construct.

these were in boxes, haphazardly scattered.
i was waiting for a bookshelf, but i stopped waiting.

posit.

wen[hhh]/.

i feel about you.

wing.

in the grand scheme of the whole nanowrimo, a major theme is to never look back and, in fact, to write headlong and to never stop. i forgot that what happened last year was not so much lack of interest, but lack of grindstone in the face of the retail holiday season's endless pummeling. i don't feel myself, really. not that it's a bad thing or that i'm slipping away or anything like that. but i think we all hit that notch in which you fall where nothing glows the way it should, and picking yourself up to do it all again, any of it, requires a crowbar and a hammer. i'm in the middle of that.

and i hear the other day, i hear someone say, "just another month," and that's until it goes back to the way it always is. which isn't something particular to look forward to.

gloat!

I had a very good dream last night. very good. it wasn’t really beneficial, so to speak? meaning it wasn’t a dream in which I was given a ton of money, or a ton of love or a ton of compliment in general. just that the world was very rich. I was at a show at first, and it was very dark, and we were in some kind of house that had a lot of little coves where you could tuck yourself in and watch where the bands would play. “this town again” was the band playing, and I was telling someone about watching them and when you watch them, you have to enjoy all of the really complex interesting stuff, but sometimes they go into these parts of their songs and they are just terrible. very bad. so you have to literally hold on and not get knocked over or knocked off of the shelf you’re on. because it’s so bad.

blur.



then I’m looking at the banister or the railing of a deck and I’m watching a cicada on it, and it’s crawling away from me, and its wings are those of a blue jay. and it was incredible. they folded flat against its back, but the color pattern was the light blue, the white, and the darker blue tones of a blue jay. and it was actually feathers. I wanted to grip it from the back of its wings and hold it and examine it. when I reached for it, it jumped away like a cricket. those big crickets, I think they call them camel crickets. it was gone, though. and they would appear again every so often.



and where I was, I was slowly building the world in my brain and the longer I stayed and understood the culture of that world, the more the world had detail. north south east and west was slowly established. things of that nature. I started to see there were different groups of people, but they were extravagant outlandish differences. like one group was full of pirates in full garb, others were ancient wizards, there were japanese school girls, and so on. but the most sought after groups, the groups that entire throngs of people would follow were the cicadas with the blue jay wings, who would eventually grow larger and larger and walk on two legs, but crouched over like the urRu from the dark crystal. they’d walk around slowly, but covered in robes almost like Gandalf type spell casters, and people would follow them and follow them. they seemed to still have that aimless insect gait. this village or world was somewhat like a tree village with lots of levels and branches and little places that were built into the tree or building to go into and live or shop.

headwind.

click the above picture to get a little glimpse at my profile for the work i'm doing for nanowrimo. it'll probably be very static save for the word count, which is something i plan to update as i take it on daily.

as i learned from reading brian martinez' piece from last year's nano (kissing you is like trying to punch a ghost) it doesn't have to be as demanding as it seems. it's about telling a story, almost like sitting down at a campfire with an idea and exciting yourself and anticipating your audience's moves a lot less than your characters'. each character has a voice and a path and you let them speak through you. almost a channeling piece.

bring me up.

so nanowrimo has begun again. i remember that i had begun during last year's in writing something i had somewhat shaped in my head and then started running at 12:01 on 11/1. it didn't come together as i'd thought as i got overwhelmed with the goal, word-wise and underwhelmed with the overall concept i had and the actual words that were coming out. (see what i'd written here)



this time around, it's all very random and a little more patchy (much like the beard i'm allowing to overtake my face) but it's more fun, and i feel more drawn to it than i have in the past. i'm not concentrating on word quantity, but more the act of getting down to write something all on one massive project. i'm generally more one to open up a piece of blank notebook paper, start with a line and run on randomly for whatever time it takes until the dagger hits the hilt. it's rare that one project makes sense to me for more than an hour. maybe this will go over well.

quandary.

i just thought this was a great film poster.
i'm sure the movie will be phenomenal as well.

crux.

i have been waiting forever to get a writing desk.
been looking for a good desk to sit down at and really get down to it.
just moved into a new house, and one was abandoned here.
the room i moved into had the perfect wall for it.
utility.

kierkegaard.

Leveling at its maximum
is like the stillness of death,
where one can hear one's own heartbeat,
a stillness like death,
into which nothing can penetrate,
in which everything sinks, powerless.

redgold.

i wish i could get as stoked for things as i used to.

like 2004 stoked.
or maybe 2006 stoked.
very different times.
such very different eyes.
i had a good feeling about a lot of it.
and a lot of it was just as vague.
"a lot of it" as a definite indefinite.

i've hit a point where nothing matters.
not in an empty way, i'd hope.

i think i've always had this vision of having an unbelievable crew of individuals who are this massive inspiration to each other. who write and create on a daily basis and who throw each others' work around back and forth at each other because while they can't wait to have their next piece done, they really, almost moreso, can't wait to read what's next from the guy down the hall. throwing opinions on each others' work back and forth and constantly building. like a massive lennon and mccartney thing, happening always. always.

if i had that, i wouldn't care what kind of money i'd be making or even who loved me.
but fuck it,
these are seeds to the wind,
and off to the rocks or the sea.


you left with him
and even when you didn't,
you said it's definitely someone else.

weak in the life.

yo.
i'll be
right back.

, but soundly.

so, this is done.
it took me a trip to office max and a few cutting jobs
to get furious about The Beach Boys' becoming Beach Boy's.
was trying too hard to keep everything contained on that size.

spherical evaporate, the.

i've lost something.
two things, really. one which wasn't as significant.

they were placed together in my old apartment while packing, and i put them together in a place i knew i'd be able to access easily once i got back to the house here. and now i can't recall where that place is. it's a whole book of poetry i'd been working on, a specific project. tons of notes. it was one of those composition notebooks as well. i've lost moleskines before. those seemed random, though. i've lost two or three. and while the realization that it is no longer going to be found is a massive heart breaker, it ends up being kind of okay. i feel like it's sort of a gift to someone. the 1/10 chance that someone might find it and appreciate it (vs the 8/10 chance someone will simply toss it, or the 1/10 chance someone will find it pathetic) is good enough for me. but this is a pretty big deal. i'm feeling a great weight of it. i don't feel i've ever had a major tie to anything that i could really lose. i tend to feel most things are replaceable.

there was a letter in that book as well.
and drawings.

-

new mix cd is done.
mix xix: ", but soundly."
track list up in a week or so.

species pieces.

could be the best night of my life.
just broke a horse's neck.
could be the worst night of my life.
that's a dead fucking horse.

