don't believe them; we are all ugly; especially you

full sized here or here.

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Meta Puppy

Merry Christmas Y'all

Reading Roberto Bolaño

"The inseparable dangers of life and literature, and the relationship of life to literature, were the constant themes of Bolaño's writings and also of his life, as he defiantly and even improbably chose to live it. By the end of that life, Bolaño had written three story collections and ten novels. The last of these novels, 2666, was not quite finished when he died of liver failure in 2003, which did not prevent many readers and critics from considering it his masterwork. It is an often shockingly raunchy and violent tour de force (though the phrase seems hardly adequate to describe the novel's narrative velocity, polyphonic range, inventiveness, and bravery) based in part on the still unsolved murders of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juárez, in the Sonora desert of Mexico near the Texas border. (2666 is currently being translated into English and is due to be published next year by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.)
Yet the writer with whom Spanish-language critics have often compared Bolaño is the Argentine Jorge Luis Borges, renowned for his singular bookishness, and for the metaphysical playfulness, erudition, and brevity of his entirely asexual writings. With those comparisons critics have wanted, partly, to emphasize their sense of Bolaño's significance, for Borges is probably the only Latin American writer of the past century whose greatness seems uncontested by anybody, though the more you read Bolaño, the more interesting and appropriate the comparison between the two writers becomes. Bolaño revered Borges ("I could live under a table reading Borges"). He would have been happy, Bolaño told an interviewer, to have led a life like Borges's—relatively sedentary, devoted to literature and a small circle of like-minded friends, "a happy life." But Bolaño lived most of his life in another manner. "My life," he said, "has been infinitely more savage than Borges's."

Extracted from The New York Review of Books, July 19, 2007

Comment?

Freaky Daytime Television

Ah! Time off of work.
One benefit about being on a day off, (with the exception of sleeping in) is doing whatever you want to. Of course, there are endless options on your day off, unless you live in Egypt and you happen to be female.....but I digress. If you are an alcoholic, this means a day of binge drinking and self-loathing. If you are athletic, you can opt for working out while the sun is out. Perhaps it's a real (not fiction) sick day. Congratulations, you've managed to call in sick relatively near the time you were supposed to get to work. In between passing out because of getting trashed on NyQuil or Robitussen, you may be dopey enough to flip on the boob tube. Those without cable will soon realize that this is a very bad idea. Daytime TV should preferably be avoided at all costs. It's redundant to say that there are soap operas but a myriad of talk shows that are ever multiplying and dying off at an alarming rate. When I was younger and my entertainment choices were not as mature, I watched Days of Our Lives. I watched for about a year in Junior High. Apparently, nothing has changed in the show. There seems to be the same cast, same plot lines but they are cadaverous and fully Botoxed. A show called "Passions" featured, to my horror, a doll that came to life and served as a toady to some overacting "witch" who was trying to poison her niece. One scene involved a tea party, with doll in tow. The niece and her unassuming boyfriend were drinking tea and talking with the ....older woman. There was a lot of stress with the older woman. She'd carry the doll out, he'd come to life, she'd yell at him, etc etc. The doll's occupation was to poison a petit four and the niece would eat it at tea. That was the plan was thwarted as, who would really eat a petit four anyway, whatever they are.... The word "petit four" was screamed and screeched about fifteen time in succession. The doll that came to life was actor and little person Josh Evans, pictured above.
hearing the word petit four screaming by a little person was just more than I could handle, frankly. In desperation, I changed the channel to what ended up being Jerry Springer to witness the "I'm schtupping a stripper" episode and the audience members (who were not strippers, should never BE strippers, and are in the big group of people who should just go ahead and keep their clothes ON) were flashing Jerry for beads, a la Mardi Gras. I landed on a local car dealership commercial that was poorly produced and filmed in low-definition video.
Such deep regret.
I'm still trying to recover from it. After the years of intense counselling, I'm optomistic that I'll be ok.
In the meantime, I think I'll take up reading literature again.

