April 15, 2009Not everything in life can be solved with movie quotes.Everything is mutable and shifting, words that mean one thing sliding and changing until all the meanings mean nothing and nothing means anything. In this atmosphere, the air is thin and too warm, and little things travel farther and block my neurons and I can't think straight, hence why my thoughts are crooked and unaccounted for. Still, one can try, and try again, and maybe stick to the course, but then again, I've never been one to do what's best for me. Te occidere possunt sed te edere non possunt nefas est. Anyway, some day, I'll work it out, why things happen and how they do. I'm sure of this, as sure as I am that the future we've been promised since decades before I was born is not coming, with a distinct lack of exclamation points and absolutely no flying cars or jetpacks. Waking up, saying goodbye, touching, not touching, singing along, playing the parts, whatever. Mutatis mutandis, kids, and don't you forget it. So, what's next? Change is in the air, and is inevitable, and is probably for the better, and summer is coming (which I am most assuredly a fan of), so to what do we owe this feeling of reluctance and dread? Oh well, "c'est la vie" say the old folks. We're getting older, getting colder, moving on, getting better, getting bitter, and giving up. Can't say that I blame myself, though I probably should. In any event, there is work to do, and not much time to do it. Exclamation points aside, the future is still there, waiting to be slapped like a newborn and made to do our bidding, and so thusly, I shall get to it. Tempus fugit, and all that jazz. (snap snap) Good night, and good luck.
Posted on 04/15/2009 9:29 PM Comments (0)
April 12, 2009Some People Have Terrible Taste In Music.There's no blog or expanded statement to this. I just wanted to use that title. Because it is true. Deal with it, America!
Posted on 04/12/2009 10:04 AM Comments (1)
April 5, 2009...wait, what?ok, seriously, what the fuck just happened? I had a successful first gig, made some money, and established that I indeed now have a significant other. SO, why do I feel like a terrible terrible person for... well, I'm not quite sure why I do, and I'm not sure why I should. And honestly, it kind of sucks. (Specificities will be left out, because I am not an ass.) But yeah, goddammit. I am confused as fuck right now.
The lack of sleep is probably compounding this, by the way.
Anyway, what's the Frequency, Kenneth?
Posted on 04/05/2009 10:55 PM Comments (1)
March 14, 2009buy the ticket, etc etc.
I wonder if it's possible to be in too many music projects.
I mean, I am a bass player/vocalist and of the songwriters in Robots and Racecars, I am the bass player in Take Today, I am the bass player in my drummer's sideproject Stay Sweet, I could potentially be involved in my friend's sideproject Lightsleeper, and I have my own solo project called How I Became Invisible. On top of all that, there's ANOTHER group being put together called Boom City. I hardly sleep as it is already, and yet, I don't really do a whole lot with my time. Sitting around watching Monty Python on dvd and twittering about Watchmen, Final Crisis, and Scott Pilgrim don't really set the world on fire, y'know? Hurm. OH, and I forgot to mention, I will soon be the unquestioned lord and master of this planet and all reality. Be prepared for the reign of Emperor Nicholas The Fabulous. Right. So, yeah.
Posted on 03/14/2009 11:25 AM Comments (2)
January 15, 2009miserabilia.
"Straighten up and fly right," that's what I'm told. But with no map, and very little in the way of navigational sense, "fly right" is a loose direction to be given. I have so many things I have done, and so many things I haven't, that the pro and con columns on my "this is how I am" list are staggering in their complexity, not to mention length. And there's always the next day to wake up to, the next new beginning, the next "it's all happening." But the happening and the being are two very different concepts to me, and right now, I am neither being nor happening. I simply am. I am alive. I am breathing. I am not sleeping. I am still. I am standing. I am.
But is it enough to simply "am"? I can't imagine anything else, really, I cannot. Ingesting information and analyzing, that is what I am best at. Spitting out facts and figures to support theses and ideating randomness into order, chaos into FACT. But there is not much in the way of a field for this, without certain concessions made to existing social order and class structure, and I am far beyond wanting to kowtow to that. Which is a large section of the problem, most likely. I am not built for these societal structures, thus I deny them, thus they deny me. I am, but they do not choose to acknowledge my am. They ignore my am and declare me persona non-grata. Excepting where money and the owing of it is concerned, though that is another story. Lack of REM is a killer, and maybe that's the problem. Too much introspection, not enough intervention. My chosen fields are, at best, non-linear, and I love the most what I do best. I abhor a vacuum, and the vacuousness of everything else I see waiting for me is disheartening, to say the least. I miss falling asleep next to you, I miss you waking up next to me. There are so many regrets and kudos built into a lifetime, and I have lived but a third of one thus far. But no worries, I suppose. Lifespans being what they are, who's to say who will outlive the best or worst of us? (I know. But I'm not telling.) So yes, so anyway, that's my conundrum. Aside from my current state of not being able to sleep. The future, though unwritten, certainly has a certain bent, a distinct curve, that I do not approve of. And while my approval is scarce needed, and certainly ignored, it is what I wish to contribute. Drastic times call for desperate measures, and mine are certainly underwhelming thus far, but I hope to break this metaphorical chain and save this metaphorical city. Hand me a metaphorical arc welder, please, I wish to operate on this literal patient. But I suppose here's where I get off this pity train, and jump back into the deep places of today. Mind the gap. Mind the gap. Mind the gap.