RIP MMVI-MMXI (2006-2011)

district of columbia.

had i been guilty of those fabrications,
i'd have left me too, by god and Gods.
many fictions have been donned by myself,
and none so much as the character who could show you
such adoration.

painter, o', i looked at you as sun on breathless acres,
though in passing seasons as light fractured in panes of plated glass.
and the silhouette meant you still showed up.

i heard the rain, you know it.

the bathtub filled with bottles
where there once were hands instead,
which cupped the stories.
they bang together ungraciously,
no concept of what will sound a proper cadence,
all hollow space filled with merciless spinning
where there once were maps of every coast and in between.
i never heard you sigh again, i only heard you breathe.

the bottles floating endlessly, you tied them sweetly,

addressed to home.

had i been your greatest fear,
at least i would remain inside your backwards glance.
but i know you're sleeping soundly now,
no light to pale your face.



i have only loved survivors.

you said.

i believed you, and you weren't even the only one.
you talked about how i filled a vacancy and with hope.
i could wake up flattened and dried all wrong, and still
you never admitted that you were just a figment.
you never spooled up on the projection room floor.
you never hissed at the end of your final song,
intermittently puffing with no sound to release
despite the perpetual spinning.
i believed you, with your hand on my heart
and talking about being lost in nameless cities,
talking about being old and storied.
your hands on my face, watching your tear pass down your cheek
titled: "this would be years and decades"; still framed.

i'm fairly sure it happened, and it's simple to never be fragile again.

locustoms.

you can be no one and still escape nothing.
in barred windows, their faces are catalogued in longing portraits.
no wilderness here in hindsight, boy.
there's no one willing to petrify your presence.
you're out, in league with the antiquities, and ain't that a thing or two?


we waited you out, The Flood and I, in winter's berth.
it's easier to pique with no one watching, and the eager half as willing.

i could never work this genius shit out,
for it was always lack of courage.

well, you could breathe.

fully uninspired.
brutal.
smoking with the windows up.

i've had these visions the past few days of being stabbed repeatedly. in the head, through the skull. no one having the humane rationale to stop it, so they all scatter or stare like no life is at stake, just a playground scrap. i imagine my blood on my driver's license. i think about building a graveyard stare to keep the wolves at bay. i think of men of no consequence. i think of their bearing down on me. nothing lost in their attack, though nothing gained. a violence to contribute to their sin, a pelt for their collection. my life dominated by fear for a solid three months. shame and nothing else. this is the dynamic.

feels like i left a record playing in the next room.

remendeleev.

d
on't change now into
somethi
ng you can't handle,
because when it's
done i
t's done,
and whe
n
it's through it's through.

esmé.

i feel awash.
awash.
words on a page
sworn by ink in western pictograph.

make no promises

their own self resonance
and she won't answer.
it's not as if i turn her away.
fruitwine;
alone for volumes and more.
the passing and passing of an evolution of imperfect wrecks.

we pace in a dream state,
halls, halls,
and then company.
dreams of sex with her in hell
aside broken wine glasses on sidewalks.
eyes passing by the windows.

we are false, for real.

wanna share an epoch?
or communion?
real spirit, but o' nothing promised or true.
the dead in your dreams are your questioned breaths,
a want to be good, alone and unique.
strong because you are art without premiere.

hands, idol.

i have spent a lot of time in 2011 playing video games. i wouldn't say it's one of my passions, but it's definitely a story telling medium that i've come to appreciate since i was younger, and beyond that, they can be entertaining on SO many levels beyond telling a story. in fact, sometimes it's a relief to be blasting dudes with guns bigger than my torso because of some vague shadow group they belonged to or were hired on by. and they were in my way.

i spent forty something hours on mass effect 2. as commander shephard, i was trying to save the human universe from collectors who were stealing human beings and using their bodies as husks and as a model on which to build a gigantic reaper, which would then be consumed with destroying all organic life within the galaxy. ya know. that's what i did. i think what got me so deeply involved in this game was the fact that a massive portion of the game is spent building your team. which was a throwback to possibly my favorite game of all time, final fantasy vi. building this pretty major relationship with the various men and women you pick up and aid ends up coming to a massive head in the final drive towards the final goal, when you have to select different individuals to lead parties, perform specific tasks, and fight alongside you based on their previous and current training. you're also given the option to go on character-specific loyalty missions which are requested specifically by the individual characters which can bring them closer to you by showing you're willing to go to another level for your crew. dope game. third one is coming out next year, probably around march. whole thing looks a little different. i've heard there is going to be a smaller crew overall, so that you can build richer relationships with those with you. i was a little bummed to hear that the other characters who i'd just fought side by side with wouldn't be playable in the new one, but bioware announced that they'd be back in some level. stoked. gameplay in the game actually wasn't all that great, to be honest. it was standard cover based shooting, accented with different powers like fireballs, shockwaves, gravity altering singularities, etc. but what kept this game a staple in my daily life was the size and depth of that universe, and the ever building and changing relationship with everyone i'd met and brought along in the game. phenomenal.

one thing i really admire about bioware is the fact that they are almost tolkienian in their chronicling of their worlds. even within the dragon age series, i felt i was reading pieces of information on races, areas and individuals that i'd never meet or be affected by. wars happened in which the result barely affected the present any longer. but they wrote about them. created heroes. killed heroes and kingdoms. and in mass effect, they've done the same. entire races are described in pain staking detail. information about the gravity of the planets are provided, the evolution of those races to their current appearance and economy, interactions with other races. and even in little ways, it will always be accurately portrayed in the dialog between two characters. when a character doesn't react or interact in a way you'd expect with another character of another race, you're not put off or calling it out. you can see within the choice of words that this whole process is one of distinction. the way the conversation plays out is completely believable.

the only reason i didn't dive directly into a second play through of mass effect, was because as i was finding myself concluding that story, another one was coming out. and this next undertaking was l.a. noire. it's a 40s detective story told in the motif of a lot of the books and films of the time. i don't have to illustrate it to you. the major part about this game was its innovation. and it all began at the visual level. they did this entirely using motion scan technology, which is used to capture the real actors facial expressions from a multitude of angles to really flesh out and embody the entire visage of the character. i can tell you with no exaggeration (possibly from the hype that i'd been building for it on my own) that when i saw in-game footage of it more than half a year before its release (and the first that many had ever been exposed to) i got a little choked up. legitimate body tension. i was floored. but still, i was unsure how they were going to actually pull the game off. sure it was pretty, but what am i going to be doing? how is this going to happen?

and that's actually what stole the show once the game was in my hands. an hour or two in, you quickly forget about the visual innovations and all the ground they're breaking there, because the gameplay is unlike anything i've done in a game before. your cases involve you finding clues within a crime scene, followed by interrogations of witnesses or people of interest. occasionally, there will be a more traditional chase sequence or some kind of action event that will finish up the case. this is fine. it brings you back to a place you're comfortable, you feel in control once more, and also, what's more, it makes sense when they throw it in there. it feels like an honest, pivotal moment.

