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 |   My fourth blog. Amazing yet disconcerting. Don't worry; this'll go away in a year or so. |
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First there was "I'm Studying You"  ...then there was "Who Do I Think I Am??" . Finally, we reached "Who do I still think I am??" .Until now. Welcome to the Buffalo in your soul...       A THREE-TIME CHAMPION OF THE "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" !   |
| 30DBC PROMPT: "Is there a particular rule of grammar that irks you when you see it has been broken?" What's up y'all? I know why some of you are here right now...and I know why I'm here, so let me get this silly prompt nonsense out of the way first before I get to fulfilling your wishes, 'kay? Good. By judging me on what you might read in this here spot of occasional internet-based tomfoolery, you might think I'm no kind of grammar snob. That, however, couldn't be further from the truth. Grammar is important (to me, at least), and with the advent of text messaging and social media it's sadly becoming a lost art. Nothing turns me off more in a person besides spinach stuck in their teeth than their failure to grasp simple concepts of the language they've been speaking for the last, oh, I dunno, 20, 30, or 70 years. And I know I'm far from perfect and I occasionally end sentences with prepositions and put too much faith in a spell-checker nowadays, but c'mon...there's a reason we're taught simple grammar as young as the age of eight or nine! If it's meant to be mastered at that age, why are grown-ass adults not capable of knowing the difference between to, too, and two? Or than and then? Your and you're? Spend five minutes on Facebook, and surely someone you know and love writes like an emotionally crippled six year old.  The not-emotionally-crippled six year old me. Seriously...if our founding Grammar Jedis were alive today and could only see the travesties being committed against the English language via technology, could you imagine the ways they'd like to punish us but can't get away with now like they did in the good ol' days? The lack of teachers being able to beat us with rulers in the 21st century is directly proportional to the fact that stupidity among adults is at an all-time high when it comes to knowing where to put an apostrophe correctly. But that's probably an entirely different blog entry for another day. And maybe it's not an actual "rule of grammar", but the one thing I keep seeing more and more of lately is people misspelling the word "definitely". But oh, they're not just misspelling it, my friends...no! They are so adamant about whatever it is that they're professing an agreement with, that they're "defiantly" going to be at your party on Saturday, they "defiantly" agree that your ex-boyfriend is a jerk for allowing some skank to text him, and they "defiantly" are gonna kick her skank ass if she dares show her face on Saturday at your party. I think you see my point...makes me "defiantly" wanna dropkick a dictionary right between an idiot's eyes (except you, if I think you're pretty alright as a person and yet you still offend me like this). How did we get like this? Where did we lose our way? Why are people so lazy and arrogant enough to expect us to decipher their shoddy craftsmanship of the language? I shouldn't have to carry separate sets of translations for everyone I know that does English a little differently than the rest of the English-speaking population. Like I said, we learned the majority of the basics at a young age, and most of it we practice orally on a daily basis...so why is it so hard to transfer that from spoken form onto a page, using letters and proper punctuation? I don't get it! Ok, semi-rant over. It's not often I look forward to reading the responses to prompts I submit, but this one's got me intrigued enough that I might stay up a little later this evening and see what you guys came up with (that, and I have a lot of work to do between classes tomorrow, so rather than read your entries then maybe I'll try to get through as many as I can after I'm done with this). MUSICAL BREAK!! So, I knew this existed and all, but to actually see it lends a completely different aspect to the context. Sorta like when someone types "f---", you know what it means, yet it's somehow supposed to be better than actually typing "fuck", even though they both mean the same thing basically when your mind processes them. Anyway, yeah... THE DAILY BOX SCORE:  Ever see someone use quotation marks and wonder, "Why are they using quotation marks in that particular instance?" Does it trip the conspiracy-theorist wires in you? Maybe it should...here's 26 examples of quotation marks that should make you wonder what the actual intent of the punctuated area is. And while we're mocking the less fortunate, grammatically on the subject of grammatical errors, let's chuckle a little at 18 instances where proofreading was overlooked.  Ok, if you bothered to read anything above this sentence although you really wanted to get to this point, thank you...I know it must've been hard, like sitting through dinner on Christmas Eve before getting to open a few presents or something. Recently at school I joined two separate writing groups (they both meet at times when I'd otherwise be eating, so it won't be taking me away much from studying)...the "Writers' Guild" (which is for writers of all kinds), and the "Poetry Club" (self-explanatory). Because of the positive response to a poem I wrote back in July (as part of "This one's about Barilko, Monday, and Imagine." ...thanks you guys!), I was actually going to share "Black Monday Moon" last Friday during Writers' Guild but we ran out of time (although I did give a copy to another person in the group to see what she thought of it). Then today during the Poetry Club meeting, we were given 10 minutes to do a "free write" on anything at all. It was that or discuss current events, and because I'm not great at coming up with stuff off the top of my head I opted for "current events" but was outvoted by everyone else in attendance. When it was my turn to read, I made sure I started off by saying "free writing" wasn't my thing, and that usually I get an idea or a line and then over time and at my own pace I'll come up with something. The guy that pushed for the free write apologized, and I jokingly blamed him if what I wrote sucked. And according to the reactions of everyone in the group, it did not suck. So I'm sharing this with you guys now...feel free to tell me what you think (good or bad), but just remember, I was under pressure to write something in ten minutes. "Free Write No. 1" And that's all I've got for tonight...gonna try to get to your 30DBC entries while catching the rest of Monday Night Football and pretending I'm not in denial about going to bed at a reasonable hour this evening. Peace, knock 'em off, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| 30DBC PROMPT: "Peter Rubin says, 'The story is not what happens, the story is who happens too.' By this he means, readers need to be engaged in the lives of the people they read about before the author thinks about the plot/story. Do you agree? Which is more important, having really interesting characters or a really exciting plot? Do you think First, Second or Third person makes the characters more realistic to your writing? Last question: he indicates the hook is what makes your writing relevant. What do you think?" 'Sup y'all? Props to Lyn's a Witchy Woman  for, pardon the pun, an exce-Lyn-t prompt in the "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" today! Although I personally have a hard time relating to it based on my own writing experiences, I'll take a stab at it 'cuz it's not my prompt. Writing to one's own prompt is like listening a recording of yourself, I think...and nobody likes hearing the sound of their own voice that way.I agree with what Rubin said. You have to have a certain amount of emotional investment (positive or negative) in at least some of the characters if you're really gonna get into a story and enjoy it. You want to feel something for the people in their situations...maybe you want to root for the underdog, or see the antagonist get his or hers at the end. Without that underlying theme of attachment, all you're doing is looking at words on a page...you may as well be buying wallpaper or watching paint dry. Looking at the next part of the prompt, it's my opinion that both the characters and the plot feed off of each other. They need to coexist peacefully for a successful story...a good plot can make characters more interesting on some levels, and characters you really like can pull you in and help carry a lackluster plot. How many books have you completed where the main characters were douchebags and the setting and/or storyline was borderline ridiculous for your liking? After a few chapters, you're like "Why am I still reading this?" Having at least one element be intriguing makes the reading experience more worthwhile. As for First, Second, and Third Person-based writing, it doesn't matter as long as the characters are well-written and you have a good idea in your head who they are. For me though, I prefer First Person accounts because I feel like I'm reliving the character's journey alongside them. I'm taking in the experiences with them in stride, almost as if I'm playing a hidden role in their scenes. If I don't feel that, chances are I'm not gonna like the story in general. And the hook? It's crazy important! A hook is just that: it's meant to hook you in to the action. It's what stays in your brain long after you've finished the story and causes you to recommend it to your friends. Without that, again, you're just looking at printed words on a page. You don't wanna read a book that reminds you of a tampon ad in a magazine or makes you think of your email's Spam folder. You want life! You want something that grabs you and makes you feel like you're a part of the writing transaction! And if you're a writer, you need something that keeps eyeballs in your pages and makes fingers turn them pages. That's my opinion, at least. I can't say for sure because I don't really write stories...just blog entries where I'm usually the main character, or the occasional poem. I think the