Friday, March 26, 2010

I had occasion to say today, "Soak it up, Miss Sponge. I'm a-gonna love squeezing you dry."

Saturday, March 20, 2010

What next?

I think that we should write a pop song. I think that that would be super. I think that we should choose a theme, and write the song, and that it would be the best. No bullshit, just write a pop song. I was in a room the other day, painting, and singing the St. Matthew Passion with an old buddy. No limits, no limits. We could do it. It would make a good story :)

Monday, March 15, 2010

Today's Verse: 16 March 2010

If Shakespeare had been Jesus
We would worship irony
And all those priests
Would we disgrace
Who lacked guile and subtlety
Being chaste would be a waste
Whose surfeit we'd deplore
Sensation pricks the mind to seek
And finding seeks for more
If there were sin
It would lie in
Dull hypocrisy
And special pains
Would be retained
For making life a bore

If Jesus had been Shakespeare
His sonnets mayn't be written
The tragedies might be sermons
We'd hear but wouldn't listen
He'd drop the pen, he'd quit the stage
Perhaps he'd try to lure
The virgin queen to partnership
With vows of chasteness pure
And how they'd reign, how they'd rule
Supreme in separate spheres
But that's another history
Unsuited to our years

Just a story, Mar. 15, 2010

About two years ago, when we were doing the big push to finish the poolhouse before Memorial Day, we had a serious drought in the region. As a result of the drought and perhaps other factors, a large number of squirrels had found themselves in the fetid pool, unable to find an exit. As the weather warmed, the ripeness of the detritus began to reach a level that could be sensed on a step-by-step basis as one approached the actual pool. It is rare to experience space olfactorally, but it can happen, under such intense conditions. Many questions arose as to how to handle the situation, so eventually I got a few buckets and garbage bags, and went down there early in the morning and used a skimmer to extract the bodies into multiple layers of plastic bags, tied them up nicely, and took them home to my garbage cans. I had learned in the restaurant business that there were some jobs that were so nasty that the boss had to do them himself while nobody else was looking. It was a nice sunny morning, though, and they didn't smell anywhere near as bad as they did when the garbage men took them away a few days later. I would contend that you have to practice if you want to know how to have fun doing that kind of stuff. If it wasn't any fun, I wouldn't have bothered. We opened on time, although we have not yet scheduled the body-painting festival.

Sunday, March 14, 2010

which miracle?


Ellen moved out today. It has been difficult. An old friend said to me once, "I don't know how you do it.?", to which I responded, "It's different for me. I work without a net."

Anyone up for a little game of 'guess the reference'?

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Well well, I just learned recently that the Paca-Caroll favorite, "Pogo Dancing" is by Chris Spedding, not Nick Lowe. How the rest of you must have been laughing at me all these years!

Monday, March 08, 2010

Our Town

Thw Spring production at the Washington Latin Charter Skol (WLCPS) will be 'Our Town', the Pulitzer-prizewinning play by Thornton Wilder, set in the fully segregated northeast, and a true monument of modern American art. I believe that I have been tasked with the construction of the ladders, lanterns, and tombstones, but any further stage direction would be more than welcome. As usual, thanks in advance, hermanos et Tracy, y todo il mundo.

Saturday, March 06, 2010

Get away. Live free.

Orange denotes security and signifies men working on the highway are vigilant while they work.
You don't get orange for free, except in nature which gives with one hand and takes right back with the other.
Like living in the moment: the culmination of everything that's come before and the single point of departure for everything that follows.
So when you say "let this love last forever", you're asking for what already has happened to happen again, and keep on happening, for every moment to be the same, for time and change to end. Like repeating the same note.
For the men working the road, it goes on forever, till quitting time. They get out of the sun, cool down, have a drink, something to eat, and figure out how to fill the hours before sleep -- that infinity before work resumes again.
They too love and lust.
When they're naked, their vigilance relaxed, maybe viewed, maybe viewing, eyes brimful of glee or mirth, they're like fires lit on hilltops in the dark -- signalling.
The flame is orange yellow from a distance. As you approach you perceive different colors of the spectrum, especially blue and red. They line its black heart.
It's a hungry road and a thirsty road, and, unlike the way to heaven, it's curvy as hell. It'll take you where you're going but it won't set you free.
Doesn't have to, you are already.
Free to moan.

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Anecdotally, Mar. 4 2010

I've really got to catch up on this whole Magnetic Fields phenomenon. Considerable Buzz, as far as I can tell.

It has occurred to me lately, that remembering some times back in Buffalo, that there were a lot of nights that ended with someone saying, "Well, fuck 'em if they can't take a joke." Sometimes it was said with a bloody nose, and sometimes with a bloody fist, but somebody usually had to say it, just for the tradition. I often watched, usually in agreement with the sentiment.

Wednesday, March 03, 2010




I had a reunion of sorts with Stephin and Clodia, playing on a few songs this weekend, in both Oakland and San Francisco where the Magnetic Fields were playing as part of the Noise Pop Festival.

And Tracy, although I did not see the movie you'd mentioned, apparently my horn (but not my face) makes a brief appearence in a clip from the last Zinnias show at Now and Then. You may recall it; you took some double-exposed pictures that night.