People with incredible intelligence and motivation and a lot more time on their hands

oh, they Blog here:

Hope Blogging

Go there and thank me lately.

That is all.

Didn't go, didn't get the goddamn shirt

Goddamnit, I was supposed to be at BlogHer but circumstance confounded me (Grace losing her dad, for one) and I wasn't able to finally meet the true owner of my heart (though, I understand she hooked up HUGE). It's not like they needed me there, running around in my speed-o and spilling rum and cokes over everyone but still, it would have been fun to piss on the baby leopard at the chicago zoo and pound on Amy Sullivan's door at 4 AM screaming about her aborting our baby, especially after all the acid we'd done together. The bitch was insatiablee on acid, would go all night, wake the goddamn neighbors. C'mon Amy, PLEEEEEEZE.

Oops - Amy Sedaris. Shit. That's uncool. Too many rum and cokes - sorry. After security would escort me outside (and what an idiotic mistake - Sedaris being so much finer than Sullivan), I'd have stumbled back to the zoo to piss on the baby leopard - again, mama leopard be damned.

Cuz I roll like that, yo. Mamacat awed by my huge schwang waving around, pissing on her babies, wide-eyed and afraid, wondering if I'd hit her over the head with that monster and dead to the ankles afraid I'd poke her. Hard. Pissing on kittens and unafraid of getting clawed and bit. Especially by Amy Sullivan, not Amy Sedaris.

Another reason they kept me away from coming to BlogHer

David Brooks, are you Harvard educated kids in Iraq?

Well, Scarlett wasn't ready and we never made our visit to the MBS villa. On Tuesday night (on my way to gather my brood), the alternator belt snapped; after I replaced the belt on Yuesday, the fuel pump went yesterday. I must have some kind of karma because when I intended to visit MBS before, my Audi decided to start overheating and once it was in the shop, I learned the timing housing was about to go. As much as I want to (and need to) get to where MBS lives, the universe has been clear about what I needed to do to prevent being stranded on some desert stretch of road. Still, that hasn't prevented me from feeling worthless for not being able to get to MBS, and my karmic coincidence hasn't come without a psychic cost. We can equivocate about how well it worked out that my cars have taken a dump the day before I was about to hit the road (so didn't die somewhere miles from nowhere) but I nonetheless can't avoid the thought that something is holding me back.

Maybe it's just poverty; that certainly makes sense. Despite what the useful idiot David Brooks says, this isn't a smashing, rockin' economy. Those of us who are struggling to just get by (or know those who are), we're not interested in knowing that the top 1% are living fat. If everything's so fanfuckingtastic, where's ours?

Bug-B-Gon No Mo!

In the continuing saga of this marvelously charmed summer, my long-time toy has come home to me.


She (“Scarlett”) and I have been together for 19 years and have traveled all over, often on bailing wire and snot, duct tape and spare rubber, mostly with me chanting, "go Scarlett, go," a mantra that works, sometimes, but usually it involving me and my scraped up knuckles rammmed against hot metal, me growling against her and her pissing brake fluid and attitude, rattling ass in that proprietary Veedub chitter that announces a bug like a cicada. In the bonnet (not trying to be some pretentious anglophile prick but I can't think of a better term for it) is still a bedroll, tarp, cooking & fishing gear, sundry survival items (i.e. pipe fittings and faucet screens), and a WWII surplus camouflage net: I can pull over almost anywhere (and I did, many times), throw the net over her and shove in some branches, find some solitude, get a huge buzz on, or just create a quiet place to rest my head. Before the kids, it was more often than not that I'd let her spontaneously take me somewhere into the mountains where I'd never been, a couple days and nights free, me free, everything free but gas and beer and a package of hotdogs. With the engine in the rear and the incredible amount of torque that goes with that, she took me places no regular car (or even trucks) could go. We've made it up many jeep-trails and never once was I scared we'd get stuck.