closest I ever came to feeling like I was writing a novel was with my very first blog, "I'm Studying You" ...it quickly turned into an account of my pursuit of a drugstore cashier who eventually became the love of my life for over three years. Every entry was that day's experience of flirting and wooing and wussing out, and it built a decent following here on WDC over six years ago because people became interested in me and what I was up to. I had the likable characters (me and my ex), a solid if not sitcom-ish plot, and the hook. And it worked! For the first time, people all over the world were experiencing what I was going through, via my words. I was getting advice from people as far from Buffalo as California and the UK...a tremendous and humbling experience. To this day I'm still friends with many of the folks who would log in to WDC daily, hoping to catch my latest escapades with a girl. If that wasn't Peter Rubin's intent by saying "The story is not what happens, the story is who happens too", then I don't know what it was, and I have a lot of views and awardicons on WDC to return.BCF PROMPT: "What is your favorite musical instrument? Why is it your favorite? Write a story, poem, or anything you want about it. Have fun. Be creative." I don't know that I've got a "favorite" instrument. When I was a kid I think I always wanted to play guitar, because in the early days of MTV (you know...back when they played these things called "videos"), the guitar players were out near the front and they always got the chicks. And being a pubescent boy, I wanted to get chicks too, so playing guitar must've had something to do with that  . But I find myself at most concerts I go to watching the drummer. He/she has an important role...keeping time and the beat, which along with the bass is the backbone of a song. And drummers are phenomenal specimens...watch their movements, and their arms. See how they work in relation to the rest of their bodies. How do they do it? I used to work with a guy who drummed in local bands, and he was sick...he sat very upright, almost stiff, but his arms floated frantically over his kit (he was in a sort of twangy punk-ish threesome, and if you're on SoundCloud you can hear a couple of their songs here ) reminiscent of those big inflatable things with flappy arms that car dealers put on their lots to advertise a sale. How he did it was astonishing to see. Even though I prefer now to be the karaoke hero and write lyrics occasionally (because I consider a person's voice to be an instrument), I still find myself enthralled by what drummers are capable of. It's a physically demanding job, more so than playin' a few hot licks and struttin' with a six-string. And here's a little secret...when my ex bought her kids an Xbox for Christmas one year, I went out and bought them Rockband. Sure, it was for them, but I wanted to live out my drummer fantasies as well. I can say firsthand that it's not easy...but it's a hell of a lot of fun. MUSICAL BREAK!! Speaking of knowing drummers, I've had the good fortune of being friendly with a few. I actually shot this video on my old Blackberry...Josiah was a dude my ex worked with, and his former band Letterset was a legendary pop-punk band in the Buffalo scene for a while. He's a crazy amazing drummer who's done some incredible work over the last five years or so, including his famous "JoJo Monster iTunes Sessions". The sound in this clip is garbage (hey, it was my Blackberry, cut me some slack), but it's still a great tune. "There's just a certain little something that I can't explain. I know it's stupid so I think I'd rather hide it away." A lyric video with better sound. THE DAILY BOX SCORE:  "Would you rather be on Gilligan's Island or Survivor?"Dude, y'all know how I feel about reality quote-unquote television. I hate it and it sucks and there's no need to further expound in the subject. Hands down, put me on Gilligan's Island, because at least that was interesting and entertaining programming without the TMZ gossip factor. Even though I'm a competitive type of brotha, and maybe in my more physically fit days I might've wavered and contemplated this a little, no a thousand times...gimme the damn three hour tour gone haywire with a blatant lack of amenities over sticking x-amount of people on a not-so-remote desert island charged with performing tricks for the viewing masses that sponsors kill for. Gimme straight-up comedy that we know is fictional over some unintentional comedy that's being sold to us as "reality". Fuck that and the boat it sailed out on. Even if I didn't like watching Gilligan's Island reruns as a kid (which I loved), I'd still choose that over Survivor. If I were to pick between hokey crap and hokey crap, at least there's Ginger and Mary Ann (and I'm sure Mrs Howell was pretty smashing back in her day as well)...not some brute chicks who'd probably kick my ass and know how to skewer me over a campfire. That's not appealing to me at all, regardless of how many pieces of clothing they aren't wearing. I'm all about sittin' right back and hearin' a tale. I'm good with that. Save your "let's make friends and double-cross each other for the sake of ratings because in the end only one of us is left" chicanery for The Discovery Channel or the county fair or wherever else this shit plays well. Show me seven people making the best of a bad situation, not a bunch of idiots sellin' each other out for cash, notoriety, and the last dead rodent on the isle. I mean, at least if you're gonna clutter up the broadcasted airwaves with bullshit, at least make it semi-believable and funny...not a bunch of jerk-offs trying to prove something to their high school gym teachers. Chances are, I'm more likely to get on a small boat that gets stuck in the middle of nowhere, forcing us to all get along with the hope that maybe we'll be rescued, than I'd be shipped out on an all-expenses paid trip to Camp Oneupsmanship. But hey, you've got your hopes, dreams, and preferences...and so do I.  I'm not a violent person, but if you're like me (and you're probably not) you enjoy seeing people randomly getting faced by potentially painful objects. And sometimes, they make funny faces when it happens.  Speaking of television, y'all know I'm a big fan of Arrested Development, right? Please enjoy this guide to Arrested Development quotes you should be using in your everyday life. Thank me later when you make a new friend because you dropped "I don't understand the question and I won't respond to it" at the most opportune of times. So I've got this Android tablet thing, and I've found a new (to me) app called Pocket, which will store web pages for viewing when you're not online. This is incredibly amazing to me, because I occasionally find myself on a bus without internet access (ok, almost daily), and now I can load up a bunch of stuff on my tablet and then read through them while I'm on my way to school. I heart this app so much (and yes, I used the word "heart" in place of "love", because I won't be dating this app anytime soon and I choose to express my admiration as if I were still 17 as opposed to the grown-up I am). It even works on my Windows 8 laptop! Oh, have my commutes just gotten brighter!And that's where I'll leave you all this evening...hopefully you're not deserted anywhere else but in front of your internet viewing device of pleasure. Peace, I don't find you at fault, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| 30DBC PROMPT: "When is too much of something not a good thing?" What up blog fam? I love having me some extra free time to myself, so I'm goin' all out like I used to do back in the day (which wasn't that long ago, actually) with three prompts and three responses. Clear your schedules and make some time, because this entry promises to be worth your while (and if not, save your receipt and you'll get a refund within thirty days*). *Restrictions apply...as in, there are no refunds. When is too much of something not a good thing? I'll tell you when...but first indulge me a little subtraction (not the word I really wanna use) from the point. Take, for instance, this: the "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" . It's the longest-running blogging group of any kind on WDC, and it's a great experience for many reasons. I've lost track of the amount of times I've been involved in it (either as a participant, a judge, an unofficial round leader, or now as the ombudsman). It's mad wicked fun if you're into blogging, and I've had the good fortune of getting to know so many people through the sharing of experiences. I've been asked on more than one occasion to overtake the whole thing...overseeing it, running it, however you wanna phrase it. I can see people's points; along with Lyn's a Witchy Woman I've been in charge in August and this month, with 30DBC Creator/Founder  our fall-back de facto 30DBC guru and founder. And while that's been fun and all, I enjoy competing in it a lot more than I would from the other side of the keyboard. I don't want that responsibility full-time. Among other reasons, it wouldn't be fun anymore. It would feel like an obligation, and I have commitment issues in that regard. As a participant, I still retain control if I decided in any given month that I'd want to bow out. When you're a leader, you don't quite get that opportunity. I won't go into further detail...but that's one example of how this could eventually become, for me at least, too much of a good thing.Now...here's 14 more sentence fragments that'll illustrate my response to this prompt. 