Chance of Flurries.

Monday, October 30th, 2000

Sometimes I have so much to express that I'm not even interested in listening to myself. The day started out right, gentle snowfall collecting on cars and shrubs. But the movement over the course of the day from cold dry flakes to cold wet downpour left my head smarting like a paper cut. And I don't even know what exactly the verb "to smart" is supposed to mean. Still, I confuse responsibility with duty, despite the clear differences between them.

Goddamn farting sheep, ruining earth.

Sometimes I'm so overwhelmed with beautiful objects, processes and possibilities that I poke and nibble at them like I'm choosing facts from a database of information. Once you think you understand the systems of rules governing these things, you can point and click beauty like gifs on a frickin' contents bar. People talk about comedy and tragedy as if they're polar opposites, but that's not true at all. Really, the two are separated only at an acute angle, the slight disparity between magnetic north and true north. Almost all comedy has a tragic core, and all tragedy can be hyperextended into the silly or satirical. It depends how far your sight horizon stretches. Absurdity just piles those moments on real thick-like, full and rich. But the opposite of all of these things involves the mundane, the average, the empty. Once pretty things seem mundane, there's trouble.

Ooh, an extra-big Thanksgiving in Plymouth this year, thanks to the United Nation's declaration that we're experiencing The International Year of Thanksgiving. Let's just hope the extra-big parade is accompanied by a proportionally sized Native American protest. Hell, I'll even volunteer to be shot in the chest with a musket. Or scalped, should the county fall to the control of Injun warlords desperate for justice after 400 years.

I used to wonder if I should learn to quit while I'm ahead. I don't have time to think about that now, though, because I have to pick up the guys at 6 tomorrow for breakfast at Bickies.

11:12 PM | plink

Sat on Their Park Bench Like Bookends.

Thursday , October 26th, 2000

Fresh.
Air.

If you're tired of making a mess something awful, gentlemen, I suggest you order yourself a Spankie. It's sure to provide seven minutes worth of good laughs around the office.

Happy Birthday, years and gears, sharp and subtle.

12:59 AM | plink

Large Enclosed Structures.

Tuesday the 24th.

hope all goes well stop no time to write stop giant robots attacking town stop joshua came home stop sigh stop

11:02 PM | plink

The Big Corporation in the Sky.

Mid-Late October, 2000

Bright light? Of course.
And friendship, and doubt, and hot coffee.
I barely have time to stop and try to remember what I was supposed to be doing.

I'm so thin.

12:34 AM | plink

Brendan Is a Wanker.

And other darkness - October 19th, 2000.

At least five employees of a burgeoning eastern Massachusetts golf course were shocked early this morning to learn that one of their coworkers, Brendan French, is a complete and utter Wanker. French, a twenty year old resident of Duxbury, is believed to have migrated to the area from upstate New York.

"We always suspected that he was a Douchebag, but this comes as a bit of a surprise," said a fellow employee, who asked to remain nameless. "I mean, you never encounter those types around here. Don't they all live in Missouri?"

According to observers, French is reported to be lazy, dim-witted, funny looking, rude, and just plain annoying. He has often been known to dissapear for great lengths of time during working hours, and is frequently seen talking on his cell phone at work like a spoiled little fartknocker. After even the briefest of interactions, many who've encountered French agree that he "thinks he's so big, but he's, like, really an assmunch."

But not everyone was shocked by today's revelation.

"Are you kidding? I realized he ws a total Wanker the first time I saw him," commented coworker Ryan Gantz, who insisted that his name be used in full. "Not only does Brendan think he knows everything, but he drives a brand new Saab that his mommy bought for him. And what's the dilly with those sunglasses? Man. What a scumsucking dickweed of a tard."

It is expected that the Wanker will be put on Futerra duty indefinitely.

9:13 PM | plink

one of many amusingly depressing search strings found recently in my referrer logs.

Sad but true.
Sad but funny.
Sad.

well, when all else fails, be the hippo.
another day of terrible cinematic beauty.

10:40 PM | plink

Standing in the Shadows.

Wednesday , October, 2000

I watched all of the debate last night, while eating popcorn and slurping on a $3.00 bucket of soda. I knew a kid in middle school who used to watch footage from the Gulf War on CNN like it was the movie of the week. He'd curl up with a sack of Bugles and just munch away, laughing. He said it was almost as good as watching a real war movie.