Today, as we drove north, Lilly asked if Scarlett talks to me. Feeling the vibration of the steering wheel, the torque flexing as I shifted, I had to say "yes," she does, she's happy, tickled that the children who played in her while she stood idle and broken are now enjoying the wind rushing through her windows. I talk to her, she talks to me and I think, for most things, we understand each other.

A couple years ago, I dated a goth girl for about five minutes. She needed a car and I foolishly lent Scarlett to her, believing her when she said she knew how to use a shifter. Some small part of me believes Scarlett was miffed at my promiscuous palming her off but whatever the reason, she refused to move, her clutch flacid and worthless. Two years of slave-wages had her silent and still in my driveway, weeds growing around her tires and through her bumper, sad and forsaken, a plaything for my kids but not for me.

And now she's back, purring perfectly. We're taking her south this week to see MBS and her girls, a 4 hour drive through desert and mountains. I'll pack a lot Capris Sun, coloring books, and soft toys. We'll leave early to get through the desert while the day is cool, hit the mountains by late-morning. No DVD, no A/C, just us and some road songs and long looks out the window where imaginations run free. I'll post some pics later in the week.

I am a happy man.

Out of the Burbs and into the pit 7/8/07

...and you will know us by the mud on our Chucks

The universe was shining brightly Sunday as my Binary Star and I blazed to Denver for the Warped Tour. Almost sixty bands on five stages, none of them on the bill to induce a meditative mood. Considering the skull-smashing hangovers we were both nursing (resulting from the too-much-fun we'd shared on Saturday night), meditation was about as welcome as menudo (both the soup AND the band).

A perfect punk vibe, all DYI and seat of our pants: the tix hadn't arrived in MBS's mailbox by Saturday (we had to arrange for alternates at Will Call), we woke up late (see above, RE: near-fatal hangover), when we arrived at the hotel the room wasn't ready, it took FOREVER to get a cab and MBS missed one of the "must sees" on her list, Tiger Army (I took a punch in the shoulder for that one). Intrepid orbs us, we plunged headlong into the crowds and had one of the best times of my life, ever.

The first stop was the beer tent (overpriced watery crap) to take the edge off our hangovers. Since necessity breeds desperation, we drained a couple of plastic cups without complaint - hell, it was with a sigh of relief. Got a couple more cupfuls and headed off to see the tail end of Big D and the Kid's Table set, a ska/punk outfit. Wandering some more, we finally made it to The Line-Up Board
where we were finally able to get oriented as to who was where, when and all that (though I admit I was pretty much disoriented all day). You can probably blow the pic up and see most of the band names; short of that, I can tell you our next band was Pennywise which, two songs into the, the producers shut down due to the impending thunderstorm.

The skies opened up and really dumped. Naturally, we grabbed a couple of beers and took refuge from the pouring rain under a Miller

You can't see it in the pic but rain was streaming down the bill of my cap and watering down my already watery beer (note to Warped Tour people: get us some microbrew!). The storm lasted about an hour and people huddled where they could

although I'm not sure a tree is the place I'd want to stand during a thunderstorm, even if there wasn't much lightning. Needless to say, we weren't rained out and Pennywise took the stage again - probably my favorite band of the day.

Yeah, blurry (a phone pic ferchrisesake) but you can see I was right up on the pit and was getting jostled a lot. And yeah, this old man did go into the pit (during Bad Religion) and I have a scab on my elbow from getting knocked to the pavement. Two guys were right there to lift me up and throw me back into the eddy which was totally cool slam-dance etiquette and warmed my heart considerably. I didn't crowd surf, though; hell, I'm OLD!!!

The next few bands didn't do much for us so we spent some time walking around, checking out booths, drinking more beer. The place was a maze - and amazing - we

eventually ended up at the Pepper table where I got a shirt and CD signed for MBS. Their set was fun, punk-reggae from Hawaii.

More fun :-D MBS and me...

Finally, the headliners Bad Religion... again, too fuzzy but I think you get a sense of how much energy - LOVING ENERGY - was there for all to share.

And as the sun set on Invesco

we bid goodbye to one of the most excellent days ever...

....oh, but what a night!!!

"I am IRONY man...."