Posted on 01/15/2009 1:19 AM Comments (0)
October 18, 2008project.
My life turns. It spins, it revolves. Like film on a reel, unspooling at 24 frames a second, spliced and taped together to make a simulacrum of an existence. So far, so good, I suppose. Dim the lights, roll sound, call "Action!", and away I go, on and on until my life meter is low and I need a health pack before I lose a turn. Respawn, replace, and replenish the cycle, I'm on a roll, and baby, I feel my luck could change. The sun is red over the city, a spinning circle burning down behind the skyline, all silhouetted buildings and scaffolding, and I think it deserves whatever is coming to it.
: : : : : : : : Fight Club is most peoples' model for projection now, but it is not strictly true anymore, by the way. Film comes as separate reels still, but it's no longer shown that way. It's built into one large super reel, on a platter system. Splices are obvious too, so putting porn shots into kids movies is right out. (Like life, sex is not something you can just throw into anywhere and expect to work out how you want it to..) The film unspools from one platter, through the projector, and onto another platter, either above or below the original. And on and on, repeating ad nauseum. Light pours through the film, the images thrown onto the screen, fake peoples fake lives and fake problems displayed for the audience to cheer or reject as they will. As they want. And god forbid it be too real. The film turns and the clock winds and it's all pretty irrelevant. It's not real, so what's the point? : : : : : : : : The circle turns some more, the wheels spin and fail to stick, gears not catching and axles breaking, until forward momentum becomes a myth. Total Catastrophic Failure. An emergency condition that is unable to be fixed and results in a complete ending and cessation of any activity. The cycle ending, basically. A modern projectionist's worst nightmare is a blown bulb. The circles keep turning, but the shadow plays cease and an unhappy audience revolts and strings up the nearest representative of authority, burning and pillaging as they go. Total catastrophic failure. The only solution is to replace the bulb, which is a difficult and somewhat slightly dangerous task, but one that if accomplished, lights up brighter than the sun in the middle of August on a clear day at the beach. So the benefits outweigh the risk, is what I'm saying. Total catastrophic reversal. Or something like that. : : : : : : : : My life turns. I come back to where I've been before, watching the same circumstances play out like images in front of me. If I blink rapidly enough, it even looks like frames going by. It's recursive, and I curse it, but if it disperses I'd be left behind again, so I grab onto the nearest familiar face and hang on for dear life, through the rising action, dramatic climax, and denouement, and hope that there's an extra scene after the credits. Because why spin these platters if all I'm going to do is break the film before it resolves into a satisfying ending? Splice in any section into any other, the order doesn't matter, the audience doesn't know any better, and neither do I. So I suppose this is the part where I confess that I don't know anything about anything. : : : : : : : : "You're kidding yourself if you think this changes anything." : : : : : : : : Turn spin spin turn twist and rewind. You can catch the patterns if you look closely enough. So celebrate the repetition, revel in it, and hopefully you can get beyond the notion that movie endings never happen, and that plot twists always have to make sense. This is the part where the hero doubts himself and misinterprets situations into something else, but it all resolves for the best in the end. It does resolve, right? What sense is there in doing something if it never works out the way you want it to? : : : : : : : : Cut. Print. That's a wrap.
Posted on 10/18/2008 11:16 AM Comments (0)
September 17, 2008The cake is a lie.
The cake is a lie.
The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. But I'm still alive.  [For those who don't speak nerd, this means I recorded a cover of "Still Alive" from PORTAL, and have posted it on my music page. Listen, download, react. The cake is a lie.]
Posted on 09/17/2008 7:55 PM Comments (0)
July 17, 2008My heart is, my heart is, my heart is an empty room.
SO it's like this:
the older I get, the more well-adjusted I seem to be. I take things in stride, I don't stress/fret/worry. Openly anyway. When someone asks me "Is something wrong?" or "Are you upset?" or "How do you feel about that?", I, more often than not, answer with "I'm ok." Whether I really am or not is the issue I'm having at the moment. I have become, over the last year or so, entirely less cynical than I have been in the past. In fact, at this point, despite everything, I am almost a complete optimist. I believe the world as whole is something good and worth living in, and that the future, though unwritten, is something to look forward to with hope rather than fear. Still, something nags at me. Over the past month, there's been three separate, unrelated events that, I assume, would cause consternation, worry, and issues for most people. They are, in a word, traumatic events to most. But, and this is what's giving me pause, I have had no visible reaction, internal or external. I have gotten along to get along. This worries me, in some small way. Because I have been accused in the past of being heartless, cold, and uncaring, and the above reactions seem to support this theory. But I don't think I am. I don't feel that way, anyway. I care about things, about people, about many things. But my lack of reaction to the unnamed events does not jibe with this. Someone once told me that my attitude as such meant I was more adult and well-adjusted than most. But I don't feel that way. I feel... nothing. Vague senses of regret and sadness, but nothing concrete or real. So my question to the coterie of the internet is: what is wrong. Am I really the robot people have said I am? Or am I just... inured to catastrophe? I don't know. And the fact that I don't know what is wrong, or even if anything is, is what bothers me more than anything...
