A Procrustean Hotbed of Inanity

My, That Snicket is Lemony!

2008-07-01T20:31:07Z

Lunch break found me visiting a little, local used-bookstore. On a whim I purchased (among many other things) a fine-looking copy of Adverbs by Lemony Snicket's made-up alter-ego, Daniel Handler. Getting back to the library I cracked it open to take a look at it, and on the title page was... Eeeee! "I wrote this book - Daniel Handler" in pen. Surprise signed copy!

- - - - -

I watched a strange movie last night. Michael Apted's Thunderheart (1992). Val Kilmer. Sam Shepard. Graham Greene. An uptight FBI agent goes native in an investigation of a '70s rez killing. Nicely satisfying, but the amazing bit was that the great Roger Deakins was cinematographer. I kept wondering why shot after shot was so incredibly beautiful.

The Case of The Curious Celebratory 365th Circuit!

2008-07-01T14:04:08Z

May you have a dashedly fantastic womb extraction anniversary, Musie (even if you do have to work)!

Is Ahab, Ahab?

2008-06-30T18:16:06Z

Call me Zacshmael. I've finished Moby-Dick, and in a bout of melancholia, am determined to go a-whaling. But it appears, as with everything, I am around 200 years too late. I was pleasantly surprised with Melville's strangeness, however. Stage directions!

I got a new car, a 2008 Nissan Versa, bright red. I don't want her to go too long without a name, so any suggestions will be gladly taken underoverthrough consideration.

Wulf in Beverly Hills

2008-06-26T14:16:33Z

"It took four men
to lift Murphy's head onto a spear
and carry it, grunting and groaning to the hall...

The commander and self-same warrior
entered, addressing King Hrothgar:
braveness and mettle so secure.
Murphy's head was dragged by the dentures,
sliding on the floor amid drinkers,
an eldritch sight for queen and all.
Mouths dropped. It was horrible and holy."

(Paraphrased, with apologies, from Mr. Heaney.)

"Hot and Cold" by Roald Dahl

2008-06-24T00:37:23Z

A woman who my mother knows
Came in and took off all her clothes.

Said I, not being very old,
'By golly gosh, you must be cold!'

'No, no!' she cried. 'Indeed I'm not!
I'm feeling devilishly hot!'

A Beginner's Guide to Unbridled Id

2008-06-20T20:45:47Z

Nortontylerhurtroth. It's strange because I've never been a big Hulk fan, and I never even saw the Ang Lee, but I thought this one was well-done. These Marvel-helmed movies (Hulk, Iron Manare a blast because they feel like reading comic books without slavishly recreating panels/color schemes. Fast action, nice vignettes. Liv Tyler in cats-eye glasses is a nice plus. A great marriage of action fun and thought-provoking tropes like science vs. military, man vs. monster, hurting the ones you love, playing god through science.

Mecha-Welk

2008-06-19T14:22:13Z

Tentatively scheduled the week of 20s in the third J month for vacating. But I'm not sure I'll know what to do with myself, other than voracious reading. Any ideas?

I wrote my brother a letter (he's away at art camp). Using arts & farts & crafts, I put the Clash of the Titans on the front of the envelope. Yeah, that's right: Godzilla fighting Lawrence Welk. Will Mecha-Welk's mysterious old country musical powers prevail, soothing the savage beast? Or will Gojira be driven into insanity after hearing one more champagne standard?

I'm piecing away at Moby Dick (Moby Richard, to his parents), so if you see me, remember to call me Ishmael.

CB

2008-06-16T16:48:14Z

Been interested in Cecily Brown's art recently. The pic above was taken by the one and only Chuck Close. GIS for Cecily Brown--her stuff is rough and kinetic, almost looks smacked on the canvas with a knife.

Some Summer Summed

2008-06-13T21:27:13Z

My new eyes came in the other evening. I've been wearing them for the past few days, but I'll really have the chance to test them come tomorrow. Family roadtrip! I'll be the cow-seeingest son-of-an-object-that-shoots-things this side of the Pecos. We're taking my brother down to Quartz Mountain (prestigious arts and farts camp for those not in the Oklaknowma). I have the biggest urge just to take Team Boo! and listen to it over and over, but I don't think my family likes it as much as I do.