Doooo Doooooooooooooooooooo.....

Duh duh dadadada DUH dadada DUH da DUH DUH

Just wondering when children of privilege feel the least bit icky when they post Mission of Burma up on their site and not recall that the barb was meant for them.

Wot? Hello...

G Is for Not Just One George

Gilbert and his brother, plus the monkey,
Plus the Boy, plus the place to touch,
Plus the force in a high-speed plane at upper altitude.
Then there is the grape we learned to drink

And the gas we loved to guzzle and the nightmare
Of a president we suffered to the world
When he looked into the gorge between true and facile
And said, Bring them on. Sad, sad,

Sad going world nowhere.
"They" say curiosity is what keeps us going.
(The girl who only repeats what she hears
On the NPR smacks her gum

And fingers her Hop-along gun in its holster;
She purchased it in August on eBay.
Graphic novels are all she'll read, she says,
But she's lying. At night she reads Goethe

And studies the German way
Of saying her gutturals.
Get your hands out of the gutter, Girlie.
She doesn't dare look his way but only spits

Out her gum into a tissue. She has "issues"—
Obviously.) And Gandhi, who can forget him?
Although clearly some have. And an earlier war's grudge.
Does anyone's mind go there anymore? The jungle

Heat, the endless night cicada cacophony.
The sick whir of the rotors, men clinging
To landing skids, sweat drizzling down
Along every subtle pattern a spine can possibly make,

The hovercraft adrift, pirouetting above
The American Embassy. Yes, Virginia, it is Saigon
I'm speaking of. And, yes, you're so right.
After a while, the mind goes silent.

Even though there's always a bid in, and the crying
Of another proffered lot. Another other voice echoing itself
As the gong of the inevitable "Going, going, gone"
While someone crumples over somewhere and—

We gasp, as if we didn't comprehend it would end
This way nor what Dylan meant years ago
When he played guitar
And said we wouldn't need a weatherman.

Get it going on for our friends and family who never served, say you? I have plenty friends and family serving who hate this war (and our retard president) who are kind of sick of them, separated by degrees, yet not doing one goddamn thing to get them that sacrifice out of the sandbox.

Wave that flag, wave it wide and high

One of the bursts from Red Mountain

Picking myself up from yesterday's full-on psychotic ramble, we strolled down to the park for barbecued buffalo flesh, balloon animals, and a park full of over-priced crap. It was a perfect 4th of July, probably the best Independence Day I've ever spent; music and love and children running wild for whatever moments they have left as innocents in their here and now, all that which we'd sell our souls for, just to possess a fraction. We danced, we dipped our toes in the stream,

climbed to new heights,

and danced together as local bands played folky/swing stuff in the midst of a hail storm.

I hope your fourth was as full of love, fun, and free of the shit that Bush/Cheney have sunk our country under, participles dangling withstanding and Constitution compromised.

Oh yeah - here's me:

(via http://www.simpsonsmovie.com/main.html)

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you tomorrow

Happy time, yes, as I said yesterday, summertime and the livin’ is easy, everything sweet as pink lemonade. Tomorrow will be a blast (of course, please excuse the pun) and our hoard will be terrorizing my tiny town, making the sidewalks sticky with spilled soda and tufts of cotton candy. Manitou Springs sponsors a big buffalo barbecue in the park and we’ll be there, enjoying the day, waiting for the fireworks, celebrating another year of our great country.

Happy time, yes, and yet I am furious, enraged by the lawlessness of Bush and enraged by the Eloi stupidity of our Washington elites and bovine press corpse. Patting themselves on the back for looking out for themselves, their well-connected pals, and how that's been achieved on the backs - and the blood - of honest Americans.

A little over 13 years ago I made a stupid mistake, I was busted for possession of a small amount of meth. For that I received a felony that has haunted me ever since. Fortunately, my current employer only asks about crimes from the past 7 years so it was overlooked (aside from speeding tickets, my record is spotless the past 13 years). I didn't lie to a grand jury, I didn't out an undercover CIA operative, I did my time like a man and put my past behind me. Fuckwit Bush did not commute my sentence.