They tried and they tried and they tried

Frantically, like monkeys
Furtively, like moles
Shyly, like mice

My Puppy

Ain't he cute?

Things could be better. Things could be worse.

There's no purpose to this blog post but to let the audience know that I'm in limbo.

what was overheard in conversation?

message from the Juneau police department

$200 reward if you can guess this noise

this noise.

Saturday morning, no need to rush, reading my newspaper

Do You Still Believe in Eternity?

Description of scene?

Title?

Do You Still Believe in Eternity?

Who Is This Young Man?

Guess it

animal class

Pliny's Law: Invasion of the Pod People (2007)

This movie is about a ginger plant from space that clones and replaces its victims, and is redeemable for at least one reason.

The heroine of this film, who escapes cloning, is in several sexual encounters before the second reel. It is notable, given the genre and its expected turns, that she remains completely covered throughout this period. We reach a pivotal scene at least 40 minutes in, where she bears witness to the intrigue and sapphic excesses of her ostensible co-workers, the titular pod people.

After being seduced by her female boss (double psychosexual damage), we see her yield to complete disrobement and acquiescence. The metaphysics of it all -- prior to this, we are pondering the nudity clause of the actress' contract with every delightful furrow of her brow, every tic and gesture that distinguishes her from the otherwise wooden cast -- heightens the tension. A novelty that did something physical to this reviewer, and made him dream of a beginning, a brief return to the flying days of love.

Otherwise, an all-too-easily-imaginable hunk of rat shit with terrible sound and spare, repetitive effects. Two and a half stars.

Gifted

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour...

And Now Some Prose: Sviatoslav Richter, The Maestro

From the early 80’s, he performed only with a score in more or less darkened halls where it was difficult even to make out his massive silhouette, but where he created a gripping atmosphere, convinced that he was prevneting the spectator from sucumbing to the demonic temptations of voyeurism.

Yamaha placed two grand pianos at his permanent disposal, together with the staff necessary to maintain them, and they accompanied him wherever his imagination took him. Well, not quite everywhere. They remained behind when, over seventy, he ledt Moscow by car and did not return until six months later, covering the distance from Vladivostok and back, not counting a brief sortie to Japan, in conditions one can barely imagine, giving a hundred concerts in the remotest towns and villages of Siberia.

[Years later, when asked to return to Japan, he said that] he would go to Japan under a general anaesthetic; he would be put to sleep in his hotel in Paris, an ambulance would take him to the airport and he would wake up in his hotel in Tokyo. This demand seemed eminently reasonable to him, but it failed to impress the doctors who were consulted.

WORDS (W.B. Yeats)

I had this thought a while ago,

"My darling cannot understand

What I have done, or what would do

In this blind bitter land."

And I grew weary of the sun

Until my thoughts cleared up again,

Remembering that the best I have done

Was done to make it plain;

That every year I have cried, "At length

My darling understands it all,

Because I have come into my strength,

And words obey my call';

That had she done so who can say

What would have shaken from the sieve?

I might have thrown poor words away

And been content to live.

And seeing that it was a soft October night, curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

I read Tolstoy once

but now it's Nabokov.

"Somebody told me later that she had been in love with my father, and that he had lightheartedly taken advantage of it one rainy day and forgotten it by the time the weather cleared."

Tell me, how much do you love that line?

today is good day

Behind the Wall

Why people don't get along or understand each other: easy. You go into the bathroom. Immediately, you feel the presence of another man in the stalls. You are both in a private room that accommodates both your needs. He's presumably shitting. However, you don't have to do that -- you just have to urinate, so you sidle up to the urinal. It's simple and you get started. Meanwhile, the dude still has to shit. This is the act of aligning and forcing a nunchuck-sized amount of fecal matter out of a small, hard-to-see hole. He gets started. He's lining it up. And the sounds! Good lord! A cacophony! It's internal, you know! Your head almost rears back in disdain because you're just taking a wiss. Meanwhile, dude is knocking out a musical, grunting, groaning, tract-inverting shit! You're alienated, offended and bemused, and he doesn't care -- he's in the thick of that shit. He doesn't even know you're out there!

