It's Gettin' Old

I am sincerely sorry. We have to do it again. I know it happens too often, for some reason indeterminate reason or reasons. (And possibly because I get bored & am sick and it's easier than writing a new entry—a popular strategy employed by TV writers when the deadline for a new episode is looming, and they really have nothing to say.)

But OK, usually I don't know why these things happen when they do. Are quantum forces at play? Are divine beings (e.g. Elizabeth Elmore) exercising their influence? Am I enjoying another mood swing? Could be. I wish. Probably. This time, though, there is a reason why we must review, reconsider and regurgitate things past—including last night's bloated ration of gin.

Check the calendar lately? Hmmmm??? So, whadja get me? Better not be no malodorous cologne, nor cheap gift basket some asshole gave you at the office Xmass party last Dec.; (w/ rancid chocolate a-spoil, wilted lil' plastic grass n' foil n' whatever;) nor a donation to the Boys Secular Chorale Corral in my name. I better get something good. A $500 gift card to Bob's Adult Spot for Hot Splots n' Gin Shots would be acceptable, but c'mon, really, I deserve something like jewelry, or even a car.

It is our 5th Anniversary, yours & mine. And before you start pretending like you remembered and go frantically running off to buy whatever shit you can afford—as you haven't even been saving for this day—anything that is remotely construable as a gift…Forget it. I knew you'd forget.

May 21, 2004. It was a quiet night, watching Puppet Master 4 or 5 or whatever. The very first entry. The lightning strike that heralded the birth of this blog! Oh the wonder! Oh the grandeur! Etc....

And although it's been 5 years, and prob. deserves something at least as sprawling (or rambling and over-inflated, if you prefer) as past retrospectives... Something that contains mechanisms that are as clever (or silly, if you prefer) as Charlie Sheen tirades or close encounters w/ Moray Eels... Despite all that, I'm gonna keep this short(er).

I think we all wanna go home. I'm tired. You look like you might be too. So trivia. A short list. 1 point per year, except for 1 year, which gets 2 points. (I am incapable of restraint or brevity, as you may know.) These points were chosen by anniversary years, not calendar years, which means 5/04-5/05, 5/05-5/06, 5/06-5/07, 5/07-5/08, (the year that gets 2,) and 5/08-5/09. Here goes:

"Cage Match: Peter Cottontail Vs. Ema Saiko!!!" (7/7/04): Every Spring in Chicago, you'll start finding the decapitated remains of pigeons all over the place. Probably just the work of cats or something, I guess, but it's pretty fucked up when you stumble across one, its blood pooling in vivid red, as you try to steer your fortunately blind dog away from its carcass. Here's hoping my acquaintance back in Pilsen fared better.

"Titus" (9/17/05) & "Titus Strikes back" (9/26/05): My "poem" in "Titus" is not technically a sonnet, as it doesn't utilize the appropriate meter. Titus's effort, however, is in standard sonnet form. Classy bastard.

"Hello, Hilo" (11/3/6): Some species of termite maintain 'gardens' of specific types of fungi. The fungi absorb nourishment from the excrement of the insects. When the termites harvest and consume the fungi, spores pass through the intestines of the insects. They then emerge as part of the termites' feces and begin germination, thus completing the cycle.

"Into the Black" (11/17/7): The Elizabeth Elmore solo LP described in this entry does not exist. I made it up.

"What I Did w/ My Year-Long Vavation" (1/8/8): The double disc version of Playing with Fire, which clocks in at just under 2 hours in length, also includes alternate mixes of "I Believe It," (labeled "Alternate Mix,") "Let Me down Gently," ("Drum Mix,") "Lord Can You Hear Me?” ("Demo Vocal,") "Honey," ("Demo,") and "Suicide ("Alternate Mix"). It also contains live versions of "How Does It Feel?" and "Suicide." All in all, there are 22 tracks, and 9 of these are alternate mixes or live versions of other songs on the album. That's 40.9% of the total number of tracks and 49.6% of the total running time. Enjoy!

"Lovin' the Rubble" (11/20/8): This is the first time I mentioned Sloth in a couple of years. At some point, I fell out of the habit of addressing him in my entries, which pains me a little. He was a good friend who died a couple of years before I started keeping a blog. He was young, and it was unexpected, and we were very close. It fucked me up pretty bad to see him go like that, as he was a very brave person with a very good heart. The Real Deal. So, hey, Sloth... I hope you liked this entry...

Fun, eh. I promise I'll get to Hawaii, NYC, and all the other irons I have in the fire soon here. Maybe by the time we hit 10 years—god help us, if that actually happens—I'll have finished all of it.

Happy Anniversary, baby...

New York, Part 2: Friday the 13th—Forceman Takes Manhattan

(I apologize for the long post. I couldn't find a good place to break it.)




Long, long narrow halls, and everywhere, pocked red carpet. Even in the elevator. Lighting was not so much dim, as erratic—overly bright wall fixtures split up the gloom. And when we opened the door of our room, there was that fucking carpet again.


The space was small, needless to say, but it was also oddly laid out. It was a scrawny rectangle—extremely-narrow by not-esp.-long. There was a bed w/ a squeaky metal frame. There was a battered desk. There was an armchair and end table. There was a small closet. And there was a TV.


“Look,” said BFA, holding up the remote. On the back, the battery compartment was missing its lid. In its place, a cardboard square had been scotch-taped.


“Rad,” I said. “Hey! Do you think we get cable? Like, maybe porn?”


“I’m not watching porn.”


“Oh, no! I didn’t mean that. I figured you could go out for a while or something.”


“We have to meet my uncle,” said BFA. “We’re late.”



Broadway does look different than Chicago. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the spiffy old buildings w/ their clean brick walls, lined by clean, unscarred lanes. NYC potholes must be an endangered species. I was sorry I’d left my safari gear at home. I might’ve been able to find one w/ my XL binoculars. (Though I must confess, they’ve never helped me find the clitoris, nor that spot on a guy’s prostate that you can reach down n’ tickle. Drive ‘em nuts.) But then, you need traffic to get potholes, and it seems that in NY, there isn’t any. Other than taxis, and even these are judiciously dispersed. There’s just enough of ‘em that they’re right there when you need ‘em, but not so many that they get on yr. nerves. There’s a vehicular snarl all over Chicago that can be oppressive, so I was downright surprised by how un-claustrophobic NYC seemed.


There’s a place there that looks like a Long John Silver’s and only had bottled beer, and that’s where we ended up. At first, all of the people there seemed to be dining in groups made up of 2 older people and 2 younger. The latter would smooch and giggle, so that you didn’t have to be Steve Forceman, P.I. to know that this was Ma & Pa & Billy & Mrs. Billy, out on the town, which meant that this was the sorta place you take Ma & Pa when you wanted them to meet the new Gal or Guy, or when you wanted to announce your engagement on a budget.


If anyone at our table had been smooching and laughing—or maybe just appeared young and glistening—we might’ve fit right in. Instead, I felt too sober, and BFA looked tired—even though, she’d spent 90% of the trip here drooling on my shoulder. Minus some pleasantries, I was left w/ my thoughts, as she & her relatives discussed the fates of their various kin.


I have this bad habit of zoning out on things that I have no interest in. I started watching the Billy’s & Susie’s & Mom’s n’ Daddy’s around me more closely. They were more interesting, because I didn’t know them, or have to know them. In my head, I was making up narratives about what their lives might be like in another, more lively universe.... f'rinstance, I pictured this 1 esp. squeaky cleen babe in a ruffly white dress whipping out her tits out at me and waving them about. They had these pointy green nipples. Look she'd say... I got green nipples... She wouldn't be saying this by way of seduction or whatever, but just conversationally, y'know? Exchanging pleasantries w/ a friendly stranger n’ all… sharin’ some of the Big Apple pie of hospitality.


As to BFA’s aunt & uncle… I don’t know where to begin.