Before I collapse into a shrill and incoherent rant, I'll let what Keith Olbermann said tonight speak for me:

And now, when just one cooked book gets corrected by an honest auditor…

When just one trampling of the inherent and inviolable “fairness” of government is rejected by an impartial judge…

When just one wild-eyed partisan is stopped by the figure of blind justice…

This President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but instead to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of you becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.

Tomorrow I'll celebrate the ideal of what my country promises and try to forget what it has become under the corrupt leadership of George W. Bush. I wish you all a joyous Fourth and may God have mercy on our president.

No cure for the summertime blues

This has been a long time between posts and I wonder if there’s really any reason to post. Over the past few weeks, I’ve wondered if I should continue this – I’ve felt like I have nothing to say, that there’s no real reason for this blog. It’s not that I’m miserable or anything, Quite the contrary, I am happier than I have been in years, perhaps ever. The job I have now (although not in my field) pays very well, is employee-focused, and doesn’t send me home limp and emotionally shattered. I’ve been dating someone who meets and exceeds every quality I’d associate with the concept of “soulmate” (it doesn’t hurt that I also find her stunning, a goddess). So much of this blog has shown me whining about how dismal my life has been and I was all too ready to spill that out here on your screens. Now that things are one big ice-cream sundae, I have been tight-lipped, as it were.



Part of that is superstition. Funny how an atheist like myself will give credence to silly beliefs but honestly, I am afraid that I write about the good things, I’ll somehow jinx that by merely making it real here in the blogosphere. Maybe that’s from a deeper belief that what’s good in my life is merely a dream and that by writing about it will shatter the illusion but I’m circumspect about going into detail about those aspects of my life.



I’m also trying to write a novel and that seems to be drawing energy off of what I’d normally expend here at this little dive. As notes and sketches come together, I’ll give the three or four of you who read me a little preview.



And finally – is there a mixmania! Going on? I have to check my archives, I’m pretty sure we had a cool theme this time but I’ve spaced stuff out here (for reasons I mentioned above).



Hey, it’s summer – too nice to be inside on the web or composing blog posts. Enjoy the weather.

Milestones and millstones

At the end of the summer, Zeke starts kindergarten.

Damn, when I started this, he was still making massive messes in diapers (which I avoided mentioning, thankyouverymuch) and now we're here, with him starting school. What a long, strange trip it's been.

I don't have much to say, really - finishing my parent's yard (I swear, pics in July), working loads of OT - my life is going swimmingly. As I told the binary star in my newly sweet system, I think I've swept all the karmic junk into the gutter, the past is dribbling into the sewer hole where the kids catch air on their skateboards.

To KC - the birds are at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. To everyone else - enjoy your summer, I know I will. Peace.

Of melodies pure and true

Fuzzy birds - no camera but my phone:



Our local zoo tries, tries hard. Regretably, there's not much you can do at this altitude and zone but they've really done much to move beyond the conrete slab/metal cage presentation of animals and although the selection is not that diverse, at least it's not a circus.

The newest display involves free-flying birds, parrots and parakeets and all those kinds of animals (as you saw in the first pic) that may or may not be eager to eat you shit-on-a-stick. Zeke lucked out (as usual), some large tufted bird landed on his head then crawled down his arm to eventually sit on his finger. I wish I had pics of all that but I was busy assuring him that the bird wouldn't peck his brains out, showing him how to put his finger out as a perch, watching the light in his eyes flash as he held the bird on his finger



The girls weren't as lucky, no birds landing on them much less looking for a seed stick. Nonetheless, they found some willing beaks:





And at the end of it, I took three very tired children home to reflect on what they'd experienced, where they'd been and of course, they just wanted to eat and go to bed. However, the proof is in the eternity because, at the end of this day, they're still talking about their experience whereas I'm wondering how I'm going to get my struts replaced.

Kids - heh.

We Eights it, it burns us….

Kim – thinking person’s blog; a couple of months ago but it’s been clear that the last couple of months have been blogging desert for me.