Similarly, the Bush v. Gore debate is almost as good as watching a real political drama, except the acting isn't as good and the characters aren't very believable. If you didn't catch the debate, let me give you a quick summary:

Gore: I want every American to have health insurance.
Bush: That's another fancy government word, "insurance".
Gore: I promise you: I will get it done.
Bush: It's gonna take new leadership.
Gore: Can I jump in here?
Bush: Well now... apparently the rules jusat aren't important to some of us.

I would have kept writing down their dialog in my stenographer's notebook, but I drifted off to sleep, from boredom or ether or both. Later I awoke to find myself covered in Ju Ju Bees and sqashed Junior mints. No wonder I'm disenchanted with two party politics. Those kind of candies are tasty when they're stuck in your teeth, but not when they melt in your hand, see?

And that's excatly the kind of hand-eye coordination we're talking about here. Let your eyes go out of focus. I was blind but now I see.

11:47 PM | plink

Apple Pie, Oversleeping.

monday, music, morning mania.

Good brother, if you didn't catch Radiohead's breathtaking appearance on SNL on Saturday, you might cruise over to lucky, click on News, and download Real media clips from the show. In addition to the band's performances of The National Anthem and Idioteque, the site also offers a clip from the closing credits, in which Thom held up a sign reading "Let Ralph Debate". Judging from their applause, the studio audience seemed uncharacteristically entralled with the band. After watching National Anthem, I could barely stand.

Sometimes you can catch me walking down the street with a pie eating grin on my face, so excited about the all of the directions music has taken, takes, has yet to take.

I'm slightly less excited about people posing as me, however. While I might under certain circumstances be tempted to refer to Mara's retro-Composer 2.0 circa late 1994 home page as "ghetto", I would surely never fabricate and/or mispell an adjective such as "bihac".

a good habit: hot apple foodstuffs and magazines in bed. climbing into a good article until text and cinammon lulls you to sleep.

11:26 PM | plink

Sweet Clementine.

Saturday, October 14th, 2000

A weekend so good, and only half over.
Talk about beautiful design.
And everything falls into place at night.

6:19 PM | plink

Head turned. Leaves above.

Thursday, October, 2000

As night rose, I found myself inside a large department store, the likes of which I had never seen. The linoleum grid criss-crossed beneath shelves of toy trucks, racks of sweatshirts, and heavy rolls of plush tweed carpeting. The lights hung evenly spaced overhead, glowing white like the painted clapboards of a house I want to own. Children climbed up and down stacks of Goodyear tires. Mustached, middle-aged men bustled from monitor to monitor.

I arrived only partially dressed. There was freshly recorded muzak in the air, and I couldn't help but ask a redheaded cashier to dance. She offered me two types of bags for my purchase. I wasn't holding anything. Each time a quarter slipped out of my pant leg, I snatched it up and dropped it back into my pocket. The bins of mittens and cases of bleach were intoxicating. I knew that I needed something, I just wasn't sure what to pay for.

My feet started itching. Shoppers were everywhere. I couldn't find my watch. Baking soda? Tennis balls? I had some already. Mock turtlenecks? Too long of a neck. I couldn't tell if I had any money in my wallet. I had put on the wrong pants. I had put on no pants at all.

The aisles were all mixed up. Doors marked "Employees Only" stood to my left and right. I kept stepping on spilt merchandise and lost children. Had I left my car at home? Was I driving? I found too many reasons to look sideways. Documents and rolls of masking tape slid and bounced around below me. Red hair fell from the ceiling tiles. I thought that I missed someone, and I couldn't remember if I'd forgotten to put on my glasses.

10:48 PM | plink

Bright Idea.

Bluesday, October Blah, 2000

So who's laughing now, funny man?

Earlier tonight I received an email forward from a friend of mine. The body of the message was empty. Attached to the email was a file, VeryFunny.vbs. And do you know what I did? I opened it. And do you know what happened? It destroyed 7,000 jpegs on my hard drive over the course of 6 minutes. Half of those were photos. I have some of them backed up, but that's no reason for me to feel like any less of a Poopy Jenkins. For the love of ALL THINGS HOLY, delete any email you get from me with "Fw: Joke" as the subject line.

