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Is my literature escapist? I hadn't noticed.

Is it just me, or does everybody else forget to add stuff they do to their resumes because they think of it as just sorta something they do? So, slapping my forehead and cursing mildly (Geez, I'm an oversightful dummy sometimes) I've added VioletCrown and Green Muse to my resume. So, yeah. Maybe that'll help with my quest for employment.
Now that I've got that stuff on there, I'm gonna go back to the TV&Radio stations again and see what they've got for me. Maybe two years of sound crew stuff will look better than, say the zero years I was sporting.
Y'think?

A friend of mine died Sunday.

omfg

Hey You!
Look which large fellow was On TV! That's right, it was ME!
W007 and all that.
And all because I'm part of Violet Crown. Also note that the page is currently updated by Toshi and will be redesigned by same in the near future. And so on.
OK. Back to your lives.

OK. I'm a little over 35000 words in, and I've got about 9 days left. I can handle this. I've got a grip on it, and it feels like it's going to be finished before I can say "What? I wrote a book?"
My plan right now is to print up several copies of the manuscript and show it around to people to get something resembling opinions on it. I'm enjoying reading the stuff I wrote, which is probably a good sign, right?

About the current book: I had this whole plot started, and I just kept looking at it thinking, I can't do this. I can't make this work for more than about ten thousand words, and for sure I can't make it good beyond about five. I still have the notes and the beginnings of the bad novel so that I can cold knock out that story, but I just started writing and what came out has been really good. I'm happy. I'm excited by the prospect of making people read it, at knifepoint as necessary, he said with his tongue firmly in cheek, as it were.

Ok, first of all, it's been most of a month since I updated here because I've been damn busy. I haven't actually had time to write much of anything that wasn't scheduled. Today, right now is the first chance I've had. The book's going very well. It's a little over thirty thousand words old and growing steadily. By my math, that's pretty much exactly where I need to be right now, so I'm not gonna worry at all. I kicked the butt of my thirty thousand barrier, and I fully intend to go back to the other novels (Which, upon second glance look much improved) and at least push them to where I want them to be.
But that will wait. That's not until after I finish my History. I swear, this book has been bubbling up out of the back of my brain since about junior high, and getting it written has been like taking out a thorn that's been twisting in my back for the last twelve plus years. I feel like I'm finally doing what I'm supposed to be doing.
I feel like this from time to time, and it feels great. I love it when I can just stop exerting the effort to stop being who I am and start allowing the flow of life to show me where I'm supposed to be looking. About half of the time, It's not like I'm writing so much as allowing the book to come out of my hands.
Well, back to it.
If you get a chance, check out my weekly fictions at NihilCentral Dot Com, which is secretly another blogger type page because I'm far too lazy to create a real one. Really. I'm actually that lazy.

Also, regular Wednesday rounds at the Green Muse this week. It oughta be great!

Hey! 43 Weeks! At least one a week! Hey, yeah!

What am I gonna write about? I got something for tomorrow, but what about the month of November?
Ahh, well. It'll come.

OK! Opening weekend happened! Yeah! Um.
We were the predicted 95% technically. Everybody did what they were supposed to. One mic that was supposed to feed back for a moment didn't, but we covered well and nobody knew it was supposed to. It's a good show, if a tad on the long side.
A friend put her finger on the problem I'm having with the show: It needs to end before the finale thingy. There's a monolog, a dialog and another monolog that could be cut, leaving in a great ending dialog (by our fearless director) as a finishing thing. Yeah. There's a bit that I find frankly a little boring, but it's a great show. Now you know.
I am tired.
I helped my friend Dana, who's getting married tomorrow (today. Ick) with a project she's got. She offered to help type out a term paper (for money). I had time, so I did a whole frikkin lot of the typing, but she offered to split the money with me.
This is no way to earn a buck. Maybe it's just the paper (27 pages of ALL CAPS is hard to read, much less hard to type), but my eyes hurt. My back hurts. My arms hurt. My everything is pretty much hurting. I have to drive to Waco tomorrow. I'd grumble, but what's the damn point.
I've signed up for NaNoWriMo again. I just keep getting closer to that goal. maybe this year. I can write a novel and find a job, all in the same month. Hey! Yeah!
I'm so tired and so excited about life.

OK! Whoo! Yeah!
Opening night happened... um.
*nothing here will ruin the show for you*
Here's what I got: technically, it was about an 80-out-of-100. Tomorrow will be a good, solid 95. For anybody unfamiliar with theater, a 95's as good as 100 for an audience watching for the first time. There was one glaring level problem which I fixed by simply being really damn good at my job; there was one weird feedback problem, which I fixed while doing voice acting work; there was one tiny niggling sound-quality problem which I can guarantee you nobody in the audience noticed (because it had no effect on them, other than to make the feedback thing a little worse, which they wouldn't have noticed particularly since one second of feedback is still one second of feedback, even it it's got a funny little echo on it).
It's really a good production. It's funny how you can miss that kind of little detail when you're, you know, so close to it. We had a genuinely good time putting it on.
I found out today, though, that tryouts for the next show are next Saturday before the performance. It's the Christmas show. It sounds like it'll be at least fun to do. I need to write up my commercial idea...

And, I didn't even have to use my A.K.
What can I say?

Wow! Today was a good day!
The open mic was good: A couple who used to run an open mic at which Flash & I started were there and I didn't let their constant stream of crap bother me. It was fun! They kept kvetching and I kept smiling! Even through a terrible filk! W007!
And then, on top of it all, I got paid! Sure, it's only a stipend (like money, but so little of it they have to have a different name), but the point is, I'm a professional music... organizer.. thingy now!
And, to make things even more so, Adam and Dana are getting married this Sunday by a person whom several of us know and some of us even love! How 'bout them apples.
(Oh: I don't mean me, BTW. I can't legally perform marriages, as I'm not a minister, hint hint)
(and if the hint didn't take, Sherbie, call Meeker 'cuz she'll be in town this weekend to perform an arriage-may for some utual-may iends-fray, nudge nudge)
So, all in all, not a bad day. If I'd found a job, I'd be a proverbial pig in proverbial "mud-by-which-I-mean-shit." Now, where's that pesky portfolio of mine? I heard the Statesman is hiring editors...

I'm just getting tired. I've only been looking proper for like two weeks, and I'm already tired. I don't know. Maybe I need to, like, drink coffee or something. I guess it would help if I hadn't quit smoking the same time I got really intense about getting a new job. Oh well. One day I'll have to look at that schedule.
Also guitar madness. Whee!

Man. Zim is just a hell of a cool thing. There is no way it could have been other than short-lived. I'm just shocked it takes six discs to fit 'em all. There were 27 episodes made. I'm just so absolutely shocked there were more than 5, having seen them. 'N stuff.

Looking for work is both fun and not. I'm not going through anything anybody else hasn't but it's interesting just the same. It's easier, as Toshi & October are doing the same, and we can sort of feed off the energy of the group. I think it was harder two and a half years ago when I wound up at BP, if only because it was just me looking.
So, yeah. jobs -n- stuff.
I'll write if I get work. And remember to hang by my thumbs.

The band has been playing at Green Muse (just west of the corner of South First and Oltorf, next to the moneylender, where the old 503 used to be) on Wednesdays. We've had the open mic turned over to us. They trust us with this, and if this week is any kind of representation, they trust us rightly. We're getting, ugh, good at this.
Now I need a job...

Changing the subject, the George Carlin collection, the Little David Years 1971-1977, outside of having seven albums of George Carlin, has record sleeves on the CDs. The discs are pretty much exact replicas of the old albums. And that may be the coolest thing about this. Somebody realized that when you bother to buy a collection of albums that you could have got on CD transfer, what you want is the feel of the old records with the reliability and ease of use of a CD.
Keen.

It's like breathing again for the first time in a month. Ahhhhhhh. Try it. Try not breathing for a month. I dare ya'. See how good it feels to take in that first little puff of air. It feels good. So shut up.

PS. novelnovelnovelnovelnovelnovelnovel

Also, we're writing songs. Like, lots of them. I did one called "My Baby Don't Dance," and one about a train on MoPac. It's nice. I wrote a buncha novelty type songs, and now we're doing ones that mean things (or are sweet, as in the Don't Dance song). As a band, we're still looking for our voice, but it's hovering around jazz-swing and punk. We'll have to see. I love both kinds of music, and so seems my band to do.
I gotta quit saying "my band." It's Adam's and Dana's band. I'm just a member. Hell, I'm just a Mice. Adam's the Bunny.

It's been a long summer, and the fall is screaming enticingly to me.

It doesn't feel real yet. I resigned on Friday. I'm out of the business. How, as they say, about that?

Double special thanks to Jon for his participation. Heehee.

Do you know the feeling that you get when you're very thirsty, and you can smell water? The water takes on smells it could not possibly contain, silver and mars and happiness. It seems to call to you with a fishing line in the back of your head, pulling you toward it. That's the feeling. That's the one. It's something I'll only explain in person.

Do you know the feeling, the one you get when you should feel bad but you feel really good instead? Yeah, me too! It's called Unexpected Pineapple Chunks! WooHoo!

Do you know the feeling you get when you are about to break up with somebody you should have broken up with a year ago, but you stayed with them longer because you knew they needed you more than you needed them, and you knew that if you left you'd just destroy them, or at least make them very, very sad?
It's so hard to speak to the everyman, when you're just one.

They tell me this might take 48 hours to work, but it seems to do OK right now: My Fictions!

I'd like to try something. Chime in when you're ready:


Knock Knock...

