Asbestos and Bed Bugs

I don’t mourn the life lived, only the cycles that inexorably, disgustingly keep themselves crashing at my gates. Tidal and circumspect; like a locked groove in endless unpredictable motion, spin me into oblivion and suck. These days I don’t cut my whiskey with soda for taste, I do it because it goes down just the same way and that’s a damn waste of good whiskey.

The precept happens when one irks the psyche, spilling true understanding down upon the soul like tainted honey from a dead hive of bees. My psyche in this case was suddenly irked when it was discovered that my one-year-old marriage had been sabotaged almost from the beginning and by one of my oldest of friends. This kind of ecliptic blow is not unknown to me, it happened when one of my girlfriends suddenly became bi-polar, when another of my friends offered to kill an ex for me and then ended up in a Missouri penitentiary for life, when my best friend in 2nd grade was run over on his big wheel while I watched, when I knew I had fallen in love with a musician woman half my age half way around the world and I was engaged, when I finally connected to a beautiful woman then left town to be with a crazy one, when my favorite cat hung itself on the stereo cords and I didn’t bother to get out of bed to check, when I proposed to a woman who was smart enough to parse the truth that we simply shared a biological function together, when I realized my most influential participation in a band was breaking up because the friend songwriting genius was a secret heroin addict – when I realized I could have fulfilled my dreams if I had just taken a chance to believe that I could. But this is not a diatribe on regret; it’s not a treatise on lost permeation, or a missive of bitter revealings. This, my friend, is the life lived and utterly enjoyed; because nothing stands so firm like awesome, courageous, ephemeral life. I was so lonely once that I took my pants off at band practice, because I was in a band with 3 gorgeous women and I couldn’t figure out how to get any attention from any woman anywhere. I laugh now, I strut and spout about the moments I should bury deep inside my self-consciousness, moments I should hope to exercise with lasers and scalpels, but instead celebrate because I wear the absurd and disconsolate close to my chest; because when there is nothing but sheer locution and pain my mind wanders to the absurd, disjointed and wonderful moments that will always remain unexplained.

Once I used the promise of endless years left to live to justify the times I ignored my intuition, the moments I felt myself shuffling through predictable scenarios in my life. The first heartbreak decades ago, coming home from tour a day early to an empty house and being batted against the temple with the knowledge that she was at his house. I used to focus inward, wondering what I needed to learn about humans and nature, about myself or the intersexual relations I futured and fostered.

So now when immutable fact suddenly transcends into chaos and all judgment becomes tenuous I put on Daydream Nation by Sonic Youth, hoping to reach some harbour, some balance in mind and soul. My old friend and compatriot, creating some semblance of comfort in a world utterly gone mad beyond duct tape and chewing gum. Shifting randomly like the dust and cat hair on my foyer.

We met through a work mate – a wonderful woman who was married to a musician I admired greatly. It seemed like ecstasy and bliss wrapped in the most delicious pastry. We both had such similar stories - a son each, single parents for years, the struggle and heartbreak of living life into the void and all the while providing and describing the shape of the world for our most precious cargo. Her appetite was insatiable, like kissing the whip, I was unable to sustain the meteoric assent. I held each moment precious and sacred, the ceremony was at SF City Hall, with my one witness and long time friend still left in SF from the desert, her with 3 close friends and both our sons in attendance. This was by design and in full consciousness as neither of us trusted the institution or the examples we had been provided as youth. Delicate and simple, but it came apart all too soon. Soon the confession of infidelity and dissatisfaction; the unknown interloper who crashed into our probate of partnership drilling deep into the cloth of trust and loyalty. It washed like white hot lava into my brain but we had so much love and purpose that we continued, through counseling and explosions, through accusations and depression, both of us equally ministrating the pain and hurt from perceived incompatibility and discontent. It seemed to work, biting at times, harshly furious and overwhelmingly ugly, but those moments seemed to give way to peaks of solution and tight bond. It’s never the same, it’s more than a game, can’t take it away, can’t kill all the shame,……

Working with what ever was there, eating shit or making cakes was really the same.

It started with a work incident, I manage 16 people and we all work together well.

Our workplace was under an earthquake retrofit, something quite common in California, and then asbestos was discovered. We were asked to evacuate. The shit started to go down, differing accounts of safety precautions, crazy inferences, and I raised my voice because I felt I represented some important people – namely the incredibly hard working souls who are my Team. I wrote and sent an account of the incidents that transpired so there was no mistake. But – it flew in the face of liability and status quo; it made fault where there was reported none and the result was my undoing among my superiors at work and peers that facilitated my projects. I stood alone, suddenly – irrevocably. My training rescinded and expenses unpaid I decided to use the fare I bought to travel back to a place I once lived anyway, Chicago. I met with old friends and had an amazing time with strangers. I played music and enjoyed spontaneous commiseration from the most unlikeliest sources, I once again felt inured. Still the heart beats and regrets nothing, using all nuances to sway the soul into mirrored being, opening probabilities and launching hope anew. Ugly horrible hope. A woman I had been close to for nearly a lifetime took me in and made me whole and then supplied the undoing to my current life, volunteering unasked information which made all the mysterious pieces of the marriage infidelity fit together. Making me realize one of my oldest friends – the man who witnessed my marriage for me, who I have known through 3 lifetimes and 2 different locales– decided in a sober and deliberate way to have an affair with my wife, that was the missing link. Complicating matters, I now had no one to commiserate with. All of my dearest friend were also friends with this jackal but did not know the difference, yet. Should I break them? So many questions. Suddenly thrust back into the home life a new twist develops, bug bites, welts and bruises form on my wife even as I confront her with the information about the crushing reality that the man who I entrusted to witness and stand with me during my marriage ceremony, whom I had know for over a decade, willfully decided to succumb to the most pedestrian interplay. Her wrenching admission under confrontation seems to be reflected by the four dozen welts on her body. The best man screws the wife of the best friend. Some kind of access channel soap opera, off-off-Broadway play, a Montel Williams rerun. She leaves but under the guise of multiple insect bites I mysteriously do not receive. Confronted with the truth she belches forth and reveals herself, coloring the ground and immediate geography with stench and deception revealed.

Affronted, this powerful epiphany strikes me to the core and also seems so achingly familiar. The hurt, the promise obliterated, the broken crucible of hope.

