like a mole, tunnel through Beverly Hills.
Like a prairie dog, dig through Santa Monica.
Like a mir cat, bore your way through all those hills of Hollywood.
Be brave! Be Woodchucks!
Official Site of the Orange
Check out the Fixes for the Orange
But weird thing is, this line has been open for months and though I've been in the valley many times since the fall, this is the first time I have crossed the busway. Why?
Because it's so damn North of the main commercial spine of the valley, Ventura Boulevard.
Oh friends, friends, friends. Just dig up this city. Dig it up like the sewer that it is and bury trains under the real sections of town. Shoot under Fairfax and Santa Monica Boulevard and Ventura Boulevard and Wilshire and Sepulveda and do a circle line all around the South basin and another circle line all around the North basin.
Like a mole, tunnel through Beverly Hills.
Like a prairie dog, dig through Santa Monica.
Like a mir cat, bore your way through all those hills of Hollywood.
Be brave! Be Woodchucks!
Official Site of the Orange
Check out the Fixes for the Orange
Monday, June 12, 2006
Friday, June 09, 2006
Sit N Spin
Tonight, Adam and I both did our Sit-N-Spin pieces. Comedy Central Hosts it. The people involved are wonderful and lovely. We have established ourselves as a team...It was so interesting. And the response was fabulous.
I enjoyed that performing experience one gets by being in front of a crowd. Afterward, we all went out and frankly, it felt like a very important night. Agents. Television people. Etc. Hollywood...what an acid trip.
PEOPLE COME FIRST
BY ADAM WARING
It all started in bed. My Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner Don and I were in blissful harmony there. That is until the day Don came home from the doctor, eyes swollen, head clogged, and declared, “That’s it. The cats are no longer sleeping with us.” Naturally, I was upset. Oliver and Juanita were twelve years old and I’ve had them since they were tiny kittens -- two years longer than I’ve had Don. Depriving them – and me – of sleeping together was unthinkable. But I had to admit, Don’s allergies had gotten worse. So much so that he became “unable” to do household chores involving cat hair, or pollen or mildew or dust, lest they cause a “reaction.”
I don’t have allergies. I have a strong, stable constitution, much like our country’s. Don’s constitution is like that of Iraq. And, because I’m always healthy, my tolerance for those who aren’t is low – at least according to Don. So when Don dropped the cat bomb, I pretty much had no choice but to agree. The cats are very dear to me, but people come first. So, with only a hint of passive-aggressive resentment, I followed Don’s explicit instructions and stripped the bed, washed the bedding, zipped the mattress, pillows and duvet into their new, anti-dust mite hypoallergenic plastic slipcovers ($340), dusted and vacuumed the whole room, plugged in the new HEPA-filtered air purifier ($289) and remade the bed. Then we got in it and closed the door on the cats. And Don slept great. None of the usual snoring, wheezing, hacking, coughing, honking, horking or spitting. But I lay there and listened to my poor babies meowing and scratching at the door, my heart in my throat.
Eventually, the cats found new places to sleep, and my bitter resentment toward Don diminished. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for his allergies. The next strategy he proposed was for me to cover all the furniture the cats sat on with dust cloths, and for me to keep the dust cloths clean by washing them regularly. We also bought a fancy, HEPA-filtered vacuum cleaner ($650), which Don instructed me to use every couple of days. But alas, the cat hair tumbleweeds continued to roll.
Now, we also have a dog – Louise. She’s an adorable little terrier and the apple of Don’s eye. Mainly because when he’s around her, it doesn’t burn and ooze. However, that started to change. Don decided that all Louise had to do was sit where one of the cats had been and – according to the pet chapter in his bible, My House is Killing Me -- she got covered with cat hair and dander. To combat this, Don determined the dog and cats should have as little contact as possible. Since Louise liked the armchair in the office while the cats preferred the living room couch, we bought several pet gates ($115) to keep Louise out of the living room. Of course, the gates made it considerably more difficult for us to navigate our own house, and the pets had now successfully taken over ever piece of comfortable furniture we owned, but Don seemed appeased, and a tenuous peace returned.
That fall, the Santa Ana winds arrived with a vengeance and Don got horribly sick with flu-like symptoms and a sinus infection. It lasted for ten weeks. Toward the end, he made a fateful proclamation – “The cats are leaving the house.” My reaction was no way in hell, as it is with pretty much all new ideas. But Don put it in simple terms: it was either the cats, or him. His idea was to move the cats into the garage, and he would park his car on the street. Our garage happens to have two separate stalls and Don reasoned that his stall would make a nice pussy home. Although I couldn’t deny that it was doable, I absolutely hated the idea. My babies had done nothing wrong, why should they be so severely punished? And how would I pet them and hold them? Don wheezed, “As little as possible. And make sure you wash your hands after.” I burst into tears. But I realized I had to be reasonable. Don was sick as hell, and he had come up with a workable compromise. People come first, right? So with a heavy heart, I reluctantly agreed.