Eh. Ack. Man, this is so lame.
I wonder what Mr. Wong would do at a time like this.

10:23 PM | plink

Take Off, You Hoser.

My 23rd Columbus Day.

Ladies and gentlemen, the moment has arrived. I offer you the most comprehensive list of 3rd grade insults that I was able to assemble. Some of them are funny. Most of them are offensive or homophobic. Enjoy them, you lame-o.

scumbucket
gaylord
hoser
stinky
butthead
poophead
dickweed
peckerhead
dickhead
penis wrinkle
penis breath
pencil dick
retard
tard
turd
dillhole
trashpicker
crap-for-brains
dirt-bag
nerd
geek
gaywad
dorkwad
jerk-off
four-eyes
spaz
narc
snot-nose
brownnoser
wuss
candy-ass
buttnugget
homo
doofus
sherlock (as in "no shit, sherlock")
dweeb
needle dick
smooth move, ex-lax
slick
butt pirate
assmunch
smarty-pants
fungus butt
dickweed
fatbutt
dingleberry
lard-ass

The following names didn't seem childish enough, but I feel that they deserve some attention just the same.

Poopy Jenkins
nut bustah
Old Mossyface
rapscallion
homo Erectus
jilipollas (spanish...no translation)
Philistine
cock smoker
anal birth (??)

Thank you to everyone who sent in suggestions. If I didn't include your insults, it's probably because I think you're a douchebag.

9:15 PM | plink

If you're still not satisfied, and you're looking to laugh your ass off, The Law Of The Playground offers an A-Z encyclopedia of cross-referenced insults, concepts, memes, and everything else you thought you didn't want to remember about elementary school social life. It just keeps on giving. [via Heather, months ago].

9:36 PM | plink

Should never have left the Crystal Lake.

The Second October Sunday 2000

Actor Richard Farnsworth died yesterday at the age of 80 due to "an obviously self-inflicted gunshot". He received an Oscar nomination for his role in a movie I saw recently, directed by David Lynch. All through the production of The Straight Story, it seems, Farnsworth was coping with failing health due to cancer, and on Friday his pain became too much to bear. In the film, his wise character rides 300 miles on a lawnmower to visit a sick brother, in a true story of patient determination.

Speaking of patience, when did red stoplights become suggested guidlines? This afternoon at a major intersection I saw three (3) cars in a row run a red light to make a left turn, cutting across two lanes of advancing traffic. How will we ever conquer The Man if we can't agree on a few ground rules?

Speaking of conquering The Man, I recommend If Nader had been there, an article that appeared in the Focus section of today's Boston Sunday Globe. It incorporates quotations from multiple interviews to suggest what responses Ralph Nader would have given to questions posed in last week's Bush/Gore debate. Had he been debating. Or in the room, for that matter. The article provides a great overview of his position on issues like taxation, social security, healthcare, the military, and most importantly, education:

Nader wants to abandon not only the standardized testing both Bush and Gore endorse, but to radically refocus schools. Students ''should learn, as the core curriculum, developing civic skills, learning how to practice democracy,'' he said, ''and the arithmetic, reading and writing will be a byproduct.''

Speaking of reading and writing as a byproduct, you might enjoy my essay, On Revising Education, adapted from a couple of long emails I sent to the saturn-list many months ago. It discusses issues and ideas that are very important to me.

7:31 PM | plink

A Brown Particleboard Shelf.

Friday, October 6th, 2000

These books and baubles seem so well placed. In a DayQuil induced haze, I imagined a four-hour Metroid marathon played in an alternate present. Pay checks came and went. On the way to my bed, I encounter'd lovely people, colorful places, music that tells the whole story, and mugs of hot cider flowing over the tongue.

8:56 PM | plink

Fall On Me.

Wednesday, October 4th, 2000

I paid a bunch of bills today, and I remembered to write a check for the $75 parking ticket that I got in Boston last month. I found this dream space right in front of Shelton Hall on Bay State Road, but two hours later the dream space turned out to be marked by a suprisingly visible handicapped parking sign. To be sure, I honestly deserve to pay $75 bucks for being a foolish and selectively blind handicapped space thief. I hate when people park in marked spaces. So today, while I'm dutifully sealing my ticket envelope, I noticed the following words printed on the envelope in a rather large font.