They were vanDeuxs: Kasper and Ilse, (he introduced himself as “Signor,”) and they were somewhere between the tail-end of their 50s and the low-point of the 60s. Now. Get this: Uncle Kasper was wearing a fez. When they showed up. Really. A little gold tassel flopped around on it and everything. Thrown over his extremely wide torso was a white jacket with black bow tie. Seems he had just come from some affair put on by a quasi-Masonic group. Or maybe they were full-on Masonic. Who the hell knew the difference? Or cared? To the extent that I know anything about ‘em, which is not much, of course, I’ve always found the Masons to be pretty disappointing. As Secret Societies go, they seem kinda PG-rated, sorta like Herbie the Love Bug movies—the old ones, w/o Lyndsay Lohan—as opposed to the teen slasher flick that is the Rosicrucians, the soft-core porn of Scientology, or the splurtin’ hardcore porn of the Bavarian Illuminati. (Let’s just not even talk about the snuff film that is Amway. You gotta draw the line somewhere.)


It seems to me that about all the Masons out-intrigue or -frighten are the Shriners, who are sorta like the Sat. morning cartoons of Secret Societies. ‘Course but then, what do I know? (And that’s the point of a secret society, right?)


Anyway, his “fraternal brotherhood” went by the moniker of “The Circle of the Comely Hind” and he hadn’t had time to change his clothes after visiting it.


Well, fine, this was weird, but something about it seemed too weird. So I laid courtesy aside and said that while I understood that he’d not been able to change his clothes, I kinda wondered why he’d retained the fez as well, seeing as we were indoors and whatnot.


As he leaned forward, he was smiling and staring at me, but he looked like his mind was off somewhere else. I was hoping this location wasn’t a bed besplotted w/ puddles of KY w/ body hair stuck in ‘em—somewhere where his pink lil’ willy wasn’t wanglin’ somewhere in my general area.


But then he said something. “Something.” And then he said something else. “I like your candor. A man w/ such candor could go quite far.”


“Eh-heh.” I glanced at BFA. She was looking out the window, smiling obliviously.


“I suppose one might say you’ve already come quite far.”


"What the fuck do you know about my come shot?"


He looked at me as 'tho I was a wooden board.


"Mr. Forceman, that remark referred to yr. trip here from the... City Of Big Shoulders."


"Heh?" I always forget that expression and have absolutely no idea of what it means.


"The City," he said. "Of Big Shoulders."


"Hey. You're cultured. What does that Big Shoulders crap mean anyway?"


"Hmm," he said ruminatively. "I've often wondered that myself. The appellation does appear in Carl Sandburg's much beloved poem 'Chicago' (1916)."


"Signor VanDeux, I’ve retained almost nothing from high school English. Now you’ve raised some unpleasant memories of a poet whom I now remember is very bad. Could we please move less far into the past to the point where you answer my question about yr. head gear?"


More chortling. With lil' girly grace, a fat finger & thumb lifted an espresso cup. He looked off across the restaurant, watching something for some while. Was he pissed or watchin' for something?


At this point, I was only irritated. I have had plenty of clients, who were this difficult--or more so--but they were cut from different cloth than this guy. I couldn't even understand him. I looked to BFA, feeling it was way past time that she intercede, but she'd escaped into a conversation w/ Aunt Ilse.


VanDeux said, "What do you know about my Circle? Of the Hind?"


I decided to be honest. "Um, well, nothin'. Cool name 'tho."


Lean. Sip. And now he stared at me, smiling.


"Ours is an elder Order, w/ a storied past


"Right."


"Some say our practices predate the Roman Church."


"Right. Signor..."


"That is my title. Please..." his eyes a-twinkle... "Call me Kasper."


"Um... OK." Just like the Friendly Ghost, which seemed, somehow, appropriate. Later, I found that my intuition was warranted, even if 'Kasper' was spelled differently.


I signaled for another beer, fighting the urge to be annoyed by the bottled piss. At least I wasn't buying.


"Someone is trying to kill me."


He'd said it flat--no whispering or mumbling--but I still said, "What?"


"I fear it is someone from the Order. Or one who has left, or been dispelled."


"Signor..."


"Kasper," he said, tapping my wrist w/ his meaty fingertips.


I sat back. "Kasper. Ever seen Columbo?"


He shook his head.


"Oh. I did here & there. I don't remember it so well, except for that the way you solve a crime is to figure out three things. One of 'em I can't remember. Oh wait: it's 'means.' Like, how will they kill you? I mean, would they kill you. I'm not gonna let 'em. OK, but, then... the next thing is something called 'location.' Well, see, unfortunately, unless you have any insights, I don't think we're gonna know where that might be, until the offended party puts a hole through yr. head that causes yr. cerebral cortex to plop onto the wall and go slidin' down like a big bloppa spit on a wall, or however he/she... (What's that? Yr. Society doesn't let women in? Kinda sexist, don't you think? Ahh... well... whatever... Life is fulla injustice...) ...decides to eliminate the prob. that is you..."


Somewhere in the midst of alla this, he'd finished his espresso, ordered another, finished that, ordered a Harvey Wallbanger, (whatever that is,) consumed that, requested a Shirley Temple, sipped that up, thought twice about that, & was now sipping absinthe mixed w/ laudanum or something--Ida know... I was too busy talkin' too much. Now he was lookin' at me w/ gapin' mouth. It was not so much the expression of a catatonic as it was of a sentient transistor radio that is occupied w/ signals from god knows where and from god knows who or what.


"Oh. Shit. Sorry. That prob. isn't helpin' yr. general sense of corporeal security..."


He shook his head.


"I meant whatever sorta means the would-be killer chooses to try n' kill you before I intercede, well before the whole thing seems to be a prob. OK?"


He nodded.


"OK. Now. See. The other thing you gotta know is called 'motive,' & that's the 1 we might very well be able to dope out, at least up to a point. OK?"


My beer came, and I drank a lotta it right away. My throat hurt. I’d been talking a lot.


"Now," I said, "Why would one of yr. lodge bros. or whatever wanna kill you?"


He looked calmer now, w/ his mouth closed. It was a little girl's mouth. Despite yr. better judgment, you felt the need to protect it.


He said, "For many a year, within the Circle, I have held the title of Man Friday?"


"Wait. Are you some kinda super-being? I mean, y'know, like Man-Bat from Batman? I always thought that they were fuckin' lazy--comin' up w/ a Batman villain by just flippin' the words around like that. Comic book writers had no standards in the 70s, 'tho the artists mostly drew better than the ones in the 80s. So, like, what's yr. super power anyway? Can you make the weekend show up faster? And then all the grateful 9-to-5-ers could say: Thanks god it's Friday! Shit that's great! You can use it, if you wanna..."


Naught a smile did part his jowls.


"The title 'Man Friday' has nothing to do w/ the costumed comic book heroes produced by the juvenile for the juvenile."


"Yeah, but, like, what other kinda costumed heroes are there?"


He was kneading the bridge of his noise, as 'tho the fat clumped their were well-risen wheat dough.


"The title refers to my sacred duties... I am the Circle's scribe... its record keeper..."


"Say, in a group like that, don't you usually refer to the person who does that job as "secretary? Mmmff... Snicker... So you're a secretary!"


His eyes were shiny bowling balls. "I am not... a secretary."


Then the really funny part hit me...


"Wait! 'Man Friday'... Girl Friday!"


I choked down a stale roll to keep from laughing, but it was getting difficult to swallow. It was pretty clear that this job was shot.


Kasper looked defeated.


"Mr. Forceman, please."


I looked at him like he was an optical illusion. I hate it when people are earnest.


He said, "I need your help. There is no one else."


I sighed. "What makes you think that someone is trying to kill you?"


"I can't tell you... but I know."


My head hurt. I couldn't decide if it was from travel or irksome contact w/ other human beings.


"Look... Kasper. Gimme somethin' to go on here. Otherwise, how am I 'sposed to do my job?"


He deliberated over this for a long time. "There have been threats..." he said "...death threats."


"And what form have these threats taken? Phone calls?"


He nodded.


"E-mail?"


Nodded again.


"You got print outs, recordings, saved files...?"


This time, he shook his head.


"...anything? OK, well, do you remember anything these messages said?"


"Veiled insinuations," he said, "but very evocative."


"Well, like what?"


"References to the various punishments visited by medieval groups... made up of scholars, knights, and others on those who had transgressed."


"Punishments."


He stared. "Horrible. Torture. Slow, excruciating death."


"And these messages have promised you similar punishment?" He nodded, and I said, "Kasper, I'm not one to knock my own skills. I need the work. Still..." and it pained me to say it, but I did... "You should go to the cops."


