The Vampire Movie genre is a funny thing: it's much older than the zombie movie genre, but has none of it's cohesion or consistent formal conventions. Nosferatu, of course, is a classic: Murnau's vampire was inhuman, loaded with metaphorical value while staying essentially creepy. By all indications, the vampire would be the gold standard of fear in cinema. But from the moment Bela Lugosi stuck a pair of (I assume) funny-smelling plastic fangs in his mouth, the genre was doomed to a future of campy jokes, silly accents and affectations, and really bad wardrobe. You might be thinking that I'm referring to the extremely gay Interview with a Vampire (and I don't say that derisively; the movie is laden with homosexual subtext and, well, text), and I am, but I'm also thinking of the Blade and Underworld Movies, which basically cranked out clumsy vampires by the barrel and cut through them like Chuck Norris cuts through gangs of ninjas. Some films, like Larry Fesenden's Habit, were well-done, but they got caught up in the sexual aspect of vampirism. There's no doubt in my mind that Bram Stoker's Dracula is an extended sexual metaphor, among other things, and I'm certain that the oft-maligned Fessenden was paying tribute to the B-movies of yore like Daughters of Darkness. I'm not going to lie: I love a sexy movie as much as the next guy, but turning a vampire into an object of sexual desire (or mirthful escapades as the case may be) is in direct conflict with it's sense of menace, it's inhumanness, it's pall of fear. Me? I want blood.
I have no idea why the vampire was defanged in this way, but 30 Days of Night set out to undo all the damage done over the last several years. The film is set in the northernmost town in Alaska, during the part of the year when there are literally 30 calendar days of perpetual night. A group of vampires cut off the town's communication and go on a month-long feeding frenzy. Without commenting overmuch on the premise, it's quite refreshing to have one that doesn't involve vampire race wars and the Ultimate Fate of vampire-kind. This is a small town and a small faction of vampires intent on nothing more than sucking all the blood they can.
The protagonist, Sheriff Eben Oleson, is also a key to the threat posed by the vampires. Although he is generally a quick-thinking, capable man, he is far from being the super-cool Blade or Selene, who slay enemies by the dozen with a dry quip and a dry brow. Oleson is not a badass hero, but a protector who is barely able to protect a small group of survivors, let alone a whole town. He great under pressure, but the pressure is so great that at moments he appears to be on the verge of cracking.
But who wouldn't? These vampires are menacing, the way vampires should be. If a porcelain Tom Cruise wearing a puffy pirate shirt accosted me, I'm sure that I would die... laughing. The vampires in 30 Days are not the foppish aristocrats of the night we've become accustomed to, nor are they the leather-clad glorified red-shirts that Wesley Snipes eats for breakfast: they are monsters in men's clothing, razor-fanged, crazy-eyed, blood-soaked beasts with contorted alabaster faces. Everything about them says fear, from their normal-yet-slightly-stressed attire to their gutteral vampire language. The wonderful thing about them is not that it's a unique re-envisioning of the vampire, but a return the core foul thing that predates all cinema. They are part of no underground cabal or society just beyond the scope of human eyes, just a pack of dangerous, hungry scavengers with nothing more in mind than tearing out a throat or two.
All told, the movie is generally unspectacular, but likable nonetheless. It dusted off a few tricks from the horror movie playbook and filled in the blanks with great makeup, good but scant gore effects, and a hasty tacked-on romantic angle. That said, I would watch this movie again and possibly buy the DVD. I like gore effects, great makeup, and the horror movie playbook. I would go so far as to say that I'm skeptical of films that think they can improve on it. Even though this is a perfectly likable little movie in the grand scheme of things, in the here and now, it's a wonderful treat for those of us who have been waiting for a vampire movie with scary vampires in it.
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Monday, September 10, 2007
Freewrite
Ok, no long exposition. Freewrite time: ready, set, go:
"Guillaume! Guillaume! Where is that boy? I swear he's always getting into one thing or another! Guillaume!"
Guillaume was not in his room. He was not anywhere around the mounds of crunchy fresh snow in the backyard, nor in the surrounding woods. He had not climbed over the rickety rusted chickenwire fences erected decades ago by the grandparents of his neighbors. He had not wandered down the gentle slope of the hill he lived on, nor up the equally mild incline of the next hill. He had not traced the path of the semi-frozen rivulets of melted snow, nor was he at any the various puddles and undisturbed basins where the water collected.
"Francois!"
"Yes mother?"
"Where is your brother? Where is Guillaume?"
Francois's heart strained to tell his mother again. Instead he wordlessly poured her a fresh cup of Earl Grey and adjusted her blanket. He was unsure whether the tea service was older than the dozens of porcelain dolls in oak cases lining the room; they had always been there.
