tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75119192024-03-13T10:43:05.038-07:00The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen DirectoryUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger97125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-70684455770303356012016-12-24T23:50:00.000-08:002016-12-24T23:50:15.130-08:00The Fever SkitI guess this year was a big bunch of something for me, since it took so long, but I don't know if I got any one measurable thing done. I, to quote Cornelius this afternoon at the Dude & Catastrophe, "turned the tiller a few spokes here and there toward breaks of horizon light, toward promise dark or light, and strode the deck while the water lapped quietly at the keel, the sails never taut but never slack." I would have just said I fucked off and tried most of the new Taco Bell stuff, but when he talks the narrative of life seems to have a coherence and purpose. Or to be a narrative at all, instead of the confused sneezing fit that is my journey.<br />
<br />
I went out on some OKCupid dates that I didn't tell anyone about. I'll give some details later here, I guess. Maybe mainly so I don't forget them entirely.<br />
<br />
I lifted weights for a bit and then stopped lifting weights to see if it had mattered. It had — I gained fatness where once I had a little muscle. At times hear the wicked Southern men in my imagination call me a "titty-boy."<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Lookit him there. Jus' a god-damned titty-boy. Look away now, son. Stop lookin' at that titty-boy. We hate his kind. </i><br />
<br />
I went on an extreme diet, but that diet made me fatter and crazy and dizzy, and I stopped that diet one day down at that dirty-ish Hidden Hills Burger King, where the THANK YOU swinging panel on the trash can always has ketchup smears on it. I stopped that diet with a finality and focus and genuine happiness that I will not apologize for. Medium-size Whopper with cheese meal. Strain-streaked faces in oversized dirty parkas, wearing backpacks, sat without food at some of the tables, waiting for god knows what, and the fries were just warm, and the Whopper itself leaked brown-edged shredded lettuce from atop a gray patty, but it was the greatest meal I have ever eaten in my life, and I am still happy about it.<br />
<br />
Now, at the end of the year, I look more or less like a person who is not famous for his outer self, but at the same time generally bearable if seen from above and with light that flatters my chin/neck situation.<br />
<br />
I guess the part of my year anyone would actually want to hear about was my Internet dating stuff. Everyone already knows that guys my age aren't typically thrilled with their bodies, so we can leave that at that.<br />
<br />
First in the experiment of hope was Beth, whose username was GiraffeKisses. She was an ER nurse. I liked that she was a nurse. I think if you want to be a nurse, and can actually handle being a nurse, with the fluids, and the life-nadirs, and the unforgettable indignity of the septic and marginalized deliriously yammering their way into corpsehood, I'd be excited to know you. That shows some respectable grounding. You're actually about something, and see bigger truths.<br />
<br />
We met at a short-lived local pub called SPARKY HARMER'S. [Ok, I admit, I changed the name while I was editing this. I don't want people to know where I go on first dates. And maybe a part of me thinks about dating as a stand-in for the electric chair—will the governor call with reprieve? Will he not?] We'd chatted online for a few hours the night before, and had the kind of rapport that seizes your chest with electricity. I'd been thrilled to meet her. She brought out a part of me that dared its way through every line of our chat, toeing the line of confidence with resounding success, a cocaine Lothario who was his best self. <br />
<br />
God, now I don't want to say anything about our date. I was just not feeling it from the moment I saw her, even though I'd walked up to the place with real zip in my step. The kind of zip where you're in the autumnal New York of your own love movie, indulging in the thought that this could be the explosion at the beginning of your real life. But her haircut was three degrees to the left, and I didn't like her wrists, and her earlobes seemed ungenerous.<br />
<br />
It was the trap where you have just a single thin thread of a person's words and a couple photos and then back-fill 99.9% of them with an overheated imagination that longs for love, dreams of New Year's in Marrakesh, and fills a script that Nora Ephron reads with a tissue.<br />
<br />
For all of OKCupid's algorithms, I thought, in reflection as I walked away that night, I'd rather just let my million years of animal instincts tell me if someone really piqued me. Over the citrus bin at the grocery store. Across the used derailleur crate at the community-supported bike shop. Not from some favorably-contrived essays and carefully-curated photos. (I've set up the same vanity trap for anyone who sees my account, don't think I'm not aware of my own guilt.)<br />
<br />
There was another one, Leah, and I met her at Yagi, a Japanese fusion place that closed down last month. After a couple emails she'd surprised me by texting a very sexy selfie, which prompted me to suggest we meet, so we met about a half hour later. She was a poet, and that made me kind of nervous, because with a poet there's this whole reckoning coming where you will have to manage your relationship with what very well might not be compelling poetry that matters a great deal to them. We hit it off really well, and I asked her if I could kiss her when we were parting, and she said "You'd damn well better," and our lips met in a kiss that came as much from her as me, and when I realized that the strength we put into it was mutual, I sparked a little. More than a little. I was ignited and felt that lift. But then a couple nights later I was at the mall looking for headphones and she emailed me and said she was moving away because of some kind of lawsuit at work and needed a fresh start somewhere else, and goodbye. So that was that, and that is what happened. I've looked her up on Facebook a few times but she has her privacy settings locked down pretty hard. I guess I would too if I got in a lawsuit at work every time I didn't actually wind up liking a guy I'd kissed.<br />
<br />
I wrote to more women, but I started to develop a rule where if they never asked me anything about me after a few exchanges, I let things taper off. I just think it's polite to express any sort of interest in the person who you might spend the rest of your life with. I've seen marriages go bad where this never happened. If the clerk ringing up my jerky at 7-11 is nicer to me than BeTheOne4Jen, I move on.<br />
<br />
I try to walk into the grocery store (or coffee shop, or diner or what have you) with a positive mindset and smile these days. So my positive energy can create in kind. I've looked at my "resting" face in the mirror and I look like a freshly-hurt judgmental jerk too much of the time. Ray has a twinkle in his eye when he's out and about, and people add him to their lives like a corsage. I try to mimic that. An old-school sparkle, a caricature of a fine and content fellow. It's slow learning stuff like this, and it's not a hundred percent successful, and I don't remember to do it all the time, but here and there I get the reward of a returned smile, the surprise of a warm reply, a latch into conversation.<br />
<br />
Happy new year. Try to say something nice once a day. To someone else.<br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-50948802894896189522016-10-14T00:35:00.001-07:002016-10-14T00:35:27.952-07:00Not Exactly a Bucket ListThis is a list of things I just realized, tonight, that I hadn't experienced firsthand yet in life, and probably never will.<br />
<br />
<b>1. Worn a jockstrap, or even really known what one was</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
I'm serious. What is a jockstrap? I feel like it's underwear with a really strong band, and the "pouch" area is made of some kind of sanatorium-shade plastic like Hannibal Lecter wore on his face when he was on the Krazee-Dolly. I played sports the entire time I was in school, but I only wore "tightey-whiteys," and there was rarely a time in which I wished I'd been wearing more cumbersome underwear.<br />
<br />
<b>2. Attended a perfect beach bonfire full of hope and promise </b><br />
<br />
I think there is this American ideal scenario where a popular group of lithe, tanned, loosely-but-tastefully dressed teens or young adults gathers on the beach for a bonfire that lasts well into the night. Simple things are grilled over the flames, and there is fun booze like bubbly, can beer, maybe a little brown liquor. Everyone has something warm and cozy to wrap up in if the evening air gets brisk, and the likelihood of pairing off with someone you've had your eye on all night is very real. But it's not a night of going straight for penetration; the warm tribe environment and end-of-our-last-summer-vacation feel encourages couples who have privacy to open up to one another, and even recognize within themselves honest attraction beyond the sexual.<br />
<br />
I think I ran out the clock on this one when I started growing weird bent hairs on my back. <br />
<br />
<b>3. Gotten an MBA</b><br />
<br />
At times I realize that in order to really make a fortune it would help to know the basic vocabulary and principles of traditional business, but then I'm like, I don't want to sound like a dick when I talk. Whenever I overhear a guy going on about reduced vestiture schedules, or the Brazilian gelatin futures market, I know I'm hearing a man who cleans his hair extremely hard every morning and could not respond to true beauty in a way that would be satisfying to observe. I may not have any money, but the first time I heard Jimi Hendrix's Little Wing I couldn't get out of bed for three days.<br />
<br />
. . .<br />
<br />