Posted on 07/17/2008 8:27 AM Comments (2)
June 12, 2008When I Decided to Get Off My Ass and Do Something Useful
Hey, just a quick note to let anyone who's interested know that I have a music page on "the my space" (as the kids like to call it), located at http://www.myspace.com/nicholasreed. As of right now, all that's up there is a home recorded cover of Jets to Brazil's "Sweet Avenue", but I just finished recording 2 new songs in the studio, and will have them up within a week (as soon as the mixing is finished). SO, check it out, add me if you have a myspace, and get in on the ground floor, so to speak.
 IN RELATED NEWS, I'm considering adopting an actual band name, for the future when there's more people then just me playing these songs live. I've narrowed it down to 4 choices: 01. How I Became Invisible 02. Audio Geography 03. Lemon Yellow Black 04. One Hundred Resolutions Which do you think is the best?
Posted on 06/12/2008 11:06 PM Comments (0)
June 6, 2008lemon yellow black
There's too much happening, and all too soon. My head feels crowded, so
many people and words struggling to get out and be heard that they all
get stuck in the door and none get out. Tiny Door Syndrome, but in my
head rather than my lungs. I can't be specific, things are vague and
unformed and quite frankly up in the air, falling slowly ("sing your
melody...") to settle amongst the detritus of approximately 28 years of
degrading memory and let-downs. Whatever. We all fall down eventually,
it's what we do to pick ourselves up that matters.
To paraphrase: My heart is deep space and my head is mathematics. So yeah, there it is. Small, unpinpointable, blinking in the distance to signal the ships to shore ("do you read? SOS JTB?"), but assuming the position to drown, and I'm assuming very little about any agendas put forth now. There's up, there's down, there's in, and there's my out. To the left, below the small portrait of an elder gentleman and his regimental stallion, and right above the wainscotting. ("We've been metioned on telly!") I reference for reference sake, sometimes. Others, because it's appropriate. Sometimes, because I think it's funny. And even others, because I am trying to break your heart. To paraphrase: You are a complex structure. I can't think of where else to take this, my dear diary ("it's just you and me"), and so I will probably decide not to take it anywhere but back in on itself. Oroborous, the snake eating it's own tail, I palindrome I. GUESS WHAT I READ BOOKS THAT ARE FULL OF BIG WORDS AND ANALYZATION. Am I being obvious enough? Is this worth it? Does my lack of a $100,000 piece of paper make my opinions/observations/thoughts any less valid then they would otherwise be? Dammit, I've gotten off-track. Back to the topic at hand... I've forgotten. To paraphrase: Note to self: no one cares, your voice is average. I can write myself into the story, and thus out of this predicament. Life is just that, in the end, a story. Or stories, to be exact. When you decide to write your own is when it gets interesting. [LISTENING RECOMMENDATIONS: Jets to Brazil's album Orange Rhyming Dictionary]
Posted on 06/06/2008 9:02 AM Comments (0)
May 20, 2008A story because I can't sleep.
I was halfway through Bristol, and I had to pull over. My car was making strange noises, and irregular puffs of what appeared to be smoke were coming from under the hood. I'm not a "car person", but I would assume that's not a good thing.