I'm at 78 books so far in 2008.

Special Alert for Tulsa Folks

2008-06-13T13:46:07Z

I was thumbing through the phone-book the other day while waiting on something. There is a "Napoleon Midget" listed. Real? Magic?

That is all.

Fat History

2008-05-21T14:10:29Z

Fact: On this day in 1904, Fats Waller was born in a building on a city corner which would eventually become a video store.

Bonus! Sesame Street version with animation by the incredible Sally Cruikshank!

Addendum/Pudendum: I love Mia Farrow.

Slides For Somebody

2008-05-14T15:39:46Z

A handful from the box in the corner of my apartment. All I can tell you is that they come from my step-great-grandfather.

This entry was going to be called Slides For Nobody, referring to the strangeness of unknown pictures, unknown people, unnamed landscapes and buildings.

But in just one picture, I found my father.

the_unnamable @ 2008-05-13T08:35:00

2008-05-13T13:38:11Z

Dispatches to Nod

2008-05-09T13:44:47Z

Dear Dream-Me,

    While we rarely break the consciousness wall of communication between us (unless I have a crazy story to tell about you: "Dream-Me was a rodeo clown!"), I feel I must quit this radio silence to discuss an issue with you. As it has been years (3, in fact) since I have ever had to sit down and do math homework, I would greatly appreciate it if you could get over this increasing loop of math-related anxiety scenarios.   It's silly, when we could be spending our time on other, more interesting matters: lion-taming, flying, talking to dead authors, traveling through Oz. You see? Perhaps you can't do this alone, so I'm extending my hand.

Ideas:
    -a Dream-psychoanalyst or therapist (or analrapist). Doesn't have to be Freudian. In fact, I think I'd prefer it if he wasn't. Jungian, yes.
    -focusing on some other anxiety. Public nudity, perhaps. Doesn't really annoy me that much, and sometimes pretty funny upon awaking.
    -Dream-math tutoring. If this is the route you're going to go, you can at least get some super-professional help from famous mathematicians, like... erm... Mr. Peabody?

Please take the time to consider these and keep the dialog open. I promise to not go all Heather Langenkamp on you.

Respectfully your Dream-Me,

Zac

the_unnamable @ 2008-05-05T10:01:00

2008-05-05T15:03:40Z

Tom Waits. Tulsa. June 25th.

You don't even understand.

There's Time Enough For Making Sense When I Die

2008-04-21T15:21:50Z

Elvis Costello, Janet Jackson, Ben Folds.

I'm retired now, all four of them. Mechanics say "bald" with such disdain, and don't understand at all when I ask if they can just be combed over for a bit.

Pinky ears and pinky receding hairline, though I don't feel so utterly vampiric. Frisbee, a mountain of turkeys, and saying hello to a three-legged dog.

I want to have an art attack.

I read several short stories which used the word "burbled."

Playing Scrapple with my family while watching old ANTM reruns. My favorite moments are when Tyra explains "You were like this." She makes face A. "You need to be like this." She makes face A, but squints her eyes just a little.

Phonecall to my friend!

I'm better. I found my old glasses and now they're my new glasses. Old-new glasses? New-old glasses? Right? Write.

An Important Monday Meeting

2008-04-01T18:19:37Z

Leaving the library yesterday, I swizzled down the gentle curves of the sidewalk. Noticing a gleam in the wet grass right near the edge of the concrete, I abruptly stopped and gazed down. Something was moving not two inches away from my black-shoed right foot! And I immediately thought "Yow, that's one, big scorpion!"

But he wasn't a scorpion; he was a crawdad (crawpappy? crawfather? crawmom? crawcousin? crawprogenitor? crawncestor?). I knelt down and said hello. He peered up through beady little eyes. I told him that he was quite a ways from the creek bed, and he waved his pincers in agreement. By then it was time for me to take my leave. We both waved goodbye.

My life is a dark room. One big dark room.