Explaining all our difficulties is really that simple.

Sweep the Leg

Like jujitsu, he said; the belt colors
melt over me and are no help. Melt in my hand
At a game who plays not, for he cannot choose
From among the smoking gun. This trigger finger
Stands for life, and wiggles and wobbles,
East or west, north or south, we all fall down
A stranger who walks beside me. O no,
Boots to galoshes, what has it gots in its pocketses?
On the outskirts of some suburban carnival,
The candy cane you drop and never say is mine, yours!
Some day I'll claim to you how all used up
I am because of you but in the meantime the ride
Continues. Everyone is along for the ride,
It seems. Besides, what else is there?
The reindeer games? True, there are occasions
For red and white uniforms and a special list
Kept secret from the mothers. The lines
Are duly sliced. I know all this
But can't seem to keep it from affecting me,
Every day, all day. I've tried recreation,
Reading until late at night, video games
And chick-lit.
One day a man called while I was out
And left this message: "You got the whole thing wrong
From start to finish. Luckily, there's still time
To correct the situation, but you must act fast.
See me at your earliest convenience. And please
Tell no one of this. Much besides your life depends on it."
I thought nothing of it at the time. Lately
I´ve been looking at old-fashioned plaids, fingering
Starched white collars, wondering whether there’s a way
To get them really white again. My parents
Think I’m in London, London, France, that is.

Worsening Situation (John Ashbery)

Like a rainstorm, he said, the braided colors
Wash over me and are no help. Or like one
At a feast who eats not, for he cannot choose
From among the smoking dishes. This severed hand
Stands for life, and wander as it will,
East or west, north or south, it is ever
A stranger who walks beside me. O seasons,
Booths, chaleur, dark-hatted charlatans
On the outskirts of some rural fete,
The name you drop and never say is mine, mine!
Some day I'll claim to you how all used up
I am because of you but in the meantime the ride
Continues. Everyone is along for the ride,
It seems. Besides, what else is there?
The annual games? True, there are occasions
For white uniforms and a special language
Kept secret from the others. The limes
Are duly sliced. I know all this
But can't seem to keep it from affecting me,
Every day, all day. I've tried recreation,
Reading until late at night, train rides
And romance.
One day a man called while I was out
And left this message: "You got the whole thing wrong
From start to finish. Luckily, there's still time
To correct the situation, but you must act fast.
See me at your earliest convenience. And please
Tell no one of this. Much besides your life depends on it."
I thought nothing of it at the time. Lately
I´ve been looking at old-fashioned plaids, fingering
Starched white collars, wondering whether there’s a way
To get them really white again. My wife
Thinks I’m in Oslo- Oslo, France, that is.

Walk the Duck

Old News

Extreme Kissing Detection Product Now Available:
click here for the whole unbelievable story

success * the show so far * more success

The Perils of Art

From today's New York Times:

"People have blamed a million things for the supposed decline of American theater: the movies, the lack of government support, the coarsening of the culture, etc., etc. But here is another theory: that the currently running Broadway musical “Xanadu,” based on the famously atrocious 1980 movie, is simply disabling everybody one by one."

Roller skating musicals. They are not for the weak.

It Takes A Weatherman

Amusing conversation provokes thought.

Bless me, oh lord, for I have seriously sinned. I rotted my brain for a least a good hour watching Rock of Love*.

*For those of you not in the know, as I'm sure you are spending much more wisely than I am, Rock of Love is a spin-off of the critically acclaimed Flavor of Love. Brett Micheals, former front man of Poison whittles down a selection of quality women (read: Band whores) via a battery of dates/ humiliating competition in order to get to his one true love.