I almost put "been in a band" here, but you never know. Perhaps late one quiet fall night I'll be on the couch, reading, with the window open, and I'll hear the faintest strains of live music coming out of a neighbor's garage. I'll walk over, surprised and excited by my boldness, and out of their little window they'll see me looking in from the sidewalk. An unused guitar will be leaning against an amp cabinet, and they'll wave me in. I'll strap it on while they vamp, and lift my pick between thumb and forefinger, and then, suddenly, those many decades I spent practicing the first ten seconds of Greensleeves and La Bamba will all have been worth it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-72244196378825108782012-07-16T22:13:00.001-07:002012-07-16T22:29:09.551-07:00The Christmas Party, Pt. 2<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>(The first half of this installment is below this post, or <a href="http://orezscu.blogspot.com/2012/01/christmas-party-pt-1.html">here</a>.)</i><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I won’t lie to you, it had been some time since I’d seen action of any sort, so my sad little body was going into overdrive with the juices and hormones (are hormones juices? Or are they, like, thin clear serums? I honestly don’t know, but I’m going with thin clear serums, on a hunch) it was creating around the idea of this horny woman. And since when are women overtly horny? Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard girls say that they’re just as horny as men, that they practice blowing carrots in the bathroom at the mall and all that, but really, now. Until a woman can convince me that she has masturbated using an old velvet cloche with some rubber bands holding it closed—while desperately trying to tickle her taint with a feather-haired pencil-topper she’s affixed to a chair leg with twist-tie—no dice. Bonus points if she can say she actually went to Goodwill with the express intent of buying this stuff, after thinking the design through, for the scandalous purposes heretofore described. For me these scenarios are usually ad hoc, but women are said to be more cerebral about sex. <br /><br />That said, I was ready for some low-hanging fruit, and this fruit was practically jumping off the tree and peeling itself. I had the old man to deal with, and he was probably going to give me guff for doing something beyond the pale like enjoy a party, but then again you never knew with him. His waters run pretty deep, and he’s seen enough of life to accept the ludicrous as a statistical and therefore forgivable inevitability. He also likes to have his fun – ask me about the time he bought a hat on the Internet. Never even tried it on at the store—nope, not wild old Cornelius. He insisted I print out the site’s return policy, of course, and gave me a lecture he felt he had to give about the importance of “taking in the whole man” before knowing that one’s “sartorial oeuvre” could truly absorb such a critical accessory, but in the end he kept the hat (a Goorin Brothers wide-brimmed “Jameson” he thought made him look like a “Westeran scholar with the Pecos at his back”). He looks alright in it, although the crown is a bit wide for his face, which makes me think he’s just wearing the hat so he doesn’t have to admit to his impetuous mistake. <br /><br />I stood and grinned, and she did something even more surprising. She left. Not leave-the-house-while-her-hand-still-smelled-like-my-detergent left, but walked casually off to another room like it was nothing. I lost sight of her, and while my heart wasn’t exactly sunk, I felt kind of left at the altar. My mind raced trying to figure out what this meant, and in true party fashion I thought things would be helped along with another few slugs of my drink. Bill walked past me, this time utterly unaware of my existence. He was grinning wide and holding two mugs of his famous nog, on a beeline for the same room she’d gone into. <br /><br />Maybe there was a VIP game of cribbage going on in there, I thought, or it was the room where Bill let people listen to music with guitars. I stood in view of the door so I could check it out next time someone entered or left. I wondered if I wasn’t supposed to follow him in there, if that butt-rummage hadn’t been some kind of swinger shorthand for Follow Me, You’re In The Game. I never know about these things, not that I have a lot of data points to work with. Cornelius sidled back over to me from a giclee print he’d been enduring in the corner. <br /><br />“Quite a spirited bit of chirosophy,” he offered, taking a long nasal pull off his booze’s wreath. I figured he meant the grab-fanny, but since I was the one who had been violated, I stayed mum and let him develop his thoughts. That puzzler had earned me a moment of processing time, so I was off the clock.<br /><br />“A fiver says you can’t snag a lap at that lavender-wanded harlot’s fragrant mons,” he said, apparently deeper into the heat of his Scotch than I’d thought. “Five if you do, and can prove the after-effects of giardia.” He brandished a crisp green folded note and tucked it into his breast like a pocket square, an unthinkably gauche gesture he’d never dream of while sober. He seemed to want to give me five dollars; it was the holidays, after all, and he’d be providing himself with the gift of some cheap, highly personalized entertainment while shopping locally and sustainably for my disgrace. Fine, I thought—I’d been planning on trying for either outcome gratis, so this was just icing with the excitement of sport. I didn’t like the bit about him kneeling with his ear to the bathroom threshold while I tooted on the pot after, but he’d probably reconsider the benefits of that angle the next morning anyhow.<br /><br />“You’re on,” I said, now sipping with purpose, deeply and with steeled eyes, or whatever. <br /><br />“She has made no secret of her salacious intent for you, so if you can simply keep from jacking the whole affair beyond recognition with characteristic word or action, the wealth of her costlew bosom shall soon flood across your own pigeon chest. I suggest playing mute and dropping trou while the erotica unfolds in situ, perhaps inhabiting the role of a supine victim of Medusa.” He tossed his head in the direction of the other room and winked. His cup was talking for him more than usual, and I liked it. <br /><br />I’m not a total shoemaker when it comes to the tender affairs of the ding dong, you know, so I resolved to go above and beyond the easy demands of the bet. With luck I’d snatch a trophy pair of underpants, and I could use these to seed a collection of hot-gotten gains. Or not, since women tend to remember those garments, no matter how well I’ve ravished them. I’d certainly have memories, at least, and five dollars, which is way better than usual, when all I have are memories, and these are typically of drunkenly buying some Pringles at one-thirty in the morning while absolutely nobody is around at all, anywhere, except for maybe the President, who is asleep at the White House. That’s the way it feels some nights. <br /><br />I took a hoot of cocktail about three times the volume of my mouth, which led to some of it running down my chin and splashing onto my shirt, so I was going to look and smell a treat, but by the same token I was going to be able to charm my way through cement walls, so I was, as far as I was concerned, as predisposed to success as I ever get for things. I felt the cold bracing surge wash into my bloodstream and shook Cornelius by the hand. <br /><br />“And what of you, while I complete this randy errand?” I said grandly, like a, well, drunk guy. <br /><br />“I expect as the evening wears on and these harridans grow dissolute on canarie, I shall have welcome opportunities to exercise my more withering imprecations,” he said, taking an eyebrow for a spin and leaving it pointed toward the bridge of his nose like a check mark. Impressive. <br /><br />“Well,” I replied, “If I’m not back in half an hour, or an hour, or five minutes, or whatever, well, you know. Whatever.” <br /><br />“Much as it ever was and will be, my good man,” he said. “Should I require a facsimile of your conversation in the meanwhile, I shall sidle up to the nearest snow globe or dried prey and carry on as usual.” <br /><br />There was no more getting around it; it was time to approach the door. I set down my glass, picked it back up when I realized I needed a prop, and filled it with something called Key Lime Koromovka, a cheap flavored vodka I hadn’t seen before. I forgot to mix it with anything, but my feet were moving and there I was, before the door. Knock or push open? It wasn’t my house, but then again, being polite about entering a room where such impolite things were probably happening seemed retarded. I went to reach for the knob, but then noticed some mustard on my knee, and bent down to try to lick it off before going in. <br /><br />Just then the door opened, and I was face to face with the business end of Bill’s crotch, if you get me. Well, the dick business end, not the butt business end, since that analogy doesn’t really make sense given how much stuff crotches can do. But anyway, there I was, nose-to-hose with the guy (he was still dressed, don’t worry), and I figure it must have looked like I’d been peeping in the keyhole, because he let out a guffaw like an electrocuted Jamaican Santa Claus and clapped me on the shoulder. <br /><br />“Susan! Look!” he called back to the woman, now named Susan, who reclined with arrogant, smiling ownership in an oversized beanbag chair. “Peeping tom here has been enjoying our little show!” <br /><br />I don’t like being called “peeping tom”—unless I’m walking down the street in a peanut costume selling reading glasses from a cigarette tray, or something—so I was defensive at that, but Susan smiled again and nodded at me, and Bill guided me into the room in a friendly sort of way. He shut the door behind me, and I could feel Cornelius sither-chitting, or chucklepating, or ginny-mugging, or whatever word he would choose, from the cocktail stop. I envied him, in a way, but was also pretty sure I was going to get my wick spitted at some point, so I bucked up. <br /><br />Bill sank into the bean bag next to Susan, sipping from his mug with his lips pulled so far back that only his teeth touched the liquid. It was a strange thing to see. <br /><br />“Why don’t you choose an album, Téodor?” Bill suggested, motioning toward a charmingly old-school hi-fi in a wooden cabinet with a glass front door. Big padded, beige headphones (“monitors,” I bet he called them) with a long curly wire were hung on its side, and two boxy, dark-veneered speakers with gridded, textured foam faces sat on either side like mute sphinxes. A stack of records sat on the counter built into the wall, so I started sorting through them. The assortment kind of caught me off guard. <br /><br />First, I’d never seen any of them before, and I spend a lot of time flipping through arcane crap in dusty old record stores. They were foreign, but the translations were decent, so it was hard to tell by the few mistakes who was making them. Italians put exclamation points at the end of everything, even if it didn’t originally have them (“A ROSE FOR EMILY! BY! THE ZOMBIES!”) and the Germans always put a period after everything, like a lonely deejay floating across the dark airwaves announcing factually and without cadence that the song he is about to play has just died. The graphic design was spare, just a slightly-fatted Helvetica in black on a spot-color red background, so no clues there, and the date and label information wasn’t included, like these were black market, bootleg, or home-pressed artifacts. I finally figured that they were Dutch, given a double-O in a word that usually only has a single-O, and also the word GANSEVOORT hand-stamped crookedly on one of the faded newsprint sleeves, but that was just the beginning of the mystery. It was the titles that threw me off; it was like seeing fake albums in a dream. <br /><br />The bands had names like ATTRACTIVE SUPER PUSSY, THE DICK-EATERS, and PARLOUR WAD. You know, stuff like your brain might make up if you fell asleep really high and horny during a Russ Meyer flick. Tracks were things like “Two Tickets To Hooray!” and “Lean Up And Fuck.” Whatever Bill and Susan were into, it got way more interesting with this discovery, and I was kind of fascinated to start putting the needle down.