The first rule of the game is to post the rules of the game. Here they are:

* Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
* People who are tagged need to write posts in their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
* At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
As the world’s worst blogger, I shouldn’t have to explain one damn thing but I will because, hey, I’m the world’s worst blogger and the half-assed excuses for my half-assed life make for some compelling reading. That is, if you’re here because you’re done reading the back of the soup can.

One of the reasons I haven’t been writing much (aside from not having much other than, “Got up and after I discovered I had to pee, realized I hate to iron!”) is that it’s Spring and the Garden and the lawn calls. Flowers and vegetables to be planted, plots to be rearranged, rocks to be hauled and holes to be dug. Once the hint that Winter was edging towards the past tense, I’ve been ripping out the old and deciding how the new should be arranged, accepting that a hard freeze is part of a Rocky Mountain Spring.

This is all done at my parent’s house, BTW. My own place is owned by tweakers, my yard full of boxes of dead printer parts and bricks.
Tomorrow I’ll give you (both of you) a pictorial tour of the work or work-in-progress – I wish I’d had the foresight to do before/after but thank God I didn’t – and you can see my hand hasn’t been idle, in service of the devil, and far too dirty to, well, you know.

Until then, I need to acknowledge those who have acknowledged me. The first be the Fabulous Kim (and this is WAY overdue – I’m such a schmuck) for nominating me and writing REALLY nice things about me for a Thinking Blogger award. She said:

Nino the Mindboggler at Patriside. If only everyone could write like this man... It's impossible not to mull over his thoughts, go ahead, go see for yourself.

Which is a bit like Carson McCullers throwing a bone to a drooling undergrad. I appreciate the award and the kudos. I'll eventfully put that button up when the Zero Boss awards me the $50 Amazon certificate I was supposed to get back in March (what a good month for me!). Kind of cynical on buttons, I guess.

And on top of that, I need to acknowledge the magnificent MizMell and the hurt she just put on me for this meme thing. Less a meme and more a game, so let's play...

The first rule of the game is to post the rules of the game. Here they are:

* Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
* People who are tagged need to write posts in their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
* At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

Here’s mine:

• Obviously, I love to garden/do yardwork; there's something about a lush, green lawn that gets me going;
  
• I'm not one of those PC "freethinker" athiests: my kids believe in Santa, the Easter Bunny, and watch "Veggie Tales" - they'll figure it out at the end of the day;
  
• When we go camping, my children know Orion, Scorpio, Leo, et al, because, at the end of the night, what else are you gonna’ do?
  
• Ego narro latin volubiliter; just kidding, I know enough to translate most romance languages, v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y;
  
• I have tried to read Ulysses four times and have always been stalled just after the funeral scene;
  
• I read Atrios, then DKos every day; Tbogg and Sadly, No! every day because, if you're going to watch the feathers plucked out of a turd chucked under a chin, you might as well do it from a distance, eh;
  
• I hate blogs that whine about being tagged but more than that, I hate blogs that just ignore the tag and shift their superior nose to the air to sniff where no one cares whatnot and such.

Ka-faw, ka-faw, ka-faw... here's your eight:
Mamacita, Vicki, Landismom, Sarah, Trusty,
Anne,
Lauren, and the afformentioned Zero Boss

I'll email all these folks but I expect a 25% return rate so I leave it to you to wonder WTF happened... cheers!

Mixmania! - Your life story

To all you mothers – I hope your day was full of laughter and burnt French Toast and May flowers. I would have written my own tribute to you mothers but I had my own mothers to contend with, tributes and tribulations.

There’s been a lot distracting me lately, the least of which is my parent’s yard and my urge to make it pretty. Pics to be provided this weekend. There’s a lot more to say but I dunna’ wanna’ jinx it, y’know. I’m a bit superstitious with that and for good reason.

Until then, it’s Saturday as far as I’m concerned; I’ll take players until June 15, disks to arrive by June 27 and then, by July 1 – post your life story.