"Mother, would you prefer to take your tea in the living room? It's almost time for those judge programs on TV that you love so well."
"I would prefer if you would find your brother and bring him here, you lackwit!"
The last time Francois had heard that word was long ago; he and Guillaume had clambered across the slippery rocks of the creek across town and into a cave that reputedly had been a pirate's hideout. Mainly they found dozens of beercans and a powerful stench of urine. Convinced they would find some manner of booty, Guillaume dragged Francois through the deeper chambers of the cave. The croaking of the native frogs was amplified several times over, creating a monstrous omnipresent rumble. It was this that distracted Francois long enough to keep him from immediately noticing the wails of pain from his brother. He had fallen and sprained his ankle, which, at the time, seemed life threatening.
Note... okay, this is good stuff... I think I need to switch into real writing mode.. I'll let you know when it's done.
"Guillaume! Guillaume! Where is that boy? I swear he's always getting into one thing or another! Guillaume!"
Guillaume was not in his room. He was not anywhere around the mounds of crunchy fresh snow in the backyard, nor in the surrounding woods. He had not climbed over the rickety rusted chickenwire fences erected decades ago by the grandparents of his neighbors. He had not wandered down the gentle slope of the hill he lived on, nor up the equally mild incline of the next hill. He had not traced the path of the semi-frozen rivulets of melted snow, nor was he at any the various puddles and undisturbed basins where the water collected.
"Francois!"
"Yes mother?"
"Where is your brother? Where is Guillaume?"
Francois's heart strained to tell his mother again. Instead he wordlessly poured her a fresh cup of Earl Grey and adjusted her blanket. He was unsure whether the tea service was older than the dozens of porcelain dolls in oak cases lining the room; they had always been there.
"Mother, would you prefer to take your tea in the living room? It's almost time for those judge programs on TV that you love so well."
"I would prefer if you would find your brother and bring him here, you lackwit!"
The last time Francois had heard that word was long ago; he and Guillaume had clambered across the slippery rocks of the creek across town and into a cave that reputedly had been a pirate's hideout. Mainly they found dozens of beercans and a powerful stench of urine. Convinced they would find some manner of booty, Guillaume dragged Francois through the deeper chambers of the cave. The croaking of the native frogs was amplified several times over, creating a monstrous omnipresent rumble. It was this that distracted Francois long enough to keep him from immediately noticing the wails of pain from his brother. He had fallen and sprained his ankle, which, at the time, seemed life threatening.
Note... okay, this is good stuff... I think I need to switch into real writing mode.. I'll let you know when it's done.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Friday's Link of Wonderfulness vol. 1
Since I'm a professional web surfer (I work at Mahalo.com), I thought I'd begin favoring you with a weekly weird link chock full of wonderfulness (in addition to my well-known love of nautically themed melancholia, I'm also a big fan of strange things and portmanteaux).
This week: The Parasite Pals!
Have you ever felt lonely? Upset that even though you get to see your friends on occasion, they eventually have to go home and leave you? Well, if they lived inside you, they'd never leave! Joy!
This is the central idea behind the Parasite Pals. They're basically cute, Sanrio-style drawings and flash animations of disgusting organisms that feed off of your blood and inward meats. My favorite is this happy fellow, Tickles the Tapeworm:
Aw, the stomach is sad! :(
No reason you should be, though!
Happy weekend and labor day, y'all!
This week: The Parasite Pals!
Have you ever felt lonely? Upset that even though you get to see your friends on occasion, they eventually have to go home and leave you? Well, if they lived inside you, they'd never leave! Joy!
This is the central idea behind the Parasite Pals. They're basically cute, Sanrio-style drawings and flash animations of disgusting organisms that feed off of your blood and inward meats. My favorite is this happy fellow, Tickles the Tapeworm:
Aw, the stomach is sad! :(
No reason you should be, though!
Happy weekend and labor day, y'all!
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Happy Babies and Angry Old Men
So yesterday my buscapades continued. As I was only my way to work, I noticed one old man getting kind of annoyed. He was one of those old guys who can't really stand up straight and needs a cane. I think he was upset because another old man was standing too close. I could here that they were talking to each other, but I couldn't make out what they were saying until this little gem from the one with the cane:
"Get away from me! Are you a faggot or something?"
He said it in Spanish, but that sounds even more abrasive.
They continued bickering for few seconds, then both got off at the next stop. The bus idled there for a few moments, and the whole load of commuters rushed to the right side of the bus to watch their continuing and escalating beef. The one with the cane was now wielding it as a weapon.
"Pinche Viejillos!" exclaimed one bus patron with a laugh. It means, roughly, "fucking little old men!" Perhaps I'm a little too sensitive, but it was too early in the morning for hostility and madness and callousness. I needed a book of Bukowski poems and a belt of whiskey, stat.