He was suddenly sharp, looking at me clearly, despite his fear.


"And what would I tell them, Mr. Forceman?"


He was right. He hadn't saved anything. Dumbass.


"Well, you could wait till you get another message. I could keep an eye on you till something shows. Then we could go to the cops."


"The messages have stopped."


"When?" I said.


"Two days ago--Wednesday."


I considered suggesting that there might not be anymore. Maybe it had all been a mean-spirited gag. But I felt that might not be true, and I could see that he felt the same way.


I looked over to BFA. Still giggling at the aunt--it was starting to seem calculated.


Kasper was watching me watching them. He said, "You like her, don't you?"


I wasn't sure what he meant.


"Your wife? She's pretty hot, for a mature woman."


He did not blink for a full 37 seconds. I counted.


He said, "I do have one piece of concrete evidence for you," and my jaw might've dropped.


This futility of this whole affair had really been getting to me. I felt more alive than I had for a week.


"Lemme see!"


He produced a small, round object and dropped it into my hand.


It was a dark red glop of some sorta putty. It was about the size of an old half dollar coin, and it felt quite tacky in my hand. There were so many purposes for which it might exist that I did not want to know about.


"What is it?"


Kasper said, "It is the insignia of a Magnificent Headsman. In times past, a headsman was an executioner. Within our group, this role is symbolic and rarely practically relevant. It is, however a high honor. Only the Lofty Hierophant can give Headsman status to a member."


"Could you repeat that last part? What can the Lofty Hierophant do?"


"Give Headsman status to a Circle member."


"Ahh..."


"The Headsman's role is to punish or cut off members from the Circle, who have transgressed against the Circle's rules."


"What are some of the rules?" I asked.


Without hesitation, he said, "I cannot reveal them."


"Hey, c'mon now..."


"I can’t,” he said. “It is my Oath."


"An Oath that'll get you killed."


"Nevertheless."


I said, "OK then... screw general principles... Can you at least tell me something about how you’ve transgressed?"


"I haven't," he said, "nor have I been accused of doing so."


"So the Headsman’s gonna withdraw yr. membership or whatever."


"But there is the most traditional responsibility of a Headsman."


"As an executioner," I said. My brain was working in the background somewhere--trying to see something. It was a process I didn't understand. "So the Circle's Headsman is nuts. That sucks, but we can deal w/ it."


"We can't."


"Why not?"


He sighed and looked sleepy.


"The Circle has not had a Headsman for over 3 years."


Ilse was poking Kasper in the shoulder.


He said, "Mr. Forceman," he waited--maybe expecting me to tell him to call me Steve? I didn't-- "Have you ever heard of the Knights Templar?"


"Nope. Why?"


It saddened me a little--the way he deflated into his chair. The tassel hung limply on his fez, like a flaccid lil’ golden dick.


"No matter," he said.


"Kasper, whatever you do tell me will help me solve yr. prob. Inversely, whatever you don't, won't."


"Later," he said. "Now, I am tired."


We said good night. Predictably, when she rose, the old lady was as tall as a cherry-picker. For the first time, she spoke directly to me.


"Have a wonderful visit," she said, and I thanked her.


"One last question..." I said to Kasper, and he nodded.


"Do you take stenography?"



When we left the restaurant, The City That Never Sleeps was deader ‘n Mick Jagger’s artistic integrity.


I’d been trying to ask BFA more about her uncle and just what the fuck might be goin’ on. She was being uncharacteristically taciturn—defensive, maybe protective. I chalked that up to fatigue, but couldn’t help wondering why these assholes had dragged me here, only to make it impossible for me to do my job.


Since BFA wouldn’t tell me more about her uncle, I tried a different tack. “Hey, what’s w/ those Knights anyway?”


“Knights Templar.”


“Templar Knights, Boogie Knights, whassa difference? What do they have to do w/ anything?”


She rolled her eyes. “Didn’t you see the DaVinci Code?”


I mentioned that the idea of seeing the DaVinci Code had all the allure of gargling the remains of a gerbil that had been used by Richard Gere for unmentionable kicks, before being repeatedly blended in a food processor (on the pulse setting, of course). I described how the only cool movie I could imagine that would star Tom Hanks would involve slashing him w/ several machetes and then running over him w/ a flatulent bison. (A little over-busy & not esp. imaginative I’ll grant you, but it had been a long trip.) Then I mentioned that he bored the crap outta me. The 2 sentiments conflicted w/ each other, but living is always like that. Isn’t it?


I explored this contradiction, whilst I ignored a monologue BFA was presenting. It dealt w/ some stultifying shit about the Crusades and massacres and things, and I was basically falling asleep on my feet till she said, “Y’know… the Knights Templar have connections to some Masonic and quasi-Masonic organizations, just like Uncle Kasper does. It’s weird.”


“Yep. Weird.”


Then she stopped walking and grabbed my arm.


“Steve.” She looked deeply into my eyes.


“What?”


“I didn’t see the DaVinci Code either.”


“Right. Whatever.”


“No, really, I just heard the review on NPR. I mean, c’mon… Tom Hanks? You really have a low opinion of me, don’t you? ”


She started walking, and I followed her. I felt bad, but wasn’t sure what to say. She was right. It was a lousy judgment to make. Sometimes I’m too quick to think poorly of people. Then she stopped and grabbed my arm again.


“Steve.”


“What?”


“I just thought of something else that’s weird.”


My head still hurt. “So tell me about it in the morning, when I can better appreciate how weird it is.” My arm also hurt. “Let go.”


“Back sometime in the 14th century, King Philip II signed the order for the assassination of the Knights on Friday the 13th. Some people think that’s how people came to think of it as an unlucky day.”


“Yep. Weird. I’m goin’ to the hotel.”


With only a rudimentary amount of contempt, she said, “Shithead.” And we were on our way. I hate Creative Anthropology.



We’d left the hotel in such a hurry that we hadn’t even had time to inspect the

bathroom—and, incredibly, we’d forgotten about the trundle bed.


The former—well, that was something to behold. Thing is, it was impossible to do so, really, because when you went inside, it was too narrow for you to move your head around—or open or close yr. eyes for that matter. The only thing I can say for certain is that the floor was made up of these cracked little squares of yellow tile. Whether their color was by design or by piss is something everyone must decide alone—just as he/she must do when confronted w/ the existence of god.


On to the trundle bed. I’m afraid I must confess that up till that day, I’d had no idea that what these things were—or that they even existed. You are prob. more erudite than I. You prob. need no descriptions, but on the off chance—something that one must always bear in mind—that you are a coarse wretch like me—let me elucidate: a trundle bed is a narrow metal frame, ‘pon which not a single mattress, but a mattress so small as to defy traditional classifications—like “single,” et. al.—may be placed.


As Jerry had mentioned, the trundle bed was concealed under the main bed—itself a hide-a-bed of some sort. Beds w/in beds—it all sorta created the impression of one of those Russian dolls that conceals a smaller doll inside, itself containing a smaller doll inside itself on into infinity—or rather, to the limits of the dollmaker’s patience, tools and materials.


Anyway, the setup was really confusin’. I couldn’t decide whether I’d be watching TV on a sofa, bed, trundle bed, or what—or maybe just on the floor, which was looking more & more attractive by the moment. But I rolled the trundle bed out—a cheap, anorexic frame w/ a thin pad and blanket on it.


I stayed outta the way as BFA emptied her luggage. I marveled at the fact that altho’ we were only here for a weekend, she somehow needed to unpack for more than 60 seconds. I stood aside, flipping channels. By luck of some sort—good? indifferent? bad? —one of the 4 channels the TV got was the Sci-Fi Network. I found an episode of Ghost Hunters & settled into ogling Investigator Kris Williams. She needs serious dental work (huh huh) & is not remotely hot, but lately, somehow, she’s begun to seem more interesting.


“Say,” I said to BFA, who was moving around the room, brushing her teeth. Somehow, she’d donned pajamas w/o my even noticing it. “What’s up w/ Investigator Kris Williams’s boobs? Lately, they’re, like, more prominent.”


She glanced at the TV.


“New bra. You get the trundle bed.”


“Screw that. Look at that thing.”


