And We're Off

I'm going on a big trip. It's exciting now, after six months of waiting and twiddling my thumbs. Now everything's moving fast: selling this, that, yard sale, car gone, all of it happening and at such an accelerated pace when for the last forever I was so stuck, so suspended in the Can't Do Anything Because I'm Waiting for Something Else mode. I mean, I did things, like finish grad school and such as, but really it's what your brain is doing, and mine was doing this: Mmm, okay, come on, little more, mmm...

This is the time when you appreciate your surroundings. This is the time when you walk the streets and actually SEE, and people seem prettier and kinder and you stop and smell the old garbage and say, "No place has garbage like this. This corner has always stunk of urine and oh, I'll miss it so."

Packing up and shipping out is weird and wonderful. I'm used to scorning those who say, "I wish I could do that," (because come on, if you want to do something...) but I don't feel so superior anymore. It's just a choice, and those who don't choose to take off have some things I'll never have (sanity, good sense, well-paying jobs). I do it because it's what I know how to do well; I wish I could have a stable home and a happy bookshelf and clean plates, but I don't. That's not me, yet.

But I know how to go. I know how to be away, and it's really amazing. This is your invitation to join me, if you want. It's always better with people. I've already got a yoga lesson on the books with a friend I haven't seen in years, on the sand, in return for a reflexology treatment from me. All this hippytasticness has its place, I assure you. And it's good medicine for those of us who are so jaded we're hard and green and oh-so-precious.

Sounds like paradise? Yeah. That's the point. What suffers is the building up of a Life with its contingent benefits. So, perspective. I'm the guy who moves to Mexico on a one-way ticket and who you're jealous of but I'm also the guy that doesn't have any health insurance and never knows what the deal with IRAs is and can't get my teeth cleaned regularly. Which is gross.

So this isn't all I have to say on the topic, but it's a start. And mostly, this is just to say, I'M GOING TO MEXICO PRETTY MUCH FOREVER. SUCK IT. And love.

Pork Belly of the Beast

The biggest problem with The Great Swine Flu Epidemic of '09 is that the puns are too easy, and threaten to overwhelm the largest part of my brain, the punmaker portion, rendering me essentially useless for regular interaction.

The second biggest issue connected to TGSFEO09 is, I'm still allowed to go to Mexico, right? Some people, who shall remain unnamed but who may also be the other person responsible for this blog, would probably not advise this trip. I'm not going to get into some pigheaded argument about the wisdom of going. I just want to know if they're gonna let me come home after I've been to this charming, picturesque cultural wonderland and horrifying petri dish of civilization-threatening pestilence.

Look, one of the reasons swine flu is not a major threat is that in this day and age disease control is very advanced and people who know things are on that shit. It's not going to turn into Something Awful because these people are paid to panic, and they do it in an effective, orderly fashion. The rest of us are profoundly inefficient freelancers.

So the real hazard of this thing is that average people, thanks to the media's proud refusal to do its job and humanity's fetish for random terror, will up their already-sky high irrational ambient fear levels to heights that make it hard to talk to them without driving pointy things into your eyeballs. This is the epidemic we should really be talking about. Do you know how hard it is to put on eye make-up with an awl sticking out of your retina? Have you herd?

Steely Dan III of Yokohama

I think I may need a spotter...

Flying Sucks

Prague's Franz Kafka International Named World's Most Alienating Airport

B. to the L.G. to the M.I.A. to the Elasticastica

Yes, there is a logical progression of ideas here. As in, doesn't it seem like Beyonce has been taking visual cues from Lady Gaga/M.I.A.? Also, did you know that M.I.A. was once the roommate of Justine Frischmann of Elastica? And did you know that back in the day Elastica was the motherfrickin' bombtrack? Because if you didn't know that, then... Well... And I'm not really concerned that they were middle-class Brit kids ripping off punk rock acts much tougher than them, because they were obviously serious about it and good at it too. Nor am I concerned about the accusations that they ripped of Wire. Because they did rip off Wire but they did it artfully. Unlike That Lady Gaga Song which is pretty good, but the melodic hook thing was totally stolen from The Bravery, which is a really lame band to steal from. And there is no point belaboring that M.I.A. is rad, because everyone knows it. She should tour with Bob Dylan and freakdance his old bones.

Beyoncé |MTV Music

Lady Gaga |MTV Music

(MTV censored the gunshots in this song!!! What gall.)

Elastica |MTV Music

Triumphant Return Pt. 2

Decided blogging is just too fun to stop, even in the face of utter irrelevance.

So I've removed the markings on this blog affiliating it with Mills College. Two reasons: A) I see now it was silly to have ever thought Mills wanted anything to do with my blog idea. Mills College seems to encourage all kinds of things indiscriminately, and I should not have taken this vague encouragement as anything other than a smoke screen for The Path of Least Resistance. B) I don't feel any real personal connection to Mills College, like, at all. I appreciate Mills in some ways, mainly for its accreditation as a post-secondary Place of Learning, what I can learn there academics-wise. But not in any way that has to do with who I am or what I think as a person; these appreciations are geographically located elsewhere. So my personal musings/ramblings henceforth shall have nothing to do with Mills College.

Not that they ever did or that anyone will notice. I only mention it, because telling the truth matters.

Yay, Truth!

Triumphant Return Pt. 1

That's all folks...

Hear ye. Hear ye. Thus endeth the blog which has been called Fierce Appendices and which shall henceforth be Fiercely Defunct Appendices. Contributors have lost interest, and readers never had any. See you in the funny papers.

Booktapes out.

Elvis

Honey Badger, you're my hero...

This little guy is my new hero. I love the part where he steals the snake's food, eats it, and then goes back and eats the snake. Talk about balls!