As the bus pulled away and relegated their rivalry to my memory, I felt a profound disgust for life itself. I can't take you through my thought process, because it was somewhat hazy to me: all I know is that something about these bitter old bastards, full of piss and vinegar, hanging on to their pride and preserving their last ragged breaths like a bag of jewels seemed utterly, utterly pointless.
But that was yesterday.
Today I've been listening to a song called "Intelligentactile 101" by a young lady named Jesca Hoop. A lot. It's nice.
As far as I can tell, the song is sung from the perspective of a fetus in her mother's womb. It mainly discusses her plans after she's born, like sucking her mom's fingers and other important things.
You know something? I love songs about being born. This one in particular is especially jubilant, rocking from side to side and laughing like a toddler with a set of colorful plastic novelty keys.
Dont' get me wrong: I don't want to be a baby again. I'm not pining for my childhood as a reaction to the unpleasant portent the two old men formed. All the same, the themes raised by this song are just really cheerful. I like the idea of just enjoying life, of seeing it through a fresh lens. That, I think, is the key: I've always though that life must inevitably become more complicated. Every moment we live adds a new dimension of context, a new aspect of complication that seems unimportant in the moment it occurs, but eventually breaks our backs with it's sheer weight as more and more of these moments accumulate.
If we didn't change, this would be completely true. But even though reality is a dynamic and ever-changing system, so is a human being. The concept of growing or acquiring greater strength to carry greater weight seems remarkably short-sighted as I think. Did not these mighty A.M. gladiators value their strength, their capable-ness, their identity as manly men without need of others to defend them? That way doesn't seem right to me. No, the answer isn't in addition, it's in subtraction.
Maybe I should explain this cosmology a bit more thoroughly before I engage this concept. Let's start with another old man: Heraclitus. Notable idea:
This world-order [kosmos], the same of all, no god nor man did create, but it ever was and is and will be: everliving fire, kindling in measures and being quenched in measures.
This is essentially the concept of Universal Flux. It means that the universe is always changing. Kant was probably aware of this when he came up with his idea that the "real" universe is pretty much unknowable, because our perceived universe is always several steps behind the shiftless actual fabric of reality.
While all of this is a bit dizzying and maybe a little depressing, it's important to remember that a human being is not just a hunk of matter or a simple animal: we're much more than creatures, much more amazing than even the greatest and most majestic of reality's constructs. We're in and of this universal fabric, but we don't have to act like the rest of it. The sun, for all it's brilliance and power, must follow it's appointed trajectory. It must burn and burn until it has nothing left to burn. Sad.
But us? People? Do we have to keep all the residue and space dust that accrues on our happless, possibly hatless heads? Hell no! We can take showers! We invented shampoo! And this is not limited to detritus from the nether-corners of existence: this concept can also be applied to the ponderous context that collects over our lives. Just as every moment forces a new dimension of context for us to carry, we can perform an act of perceptual judo and be reborn. How? By understanding that the person you were just moments ago is not the person you are now. You've aged a bit, some things that seemed true then probably seem the tiniest bit less true or more true now, and just like a baby's rapidly changing synapses, your mind has made and severed thousands of connections. The point? You're a new person! That other person? Gone. Now there's you, and no one has ever met you before, and though that other guy has eaten all kinds of shit, you have never even had the pleasure of tasting chocolate.
The wonderful thing is that it's not limited to once a year or once a day or just whenever an epiphany decides to wander in: we can do this every minute, every second, every discrete unit of time we have in our whole lives! The only thing we have do is remember.
Maybe this is sounding very Catholic of me: a sort of modified penance to achieve absolution. This has nothing to do, though, with being in the good graces of the Universal powers that be. It has everything to do with the perception you have of yourself. You have to remember that existence is any incredibly complex dynamic system, and as small spinning convection cells in this system, we're in a perpetual state of flux too. If our perception of the whole system is always a few steps behind the system itself, why should our perception of ourselves be any more caught up? We are reformed and recreated every moment, so why not embrace contextual babyhood? It sure beats the alternative.
Man, I can't wait to know what chocolate will taste like to my tomorrow-tongue.
"Get away from me! Are you a faggot or something?"
He said it in Spanish, but that sounds even more abrasive.
They continued bickering for few seconds, then both got off at the next stop. The bus idled there for a few moments, and the whole load of commuters rushed to the right side of the bus to watch their continuing and escalating beef. The one with the cane was now wielding it as a weapon.
"Pinche Viejillos!" exclaimed one bus patron with a laugh. It means, roughly, "fucking little old men!" Perhaps I'm a little too sensitive, but it was too early in the morning for hostility and madness and callousness. I needed a book of Bukowski poems and a belt of whiskey, stat.