Proof of the rot came when a partner and I used the commercial break to entertain an intellectual conversation. During the broadcast, one of the contestants engaged in a heated argument with another contestant. Party number one launched a vicious attack at party number two claiming, and I quote, "I saw you sucking Brett's [Micheal] cock." What I wanted to know was, would it be more offensive to be accused of "sucking someone's cock" or "sucking someone's dick." She argued that the words were interchangeable stating that in either scenario, she could gather enough offense with either version of the accusation.

I argued that "dick" and "cock" were not interchangeable citing there was no such thing as a dickroach or a dick-a-doodle.

Clearly, this was not an argument to be won. Clearly, I should stop watching tv.

I regret to inform you all

Elvis Mitchell will not be joining this blog. He made his regrets known to me through his agent on this day, September whatever it is, 2007. We will try to carry on.

turtle power

holy smoked turbot

look right (and up)... see that... yes. the kissing thing? click "more success". we're starting to get some viral traction. some mainstream sites are buying into it. so be sure to go there if you haven't and digg or whatever it. this is our "war of the worlds" except stupider and with far less effort. but still. fun.

living in fear of teen family member?

who isn't? (click now)

Why We Lie

Usha Sutliff
David Livingstone Smith

Both from 2005...

So The Sad Tale

So the sad tale a last time told they sat on as though turned to stone

Every Picture Tells A Story Don't It?

E-flipping out

The act of going into a complete tirade via a string of violent e-mails. Over nothing. Best viewed in complete context through g-mail.



This is Nikola Tesla. He invented wireless telegraphy. I ponder if there was ever such an incident of wirelessly telegraphing a tirade. Most likely to Alexander Graham Bell. Google cites no such incident.

Bourbon and branch

What I've noticed is that even a little bourbon and water, while pleasant in the evening, becomes less pleasant the following morning. Has anyone looked into this?

important questions being asked online

Rabble Rousers in Polyester Trousers

A meditation on Britney:

"This concerns a dream/nightmare. By what right can we call the lived experience of others a dream/nightmare? Not because the facts are so oppressive that they can weakly be termed nightmarish; nor because hopes can weakly be termed dreams."

"In the end, of course, it's pointless to characterize, categorize, and value [Britney] according to [her] gender, or to claim that women fixate on everything that irritates gynophobes about our sex. The best [performing] has as little to do with gender as it does with nationality or with the circumscriptions of time. A [performer] such as [Mariah] or [Whitney], a [song] such as [Christina's "Genie In A Bottle"] or [Lil' Kim's "How Many Licks,"] transcends not only the facts of its author's life but the manners and customs, the superficial gloss, of the era in which it was written. There will always be categories into which [music] falls, standards that have less to do with stereotype and preconception than with originality and revelation, with the ability to translate life--in all its simple and endlessly mysterious complexity--onto the [stage]. But there is no male or female language, only the truthful or fake, the precise or vague, the inspired or the pedestrian. If, in the future, some weird cataclysm should scramble or erase all the names of [performers], viewers may have trouble (and progressively more trouble, as more women join the professions and the military and more men immerse themselves in the domestic) telling whether ["Eat My Pussy Right"] and ["Hoochie Mama"] were created by women or men. The only distinction that will matter will be between good and bad."

"I have a terrible confession to make-- I have nothing to say about any of the talented women who [perform] today. Out of what is no doubt a fault in me, I do not seem able to [watch] them. Indeed I doubt if there will be a really exciting woman [performer] until the first whore becomes a call girl and [dances] her tale. At the risk of making a dozen devoted enemies for life, I can only say that the sniffs I get from the [sweat] of the women are always fey, old-hat, Quaintsy Goysy, tiny, too dykily psychotic, crippled, creepish, fashionable, frigid, outer-Baroque, maquille in mannequin's whimsy, or else bright and stillborn. Since I've never been [able to enjoy Sarah Brightman] and am sometimes willing to believe that it can conceivably be my fault, this verdict may be taken fairly as the twisted tongue of a soured taste, at least by those [viewers] who do not share with me the ground of departure--that a good [performer] can do without everything but the remnant of his balls."