She did, and maybe it was my imagination, but I thought I heard a spring give—just like it would’ve in the movies.


BFA did that feminist thing:


“No. I want the bed. And I’m a woman. Remember? Chivalry and alla that?”


There was some cliché here, but I couldn’t quite come up with it, so I just went with: “What’s chivalry?”


And she said, “What’s feminism?” Then before I even saw it coming, she leapt onto the regular bed. “Ha! He who hesitates, etc. Dumbass.”


I didn’t say anything, just reflected to myself that if there’s one thing worse than traveling with a woman, it’s when you have to travel with a man. Usually. Frequently, it’s the other way around. If you really want to play it safe, your best traveling companion is one who doesn’t exist.



I slept poorly. Somewhere during the night, the cliché about chivalry came to me: “Chivalry is dead.” Stupid fuck. How could I’ve forgotten that? Then something else about chivalry occurred to me—knights were the ones who brought that whole concept to life. Weren’t they?

Opening Day '09

So that's what "Opening Day" means. I thought it had something to do w/ anal sex... Oops!

(P.S. Go Cubs!)

New York, Part 1: The Road (to the big) Apple

About recent delays: many unforeseen situations have made themselves seen. More than 1 of 'em has involved travel, so 'tho I am ass deep in an ongoing narrative RE: a trip to Hawaii, (& have been, for as long as I can remember,) I felt you might wanna know about a trip I took to NYC last month. For some reason. Truth be told, I suspect you have better things to do, but feel sorry for me. So you will read this. And since I have no pride or life, I'll accept you kindness. Here goes...

Fuck New York.

Yeah, I said it. You taxi-fuckin', narcissistic pantywaists. Your baseball team is the Yankees! (Oh yeah--and the Mets! How could I’ve forgotten the Mets?!) Almost every year, they ruin baseball w/ their untouchable financial supremacy. Hasn’t been workin’ for ‘em the last year or 2, but the way they’re throwing money around right now, the odds are pretty good that they’ll pull something together this year.

And your mythical, much-loved gestalt? New York, I’m less than impressed—in fact I’m kinda disappointed. What happened to filth? You’re far too clean to be sexy. It’s way too easy to find my way along your streets. Your people are too polite—mostly. Remember when you used to be cool? Me neither.

And I know what you're gonna say, but I am not bitter, as I sit here in Chicago, writing this. 'Sides, I was born and raised in Flint, Michigan, which is the single coolest city that ever existed on the face of the earth. Yes, that includes Nineveh. (I know you've all heard that Babylonian cities were the best, but like that just ain't so. Ask my Babylonian friend, Pukidu.) And yes, that also includes cities constructed by malevolent non-human beings that ruled this earth when Adam n' Eve were just a sparkle in god's eye, and when in fact, He was just a sparkle in the eye of the Absolute. Even those
cities—hideous, many-angled megalopolises, like sunken R'lyeh, for example, where dead Cthulhu lies dreaming.

OK, but so I live in Chicago, so you’re gonna say I’m jealous, and New York, how can I argue w/ you? How can I be sure you are wrong? The mind has a tendency to withhold some things from our consciousness, as a defense mechanism. Still, I must say, I certainly don’t feel jealous—especially after my recent saunter through yr. bloated, weakly blopping heart. Arguments are useless. I’ll just tell you about my recent visit to NYC, in hopes of illustrating what a bland fruit the Big Apple really is…

Friday. The 13^th. Figures. These things always start the same way.

I was up early for once. Well, actually I’m up early fairly often, usually when I’m trying to rebuild whatever pieces of my life the previous night has destroyed. In this case, it could’ve been worse. My personal identity was largely integrated, and my cerebral system was maintaining cohesion. For better or worse, I could remember who I was and exactly how I’d arrived here, at home. Emotionally, I was remorseful and depressed by my tendency to fall into the same idiotic traps I always lay for myself, but then, that’s life, right? My fettle was mostly unmarred as well. I had a slight hangover, but had not barfed. That’s the important thing.

Unfortunately, someone else had barfed. Right outside the bathroom. The human struggle: sometimes you make it to the bowl, and sometimes you don’t. Despite a heroic effort, whoever this person was hadn’t quite made it—instead spilling the remnants of something w/ noodles in it onto my hallway floor. Maybe it had been Chinese food.

Without much zeal, I found myself mopping the floor. And that’s when the call came.

Without much zeal, I said hello. It was Beloved Female Acquaintance.

“Hey, wanna go to New York?”

“Why the fuck would I wanna go to New York?”

I like baseball, but could give a rat’s ass about Yankee Stadium, even if it were still open. And CBGB was also shut down, which is prob. just as well. Who needs a Punk Rock n’ Roll McDonald’s?

“Because I’m buying?’

I hate when somebody says something like that as though it were a question.

“What are you buying? Food?”

She said uh huh. Plus drinks. Plus a room. Plus any other reasonable expenses. And I asked her how she was gonna afford all that? She’s a dog walker.

“I found you a job there.”

“I already have a job.”

She sputtered wordlessly, like a gas station air hose. “I mean, I got you a case.”

“Oh. So what’re you, like, soliciting now?”

“Fuck you! You wish.”

“No, I mean, like, are you soliciting for me?”

“You’re a prostitute?”

And I took my phone and whacked it against my head until blood started rolling into my eyes.

And she said, “What was that?”

“See,” I said, “sometimes ‘soliciting’ can refer to business that doesn’t involve prostitution.”

“Really? Oh.”

She has a bachelor’s degree in creative anthropology from Oxford University.

So then she explained that she had an uncle in NYC who needed the services of a private investigator. He didn’t want to hire a New Yorker, because they were all too jaded or corrupt to understand his situation. Besides, he needed someone he knew—or someone someone else he knew knew. Or something.

“He wants someone who isn’t a New Yorker. He’s a little paranoid that way,” Beloved Female Acquaintance said. “So it’s easier to take the Blue Line out to O’Hare, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“So where do you want to meet?”

“Wait,” I said, “you’re coming with me?” If I was a mood ring, I woulda been a very dark shade of purple-green.

“I need a vacation.”

Without much zeal, I picked an L station w/ her. I hate traveling w/ other people.

The airport was chaos—but a boring sorta chaos—as it always is. We didn’t get there too early and only had to put up w/ a small amount of bullshit. Beloved Female Acquaintance is relaxed about arriving at the airport on time. It’s one of her more charming traits. She doesn’t live by post-911 adages about arriving several hours before your flight time. Like me, she figures that anything that demands you arrive so far in advance may not be worth doing—not if it’s domestic, anyway.

Still, no matter how late you get there, the airline always seems to have yr. number. The flight was pushed back, and we sat and waited. I listened to my iPod, of course. BFA is not the greatest musical enthusiast in the world. She pulled out a book, but had a bad time w/ it. It’s not always easy to read at the airport.

At some point, she slumped over and drooled on my shoulder. I said it before: I hate traveling w/ other people. It’s even worse when someone puts you in an awkward position like this one. She wouldn’t even tell me what the deal was w/ this uncle. She’d just said something about “business difficulties.” Shit, you’d think she was Italian, or at least Jewish or Irish or Chinese or Russian or some other ethnicity associated w/ organized crime, but she isn’t. She’s Dutch. And everything’s legal in Holland. (Well, in Amsterdam, anyway. Does anyone really know anything about the rest of the country?) What’s more, she really breaks that Amsterdam mold—and not necessarily in good ways: never drank, never smoked, never smoked pot, is a vegetarian… How the fuck did I get to know her anyway?

And did I really know her—I mean, as well as I thought I did? Why was I allowing her to lead me to NYC w/o more information?

I watched them go by: several of those vehicles that look like large golf carts w/ flashing lights. I listened to music. Small children ran around and cried. BFA drooled into my jacket, and I contemplated my situation. I’d made a choice to go along w/ this shit, and for the moment, that’s what I was gonna do.

The flight to NYC was short. The only thing I remember is that when we broke through the clouds, I put on the Beatles song “Tomorrow Never Knows.”