you're a veteran who's become one of the last good police officers in the city. you're also a human being. the cases you see affect you, bring you different places in your life. but more importantly, you're doing your job with integrity, the right way, and diligently, regardless of the trouble you're given while it's going down. good, solid story.

the thing that i genuinely loved this game for was the way that it made people talk and think about the medium. i talk to people all day about these games. all day. and in a landscape that is completely dominated by first person shooters (namely the call of duty series), this one stepped up to the forefront and fearlessly threw most of the guns to the side. even many games within this sandbox genre are more open ended random encounter based shooters. but not l.a. noire. you thought about these cases while you were playing them. you were retaining detailed information not only to get a better idea of the story line, but also to succeed within the narrative. the best story was told when you were properly interrogating your witnesses, using every clue at your disposal, and recognizing the ticks that your questions had spawned, and knowing when and where to pull your ace in the hole.

a lot of times, i felt beaten down by this game, even though i was still getting to the root of a lot of the crimes at hand. and so were many others. many people genuinely wanted to get better at examining the crime scenes for every clue, to get as much information from each spoken eye witness account. you could hear people wanting to get better at what had become their virtual job because it was almost making them feel a dedication and an obligation to the city and its inhabitants. the pulse of this game was rich. something has to be said for the writers of this game, and how they had to think and speak directly to los angeles, and to the set piece that had been laid out for them, and not worry about what video gamers were going to think. this wasn't a game written or produced for gamers. it's for people who want a virtual experience, and all that comes from it. this was an entirely new type of storytelling.

i then played infamous 2 which is a much more traditional entry into the sandbox genre. it's a sequel, which lends itself to following a ton of already laid down mechanics, and even plot points and story arcs. this was not much different than any other sequel that the genre tends to offer up. though there's something about this type of gameplay that i cannot deny. the endless collecting, the massive scale, and the continuous character skill development makes me want to perpetually check in to the game, although i'm essentially repeating many of the same actions.

had i simply carried through with the core storyline, i could have had it buried in about 7 hours. you learn more mysteries about your powers (lightning and electricity based control, as set up in the first game of the series; a fantastic superhero origin story) and how to continuously upgrade them to charge a device which is meant to be able to strip powers from a massive "conduit", which is what they call human beings who are capable of wielding such powers, in the event that their inherent powers are eventually awakened. this one antagonistic conduit is titled "the beast" (lame) and is about the size of several buildings and is laying waste to the entire east coast. all the while, a preacher turned warlord is commanding gangs of mercenaries to stop you and is enslaving the faux new orlean's populace as well. you eventually get enough power to stop these villains, but consequences abound. depending on whether you've followed the good or evil storyline, the outcomes are vastly different, and have ripple effects, worldwide.

being the type of player, though, that isn't content to just follow the 20% of the video game that the story encompassed, i needed to recapture every piece of the city, i needed to gain the respect of the people (i played through the good storyline), and i needed to comb every corner of every street to make sure that i had obtained every piece of the underground, parallel story line that you can uncover by pieces together recorded messages between the support characters. i could find things to do forever in that game. something about that core gameplay style screams out to me, and i can't put it down. i'd say this game wasn't as good as its original, but its plot points were a little larger, and had a much bigger impact.

something that stood out to me in a big way was the fact that so many who had played and enjoyed the first one and didn't like the second would cite the character's new voice as a major reason they couldn't relate to the game. it's interesting that they had meshed, and gotten invested in cole (ironically named the same first name as the protagonist in noire) on such a level that something as minor as a voice could turn someone away from a game overall. this is a place that i'm sure many felt video games could never reach. a common case of "the other darrin."

and this is what i'm playing now. fear 3. i don't think i like it. i'll probably finish it, just to know what's going on with the storyline in the series. i'll try to break it down, but i'm not even sure i'm following it very closely. you play nameless "point man" who was sent in months ago to take down paxton fettel (who ends up being your brother) who had set up a psychic link with a hired mercenary squad. also helping fettel is a paranormal entity, little girl alma. in the second game, you control another guy, who alma is strangely drawn to, and she ends up somehow psychically getting impregnated by him. and now in the third game, you return to where these actions occur, and are trying to subdue alma from having this child. she's having massive contractions which are crushing the city. and if she has this child, it will be the embodiment of massive evil and suffering, and mankind will be ravaged by the child.

alright?

this is the perfect example of a game that didn't need to be made. i genuinely loved fear 2. from a gameplay standpoint, it was a very tight first person shooter with a nice bullet time mechanic, had great set pieces and well-balanced weapons and enemies. aside from being a shooter, it also was going for a survival-horror type thing which was pulled off perfectly. i can remember many conversations with friends about the school, wherein while they were playing that particular level, they genuinely wanted to go no further, knowing things were going to be messing with their mind. the game borrows a lot of themes from japanese horror, from the timing, to the off-angle shots of what is coming for you. also, misdirects and false reliefs were a major part of what made the game so stressful. a great, true fear experience, if you allow yourself to get immersed.

and what it comes down to is ideas, and the desire to pull them off. playing this game feels like you're hearing a story told by someone who read that it might have been told to someone who thought it was an okay story from someone who somewhat liked it.

there's guns and a ghost? here's alma? oh, and sometimes, you go slow.

this game had one solid moment, and it came in one turn of a corner about 3 hours into the game. the idea was then reused throughout the next few levels. they introduce enemies who act more as obstacles than functional inhabitants of the game world. if your ideas aren't strong enough to fill a concept from birth until conclusion, keep building ideas. what this game could have been is the remainder of the final pieces of an idea that barely came together in the end, or a full 10 hour experience built around a few neat ideas a writer had floating around. but what's more than likely the truth is they wanted to cash in on a franchise that has a fairly loyal fanbase that still had an open ended story with a few more chapters to be adlibbed. strong ideas only look strong when they're complete. beyond that, i've always felt that they get dragged down by the mediocre ideas you've used to vehicle them outward.

akimbo.

not sure what to do with myself,
so i'm standing on top of my doubts.

in swaths.

i'm generally not INTO art pieces or visual artists in general, and the only reason that is true is because i, myself, haven't come across very many that i can get into by name. the medium is so silent, very reflective. it often doesn't elicit very much from me, other than inspiration for greater, farther reaching ideas. also, having never studied art, or had any friends who have, i'm again a bit of a guerilla style fan, picking up what i can from environment and in passing. oftentimes, this has served me better than word of mouth. my path sort of devises itself.

the above artist is gustav klimt and much of what i'm seeing from him is very densely populated by color and thought. seems very huddled together. i enjoy it, to a degree. sort of slowly looking for more.

i love that the above painting is entitled mermaids.
there's something very wrong about them.

cuniculus.

i am not a photographer.
but i do photograph.