As the bus pulled away and relegated their rivalry to my memory, I felt a profound disgust for life itself. I can't take you through my thought process, because it was somewhat hazy to me: all I know is that something about these bitter old bastards, full of piss and vinegar, hanging on to their pride and preserving their last ragged breaths like a bag of jewels seemed utterly, utterly pointless.
But that was yesterday.
Today I've been listening to a song called "Intelligentactile 101" by a young lady named Jesca Hoop. A lot. It's nice.
As far as I can tell, the song is sung from the perspective of a fetus in her mother's womb. It mainly discusses her plans after she's born, like sucking her mom's fingers and other important things.
You know something? I love songs about being born. This one in particular is especially jubilant, rocking from side to side and laughing like a toddler with a set of colorful plastic novelty keys.
Dont' get me wrong: I don't want to be a baby again. I'm not pining for my childhood as a reaction to the unpleasant portent the two old men formed. All the same, the themes raised by this song are just really cheerful. I like the idea of just enjoying life, of seeing it through a fresh lens. That, I think, is the key: I've always though that life must inevitably become more complicated. Every moment we live adds a new dimension of context, a new aspect of complication that seems unimportant in the moment it occurs, but eventually breaks our backs with it's sheer weight as more and more of these moments accumulate.
If we didn't change, this would be completely true. But even though reality is a dynamic and ever-changing system, so is a human being. The concept of growing or acquiring greater strength to carry greater weight seems remarkably short-sighted as I think. Did not these mighty A.M. gladiators value their strength, their capable-ness, their identity as manly men without need of others to defend them? That way doesn't seem right to me. No, the answer isn't in addition, it's in subtraction.
Maybe I should explain this cosmology a bit more thoroughly before I engage this concept. Let's start with another old man: Heraclitus. Notable idea:
This world-order [kosmos], the same of all, no god nor man did create, but it ever was and is and will be: everliving fire, kindling in measures and being quenched in measures.
This is essentially the concept of Universal Flux. It means that the universe is always changing. Kant was probably aware of this when he came up with his idea that the "real" universe is pretty much unknowable, because our perceived universe is always several steps behind the shiftless actual fabric of reality.
While all of this is a bit dizzying and maybe a little depressing, it's important to remember that a human being is not just a hunk of matter or a simple animal: we're much more than creatures, much more amazing than even the greatest and most majestic of reality's constructs. We're in and of this universal fabric, but we don't have to act like the rest of it. The sun, for all it's brilliance and power, must follow it's appointed trajectory. It must burn and burn until it has nothing left to burn. Sad.
But us? People? Do we have to keep all the residue and space dust that accrues on our happless, possibly hatless heads? Hell no! We can take showers! We invented shampoo! And this is not limited to detritus from the nether-corners of existence: this concept can also be applied to the ponderous context that collects over our lives. Just as every moment forces a new dimension of context for us to carry, we can perform an act of perceptual judo and be reborn. How? By understanding that the person you were just moments ago is not the person you are now. You've aged a bit, some things that seemed true then probably seem the tiniest bit less true or more true now, and just like a baby's rapidly changing synapses, your mind has made and severed thousands of connections. The point? You're a new person! That other person? Gone. Now there's you, and no one has ever met you before, and though that other guy has eaten all kinds of shit, you have never even had the pleasure of tasting chocolate.
The wonderful thing is that it's not limited to once a year or once a day or just whenever an epiphany decides to wander in: we can do this every minute, every second, every discrete unit of time we have in our whole lives! The only thing we have do is remember.
Maybe this is sounding very Catholic of me: a sort of modified penance to achieve absolution. This has nothing to do, though, with being in the good graces of the Universal powers that be. It has everything to do with the perception you have of yourself. You have to remember that existence is any incredibly complex dynamic system, and as small spinning convection cells in this system, we're in a perpetual state of flux too. If our perception of the whole system is always a few steps behind the system itself, why should our perception of ourselves be any more caught up? We are reformed and recreated every moment, so why not embrace contextual babyhood? It sure beats the alternative.
Man, I can't wait to know what chocolate will taste like to my tomorrow-tongue.
Monday, August 27, 2007
The Wheels on the Bus
My car is broken at the moment, so I had to ride the bus home from work today. It made me remember a few things I already knew:
1) People who ride the bus are by and large decent, but there's always one jerk in the bunch. For the most part they're fine people: quiet, minding their own business, generally absorbed in their own affairs, iPods, newspapers, or conversations with the other people living inside their skulls. Still, there always has to be one person who wants to be the center of attention. Some kid I saw today was tripping old people as they walked by. When one lady said something to him, he lost his cool. It was a rather pathetic spectacle.