2008-03-24T15:50:49Z

After my dad died and I had written a play loosely based upon the life of Sequoyah which was performed by my fourth-grade class, my mother got the position of director of the Ada Arts & Heritage (helpful exterior picture here). It had been the public library, and was imposingly colonial, a marble rotunda, and multiple rooms full of formal furnishings. So I would lounge on couches of seafoam green, reading my Poe and Dickens and L. Frank Baum, watching folks set up for events--weddings, dinners, art shows, DARS meetings. But the room of complete power was upstairs. Upstairs is always a magical place for children, drawing and calling for little footprints.

Only one room, it had the feeling of a board room. A big table dominated the center, and one could almost see cigar-chomping small-town-big-fish talking free trade and corn futures. Perpetually dim-lit, the room was a museum within a museum, tables and walls colored with beyond-yellowed photographs and books and memorabilia, which my tiny eyes could never associate with anything specific, only age.

But the most important feature of the room was the most disturbing for me. Standing firm and staunch at the end away from the stairs were two figures--bride and groom, absolutely headless. Stiff sleeves with no digits, no hands, no rings. Being somewhere around four feet tall, I was still under the height of these Washington Irving castoffs, and warily tried to look away. I couldn't help but imagine heads and hands gone. Scars? Glasses? Firey red eyes? Although it was one of my favorites, Beetle Juice never helped--Alec and Geena's promised amiability added sad history to headlessness. I'd often snuggle some stuffed animal in my bed, listening to the peacocks crying "Help!" and wonder if those clothes animated at night, holding hands and dancing above that boardroom table.

Let Me Hear You Say This Quit Is Bananas

2008-02-19T18:55:32Z

Fig 2. - In such curious Cuban confusion, one hombre is waiting in the wings to step in.

Yesterday a patron requested Donde Viven Los Monstruos. Whilst checking it out to her, I stated, "Es muy fantastica," pointing my index finger dramatically towards the ceiling, "y misterioso."

"Si," she said, nodding her head, "si."

Entry Divider Entry Divider Entry Diver Denty Reviver

Sure-fire Strategies For Duck, Duck, Goose:

Offensive
-An immediate and unexpected "Goose!"
-At least forty or fifty indecisive "Ducks..." followed by a "Goose!"
-goose... i guess
-Act as though you've forgotten the word, and whenever everyone reminds you, "Duck," craftily utter, "Oh yeah, Goose!"
-A crazy, super-extendo arm, allowing for awesome reach (calculated reach awesomosity)
Defensive
-Amazingly thick headgear so one can feign unawareness whenever tapped
-Condensing the game to just two people; other player's within arms reach
-An "understanding"
-Upon group-sit, subconsciously directing everyone into more of an oblong, resulting in long straightaways, where one can gain track
-Taking advantage of the Goose's natural abilities, namely the squawk, for surprise--practice at home, or remember to bring an airhorn

Not Realizing It

2008-02-07T20:44:07Z

The best part is the end.

Good news for PRaniacs (Runway Projectors? PR People? Kluminaries?). Last night's episode was great: Chris won, Christian seemed cool for once, "and I've known some Fierce bitches," and Ricky was sent off to a waiting wading pool of his own tears. Luckily he had just the orange bathing suit for the occasion!

Footprints on The Bottom of My Shoes

2008-02-06T15:11:57Z

Fig. 1 - Portman sporting a rakish moustache on the new cover of Flash Art

Things Which Bear a Mysterious Link That Eludes You and Me:
1. Peeking out my blinds this morning, I was afraid it had sniced last night, but it was just snow, maybe a snizzle, but certainly not a snownpour.
2. Listening to some internets radio yesterday and Fraud in The '80s came on and on my bulletin board Elvis Presley (wearing gold lame and balanced by crotch on a pin) liked it so much he jumped off.
3. Exercising my rights, I wore my "I Voted Today!" sticker all day yesterday, but kind of wished that I got a sticker that said "I am a Superfat Tuesdanian?"
4. It's so important to court the fictional place vote. For fictional electorates, of course.

"I've been entertained and inspired by Garrison Keillor's work through the years," Obama said in a statement. "As president, I will wake up every day thinking about how I can help make life better in places like Lake Wobegon all across the country."

And apparently Chabon wrote a discussion for some internet newspaper website that I can't see because I'm not registered--here's where the promise of the internets breaks down.