Faced with deliberate misconstruction of facts about risk to my peers,

I speak the truth at work and anonymous emails assail my character, the institutions of the heart continue to dissolve; what I scarcely wanted to believe in becomes every fear I imagined, couching itself in the trappings of human frailty and posture. Tonight I clean a house, washing, sweeping and flossing the most mediocre of tangents in an effort to distill emotion into reasonable order. It does not come, it does not reveal itself and remains the elusive prefect of unattainable delusion. I take interest in how to learn of course, blinding myself to perdition and faith so that this night can pass into the next. The whiskey helps for now but I dread when its effects wear thin and ragged, lament the moment when all blur meets mental arsenal forming unmitigated clarity. My character has a voice built on recompense, meaning there is nothing outside of my soul that can actually disable my compassion. Is that really choice – or is it simply survival?

Travel far and wide reader, reach for the rings that might be impossible, you have nothing at all to lose. There may be a time when all substance levels itself on your head, crashing about your ears as if you were a giant and the mind you use is among the thunderheads; trying to make distance and reason collaborate with unfeeling chemical reaction. Tomorrow I will again awaken to the sun, it’s rise signaling the inevitable birth and instigating the next 24 hours of revolt. I scale sheer facades in time, claw at insubstance and peer into the maw. I will not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rage at close of day, be sure of that from me.

It never sleeps but it never tires,
and it never fades, after all these miles.
And If that's what it costs..... to shoulder it, it should be more than that,
it should be more than that,
how can it not be more more than that?
and if only I could win you away.

a dram and other measures

slowly and a bit at a time. She got her show and I got the drums. What else is there. So hard to share I guess, in the end tea makes us cozy and the unshared night brings stories fo each other. How many of us have unshared events? DO we continue on in this way making great progress but solitary way? Decompress and perhaps I ponder too much. Whatever. Now I have a mustache, so bring on the night I couldn't stand another hour of daylight. It might have been precious but she is asleep, I have chosen and can feel like a heap. Bring it to me ad never doubt again, jacoby and meyers the little dead hen.

tones by turns

Long days melting schedules into each other
Like collisions but pre-meditated – likely
I just get worn from one event to another
Graduation, computers, meetings, classes,
Just a shoe or a hat so the day wears me down

Then surprise! A package for me marked
Royal Mail. Hell yes! So this morning I ride to work
Excited by the unknown again – anticipation
Of thought forms and team brick musics.
Stellar and prescient - all for me
So now it’s a good day
Not to be interrupted
If even for 39 minutes
And 69 seconds
hooray

spook country

Went to Denver for a healthy dose of "whats up?!
" and got blizzarded shades found light and dark in the process
- commiserating whole and wet on the floor while
lives got a bit stretched, too thin; and snapped back.
sometimes despite the strongest evaluations
worded testimony to convict the believers and
disbelievers alike does not prevent living with a stranger
. for years.
watching the snow go on down and waiting to
pour a litmus test into the fire.

The snow cooled everything but the sun broke and I was back
in san francisco having bought a book and some canned beer
which I heard they are going to discontinue on economy
flight - depriving me of trying to find some amusing
distraction, a couple hours lost in the air. unproductive.

I crossed a line now and don't see coming back in computerworld.
I have drawn lines between myself and the others.
2 machines that blared LCD glow while I virtualized 2 guest
operating systems working twitter and blipfm gooearth
banking on safe processor overclocking and generic display
driver downloads. confession: I dont do IM. yep I know
but there it is. its too confusing and disruptive for me, (can I flag that as addhdh?) texting sure. that airport book? it was a william gibson paperback.
no problem, and bypassing thefacebook thing too for some of the same reasons
but I do love that wacky tech shtuff.

Speculating on the bad news

My sister set me an email:

Below is a posting from a blogger I follow. I started following him when I got the sense that the real estate market was not going to hold. He's one of those intense workaholic brianiac types who has been working as a money manager. He's done well for himself predicting the collapse of the stock market but this recent posting took it to a whole new level. He is NOT a survivalist. He is a money guy.

Here is the blog entry in it's entirety.

The End of the World . . . As We Knew It
For the last four and a half years, I have been writing, speaking and warning about the consequences of the housing bubble, commercial real estate bubble and the toxic paper that fueled both bubbles. I took a lot of heat for my comments.

I was not shy when I said we were headed for the worst Recession since the Depression. I was not shy when I then began referring to the coming tsunami as a Decession . . . and then in January of 2008, I took the next step and called it what it is . . . a Depression.

Deep VIOLENT Depression - I cannot emphasize this enough . . . and I have already taken heat for using the "V" word. But today I am prepared to kick it up a notch, and urge you to prepare for what is unfolding. Did we think we would have seen the extent of the violence during the Civil War, when we killed each other on our own land? Did we ever think we would have seen the violence that came out of the Depression? Hitler came to power when people lost hope in the government and financial markets. Can it happen again? We said it could never happen then, so now that we are in far worse shape than 1930, why couldn’t something much worse come out of this crisis?

100,000 Protesters - Does the government have any idea how angry people are, how betrayed they feel? It will be years before our economy recovers from the devastation wreaked by bankers. In the meantime, the possibility of something awful happening is very real. We’re one swing of a garda baton, one cracked head, away from chaos. - Gene Kerrigan

This statement could have been written about the United States, England, France, China or just about any country in the world. But for now, it comes straight from The Irish Independent. You didn’t see it on CNN, CNBC or even in any of the American papers. You had better prepare for it, because it will shut down banks, supermarkets and the very fabric of what we are. If you have not built up a food pantry, stored cash and gold, and armed yourself, you might want to consider doing it now.

White House Vegetable Garden - Tom Vilsack, our Secretary of Agriculture, proposed just that. He wants to call it "The People’s Garden," and he wants to establish community gardens at each of the department’s offices around the world. Why? It’s probably not because things are going well. It’s actually in response to a grassroots movement that has been rumbling about the need for us to grow our own food! By the way, vegetable seed sales at Burpee, Gurneys, Park Seed, etc. have been skyrocketing.

How To Avert Disaster - That was the title of a subhead in an article appearing in The Economist. The title was . . . The Bill That Could Break Up Europe. And the article dealt with ways of "stopping the rot" and "the meltdown of the EU." Let me note, there were no solutions and there was no mention of going after the men that created the problems . . . and clawing back the trillions of dollars they have stolen.