1) Too much socks and not enough shorts 2) Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (yes, I've discovered I have a limit as to how many I can eat at one sitting, and it's not a good feeling) 3) Ranch salad dressing (see #2) 4) I need alone time, away from even my most favorite people...I tend to have short nerves 5) I can only listen to The Beatles for so long before I need to switch it up 6) Not every day can be 80 degrees and sunny 7) Can't dress each morning like it's a night on the town 8) Eating your favorite food every day is a surefire way to ensure it won't be your favorite food for long 9) The hot water eventually will run out if you shower too long 10) Blondes don't have to be your downfall 11) Neither does vodka 12) Money can only buy so much happiness before either the money or the happiness (or both) needs replacing 13) Sometimes I like a lot of hot sauce, and sometimes I wanna taste my food and have a normal digestive process 14) Satisfaction, like pain, should only be temporary I'll tie this portion of the entry up with a few anecdotal bits of wisdom..."Life is not joy; it is motion" (Mario Cuomo); "You want it all but you can't have it" (Faith No More); and "I just wanna be a cool breeze on a warm day" (DMFM). BCF PROMPT: "We are all creatures of habit... what is your morning ritual? Tell us the first five things of a typical day (let's skip the morning necessity  )." Guess that depends on what you consider a "morning necessity"...especially when you're of the gender where some parts of your body wake up before others.  But I'll skip that detail, I suppose, and quote our friend Lyn's a Witchy Woman ..."I'm <insert an age here>, I'm not dead yet!"  I'm a night owl...what that means is that I don't do mornings very well at all. In fact, I'm quite a righteous prick before I've had coffee or an energy drink and have fully waken up. I'm irritable, snappy, and by golly don't piss me off, because I'll act out first and apologize (maybe) later. Suffice to say, I don't have much of a morning routine...I wanna milk every last second of sleep I can get, because it's hard enough for me to come by and waking up to an alarm is not in my DNA willingly. I try to take care of as much as I can before I go to sleep (showering, lunch packed, clothes laid out) so I can get up and go. There's nothing worse (for me) than waking up with enough time to have too much time to get ready, but not enough time to get into anything else. That said, here's my morning routine list...  Gotta use this image every chance I get! 1) Take my meds, usually with a Mountain Dew Kickstart (although I'm gonna have to find something else, because I'm ready for a solid nap like two hours later) 2) Get ready for class (get dressed, get the morning essentials out of the way, make sure I've got all my shit together again) 3) Catch the bus to class (I have a 20-25 minute ride, so I usually do some leisure reading to alleviate stress and anxiety) 4) Check my school email, Facebook, and WDC email before my first class (except for Mondays and Fridays, where I barely have enough time to get to my first class once I get off the bus) 5) Do that learnin' thing Lately though, there's been this, ummm, interruption, if you will, in my morning routine. I catch the bus at Cortland's hub, where all the buses start their runs. Lately there's been a woman waiting for the bus with her mother and a small, rambunctious child. This kid, like every boy about his age (approximately three or four), knows every kung-fu move there is to know, and isn't afraid to step out in front of you and challenge you to a battle. I would see him on my walk-up, and start to veer toward the farther end of the sidewalk to avoid him (because I don't like to be fucked with by anyone first thing in the morning)...but little homie sees me (I'm not hard to miss with my limp and ginormous beard) and will walk just as far out of his way to get all up in my kneecaps with his Pre-K Mutant Ninja/Power Ranger combo stance to wage war on my nutsac if I'm not paying attention. I've given up trying to avoid him; because these little people don't know any better. I've found a way to put him in his place (hopefully it's not temporary and it works as long as him and I are destined to be waiting at the bus stop at the same time)...I do a stop/stutter-step thing and then flex out like I'm gonna lunge at him with my fists clenched, head-faking him while jerking my shoulders. Scares the everlovin' outta him; he booked over to the little shelter by his mom, and his grandmother laughed at him. Norb: 1, Li'l Bastard: 0. MUSICAL BREAK!! Someday, these kids are gonna learn not to toy with me first thing in the morning. I'm not a violent person usually, even if I may come across that way from time to time. I wouldn't actually tackle an otherwise-defenseless child who's steppin' toward me in a threatening manner, but I'm also not gonna let some punk push me around either. "You want it all but you can't have it. It's in your face but you can't grab it." Lyrics and interpretations. THE DAILY BOX SCORE:  "When was the last time you dedicated a day to yourself? If you have, share the details and their effects on you at the end of the day. If you haven't, why not, and would you if given the chance?"Yo, when haven't I dedicated a day to myself in the last two years? That's the beauty of being forever single...you're not directly responsible for someone else's feelings. I can wake up and do my own thing and not have to worry about how that's gonna impact someone else. It's liberating, especially when you tend to get into long-term relationships like I find myself in (and really, who gets into a thing with someone and is like "This is cool and I'm totally happy, but we're gonna break it off after 32.8 months because anything after that is too long for my liking"?). I can be me, and I don't have to worry if I've gone over the "fucks I still have to give" budget...basically, because I no longer have to give so many. Nobody to impress, no worries if dinner isn't on time or to someone else's liking, and if I wanna lounge around in my boxer briefs eating Cheetos, the orange dust that collects in my beard will wait until I'm damn good and ready to get 'em outta there. Oh, did I say "beard"? Yes, because I can have one without having to deal with the "Ugh, I can't kiss you because your beard hurts my face when I try to" nonsense some women like to pull because they think since you're with them, they have full authority to remake you into their physical image of what suits them in a creature who walks on two legs and owns a penis. And wow, I'm now so off-topic that it's gonna take a miracle to get me back. Luckily, I have miracles stocked up because I don't have to pull any off to satisfy a woman or her parents right now. This is hard, because I'm a minimalist...mainly out of necessity, but also because I'm fairly easy to satisfy under almost any circumstance. I do what I can with what I've got. I try to stay drama-free and prefer not to stick my nose in anyone's business. I don't say much; so when I do it's because I've got something important or meaningful to add to a discussion. I don't like wasting anything- words, steps, actions- if anything is worth doing, it's worth doing well, and getting it right the first time. It's a blessing and a curse, but it's better than the alternatives. So that's why I try to dedicate every day to me. I'm the only one I know who I can count on to take care of me. I can't/won't allow myself to trust that others have my best interests in mind, especially in situations where I might need them to. Sounds egotistical, but it's not. Not at all. If I can minimize the opportunities for others to let me down, I'll be better off in the long run...less setbacks, a straighter shot to where I need to be, and fewer headaches and heartaches. Gnothi seauton; the Greek aphorism for "know thyself"...no matter what situation you find yourself in, you'll be able to trust yourself enough to get through it or get out of it. If I don't look after #1 in a world where everyone else is doing the same, who else will? Be not the dreaded reason. Be your own best advocate. Be yourself, and be comfortable with that in a society that lives only to tear down anything that isn't like everything else. In the end, only you are in that grave...don't take others' hatred and disdain with you. Celebrate you every chance you get, even if you're the only one at the party! And if today wasn't working for you, most of the time tomorrow's another day...another chance to get things right. Don't listen to the bullshit the mainstream world wants you to believe in and conform to. You know what's best for you. THE LISTICLE 9.16  In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you 14 songs that are all about you (or me) being the best you (or me) only you (or I) can be.1) "You" by Atmosphere 2) "Stay" by The Tragically Hip 3) "One Man Army" by Our Lady Peace 4) "Don't Be Crushed" by Hawksley Workman 5) "You Are So Beautiful" by Joe Cocker 6) "You're My Heart" by LL Cool J 7) "Fall Semester" by The Get Up Kids 8) "You Can Do Magic" by America 9) "You Never Know" by The Goo Goo Dolls 10) "I Am...I Said" by Neil Diamond 11) "I Go To Work" by Kool Moe Dee 12) "Ironman" by Black Sabbath 13) "Hell Yeah" by Bloodhound Gang 14) "Who Said We're Wack?" by The Lonely Island I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  And...if you're that intrigued by any of my list songs (except for the one list where I used cartoon characters instead of songs), I'm throwing it out there just for you...get at me via the comments section, email, or WDC IM, and I'll hook you up with a cd of the any day's list if you'd like to add it to your personal collection. I haven't figured out all the details yet, and production wouldn't likely happen until next month at the earliest anyway, but I love music and hey, I'm here for you because you're here too. I might even throw some personal touches in there as well. C'mon, let's make this an interactive thing! Sharing and whatnot...it's caring, or something. Perhaps I'll create a separate "List Only" static item with entry/songs and some sort of ordering system. That's how I ball in this era...throwin' back to the mail age with digital technologistics. Don't hate; appreciate.  I don't even know if I'm allowed to do this, or if you're allowed to do this either, but there is an open voting period for the best "lister" of all the listers that took part in "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" that runs through early Friday evening at 8pm. I'd appreciate it if you vote for me take a little time to check out everyone that's submitted 14 days' worth of eligible entries and pick your favorite. I was unaware that there would be a voting of favorites when I decided to throw my name into the fray, so I'm assuming there's a prize attached, but that's on me...I should probably pay a little more attention to this kinda stuff in case the only prize is me saying "I had the sweetest lists, as per the voters of these things". All I know is that I have people sponsoring me, and I don't even know how many, but there's a good lot as far as I know, and that's stellar...the proceeds go to "RAOK Upgrade Brigade Group" and "Invalid Item" , so how could I not be a part of this? I need to thank my sponsors. I need to figure out who they are first! I know this is off-topic, but this article/video is hilarious if you grew up in the 80's..."Where Are They Now?", Cartoon Character Edition.  