I was on a date, a long time ago, with this woman. Well spoken, articulate, beautiful, a bit awkward in that way people are on dates. We went to Versailles, this cuban restaurant — it was late and it was the only place open that wasn’t fast food bullshit and she wasn’t familiar with real cuban food, so why not? — and we order and eat, and I finished before she did so I ordered coffee while she finished. The waiter came to take my plates away and mistakenly reached for hers and she snapped at him. I should have known then it was fucked, and in retrospect I can pinpoint that as the moment I Should Have Known Better. Not so much because she treated the waiter poorly, although I suppose that’s a signifier as well, but the look on her face was…I don’t know, rage. Almost a comtemptous snarl.
I don’t know why this came to mind recently; a je ne sais quoi of regret? My subconscious reminding me that I am a bad judge of people that I’m fond of? Time will tell.
edit 5/5/09; commenting disabled on this post because of spam.
One day it’ll be a choice. I don’t like it. I mean, the flexibility is nice to have — especially for something traumatic that you just want to get rid of; war, rape etc etc. But part of your job in existence is to be witness and to work through your pain and evolve yourself. And I can see this being used nefariously — and not just in a paranoid Phillip K. Dick dystopian future kind of way, either.
I had (or have? I dunno. We’re still “friends” on facebook) a friend who called me up. Let us call her Agnes. She had broken up with the love of her life because shit happened and anyway, time heals wounds etc etc and several years and a marriage later she gets an email from him out of the blue “i fucked up, you were great, if you’re still angry I don’t blame you but i just wanted to tell you i know you were great” etc. Long story short, they got back together (and are still,) and as far as I know are deliriously happy together. Which is all well and good — forgiveness is a nice thing, after all, and happiness is a bitch to find, so you gotta work for it. Except about two months into their newfound love she calls me out of the blue saying “hey how do you permanently delete files from a Mac?”. I tell her and hang up and then go “Wait. She doesn’t have a Mac.” But I know my friend, and on a hunch (I’m usually really good at these) I call back and tell her off for deleting his pictures of his ex from his computer. Quite frankly, I feel a bit used and dirty and I am Seriously Unhappy about this, so perhaps I am less than nice. She gets mad, tells me he’s backing up the pictures later (…but she’s deleting them now…? just distraction BS…) and anyway I don’t know the situation. I tell her that it’s hardly fair for her to decide what memories he gets to keep, because they’re his memories, after all. She gets mad and repeats that I do not know the circumstances, and I say she’s right, mea culpa, if I’m wrong, please forgive me. She says nevermind and it’s ok, don’t worry about it and since then we haven’t spoken. Which leads me to believe that I was right. But enough about that.
So now think of someone demanding this of you, literally of your memories. Or doing it against your will. Note that one of the reasons given for not freeing some of the Guantanamo Bay prisoners is not “they’re dangerous terrorists and we can’t let them go” but rather “they’re totally innocent but they know too much about our information extraction (viz, torture) methods to be let go”.
Here, have some sonic yoof “Nevermind (what was it anyway)”:
So I finally got around to scanning some old photos, including this one of good ol’ Randall P. Jones. The man certainly enjoyed his beanie propeller hat and could carry it with a certain panache. Need to send copies of related photos to interested parties, but Randy’s gone, so I figured what the hell.
Another year coming around. I find myself re-evaluating all the shit, good and bad, come my way. I’m doing OK, I guess. There are some causes for sadness, but overall, I can’t complain too hard, really. I enjoy my new job, and despite the death of Vic (or maybe because of?) I am learning more and doing different things, which is something I wanted when I left the old joint. Had Indian for lunch earlier with the dudes from Ye Olde Jobbe and they are in misery full-force. Which sucks. That whole environment is like a kid trying too hard; they want to be a business/enterprise instead of educational/medical — or maybe they think they should be? — and they’re just stressing the wrong things. Be a hardass about what you expect, don’t be a hardass about vanity or chain of command or other bullshit pipe dreams about how to show that the proverbial dick is bigger than the other dudes’. On the bright side, in about 5 to 10 years time, it’s going to be SUCH a premier environment (reputation-wise, for their care and tech etc…workwise, meh…too soon to say and things are too fast-moving to be able to pin down.) Relationship stuff’s worked out, really. Interpersonal drama-llama visits have been avoided. Old friends come back, Eden’s back and I will hopefully soonish find myself making some music with Bunny. I find myself thinking of Cass, wondering if she’s doing OK. My phone calls and emails to her are infrequent and I think awkward for her. I’m hoping this is why she doesn’t reply to emails. I switched back to winamp for playing music (itunes for the ipod still, but winamp is still awesomer) and the queen cover comes up at the oddest fucking moments. Still, she was awesome and that was aside from having the most amazing tits ever. Skeeter’s still pissed at me, but since she won’t answer or pick up, I just leave “wishing you the best” messages every 6 months or so. Mils is here today and gone tomorrow, back with the ex she always will have a spot for, which is kinda good, really. Sun’s comin’ from the tx, and i will be going to tx come august and maybe san fran or canada in the winter? I dunno. The old man’s gonna have multiple surgeries done at once but is putting it off until my sister gives birth, I guess in case he dies. I try not to think about it. Maybe let the vacousness of television numb it down; dr who greys anatomy dexter futurama cooking shows. Some days it’s just so much and some days you just relish in jumping into the fray, you know?