LaGuardia,10 p.m. I’d never flown there and found it to be like every airport in the eastern 1/2 of the U.S. (The airports in the west, for example, feature all sortsa surrealisms, from slot machines to Mormon micro-breweries, and are therefore helluva lot more interesting) Outside the terminal, a cabbie threw himself on us, like they always do when you get too close to the cabs at an airport. I’m embarrassed to admit that I was a excited: a real Jen-U-Ayn New York cabbie! These guys wrote the book on obnoxious urban shuttlery. This was gonna hafta be an experience to remember. Right?

Turns out this guy acted, drove and spoke exactly like every other cabbie I’d ever patronized. About the only difference was that he hadda slight Gotham-ite lilt rolled up in his otherwise mildly Hispanic inflections. Back home, the cabbie’s ergot woulda been more Ditka than Trump. Otherwise, he would’ve been the same dude. At least, that’s how it seemed at first.

There were some other minor provincial differences, but that’s a given. The guy was a Mets fan. We talked baseball for about a New York minute, before it became clear that there were 3 sortsa teams in the major leagues: Red Sox, Yankees, or Mets. He was categorically not interested in the mid-west, the west or the south. His take on the Cubs: “Man, you’ll never get nowhere till you get Sammy Sosa back.”

But if the guy was myopic about baseball, he was downright possessed when it came to NYC facts, figures and other trivia. And that’s where he really differed from the cabbies I’d met elsewhere.

Did you know that the NYC founders visualized everything that stands there today? That they’d designed the streets around sewer systems to come, which themselves were designed around the as-yet-only-envisioned subway tunnels, themselves sculpted around prognosticated-but-yet-to-exist electrical lines, etc. One only wonders what else they foresaw. What, even now, are we temporally anchored beings, w/ scales draping from our eyes down to the earth beneath us, unable to see? Was Central Park devised to fit around future hover-pads where that dude from the Jetsons—the one w/ the white mustache—will repair yr. anti-gravity windshield wipers, before goosing you cruelly w/ his big wrench, till you splurt and/or ooze all over yr. undergarments? Will the now defunct CBGB one day house time machines, from whence you can call up luminaries such as Fred Flintstone and his pet whateverosaurus, Dino, so they can put on a lil’ show fer you—hmm… hmmm… coff coff? But I’m getting off track.

The point is that the guys who set up NYC were not just into urban planning, but black magic as well, apparently, as they scried up more than NY strip steaks. (And Satanic trafficking might explain not just their ability to see into the future, but also why NYC is this big grimy, violent city, or at least that’s how it’s portrayed in the movies.) Or so our cabbie sez, and apparently he and every other NYC cabbie had to take a class, so they can learn all this important esoterica for purposes of promotional dissemination. (Ermf… snicker…) That was his story, anyway, and while he may’ve been delusional, I’m pretty sure he believed his story. Or he was an incredible actor.

But ‘tho he ran his mouth non-stop, and seemed to have the not slightest interest in who we were, he was cool enough. He did give us some quick, wholly unsolicited advice about how to find our way around Manhattan, and he did help us w/ our 2 small bags at the door of the hotel. I gave him a good tip—or rather, I made BFA do so.

The hotel lobby might’ve been bigger than an airplane restroom. Everywhere, there were linoleum floors of a greyish-peach color and smeared glass windows and mirrors. The counter in the lobby was so tall that you could hardly see the clerk slouching, troll-like behind it. Heavy-set with voluminous grey-blonde hair and a ruddy complexion, he wore a yellow dress shirt with suspenders. He was eating a sandwich of unidentifiable extraction, and occasionally he would dab at his chin w/ a napkin.

A TV was airing the news, and some guy in a wool overcoat was leaning on the counter, telling the clerk about how we are at war—no matter what anyone says. The clerk didn’t seem to be paying attention to either the electric or organic narratives. Instead, he was gazing w/ reptilian detachment at nothing in particular.

I waved my hand in an introductory way. The clerk nodded and held up a pink finger. The guy in the overcoat gave us a very quick, suspicious glance. Then he said, “See ya, Jerry.” He hurried out, down a hallway in the back, past some sorta darkened dining room. I never really saw his face

Jerry continued to gaze and chomp. His line of sight might have included the TV. I leaned on the counter and said, “Hey there.”

He nodded.

“We have a room, I guess.”

He set down his sandwich, donned a pair of black-rimmed reading glasses, and turned away from me to tap at an old computer.

“Name.” It wasn’t a question.

I looked at BFA, who was skulking behind the bags.

“Name?” I said.

“Forceman, P.I.”

“Why’dja give ‘em my name?” I said.

“Don’t know,” she said.

“Forceman,” I said to the clerk, and when he looked up from his computer, I saw that his eyeglasses must’ve been very powerful. Behind them, his eyeballs looked like a pair of those sanitary cakes they put in urinals.

“Forceman?” he said.

“Yeah.”

He moved some papers in and out of a stack on the desk. He held a card up at me.

Beneath the printed legend, “GUEST INFORMATION,” were lotsa black lines, whereon I put my name, age, driver’s license number, turn-ons, turn-offs, sexuality, psychoses and home address—and probably some other shit. Who remembers?

I handed the completed card to the clerk. W/o looking up, he passed me a key. When his eyes did meet mine, he said, “You got a trundle bed.”

“What?”

“It rolls out from under the bed. Just reach under there and pull it out.”

“Wait. There aren’t even 2 beds?”

“Yeah. Two. One trundle, and one the other kind.”

I looked at BFA.

“Guess that’s why it was so cheap.”

The clerk belched.

After we’d rolled our bags up by the elevators, BFA said, “Oh yeah! You gotta see the dining room!”

“When did you see it?”

“I didn’t. Really. But I was kinda looking at it from the lobby, while you were signing in.”

“So what’s it look like?”

“I couldn’t really tell. The clerk kept looking at me.” Mentioning Jerry, she made a face like she’d just checked to see if the milk had gone over. “All I could do was crane my neck and try to get a better view. The furniture and decorations looked weird.”

“So let’s take a look.”

“What’re we, just gonna leave our bags here?”

“Sure.”

“But we’re in New York.”

“Fuck New York.”

When we walked back through the lobby, the clerk didn’t even look up. The dining room doors were closed and looked. Through the curtains and the smudged panes of glass, you could see something, but it was hard to say what.

Situational Ethics

The last time you found yourself walking down Michigan Avenue—for whatever cursed reason—you might have noticed them roaming among the general hoi polloi of tourists, street performers and homeless people. They are a small, loose, local herd. Often they are made up of matronly types with armloads of designer bags, but not always. Whoever they are, what brings them together is the luxury furs they wear, sometimes down to the ankles, and sometimes with matching accessories. Once, I sighted a man wearing a ridiculous silver hairpiece. It blended in so well that I thought it was part of the fur coat that cascaded over his shoulders and down to his shoelaces. So thorough was this covering, that for just a moment, I mistook him for some beast-man—an unfortunate yeti that had wandered onto the Magnificent Mile.

I have no knowledge of the varieties of fur that undulate past me on Michigan Avenue. I only see a range of glamorous hues from silver to caramel to jet to cinnamon, but I understand that many sorts of wildlife find their ways onto the fluent, elegant soma of the discerning consumer of outerwear—from rabbits to raccoons, from sables to minks, from foxes to seals to various points down the line. (One can only speculate as to the fortunes of cold-blooded fauna like snakes and alligators.)

Fur-bearing hide: that substance generated by the elaborate slaughter and ritualistic flaying of certain creatures to make warm, stylish attire. It has to stop. You know it, and I know it. It is a human imperative, because we, as human beings, are the only creatures given the ability to grasp moral complexities and the facility to understand how we might best resolve them in a way that supports the Greater Good.

I believe the practice of killing animals and then harvesting their skin and hair to make luxury items not only should end, but must end. Before I begin my appeal to you, the reader, let me clarify my motivations for making it: I don't care about animals, no matter how cute or furry. In fact, I prefer homely, disagreeable animals, like cockroaches and squirrels that could give a rat's ass about human beings. They exist in their natural state just as they would without us, and that's the way it should be. How can one have respect for a dog or cow when they are so hell bent on winning your approval, or your care, at least? At heart, relationships between humans and animals are unnatural which is one of many reasons that the manufacture of fur garments should stop. All of the minks, rabbits, raccoons and their kindred that are farmed for this purpose have become indolent and do not live according to their true nature. (Seals do, but we must apply a methodical ethical approach here. Otherwise, we are no better than animals ourselves.)