And hey, Soundtrackers and maybe-you-wanna-be-Soundtrackers, get down with lizco252's idea of a Halloween-ish activity now before it's too late! I don't know what my favorite Wytch has up her sleeve whatever wytches wear these days, but it's sure to be kick-ass. Get at her if you wanna be a part of the music-based fun and shenanigannery! (And I don't even care that "shenanigannery" is not a word...that's how awesome whatever Beth lays out for us is gonna be!)I think I had more to add here, but I'm gonna close it off now anyway because a) it's a good place to; and b) I should consider my administrative duties in the 30DBC and make some time to get back into reading some entries while I still can without feeling overwhelmed by an entire month's worth of submissions (because I hate it when I'm judging a week and I let it go 'til the last minute). Peace, it's magic, it's tragic, it's a loss, it's a win, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| BLOG CITY PROMPT: "If you could invent anything new, what would it be? (Thanks inky14dinky for this suggested prompt.)" What's up folks? I'm gonna keep this short tonight because I've had along day and there's a football game on (priorities, y'all...respect). Remember Y2K? The panic society was in during the onset of "the new millenium"...all the computers were gonna crash, food supplies would dry up, and the world was basically gonna end? What was that all about? I was almost 25 years old; I had nothing to be sad about! Thanks world...it was a good run, but now it's time to hand the reigns over to some other forms of intelligent life in the universe, since us humans were too stupid to ensure a future where computers would be able to read more than two digits in a year...even though we've had four-digit years for the last, oh, I dunno, maybe thousand years or so? We're so back-asswards as a people still that we can't get our own downfalls right even when they're custom-wrapped by IBM and Microsoft. Now we're just under the threat from some lunatic fringe religious cult every few years promising doomsday, and we just laugh at it because it comes (for most of us, at least) out of some left-field sect of a sect of a sect that's been convening in a basement taste-testing random batches of the Kool-aid for decades until they finally came up with all the "right" reasons to think the next apocalypse would be occurring on July 31, 1975 September 11, 2001 December 21, 2012 any particular date. Where am I going with this? Well, while y'all were preparing to live in bunkers eating nothing but rice and drinking bottled water, I was sitting at a typewriter in the spare room of my first apartment at Briarcliff. I wrote a poem titled Y2K, and I typed it all out...only I didn't use any spaces or line breaks, so it looked pretty bizarre (and it's a bitch to read...I remember a few years later trying to decipher it in a more traditional sense, and I was actually cursing myself for typing it out that way). I used to have it in my port here on WDC, but I took it out awhile ago during one of the many restructurings my port's undergone throughout the years. In that item there was a line that went something like "What's left for my kids to invent? Maybe they'll invent trees and parks and grass." Think about it...even if you're not very old today you can probably relate to the fact that perhaps one of your favorite places to play when you were a kid or even a teenager is now a mall, a parking lot, or a housing development. And all that urban sprawl comes with a price...parks get smaller, trees get cut down, and streets are widened because grass between the road and the sidewalk or the sidewalk and properties isn't as important as having another strip plaza on a road full of half-abandoned strip plazas. Fortunately though, the world didn't implode when calendars turned over to 2000, and someone/someones took steps to sort of reclaim some of the greenspace being gobbled up by greedy corporationsby coming up with rooftop gardens...another step toward building a self-sustaining lifestyle. Basically, on the roofs of these mostly urban structures like apartment buildings and office complexes, people are growing vegetables and flowers, building communities through homegrown products rather than dealing with traveling to a bland,sterile supermarket for produce trucked in from god knows where that's been treated with pesticides and who knows what else. Do some research on it...you'll see that it's a pretty cool concept. It's also more appropriate and cost-effective than the rooftop playground idea, which I haven't come close to perfecting yet...all these ramifications and stipulations and legal hurdles to overcome; how are kids supposed to have fun with other kids outdoors these days? Where can teenagers go to escape their thoughts of impending adulthood for awhile? Law enforcement officials frown upon underage drinking in parking lots a lot more than they do at parks (provided they actually care enough to catch you at a park). At least, that's what I've heard. MUSICAL BREAK!! And then there was this song, which I don't think was actually about a millenium at all. It was like "let's take a popular word for 'our times', write a chorus, say the word after the chorus, make a stupid video, and we'll have a hit song and everyone will be too stupid to care since they'll like the song so much that it won't matter if the song isn't about what the title actually means"...which I think that's how a lot of songs that were popular between 1993 and 2003 got made. THE LISTICLE 9.15 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you 14 songs about making things.1) "Feel Like Makin' Love" by Bad Company 2) "If I Had A Hammer" by Pete Seeger 3) "Steam Engenius" by Modest Mouse 4) "Make Me Bad" by Korn 5) "Pour Me Another" by Atmosphere 6) "You Make Loving Fun" by Fleetwood Mac 7) "Sextape" by Deftones 8) "Cry Me A River" by Justin Timberlake 9) "Do The Evolution" by Pearl Jam 10) "Welcome To The Machine" by Pink Floyd 11) "Sowing The Seeds Of Love" by Tears For Fears 12) "Kitchen Song" by The Sheila Divine 13) "Learn How To Knit" by Hawksley Workman 14) "Makin' Whoopee" by Frank Sinatra I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  And in honor of our original creators, our parents, here's a list of parents who might be cooler than their kids . Fair warning for the children I may never get to have: I'll probably be the responsible adult in #16...and by "responsible adult" I mean "I'll totally be taking pictures and video of that shit and calling as many people as I know before I get your clumsy ass down because you don't know how to watch where you're walking".Well, that's all I've got for today...one more day of listing comin' up tomorrow! But for now, time to fall asleep to some football. Peace, it's not too late, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| 30DBC PROMPT: "Describe to me the scene of the crime where the murder took place from the murderer's point of view. If you view energetic, try it from the victim's point of view. Remember it's Creation Saturday and the key word is creation." What up y'all? I'm back for a full-blown go-'round of today's prompts, so let's get right into 'em, shall we? I'm not gonna lie...like most other Saturdays, I'm not really feelin' creative. Usually I prefer to write from a perspective I'm at least familiar with (as it's been known that I'd much rather be coming from a place of experience). I've never murdered anyone before, and I've never been a murder victim either (although there have been enough times where I've felt like my heart's been ripped outta my chest, but we'll save those entries for Valentine's Day or some other syrupy-sweet occasion). Yup, this is gonna be hard. I'll say this much though (at the risk of comin' off soundin' like OJ Simpson)...if I were a murderer, I likely wouldn't care about the scene of the crime. I'd be all "get in, do my thing, get out". Makin' sure my tracks are covered, my alibi's airtight, and the victim is straight-up dead. Ever seen some stupid horror film where the killer thinks the person is dead, but it turns out they're really not? Yeah, that's bad for business if your business is peelin' caps back. The important details are the ones that don't come back in the end to haunt you (or incriminate you). I'm sure most of the muderin' types out there aren't stressin' over what the crime scene looks like enough to write a book about it later (and if there are true-life examples, please, there's no need to point them out to me). Seriously, if I were stupid enough to develop some kind of narrative that included my homicidal rage, it'd probably look something like "I jus' kept stabbin' 'im 'til he stopped screamin'", or somethin' like that. And then I'd go change my identity, location and online footprint. BCF PROMPT: "Your pen just came to life... the first thing it says is?" Geez Lyn's a Witchy Woman ! First it's about taking a human life, and then it's about life going into an inanimate object?! With my luck, my pen would probably start yappin' the minute I killed someone...and it'd probably be in some annoying Joe Pesci "wise guy" kinda voice: "Hey, why ya gotta do dat to dat guy? He's wunuhmy aaah-so-she-its." And then I'd probably get pissed off and "accidentally" drop the pen down a sewer grate. Is it just me? Did ya ever notice that when you need some encouraging words to appear out of nowhere, something bizarre like a talking pen would happen? We had a situation over the summer at Capco where we were taking in a large donation, and we came across this weird stuffed animal/ball thing (I'm not up on what all the kids are playin' with these days). It looked harmless enough...if you touched certain spots it made sounds (try typing that line with a straight face), and sure, it could probably entertain most kids between the ages of 12 