<br /><br />Bill laughed his hard plastic laugh again, the air exiting cleanly and fully from his lungs with each little crut.<sup>1</sup> I turned around to see them both smiling intensely but with scrutiny at me, as though relishing my uncertainty. I waited; they were the ones with the pet outsider, they could be the ones to talk. <br /><br />“So, Téodor!” Bill smiled, finally, looking at me with the fixed face of a toy snake about to devour a marshmallow rat. “You’re a music guy, right? You know these?” <br /><br />“No, man, I don’t. I go to a lot of record shops, and I’ve never seen any of this stuff.” This is a big admission from one record guy to another, but I was floored, and just trying to sound appreciative to save face. <br /><br />“<i>Hello, Baby</i>? <i>Trans-Press</i>? <i>Flemish Hi-Stride</i>?” He was listing labels, as though to jog my memory. It’s that record guy thing where just because they find one ultra-rare pressing of a forty-year old Afrobeat album at a flea market on the edge of an illegal kidnapping district in Bamako, they expect everyone else to know who sat in on guitar on track three. (“Eric Clapton!”) I nodded in the right way during this litany, which is an art form more complex and nuanced than Japanese bowing, and let it run its uncomfortable and shaming course. As is customary, the instigator must begin playing “just one track,” and while you listen appreciatively as your penance you know, in your heart, that in two hours you’ll be watching Rutger Hauer in “The Hitcher” together. It’s just the way these things work.<br /><br />Bill dropped the needle on “Thigh Milk,” a kinky track by a group called Polish Spread. It was a blend of late-60s UK mod and what seemed to be experimental Argentinian pop of about the same era—kind of like Os Mutantes—but there was a thickness to the integration of the firm, high-neck bass and a tight, peppy drum kit that was sensual, suggestive, and sexy. It was the musical equivalent of flirting, and it made me feel good-looking, which is hard in a room with a mirror. As the song aligned me with them and gave us a groove to share, I began to sense Susan looking at me. <br /><br />Sure enough, when I made eye contact, she pouted sultrily and curled a finger towards herself, a picture of come-hither. As I began to walk over to her, she slid forward off the bean bag, and assumed a kneeling position, upright, facing me. This, I thought I understood. When someone goes on their knees in front of a man at a party where cult Dutch hump-pop is being played in a private room, that can only means one thing is about to happen, right? Was this really about to happen? I tried to remember if I’d dribbled in my underpants after using the bathroom, and if it had been bad. <br /><br />I ran through the next minute in my mind. I would stop just before her, close enough so that her arms could work my pants open, and let her get started. After a minute, before I got too worked up, I’d kneel down too, and slide her straps off her shoulders, revealing the swelling breasts that had started this all. I would cup them, and lean into her kiss, and…and yeah, Bill would be there, but guys like Bill are always somewhere, and I figured he was just there to get his rocks off without abdicating the bonds of matrimony, or whatever unfulfilled married guys say. If he didn’t mind seeing my butt putt-putting up and down while all this was going on, her luxuriating beneath me, her thick long hair spread out all around her like an aura, then whatever. You only go around once, and I got no truck with god or the devil, so it’s all for a laugh, sometimes. <br /><br />As I started to walk toward her, Bill did too, and he and I kind of matched step for step, me eventually just following his lead since he seemed to have done this before. As he got within a few steps of her, he started to crouch to a kneel as well, so I did that, and pretty soon we were all three on our knees facing each other. Susan took my left hand and Bill’s right, and Bill took my right hand, and I started to get pretty oggy inside. Whatever was about to happen, it was starting to look less like Acapulco party-head and more like Bill somehow having Missionary-style sex with me while Susan deejayed. <br /><br />Then, the music gathering up its solo and striding to its crescendo, they leaned toward one another, and the corners of their mouths touched in a kiss. It was clear that my mouth was supposed to complete the third part of the kiss, but what with my sense of joy deflating so quickly it could have filled a car tire, I paused I guess a bit too long. Each of them opened one eye, eyed me coolly, and then they blinked and leaned back. <br /><br />The single came to an end, and the tonearm tucked itself away, kind of like what was happening in my pants. Faint party sounds could be heard outside the door, along with the tinkle of ice cubes in somebody’s glass. I didn’t really know what to say, but knew that saying anything was pointless, because nothing fun was going to happen until I was squarely off Bill’s property, and ideally situated somewhere behind Mars. I gave them the benefit of First Noise and prepared to bolt. <br /><br />“So, Téodor,” Bill said. “I guess…guess I mis-read you.” His voice was firm, not embarrassed. Somehow I had been giving him big, clear, false signals, leading him on, he seemed to be thinking. <br /><br />Susan seemed no less disappointed in me. She looked aside angrily, sitting her ass on her heels and waiting for Bill to give me my dressing-down, for it to be over. She closed up her shirt and held it that way. Bye, boobs. <br /><br />“That could have been a really great moment—this could have led to something really magical,” Bill continued, “If you had any concept of respect, imagination, or follow-through. Now we’ve wasted nearly an hour, and the energy in this room is just shot.” <br /><br />I got kind of pissed, because I could afford to. It’s not like I had his lawnmower or something. I felt a little punch in me and wanted to see it grow. <br /><br />“Look, dude,” I started. (I’m from California. This is our “Friends, Romans, countrymen.”) “What kind of a world do you live in where three people—two people and a stranger—kneel in a circle and fucking <i>three-person kiss?!</i> Without talking about it first! Like that’s expected? Like I have some model for that? I don’t know what god damned movie you both saw when you were eleven but that is not how things work at parties.” I motioned at the record player. “Yeah, you’ve got neat records. That doesn’t mean I want your bag on my chin.” I shot an insinuating look at Susan, who scowled and looked further away. That is what you think neat records mean, I said to her with my eyes. <br /><br />Bill, it seemed, wasn’t used to getting challenged, so he went silent, which in a situation like that is as good as retreating. With the sexual economy between us evaporated, I was basically just in a room with two people who were trying to make me feel bad for being different from them, I realized, and suddenly they were just two dopes with old records and weird ideas about kissing. I don’t know what they were after, what their “scene” was, if anything. I just felt put-out, and after a lifetime of trying to be nice to assholes who walked all over me, I was cooked. <br /><br />“Stay in here and kiss sideways, for all I care,” I said, getting to my feet. “I am going out to the bar, and I am taking a bottle of whatever is most full and least expensive, and I am leaving. As I go, I will roll your wife, whose name rhymes with benzodiazepine, on her side, so that she does not meet our Father with a throat full of holiday cheese loaf.” I showed myself out, to six-pound silence. <br /><br />I figured I had about thirty seconds of clear time before Bill and Susan would have a game plan, so I stormed to the table, flew a high sign at Cornelius, who was dispensing with the harridans left and right, and grabbed a bottle of something clear. He read me straight and we were out the door like surgery, complete. I had an invigorating pull, he shared the gesture in solidarity, and we strode home, two men with one task behind them. <br /><br />“I read in your gait the unconsummated loins of anger,” he offered, after some head-clearing.<br /><br />“Bill wanted in on the mix,” I said. “I wasn’t down.” <br /><br />“Of course he did, lad,” Cornelius sighed. “The particular artifice of his life’s camouflage broadcasts deep signals of oddity at the core; why else would he compensate with such a catalog of fluff?” <br /><br />“I’m not bugged or anything, just kind of annoyed.”<br /><br />“The conscious mind is a hungry pathology, our exteriors manifestations of truth and misdirection. We hide in plain sight that which we think we contain most deeply.” <br /><br />When he passed the bottle back to me, I noticed something wrapped around the label. It was the five. <br /><br />“Even if you can guess the ending, some shows are worth watching,” he said. We crunched off down the shortcut home and got some cold cuts going before too long. <br /><br /> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">END NOTES<br /><br />1. Here I think Téodor means to say “eructation.” <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-70444087652557512592012-01-18T20:58:00.000-08:002012-01-18T21:00:20.496-08:00The Christmas Party, Pt. 1I was standing there at Bill and Shelley’s Christmas party (our new neighbors two doors up) when I felt something hard bump into my elbow. It was a breast, apparently in a pretty supportive bra, which got my mind going about sizes and cups and all that before I had even figured out whether to say sorry or not. The woman, who was about my height, hadn’t paid much attention to it, and was refilling her drink, holding the arm part of her big drapey shawl or whatever it was back while dipping her cup into the antique silver punch bowl. It had tasseled fringe (the shawl, not the bowl, although I guess that wouldn’t have been too surprising given its vintage) and was kind of hippy-dopey for my taste, but you can’t, or shouldn’t, really judge someone by their scarf, as it might have been a gift or handed to them from a particularly special deathbed or whatever. Scarves come and go, and I had on a stripy black-and-cream number I’d found after a party at Ray’s. It was Calvin Klein, and had a little silver tab that said so, but I was always careful to tie it so that that part was hidden. I don’t like clothing with names. I can get behind a Who t-shirt, but when it’s just an ad for a manufacturer who never wrote Heaven and Hell…you know what I’m saying. Anyhow. There was this woman, and she had a breast, and she was pretty fast and loose with it.