went to brooklyn this past week to take some photos and walk the streets that i miss. got inspired, saw some friends, started missing the place in a major way. would love to make the place my home again, get a job out there, and really get established. even if not immediately, i have to start making a push to have myself happen out there more often.

claustrophobia has become the mode.

again, some pictures from the visit, the rest (and the full sizes) to be found on the flickr.

visit.

justine and dan came back to new york to visit for justine's birthday. dan lived here for his whole life. and justine did want to see the beach (which wasn't in the meterological cards). but i like to tell myself that some percentage of why they came here was to see me. so i will have to repay them with a trip to west virginia, somewhere in my temporary relocation exploits.

i wrote her a birthday letter that was written expressly, very deliberately.
the words came quickly.
having her in my life is a pretty big deal.
there are some people that i want to sync myself with,
have our sensory traffic interweave.
she is one of them.

here are some pictures i took that i enjoyed while she was here. the rest are on my flickr.






and here is a picture of capone,
exhausted from the weight of reason:

sull.

the canon powershot elph 300 hs.

as if that means any damn thing.
i bought that camera today.
i'm stoked. it's super small.
i have a good amount of friends who do a good amount of things.
i've never had a digital camera.
glad to add it to my crew.

about a year or two ago, i was thinking about buying a digital SLR camera on the recommendation of a friend who is really into technology, and also a friend who graduated with a degree in photography. the more i looked into it, the less i felt i was going to use it for its true purpose. so i got a small little camera that i thought was cute, and knew i would use.

i started feeling bad, and almost fearing the fallout from my tech friend.
i still kind of do.
i'm worried that when he reads this, he will know at least three glaring reviews off the top of his head that he will CITE FROM MEMORY once he sees it.

i'm still stoked to take pitchers though.

straight lined jacket.

this is a project being undertaken by the frontman from a recently dismantled band called the depreciation guild who were also incredible. very direct premise for the songs, not going outside of what the theme is. 1980s inspired synthpop. had a track on a mix cd a few months ago (dream about me) which had me captured for a few weeks, along with the rest of the record, spirit youth.

these five tracks are all listed as demos, and i have yet to find an opportunity to officially digitally download them or to purchase a physical copy of it. tried to get in touch with him today, haven't heard back from him. until then, i figured i'd share it here. get the exposure up a bit. see what some of you guys think.

have four creative writing pieces in the process of coming together.
two of them are not poems.

savlo.

pricing tickets for chicago to get to the braid show got me amped. it will be followed shortly by a week in vegas. oregon in july and a day or two in florida if i can swindle it.

don't give me up.

stabadabadingdong.

some phenomenal works of art here.
some of it kind of runs together, but the style is marvelous.



arthur, michel

eastern europe bale fires.

i've been a fan of dan hillier's work for a couple of years and i've definitely posted a few links to some of his pictures on this blog, moments after seeing the pieces, simply because someone else needed it. then and there. it had to happen. disbelief.

he had a show in brooklyn last april, on the 7th. through cowardice, laziness, excuses, many of the above and more, i didn't go. i know artists don't "break up", but this is exactly the kind of regret i felt when every band i've ever loved has broken up and i know i skipped a show because i'll catch the next one, and so on. pathetic.

but
i went on his website this morning after linking in from a show flyer he had. the site is sparse, not much there. but i clicked, randomly, on a piece of the page which appeared to be simply blank, but it yielded something incredible. truly one of the best pieces of work i've seen, both from a written standpoint, but based on the visual artwork as well.

phenomenal.

check it out here.

a groan.

and plant her down in soil undisturbed,
what wretched cloth was found amongst her bones.

shelv.

I understand the need for diversity and that not every kind of art has a definitive style that works within it. Look at the many genres and artists within the medium of music that i have fallen deeply in love with. Common to Fairweather to Misery Signals to Tim Hecker.

There's a level, though, that has just been illustrated to me in a solo train ride out to Manhattan. You can find the same sort of lesson in any brick wall in almost any urban area, though. To see masterful, quality pieces of graffiti dominating a wall or bridge only to be surrounded by juvenile go-hards is almost insulting to the artist. Are we even having the same conversation?

And i feel this way about a lot of writing that i see out there. It's not that i expect anyone or everyone to stop putting words to paper or out into the internet. But some of the pieces that get published in the world of journalism and reporting seem to act as punishment for all of the words that never will. You can see the lazy and sensational dominating the landscape, the same as the quick and rushed lines of the all-but-anonymous initials hacked up as if in a dare or in a fit of bravado.

We can't all be Hunter S. Thompson and reinvent the game, but we can all at least write to an audience we'd love to respect us. And an audience that we'd like to respect, alike. The less quality that's become demanded of the writing community, the less i want that to be my audience. And for just how long can you whittle down the interested and interesting until it's all become chain-gangs of gossip and gasplines that are accentuated with exclamation points?

new project.

here's the new project i started.
if you know anyone interested, repost.
spread the word.

stevedoesp90x.blogspot.com

irrigation ditch wedding proposal.

born: 5/13/11; 8:47a

blogger’s down.
that’s so strange.

there is a new project I’m going to be starting on once this weekend is over. it’s going to debut on a different blog which I can’t yet register. I’m pretty excited about it. seems like it’s going to be hilarious. it’ll be productive as well, once I can actually start getting a roll on it. but knowing my attitude on the subject, it’s going to remain extremely funny (at least to myself) for a good amount of time. my main issue with the progress of the project will be that I tend to have little to no consistency in long term projects. and while this won’t be solely a writing project, I’m depending on some kind of inner inspiration and drive to keep this one going. it seems that it’s going to be drawing some energy of my two favorite mediums as of right now to inspire the theme. enough vague tapping. I’ll be revealing it as soon as I’m able.

i woke up in the midst of the thickest pool of REM sleep extract around 4:14 this morning. I reached for the dream journal, but i instantly started feeling the phantoms scattering towards the seams of the walls. I backed off. laid back down, started swimming through it. it felt like a good trip on the verge of going bad. the way the capes of the bottoms of your friends’ shirts start to turn from jellyfish to leeches. I felt it turning bad, way wrong. from a spring sticking out in my atrocious temper [wow. I forgot the word I need.] temporary [how does that happen] bed. let me retype. --- from a spring sticking out in my atrocious temporary bed, one of my ribs fell asleep, so I had that odd numbsparkle feeling in my side. what the whispers said is that there is now a hole in my system, all the excess spillage filling the skin of my gut, spreading necrosis. a piece of my brain is listening, reacting. pulse is rising, breathing is getting hasty. I’m watching this happen, patiently. I watch myself in the third person start to sing. some loud, operaface. and I step back slowly and I see I’m resting in, first, the husk of a dead snake, and then it turns into my rib cage, and I’m curled up in it like a bed of crescent moon. still singing. and I’m suddenly tasting what my mouth tastes like, getting nudged that it’s because I’m slipping into coma due to the death the insides are dealing. I push and push to sleep, letting the arms and hands of demons become a canopy.