I've been too hard on the British, really, about their food.
Any culture that gives us the meat salad and the cheese salad can't be all bad.

C'mon downtown & stay with me tonight.
I got a pocket full of Kryptonite.
-Spin Doctors.

I used to be so funny. What happened to me?

     I love Texas. I love Discounts.
     I feel that every time you get a discount, you've stolen a little something back from Death. No, I feel that every time I get a discount, I've stolen a little something back. Mark Griffin, American poet & musician, wrote a wonderfully evil piece about a woman who achieves this effect through fast driving. She feels that the ticking of yellow lines past her car is like the ticking of grains of sand in a hourglass. This way of thinking, it turns out for her, is backwards and she dies, perhaps before her time, but really before she might otherwise have died. He doesn't examine it closely, because the piece is a work of genius. He doesn't have to examine it. The point is made to his satisfaction and the rest of the world be damned.
     Texas is wonderful today. When I left work for a break and a constitutional, it was 95 degrees in the shade with a hot breeze barely lifting its weak little head out of the blacktop. The sky was mostly cloudless and threatened to turn into a Proper Texas Summer, here at the end of a gracefully mild one. I ducked into a store for a moment to browse, and stayed for nearly fifteen minutes. When I stepped out, the day was still hot, but a cool wind had picked up, probably here to avenge its sad little brother smothered by the heat, and the sky had clouded beautifully. Black clouds were collecting under the sun and the temperature had dropped five degrees. If you don't like the weather, stop and bug a shopkeep for a few minutes.
     I love Discounts. I love Texas.

I'm glad somebody got a photo of this stencil before it was removed. They used to be all up and down the sidewalk here on sixth. They've been replaced, though, with ones that say "Your President Lies." A clever person came along and painted a well-placed "f" in that one, making it, and here I'll admit to an attempt at humor, SUPER!

I have a pain. The only way to kill it is to leave work early. Who am I to argue with the best interests of my body?

I've been writing a lot lately, just not much here. There are actually two better places to see fictions by me, if yer interested:
600 Seconds
One Story A Week!
And now you know...





where I'm posting the rest of my stories.

You can dance if you want to.

     I'm offended! I'm incensed!
     An author whom-I-won't-name contacted me to get an event order in the works, and the tone of the contact was just so intolerably derisive. The phrase "they are a large distributor and might set up an account for an independant bookstore such as yours" was used.
     Oh! Well! Your largesse is astounding! Goodness! For little old us? We're just a bunch of down-home nobodies, running the biggest goddamn bookstore in Texas. We're practically a lemonade shack compared to what you've been up to.
     Oh? You signed at Borders in Houston? THE Borders in Houston? Goodness. They must be, I don't know, world famous! I mean, the prestigious Houston Borders doesn't take just anybody, do they?
     Grrrrr.
     So, I called the publicist to whom I was recommended, only to find out the book is distributed through St. Martin's. The author didn't know this. The author was sending me through MacMillan, who are distributed through Pearson, although, the suggestion was made (kind of rightly) that the book was being distributed by Palgrave, which is true until you realize that Palgrave is just a subsidiary of St. Martin's. I found it puzzling that I'd have to go through all these hoops, but I've never dealt with a big-shot like this author.
     Oh, but wait! It gets better! I spoke to the publicist, who asked did we have an account with VHPS? The publicist corrected me when I suggested we'd just order them from the same person we order from for every other St. Martin's event.
     No no, said the publicist, this isn't through St. Martin's. It's through VHPS.
     Well, that's fine until you relize they're the same company. I don't expect the average person on the street to be able to say, "VHPS is the same company as St. Martin's. When you call one, you're calling the other," but then the average person on the street doesn't work for one of these companies.
     Anyway, back to the piddly-squat world that is my tiny sad little bookstore. I ordered the books. We're getting 40, but that's a huge order for a little place like us.
     
     Oh, and Brian Herbert and Neal Stephenson are signing near the same time. I hope they don't feel dwarfed by the titanic talent who bugged me today. Oh, wait, they won't.

In order to succeed, you've got to try.
In order to try, you've got to believe.
If you believe, you've already succeeded.
If you've already succeeded, why bother trying?

I've been handed poetry by local poet Neil Meili. I've got three books, and have opened one, entitled the Austin Book of the Dead. I've read two of the poems. The first, "Austin," was unremarkable. It's OK but it doesn't appeal to me.
The second is called "Dodo bird." It ends with the line
The world is a grain of sand you know
and sometimes that whole world can depend
on the shit of a Dodo.
Heehee. Silly.

They didn't even try to sell me anything...

I got an email from "Jenifer Hickman," sent to "barry" (why I got it I couldn't tell you). Here's the beginning of the text:

Hi Everybody I'm back from mexico. the beaches were great and the chicks even more. remind me you all to show you some pictures. cheers Konan sallow intimalelliot dickey persianfrankfort bellman blanchnonchalant phalanx focallumbermen showman...

There is no "buy this," there is no link to a Viagra sales page. It's the spam equivalent of the flaming paper bag of shit. I got another piece of spam (surprise surprise) which is titled "Backi to school special with biggun pills." They sell to children. Those lousy pukes. Grrrr.

A Modern Horror RPG

By MisterNihil

First, this isn't a game about combat, it's about storytelling and character. It's a metaphor for the human condition, intolerably executed in a manner in keeping with an adult game. Be warned! This game is not for children. Also, don't really stab people or kill them. That's bad.

Part 1:Character and stuff.
OK, so make up a character with a name. Ooooh. Scary is good. Do real scary stuff, like vampires or ghosts or something. Do all, names and backgrounds or whatever. You can fill that stuff in later. Your character is, like, this person and the other ones are these other people and you FIGHT MONSTERS, or you ARE MONSTERS or whatver. Maybe do, like, Frankenstein from the Monster's Perspective, all tall and green, but do it like the book where he throws the girl down the well, not like that new movie with Al Pachinko. Mary Shelly was all sexy and stuff. She ROxxors, but all victoriana style, like
0- -0
  |
v---v
Yeah! OK, so now your have your character. Go and do stuff, and then, like, get experience. You don't need numbers or nothin. They detract from the modern horror feel of the game and stuff.
PERSON RUNNING THE GAME ONLY: Ok, so no players are reading, right? OK, so, to make it horror, the bad guy has to be like a bad version of them. Make them be all blacker and nastier than the characters. And make them kill cats. That's evil. And at the end, be all "Oooh. The bad guys was YOU! UR THA 5UXX0RZ! and he's IN THE HOUSE! It was a BLOODY HEAD!" That'll get 'em good.
OK EVERYBODY AGAIN:So, like, when you want to do stuff, use our kewl combat system. It's really kewl, and it makes up for the fact that we have a numberless character system by assigning numbers to a character's stats. Right? Awesome! Let's Go.


OK, Part 2: We didn't want to include a combat system, but here's on just in case. I mean, it's not about combat. Or something.
COMBAT in ten easy and three difficult steps

1. Roll forty six-sided dice, or roll one six-sided die forty times and record each roll.
2. Make a list of the following stats: Strength, Muscle, Brawn, Sleekness, Speed, Beat-Downity, MisterT-ishness, Arm Strength, Leg Strength, and Brains.
3. Assign four dice (or four numbers) to each stat. Add the numbers together, giving each stat a value between 4 and 24.
4. Add Brawn, Muscle, Sleekness and Speed together, take the square root of the Cosine of the resulatant number, round to the nearest whole number higher than thirty, convert to Hexidecimal and record it as Hard-to-Hittedness.
5. Add Beat-Downity, MisterT-ishness, arm strength and Hard-to-Hittedness, cube this number, divide the resulting number's digits, and look on a world map or globe at the coordinates dictated by the numbers there. Convert the name of the nearest city to the point obtained to a number (a=1, b=2, c=3 etc), and record it as "Kikk-Assery".
6. Make a new stat, Tactics, which is equal to smarts.
7. Begin combat by comparing the digit of Pi found by counting down (not counting the 3) to each character's Sleekness+Speed. The character with the lower digit of Pi acts first for ALL COMBAT MANEUVERS.
8. Each character may take one Smith action (see step 9) and one Michigan action (see step 10), or two Michigan actions. Combat rounds pass to the right. See step 11 for Damage.
9. Smith Actions: BeatDown (Compare Beat-Downity to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Smack (Compare Brawn to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Kick (compare Speed+Leg Strength to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Wildcard (compare any two non-Brains traits to target's Hard-to-Hittedness and describe action)
10.Michegan Actions: Whine(compare Sleekness to target's leg-strength), Wildcard (compare any two non-Brains traits to target's Hard-to-Hittedness and describe action), Preen (compare Sleekenss to target's Brains+Brawn+Speed+Beat-Downity)
11.Damage: Every character takes one six-sided die of damage every round to his MisterT-ishness, no matter what. On any successful action, a character reduces the target's MisterT-ishness by the attacker's Muscle. If a character is reduced below 2 MisterT-ishness, that character LOSES!
12.Damage Part 2: If you fail at a Michegan action, you take damage to your MisterT-ishness equal to your opponent's Beat Downity.
13.Go back to step 8. Continue until one character is the LOSER! Lose interest in the game and never play again.

This process must be performed each time combat is required.

For some definition of "Roses," everything's coming up them.
For all definitions of "Rose," nothing's smelling like one.