I just stumbled on a site about Set Theory Primer as it relates to music theory. Which reminds me of my favorite story about music I wrote that no one ever heard.
Bunny called me up, “hey there’s a gallery opening, we’re doing a music/performance/installation — the theme of the gallery is Summerian/Babylonian art, they’re showing some pieces etc etc”
I dig Sumer, cradle of civilization etc etc and I’ve read through Snow Crash so I know just a bit more than nothing about their language construction (atonal glosolalia? or some shit. doesn’t matter, i’m not writing poetry). So I look up Summerian music. Turns out it uses a 60-tone scale. Because I am S-M-R-T smart, I figure OK, I can make music akin to atonal 12-tone theory pieces, but I have to use 1/2 and 1/4 microtones (ie, bends and half-bends) and viola, 12-tone automagically becomes 60-tone. So I write this long droning piece in an open D tuning and because it would be a bitch to be bending whole chords (although you get some really awesome dissonances, some sonic youth/glenn branca shit going on where the notes beat against each other in the air) I go and get me a slide. So it’s like this blues hawaiian indian drone monster thing. It’s made of pure, concentrated awesome.
And then the day of the show, come to find out they go on an hour before they said they would and also that the music has been relegated to the alley behind the gallery. Which is OK, since that’s where the party people’s at anyway. Ran into solo and other people from the wayback.
in which Sterling provides an apt summary: “I consider it my personal Vietnam. If I had gone in and struck hard and fast and all in one go, none of that shit would have gone down. But because I didn’t, because I took it slow, I sabotaged myself. And I think it was because [removed].” “…So you consider it all your fault?” “Yes.” “And none of it would have happened and [removed] would still be friends with [removed].” “That’s what I’m saying.” “Wow, that’s a lot of guilt.”
in which Laura considers the possibility that there may be a better way to handle situations Laura: so, he is right. we do need more time. though i think he went about it totally wrong. but, i do realize he doesnt have the emotional capability/tact that i hhave (erm, maybe i dont always hav tact) David: like when you laughed at [laura's ex-boyfriend]‘s naked erection? Laura: yes David: some people might say that was …. less than fully tactful
in which Little Trouble Girl summarizes her complex love life: “So I’m going to see my husband in the hospital, but I stopped by to have lunch with my boyfriend — that I’m not having sex with because he’s married — to tell him about how I didn’t get laid last night with my coworker/crush because he couldn’t get it hard despite a long blowjob and to complain about how my fuckbuddy just left for [unnamed country] which is good because we might be developing feelings for each other. Which would be bad.”
in which i make an ass of myself at a party: “dude i was in college when you were still sucking your momma’s dick!” “you know my mom’s dead, right?”
title courtesy of The Bird and The Bee’s “fucking boyfriend”, which song was what was playing on the CD that I gave Little Trouble Girl after her romantic misadventure with her puppy-love/co-worker person thing when she was driving to work and ran into (figuratively) said puppy-love/coworker. Like some shit out of a John Hughes movie or something.
speaking to squirt yesterday she drops “you know the reason i never liked you romantically 12 years ago when we met was because when i asked what you looked like you were so negative that it killed it”. i cock-blocked myself. I bummed about this on several levels.
got mail from skeeter’s man that her kid (#2) had been born, with attendant pictures. They both look glowingly happy, her in particular but that might be a mix between relief and happy and tiredness. The amusing thing is on friday I wanted to call her and in fact got as far as dialing but she’s still mad at me (justafiably, i’m a sellout although i take issue with her iron-gripped resentimiento, i’m guilty of the same thing so i can’t really complain about that too hard.) and probably would not have answered but I never got to follow up and call again. Too much of that is annoying, especially when someone is pointedly not answering. But WWu mails occasionally, and I hear things on the grapevine de rato en rato so I guess it’s ok.