CIA Bracing for Global Economic Fallout - The CIA’s primary concern now is the security of the United States in terms of the global economic crisis and its geopolitical implications. Dennis Blair, Obama’s "intelligence czar," told his staff that concerns about the recession were now at the top of his annual worldwide threat assessment to Congress. Leon Panetta, our comical CIA directors, just announced that the CIA was now producing a secret daily bulletin, called the Economic Intelligence Brief.

Hitler Only Won 2.6% of the Vote - In 1929 Hitler was still considered a joke, and he only won 2.6% of the vote and 12 seats in the Reichstag. But just a year later, as the Depression took on steam, Hitler’s Nazi Party won 107 seats in the Reichstag. At that point Hitler’s only promises were to restore prosperity and jobs . . . and to purge the system of profiteers. I am NOT analogizing Obama to Hitler, but I am analogizing the promises of prosperity without paying the consequences for our past action or planning for the future.

Frank and Moose - After the previous paragraph, I think we need this quote. "There are names floating around, and they’re bad. Frank was one of them. Frank! Moose was another one." - Michelle Obama on her veto of the names her daughters suggested for the hypothetical family dog.


Bankruptcy for Vallejo, Phoenix, Dallas, Philadelphia - Vallejo, California has already submitted to bankruptcy. Phoenix is facing a $250M deficit. Dallas $100M. Philadelphia $300M. And New York could be facing a $900M-1.2T deficit next year. Ask yourself this question. If they are facing these deficits now, how bad does it get as tax receipts plunge due to the crushing unemployment numbers? And then ask what happens when receipts plunge, but services to the unemployed in the form of police, fire, medical, food, schools, etc. . . . skyrocket out of control? Instead of going to the doctor, the unemployed/uninsured will go to Emergency Rooms. Instead of going to the grocery store, the unemployed will go to food banks and soup kitchens . . . or worse, they will loot grocery stores. And that, my dear friends, is just the beginning of something too dark to write about.

Banks Rationing Withdrawals - It happened last week in the Ukraine, when banks not only limited withdrawals, but closed their doors altogether. But it can’t happen here, right? Wrong.
$2 Trillion to AIG - We’ve already given them $180 billion with a big B. We received an 80% stake in the company for the first $85B, but we got zippity-doo-da for the next $95B. Moreover, we have no idea what they did with the money, but I hear Goldman Sachs got billions of it from AIG, as well as JP Morgan and other banks that seem to understand the rules on sucking cash out of the system and pumping to guys like King Henry, Lord Blankfein and Prince Jamie. But the real kicker is what AIG is not telling us. As the financial crisis deepens, so does the money AIG needs to pay out. My low estimate is $2T. Unfortunately, if we continue to allow things to melt down, AIG will be on the hook for more than $5T. Strike that. WE, the taxpayers, will be on the hook for $5 trillion . . . or more.

Chinese and Saudi Ties - Last week Chas Freeman was appointed to head the National Intelligence Council. This is a guy that not only has some very strange ties to the Chinese and Saudi’s, but he still has family members and close friends on the payrolls of these countries. If not directly, indirectly. But really now, what’s the difference. Here’s a guy that worked for companies owned by the People’s Republic of China that was investing in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Even though Republicans asked for an investigation into Freeman’s ties to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, China and Iran . . . the Obama Administration ignored the warning signals. As if this was not enough, Freeman has been a supporter of how Hamas has handled things, while denouncing Israel for protecting herself. If you think Obama to the Rescue . . . you’d better start looking at the people he is surrounding himself with.

Obama’s Making It Worse - Maria Bartiromo interviewed Jim Rogers, and when she asked, "What do you think of the government’s response to the economic crisis?" he said . . . "Terrible. They’re making it worse. It’s pretty embarrassing for President Obama, who doesn’t seem to have a clue what’s going on - which would make sense from his background."

Jim classically continued . . . "And he had hired people who are part of the problem. Geithner was head of the New York Fed, which was supposedly in charge of Wall Street and the banks more than anybody else. And as you remember, Summers helped bail out Long Term Capital Management years ago. These are people who think the solution si to save their friends on Wall street rather than to save 300 million Americans.

I will close with this quote from Jim Rogers . . . "We’re going to have social unrest in much of the world. America won’t be immune.


Here is my response to my sister:

Hey guys – I love this kind of discussion because it brings us out of our very subjective experience and gives some emphasis to a larger view of what happens around us, without putting us in the position of having to figure out a solution. I have to say that we are certainly at a very interesting place in time right now, where many people are in a situation or environment that they never imagined or worse yet can see something happening that they have no control over, and it’s coming at them like a freight train. I imagine that must be somewhat excruciating right? Seeing your life unravel slowly around you with no way to stop it? I feel for those folks mostly because they have no plan b and never even considered they would need one. The thing that really makes me want to scream echoes what Anne said – the godawful parasites, opportunists and neophytes who use this kind of cultural crisis to promote their own agenda or even willingly take advantage of those who cannot or do not know how to cope. It is truly human behavior at its rock-bottom worst.



I have been seeing a lot of what this guy in his blog is speaking of here (yes even in the financially insulated bubble of SF). At least 6 of my favorite coffee shops and/or corner stores have closed for good, along with all the circuit city’s, most of the blockbusters, and even SF’s famed, Tiki-themed Tonga Room at the Fairmont Hotel looks like it is headed for memory lane. Jaretta and I started to take note of these places at first, but it became a little too depressing. I am not too sad to see the corporate chains go down but at the same time I know that means jobs. Here is a link that reminds me of pictures from one of my favorite depression era photographers, Dorothea Lange (cited in the article) except now the pictures are in color and they are from Sacramento.



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1159677/Pictured-The-credit-crunch-tent-city-returned-haunt-America.html



The article mentions that this was shown on Oprah, but I tend to think that somehow marginalizes the issue, kind of giving it that 30 second soundbite authentication; meaning it grabs your attention and then it’s gone – so it goes through your TV screen, so it goes through your consciousness. On that note I also understand what Anne says about the self perpetuation of the bad news. Jaretta gets kind of annoyed at me when I have the computer open to the NYtimes online on my lap while watching the local news. She doesn’t want to hear it, doesn’t think any of it is relevant to what our current subjective daily lives are about. I almost agree, because in working with the SF public schools I have come to realize that almost every policy made to address public or private issues is most often driven by the fear of liability; it’s the damn insurance companies and the lawyers who run this show.



