 Home  What's New  Feedback / Submit Reader Photos  PGDesigner  Cylindrix  Links  Personal |
|
Links: Watch Me Eat a Hot Dog www.glitch13.com Live New Orleans Yaddoshi's site Six Ten Split Fleshbot Offbeat |
|
||
Anyway. It was a nice, two story place with hardwood floors. This place was just a block away from a cool bar called "Parlay's," a nice grocery store, a neat little coffee shop with good breakfast, and a convenient gas station. We were just a quick hop off of the Interstate, and it was a reasonably quick jaunt over to the Quarter or Metairie. It was a bit expensive though, so after a couple of years I decided to get a cheaper place in Metairie. Well, I also decided to move out because my girlfriend left me (and her sister, who was living with us), and I was now in this huge place by myself. It took a few weeks to pack up all of my stuff since I am a bit of a pack rat. I had a bunch of stuff in the attic, and I put that off for last because I just hate crawling around in the heat and insulation. A couple of days before moving day I decided I finally had to go up there. I had never actually crawled up there, as I had just sort of scooted all of the boxes up there from the ladder. Unfortunately a bunch of them had been scooted pretty far back, so I had to climb up there to get them. I was really surprised by how roomy the attic was. It really seemed much larger than the room below it. I tend to be a pretty bad judge of relative scale, so I just blew it off. I started hauling boxes down the ladder, one at a time. As I got to the last few boxes waaaay back in the back, I became confused. They were really far back there, and I didn't remember putting anything that far back. I opened one of the boxes and realized that none of the stuff was mine. "Wow!" I thought, "The previous renters must have left this box here. There was a ton of cool loot in this box. There were nice rock glasses, some wine bottle openers, and a really really nice flask. I stuck the flask in my back pocket and dug through the box a little more. The light in the attic was extremely dim, and my body was casting a shadow over the box, making it difficult to see the contents. I shifted my body and moved my leg to take my shadow off of the box. My foot punctured a hole in the thin floor/ceiling between the boards, and my leg slipped into the hole. My entire body lurched over, and my leg fell through the hole all the way to my groin. I shouted in pain. A woman below me screamed in terror. I was in agony and totally confused. My girlfriend and her sister had moved out weeks ago. I was alone in the apartment. How was there a woman below me screaming? She kept screaming. I adjusted my weight, and my thigh tore a bigger hole in the ceiling. I was able to see below me. This wasn't my apartment. I was looking into my neighbors apartment. I experienced another few seconds of confusion while my neighbor screamed. Then it dawned on me. Our duplex shared an attic. I had inadvertently crossed over into her attic, rummaged through her shit, stolen her flask, and shoved my leg through her ceiling. No wonder she was screaming. "Holy shit," I said, "I'm sorry...I'll pay for the hole. I didn't know I was in your attic." I pulled my leg out of the hole just as her husband came in -- ready to kill someone. "It's me, John, from next door," I said as I pulled my leg up and surreptitiously snuck the flask out of my pocket and back into their box. Permalink to this post. |
||
Probably you also, but I can only speak for me. When I have a dream of an argument, I find myself angry at the antagonist for the rest of the next day. When I dream of violence, if the villain is someone in my everyday life, I find myself uncomfortable -- or angry -- around them for the entire day. And a sex dream? That's the worst. A person who was previously a peripheral player in my play is now a primary participant. (The Proliferation of 'P's was Purposeful) This imaginary world doesn't seem so illusory while my brain is still able to taste the memories. They fade rapidly, but before they do my brain feels that they have a very important meaning. A random dream, and suddenly everyone and everything around me is different. The ugly, beautiful, and the allies enemies. The sane insane, and the strangers lovers. Permalink to this post. |
||
I watched tadpoles gestate in this water, and watched them grow bigger and sprout proto-legs. But when I bought this property, I wasn't signing up for the "tadpole spawn" plan. I thought I was on high ground -- and I was until it collapsed. I suppose we could be snarky and point out that entropy will always take over. Looking at the picture, I'm finding it difficult to care too much. I suppose it's going to cost me a boatload of money to fix, but I do not live in Afghanistan, I have not been indoctrinated into madness. I suppose that even my misfortunes are a fantastic dream for a child whose life consists of explosives and brutality. Permalink to this post. |
||
A couple of days ago I was digging around and noticed "Garage Band." I had seen it when I first booted the Mac up, but I assumed it was some turd that tried to get you to register and buy things. On a lark I cranked it up, and was blown away by what a great multi-track recorder it was. I recorded a little ditty, and wanted to upload it to Facebook. Unfortunately, Facebook won't let you upload a raw .mp3 file, so I tried to convert it to a video file with audio only. No dice. So I figured I'd have to make an actual video file to go along with the audio. Since the lyrics to this song were so complex and meaningful, I thought it would be a great idea to do the Bob Dylan/INXS style lyrics-on-posterboard bit. Enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LF4MnJpRbSA Permalink to this post. |
||
Permalink to this post. |
||