i wrote my dreams down every night for over a year. whether in my phone, on this laptop, in a notebook. whatever the case was. I compiled them twice, passed them around. I started to notice though, that I would use this recollection of my dreams as a form of creative outlet. and while it seems to have a bit of help in getting the fingers moving every day, it does take a bit out of actual work that I am creating of my own accord. because, really, I can’t take credit for any of the dreams I catch. it’s just mindwar journalism. I want to take some of the visions and interactions I have under the veil and use it in fiction, or have it inspire me to reach out a bit. to communicate it a bit more in real time. I don’t see myself stopping the documenting, but I definitely see it as becoming more source material than standing on its own as a body of work.

also, this was a big deal to me.
http://www.nettserier.no/jellyvampire/1304892000/

disremeanor.

the new world hasn't given us a chance at all.
waves, the giant innocent results of the moon and earth and orbits.
it's not that the planet is fighting back;
that'd mean it cared about us at all.
it didn't occur for us to document.
it would have happened had we never named the days after the myths,
it would have happened with or without these cities in place.

on inspiration.

started talking to some friends about where our influences come from, and why we create the way that we create. looking at art, reading our writing, you can always see that there are various heroes voices coming through the cracks. we're not creating art in-character, and taking their voice and patching things together the way that we think they would. no, no way.

the best way that i can explain it for myself is through the way i found more strength in my poetic voice through hearing cedric's words in at the drive-in songs (later and more specifically, in mars volta tracks) and then reading burroughs' naked lunch. i didn't take any specific cues from them. i didn't see what kinds of words they took, i didn't follow their stanzas and replace syllables that fit. i found strength in their aesthetic. literally, and i've explained this several times to anyone who will listen, they made me feel okay to write the way i was writing. having a new voice is exciting, and innovative, but to be writing the way that i sometimes write and have no one able to understand it, to have comments like, "it just seems like you're throwing words at a board and seeing what sticks" is pummeling. so disheartening.

but when i got that form of acceptance through reading other people's art, to see abstractions that i have been drawn to, both internally and externally, it's like a new awakening. you keep going. you find your place. like being raised by wolves but happening onto a township of sympathizers.

but it's something inside of us that's arranged for inspiration both within and without. somehow during our creation as the person we are today, a decision was made within our hearts that we will find genius in various artistic aesthetics. whether it is raw realism, fully abstract perception, the old, the new, broken, rusted, minimalist... any of it. and when we have creative hands or voices, we are naturally drawn to that medium or that style. it's why we like the bands we like or the paintings we admire. even sentences spoken or sense of humor. it's what makes us laugh or shudder or dismiss.

if someone were forcing me to draw a still-life or photograph a portrait, i couldn't do it and be happy with it. i'd still see those products as flawed. no matter how high they ranked within that genre, they'd look the same to me. they feel fraudulent to me. as i'm sure masters in that genre would feel about things that i've loved, and things that i've created and had pride in.








i've found myself so uncomfortable in my own skin these todays,
want to pile my wardrobe in an oilfire.
i'm finding it so easy to ignore the tools of self-improvement.
shoveling spades of soil onto full-length mirrors.

le ciné.

small pieces of light coming together.
if you forget what you're seeing, just trust the mathematics.
old picture houses with the red curtains dense with lead.
level two programmed reality: both picture and weight.
wittling and tensioning the taut-wire social,
knowing every man in every portrait.
serial numbered blood stains.
lines and lines (the queues) of visitation to dip your plume or splinter off.
light and splashed glitter in cubed galactic fuckmess.

some centuries old astral body generating out its last nitrogen masterpiece,
adapting and suiciding, novasploding in a musty staircase with peeling plasterwalls.
no longer a slave to probability, our agent, no, just a force eloping altogether.
disproving the proof that there is no ether,
cloaked in the guise of protoplasm.

crying eyes of a prostitute in a pig's arms catches him while she lays hopeless.
careless reverse cowboy; lazy je'taime, prayers and prayers for premature ejaculate
but it never comes.

agent passes namelessly.

the renounced whore and the supernova, one and one.

color as a mathematic act of man's observation.
otherwise, who'd know better.
off and on practice of a grand piano.
hammer to the tune of minimized bone.

numbered exposures.
the generalization of men acting illogically
in the presence of their spraying seed,
fathers developing negatives of their sons.
microphones descending on their lives to broadcast individual choices
to a God of Reasoned Audience.
applause and praise to answers from control centers.
canned approval sounds.

a theory of shooting men in self defense,
a definition to slower the distribution of men at war.
a seated theater of roulette enemies, religion of the drawn number.
in the balcony [N, NW] she stares on,
her number branded beneath the butterfly of her breasts,
her nakedness pure carnal and digital definition, a three pieced numeral,
her pure socratic formula to be extracted
by some earnest, inquisitive robin of a boy
who she will refuse and refuse until he turns away from her, defeated.
warded off by venetian masks.
silhouette fades as the police approach
while she complains of the haste of lust and the death of sensuality.
against the image of baton movement, she laments the piercing of his lightness.
with tender orbitals, she softens her vision on him, wipes out his entire race,
patterns of relief of all the sweetness he's ignored.
a million dead in the city, boarded up or no.

COLLIE.

i began this in november as part of nanowrimo, and i was quasi-inspired, but i've gone back to it and can't really make head or tail of it. so here you go internet. ingest and antimatter.

-=-

i guess every time i heard a new record, i sort of expected it to be prepackaged for me the way i'd set everything up for myself when i'd made it for myself. that's not so much to say that i expected to like everything, but generally when i was younger, i saw that if something had come into my path, it came there for a reason. my friends and i, we were all the same: same classes, same teachers, mostly same crushes. here and there, we'd catch a magazine article to throw out there in some vague way, to get the others interested, so we could spread the mass appeal. and generally, if it didn't sit well with one of us, we'd all just give it up. unanimous, or nothing at all.

unanimous or tuesday.

another girl walked up and asked for a small, and i'm sitting there thinking about how it's too big for her, she probably has a boyfriend. or body issues. "you sure?" i hold up the shirt, all plantationed with fold. light blue, got some weird alien on it, i don't know what i was thinking. it was such a good idea when i started it.

"ten right?"

she hands me the twenty. another fucking twenty. go into the cash box, break out a five and five singles. running low on all sorts of small bills. but it's all good. we played an hour ago, there's no way we're selling anymore of these things. no tip, nothing in the jar. she walks away. doesn't matter that she's 15.

i miss my cat. i miss jerry o. i miss our shows at home. but it's always the same. i get something started, i get hyper motivated on it, half-ass it enough to blame it on excuses that i make up as i go. then here comes the band or a show or an out of state show, and there goes that. oh well. never gonna finish it.

is that me? no way.
i smell like that?
shit no.

what's up with these bands that we're playing in front of? not we per say. it's the four of those guys. but still, i see these locals who bring out the kids and it's all the same kinds of bands that make it big, the kinds of bands that show up late, load-in while we're breaking our shit down. gives you an utter distaste for the state of music and where we're at these days. makes you want to change it all up. drop music altogether, the solo projects, the side projects, the out of state shows, the flyering, the cold van rides.