Inter-species congress also weakens humans, as it encourages withdrawal from more and complex—and sometimes difficult—social relations with other men and women. Humans turn animals into proxies for their emotional needs—a warmth not provided by fur—“love,” a feeling that no animal can feel as we do, no matter how unhealthy we make both them and ourselves through coddling and over-feeding. Sickening as this phenomenon may be, transforming animals into emasculated puppets, or pets, isn’t much different from making elaborate clothing from them.

Unhealthy interactions with animals aside, a much more important reason for doing away with the luxury fur industry lies in the environmental precipice over which we are currently leaning. We find ourselves fighting for some sort of balanced footing, and the use of animal pelts in the construction of coats and stoles may not seem to be of great importance, but it is, in fact a major chink in the planet’s natural coat of mail: the diversity of global eco-systems.

One organism interacts with another, and the consequences spiral out, pulling in ever more life. Motivated by need, life fosters life, keeping even inanimate matter like air, soil and water alive. Alive to feed all and in so doing to complete the great organic cycle.

Science has delineated much of this cycle, but we are ever surprised by the damage caused by the depletion of even a single species to the larger environment it inhabits. As the new popularity of fur garments grows, it is foreseeable that our desire, if not our need, may outstrip nature’s power to replenish any raw materials involved. Our hunger may consume nearly all of the farmed species involved. Then we will be forced to turn to nature for more specimens, and eventually this supply may be exhausted as well, leading to disastrous consequences for various ecosystems.

These animals consume populations of other animals and of plants, keeping them from unhealthy growth. They are themselves consumed, maintaining the numbers of larger predatory animals. To remove an essential link from a chain like this can only lead to ruin. I might not be able to see all of the consequences of these animals’ extinction, but on Michigan Avenue, where this discussion began, I can see at least one nightmarish consequence looming large: with the absence of raw goods, the fur industry itself will collapse.

Think of the jobs lost, of the financial consequences. I abjure the fur industry to modify its practices, to greatly decrease the volume of product it is currently generating, despite soaring consumption of its wares. The danger is real, and not just to ecosystems around the globe, but to the industry itself. It has lit the candle of supply and demand—so clearly a recapitulation of nature's own cycles of need—at both ends. Supply will be lost in the disproportionate destruction of animals, and demand will be lost in the loss of fur consumers.

Like the makers of fur garments, their wearers, too, endanger themselves, albeit through an inverted mechanism. Again, we find reflections—we are lost in a House of Mirrors, wherein the human bearers of fur threaten themselves through over-proliferation. The depletion of furs intensifies, not just through the growing hungers of existing consumers, but also, and perhaps more disastrously, through a swelling of their numbers. It is an escalating trend, as can be seen in the fur flowing over Michigan Ave. And one can only speculate as to what might happen to fur enthusiasts if new pelts become unavailable.

Clearly, pointing out their plight to them will do no good. Anyone so committed to wearing such bizarre and reviled clothing will not relinquish it without a vicious, possibly mortal, struggle. Assaulted and spit upon in the open streets, publicly splattered with blood or red paint, the fur wearers’ chutzpah is titanic and pathological. They keep their furs. And now, as trends have shifted, they have thrown off any pretense to shame, liberated their favorite garments from mothballs—and their demonstration of courage has won new converts to the practice of wearing fur. So now, as long-standing fur-bearers openly wear and demand more wardrobe items, they bring newer enthusiasts with them, forming a vast swarm with an ever-growing hunger.

Again, we are human beings, and it is a moral imperative that we maintain the Greater Good. We must then, somehow, find a way to save luxury fur enthusiasts from themselves.

Fortunately, the wheel has been invented for us, and we need not re-invent it. I would suggest an exploration of time-tested methods used to address similar problems. Throughout the United States, federal, state, and county authorities have employed various tactics to control wildlife populations. The re-establishment of natural predators in depleted areas and incentives for increased hunting by humans have met with some success, but it is absurd to suggest them here. The hunting of another human being is murder, and while that might be an amusing satirical notion, it leads us nowhere. And of course, the natural predators faced by humans—and there are virtually none, as we are now the alpha-carnivores of our world—are too large and indiscriminately dangerous to be reintroduced to Michigan Avenue.

A more humane—and less ludicrous—solution is called for—and does exist in the practice of trapping. The efficacy of trapping need not be considered. It has been used by humans across cultural and millennial divides to successfully subdue game or of unwanted “pest” animals, and as a human endeavor that has existed in some form in virtually every area of the world for thousands of years, it has certainly stood the test of time.

The ethics of trapping may be more troubling for some. Thankfully, its moral complications are not nearly as thorny as those provided by the practice of wearing furs. Over the last several decades, the operation of animal traps has served as a flashpoint in the ongoing struggle between hunters and animal rights activists. The latter have cited numerous consequences of the placement and design of traps, and of the laws governing these matters. They have pointed to studies like the USDA in 1992, which claimed that up to 45% of coyotes caught in certain foot traps were moderately to severely wounded, due to broken legs, prolonged exposure and other incidental factors. On the other side of the coin of husbandry, fur trappers have pointed to investigations which bear obvious significance, including one that indicated that during the five year period after 1998, when foot traps were banned in Southern California, coyote attacks on humans rose from 4-10 per year—more than a 100% increase.

At times, this debate has grown quite tense, but faced with the impending luxury fur crisis, all of us have no choice, but to set our idealistic concerns aside and yield to practical necessity. We must agree on this one approach, as it has proven so successful over the years, in terms of numbers, if not of simple answers. Sadly, there are none when faced with an issue of such gravity.

Having accepted the necessity of trapping, we must now arrive at some general agreement as to how we will trap and what with—obviously, the particulars of such a complex operation will call for considerable plotting. The second question is far easier to answer than the first: foot traps are the most sensible choice, as they are extremely effective tools when dealing with large animals. They consist of an interlocking set of jaws that are left open on the ground. When an animal steps into these jaws, it triggers a small catch. The jaws abruptly close, clutching one of the animal’s appendages.

Much has been made of the occasional accident that occurs when an inappropriate animal—not the sought after species—wanders into the trap and is unintentionally held or hurt. But when one considers the efficiency of these devices, it becomes clear that their benefits far outweigh their costs. Foot traps are not just productive, but simple to use as well. They can be easily baited—perhaps with edible or drinkable matter found appetizing to most targets, such as frappucino. Baiting with false fur garments is also possible, assuming that genuine products are absolutely avoided—our basic motivation is to reduce the need for authentic pelts. Quality replacements would be easily mistaken for real furs without close examination, and our only intention is to cause the fur-bearer to approach.

What happens then? We are dealing with human beings, not animals, so it is important to note that there is some small danger of injury, when the trap closes. If traps are set up correctly, however, the possibility of injury is minimized. Additionally, fewer trap models contain softer jaws that should further diminish problems, while other, more conscientiously designed mechanisms, like the “coon catcher,” can help ensure that the wrong sort of animal is not caught in the trap.

Once the fur-bearer is trapped, he or she must be subdued, removed from the trap, and then taken to a remote facility for processing. What happens there would depend on the choices made by the community and its representatives. If the fur-bearer is to be returned to his or her environment, he or she should be anesthetized, so that any fur items may be removed. Electronic “tagging” of disrobed fur-bearers for continued study may be pursued in areas where the goal is to study and attempt to modify their behavior.

Sadly, given the magnitude of the danger presented by fur-bearers to the global environment, and given the pity each of us must feel when viewing them, stumbling at the verge of extinction, the best solution is probably the simplest: humane euthanasia. We reach a grim conclusion here of course, but we can be comforted by the fact that we could always maintain the spirit of the fur-bearers and of the meaning they bore for us by having them stuffed and mounted. Personally, I wouldn’t mind having the head of one of those matronly types, with grotesque, death-distended lips, staring down at me from above my mantle, like a departed deer, meeting my eyes with her own glassy orbs, as she never would, if she were stepping on my toes on Michigan Avenue. It is a tragedy. God bless the rich… And the people who want to look like them.