I don't even know why I bothered getting out and looking at the engine. The most I could do was stand, with my hand on my chin, saying "Hmmm, yep, that must be it," out loud. Though I don't know what "it" would be. Again, not a "car person." But I figured, looking under the hood made me seem less of an idiot to the passer-by then sitting in my car looking frustrated would. I'm still not sure what was wrong with it, at that point. My car had a tendency to just stop working sometimes, but usually a good 15, 20 minute sit would make it all better, than I'd be on my merry way. I figured I was going to be there for at least a few more minutes, so I popped the trunk and checked the inventory: guitar, cd book, notebook, 2 chairs, 2 twelve packs of Yuengling, 2 quarts of Jack Daniels, a box of matches, 2 cans of kerosene, and a Polaroid camera. "Yeah, it's all here, all in order," I thought. I walked back to the driver side door, and reached through the open window. I'd left the keys in the ignition, so I started the car. It started right away, actually. Turns out the moment of rest had been the trick, as usual. I was just about to open the door and get in when the first truck clipped me. I spun around to my right, falling flat onto my stomach. I laid there for a hot minute, testing myself at various places to see what was injured. I'm pretty sure my right forearm's broken, and I'm none to confident on my ribs either. I'm slightly in shock, not even from the hit and run, but mostly from the amazement that I'm not more injured, as I am far from athletic, and don't have any muscle mass at all. I sat up, and with my left arm pulled myself up using the car doorhandle. It's difficult, as I am in extreme pain. I mean, seriously, I just got hit by a goddamn truck! I made it to my feet though, thanking God, Allah, Buddha, and Ganesh all at once for the fact that neither of my legs were injured badly, when the second truck hit, on my right side again. This time, rather than spinning, I just flew backwards, and landed in a heap about 7 feet from my car's hood. I'm dazed, unable to see. The sun's unbearably bright, and I'm staring right into it. This, combined with my near-deranged-with-pain state, makes it even harder to move this time. I managed to flip onto my stomach, feeling my ribs splinter in my chest as I do so. My left leg is more than likely broken, and I think I have a cut above my eye, because suddenly my vision is obscured on the left by a red haze, which I can only assume is blood. I attempted to get up onto one knee, when I feel a boot step right on my spine, grinding into my back and further emphasizing the fact that, yes, there's a lot of broken ribs there. "So, Mark," the boot said. "What made you think that we'd forget?" "I- uh-," I sputtered, tooth fragments, blood, and saliva dribbling past my cut lips, "I don't know-" "Of course you do," the boot interrupted. "You know as well as I do what you're running from. And it's not going to do any good." Why can't there be any cars passing by now? But my one good eye can only see empty road in both directions. And that voice... I don't recognize it. But I should. It seemed to recognize me. "I'm not th-the- one y-you want, man," I stumbled out. "There's gotta be some-" "'Some sort of mistake?' Is that what you're saying? Ha, no, unfortunately for you, we don't make those, Mark." The boot's almost chuckling now, all the while he's grinding into my back with greater force. I almost passed out from the pain, but a sudden click of metal brings my focus back in an instant. "A mistake is what you made in trying to run." And before I can answer, there's a loud explosion behind me, and the back of my head is gone and then I woke up in a cold sweat next to the empty pillow and I remembered why I took the sleeping pills in the first place.
Posted on 05/20/2008 10:54 PM Comments (0)
April 23, 2008Two-headed boy, all floating in glass
Is it possible to feel stasis? Does the actuality of the event allow itself to be experienced by the one who is held thus? Or do the forces which act upon the body in the act of stasis act as a becalming force which numbs and anesthetizes the mind to whats taking place? Novocaine for the logical centers of the brainpan. Elliot said "traveling without moving", somehow that is related. Structured as such, one can only imagine movement, as movement is an impossibility in a stasis field. Hence, moving is not so much an action, as it is a thought. You think, therefore you act. "The ultimate in no-wave technology."
Stasis relapse can be fatal, one can imagine. Day-to-day interaction grinding to a halt as one's body adjusts to a lack of inertia and forward momentum ceases to exist. C'est la vie. Fractional movement does not matter to a stasis-bound individual, because a fraction, while more than nothing, still amounts to much less than the total movement required for any type of progress. So it's better to remain in a state of stasis than to inch incrementally toward an unreachable objective. Backwards momentum is movement as well, remember, and that is even less desirable than total lack of said action. Better to be still than go back. One cannot go back, the rules of relativity and time's arrow ensure this. One cannot fight the inexorable fight against entropy and exhaustion, even if one strains through limits and blocks placed in one's path with ease. Stasis prevails. N'est pas?
Posted on 04/23/2008 10:44 PM Comments (4)
April 16, 2008all blacklist singers.
Cross out the eyes, dots the "T"s, and await further instructions from
headquarters. Can you dig it, the feeling of superiority over the next
the person, just for shits and giggles? Take a bow, superstar, we're
all applauding your last case of hubris and vanity resulting in the
destruction of the societal bridge built over the chasm of conscience.
Secede from this union, no, facist state, and face the penalty of
forced obsolescense. If at first you don't concede. . . yadda yadda.
Premonitions and paranoia do not add up to equal anything near
compelling drama, but there is drama nontheless, and it follows you
like a miniature cartoon storm cloud. "Solidarity" is the word of the
day, and supposedly the battle cry of the newest war campaign being
waged on aural patterns, but I don't recognize half of the majority,
and my cabinet position changed overnight. Marches and maneuvers in
lock-step don't equal popularity, and contrary to your popular(ist)
belief, your words mean little, and next to nothing when weighed
against the upset balance of observed action.
Bass and treble, feedback and loop, wander off into the wilderness of the blue/red margins, where your equality is measured by how much more equal you are than the next ghost ex machina. Imitate, water down, and hit the harmonics of disharmony; something may be rotten in Denmark, but it's been long-dead and buried here. "This time. . . shall be different!" But it's not different at all, is it? Thrown your black hat into the ring, disconnected and digital, and retreated through phone lines into the comfort of the self-induced womb. Crushed by the weight of the 70-ton ball turret, you're sure to be gunned down before you know it. Knock everyone off the list, because there's no such thing as paranoia, according to the Good Doctor, and though the Enemy exists, you are no threat, toothless and mewling. Cross your heart again, with ink wrists and shattered glass, swear as loudly as the muse allows. The whim of the great magnet doesn't lie, you will be pulled down like all the rest in this 5% Nation of Sunny Day Real Estate, and when it all is tallied, your contribution will be minimal. Yes, I've lost faith, but I'm a faithless person by nature, unless given a reason to believe. And your reasons don't poll right with adults, children, or the elderly. But, oddly enough, they persist in the ether, and you refuse to go down. Imitate more, and grab the glory again, begin your reelection year comeback 2 years early. Dead by 30, obsolete by 25, your children will be buried before you hit the ground. Try not to get dirt on your shoes while you dig your own hole.