2) Bus drivers are generally not the most polite or intelligent people in the world. I think the last time I rode a bus was about a year ago. At that time, I stepped onto a bus that was apparently ending it's run. I was about to ask the bus driver a question when she made a shooing motion with her hand and commanded "Off my bus." As I tried to interject that I only had one simple question, she reiterated her order. I tried to mention that that is not the most polite thing to do for a person in a public service profession, or at least to affirm that I hadn't been rude to her, but if I hadn't stepped off as quickly as I did I might have lost my nose to the slamming bus door. This was at a terminal, so of course, the bus I wanted was hers. She parked the bus for awhile and rolled it to the opposite end of the station. She saw me running to catch it, slowed down, realized I was the guy who had questioned her politeness, and proved me right by slamming the door a second time and peeling out.
Today it was something much more simple. I was sort of lost and confused after getting off at the wrong stop, so I walked up to a bus that wasn't mine and asked the guy a question:
"Does the number 68 stop here?"
My question was answered with another question.
"Do you see a sign that says 68?"
"Well, no, but that's why I'm asking you." I briefly considered adding "because you are a professional coach conductor while I am a barely literate rube who has no right to trouble you with his problems" but decided against it.
The point, I think, is that you should never ask a bus driver questions. Burdening them with your ignorance is a cardinal sin in BusDriverLandia. Do what I did instead: carry your ignorance as you walk home. Let it distract you from the various marginalized people you run into on that walk, and the smell of sewage wafting up from the street. Then go get your car fixed, for fuck's sake.
1) People who ride the bus are by and large decent, but there's always one jerk in the bunch. For the most part they're fine people: quiet, minding their own business, generally absorbed in their own affairs, iPods, newspapers, or conversations with the other people living inside their skulls. Still, there always has to be one person who wants to be the center of attention. Some kid I saw today was tripping old people as they walked by. When one lady said something to him, he lost his cool. It was a rather pathetic spectacle.
2) Bus drivers are generally not the most polite or intelligent people in the world. I think the last time I rode a bus was about a year ago. At that time, I stepped onto a bus that was apparently ending it's run. I was about to ask the bus driver a question when she made a shooing motion with her hand and commanded "Off my bus." As I tried to interject that I only had one simple question, she reiterated her order. I tried to mention that that is not the most polite thing to do for a person in a public service profession, or at least to affirm that I hadn't been rude to her, but if I hadn't stepped off as quickly as I did I might have lost my nose to the slamming bus door. This was at a terminal, so of course, the bus I wanted was hers. She parked the bus for awhile and rolled it to the opposite end of the station. She saw me running to catch it, slowed down, realized I was the guy who had questioned her politeness, and proved me right by slamming the door a second time and peeling out.
Today it was something much more simple. I was sort of lost and confused after getting off at the wrong stop, so I walked up to a bus that wasn't mine and asked the guy a question:
"Does the number 68 stop here?"
My question was answered with another question.
"Do you see a sign that says 68?"
"Well, no, but that's why I'm asking you." I briefly considered adding "because you are a professional coach conductor while I am a barely literate rube who has no right to trouble you with his problems" but decided against it.
The point, I think, is that you should never ask a bus driver questions. Burdening them with your ignorance is a cardinal sin in BusDriverLandia. Do what I did instead: carry your ignorance as you walk home. Let it distract you from the various marginalized people you run into on that walk, and the smell of sewage wafting up from the street. Then go get your car fixed, for fuck's sake.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Public Affection Announcement
Hey stranger. You. reading this. There's a fair chance I've never met you.
I just wanted to tell you I love you. Not because Jesus says I should. Not because you were nice to me. Not because I think you might be nice to me in the future. Possibly because of a chemical imbalance, I'm not sure. Either way. I love you.
Don't look at me like I'm crazy. I'm not. I'm also not drunk or high or suffering from a concussion. It's a little sad, as I think, that I'd have to be crazy by your estimation for feeling this way. But I know you're a decent person.
Just accept it. Neither of us can stop it, so let's not fight it. I don't want anything from you, I just want you to know that someone loves you. And again, it's not Jesus: he's make-believe.
I just wanted to tell you I love you. Not because Jesus says I should. Not because you were nice to me. Not because I think you might be nice to me in the future. Possibly because of a chemical imbalance, I'm not sure. Either way. I love you.
Don't look at me like I'm crazy. I'm not. I'm also not drunk or high or suffering from a concussion. It's a little sad, as I think, that I'd have to be crazy by your estimation for feeling this way. But I know you're a decent person.
Just accept it. Neither of us can stop it, so let's not fight it. I don't want anything from you, I just want you to know that someone loves you. And again, it's not Jesus: he's make-believe.
Monday, August 20, 2007
Things that May or May Not Have Happened to Me
1. I was born.
2. When I was three years old, i had one pair of cowboy boots, which is one more than I have today. however, I also had much less control over my bowels, which led to having a pair of cowboy boots chock full of shit.