"Repair, Repeal or Repent! Fifty Four Forty or Fight!" The robot sat in the Stationery-Max section of Office Depot, calling out to customers and the single employee available, indiscriminate. "Reduce, Recycle, Remove! Rejoyce, Repo, Rewharton! Jaundiced eyes see what hampered tendons cannot!"
A customer in need of Max'd Stationery snuck behind the robot, snatched a pad of paper, and dashed quickly away. Said customer was away and gone before the robot could react, but it was aware of the intrusion.
"Defective Cat! Deploy Massage Swedes, Grammatically Recombine defective Smithy?" The robot turned in tight circles on its wheels.

"No, Resplendant Moron!" The robot ran back and forth in front of the orderphone at the Tastee Freeze. "I have Washers in My Pants!"
"hrrzzzzle ggghhrzzzzzrl zzzzzszaaawwwzsszzrrr?" asked the order machine.
"No Defenseless Badger on my watch! Resplendant Moron! I have Washers in my Pants!"
"hzzzzzzssss srrrrawwwwwszzzlllrrr?"
The robot stopped dead for two seconds, then started moving quickly, making jerking its tiny, T-Rex arms back and forth. "NO! RES. PLEND. ANT. MOR. ON. I. HAVE. WASH. ERS. IN. MY. PANTS!"
There was a long pause, then the order phone answered, "rzzzfzzpzz mrrrmmm zzzzzz spzzzzrzzzrzzzzzzzmzzzzppzzzz?"
"Thank you, please drive up! The grass is always greener on The Other Side! Death! Death!" The robot rolled up to the window, cash in one hand, pistol in the other.

"Remain ignorant!" said the robot to the manager of the Orange Julius. "When the sun is out, make hay, and there is no rainy day!"
The manager looked from the robot to the pile of money, and started punching in the order. "Two Juliuses," he said.
"Hampers are the Devil's Playhouse! A Collander makes a Super Hero Helmet!" replied the robot.
The manger took its money and backed away.

My head hurts. I think it's the sun. I can't stay awake. I can't sleep. The fluorescent lights are making it worse. I can't look at a monitor for five more hours today.
Ugh. I haveta deal with customers this afternoon.
I so hate humans.

Everybody shut up & leave me alone.
I'm going straight to Heaven.
-MC900

Hey! It's about time! If the Collected Calvin & Hobbes is as cool as the treatment the Complete Far Side got, it'll actually be worth looking into. Hot damn! I wonder when the Collated Bloom County is slated...

OK, so here's the skinny: My eldest brother, whom I refer to as AngelBob, was hit by a car yesterday in the fast-lane of a highway (880? sure, why not). He was on a mototcycle, and is no longer on said motorcycle. He has been operated upon and is stable-if-drugged at last update. I haven't heard directly from him, but I've talked to Mom who has talked to people who have talked to him, and she's talked to his doctor who has become familiar with the situation, as doctors do.
The damage: So, from what I hear, his right arm is broken at the wrist & one additional place, he's got some stitches on the back of his left hand, and he's done a bad thing to his right ankle, which in turn has become dislocated and distant. After coersion from the doctor, whom we all have only gratitude toward, his arm and leg are ready to kiss & make up and resolve their differences. They've agreed upon separate housing (the trendiest casts available!) for a period of not less than four weeks, and personal attention in the form of physical therapy.
Hmm... I'm making light of this. It's overwhelming and I don't know how to deal. He's OK, and he's not going to die. That's the important part. Bruised, scraped & a little broken, but alive. I hope he gets better fast.

AngelBob won't read this for at least a while, but he needs to mend quickly. We're all thinking good thoughts his way, if that helps. He's going into surgery as we speak, and we all hope he'll come out right as rain, as it were.

Under a pile of work. Be back soon.
Kochalka is still the king of everything sweet & cool in web comic world. His little strippers make me want to draw in the same way that Elvis makes me want to pick up a guitar. Elvis was the motivation to get me to where I am on the guitar. I hope Kochalka's work will be the kick in the ass I need to put a pencil to paper.
But first, work. Lots and lots of work.
And my parents are still looking at tomorrow, but there may be a delay. I'll post that separately.

My parents are coming to visit. I think they may bring me steps. I should go buy something to cook for dinner tonight.

"Technique" is a word that looks funny truncated, pretty much no matter where you truncate it, with the exception of choppin' off the last eight.

And once more, once more unto the breech my friends.

     So, when Freddy died there wasn't any funeral. I told myself it's how he'd have wanted it and it helped me sleep through the night. I couldn't have given him a funeral. I was in China at the time, but I felt bad just the same. He had to go and die while I was away. I didn't ask him to and I didn't ask him to be my friend.
     When Roberta went while I was in Pittsburgh, I figured it was just a fluke. I mean, people die all the time and Roberta was pretty sick. The doctors said it was just a matter of time, but that she had a good chance at going into remission. I guess a good chance wasn't good enough for her.
     After that, Jeremy died while I was at the store. His wife called me first and I ran over there. He'd been hit by a stray bullet from the shooting range eight miles away. I know, right? I guess the effective range on those guns is shorter than the actual.
     From there, I went home, and then realized I'd forgotten to buy carrots. I was at the grocery store again when I got a panicked call from Jeremy's elder child, asking me what to do: Jeremy's wife shuffled off this mortal coil in their living room and the boy was alone. I abandoned my shopping basket and drove like a demon to their house, calling 911 on the way. I instructed Jeremy's elder, Samuel, to do the same, but more warning couldn't hurt couldn't hurt, I supposed. At the house, I waited with Samuel until the police arrived. Together, he and I called his two relatives in town: an elderly aunt and a ne'er-do-well cousin. When they arrived, I turned Samuel over to them and bowed out. I couldn't deal with another death.
     I drove home, and flopped on the couch before I realized that I'd forgotten my carrots again. I didn't even get all the way to the car in the driveway before the phone started ringing. It was my mother. She was alarmed by a loud bang from the neighbor's house and wanted me to come over to investigate. That's the problem with living five minutes from close family. I drove over and, with Mom, went over to knock on the door. It was broken open, the lock splintered. I called the police immediately and insisted that Mom not enter. She nudged the door open with the toe of her shoe and moaned. On the living room floor was our neighbor, lying in a pool of blood. I heard the back door bang open and the rattling of a man climbing a fence, then the sound of the back door of the next house opening and slamming.
     I don't exactly remember what happened next. The following six or so hours are a blur of blood, cops and questions. They took my mom and me down to the station, sat us in separate rooms and asked questions we couldn't answer. We were released, and as we left we saw her next door-once removed neighbor being brought in. He had blool all over his hands.
     I haven't left the house again. I think I left my car unlocked before, but it's been four days now. If anybody's going to take it, they would have it by now. I've called in sick from work. I told them it was a 72 hour virus and showing no signs as yet of clearning.

I don't wanna do nothin. But I haveta. Darn.

This is unfinished, but I like it anyway, so I'm posting it. So Nyah.

It was this morning that I found myself driving north along a bumpy south-austin road, holding in my left hand a betta fish. To be more accurate, I suppose it was this morning that I discovered that I had to drive north alongs said street, holding said fish in said hand, while driving my cranky stick-shift Jeep to work.
It started with oversleeping. This is a hobby of mine, in which I cannot often enough participate. Before Toshi started having to get to work early with me, I could fall asleep for twenty minutes at the drop of a hat. I'd find all kinds of excuses to fail to awaken at the proper time, from cloudy weather to even the mildest tickles in my throat. Now, with the juggernaut of wakefulness that is Toshismurf in the morning, I tend to be on my feet and bathed as much as an hour before work begins.
This morning, though, I decided to polish my rapidly rusting oversleeping skills, and sent her on to work before me. I snoozed, reveling in how smart I felt for allowing myself an extra forty minutes or so of unconsciousness. I took a liesurely shower and was out of the house by 9:15. It's the latest I've risen in longer than I care to remember. I remembered the fish.
The fish, a betta, a gift won by a friend of ours at a family reunion for happening to sit in the right chair at the right moment, was to be given to a coworker of mine who has a fondness, even a soft-spot for such fish. It's hard, though, to have a soft spot for more than about two, with limited office space. You can't double them up in their bowls, as they will kill each other. He kept a pet betta alive for some months, and has since replaced it with an albino individual. I was bringing him a blue and purple one.
Backing out of my garage wasn't difficult. The driveway has a distinct slope and I just gave the car the gentlest of nudges and let it roll backwards. I had to maneuver around two cars in the driveway, which I managed with no trouble. I'm a very good driver. Dad lets me drive in the driveway. I gave the wheel a pull and was on the street and facing north. No trouble, right?
At this point, I carefully put the car into first gear, holding the steering wheel steady with my left knee, and let off the clutch. The car jerked a little and a single drop of water made the short journey from the very-full fish bowl to my left wrist.
"A single drop never hurt anything." I thought momentarily of bankers on Black Monday, and smiled without correcting myself.
I set the car to moving, holding the steering wheel with my right hand. I switched and held it steady with my left knee while shifting. As long as I never had to turn while shifting gears, I was fine. I made it to the bottom of the hill near my house, turned left onto Manchaca, and, holding the wheel steady, accelerated north toward my work.
I am lucky, in that it only takes me some ten to twelve minutes to commute, discounting random traffic jams. At 9:30 in the morning, there tends not to be another car on the road. I made most of the lights, and managed not to cause any mayhem on the ones I missed, all the way to Ben White. At Ben White, known variously as 290, 71 and 21, and Manchaca, I stopped and waited at the light.
The fish was being remarkably calm. It retreated to the bottom of its bowl as we started, but was now swimming around, inspecting the two bits of betta chow I'd dropped into the water and which were now floating dejected at the sides of the meniscus like the crumbs of sad little cheerios. I also brought the blister-packed food with me. By using a cunning pair of chutes, the food managed to remain in the pack, despite its being open, unless the card was turned 180 degrees, so I was not alarmed at the pack sitting upside down on the seat.
The light opposite me turned green with an arrow, and two cars lumbered slothfully through and across my path. I saw another who would not make the light. The car approaching was a small import, white with a brown door, and was approaching at nearly forty five miles per hour. He did not slow down when he lost the arrow, and I waited to accelerate until he was past me, despite my green light.