It’s hardly news that I am horrible about checking my messages. So yesterday I finally check my voicemail at work — I haven’t checked it since December, easily. There’s a familiar number but I can’t place it. Victor, telling me to fix the fucking LDAP lookups about two weeks before he died.
played at the thing at soya and pomawhatever on 1st and 1st NE. it was rockin’. or more ambient. whatever. it was fun; nestor tweaked what i played live and bunny dropped live video. the crafty witch showed up looking good enough to eat, nicole also looking gorgeous and i think i ticked the lovely emily off yet again. got to play the fat tele live tho. swa-eet. i think i’m going to call that augmented chord shape song (xx231x) “i hope you die in a fire in the gaping maw of your cunt”. really it’s just an excuse to use the phrase gaping maw.
So I come in to the restaurant and sit down and say “Hey! Sorry I’m late, your tits look great!” To which she says: “They should, I’m pregnant.”
She had broken up with her boyfriend recently, just…differences, you know? and the short version is that one time a month ago they fucked up, and now my friend is getting an abortion, and is horrified and guilty and I feel sorrow for her. It’s the right choice for her, and it’s excruciating bordering on the unbearable for her to choose this.
I’ve had other people in my life who had them — a high school friend during my Christian phase who was afraid to tell me because she thought I would take it poorly, another was someone I drove ~400 miles to see because of it1,2 (and she’d gotten another one I wasn’t supposed to know about, but we never spoke of it obviously) and then another who drunk on her birthday while talking about a mutual friend having a baby just dropped it in conversation matter-of-factly (in front of her current husband) about how she’d had one when 18. It’s heart-wrenching, it really is. Necessary and liberating in a way, and in many cases, it’s the only way that makes any sense. But still.
1 If you’re still reading: you know who you are. Are you still reading? I wonder sometimes. I stopped trying to check; I figure if you can’t tell me, you just can’t. 2 Technically, I went to cheer her up because of heartbreak. The Legendary Pink Dots’ song “Home” reminds me of this period, and I cannot listen to it more than once or twice a year (which sucks because it’s on my favorite LPD album, “The Maria Dimension”), because listening to it instantly brings me back to waking up slowly with the light, dim in the morning and the traffic slowly waking up and my back stiff from the mattress on the floor, the cat freaked out.
John Dies At The End is a) going to be made into A FUCKING MOVIE (a1 is THERE’S A BOOK! ON AMAZON! WHICH I HAVE ORDERED ALREADY!) and b) there’s a sequel!
“This here is Molly. She was a good dog. And when I say ‘good dog’ I don’t mean it the way other people mean it, when they’re talking about a dog that never shit on the floor or bit their kids. No, I’m talking about a dog that died saving Amy’s life. By my rough count, that’s half a dozen times Molly saved one of our lives. How many dogs can say that? Hell, how many people can say that? One time, Dave was in a burning building, and Molly here rescued him by getting behind the wheel of his car and driving into the building. You know that couldn’t have been easy for her.
Anyhow, Molly died, in the way that all really good things die, fast and brutal and for no apparent reason. They say that even though it often appears that God just really, really doesn’t give a shit about what happens here, that that’s just an illusion and that He really does care after all, and that it’s all part of his great plan to make it appear that He doesn’t give a shit. Though what fucking point that serves I can’t possibly imagine. I think God probably just wanted Molly for Himself, and I guess I can’t blame Him.
So, here you go, God. Here’s your dog back, I guess. We hereby commit Molly to doggy heaven, which is probably nicer than regular heaven, if you think about it. Amen.”
ninjedit: while I was bummed out that Molly died in the sequel, I have hopes that Wong will bring her back in some non-evil and horrible way. I discovered JDatE during the aftermath of Hurricane Wilma and I read it on my fucking blackberry, which was the only internet-connected device I had (because I could charge it in the car).