notes from the holding cell

*warrant: minimum 30 days
bench warrant means you can still pay bail for release

*ROR - released on recognizance - released without bail
*bail can get high, based on previous offenses

*John Doe - held for upward of one year (bad situation, but felons have to do it)

*jokes about magically climbing through the barred window are mandatory (and recursive)

*stop looking at the shirtless guy's hernia

International debate: Is it a Horny Toad or a Horned Toad

I'll just keep calling it whatever I call it until someone corrects me.

Another Toad

1. And this is an American Toad.
2. I found him on Wikipedia.
3. When I was a kid I thought that toads were reptiles while frogs were amphibians, but it turns out I was wrong. Toads are amphibians too.
4. The coolest amphibians.

Toads

1. This is a Gulf Coast Toad.
2. Toads are awesome.
3. There should be more toads.

1. if you are writing an introduction and discussing the layout of the book - do you capitalize all references to future chapters? Like, "what Chapter 2 will do, once I've written it or located any of the research I did in 2004 for it, will astound you." blah blah blah, insert intellectual genius here. or are the references to chapters lowercase?

2. similarly, does the cold war always get capitalized? You know, that Cold War. The big one. The one with the Soviet Union. Which we theoretically won. As opposed to the small cold war, which I am having with my advisor. wherein we mutually ignore each other.

3. these are the things I worry about at 5:10am. i need a turtle.

help

i saw stereo total recently. they are amazing. they might be the best band ever. i can't say for sure though because of all people ariel pink recently put on a better show than stereo total. even with all the hype around ariel pink. but i can't say ariel pink is the best band ever.

you may have noticed

I just changed the title of this blog to Best Blog Ever. It seemed only fitting, since basically that's what it is, or will be, may be, and whatever. Anyway, please adjust your bookmarks accordingly. For a tutorial on how to do that just email Paul Boerner directly. And also tell him to stop being fudge surprise and sign on here.


and mike touloumtzis too. Damn.

Attend Moi

Being lost at sea is a luxury I aspire to. The object is to float out of sight of land, puch a hole in the hull and vanish without a trace.

I don't have the money for a boat, nor boat launch fee. I don't know how to sail, really, but thats fine.

I propose this as an art "action" and I'd do it for the cost of materials. The documentation is of course yours to auction off or fetishize, whatever - I'll be dead.

So far so good.

The conceptual artist Bas Jan Ader sailed into obivion, so this isn't some original avant guard gesture. Its just a pathetic attemt at manufacturing meaning in an otherwise unremarkable life. Its a gesture - a pissing into the winds of chaos from whence the creator manufactured order, to his liking, but not mine.

Nor am I rebelling. If someone has a better idea I'm open to it. I could build Viking longboats for other people to burn themselves to death in. I could rig diving bells to sink endlessly into the deepest trenches of the worlds oceans.

Nor am I particularly romantic. I'm no reader of Goethe with his sorrows. Nor a Fascist hiding in a bunker while my empire collapses. Nor a duellist fighting for the honour of my family. Nor a soldier dutybound to the army of man.

If I can't find a boat I'll go for concrete overshoes off the side of a party barge, a clown outfit, pockets full of rocks and a dirty limerick gummed to the railing that neither confirms nor discounts foul play.

But the idea of being "lost at sea" is of course a conceit and in the end I am forced to admit my real reason - I would very much like to be googled until a satellite picture is found - of me vanishing beneath the waves.

A somewhat related post.

On the glorious subject of turtles....

Today, I sat and had a discussion with a student about the wierd stuff he likes to eat. Priding himself on being "a good old country boy from Oklahoma" he listed a menu of items that clearly conjured an image of him running around with a homemade spear and stabbing at things he might find appetizing. One of these items was turtle sandwiches.