<br /><br />I filled my glass mug thing with some of Bill’s “famous egg nog” and gave it a try. We were all around the drinks table in their nice dining room; there was a fancy silver bucket of ice, with tongs, and pretty good handles of Maker’s and Aviation and stuff. I figured that I could have like twenty dollars’ worth of cocktails for free, and might even fill a Dixie cup with gin for the freezer at home. Work has been pretty scant lately, as not a lot of people are banging down my door wanting half-written guitar intros or untested recipe concepts scrawled on the back of that sticky cardstock paper that comes wrapped around a set of three new pairs of socks (birthday present from Aunt Brezna).<br /><br />Cornelius had agreed to come along for a bit, which was a relief because I’m terrible at making small talk at parties until I’m kind of flippant from a drink or two. After that I can make jokes about the bathroom or whatever it is people like to chat about at parties, but until then I know I’m a wallflower, I own that I’m a wallflower, and that’s my job at the party. I do my job well. I’m that guy that makes people feel awkward, and they can take comfort in knowing that, as with any perfect party, the universe has provided the requisite awkwardness-making guy. Cornelius is old, and people also like having a guy around who isn’t sexually threatening, so we made a pretty perfect pair. They were lucky to have us.<br /><br />Cornelius sidled over with his mug of nog.<br /><br />“Hideous stuff,” he confided in me, putting the rim to his closed lips and feigning a sip. He was really good at it; I tried it a few times, and there are definitely tricks you have to know to take a convincing fake pull. He’s always surprising me with little social courtesy things like that. It’s nice.<br /><br />“Yeah, look how proud Bill is of this stuff, over there in his big dopey red sweater,” I said, maybe too meanly. Bill was handsome, had his hair combed well, and was every bit the holiday host. His sweater was just red enough for the occasion, and had a nice white collared shirt underneath. He shared a big laugh with a tall guy who wore dark brown leather fashion sneakers, the kind of guy I’m inclined to call a PR-firm prick before even meeting.<br /><br />“I don’t know how he makes it so damned thick.” Cornelius slid this line over like a snide comment jotted on a bar napkin. It was the eggnog-insult equivalent of a karaoke slag like KARRIE SINGS FIELDS OF GOLD LIKE SHE WAS WIPING HER ASS WITH THE SHEET MUSIC PASS IT ON. Sniggers and smiles hidden by quickly-hoisted green glass Heinekens. Poor Karrie. Poor Bill…his thirty-dollar cream flop was making him a target at his own party. Sure, we were jerks. And it probably cost more than that; cream’s like three bucks a pint and the bowl it was in was the size of a Beverly Hills holiday squash.<br /><br />“I’m guessing,” I guessed, “...he whips the cream past the soft peaks stage to the point where it squeezes out its own moisture. It’s kind of like overworking a dough, and I don’t know of any way to rescue it.”<br /><br />“Well, a gentler soul than I ought to pass along an anonymous card with the correct technique. I’m suffering a fool’s syllabub here and I don’t like it.” Cornelius wasn’t usually this grouchy, and I was liking it. Maybe we’d hassle someone later, like two wild dogs gone wrong on grog.<br /><br />“I’m going to dump this out in the toilet, old man,” I said to him. “You can go next.” I liked calling him old man. It put me in my place.<br /><br />“Mum’s the word. I shall follow your lead upon your reëmergence.”<br /><br />I found the bathroom under the stairs, but it was closed, so I waited a minute. I don’t like to jiggle the lock and bug people when they’re exposed; it creates bad energy and I hate when people do it to me. I wish more people knew to leave the door cracked when they’re done. Anyhow, pretty soon the door opens and out comes the woman with the breast, and she gives me a freshly-peed smile or whatever you call it. I like a woman who can make eye contact with a stranger even when everyone knows the score about who just had whose pants down. Maybe she was a painter. I smiled back, hopefully quickly enough so that she caught some of it. I wanted to know more about the breast, I’ll be honest. What was it up to? Having a good time? Had the breast heard the new Vampire Weekend single?<br /><br />I spent a minute checking my nose hair and gums and stuff, just to be sure I wasn’t about to start up a conversation with a piece of alfalfa sticking out of my eye, or one of those other little social gaffes. All clear, I let Cornelius in to dispose of his fatty, fluffy logjam. I wandered back to the drinks area to try something else.<br /><br />The woman was there again; I guess she’d had the same trouble with the egg nog, and had moved on to bourbon with ginger ale. I forgot what that was called, which sucked, because I could have used that term when talking to her. Oh well, two fewer words in the universe at my disposal. I’d find a way. I grabbed a fresh glass, clinked in some ice cubes (perfect cubes, not the usual…interesting…it would seem that Bill had some fancy theories about ice cubes), and did a half and half of Grey Goose and that fancy full-calorie Braintree tonic water that comes in the little brown Old West bottle. There were some lime wedges, but I wanted to see if the Grey Goose actually had any of its own citrusy flavor, so I held off. I wondered if she’d notice that I evaluated the limes but then didn’t choose one; any little detail can catch a person’s eye. She might think I had been a lime snob and didn’t see a nice enough one; we might hit a good stride and I’d just be honest and tell her I wanted to see if this fancy vodka had any distinctive flavor that made it worth the extra money. She’d point out that if I really wanted to find that out I shouldn’t have mixed it with anything, and I’d laugh a little, and she’d have the upper hand, and people like that, especially at the beginning of a conversation when it’s anybody’s game and the power is up for grabs. Who wants Canada? What about Alaska? No? Okay, that’s where we’ll put nice people who don’t know what calzones are. Boom.<br /><br />Oh, I forgot to mention that she’d left a napkin in the toilet. It had balloons on it. There weren’t any napkins with balloons on them at the party. Did she have a kid? And who leaves a napkin in the toilet after flushing? Maybe she’d been picking her nose with it after the fact, or doing one of those secret things ladies do in bathrooms, like wiping her makeup around to make better cheekbones, or hiding the hole where the little alien baby wriggles its hand out. I tucked that one away.<br /><br />As I said, she was about my height, maybe a little shorter, which explains the breast/elbow thing. She had long mid-back blonde hair and a long flowy gypsy-type skirt thing that stopped just short of her funny boots, which I happened to know were Fluevog Grand Nationals, because I like shoes. Maybe she’d like that I knew that. I tucked this away as well, and had a celebratory big sip of my drink. If I was going to get into Stranger gear, especially with a mysterious woman, I was going to need some help, and I wasn’t there yet.<br /><br />I found Cornelius in the library off the living room, a little alcove with candles burning tastefully atop tasteful stacks of tasteful books about Giverny and Baroque furniture and all kinds of other tasteful, tasteful stuff like that. Cornelius was looking this all over with his nose delicately clenched in a way that I had come to recognize. With him that was the equivalent of throwing a chair through a window in unhinged disgust. <br /><br />“An assemblage of conspicuously sourced, unleafed dreck, if you ask me,” he slipped over. “Veblen would be smug as a bug in an ugly rug over it all.” He sipped from what looked to be a Baccarat of light golden Scotch. There wasn’t any Scotch on the drinks table, so I suspected he’d filled it from his flask. He may have even brought his own folding Baccarat tumbler; you never really knew with him.<br /><br />“Yep, pretty damn tasteful stuff, I have to say.”<br /><br />Bill came over to us, ever the consummate host, the superheated light of pure hospitality shining out from his collar like a crack in the surface of the sun. I took another sip so that he’d talk to Cornelius first.<br /><br />“Gentlemen!” he boomed, scarcely able to contain the great good fortune he felt at having found two guys standing around in his house. I think he had pomade on his teeth. “How are we this fine evening!”<br /><br />“One bump shy of a vacation in Rome, my good man,” Cornelius said. It sounded pretty worldly, but Bill and I had no idea what he meant. Sounded like a stab at bad Italian roads, but also made the party sound kind of like Rome, which generally seems like a good thing, though I hear the place is overrun with feral animals.<br /><br />Bill slapped Cornelius on the back, holding his own mug of nog in his odd-looking hand. For a guy who was built just a little stronger than average, he had pretty fat hands. They seemed like the kind of thing that would happen to a guy who loves to eat French fries with his friends and then go home to have a baked potato and frothy golden beer. They were starchy hands, puffy with tuber tension. You didn’t get the way Bill was by avoiding potatoes. Cornelius took it in effortless stride and asked him to which year the house dated. I wondered what he was getting at.<br /><br />“1975!” Bill boomed again. “My, you’ve really got an eye for architecture! You ever check this out?” He pointed at a book about Frank Lloyd Wright. The Masterpieces of Frank Lloyd Wright, or something. All I knew about Frank Lloyd Wright was that he was an asshole, but it was alright, because he made houses that people got F’s about in college.