The article written by Mike Morgan is something I have been reading in one form or another for many months now. Each prediction becomes scarily more true, and I do see how many intelligent people are giving credence to the idea that we, as a nation and a culture, are about to go through a sea-change. I think I stand on the side that thinks “I have seen, have lived through times as bad as those growing up. If change is due let it come, you can either shriek and run or think and plumb.” What really stood out the most was one of the comments left on Mike’s blogger page (I am a total sucker for comments) – basically it was a response to another comment where someone claimed Mike was just putting fuel on the fire of fear :

“Cook at home, not go out to eat. Invite the neighbors over for a meal, or several. (You DO know who your neighbors are, don't you?) Build community. Prepare to assist each other, because there won't be much assistance forthcoming from those who have brought us to this point. So, fearmongering? That is literally selling fear. There is no need to sell or buy fear, as there is plenty to go around for free.”

I totally loved that. There is plenty of fear to go around right now, and you can have a slice if you want to, if it shakes you out of your complacency and gets the juices flowing. Just don’t let it influence your decision making process.



My gut says that more people are about to experience a standard of life - a quality of living, that they never imagined they would be visiting in another country; much less living. It says that lots are going to be fearful and impractical and take advantage of whatever opportunities come up, unethical or not. I see many people I know and work with who are basically decent folks, but have been living in a delusion world of false entitlement - entitlement partially shaped by our culture in America and the imagined zeitgeist of unsustainable consumerism. I think there have been many people who have been calling for real and determined change for many decades in this arena, and it now may be happening because there is no place left to go. I hope that the people who speculated unfairly, who knowingly made poor choices or coerced others into them, finally realize that folly and learn. One thing I do agree with in the article (and it just makes common sense if you live in the fault zone out west) stock up on water and seeds and whatever else you might not be able to get if the power goes out.



On a side note; my years of trolling the interwebs have jaded me and I am calling myself out right now. Any of you ever heard of ‘Godwin’s Law”?



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law



As soon as I read the word Hitler in the article I stopped taking it seriously, that’s because I have been a part of way too many interweb flame wars, meme-outs, and thread bumpings. That is not to say the guy has some seriously good points, but as far as my experience goes when you start throwing around the ‘H’ word you’ve just invalidated all your previous points intelligent or not.



I love you all very much and I hope my ramblings haven’t put you to sleep, but if so, have a nice nap.



Dave

rant but whatever

I joined facebook out of guilt, and it just figures that everytime I log in I feel like it's barking direction at me, telling me I need to jello-shot-the-frog-card-and-save-the -gift-of -environment-blah-etc-blah. Luckily I am very good at ignoring everything. I must admit I had my finger on the nuke my account button after the fifth invitation to describe 25 random things I could be lying about or just being an imp and fabricating another parallel life edition for the y generation thingy. Whatever, I know it means something to people who mean something to me. So now it's like guilt by proxy or some such shite.

In any case I was working with an LG cu920 VU phone - installing a 2GB sodimm - installing software on the Dell/Vista notebook so it could be a potential MP3 unit - carrying a library of music I mostly have never heard. Hours were spent and still nothing happened.Such is the world of tech and the demons they bring. The demarcation for lots of us is the terminology - right? Is it a media player or an ipod? Is it a notebook or a laptop? a flashdrive or a USB stick? for the love of the earth is it a phone or a PDA??! I love you, and care not a whit for what it's called, I just want to make it mine by turns and screws.

a year.

coffee, quitting smoking and resmoking. family visits. meeting my soulmate. lots of food. gaining weight for the first time. starting another 300 websites. forgetting about 299 of them. working for the school district. getting promoted to manager. realizing why I always hated the manager. being repelled by the geek of it all. saving a life with an email. my doctor quits the business. My dentist fires me. I get a wicked eye infection. I take lots of pictures. Boone grows and gets almost taller and smarter than me. moving into my best friends house. My friend moves into my old apartment. getting engaged. contemplating a career change. discovering mon-a-vie. discovering kamboocha. discovering absenthe. falling down a bit more. my staff hates me. My fiance loves me. My son approaches teenage indifference. I comment on a friends blog and re-discover my own thanks to firefox's automatic sign in. good night.

plowing ahead

tomorrow I deliver the missive, still not sure how it's all gonna go down. One things for sure - no cute popculture references, no lowdown deceit, and we're all gonna be alot thinner. I keep picking up books and reading the first half chapter, enough to put it down again forever, knowing there is a magazine in my future. A time for memories that turn your bones to glass, turn your bones to glass. Former lovers keep making a stand, my heart is never big enough to motor the shoulder away from the past. Nothing slays me as much as the simple words of my son "I loveyou Dad" as he drifts into sleep. Makes me forget I loved and lost this year.

ok so I was trollurking around the nutterwebs when i noticed some different blogs dating back to 01 07 or so and this whole controversy surrounding msplinks.com. I suppose it must be effecting plenty of script kiddies because there's a ton of netspeak posts and random 7 year old shout outs among these more detailed blog posts about the embedded url re-directed. Hit counts aside, it points out something more obvious - there is probably huge money being tossed around on in the world of virtual re-directs. Hedgepoles speculating on the profit margin of mouse clicks to a ceretain site; driven by ad revenue of course. Aaa that's when the shark has long jumped and the barraccudas are settin in....... This is a place for "Social Networking News" as opposed to a place for friends , but it gets the job done. SO ~ I am immersed in this curiosity about the re-direct from myspace, fumbling around on blogs and pages wading through the irrelevant comments and boasts and my eye catches on this post and the shit brings me to tears. I was laughing my ass off, and hooting-by-myself in the living room. I was toasting the wondrous emotional eloquence of romance based languages and crying tears of joy and surprise. After reading about 30 or so posts out of 50, I'd say - one posts was such an immaturely brilliant standout that I gave a solo standing ovation for 15 minutes while the cat tried to bury itself in the chair cushions. Maybe I was tired, but the poster is: fsasdgdgs 2007-07-30 09:56:07

near the bottom of the comments. I love it when someone lets loose a good solid string of curses, capping that off of course with a amicable ascii smiley. Good for a hoot I guess.

this is all I wanted for my birthday. A chance to be the guy who doesnt know how to wear his handkerchief mask thing when mugging someone. Oh well I can still dream. Or grow a mustache.

