got new plans to make. the big build up for the small let down. the future you were riding... the "there's always this..." - it's just not happening anymore. and nothing even had to happen.
"he just went crazy."
sad isn't even the word. it's just showing my face around here again that's the hard part. another six to eight months of life threatening balcony walking. being the weird kid. "i am so out of here."
The West War Ours. Where do i go from here?
it is. it's learning to breathe again. hard and long. full lungs expanding and stretching, capillaries bursting.
starting to think about where i'll be sleeping for months... because you know me.
when i went and saw as cities burn in philadelphia, it was almost exactly like seeing them the night before on long island. except this time with a little less crowd participation.
but the thing that made this show a million times better, and unlike any other show i'd been to before was that the lead singer of as cities burn had his mother standing off to the side of the stage, and performed this song, solo, and dedicated it to her.
this is the kind of thing that shakes you on and on.
Dead man, were you ever alive? Or was I just a seed you buried deep inside Some woman you wed Right before you crawled out of her bed and crept down the hall? Did you think of me? Did you even for a second hesitate in the doorway? It's just something that I'd like to know Though I'd still love you if told me You just walked away
My God, what a world you love Where men bury their sons And without thought just walk away
And my mother's heart breaks Like the water inside of her [x2]
Dead man, is it being high that makes you alive? It makes you leave behind three boys and a wife in '89 As the track marks inched their way up your arm My mother taught my brothers and I not to call you daddy But to call you father
But I believe there is something here to be learnt of grace 'Cause I can't help but love you Even with a heart that breaks Like the promises that you made Like the promises that you made The promises that you made
My God, what a world you love
you can hear this song, "the widow", over on their myspace.
as much as it is not a desirable trait, i have a hard time leading the married life. and i'm not saying that i am married, because really, i don't want to belittle the huge sacraments that three (or six, actually) of my best friends have undergone. but, as i mentioned in a livejournal post this past week, "i know a new brand of love that feels exponentially stronger and longer lasting than i have ever felt in any previous relationship." i go on these runs where i want to be left alone and do my own thing or on other nights, i want to go out all night and not need to check in.
i know i'm not alone in this. guys, in general, i'm sure are always like this. there's always that sort of desire to 'just go.' there's always something in guys that always calls us out to the clubhouse. we always want to be he-man woman haters. do stupid shit. watch action movies. laugh at farts. and, really, girls aren't allowed to see this side of us. because that breaks the veneer.
if females really knew the secret lives of males, oh dear god, forget the species. i have a feeling, though, the same can be said if the roles were reversed.
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i'm typing in my dining room. i never took advantage of the fact that my computer is actually a laptop. entirely meant for being mobile. when i unplugged it, i got an insane shock. the kind where i was forced to say, "ahhHhHhHhH" while it was happening. in actuality, it probably lasted only a second and a half, but that's quite a bit of time to be directly mainlined to open electricity. my arm is still tingling. and there was a little bit of twitching. stupid mistakes. live like that long enough, and any day now, i could be a dead man.
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fuse called me saturday with news that if i wanted it, he had a ticket with my name on it to see underoath, poison the well, and as i lay dying at the nokia theater. i was completely signed up; so stoked. went to look up any flyers or anything of that nature, and saw that, in fact, as i lay dying was not on the bill. it was fucking EVERY TIME I DIE.
absolutely one of those bands that i want to be sure that i see every time they're in the area. there are few bands that are on that list anymore. mostly because they all break up. but i would say that the list looks something like dredg, circa survive, alexisonfire, misery signals, olympia, every time i die, the honorary title and the deftones, and ambulette. i might be forgetting some. i'm sure that i am. possibly silversun pickups, though i'm terrified of the hipster presence there.
speaking of appearances, mark z. danielewski is heading through the area this october. 10/4 he'll be at the barnes & noble in astor place.
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rahul said that he hadn't heard a band shittier than this one.
there i was, defending them, and saying that their last album sounded like a fairweather album from time to time and that even that song could hang with their old stuff, etc. and now, since i hadn't given their other album a chance, i am listening to it, and it's basically garbage. man, i hate bands.