<br /><br />“Quite a mind,” Cornelius mused. “Vibrating madly, just off-key in the mudroom of genius.” Bill didn’t know what to make of that, so he offered a hard-to-argue-with “Precisely!” and pointed out a few more architecture books, including one by that Le Corbusier piece of work (Le Corbusier is the guy architecture students vainly pretend they’re not directly ripping off by wearing severe little dark-rimmed circular glasses). Cornelius nodded in confirmation, and Bill said something about having to turn down the fire under the nog pot. He didn’t even bother to ask if we liked sports scores, which was kind of a relief. Good read, good play. Tie game.<br /><br />Bill’s wife Shelley or someone had turned on one of those Pottery Barn holiday CDs in the living room, and some rich people were “getting loose,” inasmuch as there were basically quotation marks surrounding everyone on the dance floor, metaphorically speaking. Women in thin white sweaters and tall leather boots with spiky heels were physically moving around on top of the cream colored carpet in ways that said, “Sex with me will be a painfully one-sided, seven thousand pound letdown after a long, horrible night of lying to yourself.” One particularly wild woman had taken her shoes off. Perhaps she had been at Woodstock, or knew how to hold an ocarina.<br /><br />Suddenly, a hand landed on the middle of the back of my thigh and crawled up to my ass. It didn’t stop there and, in fact, started looking for change in the space between the cushions, if you know what I mean. Interestingly, I stood stock still. Thinking about it later, I’ve never really formulated a game plan for that situation, because I never really had reason to. But there I was, standing stock still, I guess lest I make the situation worse. That’s how I react to surprises, I found out just then.<br /><br />Trying to keep my eyes from going wide open, I carefully turned to the side to see who was doing this. Part of me wondered if it was Bill, finally revealing his insatiable appetite for all things sexual and depraved. No, in fact – it was the woman with the breast, and in her other hand she held a stiff golden tumbler of bourbon. She smiled right into me and left me no choice about it. I stood there, helplessly smiled into, and did the only thing I felt capable of: I smiled back, quizzical but delighted. Or at least, that’s what I was trying to convey. I was probably making a face like Tweedle Dum with a bee on his nose.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Continues…</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-67324765849383365142008-05-30T21:23:00.000-07:002009-04-05T15:30:53.241-07:00Santa Cruz post #2Well, Santa Cruz definitely wasn't the kick-start my brain needed. In fact, I think Santa Cruz needs a kick-start, in the form of a lot of high-pressure hoses and serious laws about <span style="font-style: italic;">okay-</span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">NOT-okay</span> ways to hock your bicycle to strangers on the sidewalk. I spent like ten minutes trying to get away from some spaced-out fifty year-old dude who was chugging from a huge can of Monster energy drink and crying out like an old fashioned newspaper boy about his Trek. I have a question for you: if you needed some money, and you had a bike, would you walk that bike right smack into the middle of downtown and start advertising it out loud? That's apparently how they do things in Santa Cruz.<br /><br />Also, what's with the sneering righteous people? This group of like twenty scuzzy local college types was having some sort of march (they seemed organized; they even had a few flags of some sort), and when they marched past the bench where I was having a chicken burrito, one of the guys on the tail end did like this:<br /><br />SCUZZY GUY: Hey man, this ain't politics as usual! Get involved!<br /><br />ME: What are you marching for?<br /><br />SCUZZY GUY: What are you, ignorant?<br /><br />ME: No, just mildly insulted.<br /><br />SCUZZY GUY: You gonna join in, or just sit there while this happens?<br /><br />ME: Sorry, I wouldn't want to bring the thing down.<br /><br />SCUZZY GUY: Jesus! Man, FUCK you! [Turns boldly back to group, thumbs under backpack straps, and walks off]<br /><br />ME: Oh, wait! Wait for me! [I didn't say this]<br /><br />Is that any way to persuade someone to join you in doing something that you believe in? Nowhere in <span style="font-style: italic;">How to Win Friends and Influence People</span> does it suggest that if a negotiation is going poorly, you start yelling, "Man, FUCK you!"<br /><br />That pretty much ruined my burrito, so I dumped it in a trash can, which prompted some busted-face hobo to scamper over the second I was about twenty feet away (is 20' the "radius of honor" among those who eat out of trash cans?). Figuring I'd walk downtown and get a motel room, I crossed a footbridge over an old creek bed that had filled in with ivy, and caught a beautiful view of an old Victorian home perched high on a stone cliff above the crashing waves. I paused to admire it for a bit, and when I turned my gaze downward to see if anything interesting had been thrown into the ivy, I saw a man's face—just a face—peering up at me, wreathed in foliage. I got a very unhappy feeling in my stomach and suddenly realized that if you can't even have lunch without these sorts of things happening to you, it is time to leave Santa Cruz.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-16297387064433894822008-05-04T20:51:00.000-07:002008-12-09T10:46:24.737-08:00Foto-Kwiz #5 (not really a Kwiz)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbuG9UbxRwmyIUhTewD6-T8kN1EjhmKTPUq4DncjGYD0Pc6S9p4jpJ2h9g5o5lNi_R68OgDHnCPI3X12vc9jglvUpVYWjdCZXipU9G3WlfDEOAXvcEc_eTZVs7bNcRvWrFnb9I/s1600-h/letterman_orezscu.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbuG9UbxRwmyIUhTewD6-T8kN1EjhmKTPUq4DncjGYD0Pc6S9p4jpJ2h9g5o5lNi_R68OgDHnCPI3X12vc9jglvUpVYWjdCZXipU9G3WlfDEOAXvcEc_eTZVs7bNcRvWrFnb9I/s400/letterman_orezscu.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5194386470728800274" border="0"></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-83684249406603737662008-04-27T21:48:00.000-07:002008-04-27T22:10:31.664-07:00I'm HungryMan, there's nothing in the fridge but eggs, tortillas, and some month-old three dollar bags of mixed greens that Chris "bought and forgot" the time he was supposed to bring dinner for his kid's evening preschool class (he did remember to bring the chili and corn muffins, or they would have run him off the property with little terrible paintings). There's nothing you can do with old lettuce but compost it, and I would love to compost, but I don't want to start attracting a lot of skunks and raccoons to the neighborhood. How does composting work? So much wasted food goes right into the trash here, and I have to think it could be put to better use. Is there a composting website? I'm sure there are thousands. I'd check, by my eyes are stinging from the new spring sun and my trip to the beach yesterday (I caught a ride in the back of the Onstads' car). Man, were there some beautiful bohemian women on the beach. I bet every woman in Santa Cruz knows how to compost. I bet every woman in Santa Cruz is fine about smoking pot three times a day. Maybe I need a lifestyle shift. Maybe I need to move to Santa Cruz. I'm going to save up a couple hundred bucks and see if Santa Cruz isn't the kickstart my brain needs.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-19902453187729872452008-02-13T02:04:00.001-08:002008-02-13T03:18:59.873-08:00I think I need to be offensive.It turns out that checking my email and playing the guitar on the edge of my bed isn't generating as much revenue this quarter as I'd hoped, so it's time to drum up a gig. I'm tired of designing web pages, brochures, and logos for people who think they need to reinvent the wheel ("what if the text ran right-to-left, and you had to read our website in a mirror?"). I'm sick of getting forty dollars a pop doing blind tastings of freeze-dried coffee or letting college students measure my nipples throughout a showing of Bambi. It's time to take the low road.<br /><br />That's right: I'm going to write a boorish, controversial column for the local paper. It will be cranky, it will provoke, the opinions will not be carefully considered, and, most importantly, it will run counter to the delicate sensibilities of precisely the sort of person who gets so ruffled that they end up giving me free advertising. It should gain notoriety in no time, and then be syndicated throughout the English-speaking world, hopefully at a hundred bucks a throw.<br /><br />Here are some of my warm-up exercises. I've chosen especially divisive topics because, like I said, this isn't about doing great work. It's about bringing people apart.<br /><br /><b>VEGETARIANISM</b><br />There’s simply no need for it anymore. In this enlightened age I can buy meat from a cow that was pushed in a pram, wet-nursed by Thora Birch, and flown to Santorini for private pronking lessons. In the wild, this same animal would have been trundled off by a peckish eagle before it had traveled the distance from the womb to the grass below, so what’s there to be upset about? People who can’t stomach the idea of humane slaughter ought to see how inhumane nature is when it’s outside of our control, where Temple Grandin has no say over which end of the emu the dingo pack tears off first. As for the vegans, the vegetarians can start with them — they are no doubt fairly easy to digest, being composed mainly of wadded yarn and rhubarb poop.<br /> <br /><b>WATCHING WOMEN PLAY TENNIS FOR THE FIRST TIME</b> <br />It’s like watching Sylvester Stallone make a sandwich: every action so alien, so unsure...so much wasted movement, so much looking around for approval...your frustration eventually mounts so high that you are forced to leave and wait in the car.<br /><br /><b>THE COLLAPSE OF THE MUSIC INDUSTRY</b> <br />I, for one, am happy to see the little MP3, that Phylloxera of the phonographic industry, bring Big Music to a halt. More great music has been written than you can ever hope to hear in your lifetime, so stop being fooled by this year's soulless, calculated retreads. And all this tongue-wagging about musicians finally recording for love of music over money is fine and good, but as long as I’ve got my Who Sell Out and White Album, you can keep that amazing new chord progression that no one's ever heard before, and those clever lyrics about a certain condition of the heart. <br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">—Téodor Orezscu.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-9342944767093708852007-11-19T18:38:00.000-08:002007-11-20T19:15:19.701-08:00Thanksgiving appetizers 2007Ray's got me on appetizer duty for Thanksgiving at his place, which isn't actually so bad, since I know he'll have a ton of cooktop and oven space ready for my preparations. Still, though, I had to make sure, so I rang him up.