"how much?"

“ten for a shirt, ten for a CD, one for a sticker, one for two buttons, three for a comp, twenty for all of the above.”

when she replies she only has a twenty, i say that’s perfect, she can grab it all. she only wants a shirt. i don’t have change. she says she’ll be right back. she never comes back. i should have shaved.

this is all unreal.
take me home.

alex comes over to me, eyes wide. “dude.”

“the worst.”

he holds up three fingers, mouths the words three, two, one, then pantomimes palm-muting and open chords. out of this hallway, and in the main catering area, 5 kids play your standard 4/4 breakdown. i bite my bottom lip, my eyebrows roll together, and shake my head: nonononono.

he’s brought me a beer, something gold and in a plastic cup. it’s cold and tastes like cold. “man. when are we leaving? oh, and i need change.” he gives me a fucked five and a couple of singles which are helixed together, saying keep it. i see that same girl that was just over here, the one with the straight black hair, perfect nose, and delia’s jeans, walking by in some other band’s t-shirt. i clap in her direction, loudly, three times in a row.

“give it another band, man. we aren’t doing anything tomorrow, who cares when we get home? the kids in crash court are kind of cool. we’re trying to work out a show trade, have them come out with us so we can get some shows back here.”

“crash court!”

“whatever, man. they’re cool. they’re doing it for the right reasons. i can totally see them hanging if they came through the area. and if our tour comes through here, we’ll totally need a place to stay.”

“so we’ll stay with crash. court.?”

“dick!”

an hour later, we’re packing it all up. alex and i are bringing his drums into the van, piece by awkward piece. i’m starving. these are the last pieces we’re putting in there, tetrissing it all up against other things, the cymbals making ugly sounds against the glass. i tap the bell on the top of his ride with my finger nail a couple times once it’s all inside. jayson and bauer are hanging up front, done with it all, just exhausted. they’re sitting in silence, bauer’s hands busy texting friends or his girlfriend back home, the glow making his face some monitortone. jayson is playing drums with the cap’n jazz record on the steering wheel, waiting for us to be done with the arrangement. “where’s jarrod at?!”

i picture him leaning up against some corkboard in the hall getting a number or some myspace/facebook information from some young little sceney incident that we won’t stop hearing about for months. his hair all leto’d and righteous, his smile taken out of some billboard ad for chewing gum. this fuckin’ guy. but sure enough, he comes running right back out to us through the dark, across the parking lot, keys and belt and whatever else jingling and flopping around. “ohhhhhh!!!” he says as he throws me a high-five. “what’s good now? just heading back? who’s around?”

“tina’s having people over but they’ll be gone by the time we get back. she said we could stop by but,” he starts to read the digitalogue to us slowly, “it might be like too late to do anything like worth it or whatever.” the words spaced apart that make this chick sound dumber than she actually is, which is a stretch to accomplish. sweetheart, though. gotta love her.

“fuck it dude. home. rolling a j, COD til the fuckin’ dickens dude. done.”

“how about you collie?”

i shrug, hands shoulder high. “gonna go home, gonna jerk off, and that’s all i’m gonna do.” i don’t wait for him to catch the reference. “nah man, i don’t know i’m just over this place man. bands were a joke dude. can’t believe you guys agreed to play here AGAIN.”

“here we go!”

“no, seriously! i’m serious! i’m serious! how could we drive four hours van slam-packed, out of the city through all of that traffic, get here, unload, play in front of fifteen kids, all of them too young to really understand what it is we’re really out here to accomplish...”

“yeah? and what are WE out here to accomplish, collie? what message are you trying to send?” bauer speaks up.

“...nothin’ man. nothin’.”

“fuckkk thaat. fuckkk thaat. listen, me and collie are getting in his car, driving back home. i’m taking it easy gonna finish up my own personal miike marathon week i’ve been having, you’re all totally welcome to come, got a couple drinks there waiting for me. tomorrow, practice at 4, then whatever. let’s do something good.”

“all about it. i love it. jarrod, drop me off at tina’s on the way back? bauer, you coming?”

“whatever, dude. i’ll come. whatever.”

alex throws some fists around the van, knuckles hitting knuckles in love. you can see the callouses on his hands. “gentlemen! get home safely!”

i throw up the peace sign while walking back to my car, quiet and brown, chilling and waiting for me.

alex jogs up next to me, laughing. “you didn’t take that personally, did you?”

“ahhh, not really, i don’t know. wasn’t ready for it i guess.”

“he was just fucking with you, man. kinda. i don’t know. maybe not. but i get it. just gotta let the kids do what they’re doing man. this isn’t like some kind of competition to get accepted into NASA. it’s music, dude. some people are gonna get it, and get buried in it, dude. face first, feet sticking out, just disappear in it. others, i mean, shit, people are just gonna wanna hang out around it. it doesn’t make it wrong, man. you can’t like music the right way or the wrong way. just take it easy, man. you’re gonna be that washed up, jaded merch guy forever aren’t you?”

i can’t believe how accurate that statement is. it terrifies me. and all i say is “psh.” air coming out of a deflated tire.

we listen to saves the day the entire way home, first through being cool three times through. barely audible. then he throws in a burnt copy of can’t slow down right before passing out.

i’m the dick.
oh my god.
i’m the dick.

--

i'm sitting at home. it's the afternoon and it's in the 50s, something cold enough to keep me from wanting to go out there. i'm eating what i guess you could call lunch. a hot pocket with some tortilla chips. i'm already thinking about heating up the second one.

they're all at practice. i thought it best not to show up after bauer's comment. such a shot in the dark. how long has he felt this way, how do the others feel about this, when did i get this distinction? was it just one comment?

i watch this guy ride by on a bike outside. tall, skinny, red scarf, brown hat, blue peacoat looking thing. guy probably talks big about the bands he loves because he has to, only sees obscure movies because that's what makes his little clique go around. i think of how he's probably headed to a record store to buy something to say someone's never heard of it before. maybe pick up a show flyer just in case any of the band's makes it big this way he can say he knew about it when.

there's nothing to do today. everything is organized. books are alpha'd, DVDs and blu-rays, CDs and vinyl are alpha'd. i could be going nuts on some new flyer layouts i have in my head, but i don't want to use the same images that i've been finding on the internet already. i have to make a trip to the library and get some good scans. i should do some research on what artists i'm looking for, or at least the type. i don't have a library card. i don't have mail from this address either. i think i need one to get a card for this location. what a wash.

i check the phone,
no new texts.
no missed calls.