months to a year or two. We set it aside and went on to the rest of the items we were working on. Sure enough, outta nowhere a few minutes later, this rotten bastard demon child toy from Hell doll started making obnoxious noises and speaking in some kind of foreign robotic tongue. It happened maybe 30 seconds after the end of a conversation, in a silent lull if you will. Scared the bejeebus out of me and my coworker...I screamed and jumped back a step, because I don't like it when toys try to carry on a dead conversation in a language I'm pretty sure doesn't exist. I had to put my wounded pride aside and take out this beast...'s batteries, because it wouldn't shut up. And of course, as we're still hysterical from this nonsense, our supervisor would be walking by and have to stop in to see what our problem the commotion was all about. Sorry for the digression...as I was saying, these things don't often happen because they want to be helpful or complimentary. Talking objects just don't work that way. As long as my talking pen doesn't wanna tell me how it thinks I should be writing my blog entries and poems, I guess I'll be alright. But if I start talking back to my pen, encourage me to seek some kind of help, ok? MUSICAL BREAK!! Funny how in different contexts the phrase "the scene of the crime" (like so many other phrases) can mean different things. THE DAILY BOX SCORE:  "It's Saturday and the flea market is open. What treasures did you discover? Do you actively look for certain items? Or do you buy closed boxes because you like mysteries? What kind of shopper are you?"Awww! I miss the ol' Super Flea in my hometown! Always open on Saturdays and Sundays...I could go there for baseball cards or cheap t-shirts of my favorite bands, and so much more. It closed down earlier this year for good...the property was purchased so a new Walmart could go up in its place, and it's a damn shame. There's a Walmart five minutes down the road that hasn't even been open twenty years- maybe not even 15- but it's a dump. The employees, and, as it seems, the customers don't care about the store. At least with the Super Flea, you knew what kind of people you were gonna see there, but there was still a certain sense of pride. It wasn't just ignorant trash running around with no concern for anyone or anything. Granted, the neighborhood doesn't have a lot of the same characteristics it held while I was growing up there, but that's not the point. Now there's gonna be another ginormous empty store that no one's gonna want (because the market for used former Walmarts in shitty locations is pretty negligible). But I guess that's another day's rant. I love flea markets, but not all the time. I like some space between my visits, so that you're not always lookin' at the same stuff. Better variety that way, I figure. Yeah, there's a lot of useless crap there, but every once in awhile a match is made in kitsch heaven between some unsightly object and a fool who can't wait for his money to depart from his wallet. It happens a lot more than you think, and if you look at flea markets (or The Dirt Mall, as we'd refer affectionately to the Super Flea on Walden Ave. in Cheektowaga) in that light they're rather beautiful. More often than not, we'd go just to go...we'd people-watch first, and shop second. Usually we'd head out for breakfast, DMFM and myself, and then hit up the Super Flea. There'd be a few stands we'd always stop at...Dave would always check out what the golf guy had and a particular knife stand, while I'd look at the used books and cd's. And we'd pass by the guy selling reconditioned Nintendos and Sega systems, and I'd tell myself I'd get another Sega Genesis...that dream is now all but dead. But like I said, it was all about walkin' around, takin' in the sights and sounds (and sometimes smells), and spendin' time hangin' out and sharing conversation with a close friend. Sure, we could've done that damn near anywhere...but one of our favorite places to do it was the flea market. THE LISTICLE 9.13 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you this list of 14 songs about shopping (sorta).1) "Swap Meet" by Nirvana 2) "Swap Meet Louie" by Sir Mix-A-Lot 3) "Pawn Star" by De La Soul 4) "Thrift Shop" by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis 5) "I Will Buy You A New Life" by Everclear 6) "If I Had $1,000,000" by Barenaked Ladies 7) "Can't Buy Me Love" by The Beatles 8) "Store Bought Bones" by The Raconteurs 9) "Toy Store" by O.A.R. 10) "Gift Shop" by The Tragically Hip 11) "Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town" by Pearl Jam 12) "Rhymin' & Stealin'" by The Beastie Boys 13) "Shoplifters Of The World Unite" by The Smiths 14) "Been Caught Stealing" by Jane's Addiction I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  Turns out Lyn's a Witchy Woman isn't the first person to have conceived the idea of a talking pen ...when I come to my senses and realize that I too am having trouble learning how to speak and read Chinese, I'll be sure to invest in one of these bad boys. I'm really, really upset with myself that I haven't come across this on all the many miles of internet superhighway I've traveled: The Useless Web . I know this has already been all over Facebook the last day or two (thereby making it "old news" in this day and age), but I'm still finding it hilarious that grandmas are accidentally tagging themselves as "Grandmaster Flash" on Facebook posts. (And if you want to know why I think this is so funny, here's some info on Grandmaster Flash And The Furious Five .)I think that's all I had in mind for this evening...I think now I can relax, watch the rest of the Notre Dame football game online, and call it a day. Peace, making it was overrated, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| BLOG CITY PROMPT: "Tell me about your favorite hobbies. Why do you do them? Could you teach someone else how to do them?" 'Sup y'all? I lost track of time yesterday...had an afternoon meeting I forgot about and it kinda wrecked my timing the rest of the day. That, along with concentration, motivation, and procrastination issues, made for an evening I wish I could say I napped through I'd like to have back. Anyway, here's my list entry for 9/12...and later on I'll have a full entry for 9/13. I suppose I could knock this out in a hurry and say "Duh, I've got this writing hobby!" like damn near everyone else who belongs to WDC..but you know me; I can't abide by the same ol' thangs everyone else is coppin' to. And that's what's makin' this entry hard...because I don't know that I have any other hobbies besides writing or screwin' around with the help of the internet. I don't watch TV religiously or have pets or care about most things passionately. I did manage to join a club at school- The Writer's Guild (hence me attending a meeting yesterday that I forgot about, which pushed my afternoon into the battle with the forces of evil that it became). I do some leisure reading on the bus to and from school, but rarely do I read anything that isn't on an electronic device anywhere else. I wish I could say that I still played some sort of organized team sport, but my body has finally begun to betray me after years of reckless abuse. I'm a fun person wrapped up in a thick, triple-dipped boring shell. Some people can set the stage, and some people are content with watching. But others just need to be in the right situation to do their best work, and that's where I fit in. I'm the guy who sometimes needs a push before he's capable of jumping in on his own...but once I get there, I'm fine. It takes me a lot to get comfortable, but eventually the atmosphere wears like a second skin. The only other problem I have with hobbies is that once I get into something, I'm all-in. I devote myself to knowing and experiencing everything about it. I want to be the best at it. I'm great at making a full-time job out of something that's supposed to be a fun deviation from a full-time job. And then in a few weeks or so I'm burned out, and I never want to think about it again...so I go back to being virtually hobby-less (besides writing). It's like the circle trapezoid of life. And I figure a lot of it boils down to motivation. Take today, for example...I slept in, getting out of bed almost three hours later than I normally do during the week. Still feeling sluggish, I drank one of my Mountain Dew Kickstarts that I'd normally reserve for the mornings I fear falling asleep in class the most. And all I wanna do this afternoon is take a nap, because learning how to code a website isn't coming to me as easily as I wish it would and I'm dreading having to reread the stuff I've been looking at the last two weeks...it's just not clicking with me, and I know as soon as I crack my textbook I'll be on the first train to La-La-Land, and if that's the case then why not get a head start? It's frightening that after a few weeks back into the ol' college try, that last paragraph almost feels like the subject I'm most confident in is the science of napology. Maybe I should've majored in that, with an undergrad minor in eating until you can no longer think functionally or critically and need to take a nap. I think that's called "Self-induced Food Coma 101", and it meets Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays after my first class in the cafeteria, with lab period to follow in the upstairs hallways on the couches near the computer design labs. Thinking about it is making me question my ability to stay awake for the duration of writing the rest of this entry. MUSICAL BREAK!! Not to get all political or preachy on ya, but since we're talkin' about hobbies, why not let someone who has made stellar use of one of his hobbies sing a song about people who, for lack of a better way of saying it, should really find a hobby in a place that promotes the undertaking of hobbies instead of promoting a stealthy religious agenda? "The court I fear has ventured into a minefield; Slut-shaming geezers and religious extremism." Story and lyrics. THE LISTICLE 9.12 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you this list of 14 songs that may imply or necessitate the importance of having a hobby.1) "18 and Life" by Skid Row 2) "Pickin' Boogers" by Biz Markie 3) "Why Don't You Get A Job?" by The Offspring 4) "Bored" by Deftones 5) "Standing On The Corner" by Dean Martin 6) "Get Off Your Ass" by KRS-One 7) "She's In It For The Money" by Matthew Good 8) "I Wanna Get High" by Cypress Hill 9) "Eat Y'self Fitter" by The Fall 10) "She Watch Channel Zero" by Public Enemy 11) "Ask The Lonely" by The Four Tops 12) "Tired Of Sex" by Weezer 13) "Tomorrow I'll Be You" by Thursday 14) "Too Much Time On My Hands" by Styx I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs. And that's as good a place as any to pause for a smack of some sort right now, and maybe take a nap before I decide to tackle the rest of today's prompts. Peace, not propelled by government, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| BLOG CITY PROMPT: "What were you doing and where were you on 9-11 when the twin towers were attacked?" 