<br /><br />ME: So, can I have a couple burners to prep my apps on?<br /><br />RAY: Heyo! Who wants to talk to my face? Thrill a minute, bargain at twice the price!<br /><br />ME: It's me, man.<br /><br />RAY: That works. What's up?<br /><br />ME: Can I prep some Thanksgiving apps at your house?<br /><br />RAY: Apps? Fill me in, dogg. Hella slang. Apartments? Apostles? Appreciations?<br /><br />ME: Appetizers.<br /><br />RAY: Oh, right. You got the cooking show vocabulary happening. Yeah, you can cook here.<br /><br />ME: Thanks for not making me feel like an asshole.<br /><br />RAY: It doesn't come naturally, but in our friendship, I have developed <span style="font-style: italic;">certain graces.</span><br /><br />ME: That's really wonderful.<br /><br />RAY: So, whatchu makin'!<br /><br />ME: A toasted pumpkin seed dip, and a crostini with pumpkin butter, cream cheese, mint leaf, and a little garlic chili paste.<br /><br />RAY: Cool. We doin' a crown roast instead of turkey, just so you dig.<br /><br />ME: Really? That's a nice touch.<br /><br />RAY: Turkey sucks the <span style="font-style: italic;">dong</span>. All boring, all crappy drumsticks. Hate that animal. That animal is a <span style="font-style: italic;">crap-face repeater.</span><br /><br />ME: Yeah, I've heard people say it was designed by committee.<br /><br />RAY: You know what else was designed by committee?<br /><br />ME: What.<br /><br />RAY: Hitler's crooked one-ball dong.<br /><br />ME: Wow. Bad committee.<br /><br />RAY: Worst committee in the world. Look it up.<br /><br />ME: Won't, but much respect. I'll show up with my apps and a little gear, ok?<br /><br />RAY: We got gear here, dog.<br /><br />ME: I like my own gear.<br /><br />RAY: That is rude, but who can care if a man is rude when life is beautiful.<br /><br />ME: I was banking on that.<br /><br />RAY: See you on the day, then.<br /><br />ME: A curl of clear custard on your doorstep.<br /><br />RAY: The sign of a crappin' ghost!<br /><br />ME: <span style="font-style: italic;">Mwaaa-ha-haaah</span>. [HANGS UP]Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-91692887456735701712007-08-27T14:33:00.000-07:002007-08-27T14:34:30.873-07:00The Wedding Menu.I was having a hard time coming up with a cohesive menu for Beef and Molly's wedding, so I went back to Ray for some pointers. The guys have known each other since early childhood, so I figure that gives Ray a unique inside perspective on foods that would really make the night special. He shot me back this list, via email:<br /><br />_ _food! _ _ _ _ _ _ _ - _ _<span style="font-size:78%;">primeplayerinc</span><br /><br />-=- RAYYYYY'S <span style="font-style: italic;">lissssst =-=</span><br /><br />***alright T, here you go some rad nibbles and chin dribbles a la RQS ***<br /><br />1) Some cheese thing with an extra fried-ness to <span style="font-style: italic;">mack</span> the cheese beyond what cheese is<br /><br />2) japaleño poppers, but gourmet twist (brie? smoked trout? "slow" movement? call a chef)<br /><br />3) rack of duck brains ("rack my brains," hella classic saying, pun). Nice-ass toast? Metal thing?<br /><br />4) pomegranates are aggh i hate those things all seeds poppin<br /><br />5) main course<br /><br />_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _<br /><br />I can almost decipher his semi-cogent appetites and inspirations, but I'm sure he's forgotten whatever he tickled into that text field on that late, long, bleary night. I'm going to spruce it up a bit:<br /><br />TO PASS:<br /><br />1. Montasio frico with roasted white anchovy and shaved celery heart rib in paprika aioli<br /><br />2. Smoked salmon on tempura parsnip planks with dilled sour cream mousse, chilled caper vodka back<br /><br />3. Crispy duck skin bun, Peking style, with plum sauce<br /><br />4. No pomegranate dishes<br /><br />5. Main Course: Spit-roasted Baron of Beef, Yorkshire pudding, neeps and tatties. For light eaters, a choice of the lettuces which are being used to garnish the main plates. I hate light eaters. <br /><br />Alright, that needs work. I guess I can cook up a vegan "garland of knotted long beans" for Pat and people like him who only eat stuff that punished people have to eat.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-55647567498927531392007-08-05T21:59:00.000-07:002007-08-05T22:47:44.821-07:00I'm Catering Beef and Molly's Wedding!Ray came by tonight and asked me a favor that turned out to be a favor for me. He asked if I'd cater Beef and Molly's wedding. Carte blanche, all food and service expenses paid, any new equipment I needed to make it happen out of his kitchen. The wedding and reception are in the back yard, so it's all self-contained. I figure that since it's a blank check, he's not doing it to save money. He's doing it because he knows I want to learn how to cook in volume. Sometimes I think he's some chump eating creamed twenties with a side of ribs, but then he'll pop in with a double-sided gesture like this. As he would say, <span style="font-style: italic;">"Daaamn. I did that god-damned brains style."</span><br /><br />Here's how our conversation went. I was in my room listening to old LPs with the headphones on, on my bed, both eyes closed.<br /><br />- + -<br /><br />RAY: [Walks in and starts air-tapping on my chest with pretend drumsticks]<br /><br />ME: [Eyes closed, catches the smell of Marlboro Lights] Ray? Is that you?<br /><br />RAY: Hell yes, doggie!<br /><br />ME: I thought you quit smoking?<br /><br />RAY: I...come on, dude! I ain't here to talk about that!<br /><br />ME: You have any left?<br /><br />RAY: [Looks side to side, fishes in his pocket] Let's go outside. A ways.<br /><br />ME: Cool.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">[Soon, outside, walking around.] </span><br /><br />ME: [exhaling satisfying smoke] So, what's up?<br /><br />RAY: [exhaling] Got a favor to ask from you, hoss. Cookin' thing.<br /><br />ME: Really? What? You working on a sauce? Fish?<br /><br />RAY: You know Beef and Molly gettin' married, right? You be interested in doin' the cookin'? No mini-quiche and no stuffed mushrooms at all, that kind of thing?<br /><br />ME: ...Wow. You serious?<br /><br />RAY: I'm as serious as a...uh...a milk company, dude.<br /><br />ME: Huh?<br /><br />RAY: Sorry, man. That one completely fell apart.<br /><br />ME: Oh. So, I get to do the menu and hire a staff and cook everything myself? Do real volume cooking?<br /><br />RAY: Yeah, dude. Pretty much. Wouldn't that be cool? Like I said, open budget. Get me a menu tomorrow afternoon. [Slaps my shoulder, stubs his ash, mentions a tennis date he has to keep, and heads for his car, which is parked nearby on the other side of a clump of trees.]<br /><br />ME: I...cool man, thanks for— [the sound of Ray's Caddie engine turning over] ...for the opportunity.<br /><br />- + -<br /><br />So there you have it. He didn't even stay around for the thanks. He just knew I'd dig it, he'd done his thing, and he was off to the club.<br /><br />Maybe I'll do a tasting menu, with one dish based on each of Beef's main friends. I'll keep you posted. This is going to take some brainpower.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-50069223526959587362007-07-31T20:20:00.000-07:002007-07-31T21:16:46.232-07:00Chris is a book-leaver-arounderI guess I hadn't read much about the French Laundry before. I mean, everyone knows that they're the fanciest deal in town (town being the world, fifty years in either direction), and that Thomas Keller is the Agronius Hype (Iliad god-chef that I made up) of the modern age. Before Ferran Adrià split the disbelief molecule, before Bobby Flay wore Vuarnets and Gotcha jams to Pomp and Circumstance at the FCI commencement, Keller was kempt and self-flagellating, the "mad monk" of the gastronomic world. I need to sneak into that kitchen and watch them in action. For now, though, I'm going to finish this Michael Ruhlman book that Chris left on the couch.<br /><br />Here's a funny bit. The French Laundry is considered one of the most serious kitchens in the world, equal to if not superior to any Michelin three-star brigade. For their first few months in the mid-90s, however, the cooks started every service with a tape of this song:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L1hD5OlPtw">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L1hD5OlPtw</a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">(George Baker, "Little Green Bag."</span>)<br /><br />Isn't that great? You can picture Alice Waters, 80 miles away in Berkeley, sautéing morels with the nose of an age-pocked Remington six-shooter she picked up off some blanket sale on Telegraph Avenue. Suede fringe on the arms of her tie-dyed chef jacket. Easier times, man. Rent on every building was six dollars, flat. The Internet? Nah, my sister got pretty confused and bored with Gopher, thanks. San Francisco may as well have been Dubuque. The web was a site with pi to 50,000 places and the AOL "under construction" page. Alice got on the back of Peter Fonda's chopper after service every night and flipped off America until they attained highway speeds, at which point she nestled her cheek between his shoulder blades and dreamed of making love in a mesclun-strewn bed.<br /><br />From the sound of it, I bet there's a nice set of rafters above the kitchen where I can keep tabs on things. Might even bring a telescoping fork and an insulated burp-bag. Wish me luck.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-13816085718600544832007-07-06T21:20:00.001-07:002008-12-09T10:46:24.907-08:00Bubb Rubb is the Nation's Individual<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi57pzYvvVSbvLWuzJjJpTm-_du7oqfQCV1jhUqdHH8L2YENx5tIultJb7xBeEgtcq7zCs83IIOj1yW_hZy3syEW4BAajDAi-Wsq1Gc67_MVsP3NGsWcex6UD8oBlARe5lHw4Dz/s1600-h/bubb_rubb.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi57pzYvvVSbvLWuzJjJpTm-_du7oqfQCV1jhUqdHH8L2YENx5tIultJb7xBeEgtcq7zCs83IIOj1yW_hZy3syEW4BAajDAi-Wsq1Gc67_MVsP3NGsWcex6UD8oBlARe5lHw4Dz/s400/bubb_rubb.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5084305636496100802" border="0" /></a><img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Chris/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-1.jpg" alt="" />Bubb Rubb does not like to think that anything is wrong. If his <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmvjwOgVoVs">car is noisy</a>, you should probably be eating breakfast anyway. Woo wooooooo!Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-17947628095024707072007-06-26T22:12:00.001-07:002008-12-09T10:46:25.074-08:00Foto-Kwiz #4.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGif_HjQc7dpVK4PL0yIjUa_MJCjjd1pye1gGI3SBJb8vb00BqaDc956tV7r-0OxKjsqzVKnHCRTtjbnrf8WRr2nUmsVbetvZqIFnMeIK8t20hmAKNfTS4R4_NnDo1c8R0ybIC/s1600-h/stupid_notcool.gif"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGif_HjQc7dpVK4PL0yIjUa_MJCjjd1pye1gGI3SBJb8vb00BqaDc956tV7r-0OxKjsqzVKnHCRTtjbnrf8WRr2nUmsVbetvZqIFnMeIK8t20hmAKNfTS4R4_NnDo1c8R0ybIC/s400/stupid_notcool.