3. When I was a very young child, my cousin (also a very young child then) lived a few doors down from a slightly older kid who, according to rumor, was a ninja. In those days, it was so obvious that he was a ninja: he had real ninja stars, a real ninja sword, and the full ninja outfit. One day, we were supposed to go to his house for our first day of ninja training. Training consisted of him shooting arrows at us while we attempted to run past them. Somehow, we both survived our first day of ninjutsu training.
4. At the age of 8, I once gave a speech at a local college. Then I puked on my principal's shoes.
5. At age 12, I spied my teacher's dangling armfat, and before I even knew it, I had jiggled the armfat. She was not amused, bt some of the other kids were.
6. I didn't have a 13th year of life.
7. I had a highly sadistic high school PE teacher. he forced us to do hundreds of pushups, once in the rain in our swimtrunks next to the heated pool. He let us jump in for a few seconds only to force us to get out again and do more pushups.
This other time skipped our physical education to embrace a more spiritual one: he read to us from the bible.
8. As a teenager, I played a lot of hackey sack. I would play in the front yard of my family's house when it was cool enough. I don't think I was that good at it, but definitely got into it and worked up a sweat.
One evening at around 6, the sun was beginning to set. It was August. I start as I always did, fresh, ready try to top my personal best of something like 90 consecutive kicks. it wasn't long before I had hkciked the sack into a tree.
Maybe I was feeling cocky because it had been so easy to clamber up the branches and pluck the hackeysack like a piece of fruit. I wasn't going down too fast, but just was nearing the bottom, one of the branches I was holding onto snapped. I went plunging down and landed hard on my tail bone.
Pain shot up my back and throbbed throughout the rest of my body. I writhed around on the ground, instinctively holding my back as I rolled on the grass.
I was vaguely aware that one of my neighbors had been standing there the whole time. At first he ignored me, but soon he started watching me. The guy was a jerk most of the time, but this time he just watched me while i was lying on the ground in pain. It pissed me off, but I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of wailing out in pain. After a few minutes of this he finally decided to say something.
"You ok?"
Motherfucker. I stood up straight and gritted my teeth.
"I'm fine."
I calmly walked back into my house and into my room, where I resumed writhing.
9. I used to live in a building with underground parking. The parking was gated, and though there was access to the underground parking through the building, the front doors were perpetually locked. One night I had been out with some friends and got in at around three in the morning. I parked in my spot and got out of the car; i could hear what sounded like a soft stream of water echoing through the garage, and at first I couldn't tell from which direction it originated. I got my cue before I was able to find it for myself.
"Its okay, homes."
I couldn't make out the words as they were being said, exactly: they were a little too thickly intoned, a little too distorted by the labored rasp of breath that pushed them out. But as I asked "Excuse me?" I made the connection.
"It's okay. I'm washing the car."
It's important to mention that I had had my back to him when he first spoke, so that when I was facing him, I saw that he was standing between two cars parked in the row across from the row where I had parked. One of the cars, a mid size SUV, was sort of blocking my view of his lower half. Not that I hadn't figured out by now that he was pissing on the car, I just couldn't see it, and had no real desire to. Something to keep him over there, on the double:
"Cool, man. My car's all set, so... you know..."
Nice job. But my friend seemed to agree. He laughed a laugh laced with bronchitis, mummbled a soup of words as he shook his head. I could still hear him pissing.
I didn't really want to leave my car with this guy running around. How the hell did he get in in the first place? It was time for some decisive action.
"Hey man, when you're done over there, I got five bucks for you. Why don't you go get yourself a sandwich?" I figured if could give him enough cash, he'd want to go spend it that second. I'm not sure that's what he had in mind, but he finished up, walked over, and took the money without incident. As he was leaving he said one more thing:
"Thanks man. Godbless. Hey, I'll be back to wash your car tomorrow night, alright?"
"What? No!" Again as he left, I could hear that wheezy laugh. I never saw him again, but I parked out in the street at least two blocks away for a week.
10. Once I sawr a blimp.
2. When I was three years old, i had one pair of cowboy boots, which is one more than I have today. however, I also had much less control over my bowels, which led to having a pair of cowboy boots chock full of shit.
3. When I was a very young child, my cousin (also a very young child then) lived a few doors down from a slightly older kid who, according to rumor, was a ninja. In those days, it was so obvious that he was a ninja: he had real ninja stars, a real ninja sword, and the full ninja outfit. One day, we were supposed to go to his house for our first day of ninja training. Training consisted of him shooting arrows at us while we attempted to run past them. Somehow, we both survived our first day of ninjutsu training.