Also the perpetually drunk. I don't know about you, but I find reality painful. I find the world very difficult to process and still continue to properly function emotionally. I want very badly to bring something positive into this world, and the complexity of every problem is so incredible that every effort is pissing into a sea of piss. Me and Tracey chug down the river in our boat. We see beautiful water birds that we cannot name. They fly with equal velocity to our boat, and I imagine that we are in a race. We arrive at the dock, and it's like cheers. Brenda greets us and hugs us and makes sure we have beers. The New Bartender struggles to find the Purple Hazes that are stocked solely because of our tastes. The Galaga machine at the Dock is set to high difficulty. One would think that "high difficulty" would mean super fast with lots of shit flying around, but in fact "high difficulty" on Galaga actually means everything runs really slowly (particularly your ship and bullets) and is pretty much boring. Brenda gave me permission to open up the machine and flip the dip switches to make it faster, but I have been terrified that I would drunkenly break something and have to pay for it. Last time we went to the Dock, Galaga was gone. And there was much suffering and gnashing of teeth. By car, this bar is right around French Settlement, Louisiana. You'd think that this would be a hotbed of closed-minded thought and stereotypical intolerance. Nothing could be further from the truth. "You know what I've come to realize," the cop said to me while drinking at the Dock, "We just need to legalize all of this shit, because all the law is doing is putting everybody in jail. It's fucking ridiculous." An openly gay teen plays pool with some Corn-Fed Country Boys. The world is far more subtle than fits into quick sound bites. As you have probably noticed, the Dock has the dreaded "Cock Trough" style of urinal. After years of pissing in bars, I have finally developed the proper right-hand technique to cover my junk whilst pissing. Permalink to this post. |
||
Permalink to this post. |
||
But he saw their (lack of) reactions and understood: They have comprehended slaughter their entire lives. They understood that to eat meat something must die. It was he, the city boy, that had a jarring reaction to the slaughter. Strangely, (perversely?) the act of killing an animal gives you a deeper respect for it. Maybe not. I know that when I was a kid, catching fish didn't have any sort of existential meaning. But certainly, now, when I eat a fish I have caught I reflect upon the beauty and brutality of all of it. (Cue the violin music and sappy stuff) It reminds me of a quote, "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." We are the shepherds of the earth. All of the earth's creatures are our sheep, and we have a responsibility to them. Certainly, we milk them, we eat them, we kill them... But we owe them something. As humans we owe to them more than that of a mindless predator. Ducks Unlimited is a good example. Ducks Unlimited is a great organization. This is a group of rich dudes who love to hunt ducks with shotguns. But you know what? Ducks Unlimited spends millions upon millions of dollars to preserve the marshes for duck habitats. It is the hunters -- perversely -- who are the greatest champions for duck preservation. Me? I fucking love crabs, and it hurts my heart to see one covered in oil. Permalink to this post. |
||
Permalink to this post. |
||
I have a bias against accents, and I like a well-spoken and level-headed person. The reality is that I backed the wrong horse early in this situation. Billy Nungesser is a fucking God among men. Billy obsessed over the boom. The boom. He spent every single night with the boats and setting up the boom. He was so proud of the work they had done, you could just hear it in his voice. This is not a guy who can hide his emotions. (I listen to every nugget of local news on this spill every single day) One day Billy reported a sheen that was at a particular spot in the Gulf. They plotted it on their GPS and then went back the next day. The next day it was gone. "This oil isn't following any rules," (I paraphrase), "You think it's coming in, and then it goes back out into the gulf." Unfortunately, his assessment was overly hopeful. The particular oil patch he saw didn't recede. It submerged and became invisible. A few days later he sounded like he was close to tears. "I don't know what the point was of all of this boom," he choked, "How do you stop something that is coming in underwater?" And just like that, when you thought he was on the ground and defeated, he got back up and started fist-fighting with reality again. He started fighting for the clean-up effort, for the barrier islands, for the different options now that the boom had proven a cruel joke. It's hard to understand unless you listen and read every day. This man is fighting unlike anybody else in the word. He cares -- intensely. Yesterday I heard Billy Nungesser talk about Obama. I heard genuine hope in his voice. He said that when Obama got down here and actually saw the reality of the marsh, that Obama would make heads roll and then things would really happen. "He is an intelligent man, and he is being shielded by his advisors," (I paraphrase), "And when he finally gets down here and sees the reality that is hitting the marsh, he is going to make things happen. I saw the look in his eyes when he came down here last time, and I believe that he is committed to doing all it takes to fix this situation." (Paraphrasing because I'm too lazy to look up the quote) I am afraid that three hours spent doing photo-ops on the beach doesn't quite prepare a world leader to make the proper decisions. It gives me no joy that Billy's hope was for naught, and that Obama is far more concerned about polls and appearances and Energy Legislation than the reality we are facing in the marsh. Fun fact for you non-locals: Oil has been sitting on the shores for 5 days now, and the federal government won't let us clean it up because we don't have the proper training. So, this drink's for you Billy Nungesser. You have earned my eternal respect, and I would vote for you to fill any elected office. Permalink to this post. |
My Adventures |
Misc Stuff |
Toilets |
Philosophy |
Dream Page |
Media Reviews |
Video Games |
Poker |
Computer Stuph |
People |
Hardcrawler |
My Weight Loss Program |
Random People |
Live Show Reviews |
John's Guide to Being a Metrosexual |
My MAME Project |
Gods of F*!@ING Rock! |
The Coolest Men on Earth |
Hottest Hotties of Hollywood |
My Taiwan Adventure
My Hong Kong Hijinks