These words were followed by a formal breakdown of my rights and options as the said offender. Well I'll tell you, it made me feel like a real bad-ass, a serious criminal who isn't gonna take no guff from nobody, not no how. I'm almost crazy over the edge, you know? but my highwayman smarts keep me slithering this way and that. The heat can't pin me down, because I'm sly like a panther. But honestly, are such harsh words necessary? I'm drowning in guilt over here, on top of my loss of 75 clams. And what about fair treatment for criminals? Aren't I entitled to free cable or something?

By the way, I'm still collecting childish insults.
You better send me some more, you crapfaces.

11:27 PM | plink

Red Wine and Sleeping Pills.

October 3rd, MM

The other night I played Guess Who with my 10-year old cousin Timmy. You remember that game: try to figure out which character face your opponent has by asking questions about hair color and so forth, knocking eliminated people down as you go. We figured that asking "Does your person have an embarrassingly enormous nose?" is a surprisingly effective way to eliminate one half of the faces right up front. But we found that the game was even more interesting when you ask questions like, "Does your person dream about performing in musicals?" or "Would your person attend a cock fight?" Timmy's a smart kid.

If you know me at all, you know that I have been looking forward to today for about 2.5 years, and so during my lunchbreak I fled to the pathetic local mall, bought Kid A, the fourth full length album from that spacey Brit band, and then grabbed some foodish products at McDonalds, which was a really bad idea and made me feel a little sick, but not too sick to listen to the album over and over again, while shoveling and irrigating as the sun went down over West Plymouth, and I'll tell you that after five listens I'm mostly inside the album but it'll take about 30 more before I'm prepared to write about it, so in the meantime if you're a fan read this perceptive breakdown review by Mr. Shroeder over at Bluemag, and if you already own the CD be sure to look behind the tray card inside the jewel case because it contains a secret booklet surprise; this is really happening, don't you know.

9:02 PM | plink

Poor Dubya. Big Al downright dogged Bush during the debate tonight, seizing control of almost every question with his fine tuned speaking skills and plenty of twisted up bird-like faces. Basically, Gore kept explaining why Bush's tax plan was a horrible idea, and Dubya kept accusing Gore of using "fuzzy government math". Then Bush would explain how he planned to bring Republicans and Democrats together. Then Gore would sigh or chuckle. And then Bush would say crap like this about Al:

I'm beginning to think that not only did he invent the Internet, but he invented the calculator.

I caught this classic, with that signature Dubya smile:

Because that's what governors do. Governors are often found on the front lines of catastrophic situations!

It all just makes me glad to live in the U.S.S.R.
Those cowboys in the New World are looney.

11:59 PM | plink

My I Don't Have to Run Day.

October's Warm Sunday Debut.

So it turns out that if you forget to pay your web-hosting company, they'll, like, shut down your domain for a couple of days. Huh. My apologies to anyone who tried to email me during that time. I'm rubber, you're glue, whatever you email bounces off me and sticks to you. And special thanks to the customer-service samaritans at Dreamhost for signing every email "Happy Dreamhost Employee".

Go the extra mile: Just Smoke It.

Now ain't the time to be sitting inside. There's frisbee to be played and cider to be drunk. Drank? Drunken? Whatever. It's New England autumn out there, and I'm glad to be in my simple hometown.

2:26 PM | plink

Props to you, Andrew, for being Proactive enough to do a little picketing in support of Mr. Ralph Nader. I only have enough time and energy to ring out my tiny deep voice in support of Nader... along with everyone else on the Internet. In an email I sent to the Saturn List last week, I quoted from a recent interview with Nader in Rolling Stone. When asked what message he has for those people who support Nader but worry about throwing away their vote, Nader says,

If they're progressives and they believe that the two-party system is irretrievably corrupt, and that the differences between the two parties are narrowing rapidly, and that voting for the least worse every four years guarantees that both of them will continue to get worse, then why are they legitimizing this duopoly by giving one of the parties their vote? The only language a politician understands is to deny him your vote and put it in another visible column, in this case the Green Party column. And then the politician will say, 'Gee, public sentiment is shifting, and we'd better react to it; otherwise we're going to lose even more votes.

Up with citizens. Down with corporations.

By the way, I fixed that link below to the Multibabel Translator.

10:58 PM | plink