4. At the age of 8, I once gave a speech at a local college. Then I puked on my principal's shoes.
5. At age 12, I spied my teacher's dangling armfat, and before I even knew it, I had jiggled the armfat. She was not amused, bt some of the other kids were.
6. I didn't have a 13th year of life.
7. I had a highly sadistic high school PE teacher. he forced us to do hundreds of pushups, once in the rain in our swimtrunks next to the heated pool. He let us jump in for a few seconds only to force us to get out again and do more pushups.
This other time skipped our physical education to embrace a more spiritual one: he read to us from the bible.
8. As a teenager, I played a lot of hackey sack. I would play in the front yard of my family's house when it was cool enough. I don't think I was that good at it, but definitely got into it and worked up a sweat.
One evening at around 6, the sun was beginning to set. It was August. I start as I always did, fresh, ready try to top my personal best of something like 90 consecutive kicks. it wasn't long before I had hkciked the sack into a tree.
Maybe I was feeling cocky because it had been so easy to clamber up the branches and pluck the hackeysack like a piece of fruit. I wasn't going down too fast, but just was nearing the bottom, one of the branches I was holding onto snapped. I went plunging down and landed hard on my tail bone.
Pain shot up my back and throbbed throughout the rest of my body. I writhed around on the ground, instinctively holding my back as I rolled on the grass.
I was vaguely aware that one of my neighbors had been standing there the whole time. At first he ignored me, but soon he started watching me. The guy was a jerk most of the time, but this time he just watched me while i was lying on the ground in pain. It pissed me off, but I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of wailing out in pain. After a few minutes of this he finally decided to say something.
"You ok?"
Motherfucker. I stood up straight and gritted my teeth.
"I'm fine."
I calmly walked back into my house and into my room, where I resumed writhing.
9. I used to live in a building with underground parking. The parking was gated, and though there was access to the underground parking through the building, the front doors were perpetually locked. One night I had been out with some friends and got in at around three in the morning. I parked in my spot and got out of the car; i could hear what sounded like a soft stream of water echoing through the garage, and at first I couldn't tell from which direction it originated. I got my cue before I was able to find it for myself.
"Its okay, homes."
I couldn't make out the words as they were being said, exactly: they were a little too thickly intoned, a little too distorted by the labored rasp of breath that pushed them out. But as I asked "Excuse me?" I made the connection.
"It's okay. I'm washing the car."
It's important to mention that I had had my back to him when he first spoke, so that when I was facing him, I saw that he was standing between two cars parked in the row across from the row where I had parked. One of the cars, a mid size SUV, was sort of blocking my view of his lower half. Not that I hadn't figured out by now that he was pissing on the car, I just couldn't see it, and had no real desire to. Something to keep him over there, on the double:
"Cool, man. My car's all set, so... you know..."
Nice job. But my friend seemed to agree. He laughed a laugh laced with bronchitis, mummbled a soup of words as he shook his head. I could still hear him pissing.
I didn't really want to leave my car with this guy running around. How the hell did he get in in the first place? It was time for some decisive action.
"Hey man, when you're done over there, I got five bucks for you. Why don't you go get yourself a sandwich?" I figured if could give him enough cash, he'd want to go spend it that second. I'm not sure that's what he had in mind, but he finished up, walked over, and took the money without incident. As he was leaving he said one more thing:
"Thanks man. Godbless. Hey, I'll be back to wash your car tomorrow night, alright?"
"What? No!" Again as he left, I could hear that wheezy laugh. I never saw him again, but I parked out in the street at least two blocks away for a week.
10. Once I sawr a blimp.
Out of Mayonaisse
Oh crap. My friend Nelson of Asymmetric recently posted a comment regarding confessional blogs and condiments. Curiously portentous, Nelson, because I've been up late working on something, and when I got up to make a sandwich, I noticed that I was indeed out of mayo. Sadness.
And weirdness. I'm wondering whether Nelson has precognitive abilities, and if so, whether they are limited to foodstuffs. If so, I'm really curious to know what's for lunch tomorrow.
And weirdness. I'm wondering whether Nelson has precognitive abilities, and if so, whether they are limited to foodstuffs. If so, I'm really curious to know what's for lunch tomorrow.
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Announcements at Dawn
Sometimes life feels like an endless stream of announcements and proclamations, but I suppose we'd be quiet all the time if it weren't this way. Right? Well, I suppose there are questions and answers, but um... shut up. I'm about to make an announcement.
I tried to blog here many moons ago (see posts labeled "old"), but found it too difficult. It's not that I mind that no one is reading this, but I somehow managed to get on some kind of list, and Epistles was drowned in a deluge of spam for dear hunting supplies. On top of hating spam, I'm not totally keen on the idea of sport-killings. My frail constitution couldn't take it, and I waded out of the blogging kiddie-pool.