Have fun - I am... :-D

Another Mixmania! …and another explanation from me (Ho Hum, hmmmm…)

Starting with the next theme (with a nod to the fab-a-lust ~D), I’m asking “What is your life story?”

I know that several of you will be inclined to make multiple disks (the always stellar Mamacita made SIX DISKS last mix!) but I’m putting a two-disk moratorium on this one: narrow down what you want to say about your life into two disks – then WRITE about what sits within the segues, describe the rocks in your streams, each and every rock’s tint, no matter what the stream said then and what it says now.

The stream has been muddy and swift lately; my babies punch me in the stomach like little ninjas in Pooh pajamas. Whenever we go to the park, they’re down at the stream and I’m there behind them, watching, reminding them that whatever goes into the creek changes it forever. Hoping none of them will go into the creek for their, mine, or the water’s life story.

We don’t have tornadoes here but that doesn’t mean random death doesn’t spin this way and that those of us tucked within tall rocks aren’t stuffed safely between the mounds of infinite bosom; remember Columbine.

Whatever dropped into the stream will be fine; rocks, sticks, bodies, dredge whatever’s there and paint it onto 48 songs or so. Something, anything – tell us who you are.

Time, time away and time to write about time

Little Man shows us all that there are far better thing to do than writing a damn blog

Yes, the theme is ‘Time’ and now’s the time for all bad bloggers (specifically, yours truly) to come to the aid of those who received a little brown envelope full of something ear-splittingly toxic this past week. Just after the FBI’s kicked in your door and started tearing up the carpet but just prior to the timorous tapping of hazmat-suited CDC dweebs at your door, I give you the links of potential victims and the recipe for my aural anthrax.

Smed
Got Cow Now?
Daily Bitch
Sterfish
Fantastic Sam
Mamacita... bow down, ya'll
Crazy Math Lady
Alala
Punchbuggy Blues
The Awesome ~d

Thems the responsible Ahmerkuns, God bless em' one and all. None of em' dropped a bomb nowhere that I know of nor ended ended a sentence

Now, for the poison I sent out with no fear of being eventually strapped to a water board...

Cornershop - 6 A.M. Juliander Shere
The call to prayer, wake up, time to shake your head and recognize the big world outside your bedroom window is waiting to toss you into rotating blades and turn you into mulch.

Ministry - Jesus Built My Hotrod
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son,[a] that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life," and left some fucking incredible tires.

Fugazi - No Exit
Gotta' figure Satre had his pistons oiled well enough by Jesus at one time or another which led, eventually, to Fugazi telling us about how it felt... MMMmmmm....

Stereolab - Analogue Rock
You gotta' tick? Let me burn it off... Tock? No thanks, you bore the shit out of me, frankly.

Brian Wilson - (Suite) Wonderful/Song For Children/Child is Father of the Man/Surf's Up
The only song(s) on this disk that really represented this theme as it was (I think) meant to be heard. I mean, we're all getting older and we're all going to die but whatever it was that we once held onto as cool and righteous will eventually find itself laid out like bits of kelp and bone-white sand dollars, abandoned, forgotten, picked up or kicked aside but otherwise nothing more than the detritus of the last wave that will, inevitably, drop more dead things on the beach. Walk on, enjoy the spray, take a tumble in the breakers - you have this, now, and the rest matters with those who walk down the beach after you. They won't remember your obituary.

Massive Attack - Inertia Creeps
So... take a walk on the beach, your time is limited. Really, less time than a Victoria's Secret fantasy, I assure you (despite what you might think, otherwise)...

Patrick Ascione - Lune Noire (excerpt)
Rzzzzz.... zick, fnkkkkk.... what'd I tell you?!?

The Posies - Coming Right Along
See? Doesn't that feel good? I mean, you're gonna' die anyway...

Les McCann & Eddie Harris - Compared to What
That's what I'm asking.

Don McClean - American Pie
He kinda' says it's the "day the music died" but then he leaves it open for you to decide if you really hate this song or if you secretly love it.

Gov't Mule - 30 Days in the Hole
Unless you've done it, you won't understand how well the Dude does this song.