Posted on 04/16/2008 9:25 AM Comments (0)
March 18, 2008spring break woo.
I've resisted thus far. I've fought against the urge. I've won my
personal battles of will. I was not going to write on politics. And
there was a reason: this country broke my heart.
I know this is a stupid thing to say. But it's true. Four years ago, I was very into the political process. More so than I'd been even four years earlier, in the first presidential election I'd ever voted in. I read books. I followed the news. I detected, I sleuthed, I studied. And I, unsurprisingly, came to the conclusion that George W. Bush was the worst candidate for president I'd ever seen. But I also came to the conclusion that I did not like any of the Democratic candidates all that much either. They all seemed too. . . I don't want to say "wussy", but that's the best word that comes to mind. And I'd be fucked if I was going to vote for Nader again. But still. . . Bush had to go. So, Democrat-bound I was, to whomever ultimately won the ticket (Kerry, duh). I polled, I pushed, I wrote, I proselytized, I even prayed (not very hard or well, but still, the effort was there). I thought, yeah, this could work, the American people will see what a crooked bunch has been running the country the last four years, and they will vote against him and his wicked ways. And I truly believed that. I had faith in the intelligence and forthrightness of my own view point, and faith in the intelligence and forthrightness of America. And we all know the results. So I dropped out of politics, a ruined broken shell of a man. I just stopped. Stopped reading the blogs and the websites, stopped watching the news, stopped buying the books. Only enough news to keep abreast of what's going on. I stayed away. I voted in every minor election, and was cheered a little when the Dems retook Congress 2 years ago, but somewhere in the back of my mind was a small voice saying, "It doesn't matter; it's too little and too late." And now, here we are on the cusp of another tight presidential race, the first of my life without an incumbent president or vice president running, with the Democratic nominee not decided yet, not by a long-shot. I hadn't decided who I wanted to win. I knew who I did NOT want to win. But that would just bring me back to where I was four years ago: voting against someone rather than voting FOR someone. And I didn't want to do that again. I didn't want the choice to be between the lesser of two evils. I'm tired of the negativity that surrounds everything I love, and choosing between two candidates I don't like smacks to me of a zero sum loss. But today, I have found a reason to believe again, I think. I realize this is not saying much in the way of reason or logic or personal issues. I won't be going into my reasons for this, for they are long and complicated, and I don't even understand much of my own brain chemistry myself. I have no evidence to back this up, short of one amazing speech, and a sense of hope that maybe, this time, we can get it right. "It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams." Barack Obama '08. Thank you for reading. We'll be back to yr regularly scheduled sarcasm and pop culture shortly.
Posted on 03/18/2008 10:39 PM Comments (0)
March 13, 2008The moon hangs like the blade of an axe tonight.
I'm poised, hung, on the precipice of the moment between asleep and awake. Currents are floating by, ideas, sounds; it's all there, if you know where to look. The moon is smirking at me, and I am having THOUGHTS. ... Strange days, yes. We're here, aren't we, just standing here, waiting for something, some thing. Music from another room, themes, undercurrents, symbolism, all that whatnot. Is it meaningful or meaningless? Are we? Do they know? CAN THEY HEAR ME?
WELL, onward and upward, as they say, and the breach must be... well, breached. No rest for the wicked, eh? And let that be a lesson to you, friends: when the going gets tough, the tough fuck off, and one short sharp shock is all it takes to start the whole thing running again back to San Jose and back to the drawing board. Buy the ticket, take the ride. Said by better than myself, I know, but appropriate, and worth it's weight in nickels and dimes. I can hear it all through the walls, the tickings and clinkings and snickering snivelers waiting for their chance to break them down and take everything back to the charnel pit. BUT. WE. WILL. NOT. LET THEM. Will We? SO. What? Never mind. This is entirely uninteresting to you, I can tell quite plainly, and so shall I move on into the wild blue yonder, singing "What a beautiful face I have found in this place that is circling all around the sun." Two heads are better than none, and while mine might not be on straight, it is still as good as it gets here on this orbiting ball of rock, fear, and ennui. Sleep is for the weak and the lonely, and while I am neither, I am also sleepy and past the point of no deposit, no return. Back to the beat, I suppose. Two three four, Selah.
Posted on 03/13/2008 11:46 PM Comments (0)
March 3, 2008I built an altar for you out of polaroids and pins.