Dragging my fat ass to the store, I noticed a hole in my pocket. Why, I asked my self, holding the rope in my left hand, had I had my right hand in my left pocket in the first place, and how, I asked myself, holding the rope in my left hand, had I not notice that equine animals, even fat ones, can walk themdamnselves to the store?

James Kochalka is awesome. Now you know.

If you've ever left in a hurry and forgot your keys,
If you've ever hit a pole while driving your car,
If you've ever bumped the still-tender spot on the back of your head,
If you've ever squished your finger between a door and a jamb,
If you've ever hit a log jam of people in a grocery store all trying to move fast,
If you've ever hit your toe on something otherwise non-threatening,
If you've ever hit a log jam of people in a grocery store all trying to move fast,
you might agree with me on this: Humans weren't meant to move quickly. Doing so creates disaster.

When I dance...
        people listen.

From James Kochalka Superstar, Monkey Vs. Robot

Show respect to Michael Jackson
He's been through a lot, and what do you want?
Show respect to Michael Jackson,
He's been through a lot, and what do you want?
But no one can sing like Michael can,
No one can dance like Michael can,
Lay off Michael, he's our man,
Remember when the whole world loved him?

I think my voicemail, here at work, just brings out the worst in people.
A young lady with whom I just spoke left me a message while I was on vacation. It, more or less, accused me of stealing from her and attempting to defraud her out of her product. She was mad. She's a relaxation guru. Need I say more? I called her back and left a nice, "please call me back, here's my number, blah blah blah" kind of reply when I got back.
She just called me back, all sweetness & light, and said "I just wanted to make sure you got them." I don't get it, but I also didn't have to talk to an angry person, so points here.
Goooh. I feel tired and a little nauseated. I should have had beer last night. Silly me, I stayed sober. Oh well.

Is today your brother's birthday?
No?
Then you should go ahead and come to my house to celebrate my brother's birthday!

     "Dag Nab You, Die-rec-tor! You'll pay for this!"
I'm thinking of two villains who can holler back and forth.
     "Dag Nab You, Muskeetor! You'll pay double for this!"
They hate each other, but they aren't foul-mouthed like some of these new baddies.
     "Blast! Die-rec-tor, I'll have your head!"
They stand on opposite rooftops and shout back and forth.
     "Rats! There is no escape, Muskeetor!"
Until one gives up or gets sick of it.
     "You also cannot escape, Die-rec-tor! The End is Near!"
There are rules to this kind of thing, which cannot be broken.
     "I hope you came looking for death, Muskeetor! You've found it!"
The insults may never be personal, and no evil powers may be used.
     "Looking for it, Die-rec-tor? I brought it! For you!"
They are far too sophisticated to use evil powers on each other.
     "Muskeetor, you shall see the inside of a coffin today!"
So they stand on opposite rooftops and threaten back and forth, neither giving way.
     "Yes, Die-rec-tor! I shall see yours! At your funeral!"
At the end of the day, if no heroes have come to "stop the rampage of tyrrany," they go out for beer and pizza. I think that's the best kind of super villain.

I've buried myself in work. Be back soon.

Posted as a convenience, for ease of linking.

Rectitude
My arms itch and I'm having trouble breathing. Everything is dark. My head aches and I know there's a welt on it, on the back, right where the swirl of my hair leaves a little bald spot, where Alfalfa has a cowlick.
The burlap of the sack I seem to be in is itchy and course. I can't open my eyes.. Somebody has tied a raw burlap blindfold over my face. It feels like I'm rubbed raw in at least three or four spots and like I'm going to have a rash in the morning.
I hope I have a rash in the morning.
I don't really know what's happening. I remember driving to work. There was a lot of traffic today and every red pickup truck in town decided I was the car to cut off and stop in front of. There's the only problem with driving a small car: people just assume you'r docile and you'll let them it. By about the twentieth big truck I was fed up. It had taken me an hour and a half and I was only half done with what should have been a twenty minute commute. When these two stupid frat boys in a big jacked up, chromed piece of crap decided to change lanes into me, I just hit my horn instead of letting them cut me off. The cars ahead of me moved ahead and I moved with them. These guys were left to wait for another sucker. It didn't help, though.
I was really, really late for work. I called the office at 8, and again at 9, letting them know where I was and what was going on. They didn't know what the problem was either. Everything was backed up. I finally pulled up in front of the building at 10am, two hours late.
The parking garage was absolutely full. On the bottom level, right by the ramp, there was one beautiful spot, but a truck pulled into it, apparently unable to read the spraypaited letters that said "Small Cars Only!" on the wall. He had been behind me, and zipped around me as I was about to pull into the spot. The driver was a young guy in a back-turned baseball cap and no shirt, wearing cutoff shorts and thong sandals. His girlfriend was dressed about the same, but with the addition of a bikini top and a bleached-out spit-end collection. As they got out of the car, both of them managed not only to hit the cars next to them, but to slam their doors repetedly into their neighbors and then lean on them as they got out. I couldn't help myself. I rolled down my window and shouted "Damn It, have a little consideration for the fact that you aren't the most important pair of ignorant Assholes on the planet! How can you think that's acceptable? What the hell is wrong with you?"
They just stared at me like a pair of really stupid statues. I drove off up the ramp, looking for another spot. The only other one open was in another section marked for small cars, and was half taken up by an SUV, parked crooked so as to consume three separate spots. I squeezed in, scraping the tip of my side rearview mirror in the process. I sat in my car, already more than two and a half hours late, and wrote a note to the SUV driver, telling him what I thought of his parking job. I told him that a monkey could have done better just by not having driven such an impractical, stupid vehicle in the first place, and that the no-doubt-lone driver with no passengers should consider the fact that the number of seats necessary for one passenger in a vehicle is, believe it or not, one, not twelve, and that this monstrocity was just wasting so much space. I said he should feel ashamed of himself. I left the paper under his windshield wiper, and labeled it "To Mr. Asshole, Driver of the Leviathon of the Small Car Spot."
Then I went to work.
In front of the building, we have a policy that people are not to smoke within 15 feet of the front entrance door. Outside, some punk was leaning against the sign to that effect, and about to light up a cigarette. I asked him if he wouldn't mind too terribly much just moving away from the building, as we have that policy in place to protect the non-smoking employees. He struck a match on the sign and looked at me for a long second.
"If you don't mind," I began.
"Fuck off, Grampa." He interrupted.
I stormed inside the building, and found a security guard. I gave him a good solid admonition for letting this policy fall lax. It was, after all, I said, for everyone's own good, and would he please go outside and remove the offending scofflaw from the premises. He looked at me dumbly, then shuffled out the door with a mumbled appology or curse or something. It's so hard to understand these mumblers.
Then I went to the accounting department, where the parking situations are handled, and first gave them an earful about the abominable parking situation. I demanded a return to the reserved spot system. Then, I told them about the trucks in the small car spots and demanded that some action be taken.
After that, the day went just about normal. Of course, my insensitive coworkers needed keeping in line, but I've taken that on along with my regular duties. I feel I owe it to the company.
At lunch, I checked on the parking situation with the accounting office. I explained to them that what I wanted was a person to patrol and have the trucks towed out of the small car spots. I wrote several memos to the accounting office and Vice Presidents of Human Capital, Fiscal Affairs and Operations, explaining my problem.
At 5 I made my way out to the parking lot. I remember a sharp blow to the head, and then I woke up in this burlap sack.
I think I'm in the trunk of a car, and one in need of suspension by the feel of it. I don't know what's going on, and I'm getting scared.
Why do these bad things always happen to me?