The first order of business was to put down linoleum on the floor of the garage ($250), as no cats of mine were going to live on concrete. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, installing the linoleum only took half a day. We still had time to shop for furniture and accessories, like an upholstered cat tower ($89), a window ledge seat ($50), a recirculating drinking fountain ($59, an electric heater ($39) and a couch ($299). My angels were used to sleeping on a couch, and I wasn’t going to deprive them of that. Plus I figured I would be visiting them quite a bit, and I’d need somewhere to sit. We loaded everything in, and luckily the day, and the weekend, was over. I got another week with Oliver and Juanita inside.
The following Saturday, Don was still deathly sick, so the renovations continued. However, I held out hope that this whole thing would be an exercise in futility, because the hardest part was yet to come -- a collar-controlled dog door to allow Louise access to the yard while keeping the cats out of the house. And lucky for me, Louise is both incredibly dumb and incredibly lazy. She would just as soon piss and shit on one of our antique Orientals. But alas, for $495, Don found the Rolls Royce of pet doors . I didn’t make that up, it’s their slogan. All Louise had to do was get within a few feet of the thing and a plexiglass door magically slid up. As soon as she walked through, the door slid back down again. She was the doggy Get Smart.
And there were no more impediments to my cats being permanently banished. Several weekends, much foot dragging, a horrendous fight, a few blisters, a near electrocution and $3261 later, it was going to happen. I begged Don for another forty-eight hours for the cats to have access to both the house and their new home, and he kindly agreed. Each night I spent an hour or so sitting in the garage, with my little friends purring contentedly on my lap. Of course, when I left to go back inside, they followed me, as they always had.
Don agreed to do the final transition while I was at work. There was no way I could be there. As soon as I left, Don was up and out of bed like a shot, the bloom of health returning to his cheeks, as he eliminated all evidence of my cats from the house. When I arrived home that night, I found them sitting on the garage couch, looking dazed. After a quick hello to Don, and a less-than-genuine show of appreciation for how clean he’d gotten the house, I high-tailed it back out to be with them. I sat with them for hours, petting them, holding them, apologizing over and over.
When I finally left them, their pitiful cries ringing in my ears, I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so low. I went into the house and approached Don for a consoling hug. He exploded. “Get away from me with those cat hair-covered clothes! I’ve just spent an entire day cleaning every nook and cranny of this house to make it habitable for me again, and you come in like that? Throw those clothes in the wash immediately, and take a shower.” Fuming, I protested that I was not going to change my clothes and shower every time I wanted to pet my cats. Don argued that I was certainly not going to come into the house covered with cat hair every night, either. “When you’re with the cats, wear this over your clothes.” He handed me a stained old bathrobe. “And wash your hands up to the elbow after every time you touch those death beasts.” Fuck. Once again he’d managed to find a compromise to what I considered an unbreachable impasse. And I was not happy about it. I snatched the robe from him, threw my clothes in the wash and went to bed, furious and unhugged.
The next several nights were pretty much the same. I came home, said a quick hello to Don, then headed out to the garage, put on my bathrobe and sat with my cats for the rest of the evening. The only problem was, cats are boring. I started bringing books and magazines to pass the time. Then I bought a bookcase ($179) to hold them. The next weekend, I bought a TV ($349). And I had the garage wired for cable ($150 set-up, and an extra $9.95 per month). A few days later I bought a mini-fridge ($99). It was a pain to keep getting up, taking my robe off, and washing my hands up to the elbow every time I wanted something from the kitchen.
Once I started sleeping all night on my garage couch, Don raised objections. I agreed, it wasn’t fair. So I took my cats and moved to the Oakwood apartments. Did Don think I enjoyed spending my nights in a drafty garage in an ugly bathrobe while he got the comfort of our lovely (and, without cats, shockingly clean and fresh) Spanish bungalow? But I was wracked with guilt about my cats, and every moment I was in the house without them I missed them terribly. I wasn’t happy anywhere and I blamed Don for ruining my life. Well, for once, I was solving the problem. My cats and I got a lovely, furnished one bedroom ($3120 per month, plus a $300 pet deposit). All I had to bring was my garage TV. See ya.
Two weeks later, we moved back. I reinstalled the cats in the garage and agreed to divide my time equitably between them and the now totally healthy Don. Ever gracious and reasonable, he welcomed us home. Bottom line, compromise hurts like hell, and I suck at it. But in the light of day, I realized that Don’s health improved, I was able to keep my cats, and our relationship would survive. And, as much as I adore my cats, there was clearly no way I could live without the real true love of my life – Louise, our dog.
I HATE YOU
BY DON CUMMINGS
“I hate you,” I said to Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, as I snatched a shiny silver toothpaste box from his bathroom garbage and threw it into the wicker recycling basket in the kitchen.
“I hate you more, honey” Adam smiled lovingly, not caring about recycling, as he crossed to the television to turn on an annoying cooking show.
“I hate you completely,” I gnashed completely as the glinting toothpaste box bounced off an empty wine bottle piled on top of an empty orange box of laundry detergent and black plastic broccoli trays. I picked up the blinding toothpaste box and wedged it between the orange cardboard and the side of the basket so it would not bounce out again.
Silently, Adam sat on the green sofa, watching the butter melting in the pan on the television.