People Passing through Me

It’s that time again. The one where I tell you about all the great music I discovered this year and about the various epiphanies I’ve had concerning music w/ which I am already familiar. Unfortunately, there were considerable financial restraints placed on me, so I wasn't able to buy as much music as I usually would. Not that I would’ve even had any idea of what to buy, for the most part. (Aside from the old standards, of course. Improbably, there are still a few Charles Mingus, Bill Hicks and Spacemen 3 records I don’t have!)

There was an even more intense leeching of my energy and personal freedom, so taking the time to find new music—taking the time to even listen to music—was frequently out of the question. I was nearly dead, musically, which, for all intents and purposes, made me dead emotionally, which, for all intents and purposes, kinda makes it seem like I should've been dead altogether. Dontcha think? I mean, what’s the point of living, if you don’t feel anything?

To be fair to myself, it’s not all aging. Whereas I often use music as a life preserver to get me through my personal ration of dismal, agonizing shit—(not sayin’ I’m special—I know you’ve got yr. own shit and yr. own ways of dealing w/ it)—here, music became a luxury at best. For one thing, I spent a great deal of time w/ people to whom music means almost nothing—who, in fact, often find music of almost any sort to be annoying.

It didn’t help that I bought a new home this year. In the process, I had to deal w/ realtors, loan officers, lawyers, inspectors, contractors and their ilk. Some of those people were nice. To some, I am extraordinarily grateful even. Others were just the degenerate sows they are made out to be. But that's to be expected and had no effect on my relationship to music.

What surprised me was the people I already knew in a non-professional friendly capacity, and who helped me out both before and after I bought the place. They were the worst people I dealt with, making situations that were stressful worse, and developments that should've been happy bleak. What's more, there's nothing worse than feeling beholden to people treat you like shit and have no use for music.

A lotta times, I’m not sure that music would’ve been equal to the situations I encountered anyway. There was rarely an opportunity to even try to find comfort in music. That pains me, 'tho circumstances seem to’ve improved, emotionally and musically. Truth be told, I feel as inert as a darkened, dried up eraser that lies at the end of an old pencil—shredding little threads and specks of myself—blunt and rigid enough to be completely pointless. Ha ha. Get it? Pointless. So in interest of letting you laugh yr. ass off at that funny gag—or even better, at the overwrought metaphor wherein it lies, I’ll shut up and get to the music…

The List:

Come to Daddy – Aphex Twin: Containing a lift from "Skull" by the Misfits. Solid noise.

Revolution – Mudhoney: A cover of a Spacemen 3 song. It was recorded as part of a split-single. Mudhoney, predictably, took this as an opportunity to poke fun at Spacemen 3’s reputation as junkies. The gag did not go over well w/ Sonic Boom of Spacemen 3.

Che – Suicide: Speaking of covers... Last year’s playlist included Spacemen 3 covering “Che...”

Chittam Irangaayo – The Ruins: No covers here—‘tho the Ruins do play a wicked Black Sabbath medley. One night, this song came on the iPod when it was on random play. I was walking home, alone, and...

Pro Life – Bill Hicks: Bill Hicks has influenced what I think and write. This track appeared on the iPod on during the same walk—a very good night for shuffle play as…

What a Botheration – Lee “Scratch” Perry: …This song came on next! I love the tinny organ. It sounds like a refugee from a skating rink. And I always like the way Scratch says this piece.

New Rock – Buffalo Daughter: Again, on the iPod... on the same night!

Uphill – Can: Yes... the same night! The final song in a suite, and this one I hadn't heard in a while. Here, I really felt it.

Holly-wuud – Miles Davis: Lately I'm really into Miles's darker, thicker 70s stuff. Many people wring their hands over the idea that he was no longer playing "jazz" at this point... As he himself once said: "So What?"

Countdown – John Coltrane: I was at a restaurant w/ some people whom I often find depressing. Giant Steps came on, and it was like a cold beer in the Sahara to me.

Hurricane Heart Attack – The Warlocks: The Warlocks' Phoenix was one of a very few new albums I picked up this year. Good solid rock n' roll, played w/ imagination.

You’re the Dream Unicorn – The Blood Brothers: I've already said that the Blood Brothers have given it a new spirit. The decaying oldster badly needed this gift. Picture Grampaw from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and we will be on the same page. And hey! Blood! Remember how he slurps the blood from that foxy chick's finger during the dinner scene?

Put a Little Love in Your Heart – Leonard Nimoy: HA! Hahaha!!! Ahooo... ahuh... huuhh... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!

New Genius (Brother) – Gorillaz: The Gorillaz songs are ingeniously produced sound worlds. There's a lot of upbeat energy, but the Gorillaz don't punk out—they also acknowledge the other, more painful side of experience

St. Ides Heaven – Elliott Smith: Elliott Smith always seems to be talking to you. That is both comforting, as you might feel that you aren't alone, and claustrophobic, and he's so damn close, and just won't go away.

Jane Says – Jane’s Addiction: This summer, I was I walking between my old place and the home I had just bought. On my headphones, two simple chords sounded on a guitar, the steel drum fired itself up, and I felt kind of alive.

Revolution – Spacemen 3: Here is the original. Accept no substitutes. Except Mudhoney's.

Voodoo Child (Slight Return) – The Jimi Hendrix Experience: This year, I spent a lot of time listening to Electric Ladyland, the Experience's last album because I'd picked out one of the dorkier tracks, "1983... A Merman I Should Turn to Be..." as something my guitar teacher and I might play. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on your perspective, it's 14 minutes long, and didn't fit on this list.

A summing up: I said above that I'm not sure whether music was equal to my problems this year; maybe because I was looking to the wrong music for solace or strength. In order to find what I needed, it may be true that I needed to actively explore, rather than just clutch at the familiar and the comfortable. Sometimes, when life sucks, it is necessary to rest—to mourn and heal. However, at other moments, it is more helpful to act and move.

For me, the music of Richard James, a.k.a. Aphex Twin, has provided both comfort and invigoration. His ambient electronic stuff is beautiful, but it presses sound into weird shapes, and when he moves outside of ambient territory, the shapes get even weirder. And louder. Here, James sounds like he's angry—maybe at all of the unimaginative imitations of his sound. But maybe he's just restless. He's always on the move, providing glimpses of the places electronic music might go. And in 2008, when I very often couldn't connect to "music," I could feel a connection to this spirit.

This is not to say that many of the songs on this list, aren't simple, traditional music. Lee "Scratch" Perry, The Gorillaz, Elliott Smith, Coltrane and Mudhoney are each very approachable, while "Jane Says" and "Voodoo Child" are inescapable rock standards. Still, I think that some of this stuff is a little darker than the usual moon in June clichés. Elliott says he's high on amphetamines, and Jane, no matter how bright and sunny her song, is a junkie. Then you have a cosmic vision of death in "Voodoo Child" and a nightmare of ghostliness and paranoia in "New Genius."

Elsewhere on the list the songs start to disintegrate, or, at least, become more difficult to hum along w/ or bop yr. head to. You can certainly thrash it around to "You're the Dream Unicorn," which, despite its fury, shows off the perverse humor of the Blood Brothers in the ridiculous refrain that gives the song its title. And Spacemen 3's take on "Revolution" is, for all its embarrassing, muddled earnestness, an ominous, asymmetrical drone that ultimately explodes in howling noise. And that's how I find myself looking elsewhere.

One thing that all of this music says to me is that there is absolutely no reason to quit, despite all the evidence to the contrary. It's worth it to try and make something real, heartfelt and new—something that isn't entirely formulaic, and won't just be recognized w/ impatient nods and a reflexive barfing out of money, at best.

The crime committed against humanity that is Leonard Nimoy's "Put a Little More Love in Your Heart" might be better forgotten, but maybe it perfectly illustrates part of the experience I had and am continuing to have. Songs became insufficient. Songs began to seem frivolous. At times, by virtue of their gross oversimplification, songs became downright insulting. Against that backdrop, Mr. Spock is doing what so much popular music does; he's just doing it more thoroughly.

Whether it's intentional, whether he's that much of a visionary, which I doubt, Nimoy captures exactly how crass and ludicrous this stuff can be—something that is not just irrelevant to, but that mocks real emotion. All that bad taste, all that insipidness, all that falseness that you can find all over yr. radio dial, in commercials, on CDs, in TV theme songs. Leonard's doing it to the 9s here, isn't he? Fortunately, he's so awful at it that it's also really, really funny.