God
From where I am sitting, I can touch God.
He's in the next booth, and I can smell a trace of his cologne. Not a whole lot, like stupid yuppies wear, where it crushes your whole nose and makes you want to barf; just a whiff. I can't place the scent. It smells soft and whispy, like clouds. Maybe he just smells like that all the time. It reminds me of being a child, when I'd smell something, then try to go back later and have it smell different, not so neat. New toys used to smell so good, but now they just smell like plastic. This is like finding a smell when you were a kid, and then finding that it smelled the same, just as magical when you are an adult.
He's wearing a blue suit. It's a very tasteful one, with a banded collar, kind of like a priest should wear, if he wants to be fashionable. His hair is black and curly, and he's got perfect, smooth olive skin. His eyes, when I cought a flash of them a moment ago, are very deep black, with very well-defined whites, the two perfect examples of the colors, deep and bright, inky and glowing, in absolute contrast to each other. They are like a perfect Yin Yang. He looks very middle-eastern, and yet not. From the right angle, he looks more mexican or asian or even sometimes like a well-tanned European. It's hard to say what kind of ethnicity he is. I couldn't help but notice he's wearing very snazzy blue shoes with black laces. They're shiny and not scuffed or dirty at all. He really looks like he has everything together.
I haven't heard him talk yet. He's just sitting there playing with a palm pilot. A minute ago he had one of those fold-out keyboards out and was writing something in a big hurry. You can tell, he types really well, and really fast, too. It must have been an important thought, too, because when he put the keyboard away I think I heard him give a thoughtful "hmm." Now he's just playing with the thing. It makes the occasional beep or whistle, but he's a really quiet person, it seems.
The waitress didn't even ask him what he wanted. She just brought over a big salad and a cup of coffee. I noticed she left him extra cream and she changed out his sugar cup for him. I think he probably just gets that kind of service everywhere he goes. If he doesn't I guess it's all for the best. Divine plan and all that, yeah?
He hasn't touched his salad except to take out the croutons and put them on a plate and eat one of the cherry tomatoes. I guess he's like me in that. He doesn't eat the croutons either. Sometimes you just have to be in the right mood. And when the tomatoes are ripe, and I guess he can tell if anybody can, they're really good, when they've just got a little spot of dressing on them so it doesn't cover the taste all the way and just adds a little zip to the flavor. Yeah. He's done this before.
I wonder if, every time he looks at something he thinks "I did a good job on that," or "I need to fix that. I'll get around to it," or something. Is it kind of like the guy who builds machines for a shoe factory going out shoe shopping? I don't know.
The whole impression, though, is just that he looks absolutely comfortable and at ease. He's doing his own thing and loving it.
I feel like I'm seeing the better version of me, the version with all the upgrades, where the engineers have taken out all the stupid features and replaced them with ergonomic ones that work every time and never burn out. I'm the model T, and this guy's the flying car the uses no gas, puts out no pollutants and folds up into a 6-pound suitcase.
I think he's done. He ate his salad, and obviously enjoyed every bite. He chewed slowly and closed his eyes while he ate. After each bite, he waited a couple of seconds and just seemed to enjoy the flavor. It's the same crappy dressing I got on my salads here a hundred times. He just seems to be able to relish it properly. After his salad, he drank his coffee. I couldn't help noticing that it was still steaming. He had the first sip black, and then, while he was still smiling from it, he opened a creamer and a sugar packet. He added a little of each, then had another sip. He kept that up, sip by sip until at the bottom it was probably just a sip of cream and sugar with a little coffee flavor in it.
He left a pretty good tip. God, it seems, tips 30%. I hope the waitress knows what she's got. After he was gone, she just came around and picked up the money and wiped down the table. God didn't leave a mess and he seems to have bussed his own dishes. I wouldn't even know where to put them. I always leave a mess at this kind of diner. I thought that was why you leave a tip.
It's a funny thing. You can't just walk up and say "Wow. You're God. I love what you've done with Honey Dew melon. I think it's your best work. I have your book here, will you sign it?" I think that would be rude. I just let him go. When he noticed me staring, he gave me a little wink and a thumbs up. Obviously, he knew I knew who he was. He was very cool about it.
All in all, God seems to be an alright guy. I've got to find out where he gets his suits made. If I could look half that good, I'd be satisfied.
That was a good looking suit.

If you'll check the Alamo Drafthouse Calendar, those of you who are Sharon will notice that I was wrong about the date of "Wizard People Dear Readers." It is next weekend, but still at midnight. If you are going to go, which you really should, the live show is Friday. And there is a description of said awesomeness on the movie description page.

She's in love with me, and I feel fine.

Well, what you see is not a test,
I'm rappin' to the beat.
and you ain't seen nothin' yet,
just try to move your feet.

You take the good, you take the bad, and there you have the facts of life.

"It's good, but is it mindless crap?"
-Edward R. Murrow, 1964

Also, I am rapidly failing to be impressed with Blogger's "compose" function on the post-create screen. It seems to be a massive waste of time, but I'll see how I feel about it over time.

Maybe the Media is using political outrage to keep our minds off of the real issues, but if that's true, I don't know what the real issues are. The point is, that comic there is funny, and it keeps my mind off of the real issues.

Terror Alerts:
Have you actually read this? I'll have to admit, it's been a while since I did. We are currently at an Elevated, or Yellow, or Bert level of Risk of Terror. This means we should be keeping an eye out and tackling suspicious people on the street because there is "A SIGNIFICANT RISK OF TERRORIST ATTACKS" everywhere in the nation right now. Think about that the next time you go to the grocery store. Remember: The lowest level of suspicion is really damn suspicious. You should never be less than fearful of brown people. That's the word from the government.

Facility. It's a great word. Say it twice, real slow. It'll make you wince the second time.

You put the money in the bag and you jump it to the car
and you leave the little planet like you don'know who you are
If the bastards catch you, you can count on life in jail
but there ain't nobody watchin from the belly of the whale
but the money in the bag, babe, it calls out to your soul
It's the last thing that you dream about before you make parole
It's what you want and need in here, behind the yellow line
The lie is just so easy thinkin money makes life fine,
but you tossed the cash in quick and then you jumped into the back
If You Wasn't Here, You'd be Somewhere, Blaming Cash for What You lack.

"Just a moment"
That's how far the Ancients got, carving their ageless and senseless wisdom into a basalt crypt. Inside, it is rumored, lies the body of the only Ancient who stayed on Earth, the only one who didn't enter a coffee-powered stone space ship and whoosh his way to the stars. I don't know what this was actually supposed to say. Nobody really does, but we like to pretend. A man with more time and sneakyness than he knew what to do with finished the sentiment. He carved the letters below the originals, carefully in the same font, the same size, lined up perfectly. The sentiment is finished. The idea complete.
"Of Weakness."

I have, upon my thumb
A Bristly
Thistly
Gristly
Why-can't-I-Whistle-y
growth upon my thumb.

It calls out in the darkness
to the neighborhood
to Hollywood
I thought I Could,
Up to no good,
but for the growth upon my thumb.

It has a little name on it,
called Winston
Finston
Benson
Representson
Growth U. M. Thumb, esq.

Beware! The Batholith thtalkth tonight!
heeheehee.

It hasn't been too bad, being back. I mean, it sucks, but work should, right? I took yesterday as a sick day (Toshi&I slept all day. It was great), and tonight is Official Laundry Folding Day. So, Enough Mundanity! Back To It!

Filling fixed. Back from vacation. 15 messages on work phone, all URGENT, all need me to get back to them by last friday.
'cause it's not like I recorded a message that expressly said I wouldn't be back until today, right? Oh. Wait.
I'd quit. I'd so quit. If it didn't mean I'd have nothing to do.
I stopped grinding my teeth about mid-way through last week. It felt good to wake up without that tight, ugly throb in my jaw. That was nice. I'll miss that.

...and the filling fell out. Grrr. I gotta go & waste 2 more hours of my life. Oh well. I guess I probably can't get it fixed until next week again. I'll see if I can go deal with used car dealers and dentists tomorrow.

My tooth is fixed. The total cost after insurance paid their cut: $80.
The next step: sell the car. I've set aside time tomorrow to do it, arranged a ride & know the place is open. Everything's looking rosy.
Also, there was this gift I was eyin' fer Tim fer Christmas which now sits heavily in my garage. I'll say no more...

A good weekend over all.
Went to see the brothers' new house, met the folks, poked around in old shops; visited dear friends' house, shared Indian food and came home tired.

Smoke on the water. A fire in this guy.
So, the crazy who threatened me: I have his home phone number, address & fax number. Does anybody know any good sign-up type things that ask for that kinda stuff?
Spam garbage? Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints? JHWH's Witnesses? Car drawings? Whatever. Let me know.

Wow.
I got a death threat at work today. I don't exactly know how I feel, but it is absolutely bad. Every time the store pager goes sounds, I'm afraid it's going to be that crazy sonofabitch. And, just to make things more interesting, I get to send him money. Paying psychos. Does it get better? Yeah. It gets a whole lot fucking better. I'm hoping tomorrow it does so in spades.

Thomas Hart Benton was born in 1889, the year after Edward lear died at the age of 70. Benton would live to 86. I don't think I have to hit you over the head with what that means. Unless you're talking about the other Thomas Hart Benton, who only made it from 1782 to 1859, and was not a Missourian. This puts him at 77 when he died, which, again, is significant enough I don't think I'll have to go into further detail.
I think my point is proven.

I love nonsense.
Nonsense is the honorable cousin of the lie, a non-truth all the same but not so universally reviled. A good liar is a bad person, so the saying goes, and that saying grew out of human belief. It didn't spontaneously erupt from the womb of human language and ethics, as the "Good People" would have you believe.
That's the whole point, isn't it? There's this unrealistic example we can't live up to and the simple fact is, we're built to lie. Other people can't see in my head and know what's the truth and what's not. I can't even do that, and it's my head. But this is all a digression.
Nonsense. Edward Lear built his reputation and career on it. Or not. Maybe he's just remembered for the Runcible Spoons and Derry-down-derrys, and he built his reputation on something as odd as landscape painting. I don't know. I don't have to know.

Is there any goodness left in the world?
Yes, but it doesn't find its way into movies.

My computer at work is broken. It died some time during the weekend, a victim of some email-checking mishap. Some person or persons killed it, and I came in on Monday to find the cold corpse sitting in its usual spot under my desk. Funeral services will be held at the city dump, where a casket of garbage will be inhumed with the earthly remains of the deceased. It has no name and no family, and served its life as a drone at a bookstore.
Seriously, though, that and a puzzling inability to sleep or remain awake are why I haven't posted in a while.

Wow. I have just been Gripey McGriperson of late. I'll see if I can't cheer up.