This goes on many nights. I look for fault. He retreats into a world of television. I shut off lights he forgets to turn out. He blithely turns them back on as he walks down the hall to grab our outdoor cat that always breaks in, the one I am allergic to. I remember what has to be done this month so the roof won’t leak, the collectors won’t come, there will be money for retirement and I put sweet pickles on the shopping list. He forgets to buy the pickles.
I patrol and control by wagging a shiny toothpaste box.
He sits with his show, lost in a world of virtual green beans.
I wash the non-fat yogurt containers so they can be recycled.
He asks me, “Why are you always washing garbage?”
This goes on night after night. For over twelve years.
I said, “Tomorrow, I’m going to drive to Palm Springs and have sex with someone who has a worldlier, more considerate scope than you. Someone with a thicker purpose.”
“Go ahead.”
“I’ll need your car.”
“I need my car.”
“Why didn’t you put the toothpaste box in the recycling? You always tell everyone how much you care about the environment and then you throw this shiny, awful box into the trash in the bathroom.”
No answer.
“I hate being the recycling police.”
No answer.
“Humans are the cause of entropy. We are the Armageddon. Fine. Do whatever you want like everyone else. I guess a free country means free to not care about fucking anything. You don’t care about me.”
He looked up, away from the television meal, and sweetly grimaced to let me know that I am actually a better person, in the grand scheme, than I was being at that moment. Fuck him for loving me.
I insisted. “We have to conserve. You never turn out the lights and already twice this year you left the stove on when you went to work. Are you trying to kill me?”
Pause.
I retreated into myself in the dining room.
I thought, “I hate him. He’s a hypocrite. He does whatever he needs to do in the moment that requires the least amount of physical exertion. He is just like his doddering father who trips over every edge of the sidewalk because he’s too lazy to pick up his feet. He doesn’t pay attention to me. I WILL take his car tomorrow so I can have sex with someone else. Someone who is lean and picks up his feet, someone who makes an effort to use air when he speaks and will recycle and shut off the lights not only because he says he is a recycler and a conserver, but because I want him to do it.”
My house felt like a filthy prison of landfill. I needed out. I just want a rice bowl and a sturdy spoon. I just want to wear a onesy every day.
I looked for something to do that did not involve products or the television. I could have gone outside for a walk but I needed to avoid an additional spike in my cortisol level that would arise from being hit in the face with spider webs. The television blared on.
I yelled, “Put on the headphones. I don’t want to listen to that smug bitch cook.”
He put them on. I looked out the window at the palm trees.
I thought, “I could sneak out of here forever. Away from the loud television and all these scary cereal boxes. There’s all this garbage I do not want. Where are the other people like me? Oh, Jesus in the cave, I’m the minority. I’m the minority. I’m the minority. I need a break. I need something fun and pure. Like a pretty daisy or an amusement park ride at a trashy carnival. The scrambler burns diesel. I could do my part and bring a few gallons of corn oil!”
Oh, how I want to go to the carnival. Instead, I stay home and worry about waste.
“Goodnight,” he said with his hand on my left shoulder, assuring me, patting me how I don’t like to be patted.
“Yeah.”
“I love you,” he said, kissing me.
“That doesn’t change the fact that your lips are wet. I told you, I hate to kiss you when your lips are wet. It’s like, I just hate it.”
He said, “Calm down. You know how you over react to things. It was just one little box. You’ll be happy again. Tomorrow is another day.”
“Another day filled with garbage and you don’t care about it. And get those lips away from me. Don’t you hear anything I say?”
Gone. I thought about the Scrambler again. It was not enough. Then, I thought about his death. To kill your life partner over a shiny toothpaste box seemed somewhat reasonable. Though extreme, it had the snap of excitement I was looking for.
I went to the kitchen and I took out the expensive cleaver from the knife drawer and I slinked into the bedroom where my sweet little love was lying in the bed and I said to him, “Little did your mother know when she bought this for us that I would use it to chop you into pieces because she raised you to be the most hypocritical, lazy, uncaring person on earth. You should recycle.”
“Put that away.”
I said, “I’m going to chop you into pieces.”
“You can’t pull out the cleaver every time you’re mad at me.”
“The cleaver enjoys getting out. And dry your lips, no wonder they’re always chapped.”
“Leave me alone. I’m going to sleep now. Go chop someone else.”
“On one condition. Promise me you’ll recycle. Don’t throw a huge silver toothpaste box into your bathroom trash. Just save it and recycle it. Bring it into the kitchen and put it in the wicker basket. Do it for me.”
“I’ll try to remember. Goodnight, honey, I love you.”
“I hate you.”
“No you don’t,” Adam said, “We’ll have sex tomorrow and everything will be better.”
“Really?” I said. “Sex with you is at best a chore and at worst a punishment. Besides, I’m leaving you. I’m joining a carnival.”
And Adam said, “No you won’t. It’s filled with carneys.”
“I’ll leave you anyway.”
“You won’t leave me, ever, we’re too compatible.”
“We’re nothing alike. You went to a bad college. And you don’t recycle. I have to chop you into pieces.”