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today i was off and i did nothing. i woke up, ate cinnamon harvest cereal, watched an hour of what not to wear, and an hour of ten years younger while holding hands over the phone, showered, watched rush hour 2, came home, fixed the forum, fucked around on the internet for two hours, ate dinner, and now here i am.
i talked about this last week. when i have my days off, and i'm not doing anything, usually i love doing nothing and just chilling out. when football season comes around, FORGET IT. i'm totally going to do everything in my power to get off on sundays. but then, once the end of the night comes around (mostly around the sundown time) i regret every minute and wish that i'd accomplished something. it's horrible.
tonight, after a long useless day off, i have to work at eleven to man a huge midnight release of john madden football 08. i'm on the fence about picking it up. because, i mean, what can it hurt. i have the ncaa game that i've been playing the shit out of. we're talking three hour offseasons. what a ridiculous child my parents have spawned.
the 360 thing is still hanging in the balance. i'm only $1000 in debt after being as far as $8000. so, really, all material possessions seem completely moot when it comes to the fact that i can be in the clear for the first time in six long years. i've been paying $300-$400 every two weeks on just bills lately. just trying to alleviate that demon. and i'm so close. i fear that if i get that system, i'll only head further down into that hole. it's scary, i guess. but there are games that i want for it.
but there's also a room i want to furnish. and a moving fund i'd like to start.
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speaking of moving, arizona was a HUGE candidate for a long, long time. but after the past two weeks reminded me of the extreme love that i have for rainy nights and thunderstorms, i really had to reconsider. there is almost NO rain in arizona. so we're up in the air again. portland or seattle are right up top on the lists. of course, i'd love to live in the midwest, too. but i think the west coast, especially the pacific northwest is such a cool area. i have heard nothing but GREAT things about it.
moving is all entirely based upon whether or not they get me my own store. once the holiday season is over, i'm asking what the deal is with that. something along the lines of, "hey, neil. i'm definitely interested in looking into becoming an MIT [manager in training]. how do you feel about my potential as a store manager, and if there are any specific areas you think i need to focus on, please train me more on those so that i can then move on in that direction." if things aren't moving after that, then the look to move is completely on. for now, it's just checking the craigslist every so often just to keep an eye on prices.
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Come tomorrow I’ll be on my way back home. In the morning call from a roadside telephone. One night doesn’t mean the rest of my life. If I go it’s not impossible; possible is probably wrong. So, let go cause I’m afraid to try.
Keep my hands by my side. You won’t come back. I hope some day you’ll understand. I wanna try, make it right; Don’t know if I can.
Last night everything was right. The rain was gone. One summer night’s the only time we’ve known. So, shut your eyes: When you wake up I’ll be gone. When you wake up I’ll be gone.
virgin readers of chuck klosterman's work more than likely begin their reviews exactly the same. whether it be spoken, or written, they will tell you that they "rarely laugh out loud at books, but this time, it was different."
klosterman is a regular writer for esquire, gq, spin, the new york times, the washington post, and even espn. you may also recognize him as the writer of the more popular book, sex, drugs, and cocoa puffs. what this means is, the man has a way with words that's appreciated in many, many circles. in no small way, this other chuck has made me a fan and follower of his writing simply by talking about what he's thinking exactly when and how he is thinking it.
this book is a blog on paper.
within these particular pages, we're with klosterman on a nationwide journey in which he is visiting the places of death of rock icons such as the allman brothers, kurt cobain, robert johnson, and layne staley, amongst others. and while we do hear about these locales in some way or fashion, mostly what we're reading about is how he relates just about every single facet of his life with pop culture references, psychoses, and rock bands. most of the internal dialogue we'll hear from him is, actually, about the women who are or were, in some shape or another, in his life.
if you were to go on livejournal.com, blogspot.com, or some other popular freeblog site, you might actually find other accounts very similar to the ones found in this book. but, unless the blogger is as charismatic, savvy, trivia infused, and likeable as this guy, you won't come anywhere near the enjoyment i received from this book. and while it was borrowed, i will definitely, at some point, be adding this (and his others) to my collection.