Here is what fascinates me the most about this clip - the random zoom in on the shoulder/chest. It is practically avant. If I watch this video any more trying to divine the meaning I will lose my mind. Someone explain what happened. Thanks.

probably caused by excess hemoglobin

the shit has hit the fan this weekend. First we found out that 'fake steve jobs' was outed, then we learned that about 200 thousand weapons are missplaced somewhere in Iraq, and to cap it all off the 'rocket man' elton john wants us to flip the switch on the interwebnets and shut the whole thing down for 5 years. Sir Elton, if I may have a word with you........... WTF?!?!? ok look - I admire your determination and fortitude - maybe it's because you rocked when you were young, maybe you passed on all the bad 80's mojo to boy-boy george, maybe you have some kinda deal with some kinda devil but for the sake of pong! we need the interwebnets now more than ever. At least I do, I dont have enough time to catch my favorite shows or webcasts as it is, how the hell am I supposed to stay relevant (unlike you sir) if my webternets gets the axe? There is no way, because I (and my young ward dick) are the only ones who know where the kill switch is!! MUUAAHAHAHAHA!! Thats right, I have been in negotiations with Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and that parapalegic guy in the wheelchair who is super smart, and they decided that I (and my faithful ward dick) are the only ones with the strength, courage, and irreparable brain damage to be able to conceal the off switch for the webternet from sassy sally forths like you, sir! I will not turn off the internet, never will you convince me! NEVER I SAY! You can re-release and re-package all your hits for the 30th time, you can perform in a donald duck suit for a year and still I will say NAY to you sir. I even refuse your offer of sending in Bono as a mediator, (but I may consider Beyonce, I hear she has a thing for geeks) this I tell you with unwavering certainty. I am sure you may read about the negotiations which took place this weekend between Sir Elton and I, even reaching a point where I considered his request and my stipulation was that he should publicly apologize for having anything to do with "candle in the wind" and make Bernie T wear the duck suit for a month. Then I realized I wouldnt be getting any RSS feeds about all my innertenwebs buddies snarky blogs, and couldnt e-stalk others, or even track my DHL and UPS purchases from amazon and E-bay not to mention destroy billions of hours watching other people do inane things on youtube. Shit,.. my offer is, was and will remain, NO! Thanks.

purchasing the leverage for a buyout options plan

I am one of the people in this world who loves the absurd, abstract, and undefinable. Recently I was asked to be in a film project by an uber-talented creative bottle rocket guy wo also happens to be a very close friend. I was happy to comply because the projects this guy undertakes are always interesting at least and fantastic-ally-incredib-ations at best. This is a guy who can write tender songs for local theatre, act like it comes from his soul at 100%, play multiple intruments (self taught), paint, make movies, photo journal, network into the future and be part of an incredibly beautiful and cool family. It just works out. Like this movie, it came together in his warped and fascinating mind and was shot directed and edited by the same mind. The music was composed and performed by him too. I know,... as someone who enjoys creative outlets and performance I feel totally in awe most of the time so it's ok. Most of the people I meet I have an instinctive urge to kill when they are total creative geniuses, so I can then be the most creative person I know who is alive. In this case I think I dont mind being 2nd or 3rd or 3836th or whatever rank I currently hold. Besides,... now I am a movie star. heh.

the web connection

switching gears now, I hate the web. It's like one of those crappy warehouse parties where there's a bunch of inter-connected rooms with different themes or some other ridiculous shit and you keep running into folks you either fucked over, fucked under or hooked up with and never wanted to see again. I got an email from someone I used to work with at the presidio grill when I was still doing the kitchen bitch thing. This grilltard was one of those guys who had obvious mental disabilities but would never submit to any kind of testing so it could never be verified. He once rolled his hightop in panko mix and deep fried it, resulting in a crispy golden brown chuck taylor. I admit the rest of us got into it and garnished the plate with rosemary aoli and tangelo slices, sprinkled with a little lime and chili powder. It looked damn tasty for a shoe. He ended up wearing it for the other 4 hours of his shift trailing greasy breading in and out of the walk-in and to the bus station. He told us this story about how, when he was growing up in NJ, he lived near some stadium but a couple blocks away was this swampy area where there were pipes sticking out of the ground about waist high. I guess the story goes that he and his buddies would ditch school and go out to these marshes and inhale deeply from the pipes, providing them with hours of brain killing fun. He said one time he woke up from a 'pipe-huff session' and it was dark and he was alone, when he got home his dad hit him with a broom stick and made him sleep in the garage.

You know - having a blog is like putting up an internet signpost that says "hey assholes, here I am."

Thats not arguable. Ever.

Sometimes I want to kill you. Sometimes I want to kill you then myself. But not by jumping off the Golden Gate bridge,.. too trendy right now. Why dont you ever hear about Bay Bridge jumpers? Just curious. I am feeling kind of angsty or just irritated because I have a houseguest and in my little 1 bdrm it seems entirely claustrophobic. And I like small dark spaces to hide - like most lurkers. Speaking of,.....my downstairs neighbors have started to let me know they dont like my smoking out the window. Whenever I am contemplatively hanging over the sill deciding whether I will be buried at sea or just blown up in a mock spinal tap cremation they will suddenly shatter the reflection by slamming - and I mean SLAMMING - their window shut below me. Sometimes over and over, or maybe it's every window they have. Not sure dont really care. Maybe its because I hacked into their wireless and changed the extension on all their (his?) porn files from .wmv to .rm (real media) and they suspect me. I got a little tired of dirty latina maids every night - same fucking scene over and over and over. Dont get me wrong, I like dirty latina maids as much as the next guy, but her fakey accent and overly postured moaning are entirely unconvincing as is the fact that she has to keep saying "I'm your D-L-M,..... oh oh oh yeah....." makes me nostalgic for the days of the EXcite search. Back then you could practically trip over wholesome amateur porn just by doing a search for 'big bananas' or whatever. Also: is there only one plastic surgeon doing boob jobs in all of California? All, and I mean ALL fake boobs look exactly the same now. I hate fake boobies.

Oh real quick: I hate loathe and despise Belle and Sebastian, as well as anything that sycophant ryan adams might be involved in. "ohh I was strung out,.. ohhh electric ladyland studios,... ohhh I got over heroin AGAIN." Puh-lease. You're career would thank you if you just OD'ed tomorrow in front of the Chelsea.