'Sup y'all? What a coincidence...I've been a WDC member for 13+ years, and this is the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy. I don't know exactly how many 9/11-themed entries I've written; all I know is I've written too many of them, and it never gets easier. I woke up on Tuesday morning, September 11th, and it was like any other day. I had a slight hangover from being out the night before; Monday nights were Karaoke Night at the bar around the corner from 542, and my roommate and I would go up there to hang out with some of my friends. I'd met one of his friends that night, and eventually I'd start dating one of her coworkers. The previous weekend I was at a party with a bunch of people I worked with...just a random get-together that quickly devolved into multiple shenanigans, including but not limited to chugging from a bottle of Southern Comfort, and the theft of a large, commercial gumball machine. Neither directly resulted in me getting pulled over by the cops on my way home (well, maybe the Southern Comfort thing did a little), but a mix-up with my insurance led to my car getting impounded. Luckily I had a coworker who lived a block away from me at the time, and since we worked similar schedules I just walked over to her place and caught a ride from her. I hardly ever listened to the radio or the TV in the morning; I had a shower radio that played cd's, so that's what my morning routine consisted of. I had a nice walk over to LeAnne's house considering my fragile state from the previous evening's vocal shreddings and the disregard for my liver. It was a warm, sunny day. It was 9:30 (we started work at 10am). I had no clue nothing was ever gonna be the same. I'd made it up the stairs to her apartment...I liked to be a few minutes early because it's always nice to be punctual when someone's doing you a favor. Plus LeAnne was a cheerleader for a few local pro and semi-pro teams (as well as a college cheerleading coach), and she was insanely attractive...once or twice I'd shown up to see her wearing nothing above the waist but a bra and a towel around her hair. Normally we'd grumble about how tired we were or whatever, and then we'd pile into her car and I'd bitch about her shitty music for the 15 minutes it'd take us to get to work. But there was a different tone in her voice (she'd been listening to the radio while she was getting ready)...almost a sense of urgency. "We have to get to the car...something's happened but I can't figure out what" she said. I was kinda like "Eh, whatever...I could use some breakfast." But once we started off, we were able to figure out what happened...planes had flew into the World Trade Center. If you'd asked me on September 10th what the WTC was or what kind of business went on there, or even where it was located, I probably wouldn't have been able to tell you. Fortunately, we worked at the flagship retail location of a local consumer electronics company just outside of Buffalo. As soon as we walked in to the Video department, we saw that everyone who worked in the building (from the sales staff and management, the people stocking the warehouse, our delivery crew, and the accountants, bookkeepers and marketing departments) was sitting in a giant group in front of the 32" and 36" televisions, watching CNN. I don't think I'd ever been around such a large group of people (maybe 40 of us, at least) who were in collectively the same state of shock. Just after 10:30am we opened our doors, but nobody was prepared to work. Mornings were usually quiet and this was no different, but the people that did come in came because they knew we'd have TV's on and tuned in to the coverage. We sold a few extra smaller sets than normal that day, because people wanted a something for their office or wherever they were gonna be that didn't have a TV (remember...this was the pre-HDTV, internet-on-your-cell-phone, computers are everywhere era...and in Western New York alone, almost every cell phone was down for hours). Around one or two-ish, our owner came in. I think a lot of us were kinda plodding through the day, obviously distracted by the events as they'd unfolded..and nobody was prepared for the lashing he was about to dish out on us. He demanded that we change the channel to something "less depressing...everyone knows what's happened and nobody wants to see this!" Even though we had satellite reception with practically every channel known to man, it was a chore finding something appropriate to watch because every station seemed to be showing something related to another channel's coverage of the attacks. He went on for a few minutes about it, and then disappeared...he was in charge of a multi-million dollar local empire; who were we to question him? He'd been known for firing people just for yawning at his Saturday Morning Meetings, so there was no need to try and run up on him, even if he was being a dick and one of his employees had no idea if his fiancee's mother had made it out of the WTC in time or if she was alright. I came home that night shortly after 9pm, and my roommate was watching more coverage on CNN. He was all like, "OMG, dude, did you hear what happened?" and then he started to fill me in before I interrupted him to remind him that there were approximately 60 televisions running where I worked (really smart kid; just sometimes...not so bright). We sat and took in the reports and talked about it, unsure of how this was gonna affect us going forward. And looking back, it wasn't an immediate, but a more gradual change in how we would about certain things. You can say that some aspects of life have slowly made their way back to their pre-9/11 protocols; for many other things, they'll never be the same...I'm not here today to say what's wrong or what's right or to complain about anything. I'll save that for another day. For now, let's just look back on it for what it is, and give thanks to the thousands of first responders and heroes for their efforts on that fateful day, and remember those who weren't so fortunate enough to have a September 12th. MUSICAL BREAK!! I'm not a very patriotic person, but I'm sentimental enough to know the significance and importance of this song. THE LISTICLE 9.11 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you this list of 14 songs about peace, war, and freedom.1) "Keep On Rockin' In The Free World" by Neil Young 2) "Freedom" by Rage Against The Machine 3) "Give Peace A Chance" by John Lennon 4) "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)" by George Harrison 5) "Masters Of War" by Bob Dylan 6) "Peace Train" by Cat Stevens 7) "War Pigs" by Black Sabbath 8) "Details Of The War" by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah 9) "Soldier Boys And Jesus Freaks" by Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds 10) "War Song" by O.A.R. 11) "People Got To Be Free" by The Rascals 12) "Bullets" by Hawksley Workman 13) "Uh-Merica" by Regina Spektor 14) "Apocalypse WOW! (Feat. Hungary Bear)" by Reggie And The Full Effect I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  More fallout from the decision by Apple to release U2's new album for free to anyone with an iTunes account! (Or, kids who are even lazier than me...or, count this among the things I never could've imagined happening or hearing in the 21st century.) "Who is U2?"  For further proof that text messaging and Twitter are ruining the English language as we know it (and thereby causing a rapid decline in intelligent society), please see the above link. I've always hated "LOL", but the fact that "loool" now exists makes me wanna crack myself in the dome with an unabridged dictionary. And while I'm guilty of the occasional "WTF?" from time to time (although I most certainly prefer to say all three words out loud, in full), I've never seen so many "tf" abbreviations in one place before, and if you think WTF looks dumb, "who tf" looks like a dictionary's abortion.And that's all I have to say about today...peace, do what we gotta do, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| BLOG CITY PROMPT: "Pretend you were on the Mayflower on that first voyage to settle in America. Describe how you felt leaving England and seeing your new home." Good evening dear readers! I've had a surprisingly active day, considering it was my day off. It'd probably actually be a good night to take off from Blogville, but I signed up for "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" so I should at least make an effort, right?And this really isn't my cup of tea whatsoever...this falls under "American History", no? Definitely not one of my better subjects, along with pretending. Luckily, as I was digging through some of my old poetry notebooks, I came across the journal I kept from when I made the maiden Mayflower voyage to America (or as we called it back then, "Let's all get on the boat and see how far this thing'll go!"). I'd be honored to share a few tidbits of my trip with you. I imagine I'll have mixed emotions- sadness and optimism- throughout the journey. I don't want to say goodbye to the friends and family I'll be leaving behind, yet I'm anxious and ready to start a new life over in the promised land. I wasn't sure how I'd feel though about being stuck on a boat for however long it takes to float from England to the US...especially without working plumbing. It's been three days in now, and I'm a little cranky...especially with the Johnsons' little pisspots kicking the back of my seat pretty much from the minute we shoved off. And it's a good thing