“Don’t chop me up.”
“I have to chop.”
“Stop chopping. You’re ridiculous. Put away that cleaver. Look at what you’ve become.”
I closed the door and I went to the kitchen to put away the cleaver. It’s a nice cleaver. It has a beautiful white handle and a leather sheath. It has only been used twice to cut up chickens. I went to the living room and looked out the picture window. The dirty cat snuck back into the house and came over to the window and looked outside with me. No carnival in sight.
I enjoyed that performing experience one gets by being in front of a crowd. Afterward, we all went out and frankly, it felt like a very important night. Agents. Television people. Etc. Hollywood...what an acid trip.
PEOPLE COME FIRST
BY ADAM WARING
It all started in bed. My Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner Don and I were in blissful harmony there. That is until the day Don came home from the doctor, eyes swollen, head clogged, and declared, “That’s it. The cats are no longer sleeping with us.” Naturally, I was upset. Oliver and Juanita were twelve years old and I’ve had them since they were tiny kittens -- two years longer than I’ve had Don. Depriving them – and me – of sleeping together was unthinkable. But I had to admit, Don’s allergies had gotten worse. So much so that he became “unable” to do household chores involving cat hair, or pollen or mildew or dust, lest they cause a “reaction.”
I don’t have allergies. I have a strong, stable constitution, much like our country’s. Don’s constitution is like that of Iraq. And, because I’m always healthy, my tolerance for those who aren’t is low – at least according to Don. So when Don dropped the cat bomb, I pretty much had no choice but to agree. The cats are very dear to me, but people come first. So, with only a hint of passive-aggressive resentment, I followed Don’s explicit instructions and stripped the bed, washed the bedding, zipped the mattress, pillows and duvet into their new, anti-dust mite hypoallergenic plastic slipcovers ($340), dusted and vacuumed the whole room, plugged in the new HEPA-filtered air purifier ($289) and remade the bed. Then we got in it and closed the door on the cats. And Don slept great. None of the usual snoring, wheezing, hacking, coughing, honking, horking or spitting. But I lay there and listened to my poor babies meowing and scratching at the door, my heart in my throat.
Eventually, the cats found new places to sleep, and my bitter resentment toward Don diminished. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for his allergies. The next strategy he proposed was for me to cover all the furniture the cats sat on with dust cloths, and for me to keep the dust cloths clean by washing them regularly. We also bought a fancy, HEPA-filtered vacuum cleaner ($650), which Don instructed me to use every couple of days. But alas, the cat hair tumbleweeds continued to roll.
Now, we also have a dog – Louise. She’s an adorable little terrier and the apple of Don’s eye. Mainly because when he’s around her, it doesn’t burn and ooze. However, that started to change. Don decided that all Louise had to do was sit where one of the cats had been and – according to the pet chapter in his bible, My House is Killing Me -- she got covered with cat hair and dander. To combat this, Don determined the dog and cats should have as little contact as possible. Since Louise liked the armchair in the office while the cats preferred the living room couch, we bought several pet gates ($115) to keep Louise out of the living room. Of course, the gates made it considerably more difficult for us to navigate our own house, and the pets had now successfully taken over ever piece of comfortable furniture we owned, but Don seemed appeased, and a tenuous peace returned.
That fall, the Santa Ana winds arrived with a vengeance and Don got horribly sick with flu-like symptoms and a sinus infection. It lasted for ten weeks. Toward the end, he made a fateful proclamation – “The cats are leaving the house.” My reaction was no way in hell, as it is with pretty much all new ideas. But Don put it in simple terms: it was either the cats, or him. His idea was to move the cats into the garage, and he would park his car on the street. Our garage happens to have two separate stalls and Don reasoned that his stall would make a nice pussy home. Although I couldn’t deny that it was doable, I absolutely hated the idea. My babies had done nothing wrong, why should they be so severely punished? And how would I pet them and hold them? Don wheezed, “As little as possible. And make sure you wash your hands after.” I burst into tears. But I realized I had to be reasonable. Don was sick as hell, and he had come up with a workable compromise. People come first, right? So with a heavy heart, I reluctantly agreed.
The first order of business was to put down linoleum on the floor of the garage ($250), as no cats of mine were going to live on concrete. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, installing the linoleum only took half a day. We still had time to shop for furniture and accessories, like an upholstered cat tower ($89), a window ledge seat ($50), a recirculating drinking fountain ($59, an electric heater ($39) and a couch ($299). My angels were used to sleeping on a couch, and I wasn’t going to deprive them of that. Plus I figured I would be visiting them quite a bit, and I’d need somewhere to sit. We loaded everything in, and luckily the day, and the weekend, was over. I got another week with Oliver and Juanita inside.
The following Saturday, Don was still deathly sick, so the renovations continued. However, I held out hope that this whole thing would be an exercise in futility, because the hardest part was yet to come -- a collar-controlled dog door to allow Louise access to the yard while keeping the cats out of the house. And lucky for me, Louise is both incredibly dumb and incredibly lazy. She would just as soon piss and shit on one of our antique Orientals. But alas, for $495, Don found the Rolls Royce of pet doors . I didn’t make that up, it’s their slogan. All Louise had to do was get within a few feet of the thing and a plexiglass door magically slid up. As soon as she walked through, the door slid back down again. She was the doggy Get Smart.