5. My three hundred two volume project is coming to fruition tonight and I'm sort of sad to see those brown hardcovers go. Empty Book Nest? I remember watching that show with my mom when I was a kid.
6. When the clime gets more tropicalian, I must find a tree for my lunches and compose songs on my mandolin whilst eating avocados and two ideas of my own design (don't tell anyone, please--you're sworn to secrecy now): pizza soup and pizza burritos.

Have I Got One Cross Word For You, Pal!

2008-01-30T17:27:52Z

For future reference, creating a crossword puzzle is a labor of love (I have no idea what that means either). Print it out and take a vocabular stab at it. Answers to be posted eventually? I am Ron Burgundy?

Across
1. The Last Boy on Earth
5. Stuck Together
8. Title of Michael Corleone
9. "Get Thee to a _____!"
10. The Accidental Liquid
11. "To ___, With Love"
13. Slippery Sort of Fish
14. For Argento, Strawberry Syrup
15. Climax, High Point
18. He Was Gored in The Crotch by a Boar
21. Entered Data
22. (Alleged) Cat Eater
24. Old Hip-Hop
26. Reeves/Hopper Flick
28. Ho's Musicmaker
29. 1st 3 Letters of 2 Funke Books
30. Beginning
31. Drug One Shoots

Down
1. King and Donkey
2. Clementine's Dad
3. Grandma's Other Grandkid
4. Short Pastorals
5. Horned Animal
6. Equus/Corn Combo?
7. Spanish Dwarves
12. Lesser Demon
14. Snipes & Jackson in a Parking Lot?
15. Orlando Furioso Author
16. He Turned Around When He Shouldn't Have
17. Ingest
19. One of The Louvin Brothers
20. Elaborate Japanese Theatre
23. Performers in a Tiny Circus
24. Actress Mercedes
25. Song to The Gods
27. Morse Sound

Curtains, Trefoiled Again!

2008-01-21T15:34:21Z

Notes on a lost weekend--

Took a vacation from weekendery and barely left my apartment, instead

-reading a regency novel that had a cockfight in it
-drawing a strange monster character
-dancing in socks and underwear to Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
-putting up curtains in my bedroom and managing to not hit my thumb with the hammer (a small victory, but I assure you, it counts)
-turning on my Christmas lights and watching an episode or two of Jeeves and Wooster on my laptop
-playing my mandolin improvisationally (note to self: learn more than three chords), though I did play it to one of my Devo albums sock-scooting across the floor, twisting into those beautiful mando-chops
-reading the first four years of Doonesbury
-sleep sandwich
-watching from my second storey window
-composing a letter to _________

* * *

Postscript- Oh, and I saw you called. Didn't miss anything exciting, did I? Like an impromptu moustache contest, or some sort of circus fight? You know how I love both.

Postpostscript- My mom goes to court this week, against a crazed neighbor. Please wish her well for me.

Postpostpostscript- You can now choose whether your entries have adult content (grown-up stuff)? Do I ashamedly check "Adult concepts" because my entry includes the admission that I read old Doonesbury strips? Or is the image of a Zac in socks and red briefs, prancing around to R&B music simply too much for the younger mind's eyes? Who am I kidding? I'm such a seven-year-old.

Postpostpostpostscript- And when I was seven I drew the letter "O" with either a line or a dot in the center, because I figured it should look vaguely like an overripe doughnut or a great googley eye...

Postpostpostpostpostscript- And my favorite musician was Mr. Roy Orbison.

Garment Construction as Architecture

2008-01-18T16:31:26Z

One of the most impressive statements ever made on Project Runway--a well-deserved win for Christian and Team Fierce! I was kind of impressed with him Wednesday, even though he does have a squid-arm.

Ricky-Jo-Jo

apparently has made human sacrifices to the god of stupid hats to continue to be on the show. Either that, or he's sleeping with Michael Kors, which I don't like to think about...

Ricky and Sweet P are the kisses of death on team challenges--I was genuinely worried for Rami.

Mysterious Mustaches, Benign Beards, & Gorgeous Goatees

2008-01-16T15:35:11Z