anti-sea pollution laws haven't been created yet, because I don't know where all the garbage is gonna go. The receptacles at either end of the ship are overflowing, and Macgillicuddy's been using extra napkins with all of his meals. No wonder he weighs 175 kilograms...he's been taking double rations and eating everyone's leftovers. I swear if those Johnson brats kick the back of my seat one more time, someone's gonna have to invent life preservers if they're gonna see the other end of this shining sea. It only took 27 days and nights for the first cry of "Aren'ts thou there yet?" Yet it was ten minutes before it was repeated by some other a-hole who thought he was being funny. No sir...you're not funny, and your wife's ugly too. I think I left a few hot coals still glowing in the wood-burning stove...or did I? I usually put them out right away, but this time I don't recall doing so. I hope I did...I had to! But what if I didn't? And what if this trip doesn't work out and I have to go back to England, only my house and the whole village has burned down because I forgot to completely extinguish a fire? What have I done? I need a Xanax. And a glass of wine. Seriously...you'd think with all these people on a boat this big, there'd be more than one bathroom. I don't know what's more mind-boggling...that, or how we have any food rations left with Macgillicuddy's fat arse hoarding everything. I get that we're British and all, but I've dropped approximately 341 hints to the Johnsons that I might consider offing one of their kids for kicking the back of my seat...and no one wants to switch with me (probably because they knew what holy terrors those bastards are...thanks for the heads' up, jerks). I can be polite without Xanax and wine only for so long...good thing I can't be prosecuted on international waters for ocean rage. Man, I hope that wherever this thing ends up docking, the people there don't have more ridiculous accents than us folks from the UK. I can't take not being able to understand foreigners. Ya know what I could really go for right now? Some turducken. With my luck though, these people probably only have tofurkey...such a backwards society if I've ever seen one. They don't deserve all this land; they're just wasting it! Wow...it's funny when you look back at the stuff you wrote almost four hundred years ago. You see how your views have changed and matured, plus you get taken back to places that no longer exist. Wonder whatever happened to those Johnson kids... MUSICAL BREAK!! Because what else soundtracks the voyage from England to a pre-colonized America better than a song by a guy who used to sing about surfing but hated swimming...and then having his masterpiece album shelved for years because the process of touring and songwriting was making the singer crazy? And for good measure, let's make a video with that song set to awkward (and possibly inapporpriate) 1970's commercials. Long live the queen! THE LISTICLE 9.10 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you 14 songs (at least sorta) about traveling.1) "Travelling Riverside Blues" by Led Zeppelin 2) "Last Train To Clarksville" by The Monkees 3) "Travel" by Atmosphere 4) "Silver Jet" by The Tragically Hip 5) "Travelin' Band" by Creedence Clearwater Revival 6) "Back In The USSR" by The Beatles 7) "March Into The Sea" by Modest Mouse 8) "Take The Long Way Home" by Supertramp 9) "Rock Island Line" by Johnny Cash 10) "Ferry Cross The Mersey" by Gerry & The Pacemakers 11) "Mothership Connection" by Parliament 12) "I'm On A Boat" by The Lonely Island 13) "Aeroplane" by Red Hot Chili Peppers 14) "Boats 'N Hoes" by John C. Reilly & Will Ferrell I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs. So I'm sure many of you have heard by now that Apple will be coming out with a new iPhone very soon ("Note: Yes , I'll be pre-ordering my iPhone 6 at th...") and to celebrate the quote-unquote big launch, some rock band from Ireland released (for free) a new studio album to everyone with an iTunes account (a group of which I'm a participant in, even though I'll probably never own an iPhone). Sure enough, I opened my iTunes library yesterday, and there it was...a brand spankin' new U2 album. I haven't listened to it yet (because ok, I like U2 and all, but I'm not a diehard fan and if this album weren't free, I doubt I'd shell out the $11.99 it's probably gonna retail for on iTunes once it's no longer free) but these 10 reactions to U2's new album , no lie, kinda have me intrigued (in a tire fire kind of way). My favorites are JJ Dunning's and Jacques Greene's tweets.And just like that, I've completed another entry...I'm debating if I want to study a little more for my Web Design class, because that seems to be about the only thing that puts me to sleep in a relatively short amount of time these days (and rendering my trip to school this afternoon almost useless), but instead I think I'm gonna hang around here for a few minutes and try to avoid gettin' into any trouble. Peace, roll over, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| BLOG CITY PROMPT: "Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things. Take this and apply it to your blog in any way you see fit." What's up y'all? I've been dilly-dallying through most of my free time today, so I guess you could say I wasted every opportunity I've had to write a full blog entry two days in a row. On the plus side however, I managed to finally learn how to take a nap during my four hour Tuesday break, which actually worked out pretty well...so by tomorrow, I should be all caught up on sleep, mostly healed from the cold I had over the weekend, and down for whatever else the rest of the week should throw at me. Well, I try not to sweat the petty things...but sometimes you just need to prove a point or can't easily let go of something that, for lord only knows why, seems so very important. Inconsequential in every venue except your heart, mind, or both. Why are we like this? What drives us to become stark raving lunatics over something only we care about? I'm sure there's been some kind of study done on this (and I'm too lazy to Google it right now or else I totally would), as undoubtedly it happens a hell of a lot more than we care to admit. On the other hand, petting the sweaty things...I'm of two vastly different minds when it comes to this: 1) Does this happen so much in such a disgusting fashion that we had to rearrange the letters of one of literature's best coping and motivational guides to suit the lesser-informed population; and 2) If we're being true to our primal urges and tendencies, is this really such a bad thing?  I say: if it feels good, go with it; if it doesn't, it's most likely wrong. That's some advice you can use in many facets of your life, free of charge. MUSICAL BREAK!! No matter which side of the argument (if there even is one) you're on, perhaps this is your best first step. THE LISTICLE 9.9 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you 14 songs that could possibly be referencing a sweat-inducing activity.1) "Twist And Shout" by The Beatles 2) "Shake Your Rump" by The Beastie Boys 3) "Firestarter" by The Prodigy 4) "What It Is To Burn" by Finch 5) "Glory Burning" by Felt 6) "100 Miles And Runnin'" by NWA 7) "Ballin' On A Budget" by Nappy Roots 8) "The High Heat" by Wilco 9) "Paris In Flames" by Thursday 10) "Bonus Mosh Pt. II" by Taking Back Sunday 11) "Get It Faster" by Jimmy Eat World 12) "P.S. New York Is Burning" by Jawbreaker 13) "The Burning Of" by Boysetsfire 14) "Fire Water Burn" by Bloodhound Gang I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  Because ZOMG, 26 Reasons Kids Are Pretty Much Just Tiny Drunk Adults .And it's about that time...I've had my first yawn of the evening, so I better wrap this up and start the sleep-prep ritual if I wanna be out by 1am (I'll settle for not knowing when I'll fall asleep as long as I can sleep through the whole night). Peace, with those laser beams, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
| 30DBC PROMPT: "I used to say to my children that each of us has a disability, that no one is perfect. Some of the most compelling and enduring stories are often about those who rise above their limitations. Share with us how you work within the confines of your own disability or someone in your family each day and manage to thrive." Hey folks! Due to the good fortune of having another three hour class cut short by 1.5 hours, I'm gonna attempt for the first time in what feels like forever to answer three prompts and add in a list for good measure. I can safely commit to this because the rate of intaking air through my nose has increased to approximately 40% of its original capacity (up from 10% this past weekend). And of course, this would be the prompt I'd pick to come back to, and on the rare chance I'd read someone else's entry before writing my own, I came across Fran 💜 💜 💜 's ("Invalid Entry" )...which made me consider maybe not blogging again for a few weeks or even months because her response was drop the mic epic and there's no way in my opinion anyone's gonna compete with her entry today. (Can I say that out loud, as a judge this month's "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" ? Too late I guess.)I mean, I have an actual disability diagnosis, but it's more of an inconvenience (albeit sometimes a much bigger inconvenience than at other times), and I'll probably be taking medications of some sort for the rest of my life that may or may not work and will require constant awareness of their effectiveness in case it reaches a point that I'll have to be put on something else...but the actuality is that I'm able to lead a life that is practically on par with everyone who doesn't have to recite a page in a medical glossary upon introduction into most circles or gobble a handful of pills to get through a day. And it feels kind of foolish for me to be talking about it, because that's the kind of person I am...I'm always aware that no matter what I'm going through at any given time, someone else is doing a whole lot more with a completely different took kit. I may have a few loose screws, but someone else is building apartment complexes without even turning a screwdriver. Like I commented to Fran after reading her entry, "I've been whining all weekend about a little chest