Creatively, I go through a lot of peaks and troughs. I'm always
writing, there is no arguing there. But my personal opinion on the
quality tends to waver, as well as the quantity, and style I'm doing it
in. For a few weeks, I will be all songwriting all the time, then I'll
write poetry, then songs again, then short stories, essays, whatever.
The cycle changes a lot, too. It weirds me out sometimes, because I'll
think to myself "I need to write a new song," but I just don't have the... I don't know... inspiration isn't the right word, but it's as close as I can get.
So, I've lagged a bit in the blogging area. I keep having ideas of things I want to write about, mostly while I'm working (and listening to the Motherboxxx), but by the time I get home to write, I have either lost the will or the idea. I thought purchasing a moleskein would help with that, but I'd actually have to remember to bring it with me places, which is an entirely different issue. It's frustrating to me, as I always have 8,000 ideas swirling around my head, but I just don't know how to get them down properly. I've been better about it lately, since I've been forcing myself to write in my blogspot on a fairly regular basis. That's helped. I don't know though. Sometimes I fear I suffer from some sort of self-induced creative anxiety, and thusly only write well when I'm not actively thinking about it. Oh well, such is life yadda yadda. Overall, it isn't that bad. I'm probably stressing because I have this massive essay idea on the Venture Brothers and failure in my head that I can't quite get around to actually writing out, and until I do, I will most likely be weird and archaic in my thought patterns. Welcome, my son, welcome to the machine. PS. Robots and Racecars is pretty good.
Posted on 03/03/2008 11:01 PM Comments (3)
January 23, 2008recelo y aborrecimiento en la republica dominica
I attempted to keep a journal during my family's four plus day
excursion to the Dominican Republic last week, but somehow I was
sidetracked by the fact that I COMPLETELY HATED IT THERE. After the
first night, the highlight of my day was waking up and realizing I'd
have one less day there before I went home. In any event, the journal
ended up devolving into a fit of gonzo journalism madness after the
first few entries. Here it is, in its entirety, unedited. I'm never
going back there. Ever.
---------------------------------------- 01.14.08 I don't like it here. I'm in the Dominican Republic, with my family, for 5 nights and 4 days. In theory, it seems like a wonderful idea; it's the middle of January, when it is freezing and wet at Echobase, escaping to a warm sunny island of tropical love and alcoholic drinks is almost a no-brainer. And yes, that part is most decidedly good. I like that part. It is nice. It's just. . . I don't know. If I'm to get away from stuff, it would include my family, and would involve my friends coming with. And preferably where I don't feel uncomfortably far from home. But let me back up a bit. We left the house at 5 AM, which means I was up at 4 AM. Which is bad, because I am physically unable to fall asleep before 3. So yeah, about an hour or two of sleep. AWESOME. A cold drive to Newark, a 3 hour wait in the airport. Fun, yes, hooray, huzzah. We boarded, we took off, everything according to spec. (I will say that my favorite part of flying is that moment right after the plane leaves the tarmac, and the g-forces and air pressure differential are acting on your body, and all I can think is "Yes! Humanity! Technology! SCIENCE!" So yeah, so anyway,) The flight was uneventful. So very very uneventful. The island's an hour ahead of EST, so we landed around 1 PM. We got picked up by a shuttle at the terminal, and the drove the longest most depressing drive ever. The architecture and growth on the part of the island we drove through was like all the abandoned and decayed parts of the Jersey shore lined up for miles upon miles, and then surrounded by lots and lots of minibikes and poverty. Lots. Anyway. I'm not doing a good job explaining myself, I think. It just seems like this wave of existential funk just overtook me when we landed here. An example: dinner tonight was at an outdoor restaurant on the resort grounds. It's supposed to be "French cuisine," but. . . it's still a buffet. Buffet food in another country is still just buffet food. And the channels that come in best on the television are local New York City stations and the Discovery Channel. And maybe that's a big part of my issue. What's different is TOO different, and what's the same is TOO the same. The balance of foreign otherness and home-osity is very skewed, and my brain can't handle it. 4 days, 3 nights to go. I'm hoping this picks up. ---------------------------------------- 01.15.08 I have made a friend here. His name is Lewis, and he is a local lizard. An anole, if I am guessing right. He was on the ceiling last night when we came in from dinner, and has stayed the night watching over me and scaring away predators. I am forever in his debt. I am still vexed by this place. They don't let you leave the resort. We are essentially trapped here, until deemed okay to release. Maybe they wish to protect us from the locals, which seems odd, as this island was the first permanent European settlement in the Western Hemisphere. Anyway... I don't like laying in the sun. And other than laying on the couch, watching "Cash Cab" and "Mythbusters" (both FINE programs though they are), that is pretty much the extent of what we can do here. I am glad I brought a large book with me, as I will undoubtedly need to fill the time doing something, since I have no guitar, no friends, no phone service, and no internet. Lewis continues to watch over me. I trust him. We have conversations. We discuss world politics and the fate of the american dollar in the global market. He makes a few salient points, but I think he is underestimating the current (coming?) recession. In