And there were no more impediments to my cats being permanently banished. Several weekends, much foot dragging, a horrendous fight, a few blisters, a near electrocution and $3261 later, it was going to happen. I begged Don for another forty-eight hours for the cats to have access to both the house and their new home, and he kindly agreed. Each night I spent an hour or so sitting in the garage, with my little friends purring contentedly on my lap. Of course, when I left to go back inside, they followed me, as they always had.
Don agreed to do the final transition while I was at work. There was no way I could be there. As soon as I left, Don was up and out of bed like a shot, the bloom of health returning to his cheeks, as he eliminated all evidence of my cats from the house. When I arrived home that night, I found them sitting on the garage couch, looking dazed. After a quick hello to Don, and a less-than-genuine show of appreciation for how clean he’d gotten the house, I high-tailed it back out to be with them. I sat with them for hours, petting them, holding them, apologizing over and over.
When I finally left them, their pitiful cries ringing in my ears, I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so low. I went into the house and approached Don for a consoling hug. He exploded. “Get away from me with those cat hair-covered clothes! I’ve just spent an entire day cleaning every nook and cranny of this house to make it habitable for me again, and you come in like that? Throw those clothes in the wash immediately, and take a shower.” Fuming, I protested that I was not going to change my clothes and shower every time I wanted to pet my cats. Don argued that I was certainly not going to come into the house covered with cat hair every night, either. “When you’re with the cats, wear this over your clothes.” He handed me a stained old bathrobe. “And wash your hands up to the elbow after every time you touch those death beasts.” Fuck. Once again he’d managed to find a compromise to what I considered an unbreachable impasse. And I was not happy about it. I snatched the robe from him, threw my clothes in the wash and went to bed, furious and unhugged.
The next several nights were pretty much the same. I came home, said a quick hello to Don, then headed out to the garage, put on my bathrobe and sat with my cats for the rest of the evening. The only problem was, cats are boring. I started bringing books and magazines to pass the time. Then I bought a bookcase ($179) to hold them. The next weekend, I bought a TV ($349). And I had the garage wired for cable ($150 set-up, and an extra $9.95 per month). A few days later I bought a mini-fridge ($99). It was a pain to keep getting up, taking my robe off, and washing my hands up to the elbow every time I wanted something from the kitchen.
Once I started sleeping all night on my garage couch, Don raised objections. I agreed, it wasn’t fair. So I took my cats and moved to the Oakwood apartments. Did Don think I enjoyed spending my nights in a drafty garage in an ugly bathrobe while he got the comfort of our lovely (and, without cats, shockingly clean and fresh) Spanish bungalow? But I was wracked with guilt about my cats, and every moment I was in the house without them I missed them terribly. I wasn’t happy anywhere and I blamed Don for ruining my life. Well, for once, I was solving the problem. My cats and I got a lovely, furnished one bedroom ($3120 per month, plus a $300 pet deposit). All I had to bring was my garage TV. See ya.
Two weeks later, we moved back. I reinstalled the cats in the garage and agreed to divide my time equitably between them and the now totally healthy Don. Ever gracious and reasonable, he welcomed us home. Bottom line, compromise hurts like hell, and I suck at it. But in the light of day, I realized that Don’s health improved, I was able to keep my cats, and our relationship would survive. And, as much as I adore my cats, there was clearly no way I could live without the real true love of my life – Louise, our dog.
I HATE YOU
BY DON CUMMINGS
“I hate you,” I said to Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, as I snatched a shiny silver toothpaste box from his bathroom garbage and threw it into the wicker recycling basket in the kitchen.
“I hate you more, honey” Adam smiled lovingly, not caring about recycling, as he crossed to the television to turn on an annoying cooking show.
“I hate you completely,” I gnashed completely as the glinting toothpaste box bounced off an empty wine bottle piled on top of an empty orange box of laundry detergent and black plastic broccoli trays. I picked up the blinding toothpaste box and wedged it between the orange cardboard and the side of the basket so it would not bounce out again.
Silently, Adam sat on the green sofa, watching the butter melting in the pan on the television.
This goes on many nights. I look for fault. He retreats into a world of television. I shut off lights he forgets to turn out. He blithely turns them back on as he walks down the hall to grab our outdoor cat that always breaks in, the one I am allergic to. I remember what has to be done this month so the roof won’t leak, the collectors won’t come, there will be money for retirement and I put sweet pickles on the shopping list. He forgets to buy the pickles.
I patrol and control by wagging a shiny toothpaste box.
He sits with his show, lost in a world of virtual green beans.
I wash the non-fat yogurt containers so they can be recycled.
He asks me, “Why are you always washing garbage?”
This goes on night after night. For over twelve years.
I said, “Tomorrow, I’m going to drive to Palm Springs and have sex with someone who has a worldlier, more considerate scope than you. Someone with a thicker purpose.”
“Go ahead.”