But I'm happy to announce that I'm back! Thank you. Thank you. You are too kind. Please sit down. There will be a slight shift in focus: frankly, the confessional blog is something I've been moving away from of late. If you don't know where to find my public diaries, I'm certainly not going to tell you now. What I can tell you is that I will try to achieve a semi-daily frequency of posting, and the laborious, slightly antiquated prose-style to which you have become accustomed shall remain in place. I am still as interested as ever in exploring the line between forlorn and cantankerous, and luckily for you, I'm still as confused as ever in this regard. When I make a breakthrough, I'll be sure to announce it to the world.
I tried to blog here many moons ago (see posts labeled "old"), but found it too difficult. It's not that I mind that no one is reading this, but I somehow managed to get on some kind of list, and Epistles was drowned in a deluge of spam for dear hunting supplies. On top of hating spam, I'm not totally keen on the idea of sport-killings. My frail constitution couldn't take it, and I waded out of the blogging kiddie-pool.
But I'm happy to announce that I'm back! Thank you. Thank you. You are too kind. Please sit down. There will be a slight shift in focus: frankly, the confessional blog is something I've been moving away from of late. If you don't know where to find my public diaries, I'm certainly not going to tell you now. What I can tell you is that I will try to achieve a semi-daily frequency of posting, and the laborious, slightly antiquated prose-style to which you have become accustomed shall remain in place. I am still as interested as ever in exploring the line between forlorn and cantankerous, and luckily for you, I'm still as confused as ever in this regard. When I make a breakthrough, I'll be sure to announce it to the world.
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Epiffles at Dawn
I had two thoughts just now that struck me as important:
1) I don't ever sleep. Ever. I pass out sporadically, and that's as close as it comes.
2) "Epiffles" should be a word. An epiffle is a fleeting thought that feels like an epiphany, but is really just gas, drugs, lack of sleep, overabundance of cheesy movies, just the right balance of Deepak Chopra and Noam Chomsky, or some combination therof.
I'm pretty sure item one is an item two.
1) I don't ever sleep. Ever. I pass out sporadically, and that's as close as it comes.
2) "Epiffles" should be a word. An epiffle is a fleeting thought that feels like an epiphany, but is really just gas, drugs, lack of sleep, overabundance of cheesy movies, just the right balance of Deepak Chopra and Noam Chomsky, or some combination therof.
I'm pretty sure item one is an item two.
Monday, August 01, 2005
According to Webster's Dictionary...
It has come to my attention that most people don't know what an epistle is. Rather than flex my lexical (?) muscles, I'll let my good friend Noah Webster handle this one.
e·pis·tle Audio pronunciation of "epistle" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (-psl)
n.
1. A letter, especially a formal one. See Synonyms at letter.
2. A literary composition in the form of a letter.
3. Epistle Bible.
1. One of the letters included as a book in the New Testament.
2. An excerpt from one of these letters, read as part of a religious service.
That asshole Webster is charging to use his site, which isn't even as good as dictionary.com. So that's where this is from. Be that as it may, I hope this has cleared up any confusion.
e·pis·tle Audio pronunciation of "epistle" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (-psl)
n.
1. A letter, especially a formal one. See Synonyms at letter.
2. A literary composition in the form of a letter.
3. Epistle Bible.
1. One of the letters included as a book in the New Testament.
2. An excerpt from one of these letters, read as part of a religious service.
That asshole Webster is charging to use his site, which isn't even as good as dictionary.com. So that's where this is from. Be that as it may, I hope this has cleared up any confusion.
Dear Readership,
I felt it was only fair, at least once, to favor you with a post written in letter format. Seeing as how this blog is called Epistles at Dawn, and especially since that's a rather poor pun, a letter would be the only way to salvage this thing. So how are you? The kids? Did Suzie make the cheerleading squad? Is Billy still self-conscious about being a severe hydrocephalic? How's that new hip working out for you?
As for me, I've been chillin'. Illin'. Not really maxin' too much, but curiously enough, a lot more co' relaxin' these days. The other day someone told me to chillax, and I said , dude, I'm chillin' and co' relaxin': I don't need to chillax. You chillax. Biznatch.
So in summary, it's time to Bork this Roberts fellow. I'm serious: we need to Bork the shit out of him.
Fondest Wishes,
Son of a Fish
As for me, I've been chillin'. Illin'. Not really maxin' too much, but curiously enough, a lot more co' relaxin' these days. The other day someone told me to chillax, and I said , dude, I'm chillin' and co' relaxin': I don't need to chillax. You chillax. Biznatch.
So in summary, it's time to Bork this Roberts fellow. I'm serious: we need to Bork the shit out of him.
Fondest Wishes,
Son of a Fish
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