Don't get me wrong. I like my Palm. It works OK, more or less. It just seems that, if I'm buying a $299 system, it should play friggin MP3s for less than a $99 add-on. I mean, right?
In a world where a small MP3 player is available for $70(and that one has double the Palm's memory), I guess it makes sense that if you add a pocket calculator and a calendar, it'd be a little pricey. Maybe what I want is the Gamer-dork edition of the Palm, one that doesn't even pretend it's for business and it just has, like an MP3 player, a bitchen' video card and bluetooth palm-to-palm-type interconnectivity so I can play friggin Battleship against other people.

Do you have a grown-up who does Mister's job?
Yeah. And I'm him, dumb-ass.

It's alright ma, I'm only pudding.

That use of Posh below is not just an archaic one, it's an archaic one that came up last night in conversation. The OED we consulted said it means a mush, as slivered crushed ice. We thought that was weird. The meaning "fancy" didn't come into common use until the early 20th century, more or less, but it is suggested that it meant that as early as the 1890s. Hell, you can read it your own self. The meaning we found is curiously absent from that link.
Also, out of the meeting with friends last night: we stopped by Half Price books on Guadaloupe, where I purchased a complete leather-bound set of (formerly) loose-leaf encyclopedias from 1932. The whole set cost $10. They're bound together with wood on the spine, and rivits through the pages. It has a certificate of Encyclopedic Usefulness or some such garbage in the front of the first volume. All in all, a pretty cool set. If I ever need pre-WWII knowledge, I have a source. Rock on.

This is the stuff of life:
I see the swirling vortex that is My Problem, a motley confusion of a hole, sucking in pieces of the rest of my life. I see the tiny shards of The Solution, all pieces, all disparate. As a posh, they can't fill the hole. I need to use the epoxy of Hard Work and Time to make a cover, to assemble the various pieces of ceramic Solution, to fill that gaping hole and make my life a single cohesive unit again.
And that's your simile for the day. What does it mean? It means I need to figure out a bunch of stuff and then decide what it means. It means my life is great, but I need to control it a little. It means it's easy to ignore your problems, but they just come back later, hungry.

It's Thursday. Time for Nodwick.

OK, not to harp, but that poem just hurts. It starts off with so much promise. It's like somebody with an idea of what he wanted and where he was going started it.
(Quoted from the above link, a part of carusoism.com, for review purpose only)
She whispered words like breezes
While staring silver moonbeams
And wrapped her love with lust
That bit: it's evocative; it cries of impure love, a moonbeam stare, and the lies whispered on the wind; it evokes an image of doomed affection. If there were just three lines in the beginnig of the first verse of The Divorcee, it wouldn't be so bad, but no. He had to go the extra mile-and-a-half.
Because her dreams had rust
D'oh! And the the Caruso Charm (tm) kicks in. Rhyme scheme? Well sure there is. It goes
ABCC
D(D)E(E)
FGHG
I(I)JK
(D: half rhyme)
(E: repeated word)
(I: half rhyme)
OK, sure, maybe it's just a complex form. It strikes me, though, that he uses alliteration in the first three lines and nowhere else, and the rythmic pattern, such as it is, establishes itself in the first three lines, the falls apart immediately. It's like he took three lines from some better poet, and slapped the poem onto it. It's like a clapboard shack stuck on top of pier-and-beam. I read it again, this time dropping the last line of each stanza. The third verse is a little obtuse, but I think the poem is much improved. Maybe that's all. Maybe this should have been a poem with three-line stanzas.
So you're thinking: But Mister! Poetry is about the content, not the form.
That's all well and good, but I'd argue that the form in this case detracts so from the content that it's hard to determine what the heck he's talking about. OK, we know it's about a divorcee, and we know it's about a woman. We know she's sad, and I surmise, probably, that she's having sex without loving her partner, based on the poet's use of the phrases "wrapped her love with lust" in the first, and "all a sexy cloak" (whatever the heck that actually means) in the last stanza. Oblique language? Why sure. It would't be poetry without it. Masking your emotions in clumsy bullshit? Same thing. Wordplay that draws a comparison between two meaningless constructs? Ditto.
And then there's the puzzling allusion of the morning rain wetting (or not) her pillow. I don't know to what it alludes. Maybe that would help. I went to look it up and found nothing. If you know, feel free to berate my ignorance of culture and literature. It seems like it must be a reference to a folk song, but maybe I made that up.
So now you're probably thinking: But Mister! Why are you picking on this poem?
I dunno why. I picked it, and it really was what I'm finding wrong with his poetry, and with quite a lot of neuveaux poetry I've read. He's just the latest piece of sand in the oyster. I have nothing actually against him, personally.

Now I'm all kinda curious. I wonder what would happen if I wrote some lousy poetry. Let's find out:

note to a honey
darling,
I left for the store
when I come back, I promise
I PROMISE
I'll have milk,
eggs,
butter,
ham,
you know, the usual,
but I'm picking up batteries
and talc
and a toothbrush.
Did you need anything?
Anything but love, I mean.
Yours,
-MN

OK, the frisbee poem is actually kinda sweet. I'm not saying there isn't a legitimate human emotion attempting to express itself through the poetry, and I'm not saying he's not a smart guy. I talked with him over the phone, so I know that, although he's a might long-winded, he's a decent sort and able to use the language effectively. I don't get what would possess a person to decide that something like
The cat
jumped over
the lazy mat
of the moon.
is poetry. He didn't write that, I did (but he did write this), but I don't claim that every use of the language is art. Sure, it's fascinating to participate in the endless masturbatory swirl that is babbling crap, but it's something eles entirely to believe, and I've heard him talk about this and he honestly believes this, that what you're doing is Art. I mean, good for ya' thinking that, but it's my place as a no-talent hack and a critic to find it, read it, and decide for myself whether I think it's good or not. My opinion: not good.
Hey! I have a comment system. Anybody else have anything resembling an opinion?

God Damn. Where was sweet Jesus?
It's like poetry, only worse. Now, in my defense: this guy called me to sell me his book. He suggests that, to get a good idea of his work, you should read the following three poems: This one, this one and this one. It's not like I picked the worst I could find. If I did, I would've linked to his phallic nanner poem. I don't know what to say. It's like reading broken glass.

My horoscope this week:
Until recently, Indonesians thought their country consisted of about 17,000 islands. But in February of 2003, an analysis of satellite images found more than a thousand undiscovered islands, bringing the total to 18,108. I suspect that you're on the verge of making a comparable breakthrough about yourself, Cancerian. There's much more of you than you ever imagined. Many previously unknown territories will soon come into view. It will be as if you have unearthed a new world right in the midst of the old one.

From Harvey:
In this life, you've got to be clever or pleasant. I spent a great deal of time being clever. I can recommend pleasant.

It's the end of the worm as we know it...

I've seen a lot of references to My Back Pages lately. I've had a different Dylan song running through my head, though. It's called Tombstone Blues. One specific verse keeps tickling the back of my mind:
Now I wish I could write you a melody so plain
That could hold you dear lady from going insane
That could ease you and cool you and cease the pain
Of your useless and pointless knowledge.
That's, of course, after the verse about selling roadmaps to the soul, which I also think is just pure genius. I just think this particular verse really speaks to the desire in those of us with sweetness and simplicity to try to make things better. I think it articulates the pain of being powerless.
And I'm sorry, 'cause I'm powerless.

It started with a quest to find the correct spelling of youse.
Then, I followed the links under that to a page which vindicates my viewpoint on the word "y'all" and its proper spelling (not ya'll, thanks much). It's an important word, or at least an important form to have, because it's darn confusing to have the singular and plural forms of "you" be identical.
Also, there's a link to a neat regional note about deletion of the initial w in 'ords, a practice 'ch'I find funny.
Anybody got anything to say? Nope? OK.

You don't really need an excuse to link to this!

     Cht'thschs, whom the hairless two-leggers call Meowsers, waits patiently in the bushes. Cht'thschs is coiled, watching the Enemy frolic. This time, there can be no escape. This time, Cht'thschs has a plan.
     Pulling herself forward, paw over paw, she approaches the enemy silently. The bush does not shake, she does not scratch the ground. This day, the Enemy will know defeat. Once she is within six inches of the Enemy, only the leafy camoflage of the bushes separating them, Cht'thschs prepares her weapons. She flexes her paws and prepares for the battle ahead. The Enemy does not seem to notice.
     Cht'thschs tenses, prepared to dispense death. In a swift, liquid motion taking less than a quarter of a second, too fast for the hairless two-leggers to see, she leaps, crashing out of the bushes and into the Enemy.
     It flaps its horrible feathery leg, trying to fly, but she keeps her jaws locked in a death-grip. The Enemy, sensing its defeat, slows its useless flapping. Cht'thschs now brings her claws down onto its heaving body, rending flesh. The Enemy, its neck crushed and its body badly beaten, finally gives up.
     Cht'thschs devours what little meat she can. Just as she is finishing and considering retiring for the afternoon, another Enemy lands nearby, eyeing her cautiously while scratching for edibles in the grass.

Ray Charles died. As an act of protest, I'm going to remember him instead of Reagan on Friday. Take that, The Man!

Sometimes it's funny the words that a spell check doesn't know and has to learn.

I don't believe you
You got milk & honey
I don't believe you
You got luck & money
Don't be sad.
For God's sake, don't be sad.
-BM

You don't sent flowers...

Kill! KILL!
-Arlo Guthrie

It is better to have loved and lost than to have a bee-sting on your eye.

Toshi has obtained employment.
Details upon request.

Sink your teeth into that, why doncha.