Thee Headcoatees - Ca Plane Pour Moi
Fucking French faggots.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Our Time to Be Hated
Fucking French faggots R Us. Or US. Something since six years ago, I think.

Pink Floyd - Eclipse
My Eclipse died six miles outside of Sacramento and this is all I've got...

Until noon I'm slapping the back of your head yelling, Morning!"

Note to all you Mixmania! players (update)

Sorry I've been a deadhead with this but there's too much on my plate at the moment to make this work the way I intended (and posted about). We, myself and the wee ones, have been stranded at my parent's house due to the weather and I'm away from my computer where all the information is regarding the various participants for the Time mix.

When I do get back to my computer, I'll probably take a kind friend's offer and have her mix and email all of you; probably won't be until Monday at the earliest. So please, hang in there and I apologize for dropping the ball.

In this decayed hole among the mountains, in the faint moonlight, the grass is singing

No more chocolate bunnies and what Easter grass remains are the stray tufts shoved between the cushions of the couch. Sunday's celebration, whatever it meant (secularly or sacerdotally) has gone the way of my petunias and crocuses.

As you can see, the midget mafia had much less enthusiasm for heading off to mass with my parents than they had for consuming peeps. Dressed nice for the occasion, though.

The bonnets were cute but unnecessary - there was nary a ray of sunshine on Sunday and we were bundling more so than bunting. The girls were not long for the dresses, either; not on a day where you could see your breath and your footsteps.

Last year at Easter, we were dealing with bees and spilled kool-aid. So much for warm-weather nostalgia.

Small wonder I'm suffering a bit of amnesia regarding the season this year: like so much of the country, it's not much of a spring. This evening looked like this:

Tomorrow's forecast calls for more of that; I'd prefer to remember Easter, not Christmas.

Close the damn door, it's freezing...

So it goes.

I just read that Kurt Vonnegut died at the age of 84.

Again, I'm too spent to do my usual ten-page rap and it would require at least that to explain what Vonnegut meant to me, especially during my exceptionally twisted adolescence. That influence extends into the present and much of what you read here is the result of what I learned from him; my sense of humor, my sense of outrage.

Life is too complicated to go into it at the moment. Hopefully, I will soon have the time and energy to articulate what's going on (and state my farewell to Kurt Vonnegut) by this weekend. Until then, I leave you with a favorite passage of mine, from “God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater,” a summation of his philosophy - and what he taught me:

“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’ ”

God Bless you, Mr. Vonnegut.

Tard

A-hyep, thass me, tard.

Spent my morning on the job track (the job I mentioned a week or so back fell through, yet more evidence for my theory of "blog jinx") and a lovely afternoon doing yard work for the Rents. Then more job stuff. My necktie (*gasp!*) is still on, too tired to take it off.

So... you mixmania! fiends will have to wait another day or so before I match everyone and mail them out. There's an ever ripening pineapple in the kitchen that I'm too tired to slice and eat, much less toss out with the trash.

ZZZZzzzzzzzz...

Blog Against Theocracy

“When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” —Sinclair Lewis

As much as I'd love to bloviate on this subject - a much, much larger threat to our country than terrorism, the bursting housing bubble, or global warming - I need to get shaking. The wee one's are getting ready to head over to the Rent's with me where we'll spend the rest of our weekend. Chocolate bunnies, hidden eggs, and Easter mass for them, chocolate bunny ears and Joseph Heller for me.

Instead of my blather, you're better off taking action at http://www.firstfreedomfirst.org/, reading about Blogging Against Theocracy and checking out Tristero's essential posts at Hullabaloo (spelling out how determined - and dangerous - the Fishists really are), Part I, Part II, and Part III - really, you need to click those links to get perspective on why blogging against theocracy is not just necessary but important.

I may get back here if I have time this evening but in the meantime, I'd be interested to read any posts YOU have put up in response to this call. Alert me with a link (and whatever else you'd like to add) in the comments and I promise to give you mention here, later.

Off to chocolate bunnyland.