This video, however, severely depressed me. That sneaky little bastard! Hiding in its hole till some unsuspecting little crab happens to walk by, then SNAP! That sound is just sickening. Nature can be a cruel bitch-goddess.

Bob

These lyrics are very good... The Arctic Monkeys' Fake Tales of San Francisco

Fake Tales of San Francisco
Echo through the room
More point to a wedding disco
Without a bride or groom
There's a super cool band yeah
With their trilbys and their glasses of white wine
And all the weekend rockstars are in the toilets
Practicing their lines

I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear, you know
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear you
I don't want to hear your...

Fake Tales of San Francisco
Echo through the air
And there's a few bored faces in the back
All wishing they weren't there

And as the microphone squeaks
A young girl's telephone beeps
Yeah she's dashing for the exit
And she's running to the streets outside
"Oh you've saved me," she screams down the line
"The band were fucking wank"
And I'm not having a nice time."

I don't want to hear you
(Kick me out, kick me out)
I don't want to hear, you know
(Kick me out, kick me out)

Yeah but his bird thinks it's amazing, though
So all that's left
Is the proof that love's not only blind but deaf

He talks of San Francisco, he's from Hunter's Bar
I don't quite know the distance
But I'm sure thats far
Yeah I'm sure thats pretty far

And yeah, I'd love to tell you all of my problem
You're not from New York City, you're from Rotherham
So get off the bandwagon, and put down the handbook
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook
Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook
Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook
Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook
Yeah

I love my wife, part eleventy billion

This is a real sentence my wife said today.

Did you not get the memo?

Two things:

A) "Cool" people of the world, (no, I refuse to use the word "hipster," guh)... Clothes have never made you you cool. Did you see how I didn't use quotes around the word "cool" that time? That is, unless you happen to be a nineteen-fifties motorcycle hepcat and have tatted arms, but not without the spider-web on the elbow, because that makes or breaks the deal. Or if you're a nineteen-sixties preppy who came out of his mother's womb wearing a cardigan. These are the ONLY two examples where clothes make you cool, "cool" people.

For further information on the matter, watch this:



B) Tiny bottles of liquor confuse me. Why are they so tiny? Will they grow if I put them in water? Do they need some kind of incantation? Are there tiny winos stumbling around someone's dollhouse? Is it possible these tiny liquor bottles are being made for Beany Babies? A better question, is there any other product in the world which are marketed in smaller portions as miniature scale models? Can I order some tiny waffles from a tiny IHOP served by leprechauns? Hold me closer, Tiny Dancer?

Get Religion

So Monday was my birthday. Oh come on, settle down...I can't write when you're screaming and throwing kisses like that. Thank you. Anyway, it was also a full moon, if that means anything to you, and a lunar eclipse was on the docket, if that sets the tone, and when I woke up and went out on the street to move my car to the other side because San Francisco is a piece of shit town that does street cleaning every other alternate sunny day from eleventeen to threety except for days that start with W, I noticed that some sweet and tender slice of humanity had walked down the sidewalk sometime during the night and methodically kicked off all the side view mirrors on the cars, including mine of course.

That kind of discipline and dedication always warms the heart. What with that sort of orderly approach to things that need kicking to the curb, I'm sure the cure for gonorrhea is next on his list. Not that I care.

So I was about to move my car but then a lady pulled into the nice spot I'd been eyeing, so I left the car there. That's foreshadowing, for all you non-fancy writer types.

That afternoon (still my birthday, sshhhh, stop it), I was enjoying a nice Irish coffee (it's Ireland somewhere) when a loud crunch was heard from the world beyond my whiskey. This crunch was the sound of a large delivery truck backing with appropriate maniacal force into my car. It wasn't on purpose, don't worry. He was aiming for the wide, unobstructed driveway into a big lot behind a thing with a thing, and my car was, stupidly, a mere twenty feet from that driveway. Basically, my car was asking for it. It was wearing a really short skirt, slutty red lipstick, the whole nine.

Then, and this is the best part, the owner of the delivery company (veggies, fresh to your door, or A Door) doesn't want me to get his insurance info for complicated carrot reasons and makes his case this way: "Don't you trust me?"

And that, my friends, is the best birthday present I could ever have hoped for. I am no longer an atheist. I realize that god, while understandably busy directing mirror kickers to cure venereal diseases, has as his first order of business making me double over with laughter in the middle of an Irish afternoon surrounded by broken glass dreams and salad fixins. And that's a deity I can get with.

Petulah Clark's Downtown

Check the tuxedoed male dancers.

Facebook killed the blogosphere star...

So I'm pretty sure the reason I have been blogging so infrequently lately is that the "Status Report" feature on Facebook basically fulfills the same function as a blog, but in about a tenth of the time. So to the guy in Dubai who reads this blog but isn't my Facebook friend, here's a complete list of my "Status Updates" from the past week in order from most recent to least:

David is thinks the first thing on every "List of Things to do Today" should be "#1: Finish List..."

David is Ubaba's big chubby baby.

David is why? Because we like you.

David depends on spellcheck to breathe.

David is Springtime a ring a ling a ling time, Springtime a ring.... A ling a ling time.

David is enough with the facebook quizzes already. I'm not that interesting.

David is Brian Austin Green, best actor ever?

David is So tell me whatcha want, whatcha really really want, I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want, I want a, I want a, I want a, zigguh-zig-ahhh,etc.

David sees the monsters on Maple Street.

David is knobbies, knobbies, knobbies... Growing out my headball...

David is the snozzberries taste like snozzberries!

David is a fool.

(P.S. I hope the irony of the Facebook logo being too large for the blog post is not lost on you...)