I was about to gripe about the rain, but it's not 95 degrees outside. It's cooled off nicely, and the rain is refreshing. I'm going to need new tires before awfully long, but I'll burn that bridge when I come to it.

Like an old Sam Cooke song, it came into my head:
Another Tuesday mid-morning
and I ain't go nobody
I got some money 'cause I just went to the bank and deposited my paycheck.
Oh, how I wish I had someone to talk to,
I'm awfully bored at work.

The question is, why are you inviting all this cancer and car trouble into your life right now?
I'm watching Penn & Teller's Bullshit right now. It's about charlatans, cheats and other fun crap.

We got a hella good review in the Chronicle. Keen!

A puzzle:
Brat Yah Piphyd
He Is Angel Bob

So, here's what I've been thinking about lately.
There are, it seems, two attitudes about World War II, the one that happened in Europe and the Pacific. You know the one. It was, in essence, the end of World War I, only with bigger guns, more advanced technology and better airplanes. Ah, yes. Now we're on the same page. It's the airplanes that really interest me, or at least that started this line of thought.
WWII was the end of the age of heroes. It was the end, really properly the end, of the NeoClassicism that held Western culture in sway for about six hundred years, more or less. This gives rise to two ways of looking at the war itself, a "just-post" and a "very-post." Probably, there will be an "ancient history" view arise, but it won't be in my lifetime. It has already started, with the belief that the Holocaust was a myth. The generation who saw the people taken out of camps can't deny that there were people hurt, killed and destroyed. The next generation has the stories of that generation to listen to, and can still feel a chill. With my generation, it's really too easy for that to take on a mythical quality. It happens faster now, as evidenced by the "moon landing myth" myth. I'm not going to call it a full-fledged attitude yet.
The "just-post" attitude was shaped by three huge factors: the end of the worst economic depression the United States had seen outside of civil war; the end of the Edwardian era, which followed the Victorian era and all it entailed; and the absolute horror of what had just happened in Europe and Japan. Despite what we would believe, Americans were a humble people. We were (and are, I'd very much argue) still in the shadow of our parent country, England. The culture of England at the time was still influenced heavily by Victorian morals and values, both of which called for extreme modesty and knowledge of place. As one of a gaggle of bar-sinisters of the Former British Empire, America had a sense of shame. What needed to be done was done, and no glory was necessary for performing necesseties. The Great Depression only served to heighten that sense. Here we were, the misbehaved bastard children of England, and we were absolutely broke. Sure, the rest of the world was too, but the attitude of the day called for introspection, knowledge that it didn't matter what the neighbors were doing, so much, as long as you were taking care of your business. And we didn't seem to be. America of the fifties were young enough to remember that. The generation who were having babies in the decades succeeding the war remembered having nothing and remembered seeing that nobody had anything. They were raised by parents who, even vicariously, were still mourning the death of Prince Edward. They saw news reel that showed things that had never been done to men with huge, terrifying machinery and guns that were bigger then even the imagination can do justice. They knew the horrors of war more directly than any generation before them.
So what does all this mean? A thousand thousand men left their homes in America, fought a huge war, and came home. It means they didn't talk about it much more than they had to. It means a generation of men got a lot of practice saying "I just did what needed to be done." The people back home had an inkling what happened over there, and they had no desire to know more. Men died horribly in the mud. Men were killed in hales of bullets. The details were probably best forgotten. If there was any doubt of that, we need only look at Vietnam. As a nation, we're still stigmatized by what we saw reported there, and by what we've since heard rehashed over and over by the soldiers. War has always been horrible. In this century, we've learned to photograph it. Up until World War II, most men didn't talk about it.
But there were heroes. There were people whose stories were reported to the people back home. There were villains, whose names were reviled but respected. Sure, there were armies of faceless men, but there were men in the front. That's the "just-post" view. A million faceless grunts and a hero in the front. It's the classic view of war. It's how the Trojan war was reported. We know Hannibal, but we don't necessarily know the names of his sergents. Napoleon and his generals are known. Who were the men on the field? They were an army of men doing what they had to do. There's nothing wrong with that view. It's how human history has viewed war for millenia. Like, roughly three of them.
And now it's the future. Now, America is run by a generation who did not live through the worst economic depression in American History. It is being run by the generation who Won the biggest war ever, and don't you forget it. We've become proud. We've become loud sloganeers for our Great Nation. We won. Our fathers leveled two cities in seconds just to prove a point, and that's not counting the countless cities they leveled over the course of years to prove the same point. We inherited the power to do the same, and we turned it into the power to level the planet in seconds just to keep proving the same point. Victoriana? Why, it's kitch. It's collectible. Humility? Well, sure, it's a fine thing. The horrors of war? Far removed or as close as possible, thank you very much. We've seen people blown up, shot, beheaded and executed, and that's just on the news.
And we've started coaxing the stories out of the soldiers. We now realize that every single person who fought in that war and lived has a story. Many people are collecting these and publishing them. This is the foundation that will allow WWII to become the stuff of legend two hundred years hence. It already seems that any amount of information you have on the war is a pittance. You can't know everything, so you can't know anything. The information available is confusing and complicated.
What year did the war start? Why, 1941, of course, when America joined in. Or 1939, when Hitler invaded Poland. Or 1933, when Hitler came to power. Or 1919, when Germany was screwed by the Treaty of Versailles (justly or not, whatever you believe. They got screwed, which lead to them deciding to pull themselves up by their bootstraps). Or 1914, with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. I'll stop.
The point: The classic view of WWII was of a few named heroes and a million faceless grunts; the modern view is of a million men, each with a story to tell.
That's what I've been thinking about lately. That, and work, of course. Always work.

My horoscope from Rob Brezsny for the week.
"Dear Dr. Brezsny: Last night I dreamt I was returning home from a horrid date with a man who didn't even know my name. As I came into the living room, the heating duct flew off, and hundreds of rabbits started pouring in. At first I didn't mind, but then they started to attack me. Long story short, I was eaten alive by cute cuddly bunny wabbits. Comments? -Apparently Delicious Moon Child." Dear Moon Child: I think you're dreaming for the entire Cancerian tribe. Here are some possible dream interpretations. 1. You've been too nice for your own good lately. 2. Your extreme, almost manic fertility is leading you to do things that aren't healthy for you. 3. You should minimize contact with anyone who doesn't see you for who you really are, and you shouldn't indulge people who take advantage of your nurturing sweetness.
Damn. All three, even. Damn.

What's the polite way to beat the crap out of somebody while explaining to him that he lives a charmed life? Oh, right, avoidance. Right.

Yeah, well (grumble) didn't want (grumble grumble obscenity grumble) couldn't care less (grumble obscenity curse) even if I did, which I don't (cuss grumble foul-mouthed obscenity insult to parentage).

"At her front door I gave her cheek a kiss
Does life get any better than this?
Young Geeks in love."
-Little Bunny FooFoo & the Field Mice, Young Geeks In Love

Our second song. The last line. I'll tell ya', I've never written anything as sweet as that song manages to be. It was a group effort between four of the five "members," without the two "other members," or our "main singer." There are a buncha people in my band. Well, Adam's band, if you wanna be really correct. It was pretty much his idea (I think he was feeling his years, although he's still very young), told Dana that he was thinking of forming a band, and the rest, as they say, is a whole lot of work and time.
I didn't write the above song, by the way. I, and I love being able to say this, co-wrote it. It's one of, like, five collaborations I've been able to work on. They always turn out very well.
If things keep moving the way they're moving, they'll turn out well. What more can you ask?

It's so hard not to giggle. I guess I never noticed before that I was reading the IBS.

What a great meme:
The current level of FEER!

And now you know.

Now I have site feed too, ha ha ha.
But Blogger sez to link Here. I can't get it to work, but more power to ya if ya can.

Orson Scott Card, crafter of what lotsa folk is calling the "best SciFi book ever," on marriage. It's long, so be ready for that, but most writings that state a point and go about explaining it proper tend toward that.

Picked up some Rye Cooder stuff. I need creepy slide guitar. I'm hoping he can deliver. If not, I got backup: Neil Young's Deadman soundtrack.

I know that he, like the rest of the world, must google himself once in a while.
So, whatever happened to Robert Stefenino?
That's a name that I don't hear enough.
Whatever happened to Robert Stefenino, who played a bartender in a movie I didn't see?

I re-enabled comments, just on the off chance...(not that I'm holding my breath)

Why should we hear about body bags and death, and how many, what's going to happen, and how many this or what do you suppose? Or, I mean it's... it's not relevant, so why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?
-Barbara Bush, on Good Morning America, 3/18/03
(re-quoted from The K Chronicles, via Salon)

Touch not these curtains
your hand will be tearing
delicate tissues of thoughts and of things
call me not your cruel voice will be scaring
flocks of young visions on gossamer wings
leave me, oh leave me
for in your rude presnece
nothing of all my bright world can remain
thou art a blight to this garden of pleasants
thou art a blot on my beautiful brain
-Martin Farquhar Tupper, Sloth from Thousand Lines

Hey. Neat.

Hey, it's cool. I don't care.

Again, Rob, It came up this morning. But thanks.

Antibiotics have been miracle drugs for over 60 years, but their potency is fading as bacteria evolve to become resistant to them. This has led some British doctors to revive a medieval approach to healing: placing maggots in open wounds. Seriously. The creepy creatures are fast and effective in cleansing infections. I'd like this to serve as your operative metaphor in the coming weeks, Cancerian. As you strive to mend old psychic lesions, call on the wisdom of the past, even if it involves a cure that makes you a bit uneasy.