“I’ll need your car.”
“I need my car.”
“Why didn’t you put the toothpaste box in the recycling? You always tell everyone how much you care about the environment and then you throw this shiny, awful box into the trash in the bathroom.”
No answer.
“I hate being the recycling police.”
No answer.
“Humans are the cause of entropy. We are the Armageddon. Fine. Do whatever you want like everyone else. I guess a free country means free to not care about fucking anything. You don’t care about me.”
He looked up, away from the television meal, and sweetly grimaced to let me know that I am actually a better person, in the grand scheme, than I was being at that moment. Fuck him for loving me.
I insisted. “We have to conserve. You never turn out the lights and already twice this year you left the stove on when you went to work. Are you trying to kill me?”
Pause.
I retreated into myself in the dining room.
I thought, “I hate him. He’s a hypocrite. He does whatever he needs to do in the moment that requires the least amount of physical exertion. He is just like his doddering father who trips over every edge of the sidewalk because he’s too lazy to pick up his feet. He doesn’t pay attention to me. I WILL take his car tomorrow so I can have sex with someone else. Someone who is lean and picks up his feet, someone who makes an effort to use air when he speaks and will recycle and shut off the lights not only because he says he is a recycler and a conserver, but because I want him to do it.”
My house felt like a filthy prison of landfill. I needed out. I just want a rice bowl and a sturdy spoon. I just want to wear a onesy every day.
I looked for something to do that did not involve products or the television. I could have gone outside for a walk but I needed to avoid an additional spike in my cortisol level that would arise from being hit in the face with spider webs. The television blared on.
I yelled, “Put on the headphones. I don’t want to listen to that smug bitch cook.”
He put them on. I looked out the window at the palm trees.
I thought, “I could sneak out of here forever. Away from the loud television and all these scary cereal boxes. There’s all this garbage I do not want. Where are the other people like me? Oh, Jesus in the cave, I’m the minority. I’m the minority. I’m the minority. I need a break. I need something fun and pure. Like a pretty daisy or an amusement park ride at a trashy carnival. The scrambler burns diesel. I could do my part and bring a few gallons of corn oil!”
Oh, how I want to go to the carnival. Instead, I stay home and worry about waste.
“Goodnight,” he said with his hand on my left shoulder, assuring me, patting me how I don’t like to be patted.
“Yeah.”
“I love you,” he said, kissing me.
“That doesn’t change the fact that your lips are wet. I told you, I hate to kiss you when your lips are wet. It’s like, I just hate it.”
He said, “Calm down. You know how you over react to things. It was just one little box. You’ll be happy again. Tomorrow is another day.”
“Another day filled with garbage and you don’t care about it. And get those lips away from me. Don’t you hear anything I say?”
Gone. I thought about the Scrambler again. It was not enough. Then, I thought about his death. To kill your life partner over a shiny toothpaste box seemed somewhat reasonable. Though extreme, it had the snap of excitement I was looking for.
I went to the kitchen and I took out the expensive cleaver from the knife drawer and I slinked into the bedroom where my sweet little love was lying in the bed and I said to him, “Little did your mother know when she bought this for us that I would use it to chop you into pieces because she raised you to be the most hypocritical, lazy, uncaring person on earth. You should recycle.”
“Put that away.”
I said, “I’m going to chop you into pieces.”
“You can’t pull out the cleaver every time you’re mad at me.”
“The cleaver enjoys getting out. And dry your lips, no wonder they’re always chapped.”
“Leave me alone. I’m going to sleep now. Go chop someone else.”
“On one condition. Promise me you’ll recycle. Don’t throw a huge silver toothpaste box into your bathroom trash. Just save it and recycle it. Bring it into the kitchen and put it in the wicker basket. Do it for me.”
“I’ll try to remember. Goodnight, honey, I love you.”
“I hate you.”
“No you don’t,” Adam said, “We’ll have sex tomorrow and everything will be better.”
“Really?” I said. “Sex with you is at best a chore and at worst a punishment. Besides, I’m leaving you. I’m joining a carnival.”
And Adam said, “No you won’t. It’s filled with carneys.”
“I’ll leave you anyway.”
“You won’t leave me, ever, we’re too compatible.”
“We’re nothing alike. You went to a bad college. And you don’t recycle. I have to chop you into pieces.”
“Don’t chop me up.”
“I have to chop.”
“Stop chopping. You’re ridiculous. Put away that cleaver. Look at what you’ve become.”
I closed the door and I went to the kitchen to put away the cleaver. It’s a nice cleaver. It has a beautiful white handle and a leather sheath. It has only been used twice to cut up chickens. I went to the living room and looked out the picture window. The dirty cat snuck back into the house and came over to the window and looked outside with me. No carnival in sight.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Admission
I went to Itunes and purchased the Video of Christine Aguilera, Beautiful.
I've never received so much for $1.99
I've never received so much for $1.99
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Hollywood Lotto
My Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner Adam won the lotto today.
Congratulations!!!!
Sitcom work has been steadily shrinking. Reality Shows (Is American Idol reality?) and crime (like CSI:Albany) have been taking over like that great fungus in New Hampshire.