Bitter much? Maybe not, but then again you'd probably have to give a shit to find out. Well I gotta get crackin, I just discovered a hack for bluetooth so I can change all my workmates ringtones,.......... that'll kill at least 40 minutes of todays shift. Yeah thats right - I put the 'hell' back in helpdesk.

borts minorts tonight

A grand festival of super-dorks. It's kind of like the ren-faire meets cirque de soliel in a professional karaoke forum. Fantasy and sci-fi all rolled up into one weird package complete with a garageband soundtrack. This is what I do: I push the pause button between songs so the spandex clad performers can catch their breath. Borts and his dancers; Dinah and Pu-nope bring a seriously warped and hilarious texture to any venue, but a shot of jameson surely helps. This place called counterpulse on mission and 9th will be hosting this evenings freakshow. Somehow Borts Minorts is able to simultaneously mock, mimic and codify the 'art' of show and the amount of energy that goes into performing. The video below is from the album Human Error, song of the same name.

commute

I drive the 6th street gauntlet to work everyday, usually twice. I start at the top of the hill near the big famous church and the masonic temple, and then end up near the DPT tow yard on harrison. Leaving my house at 6:40am gets me to work at about 6:50. I have seen some sad, scary, random, interesting and downright horrifying scenarios played out on this sad strip of blacktop. Once I actually jumped out of my car to help what I thought was a woman lying face down in the street outside bourbon and branch, turns out it was one of those inflatable thingies - a male version in drag and I actually touched it to turn it over. It was clammy. So I stop at my java spot to grab my columbian and after said transaction continue on my way, only to get pulled over a block later for not wearing my seatbelt by a cycle cop. I'm sitting in my car in a metered spot and about a half block away I see this drug deal going wrong, let me see if I can describe it.

She walks up to him and gives him the whats up, he is tweaking super hard so he cant stop moving most of his limbs the whole time. They do the palm-off and he about-faces, searching his hand for the score. He sticks his hand in his pants and then reverses his trajectory, grabbing the woman by the back of the neck. He pulls her backward as if he is some kind of Neanderthal going in for the dip and kiss, but instead of lips he jams his hand into her mouth and I can see the force he's using from up the street. She struggles but her 70 pound emaciated state is no match for his uber-tweak and he removes his hand from her mouth accompanied by a long silvery string of saliva. It was surreal enough but that long weird saliva strand glinting in the morning light was too much. The cop came back to my car and gave me the ticket, advising me to be more attentive to safety and the traffic laws when driving around the city. I had the obsessive urge to brush my teeth. Good Morning.

romantic fucker that I am

Here I am. Alive and well. I have a gigantic beating heart, it keeps me alive and it makes me want to either scream or sing. I think I have hit some kind of psychic wall in my life, because I can freely admit that I am a lover without a care to the damage that does to my hetero-coolness-streetcred value. I'd be the first to admit that shit has taken enough hits to go down in friggin flames lately. But whatever, I got the jazz you know? SOmethin about talking to a woman gets me hot and blushin and seriously all down in my pants, but at the same time I have started to notice some odd occurrences. Like not only is the pornoweb boring - but its like smoking. You just start doing it to do it, it gives back zero and in fact sucks a whole bunch of your life and soul if you let it. I would so much rather make out on the couch for hours than do just about anything else. I have started to say hello to random strangers - when completely sober, with no irony, and not even the slightest thought of flirting. Of course in SF that means you are crazy or you want something,... usually money. So no one has yet to respond. No,... wait I take that back. This one kid downtown gave me the coldest stare I have ever seen, and then when his parent wasnt watching looked back at me and gave me the vulcan peace sign (or whatever that is). I'll take it. So maybe today I dont care. Maybe I dont care enough about reality that the scales have tipped and I believe in love, and cher's singing voice. Maybe I am 2 pints of beer into my evening too. So whats the diff? If you are reading this, I hope you get some hot make out session sometime soon. There is nothin like the straight-up full on lovin liplock.

another fantastic weekend

So I bought my way into her heart/ is there another way? She told me about freak and geeks, and before I did a little weberesearch and realized that this short lived series was/is fodder and hyperbole for the alty-dork-TVhipsterclone set and for that reason could only be another cultural nemesis of mine; I bought her the complete DVD box set. We watched a few passable and well written episodes and then started making out when we got to a real clunker: that one where Lindsey smokes weed - and suddenly the editing and shooting of the show must have been handed off to the wardrobe PA. Near as I can figure. It was quite clear that either these folks had
a) never smoked or snorted anything save perhaps pool water and no-doze so had no concept of the state of mind or
b) this shit got all cut because of lame censoring and or self censoring on national TV.

Regardless, Conchita and I were not distracted a bit by the freaks or the geeks so we commenced with the weighted petting. What took hold of us was some kinda spirited grope session I'm here to tell you,... it was like Wimbledon meets professional wrestling. We were both caught off guard and had many layers of clothing separating the millimeters between our bodies which seemed like an incredible inconvenience considering the effort we were both putting into the liplock/dry hump arena. I had my thigh firmly between her legs, flexing my quadricep and grabbing her ass like it was gonna save me from the noose. My whole world spun a bit and I got that weird rush of sexual endorphin power that happens so infrequently that I never know what to do with it. At that moment I was having some trouble trying to figure out how to extract her from her wife beater and bra while she was laying on her back and I was lying on her. without even having a conscious thought about it I grabbed the left shirt and bra strap in both hands and just like some kind of god damned Neanderthal I must be related to, ripped it completely apart, exposing the skin and freckles of the now bare shoulder. I froze because her face transformed from pleasure to shock and then total anger in about a millisecond. I have never done this before, and was just as shocked myself, and I asked her if she was ok. Conchita never answered that question and instead decided to school me on how I should handle a womans wardrobe just before demanding a new shirt from me and exiting the apartment - slamming doors and measured expletives galore. I fucked up. Funny thing is I have polled a few women about this incident and the reaction is evenly split: half are horrified, half think it's hot.

I have to say I also felt pretty bad because for the 20 seconds she was tearing into me for destroying one of her favorite shirts, I just stood in a hyper-sexual awe as she somehow removed what was left of her ruined bra from underneath the trashed tank top, with one hand. My words cant convey the movement, but it was incredible and super sexy. One hand holding seperated shirt strap, while other hand does this magic trick so that ruined bra slides out from behind her somehow, never exposing those incredible boobs for even an instant. It was all david copperfield n shit.