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5080607832863002034" border="0" /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-10097369141909174162007-06-19T16:28:00.000-07:002007-06-19T16:55:19.280-07:00Beef goes in for the killI guess it was just a matter of time. Ever since Beef paired off with Molly they've been sharing an electron, and it's not like anybody's against it. Well, maybe Spongebath and Emeril. Those guys are the most adamant anti-life-moving-along types I've ever met. They're stuck in some kind of "two bros living in a cheap apartment" stasis that rises and falls by the Pizza Chicago delivery window. Plus that enormous stack of home entertainment equipment they're always adding to. Are they right, or am I wrong? Is that zen? Not everyone's made for marriage, but they could clean up their comments a bit. It's not like you're going to dissuade some dude who's headed for marriage, and if you try, it's pretty much closing the shutters on your friendship. <br /><br />They're registered for some pretty average stuff, like low-end stamped knives and nonstick cookware. I might go off the registry and get them some good stuff that will actually be fun to use and last a while. I think every new couple should get a cast-iron pan, an 8" knife, and a wood cutting board. In a perfect world, the government would mandate that you receive this when you get married. There's nothing a cast-iron pan can't do...you could roast a turkey in that bastard if you put your shoulder into it. And don't get me started on "knife block sets." How much crap is that. Four shitty steak knives, cheap shears, two paring knives...what?! A carving knife? Please. I hate products that are designed to be sold to people who will never have any idea how to use them properly. <br /><br />Okay, I'm putting my foot into the stirrup and getting off the high horse. I caught some Rick Bayless on the TiVo and I have about exactly half an hour until Lyle gets home and starts yelling about how "real" Mexicans cook.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-77680209133919331792007-05-07T21:59:00.000-07:002007-05-07T23:21:58.183-07:00Chris is such a DarrylictSo Chris is a bigshot now, with his subscription to the "Bacon of the Month Club." That fool wouldn't know salty from sweet most nights, the way he gets on with his $1.99 screw-tops from Grocery Outlet (I've seen the receipts). Yeah, I've been liberating a few of his slices here and there for my own purposes. I should probably start my own "bacon blog," where you can read things that actually work. That guy wears a coonskin cap and misses the bus on weekends -- at least I think about what I'm doing while I'm doing it. <br /><br />Tonight while he was out eating lousy family restaurant food with his family, I cooked down a few slices of his latest jowl bacon. I put it in a hot, fresh-baked baguette with super-slim grilled, trimmed asparagus stalks, shaved Gruyère, mint, lemon zest, and chopped hard boiled egg. Mayonnaise and a romaine leaf moistened it up, and it was complete. Much nicer than the Study in Pepto he worked up for you last week. Stay tuned, I guess. I hear he's getting his next shipment tomorrow, and I bet he doesn't even know.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-16657982142467038132007-03-05T20:53:00.001-08:002008-12-09T10:46:25.267-08:00Foto-Kwiz #3<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXQ8Xk5PzmvP5e-4UvmOE-Gv4yCKKDPsUXWmP-020d452dl7gQdp-IwkOBX3-hIksKpPR_h1KvS2SU4CorH1Dt1EqfmoFaRO6ONgIb9P85NW5Z8IM1okt9ZJR4qs5SwxO0QpEK/s1600-h/holloway_rock.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXQ8Xk5PzmvP5e-4UvmOE-Gv4yCKKDPsUXWmP-020d452dl7gQdp-IwkOBX3-hIksKpPR_h1KvS2SU4CorH1Dt1EqfmoFaRO6ONgIb9P85NW5Z8IM1okt9ZJR4qs5SwxO0QpEK/s400/holloway_rock.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5038670183622471682" border="0" /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-35693017833265424992007-03-03T18:39:00.000-08:002008-12-09T10:46:25.626-08:00Foto-Kwiz No. 2<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhX-SAWleuMT45W3g2Tu6z5StHhJ733i8GKXUABlC-xQNVAX2Gn_xaFoQt3nyb0_0NfdkOI1JIliO4QyUGJ34h6AXmLT9KydIGtMalvVCaoZng6ZzTHePHmjI7JdCDhcA2ueIdJ/s1600-h/blair_oliver.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhX-SAWleuMT45W3g2Tu6z5StHhJ733i8GKXUABlC-xQNVAX2Gn_xaFoQt3nyb0_0NfdkOI1JIliO4QyUGJ34h6AXmLT9KydIGtMalvVCaoZng6ZzTHePHmjI7JdCDhcA2ueIdJ/s400/blair_oliver.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5037893757996529026" border="0" /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1169611422984349922007-01-23T17:41:00.000-08:002007-01-23T21:33:48.823-08:00Whole Foods Attitude girlI had to get some fresh dill, which is actually pretty hard to find around here, so I went up to Whole Foods in San Mateo. It was kind of a schlep, but I'm working on a lobster roll variation that uses west coast crustaceans (read: affordable non-lobstertutes) so I needed it.<br /><br />Now, you know the kind of girl that works at Whole Foods. Slightly peppy and political, probably with some tattoos and Vans. I like that. I want to roll with that. I actively want to spend time with that kind of girl.<br /><br />Or, I thought so. While I was meandering down the bulk spice aisle, this gorgeous Siouxsie Sioux-type with tousled bangs and big eyes (and some armpit hair, okay, not a deal breaker) asked if I needed any help. I already had my dill, so I said I was looking for lemongrass...she called me silly and started to pull me by the hand back toward the produce section, where they keep that stuff fresh. I guess no one's pulled on my hand lately -- it felt like an immense come-on.<br /><br />Once she'd shown me the bin where they keep the lemongrass, she walked away, like Whole Foods was this big toy house where she lived and played and thought nothing of pulling on guys' hands. It was kind of a letdown after the personal contact, so after I suggestively lingered in the produce area I pushed my cart around the store trying to find her again.<br /><br />I guess she was avoiding me, because after ten or fifteen minutes of wandering the aisles I gave up and checked out. Once I'd paid (JESUS CHRIST ON GOD MOUNTAIN IS THAT PLACE EXPENSIVE) I started to shove off, and there she was at the manager's station chatting with a few of her heavily tattooed co-workers. She glanced at me, made some sort of comment, and then the little batch of them started to snicker. Like there was something wrong with me. I left, kind of pissed off.<br /><br />Maybe I don't actually like girls who spend a bunch of time looking like a particular downer style, or who work in politically charged low-end leftist jobs. I'm more or less "leftist"; why do leftist chicks drive me crazy? Is it true what they say, that you hate in others what you hate about yourself? Maybe I'll try to meet a tennis chick, with a blonde ponytail, diamond earrings, and an ML 350. Someone with no issues and rad thighs. I think I'd hate that, but maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm due for a personal breakthrough. Look how great I am, I don't even need specialty books or a padded mat to help me affect positive change in my life.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1164692871759867642006-11-27T21:07:00.000-08:002006-11-27T21:47:51.833-08:00Stupid Todd and his death wishSo a couple weeks ago Todd died. He had forgotten to bulk up for winter hibernation, and his body went kaput at the first cold snap (apparently he'd been on an America's Funniest Home Videos bender for a month or so and had ignored his body's primal instinct to gorge itself during autumn). His dying request was that I film me hitting his corpse over the fence with a baseball bat and send the video to America's Funniest Home Videos. I did, and this morning some police came to the door. Apparently squirrels getting clocked with bats raised a few red flags. I guess if I'd thought about it I would have realized that that's kind of a perverse thing to send to anyone...but when it's Todd it just seems like another funny PCP party trick.<br /><br />Anyhow, Lyle got the door and I listened to his conversation with the cops from behind the couch. It went kind of like this:<br /><br />LYLE: SooooOOOO! It's YOU again!<br /><br />COP 1: Sir, are you Téodor Orezscu?<br /><br />LYLE: Do I look like that fat pussy to you? Tell me now. Say it to my face, asshole shitwad. I fucked your mother and drew a daisy on her ass. [spits] <br /><br />COP 1: There's no need for this kind of behavior, sir.<br /><br />LYLE: Oh yes there IS! [sound of bottle breaking] ACE OF SPADES!<br /><br />COP 2: Sir, have you been drinking?<br /><br />LYLE: NO!<br /><br />COP 1: Does a Téodor Orezscu live here?<br /><br />LYLE: What's this about, mustache-dick? Your partner here put his dick across your upper lip like a mustache? Is that why you're buggin' me? I already have a mustache, so NO THANKS on the lip pedro thing.<br /><br />COP 2: We're investigating some charges of squirrel cruelty. Does the squirrel in this photograph resemble anyone you know?<br /><br />LYLE: Nope.<br /><br />COP 2: And this...[flips page]...is this Téodor Orezscu?<br /><br />LYLE: Never seen that fat piece of crap before. Get lost. Both of you. Get in your cop car and go to your cop car parkin' spot.<br /><br />COP 1: Have a nice day.<br /><br />COP 2: Make sure you clean up this broken glass. It's a hazard.<br /><br />LYLE: Fuck...YOUUUUUUUUUU! [door clicks]<br /><br /><br />So, I figure I've got to lay low for a while, and probably change the way I look pretty significantly. Should probably grow a beard...get glasses...maybe do the Hasidic Jew thing with the black suit and stuff...what are those corkscrew sideburns called? I think my great-grandpa Bliklish had a pretty rad set. Okay, off to Jew it up. The next time I see you, it will not be as Téodor Orezscu. It will be as...Herschel Schviz-Meskewicz.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1162455011643041602006-11-01T23:23:00.000-08:002006-11-02T00:10:11.663-08:00Got kicked out of my one-man band.I gave up on trying to learn how to use all that professional recording equipment. Too many dials, knobs, sliders, cross-faders, modalities, and unlabelled function keys. No user interface design to speak of. More Enigma machine than envelope, if you follow me. Every time I stood in front of it, I felt like Dave at the end of <span style="font-style: italic;">2001: A Space Odyssey</span>, presented with all those monolithic lucite "buttons." One wrong push and the whole thing might blow up in my face. Suffice it to say, I won't be releasing any album that isn't a YouTube webcam clip of my left hand doing the chord changes to "Free Fallin'." Yes, I will be sitting on my bed. Yes, at the end you will see me get up. Off-camera, I will hit the space bar, which stops the recording. You will hear the first half of the click of the key. VIEWS: 17. COMMENTS: Yah that was good, chek out mine 2 :) [link]<br /><br />What's new with me...I've been making a lot of bread. I uncovered a bread machine in the garage (a wedding present that had never been touched), and it's great. It takes the crappy part out of making bread (interminable kneading), and leaves you to just throw essentially free ingredients together, wait a bit, and then see what happened. It's like tossing a grenade over a hill, having a smoke, and then climbing over to discover that the grenade has turned into a lovely rosemary focaccia.