Sadly, many comedy writers are rendered obsolete in this television climate.
There were almost no jobs available this staffing season and it all looked so grim. Adam volunteered his services on a television pilot, Big Bang Theory, with a former boss of his, Chuck Lorre (Creator of Grace Under Fire, Cybill, Dharma & Greg and Two and a Half Men)---and Chuck was duly impressed and offered Adam a job on Big Bang Theory. Announcements were not yet made when we received the news that Big Bang Theory had been picked up. Adam scored a great gig. We celebrated for five hours. Then, it was announced that it wasn’t picked up. Very Al Gore, 2000. We sulked.
But then Adam’s genius agent came up with the idea: If Chuck liked Adam so much, why not give him a job on Two and a Half Men? He pursued it. Warner Brothers loved Adam’s spec script. Chuck was in Australia but gave the go ahead. And today, the official phone call came in.
Adam got the only job in the only slot open on the only hit comedy show on television.
When my old friend, Sarah, nervously asked today, “Did he get a job?” And I told her, “He sure did.” She responded, “Oh, that is so great. I’m happy for him. But call me selfish, I was so worried that you would have to go back to work.”
Aren’t old friends sweet?
Hollywood is hell. Unless you’re having a good run. Of course, the run could stop at any time but by then you just have to hope that you will have purchased enough property so you can open a cannery to generate income when that time comes. I’m thinking Eureka. Humboldt County is still affordable.
Congratulations!!!!
Sitcom work has been steadily shrinking. Reality Shows (Is American Idol reality?) and crime (like CSI:Albany) have been taking over like that great fungus in New Hampshire.
Sadly, many comedy writers are rendered obsolete in this television climate.
There were almost no jobs available this staffing season and it all looked so grim. Adam volunteered his services on a television pilot, Big Bang Theory, with a former boss of his, Chuck Lorre (Creator of Grace Under Fire, Cybill, Dharma & Greg and Two and a Half Men)---and Chuck was duly impressed and offered Adam a job on Big Bang Theory. Announcements were not yet made when we received the news that Big Bang Theory had been picked up. Adam scored a great gig. We celebrated for five hours. Then, it was announced that it wasn’t picked up. Very Al Gore, 2000. We sulked.
But then Adam’s genius agent came up with the idea: If Chuck liked Adam so much, why not give him a job on Two and a Half Men? He pursued it. Warner Brothers loved Adam’s spec script. Chuck was in Australia but gave the go ahead. And today, the official phone call came in.
Adam got the only job in the only slot open on the only hit comedy show on television.
When my old friend, Sarah, nervously asked today, “Did he get a job?” And I told her, “He sure did.” She responded, “Oh, that is so great. I’m happy for him. But call me selfish, I was so worried that you would have to go back to work.”
Aren’t old friends sweet?
Hollywood is hell. Unless you’re having a good run. Of course, the run could stop at any time but by then you just have to hope that you will have purchased enough property so you can open a cannery to generate income when that time comes. I’m thinking Eureka. Humboldt County is still affordable.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Greatest Hits
Corn, Over My Dead Body?
What Came First? The Bun or the Bun?
People Come First/I Hate You
Paris Under Ice: Very Inconvenient
The Irish
The Efficiency Party
The Bicoastal Chronicles: Exit 91
My Last Meeting with Anne Bancroft
We Have Got to Get it Together
Maximum Disorder of the G.O.P.
Viagra--The Seven Suggestions
Basement, New York, 1974
Are You Willing to Die for Your Country?
Making an Appointment
Divorce Oregon Style
What Came First? The Bun or the Bun?
People Come First/I Hate You
Paris Under Ice: Very Inconvenient
The Irish
The Efficiency Party
The Bicoastal Chronicles: Exit 91
My Last Meeting with Anne Bancroft
We Have Got to Get it Together
Maximum Disorder of the G.O.P.
Viagra--The Seven Suggestions
Basement, New York, 1974
Are You Willing to Die for Your Country?
Making an Appointment
Divorce Oregon Style
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Paris Under Ice? Very Inconvenient
Look, it's no big deal. With some changes, we can solve our global warming crisis. Go to ClimateCrisis.Net
and you can figure out lots of things. Like how much carbon you are putting into the environment. And what you can do to decrease your load. I was at about 12,800 lbs. Lower than average, but still, what am I? Some kind of belching ruminant?
A few things really hit me about this movie, An Inconvenient Truth.
1) All scientists agree that global warming is happening at a rate that is out of synch with the natural cycle of the earth.
2) Al Gore is doing an amazing job.
3) The ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland really are breaking up, heat boring through the glaciers making them look like Swiss cheese, and if huge chunks fall off, we will have flooding across the world that will create a refugee catastrophe.
4) Changes in ocean currents can cause an ice age.
5) This is all happening now.
What is wonderful, though, is the earth takes care of itself. You know, people think it's so awful when millions of people die. But if a system is out of balance, it will naturally correct itself. So, if we cause this out of control warming situation (much like dinosaurs might have done with all their living) then, eventually, the system changes. It seems to me that we, as a species, are motivated by acquisition. It's ludicrous. And if people won't stop overpopulating and only spend their lives trying to figure out how much crap they can acquire, how much they can build, how far they can go, how many births they can cause, then severe storms, floods and ice ages are possibly the perfect barriers to slow them down!