Stupid dreams. Stupid, stupid dreams.

You'll pardon me if I say
google google google google google
Yup. Google. Hee hee.

I found this blog because the author of it and I have an interest in common. No, it ain't Deheoglons. 'Cause nobody on Blogger of LJ seems interested in them. Yup.
It ain't nobody's poetry interests, not my deheoglon treatement, nobody's interests but my own...

I'm reading The Heliand, a translation of the Life of Christ (via the Gospel of Mark) into the Saxon language and very much into its culture. It's what I was looking for before when I found that other translation.
It's about the Warrior Chieftan Jesus at Hill Fort Jerusalem. He is taken before Pontius of Pilotland, whom the Jews threaten with the disfavor of Fort Rome.
The thing that kicks my ass: they change the ending. Jesus comes back from the dead and they go storm the castle. 'thfk?
More as it develops.

Profile of a wiseass. A study in blue.

I heard this on the radio today in an ad for a group searching out the reasons black men don't vote. The sound clip was of a woman. She sounded disgusted through the whole thing.
The System was set up by White Americans... it was set up by rich, middle-class White Americans. (say this last as if you have a mouthful of bird poop, and it is the words rich, middle-class white americans)
Yes. My old nemesis, the rich middle class. Damn them. Damn Them To Hell!

His shift happened in mid letter this time. He seemed to start normally, but after giving the card numbers, I think the monsters took over.
i will like you to chage these card again i am sorry coz i made a mistake given you thecard details and here is the card details
-Card Details Cut-
PLS BILL THE SUM OF 1,500 DOLLARS ON IT AND GET TO ME AS SOION AS POSSIBLE SO I CAN ARRANGE FOR THE PICK UP THANKS
Mrs Kxnny
He's probably still stressed from the wedding (Miss Kenny is now Mrs. I didn't even get an announcement). I think I'll congratulate him on it in my reply. I'm so randomly amused.

Brezsny gives me a goal with a time limit, even. 'K.

Your symbol for the next four weeks will be the Great Wall of China. Centuries ago, it was a 4,000-mile-long defense system. In that respect, it was an apt metaphor for the formidable barriers you've built around yourself. But the modern version of the Great Wall is only one-third the size it once was, having been reduced over the centuries by people appropriating its stones for new building projects. This reduced state, I hope, is an apt metaphor for the way you'll be dismantling your defense mechanisms between now and June 20.

I'm a published game author
'n stuff.

Reposted For Freshness
Poetic Forms through the ages: The Deheoglonic
Part One:
The Deheoglonic form (not to be confused with the Deheoglosic) originated in Greece in approximately the year 1702. The first published example known is dated 1704, but has been authenticated to be from 1703. Since those early days, more than ten thousand Deheoglons have been written, almost half of those in Canada. Among the most famous and outspoken proponents of the Deheoglon was Martin Farquhar Tupper, who, in 1840 said "The Deheoglonic style is without match in the world of poetic forms. There are none like it, and there never need be another form beyond it."
The Deheoglonic form is one of the more specific forms. It consists of twelve verses of nine lines each, in iambic dodecameter, with the rhyme scheme ABCDEFBDG. These twelve verses are interspersed with a chorus which must be in the form:
"And she died, oh oh oh,
She died, Oh oh oh oh she died"
The Deheoglon is almost unique in another way: The events in the poem must be real historical events which took place in Ireland, in the year 1642. This fact stems from the belief of originator of the Deheoglonic form, Philemothy of Sethpheth (a small village outside Athens), that the world, in fact, ended in the year 1642, and that we must examine all of the historical events of that year in order to find out precisely when and why, and that a poem in the deheoglonic form could, if properly written, bring the world back.
Some writers in the 1870's, seeking to broaden the scope of the form, began writing about fictionalized events set in that year, but which certainly could have happened. The then 60-year-old Tupper said of these poets: "Hang them."
The Fictionalized Deheoglon, dubbed the Deheoglosic poem, was a very short lived art form, and quickly devolved into the Spatzanoid, or Dreciaux form (q.v.).
The Deheoglon continued to be a favorite poetic form until 1936 when it was made illegal in Canada by a clause in the United States national budget of that year. President Franklin D. Roosevelt said of the Deheoglon: "It is my belief that the people of America will fare far better without such evils in their lives. The future of America is a future without Tupper."
It is now known that Theodore Roosevelt maintained an ongoing rivalry with Tupper, and that those animosities were passed down to his fifth cousin.
Examples of the Deheoglon are almost impossible to find in either country to this day, even though the law was later repealed under the administration of George H. W. Bush (the senior of the two Bush presidents). In the ensuing years, the form was all but forgotten, even overseas where it originated. Currently, only one Deheoglonic poet is known to be writing, and he from a small cottage on an island off the coast of Turkey, near Cyprus. He has no direct means of outside communication, and the poems wash up in empty bottles on the beach where they are promptly confiscated and burned by members of the Turkish army.

Part 2:

An example of the fabled Deheoglonic form, only one verse long, sadly, as the rest of the poem seems to have been lost. Notice how the interspersion of topics almost gives it the qualities of the French Dreciaux, and the similarity of them makes it resemble the Swiss Dreciaux. However, the real treat in this poem, obviously a late example (ca. 1933), probably Canadian, is the intralinear rhymes in lines 3 and 9. This means that the form was clearly influenced by the Rhineodactic form (an American form, ca. 1860, last written example 1886), but it clearly is not, as the Rhineodactic will never include the proper name of an European man. The half-rhyme on the first line (dim and Kilkenn) is truly problematic. Whereas first-line intralinear rhymes are strictly forbidden in the Deheoglon (or at least, in later Deheoglons), this is not a true rhyme, and thus, I feel, does not exclude it from the form. In fact, this poem was spared the torches of World War II America, probably specifically because of this rhyme. It is possible that it was penned in order to avoid the censorship of the day. Thus, this is a true Deheoglon, but with the influences and history that make the later forms truly fascinating. Please, read and enjoy, as this may be the last example of its kind in the western world.

Oh, Lo, tho on that night so dim when naught but night could puncture sill did meet the council of Kilkenn'
Eoghan Rua O'Neill did take into his own the armies of Ulstrine Catholici-sm
The council's moot it did decide the fate of those with dwellings thus in ire'land's greened country-side
Eoghan Rua O'Neill's return did mark the rise of Ire'land's church, and thus catholocism's hold
The Council's news did bring return to Ire'land continental troops that knew the ways of war and such
Eoghan Rua O'Neill was one, from flanders' army taught to fight for forty years he there had trained
That kilkenny council did a body politic erect and aim to heal the irish schizm'
Eoghan Rua O'Neill gave hope to all of those who oft had said the catholic bell its last had toll'd
And thus the irish armies grew and strong the government it too did set to rights the woes of past
And she died, oh oh oh,
She died, Oh oh oh oh she died

Part 3:

A Spatzanoid Ballad from the Archives of Amundsen, a collection of derivative verse since 1880, published in 1949. This shining example of the corruption of the form was written in 1904, in April, by a poet who chose to remain anonymous. It has been blamed variously on Clement C. Moore of America and Rhadger Dhandridge of India (Although English by birth). Neither of these authors, though, was in Wyoming during the short time during which this verse was clearly written.
The use of a centipede in the ear is a reference placing the poem's author in either Helena, Montana in 1902, or Cheyenne, Wyoming in 1904. Aumndsen, who collected the verse, claims that the original manuscript, preserved in a fish market, wrapped around a particularly tasty trout he purchased, was dated 1904. The phrase had already fallen out of popular use by 1903 in Helena, placing the poet squarely in Cheyanne.
The initial quotation is a reference to the earlier form, the Driuceauic, from which the Spazanoid arose. In the Driuceauic, quotes from Deheoglons often graced the initial lines, giving them at least some air of quality, despite their obvious flaws. Note that the forms had at this point almost completely collapsed. The quote here is actually from a mislabled Deheoglosic, titled "Mary And Her Haircut" (believed to be a Deheoglon until the discovery that Mary MacMurry, who lived in Dublin for most of her life, was not born until 1648, placing the poem squarely in the realm of fiction). Apparently the poet believed one as good as another, as was common in American Western Poets in the early part of the 20th century.
In lines 3-5, note the allusion to a poem by Emily Dickinson, an act of literary heresy in the day akin to referring to Coleridge as "That Blind Git." It is this act that, combined with geographic difficulties, absolutely excuse Moore and Dhandridge of the commission of this poem.

"Are you still alive my friend?"
He kindly asked of me
As I could not answer for myself
he kindly spoke for me.
"I feel just peachy, since you ask,
alive in word and deed,"
And saying this, into my ear,
he placed a centipede.
It wiggled there, and squirmed a bit
it felt rather a fright
And there he sat a'singing as I
ran into the night.
His verse, I fear was terrible
and it is from that I run,
Oh, that gem from Tupper,
that wretched deheoglon,
"and she died, oh oh oh
she died oh oh oh oh she died."

Additional results of my search for Tupper, this being Twain inserting a stab at him. Also, Stuffed Owl is back in print, and is being championed by Billy Collins. Talk about oughta know better...

First, Holy Cow! I'm on the listing if you search for Martin Farquhar Tupper. Like, I'm a source of info or whatever. I was scanning the results and saw the word Deheoglon. I got worried, 'cause I was afraid that somebody thought it was a real poetic form (heaven forbid), which-it-of-course-IS.
Second, I can't find the beautiful brain poem. I need to. It's for a very funny joke.