In short, I cant wait to get back to work.

getting this out of the way

Look I'll be the first one to admit that I am a complete suck-ER for gadgets. touch screen, blue- ray, tooth, chip, balls - wireless enabled audio systems, phones, electricity, deodorant sensors, self filling pet dispensers, I love it all. I try it all. This isnt news to anyone but the iphone isnt a good gadget. It ranks up there with the in-shell egg scrambler. Think about it and if you think it has a better than oh-gee! level 2 response you have been taken in by the same soulless marketers who convinced 3 generations that smoking was not a bad thing.

Tech gizmos aside I also have tried every commercial (and some not) beverage ever marketed. I have about a dozen corner stores across the city I hit up on a regular basis in order t o check out the latest stock. One in the top ten: the 'energy drink' called Cocaine. Love those ad people. It tasted just like all the other energy drinks, chilled pee meets anti-freeze. New fav: lipton brand green tea with lime. Next up to try: the coke brand energy drink called 'Vault'. See you then.

your choice: dork or goober?

As I transition away from alty bandgeek and into technerd with a side of artfag 9000 I find that through most of my personality re-incarnations one thing has remained constant. I am a goober. By that I mean a dork, or if you prefer, nerd. Personally I don’t like the ‘N’ word anymore because it has been darlinged about all too often in magazines like blender, source and (gaakk!) spin when referencing numb-nuts barking pumpkins wanaabees alt-country-psych whatever bands. I hate them, hate them all. Back to the point: I am truly dork-tastic. Example you say? Allrighty – my heart was reduced to strainer pulp not long ago by a beautiful woman. It happened quickly and because I am the consumate social misfit I missed all the signs completely, forcing this wicked vixen to become so frustrated at my inability to detect the subtlety of our impending demise that she actually had to stick her hand into my chest and hand me the burned remains of my love muscle. Just like in that indiana jones movie.

I finally got it. SO what do I do? I started a blog. Yep. Not only is that option incredibly unique but the subject matter was of course completely unlike any other blog that had come before it. I decided to publicly air my hurt and resentful feelings of rejection and pain, down to some very pathetic minutiae. Not only that I had some choices to make before hand – which mother f@^king blog to use? I just didn’t think the content would fit well with my Technorati, or lifehacker blogs, ditto for Gizmodo or techdirt. Yelp has totally soured for me and I cant even really put my finger on it but I cant stand even looking at the scrollbars anymore. I had given on up LJ about a year ago because I couldn’t get an ounce of play out of that site, and for some reason it just screams BEIGE! Myspace blog = too ghetto for these kind of passionate rants, facebook = too elite and ivy league and frat or whatever…. I could go on and on about facebook right now. I have about 20 friends and family who are desperate to convert me to “the grown-up” social networking cult but I’m not buyin into it,……yet. SO to complete this uber-emo dork out session I started a blog on (surprise) blogger! (owned by google, like most every quantity content portal) in June and wrote everyday. I also had some photos taken of me with fake blood on my chest in clown makeup. Yes that’s right. Clown make up. Fake bleeding heart. Pictures. I sent her a link to the blog posted the pictures and then scored some internet Zoloft and a case of mendocino syrah, and planned on hunkering down for the remainder of the summer blissed-out and drunk; working on a full uni-bomber beard.

I woke up the next day at 4pm and made the blog private, took down the pictures, and threw away the other 50 packs of Zoloft. I did however begin smoking again. Which I don’t even remember doing. My parting words to her? “you couldn’t possibly dislike me more than I do!” OOOHHH that showed her.

I have to get into a bar. Everything fun in life happens in bars.

outstanding helpdesk service

I had to call Dell for the 135,348th time today. It was the best experience I have ever had, at least in the realm of dell tech support. She trusted me, she was nice, and her voice was HOT! When I got the inevitable form letter I couldn't help but respond. I am a pathetic, stalker, tech nerd and I hope I didnt get her fired.

Dear Jennifer

Rep ID 01115130,

Thank you for being a live human being and speaking with me in a thoroughly professional manner about my Dell computer issues. Because of your intuitive technical nature in diagnosing my issue, your personal conduct and subtle accent; it was a pleasure working with you to resolve the issue I had with my system.

The following information relates to my recent call.

Case #150007939

Dispatch Reference #081912627

In order to perform like the trained help-desk monkey I am it is moments like this service call that keep me from completely losing my mind due to the sheer volume of ill-equipped end users who constantly hound me for trivial assistance out of loneliness or bitterness about their own malformed career choice. The part(s) of me that still resonate with any kind of actual emotion or thought because they are shielded from the constant mental pounding of my relentless clients; thanks you deeply for being intelligent, responsive, helpful, and having a hot voice.

You will not be receiving another email from me, as I am sure this one violates some corporate conduct rule, and I need this job in order to pay back the excessive debt I racked up in the 90’s. Be aware though that I will probably reflect fondly on this call even while consuming multiple beers in a feeble attempt to drink away the rest of the day’s monotonous experiences.

Thank you for choosing to be intelligent.

Respectfully,

SFUSD ITD

Systems Administrator. Help desk Primate.

Customer Experience: How am I doing? I am constantly striving to help you locate your computer power button. If there is anything I can do to help you become less intimidated by your computer, please don't hesitate to let me know by contacting me at the SFUSD helpdesk. I am sitting by the phone now, waiting, waiting. Please call.