cold...", yet she's been able to be successful by remaining positive and determined, despite the fact that she can't just take a Dayquil and a handful of cough drops and proclaim herself cured for the next six to eight hours. Not that depression is anything to sneeze at...obviously it's been in the news a little more than normal in the last month, and I've made a few references to it from time to time. The actual terminology I've heard more than a couple times involving me has been "severe depressive disorder", which is exactly what it sounds like. In my case, roughly every three to five years I basically have a meltdown. Typically it's not triggered by anything in particular; in fact, it's usually a multitude of things going incredibly wrong at an amazing pace. The more things start to pile up, the less inclined I am to deal with any of it, and then as it all starts to hit me I become overwhelmed and shut down almost completely. I become irrational, it gets ugly, authorities are involved, and easily for the next six months I'm fending off the personal notion that I've become a scrawny caricature of myself. My chronic insomnia plays into that as well...which is why a lot of times closer toward it becoming later in the evening I'll cut short conversations or you'll stop receiving email responses if that's how we're handling business. I've made the mistake a few times of taking different sleep aids and trying to converse while waiting for them to kick in, which often resulted in me having no recollection the next morning that I was damn near incoherently agreeing to things I probably shouldn't have been. And if you weren't sure about that before, I'm here to say for certain that it's not a good look on anyone. But hey, we're all here on this big ol' planet for whatever reasons, and we were each meant to do certain things. Most of our jigsaw puzzles didn't come complete with all 1,000 pieces, and some of us didn't even get a picture on the front of the box to go by, but that doesn't mean that has to stop anyone from being someone else's Rembrandt or Picasso. Life's what you make of it, and it's what you do with what you were given rather than bitchin' about what you don't have that gets you to where you want to be. I feel like I say this a lot, but it's all about perspective. BCF PROMPT: "Write anything you want using these words: clown, discredit, small, butter, tempt, towering, mouse, stir. And then there's this installment of Jokes You're Not Supposed To Get.What's the difference between a discredited clown and a towering mouse? One can stir small butter; the other can tempt smutterballs. Get it?! No? Because you're not supposed to! MUSICAL BREAK!! Having a depression (or any other mental illness) diagnosis isn't the end of the world, and it doesn't mean you've opened the door to a special kind of sadness only you know the words to. I like to think of it as being aware of so much more going on around you, but not knowing how to cope with it or explain it...because once we can come to terms with it, we can start treating and managing it, right? But the hardest part is understanding that you're at the point where you can't understand things anymore. It's a tricky spot to be in and a hard place to try navigating on your own...then imagine that cycling through its worst progressions every couple of years and having to fight your way back to who you always thought you were capable of being. It's pretty effed up, even when you've sought help...like your mind and body all the sudden become immune to generic normalcy, and a revolt happens. I think we all have days where nothing feels good and we don't know why, but eventually most people can find their own ways out of them whether it's with ice cream, or shopping, or comforting conversation. People with depression can't easily do that, and patterns of behavior can begin to develop from even the smallest of misfortunes. "Changed my mind so much I can't even trust it; my mind changed me so much I can't even trust myself." Lyrics. Interpretations. THE DAILY BOX SCORE:  "Tell us about a time when you completely lost track of time. Does it happen often or hardly at all?"I was once a teenage boy...of course I "lost track of time", especially in the company of a pretty teenage girl. But I've come to learn as an adult I really hate having no concept of time, and resorting to guessing what the time might be kinda sucks. It's all my own fault though, because I refuse to wear a watch...whenever I would wear them, they became a magnet for walls, furniture, and people within a close enough proximity to my wrist. I could buy a new watch and scratch up the face within a day or two, no matter how careful I was. Luckily, cell phones began to surge in popularity shortly after I quit watches cold turkey, so I was never without the time on my person...although one of my OCD tendencies is to, upon entering a room for the first time, locate the clock (via either the microwave, the VCR, some kitschy knick-knack, or any other means at my disposal...you know, so I don't have to slip my phone outta my pocket every five to ten minutes). Losing track of time sucks...probably more as an adult than it does when you're a kid. At least when you're growing up, makin' out likely had somethin' to do with it. When you're playin' grown-up, you're expected to not lose track of time. Like, part of passing from puberty to full-scale adulthood means that time-lapse trait gets wiped out (and you can't blame it on the hot chick from around the block you've been eyein' up). I think we've sorta got it all wrong though, us silly adults. When we're supposed to wake up by 7am to be at work before 8, but don't roll outta bed until 7:49, we say we "overslept". I'm calling bullshit on that. We didn't oversleep...nope. We lost track of time. We were too friggin' lazy to hit the snooze alarm one last time while trying to convince ourselves to get up...and somewhere in the process that turns into deciding we're adult enough to handle closing our eyes "just for five more minutes". And don't look at me like you don't know what I'm talking about. Luckily (really??) for me, this hasn't happened very often to me anymore. For some reason, when I have an alarm set, my body goes into some weird panic mode about two hours before it's supposed to go off, waking me up to make sure I haven't overslept. Then I fall back into a half-sleep, dreaming awkward dreams involving social situations with girls I had crushes on twenty years ago and haven't seen since until I'm jarred awake by a sterile polyphonic noise that hates me just as the dreamin' is gettin' good, if ya know what I'm sayin' .Maybe for that reason alone I should look into ways of living without ever having to sleep again. THE LISTICLE 9.8 In conjunction with "BLOG CITY presents: The LIST" , I present to you a list of 14 songs that feature time or a unit that measures it.1) "Time After Time" by Cyndi Lauper 2) "Man Of The Hour" by Pearl Jam 3) "Ten Minutes" by The Get Up Kids 4) "Seconds Away" by Vendetta Red 5) "Time In A Bottle" by Jim Croce 6) "Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos" by Public Enemy 7) "In A Minute" by Ours 8) "Stop For A Minute" by Keane 9) "After Hours" by The Velvet Underground 10) "Big Time" by Peter Gabriel 11) "6 Minutes Of Pleasure" by LL Cool J 12) "The Best Of Times" by Styx 13) "10 Days Late" by Third Eye Blind 14) "In The Meantime" by Spacehog I trust that you all know how to use YouTube if you're interested enough in any of these songs.  I've probably shared this link before, but it popped up in my Facebook newsfeed the other day and it's too great not to post up again..."Replacing guns in classic movie scenes with a thumbs up."  It dawned on me today that I've never, ever, stepped foot in a Walmart by myself before. I could probably count on both hands and feet how many times I've gone to Walmart in general, but it's always been with someone else...until today. I had time to kill on my way home between my morning class and my night class, and I needed a few things, so I stopped at the worst place in America to shop local Walmart for my grocery needs...and dammit if everything wasn't cheaper. But I now know why I can't go there alone...it sends my anxiety skyrocketing. At least when I've gone with someone else, I've been able to make jokes to other people about the, ahem, "scenery". But when I'm unaccompanied, these jerks just piss me off to no end. No matter how wide they make the aisles, there's always that a-hole who'll park her cart with eight six-packs of soda hangin' off the sides in the middle of the aisle so no one can get past her as she decides which cans of soup will best go with her diabetes. Everyone- I mean everyone- has a heightened sense of needing to turn corners as fast as they can, hoping you'll walk in front of their cart so they can sue you for the first degree burns their Dunkin Donuts coffee gave them as you bounced off their giant shopping vessel. And speaking of their carts...they're all one size, and they're huge. I wanted just enough things that I couldn't carry by hand (as I had my school stuff with me), but I didn't need the Cadillac Brougham of department store transportation either; a simple basket with handles that I carry in one hand would've been suitable. And finally, I showed up at Walmart's magical time for all of society's ills...3:30pm. The senior citizens winding up their day by not giving a damn about anyone but themselves, the harried single moms who've just picked up their rambunctious children from school, and the shiftless/aimless/reckless who have no clue why they're there other than where else are they supposed to be on a sunny day that isn't in a basement in front of an Xbox? Of all the god damn pharmaceuticals available in this country for all sorts of real and imaginary illnesses, why isn't there an EpiPen for nerves I can jam into my thigh for when I need to go to Walmart without another adult to keep me somewhat saner? Just sedate me so I can shop unobstructed by my impatience with evolution reaching into all corners of this Walmart society.And that said, it's good to be back for another night. If you've made it this far, thanks for stoppin' by. Peace, the truth is it's myself, and GOODNIGHT NOW!! |
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