any event, today was uneventful, for the most part. More buffet food. More boredom. More ennui. I think someone/thing is watching me through the window, but I'm sure it's just my imagination. ---------------------------------------- 01.16.08 [a transmission sent to the Bandit Queen] I have managed to acquire a wireless connection and my mom's laptop. Though it is technology, and this island is inherently untrustworthy in that regard. Send help! I am miserable and wish to return to Echo Base post-haste. I am afraid that I am either slowly going insane, or that every living thing here is out to get me. I miss my bandit queen, and midnight time travel adventures, and yelling about things that matter. I fear that there is a killer after me, he is hunting me in my dreams. There are things here, places, moments, all conspiring against me in another language. Lewis has disappeared, I am worried for his safety. I want to come home. Now. 2 days left in this foreign paradise of discontent, and then I shall be free. But even then, I am not sure. There is a bird at the window, and he is staring at me. I do not trust his motives. I miss you. Even more than normal. It might be because when I am home, I have the knowledge that if I wished, I could forgo obligations and drive to the Fort and enjoy your presence. At this moment that is impossible. That, plus my encroaching dread, are fueling my paranoia. 2 days left. End communication. ---------------------------------------- 01.17.08 Things have taken a turn. Lewis is dead. They are coming. I don't think I can be allowed to say anymore. ---------------------------------------- 01.18.08 We are on the way home. I am seated next to a couple who are the quintessential Ugly Americans. I want to stab them in the head with the butter knife given to me along with my ham sandwich. But I know I cannot, as the persona who would do that stayed on the island, and I would be detained as soon as we landed. I need to be free, to tell the story, to tell of Lewis and his bravery. But I'm finding even as I write these words the details are fading. Did they ever exist? Are memories factual representations of truth, simple electrical signals, or something more? Do they hold resonance with the past, or just effect the present? Some things last in the psyche, words and meanings, and some things float away like blood in the spray of the ocean. These things that have happened, that I can no longer recall clearly. . . does this make them any less real? Hallucinations brought on by too much sun and sleep deprivation, paranoia and existentialist crisis combine to make jagged edges in my memory. Whatever. Does it matter? Does anything really, other than the departure point and destination? I don't know. I'm going home. Echobase, do you copy?
Posted on 01/23/2008 10:32 PM Comments (2)
January 6, 2008infinite in finite.
I am talking to you from the future.
We are there, you and I, walking together in the purple twilight, everything much like it was before and will be even later, but still, it's different, and will always be. Fingers touching fingers, lightly skipping along knuckles and whorls and pores, the air crisp, bitter even. You seem so happy, and I so less un-. The season turns and snow is falling and dead skeletons line the roadways to and from our homes, and our spectral bodies line each other, hands and spines blending, everything white and brilliant and blinding. So much seems the same, yet different, and it's all glorious, eyes sparkling in lights that aren't even on, and darkness encroaching into the hearts we don't admit to the other that we have. We are simple creatures, really. Touch and taste and sight and sound and scent mingled into perception and reality. And then somehow, tomorrow comes just as you do. I am talking to you from the past. You're walking away now, and I'm standing, watching, thinking. Leaving. The same recurrent conversation created out of frustration and misplaced affections and affectations repeating again and again in toto. You lie, and then I lie, and then you lie again, and then I tell the truth, but it's a lie. So we go through the motions, waiting for something to come back, some relit spark and fire ignited. Waiting for the winter to come. Autumn gives way to summer though, and winter never comes, and neither do you anymore. Neither do I. Neither do we. There is no we anymore. Two separate parenthetical statements instead of multiple ellipses, and the equation remains unbalanced. Distance and time agreeing to never agree and leaving motion behind as they go their separate ways. You and I are perpetually walking away. Infinity loops around again, and I'm watching you walk away again. I am talking to you from the present. There's little written now. The moment occurs, the action creates, the thought sparks, the eyes meet. Tense is tensed and poised, waiting to change with the times. You are. I am. We do. It is. Small words, big ideas, all change. Sleep more, sleep less, sleepless, hopeful, hope full, hearts empty and full and holding together. We are. We are.
Posted on 01/06/2008 11:33 PM Comments (0)
October 10, 2007electrical stories.
The streets are wet, and silent, and dark. Everything has gone to bed,
gone to sleep, gone to dream away the whys and maybes that confront
them. I am awake. As is usual. I am walking the streets, my streets,
full of promise and hope and regret and wariness. Small animals and
dying trees line the sidewalk, continuing in their nervous existence,
frightened out of their slumber by the wind and the thunder and the
lightning. They are afraid of electricity, afraid of being jolted. I
think I am too. Afraid of being too alive, too caught up beyond what I
know. The future frightens me, its unknown quality intriguing and
sacrosanct and desperate. How does one qualify their own short-term and
long-term prospects within the parameters of what society expects?
These are the worries that confront my programming.