Despite Leonard's provocation, I am not done w/ songs. I do think it's worth looking further for new ways to make them. I'm not ready to let Jane's Addiction or Mudhoney go—I wholeheartedly love this music—but for the first time in years, I feel really, actively engaged by the idea of really looking to see what the hell else may be going on out there.

Buffalo Daughter offer a sorta model for how music might be able to stay familiar while becoming strange at the same time. The sonic swirl of "New Rock" is alive, has a beat and melody, but creates its own brightly lit place, where song structure and instrumentation take unexpected turns. Can it be cultural? I'm hesitant to generalize, but many Japanese bands seem to approach the making of music w/o some of the preconceptions their Western colleagues have. Look at the Ruins, who roll out weird, unpredictable stuff that, improbably, remains musical. The melody's haunting, the beat kicks, and it's all put forward by two dudes w/ drums and a bass guitar.

So here's where I find myself, and aside from everything else, I still believe that good music is being made, and that it can make your life better. And I look forward to discovering it, if I can. It's just a feeling. It may go nowhere, but at the end of a very bad year, it gives me some hope. What more can you ask of a mix tape?

A Protean Shake

I am proud to say that I was the first one to spot lava up close and personal. I looked down to check my footing, and there was one of those ubiquitous lines. This was a small one, maybe 2' long and 2" thick, and it was about 4" away from where my foot had come to a rest.

It took me a moment to stop staring. We'd spread out, and no one was very near to me. The wind had picked up and was loud, but I managed to get Niko's attention. He gazed at the ground, and then we exchanged one of those grins people share in movies when they've just stumbled onto hidden gold. Niko flagged down his father. As Stefan approached, I looked past him and saw a single radiant line stretching across the horizon behind him. After he was done gaping at the lava, I pointed out this long, glowing strip.

Stefan giggled and squirmed.

Where there'd been only vague glimpses of the lava before, it was showing up everywhere now. We noticed puffs of steam escaping from the ground. We climbed up over a steep rise to check it out, and there was this fucking pool of lava. It must've been ten feet or more across, though its shape was changing all the time. In some places, a mineral crust dissolved, exposing fluid lava, in dozens of blacksmith colors. In others, the hot lava cooled, taking on the color and texture of charcoal, beneath which spots of bright orange still glowed. Cinders floated everywhere above the pool, and a wall of heat projected out from its center. Stefan and Niko’s faces were transfixed and looked as ‘tho they were lit by a campfire.

Lava moves in these funny ways. It crawls like mercury, slowly rising, or sometimes it slithers like thick mud dripping off of a wall. Tendrils were unrolling from the edges of the pool. They'd crawl toward you, but you didn't have to move much. Outside of the main mass, the lava would immediately cool and after a moment, you'd be left with a solid black fragment.

Then there are the colors that are difficult to describe. To say that there are shades of orange, yellow and white, (very little blue to my eye,) while true, is clumsily phrased and poorly visualized. Again, my grasp of language is insufficient. I could make a list of shades from pale gold to angry brownish red, but I doubt that would do much good. Though it's liquescent, lava dances like fire, with color and form always changing. The intensity of the light varies too, so that some colors leap out at you suddenly, while others mellow and fade.

And in this case at least, pictures are not worth a thousand words—not the least because I am a lousy photographer and was packing a pretty rudimentary digital camera. I will spare you the sight of my handful of blurry pictures, not just because you can't find any sort of shape in them, but also because the colors are dulled to the point of lethargy. (There is one exception that I'll insert later, along w/ some thoughts regarding it.)

Earlier, we’d seen a few other people wandering around the field, but we'd lost track of them by now. There was no way of knowing how far any of them had gone or in what direction, with one exception: a young couple made up of a stout, pale young woman with dishwater blond hair and striking blue eyes, and a short, handsome young man with very dark skin and black hair cut in a sorta Prince Valiant bob—only messier n' wavier n' w/o the bangs. The woman's name was Natalie. The young man was less communicative and did not introduce himself, nor accept introductions from any of us. His name came up a few times, but only when Natalie was addressing him. It was an unusual name, and none of us ever heard it very clearly, so we remained uncertain as to what it really was. He seemed very protective of Natalie in an insecure sorta needy way, like he was worried that if she had contact w/ anyone else, she'd be gone in a sec.

Natalie and her (?)husband(?)boyfriend(?)pal(?) had seemed enthusiastic enough when we'd passed them earlier, but more recently we'd seen them dragging along unhappily. Natalie, esp., seemed beat. Both of them were wearing shorts, by the way, which qualifies them as officially insane. Or stupid. Or both. I'm dumb as a post, and even I realized it'd prob. be smarter to wear long pants. By the end of the night, I’d guess their legs looked like they’d had some sorta bizarre accident, involving barbed wire, charcoal dust and broken glass. They also wore plain old regular tennis shoes, which is just what I’d been planning to wear until I’d listened to Stefan’s well-warranted recommendations. Aside from protecting you from serious battery and scraping, I now have this vision of small pebbles of lava falling in between my shoes and socks as you I across the lava fields. Sorta like those freezing little chunks of snow do in the winter.

Anyway, Natalie and her companion were nearby when we found the lava and seeing us squinting at something on the ground, they came a-runnin'. Another guy, who we hadn't seen before, showed up at more or less the same time. We didn't notice him. We were too busy gawking at the lava.

He called out to us 'tho, and ever-exuberant Stefan began talking w/ him. Ever-dreamy (well usually anyway) Steve Forceman, P.I. remained transfixed by the lava. But behind me, I picked up the gist of the conversation: This fellow was telling Stefan how he'd been making the hike alone. It was only in the last 15-20 minutes that he'd really begun to question the wisdom of this course. He was relieved then when he saw us from a distance. At the same time, he was confused. Why were we all staring so intently into the space in front of us, when something truly amazing was right at our heels?

I turned to look, and sure enough, another pool of lava had appeared behind us. It was at least as big as the first one. Sparks were dancing in the moonlight above it, and we all moved in closer.

If the lava made any noise, I did not hear it. The wind was too heavy, kicking around the hot, dry air and humming in yr. ears. The lava was amazing, but we had been looking at it long enough that sheer wonder had become something calmer, if no less profound. It was funny: someone moved first. I'm not sure who, 'tho I know it wasn't me. Abruptly everyone was brandishing his/her camera like a buffalo gun. Having taken in a part of the lava fields, we were now all looking to put it across to others. For the wages of humanity are tourism, especially when something is profound.

Following suit, I started clicking off lil' digital images for my own personal posterity (if such a thing exists) and to use in boring the people back home. (Thank god the slideshow is staging a comeback! Who sez computers aren't a good thing?) I surmised, correctly—that I prob. wasn't gonna end up w/ much other than some blurry blobs and tracers of light. It was hard to be sure what I was even taking a picture, given the irregularity of the light.

The new guy offered me his sooper-dooper digicam w/ all sortsa features for the recording of both still and moving images. He seemed a little pushy. And loud. But it was a nice gesture that I accepted. You really could see a lotta details through the lens that the brightness of the lava otherwise made indistinct. It was very small stuff: rivulets and sharp curves and little bands of heat and light. I thanked the guy and returned his camera to him. Given the iris-narrowin' effect of the lava, everything else seemed very dark—sorta like when you look at a bright light in a dark room. You lose yr. night vision. So this was the first really good look I got at this guy who introduced himself as Mark.

I am suspicious by nature. Well, sort of. More like naive by nature and suspicious because I have reaped the harvest of my naïveté. Or something. I been burnt a lot, I mean, cuz I am stupid. So my eye was still kinda jaundiced despite this guy's manifest good nature. (Wow, is this the polar opposite of an experience I had later during this trip…) I was saddling him w/ a sorta commedia dell’arte hippie-indigent masque, for which I am now sorry. Maybe, you know, like one of those bean paste squirtin’ possible Jesus freak types even.

For one thing—sorta like that whole what-if-this-person-is-gay type issue that so many people have out there—even if Mark was a granola-munchin' self-righteous hippie wuss, who cares, so long as he was cool? For another, it is again a gross oversimplification—of another human being in this case—and that’s no way to run a railroad. Esp. the B&O Railroad…