"when're you fags done? ollie's tonight?"

i stare at the text for fifteen seconds after i type it, try to figure out something else to throw in to make the invite more appealing. fuck it, i send it.

i take a shower, thinking the entire time about the process of godhead deciding they want to cover the beatles' eleanor rigby. which band member came up with the idea. how they decided to create the backdrop for the song which was essentially completely devoid of what made the song so distinct. they kept the hook, they kept the vocal fixtures. i would love to see mccartney's reaction to it. i'm sure he's heard it, actually. what a moment that must have been. i'd love to see godhead, all dressed up in their goth splendor, walking up to paul's house with a single CD meant for sitting down in a parlor in front of a living legend, one of the last remaining beatles, and playing that song for him.

thinking the band, godhead, saying, "aw, yeah the beatles are great. they inspire everything we've done."

the beatles are overrated.

no text back when i get out. i throw on the good the bad and the ugly to pass the time. just picked it up on blu-ray. the remastering is fine, but it doesn't match up to what HD or blu-ray should really be. still a fantastic movie no less. eastwood kills it.

it's 4:30.

i play madden against some kid online who's unbearably cheap. he uses the colts so i knew i'd lose from the start. i send him a voice message saying i would have beat him if he played the game right. he sent something back but didn't listen. deleted.

i sit in front of my computer, and open up firefox. ready to roll through some of the band's blog updates. talk a little about last night. i go through a few of my google reader articles. things about bugs that don't dance the way the bugs before them used to dance. things about the way the white house was built. something about a new sci-fi shooter. a video with a dog. i don't care about any of it, really, once i'm done reading about it. it'd be interesting if i could carry some of it with me when i got out of the room. my biggest contribution to conversations of the obscure is often "oh yeah, i heard of that." i have the info to turn that around, but what's the point.

i got my mind on better things.

let me check facebook real quick, i want to see if anyone commented on that picture. while i'm on there i can actually upload a couple of pictures that were sent to the band's e-mail address last night after the show while we were driving home. oh my god, i can't believe charlie's status update is literally talking about election day like it's something important.

"we can already get married. leave the voting to the gays!"

people are definitely gonna dig that. awesome.

after hitting "older posts" a few times, i can't even remember what i came on here to do. it's 7:15?! what?! where did my day go?

what was i looking to do on here, anyway?

i've been complaining about not having enough time to read too much lately. let me jump back into the garland. i'll figure it out.

11:30 comes by.
no call. no text.
no one likes my facebook comment.

--

i woke up at 6:30. alarm's set for 7.
fuck it, i'll get up.

no text.
no call.
no one likes my facebook comment.

new e-mail from amazon.com, borders.com, gamestop.com, miso.

turn off the alarm, shower, dress, warm up the car.
still have can't slow down on in the car.

it picks up midway through three miles down. "letting it rain for hours" conley skipsays. i heard this guy was gay. what ever happened to that? whatever, i hope he's happy. for all the stuff the guy's band has been through, all the lineup changes, he still remains a legend. i still buy records after stay what you are came out even though they've all kind of sucked. all these feelings he's singing about, whether it's for a guy or a girl, for himself, for some extraterrestrial, so be it. guy has these legitimate tears lined up forever.

unbelievable how inefficient most of these drivers on the road are.

pull in, same parking spot every day. got an hour to open. i know at least one person's going to knock on the door instead of dropping their video through the slot. always a question, always an excuse. fat beth closed like shit last night. spend about fifteen minutes making up for her mistakes, count in, all set up. leave to go get coffee next door, and our first windowknocker is standing there as i'm walking out.

"hey, this is a day late..."

"yeah, sorry. unfortunately if it's not back by midnight last night, there's nothing we can do about it."

"that's okay, we fell asleep last night watching it."

"did it suck?"

"it wasn't BAD. not what i expected though."

"...happens."

wordless, she drops the movie in the slot. i think about it sloppily laying in the bin. i have to put it back when i get back after i just made everything perfect. as she drives off, we meet eyes through her passenger window. what does she want from me? i raise my hand in what looks like one of those native american "HOW" motions, which could mean bye, or thank you, or acknowledged, or stop, or even HOW.

coffee, back to work, put the movie away (which was a romantic comedy SEQUEL; what did she EXPECT?), and unlocked the doors to another fantastic day. the owner, brian, came in around noon, i told him all about beth's close. he said it was fine, he'll talk to her about it.

i think about godhead talking to her about it. in a parlor. with eleanor rigby playing in the background.

--

i tried sleep but it doesn't work. at this point, i'll usually think of some event far off that is tedious and meaningless and mechanical, like sowing a field or counting fiber. i'll try to mentally recreate some painted image, and find brushstrokes to even the sky out. i'll do whatever it takes to calm the hum of restlessness.

what usually holds up the works is thinking about some girl or two that got away, or some new set of friends that i let down. this time, it felt kind of like both. were the guys leaving me? what was i doing wrong?

i can't learn guitar, my fingers are too small. you can't write songs as a bassist. my voice isn't a good singing voice. keyboards take a lot of training. it's not my fault i'm not in the band.

i've found a piece of my friends that i want to nurture and for it to become something of its own organic merit. i want to support it and make it real for them. what others here, those other guys who don't know us, they hear the songs, the result of a family unit. all the hours of the day, all the small talk and small journeys that are actually endless processions formulated down to three minutes and thirty seconds. the passionless turn the page, they skip the track. pick up the needle.

pick up the needle, lay it on the shelf.
this room needs work. i have visions, i just need canvases.

quiet phone for two days straight now. i feel sick thinking about it.

it rained tonight, i must have missed it. the cars pass by, they sound more gravelly. i hear tiny wakes.

there are a lot of things that are going okay, but nothing's going well. i should focus on one thing at a time, and dominate each of those endeavors like milestones. i should be working on something always, full of answers, full of a fire that attracts and repels. i should possess a mantra in my comings and goings. there should be The Work and the background.

i have work tomorrow.
i'll think more about it then.
shit.
i work with brian.

i'll take more notes afterwards.
once i watch what the DVR records.

curdwallow.

i'm once again situated with my family in the house i grew up in and it is a miserable, miserable place. unfortunate that it's come to that point, a place that's become stagnant and void of all progress, most happiness, and any level of generated energy or life. it's something of a shock to me that things can grow this stale almost right under my nose. watching this reveal blossom directly in front of me, i'm sort of curious how long it takes before you get to the point where you are not content with where you are, what you're doing, the people you're around, but you insist on allowing it to go unchanged. i see these people, my family, as only people. i don't see the unit looking after one another, loving each other, coexisting in a synchronized harmony. i see something of what i see in the everyday lives of the people i assist at work, at a black and white retail job. seems to be a lot of standing in line, arriving home until you leave, settling into nighttime television until you're no longer conscious.