Y: the Last Man was suggested to me by dave, and i expected really good things. dave's opinion is generally one that i trust and one that carries a lot of weight in my eyes. this time around, though, i got through all hundred some odd pages of this trade and just didn't really care what happened from there.
the premise here is that yorick and his pet monkey ampersand are both the last existing males on the planet. this presents a TON of problems for them, not just socially, but scientifically, sexually, etc. plus, this changes the face of the world as humanity once knew it. in fact, it even brings into question the term 'mankind.' i mean, yes, i did like the fact that it raised a bunch of questions, but it wasn't exactly quizzical enough for me to need to know what happened from there.
the style of drawing just didn't draw me in, which, as a graphic novel plays about 33% of a role of the overall picture. and while the other large majority of this work is about story, and plot, and writing style, with all of that thrown in, it just didn't seem to reel me in the way i had expected.
i may pick up the second trade somewhere down the line, once there's a lot less going on in the "to be read" department, and see if it gets me more excited about it. but as of right now, it's just not my thing.
i just finished reading this book somewhere around 3:30. it took me forever to get through the damn thing. it wasn't so much for the length, i guess, though it was pretty tightly packed text, small size. around four hundred twenty some odd pages. i just have had a job. i love reading, and now that i have all these books, i figured i should get my ass in gear and try to at least whittle down the number to single digits. it won't happen. but it's worth putting effort into.
a lot of times, the title doesn't ring a bell, but the author does. and it's for hilarious reasons. this guy and this book is the one that went on the oprah-coaster. first, she puts it on her list, and it gets insane acclaim, and then the book ends up being debunked, leaving oprah sort of discredited.
now, if i were following this whole thing a little bit more as it happened, i might be able to fine tune this story a little bit more but as i understand it, this book is supposedly a memoir which isn't entirely true. some of it is embellished, and some of it may not have happened at all. now, for a nation of middle aged women, maybe that bothers them. but me, i'm a fiction reader. so even if this entire thing is ENTIRELY false, i'm still down with it. but some of it, there's no way it didn't happen to him on some scale. some of it is just too fierce.
i didn't underline any quotes or any passages to really pass along to you guys as a guide. it's written in a chuck-esque tone, but without those one liners that tear you down. it's just honest, and brutal. it's actually one of those books that makes sense to describe as 'raw.' this guy has no writing background, and it shows. he's just recounting his experience. and it works. the entire book just works. which is another reason i don't think it's entirely made up. things don't all wrap up nicely, and things don't really end SO badly... the experience just gets tied up. in fact, the most climactic moment in the entire book, in my experience, comes after the actual narrative is completed.
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sometimes i just want to strip my entire album collection down to just albums that need to be heard front to back. maybe just put the rest into storage. that kind of thing.
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i haven't been sleeping as well as i was. i also stopped writing as much as i was. i wonder if there is a direct relation.
i went bookshopping at three different places tonight. there's always that endless need for more and more words. i have a queue very literally twenty two books deep. oh, lord. this is definitely something i need to start focusing on, because none of them are books that i just happened upon. each of these are ones that i have a genuine interest in and i am psyched to dive into.
i was trying to explain today how i don't even know what i do with my time. i get home from work, maybe eat dinner, head up here, and then it's a blur. i spend SOME time on the internet, but i'm not abusing it. i'm not myspacing out. it's really not that big of a deal. i'd know. i don't watch tv. i haven't played ncaa. it's been insane. i haven't even been talking on the phone that much. it's just constant kinetics. and i just want to settle down.
there's some decent music coming out lately. the new portugal was great, the emmure is insane. common's album came out today, and i'm so iffy about even listening to it. the last album, Be, was perfection. and since, common has been in movies, has guest spotted on a bunch of albums. it's worrisome to see what this guy has been up to for a couple years. i've just hit play on the record, and we'll see where it leaves me at the end of it.