The natural cycle we are in could be one of overpopulation followed by a massive die-off. It's horrible yet kind of interesting.
The balancing act, however, can be brought about by our own intelligence and will to change instead of by violent forces of this planet’s atmosphere pushed to its limits. What are we going to do? It’s fascinating.
Tell all your intelligent friends to go see this movie. But then, do the hard work. Tell your not-so intelligent friends to see it, too.
and you can figure out lots of things. Like how much carbon you are putting into the environment. And what you can do to decrease your load. I was at about 12,800 lbs. Lower than average, but still, what am I? Some kind of belching ruminant?
A few things really hit me about this movie, An Inconvenient Truth.
1) All scientists agree that global warming is happening at a rate that is out of synch with the natural cycle of the earth.
2) Al Gore is doing an amazing job.
3) The ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland really are breaking up, heat boring through the glaciers making them look like Swiss cheese, and if huge chunks fall off, we will have flooding across the world that will create a refugee catastrophe.
4) Changes in ocean currents can cause an ice age.
5) This is all happening now.
What is wonderful, though, is the earth takes care of itself. You know, people think it's so awful when millions of people die. But if a system is out of balance, it will naturally correct itself. So, if we cause this out of control warming situation (much like dinosaurs might have done with all their living) then, eventually, the system changes. It seems to me that we, as a species, are motivated by acquisition. It's ludicrous. And if people won't stop overpopulating and only spend their lives trying to figure out how much crap they can acquire, how much they can build, how far they can go, how many births they can cause, then severe storms, floods and ice ages are possibly the perfect barriers to slow them down!
The natural cycle we are in could be one of overpopulation followed by a massive die-off. It's horrible yet kind of interesting.
The balancing act, however, can be brought about by our own intelligence and will to change instead of by violent forces of this planet’s atmosphere pushed to its limits. What are we going to do? It’s fascinating.
Tell all your intelligent friends to go see this movie. But then, do the hard work. Tell your not-so intelligent friends to see it, too.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Faster
There is something very satisfying about being productive.
But I must add, it makes for very simple thinking.
Like:
“Did I finish that thing on my list? Oh good. That’s good. That’s done. That’s good.”
And the inner emotional life is something like this:
“I’m so tired. I could really use a nap. I better not sleep now, though, because I want to get to bed early tonight because I have to get up for that lunch tomorrow, so I better just power through it. What’s on the list here? Okay, I better get to it. I have to. Um. I deserve a treat. A few cashews. I guess I can eat a little.”
And the occasional moments when you feel like you have inspiration and you want to work on some writing, you just think:
“I’ll do that later. I have to send out the email to S.C.. And I have to call John. And there are people coming over at seven or are they coming at six-thirty? I’m always so bad with time. I don’t mind days, but I hate hours.”
This dizzying speed. This requirement to get things done, “If I send out this funny email to Joe, he’ll think I’m cool and maybe read my other stuff,” and this push. This push.
It’s a bit much.
I’m not alone.
---Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, is in an end game of getting a job on a hit sitcom. If he gets it, there will be rich, fat days. If he doesn’t, there will be nothing.
We move fast. We win, we lose.
But I must add, it makes for very simple thinking.
Like:
“Did I finish that thing on my list? Oh good. That’s good. That’s done. That’s good.”
And the inner emotional life is something like this:
“I’m so tired. I could really use a nap. I better not sleep now, though, because I want to get to bed early tonight because I have to get up for that lunch tomorrow, so I better just power through it. What’s on the list here? Okay, I better get to it. I have to. Um. I deserve a treat. A few cashews. I guess I can eat a little.”
And the occasional moments when you feel like you have inspiration and you want to work on some writing, you just think:
“I’ll do that later. I have to send out the email to S.C.. And I have to call John. And there are people coming over at seven or are they coming at six-thirty? I’m always so bad with time. I don’t mind days, but I hate hours.”
This dizzying speed. This requirement to get things done, “If I send out this funny email to Joe, he’ll think I’m cool and maybe read my other stuff,” and this push. This push.
It’s a bit much.
I’m not alone.
---Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, is in an end game of getting a job on a hit sitcom. If he gets it, there will be rich, fat days. If he doesn’t, there will be nothing.
We move fast. We win, we lose.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Less Black, More Life
I am a big fan (okay, and big friend) of Megan Karlen, New York City artist. Her latest paintings are in keeping with her theme of life forms trapped both dead and alive underground. But now, with less black dominating the paintings, the colors are vibrant, exciting and beautiful. You feel so alive when you look at these colorful images. And then you grow sad these living beasts are trapped underground. But then, you get so happy because being trapped underground has not destroyed their life force (okay, not everyone survives). A true affirmation of spirit. And I mean spirit in the best sense of the word. I love these paintings.
Make your offers:
Underground Series: Click here and then Scroll down and click on UG May
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