i'm not out crusading, but i'm hungry.
i have people i want to see.
little stories i'm trying to keep up with,
fictional or not.

i've been fully moved out of brooklyn for about 31 hours. i've slept a night here, completely moved in. and i'm already itching. gotta go, gotta get out. it's making my eyes itchy, making my skin tweak. i already feel gravity bottoming out. it's a little terrifying. i feel like i'm being grown over by little bits of bark. like there are whispers in the little nooks down intriguing hallways and i'm getting a little deeper every trip, with fewer and fewer breadcrumbs.

it's all an illusion, obviously. there's no giving up. it's a sham.
aiming for june first. kind of want to go back to brooklyn. i watched beetle and dave debating about it mildly right before we left his apartment last week. and i started thinking about the reasons i'd want to be back out there, and i guess the number one reason i'd have to cite is that i loved it out there, because of how many rules of chaos applied out there, and how open the damn place was to possibility. i think about coming back out here, too. and being close to friends and work. and that's alright too, i guess. i didn't even give brooklyn all that much of a chance, either. and i want more of it, genuinely do. i want to work out there, somewhere out of retail. but regardless, i do want to live out there, or be out there as often as possible. i realized, too, that i'd been out there for more time than i was even in miami. and, that's a little odd. miami felt like an eternity. but it was just about 11.6 months. something like may through april. -- i've got about a month to get it figured out. i'll be alright.

hit a massive wall, creatively. i think it's just one of those weird moments of having no concept of where to direct the spotlight, what emotions to convey or capture. there's really no She who is gathering all of my butterfly thoughts in massive nets and making me breathe in gaping arcs of palpitation. i still remain focused on ensuring that all of my people are continuing to create at their sharpest, and never quitting for anything. dave was featured on the tattooed poets blog, brian has been churning out short stories here and there, beetle got the spiegel deal going, anthony always has something kinetic happening, musically. if nothing else, i want to keep them moving. keep that going. if i'm not personally churning something out that i believe in, i want to at least be midwifing.

i want to at least be midwifing.
i want. to at least. be midwifing.
christ.

good news, though, i have always written my best correspondence from this house or at the starbucks down the block.

i've got some faith it'll play out.

as you were saying.

in response to,
and to bolster
a friend's earlier bradbury post.

post-war fundamentalism.

never in physical action had i discovered
the chilling satisfaction of words.
never in words had i experienced the hot darkness of action.
somewhere there must be a higher principle
which reconciles art and action.
- mishima

a fall weekday, 3-4:30p.

(also purchased three records today:
horseback's impale golden horn,
sailors with wax wings' self titled, &
grails' deep politics.)
[droneisin]

kihlsuhn.

i took a chance on a new artist earlier today based solely on the photograph provided to advertise the upcoming show. the photo is not the one above. silje nes is categorized as "electronic" but i can't really see the commitment to that particular genre, though it's rare that labels fully make sense anymore. pretty happy with the purchase, definitely suits a need for the melancholy, background skyrocket of particular writing days. you can check out a track from the record opticks over here. i find that without taking risks on a lot of bands going forward, i'm not going to find anything new or interesting worth hunting for.

also, i randomly did 10 clicks on the randomized "next blog" train on blogger. here's what i found:

- poems by a priest.
- a family blog
- a christian watching her child grow up
- a spiritual journey by a pastor
- QUOTE. life iz whaz up... END QUOTE. for real. but another christian blog.
- a christian blog by a priest/fireman
- a christian blog
- a family's travel log, wherein they move to argentina... to found a church
- INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF THE CREATIVE ARTS IN INTERDISCIPLINARY PRACTICE ADVISORY BOARD
- and what seems like a minimalist blog by a minimalist woman writing in her own corner of the web for little to no reason. a post, in full, goes as follows:

So Ray is now recovering from a broken rib in his back, which punctured his lung in an unfortunate altercation(scuffle) with a patio table. I think Ray won,as the table is a goner and Ray is still alive to tell his side of the story. He's in pain but the doc gave him some good painkillers so he'll at least sleep lots while he's waiting to heal.There goes golf season.

it's always interesting to see who else is out there. am i doing it right. is there a point to blogging vs. webmastering. should i start separate blogs for separate themes. are there hypotheses i'm solving for in every post. so on and so forth. i have literally been blogging since before it was blogging sometime in the ninth grade, keeping an almost daily account of what i was up to, to then breaking down stuff going on in classes, to a college breakdown, to a music blog, to a full music website, and then pretty much back around to this. i get curious what makes me think something is worth sharing, or not sharing. where the filter lies, where the eager sharing voice speaks up.

i wonder how someone finding my blog on a random Next Blog clicking spree would describe my blog in a 4-8 word summary splatter. and would they read through just a piece or a month or a page? would they ever come back? what validates something like that? what am i looking for?

intentional massive.

above is a letter from bruce lee. it reads as follows:

I, Bruce Lee, will be the first highest paid Oriental super star in the United States. In return I will give the most exciting performances and render the best of quality in the capacity of an actor. Starting 1970 I will achieve world fame and from then onward till the end of 1980 I will have in my possession $10,000,000. I will live the way I please and achieve inner harmony and happiness.

that is how you set a fucking goal. i think currently, i have no goals or end points. no directed ambition, no target, no vaulting point. it's something i feel like i might have to start aligning myself with. i've essentially set some personal pieces of improvement i'd like to hit, and some general morals and values i'd like to stick by regularly. but there's nothing i'm aiming for, nothing that calls me back to the track. the last thing i can think of that was a set goal was the nanowrimo writing goal, and i fell off pretty quickly with it. i think setting and sticking to goals is something that ends up being a learned behavior as opposed to something you can just set for yourself and expect to follow. if everything becomes a plan, if everything becomes goal-oriented, i think you start to do your own microtracking, your own follow-ups on yourself.

if i wanted to lose thirty pounds in three months, i couldn't just set it and expect for it to all wind up okay because i've set it up in such a way. i wouldn't realize, at first, that if i didn't lose ten pounds by one month, i'd have to realign my plan to accelerate in the next. it's just a cloud goal i'd have, and by trying to make it all happen by the end date, the whole process would become a maelstrom of trying too hard or giving up altogether.

so when i say i'd like to have one writing project finished a month, i'm not going to be good at coaching myself, at maintaining the course, and doing the small check-ups that i'll have to do to ensure it all works out. and i think i'd like to get more into that practice, or at the very least, start HAVING a goal to aim towards so i can relate to a failure/success paradigm.

also.
shows coming up:
- omar rodriguez lopez on march 29.
- sidefires april 7.
- fairweather reunion on may 14th. [possibly most important show of my life thus far]
- portugal. the man on june 3rd.
- earth on june 16th.

and, um.
to kind of wrap this all up, here's a majorly appropos video.