tech pirates

When faced with being accountable for the inevitable problems that accompany any personal technology device even the most scrupulous individual becomes a pathological liar. Phrases like: ‘I didn’t touch it’ or ‘I didn’t install anything’ or ‘It just started doing that’ are the tech equivalent of letting your dog poop on the sidewalk and then running away. You know that someone somewhere is going to have to deal with the mess you made, but you’d rather not take any responsibility or figure out how to clean it up cause you’re just so damn busy. Personal favorite – when someone downloads every damn browser toolbar known to man and then cries about the length of time it takes their browser to open. I know, I know folks want their computers to work like a hammer. You just pick it up and hit something, it should just work. Problem is we have all kinds of ninja programmers and developers switching teams constantly. Take for instance the story of Bert. He worked for a startup company called ‘Stumble upon’, cute little toolbar that is supposed to give the user tips and options for searching all kinds of stuff on the web. Seems like Bert got acclimated to a very plush lifestyle in the Oakland hills, and when his company decided to give him an options self off or pay cut choice he simply split and signed up with a company that needed developers to infiltrate toolbars with malicious software and hijack browser results. Long story short, he has figured out how to maintain his opulent lifestyle by constantly creating demand for himself with rival companies. So far he has developed software to screw up your computer then contracted himself out to the company that designs software to catch said spyware, then hires on as a consultant to design even better spyware to elude the developing he just designed. These guys are pirates of the tech high seas, worse even than ambulance chasers, they prey off the uninformed and informed alike offering their services in an effort to make top dollar off of everyone’s cyber-frustration.

not relevant and just sad

from the wire:

Jerome drove his Volvo closer to the piers, in an effort to find inexpensive parking. He knew he could carry his son the 8 blocks or so to the ballpark and didn’t feel like battling the traffic and lot prices. The sun was setting to his left as he pulled up to a deserted traffic signal, he put on his right blinker and turned up NPR a bit to catch the last moments of As It Happens. Toby was fondling one of his Thomas the Tank Engine toys and he vaguely wondered about the recall for lead paint he had heard about on the radio earlier. As he began to reach into the pop up console to make a note on his blackberry a hand reached through the open window and grabbed his throat, fingers digging in deep to his windpipe. Fighting to stay conscious Jerome instinctively grabbed at the arm connected to the hand, but before he knew it his body was ripped from the car, his throat leading the way, and slammed onto the pavement. As the claw on his throat loosened he drew in a sharp breath and tried to stagger to his feet, too late he realized a form with a boot attached to it connecting with his stomach. Another blow to the face and he rolled sideways, forcing his legs to bend and support his weight in an effort to stand. It was too late, through tears and pain he watched his car speed through the red light and off down the deserted road. He began to run , blood streaming from his ear and nose, his cheek a hamburger mash of flesh and muscle; His screaming voice bouncing off of the vacant building and slowly disappearing over the water. The volvo was later found 30 miles outside town, the car seat and the gas tank both empty.

colateral networking

She was all retro-sassy - another devotee of fashion icon history, belly shirt and one black glove. Hair propped to one side with a ribbon so that it almost obscured one of her heavily mascaraed eyes. I heard her boots thumping asphalt even before I could see someone against the fog. some kinda creaky light blew out from an old street-lamp half a block away, and it reflected like a knfie rack off those piercings. In her hand a skateboard and a brown bag, around her neck was a vintage minolta '16'. She looked like a total bad-ass, like she'd already been recovered for years; and having nothing interesting to say I asked her for a smoke. Without even making eye contact she jammed her free hand inside her baggies pocket and threw a pack at me. Camel. I fumbled and almost dropped them all out onto the ground as she kept cruising by only pausing ten feet away, raising her hand wordlessly and wigging her fingers. My throw sucked,.... too high, but she floated imperceptibly, launching from her tip toes a sharp snag, caught the pack. We stared at each other for 3 beats and then she blew me a kiss through a haze of insecure sarcasm, softening for a moment. I saw her again about a week later standing in line waiting for the free clinic to open. I was walking to work and she looked like she mighta been drilling invisible eye lasers into the sidewalk. Rounding the corner at 7th the one armed underpass guy and his smell crippled me. I safely arrived in my little computer world and spent 90 minutes researching the mars missions on google and randomly closing email accounts.

factfour: port exchange

bridging the computer intimidation gap by shattering the "delicate machine" myth.

Perhaps I lunged my way into the office and obliterated whatever current atmosphere existed.

Some maybe 10th grade students, huddled in a corner around a NEC monitor from about 12 ad. It creaked out a fuzzy, battered database image that swooned in a sparsely pixelated land working its transformer into an audible frenzy. As everyone in the room turned to see who had just blundered into the room I could feel the radiation leaking out of the screen and into the immediate atmosphere my eyes warping to polar ends of my skull.

"are you the tech guy?!!? I mean,...." trailed off as the meaning of my appearance beat the councilor senseless. Suddenly all the tenuous curriculum mandates, progress reports and IEP's might simply vanish behind that screen, never to return; possibly sending this post-retirement biddy into a permanent paxil rage.

I dismissed the crew of GPA bookies and got down to business forging an inter-personal relationship with the madam and her blackbox typewriter. I started off with the typical folksy boast: lets see if we can get this little lady to walk like an angel......... soft and strong. Luckily it was the end of the day and that gave the woman a moment to shudder and check the time, generally the more positive of the responses I get. She lifted one hand onto the opposing shoulder and hugged herself as she asked,

" please make it stop, because if it turns black one more time today there will be police booking me on adolescent manslaughter...."

I proceeded to grapple the desk and haul it's 1970' pine carcass out from the wall; there are some benefits to being a lumbering hulk. I stood in eyeshot of the back and recognized that chassis anywhere, an old compaq d530 small form factor. notorious for the shoddy effort put into the mainboard and bus. This model was issued with an incompatible graphics chipset and there was only one thing to do. I took the mouse and covered it with my hand flashing a toothy grin to my client, in seconds I had uninstalled the stock graphics driver and inserted the hardware back into the profile manually. This is sometimes known as 'pushing back' against the operating system. finishing the cleanup into the reboot I began with the CRT monitor. Com'er love I said as I just pulled the 50 pounds of glass, circuits and plastic on its side, ramming a .03 flathead into the sharpness adjustment well. I then pulled every cord out of its corresponding port, letting the loose cables dangle between my legs like a mess of whipsnakes. I pulled each cord up and with a precise firm hand joined male and female port connections to the back of the computer - letting the friction of metal contact be machined in solid unison. settling back into the wall on my heels I pulled the desk back into place and rolled the screen back into it's native position. As the image of the cheesy logo came up she audibly gasped and swallowed air. The picture had pitch now, it was not shaking or fuzzy, and the colors were sharp and modest. slowly putting her hand on the mouse she navigates to the graduation database and smiles.

"you know a mac wants to be babied,.... but PC's, you just got to show em whos boss every now and again." this was the topmost layer of the thick buttercream folksy persona, I had her, and so I just blew the moneyshot out and turned to leave; tripping over the backpacks in the hall on my way out.