I travel west, down my street and towards the hill. It's dark there, my eyes adjusting to the lack of lighting as I go, and the paved surface gives way, first to gravel, then to wet grass. Alive and aware of something else, something other, animals and insects scatter, and I continue on, nervous energy and bravado powering my batteries and a slight tremor betraying the chill I'm beginning to feel through my jacket. There is no moon, no stars, no planes, no lightning. Nothing in the sky but clouds and rain, water vapor and water. Do we know this? Does anyone? Do we know anything? Am I doomed to ponder these questions over and over, infinite loops between 10 and 20 goto 10 repeating in my processor until my power cells deplete and I pass on into the next arena? Or am I moving towards something else, some great epiphany that sits waiting in a valley or on a peak, or maybe in the midst of a vast plateau? I wonder. The rain still falls softly, my face becoming wetter. I reach the foot of the hill and pause, for a brief moment, considering courses of action. Up, left, right. Or back. It's like life, actually. Forward, change course, or spend eternity looking back and wondering "what if?". I am a perpetual motion machine, always moving, always thinking, even when I'm standing still. Traveling without moving, to pull a quote. I see what needs to be done, I know what I need to do. Whether I do it or not, that is the trick question. I spend so long wondering that my chances pass by and I maintain my same position, hoping the chance comes around again. History recurs, after all, and I know that I can write my way out of anything I get myself into. I am looking up the hill, seeing the lights from the houses just over the edge, people asleep in them, people alive and moving and loving and dreaming in them. Do they know? Does anyone? This is pointless, I know. Just another lost stargazer looking up and seeing a cloud-covered sky and wondering what's underneath it. Or above it. Perspective affects word usage. But I don't care, I am making my peace with my pointlessness, going from points A to B to C and back again in a recurring dream of usefulness. Everything is alive out here, everything is alive and noisy and silent and keeping on in its own way. I am alive, I am keeping on, I am standing still. Eyes forward, head on backwards, its all the same in the end. Forward, back, up, down, all perspective. The sky is up, the ground is down, and the way is forward. Once upon a time, a man went up a hill, and came down the other side into another world. He asked the first person he met "Where am I? This place is unfamiliar and I don't recognize anything. It's all changed and different." The person, an older woman, smiled and said "You're in tomorrow, sir, and there's always going to be another one right over the next hill." And he, bewildered, thanked her and kept walking. Because some people can't conceive of another day, and some people can only think about the next one, and he was neither. He kept walking, kept climbing hills and emerging into new and different surroundings, and never getting back to where he was. Finally, after days and weeks of this, he stopped and sat down, half-crying and half-screaming to the sky "When does it end? I just want to be back where I was!" And the sky replied, "You can't. That is what was. This is what is. You can only go to what will be. The sooner you accept this, the sooner you will move forward." And the man stopped sobbing. He stood up, dusted himself off, and proceeded up the next hill. I reach the top of the hill. The rain has stopped, and I see the school in the distance, and the houses and the shadows of people moving in them. I turn and look down, where I have come, into the dark of what was, and then look up into the clouded night sky, into the dark of what will be. It's all beautiful, and it's all what I was and will be. And am. I am what I have been and will be. And that is enough.
Posted on 10/10/2007 9:58 AM Comments (1)
August 16, 2007"so pack your bags for the long walk home"
One two one two one two one two, one two three four five six seven eight. The music is the message, and we crash through the wall ignoring the wreckage. The sounds reverberate and come back around, "This is getting old old old old." Oh well, we go on again and sing aloud all the martyr complexes our little empty hearts can carry, anchors down and knuckles scraped up from night after night of gang fights and summer sunsets and spring flings and destructive tendencies. For those keeping score at home there are no more serenades under way and no more days or nights or theories and we are resolute and strong in the face of adversity, so watch out. Move on move on, there's nothing more to see here, it's clear, so move on move on.
The next subject comes heading up and washes out the throats of the coterie like so much a prom night nightmare, spilling all the secret codes and stifled sentences best left unwritten, but who are we to judge what's right and wrong in others lifetime? Whoa-oh whoa-oh, are you out there, can you here us, we're the faceless excuseable reactives, living from moment to moment and taking it all one step and lie at a time. It keeps on slippin' slippin' slippin' away into the afterword, and afterwards we don't know quite how we ended up in the position of masochistic mastery. Oh well, move on move on and sing along with the words said in other times and other places to other people. Save the graces, we need them for ourselves, and sing it back if you've heard this one before. Whoa-oh whoa-oh. This is melting, all of it, things bleeding into each other and situations and people coming together to form one mass of symptoms and astringent, like a symbiote with no host body. We laugh at catastrophe, and we're random but we like it that way, all our yesterdays lighting up the sky like lightning and thunder from the gods we've denied. We collapse and crack the sky and still we persist in moving on moving on moving on, getting old old old and bitter but we handle. The change you can keep and the ways around the blockade we will create with lyric and melody and whatever we forecast we will move on move on move on. This is getting on with it. We drink on, we move on, we get by, we're still alive. This is what you get when you mess with us. One two three four end.
Posted on 08/16/2007 11:04 PM Comments (0)
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