Although thoroughly disgusted with the conversation and at myself for encouraging it, I ventured further. No one states they like turtle sandwiches without piquing my interest.

I asked him what exactly went into a turtle sandwich, to which he gave me the "are you a complete fucking idiot?" look. Funny, considering what he had been telling me all afternoon, here he was disgusted with me and my apparent stupidity.

He didn' t give me a response.

I pushed him further, asking him if he made the sandwich on whole wheat or white and whether he liked tomato or lettuce on his turtle hoagie.

Still no biting.

We sat in an awkward silence for a while. Sometime later he gave an exasperated sigh and said, "Well, I don't know. I just toast some bread, crack open a turtle and butter its guts onto the toast." The kind of exasperated sigh that said I should have known that already.

Moral of the story: I'm always the last to know.


-the end-

a disappointment, as usual.

i cannot handle the immense pressure to be profound and/or witty in a tossed-off nonchalant fashion. i am already a huge writing disappointment in another section of my life. instead - I will offer the following: i secretly still wish to be a rockette.

Movie Series Idea

27 yo trust fund kid finds time machine invented by dad, travels back in time to 1995, reworks songs by New New York Sound movement (Strokes, Hives, Libertines, French Kicks, etc.) so that he precludes their success, becoming hugest pop star ever. Jack White follows him back like T2, recruits frontmen of eclipsed bands (who are naturally dishwashers, organ donors, etc. in the new timeline) to wreak vengeance on now incredibly famous and powerful kid.

this is an $8 manatee

but you can have it for $6.

there's a new cartoon on adult swim

called Lucy the Daughter of the Devil. it's by Benjamin Katz and I assume Loren Bouchard and the same people who did Dr. Katz, Home Movies and Science Court. they're always funny. and i bet this show is going to be great. someone please TiVO it for me.

Mr. Nice Guy

So I went to see Superbad today (finally), with my free ticket from those giveaways - a real free ticket... not one of the "not in the first 2 weeks of opening" free tickets... that you can get at Best Buy and has a behind the scenes dvd, etc. Well, I took this ticket (from http://www.hollywoodmoviemoney.com/) and AMC doesn't take them I guess... now the ticket itself is actually a check, with a $12 max value, where the theater just writes in the amount, and deposits it at their bank.

So my question is... going to see an $8 matinee - why wouldn't AMC accept the $12 free ticket? I was so upset I decided not to see it. My loss probably. Of course I guess the free tix has nothing to do with AMC itself, but since they are selling the preview dvds & tickets right next door at Best Buy, that it kinda sucks to not notice the fine print on the inside of the ticket that it's not taken at AMC's. I guess every other major chain in the country takes it, according to the ticket and web page.

I wrote AMC a nasty note about it today. I feel a little better now... well now that I have $18 of seabreezes in me, as well.

-RKM

BTW: voice of the kid in this clip is Dave Willis (a.k.a. Meatwad)

Hey!

How are you doing?

Check out my comics.

does anyone use del.ici.ous?

i realize this post is kind of similar to another post already appearing on this blog spot. but still, i ask.

Nothing against belly dancing

Because I'm a good friend, I'm going to go with a buddy and spend a whole evening watching belly dancers. Not that I have anything against belly dancing and the performers who do it, you just have to be in a certain sort of mood to want to see belly dancing and the performers who do it.

I've just put in a full work day at a job I detest with people I detest even more. I'm not in any sort of mood. In fact, I think I'm actually quite numb from the head down.

But here I am. Miraculously put together somehow, waiting for said friend to come and pick me up. Scantilly clad women are going to whirl about me and I'm just a little dissapointed that no matter how close there belly buttons are to me, I just won't give a damn.

-the end-

Breaking News: I Have Solved The Case of the Missing British Girl

Karl Rove did it.



from reodorant

i'm guessing you're still out of a job

i'm right, right? what do i win?

this is a blog about whatever

ask me anything.