<br /><br />I've got a sourdough starter going right now, this yeasty slop that's supposed to sit out for three days and rot. The more I try to figure food out, the more I find that toeing the line between discoloration and dysentery is where real flavor lies. Should we always be eating food that might almost make us sick, in order to keep up digestive strength? There might be some wisdom there. <br /><br />You know what? I've never had Limburger cheese. Or Liverwurst, for that matter. I'll be stinkin' it up tomorrow. For dessert? You guessed it. I'm going to eat a red onion like it was an apple. You'll know me — I'll be the guy swatting away vultures with a big diagram of Mitteleuropa.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1156233813416027782006-08-22T01:01:00.000-07:002006-08-22T10:08:38.146-07:00Rough goings with music recording efforts.<p class="MsoNormal">THE USER INTERFACES ON MUSICAL RECORDING EQUIPMENT ARE MANY LIGHT YEARS BEHIND THOSE ON GENERAL-PURPOSE COMPUTER EQUIPMENT OR EVEN BLENDERS. Thank you for listening while I got that off my chest. It's just that all this high-end gear I borrowed from Ray is virtually inscrutable. I go to establish the settings on one input track out of 64, and I'm faced with twelve knobs, two sliders, five three-position buttons, and so many LEDs that I might as well be shining a flashlight into a cave full of bats. I JUST WANT TO MIC MY ACOUSTIC GUITAR WHILE I PLUCK AWAY AT "APRIL COME SHE WILL." SORRY I'M NOT THE LONDON PHILHARMONIC. I'M LIKE A FAMOUS CHEF WHO BOOKED HELL BUT ONLY NEEDED TO COOK A SINGLE HOT DOG. Oh look, I'm yelling again. Maybe it's because I hate everything in my room, including the large stupid machines and the little idiotic man who is sitting on the floor in front of them. </p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1149924704562524912006-06-09T23:32:00.000-07:002006-06-10T14:10:15.690-07:00Into the StudioWow. I was in Ray's garage looking for a soccer ball, when what should I find under a sheet but a huge mixing table, a bunch of recording equipment, a big Pearl drum kit, and a bunch of Pro Tools software! He had about fifty grand worth of gear in there, so I asked him if he was planning on doing anything with it, since I've really been itching to lay down some tracks.<br /><br />RAY: Téodor! Doggie, you find that soccer ball I said about?<br /><br />ME: Yeah, but it was flat. It looked like a rat had been eating one of the panels.<br /><br />RAY: [thinks] That's right. Damn. I put that ball away with a slice of sandwich ham stuck to it. I shouldn't have done that. [Shakes head] Man, what if Coach Dan saw me doin' somethin' so—<br /><br />ME: I saw a ton of recording equipment out there. [Pretends to give Ray benefit of doubt] Are you starting a recording project?<br /><br />RAY: Don't talk to me about that stuff, man.<br /><br />ME: What? I'm sorry.<br /><br />RAY: Hell of annoying, dogg. Bad times.<br /><br />ME: Bad, huh. I'm sorry.<br /><br />RAY: Bad, dogg. You want a soda? Amstel?<br /><br />ME: You don't want to talk about it, do you.<br /><br />RAY: Well, I got kind of burned.<br /><br />ME: Damn.<br /><br />RAY: Yeah. These dudes from East side, you know, they played me this demo with this fat track on it, some real delicious wax, you know, but they said it was produced on equipment that had recently been stolen from them. I said I'd procure new gear and they had this thing where it was getting to be dinnertime, and they kept mentioning dinner, and I was like, I'll get on these dudes' good side, take 'em under my wing, get 'em some dinner. So we went and had steaks down at The Chophouse, and I dropped on some good wines, to kind of start grooming them for the limelight, and then afterwards real quick they said they had to go to bed because of all the food and wine, so I chuckled and they rolled off. I tried their pager the next day but no deal, it was fake, you know, and I played their demo for a friend of mine and turns out it was just the new Krass Medik single that got leaked onto the Internet that I hadn't heard yet. These dudes just burned that onto a CD and pretended it was them. Meanwhile I had ordered all this gear Next-Day Air. I feel like a stone idiot about that.<br /><br />ME: Wow. Damn. Conniving, you know?<br /><br />RAY: That's exactly it! They were <span style="font-style: italic;">conniving! </span>Exactly!<br /><br />ME: So you gonna sell all that stuff back on eBay?<br /><br />RAY: I don't know. I'm kinda hopin' some new act will come along and need it.<br /><br />ME: Why don't I take it to my place, and hook it all up, and learn it, and that way if a good act comes along, but they aren't too technically proficient, I can kind of serve as their engineer. A lot of times these guys can't tell an RCA jack from a USB port. All they know is straight mic.<br /><br />RAY: [gets real quiet for several seconds] Damn. I had about sixteen thoughts just now. But yeah, yeah. That is a real genius idea for a service. A lot of these dudes had no advantages. There is this one guy, Kareem Kara-<span style="font-style: italic;">mell</span>, his whole thing is that he can't use any digital technology, he is so poor. He can only use analog technology. He's warped. He's out there, but his sound is so odd, I can see it in like a Cingular ad. Old Navy at least, or like if Old Navy started to sell ringtones.<br /><br />ME: Awesome. How can...do you have a flatbed we can use to get the gear to my place?<br /><br />RAY: I'll take care of it. Business expense, you know. Nice. Thanks, T. This is real smart.<br /><br />ME: Alright. Let's set that up right now.<br /><br />RAY: Cool. [makes phone call]<br /><br />Now I'm here in my room with tons of gear and trying to wrap my mind around the fact that I'm now able to produce studio-quality sound. It's a heavier burden than you'd think. Imagine when Simon & Garfunkel went in to record "April Come She Will," with just one voice and one guitar: that guitar's tone would forever define the feel of the song. Think also of the distinctive Stella that Kurt Cobain used here and there on Unplugged. Do I have a unique instrument like that? One that's got a sound worth recording?<br /><br />Aw, crap. I'm acting like every note I set down will be angel-kissed. I'm probably gonna toss 99% of this stuff, then re-record later. Simon & Garfunkel probably threw out enough tape to rig a thousand Cutty Sarks. It's such a rookie move to act like every early project is worth saving, like it's going to be featured in a documentary twenty years from now. Do I watch too many "rockumentaries," or do I just think too highly of myself? Can someone please help me plot a realistic Venn diagram.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1143792539981008662006-03-30T23:40:00.000-08:002006-03-31T00:09:00.023-08:00Beef = new GOF think tanker?Man, I've never seen so much online discussion about the GOF. I guess I've never looked for it, but this year, with Ray and Beef calculating a huge B.O.C. surprise overthrow, everybody's on home row at full tilt. I read thousands of threads while the action was unfolding, most of which were based on Barry King's offshore blog, and a handful of which actually made decent points.<br /><br />I loved the full-level razing of the grounds, and as a fan I'd like to see the concept of the Fight rise up from the ashes in a new format. In fact, I'm surprised it took this long for the contestants to try to overthrow the grounds themselves. Anyhow, for my money, the guys at alt.gof.new have a lot of it figured out: for grandeur and drama, they have to take Beef on in an executive-level advisory role. He clearly knows more about the Fight than any of them, and, as many software security companies have demonstrated, you need to hire your most dangerous adversaries. Why do you think you see so many sixteen year-old Ukrainian kids driving around in Maybachs?<br /><br />I don't want to be too nosy or anything this year, but I'm sure they're going to call him and I'm pretty hopelessly interested in seeing how it all plays out. You stick around a place long enough, you see things like this happen.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7511919.post-1139129582679233832006-02-05T00:14:00.000-08:002006-02-05T01:00:18.826-08:00WINE SUNDAYI've been commiserating with Cornelius, of all people, about bad wine experiences at Trader Joe’s (I'd have thought he was above buying wine there). TJs has long been of renown for affordable wine, but sometimes it takes a couple guys getting together to compare notes and discover that, actually, hey, TJs is selling some ruined, backlot wines.<br /><br />Cases in point are:<br /><br />Their recent $4.99 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Meridians</span> (typically $8 at other stores), which basically taste like “wine.” I’m talking about the kind of wine you’d expect at Malibu Grand Prix.<br /><br />That “<span style="font-weight: bold;">Amarone</span>” they are selling, which should be a raisiny, sweet, complex dark wine, but instead tastes like “antler piss” (imagine a rack of deer antlers shooting piss out of the ends)<br /><br />Their <span style="font-weight: bold;">viogniers</span>, some of which taste like simmered Mad Dog 20/20 that has been poured and left to cool among the upraised strands of an astroturf mat that a dog sleeps on.<br /><br />This information, taken in with the fact that Trader Joe's often puts oversized, funny-shaped, horridly flavored bottles of wine on prominent store-front displays, indicates that they are not the quality broker they originally purported to be.<br /><br />Here's another weird thing about their liquor aisle: all of the full-pint canned 6-packs (Oranjeboom, Peter's Brand, 3 Horses, Melcher's, Henninger) taste the same. Why carry 5+ different brands? Do they have some LagerBringer machine in the back, and just shoot the stuff into different packaging? Those lagers are fine, but it's weird that there are five of them in a store with limited shelf space.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com