I Need More Tunes!

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Alas, the bulk if my music collection is in a box in someone else’s garage, waiting for me to ship it overseas. I have 564 tunes on my laptop, which seems like a lot at first blush, but it’s just over 31 hours. Given that a few of the tunes aren’t very good (Enuff Z’Nuff will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes – what the hell was I thinking?) and I listen to my tunes quite a lot, the selection is wearing thin.

I really like emusic.com, where I have found several bands I never would have heard otherwise, but it’s a monthly subscription and you only get so many downloads per month. The 22nd of each month is download day, the day my account refreshes, and I have come to look forward to that day with great anticipation. By now I have several months worth of tunes queued up for download.

My hosts have a bunch of CD’s but I’ve now become too lazy to get up and choose another CD when the one finishes playing. I’m ambivalent about copying music these days; it’s kind of an extension of my philosophy that as someone who is trying to make my living selling software and eventually novels that I shouldn’t be stealing other people’s software and artistic output.

So, any of you have favorite bands with downloadable demo tracks? I can’t order CD’s because I have no place for them to be shipped.

Thanks!

Regularization

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10

We all like to be recognized. When we walk into a room, we want people to turn and say ‘hello’. It’s not vanity, it’s the need to belong somewhere, to have a place to go where no matter how full of crap your friends are, (it’s never you), they will welcome you and be honestly happy to see you. That’s what being a regular is all about.

Even on my travels, I want to be a regular. While someday I may market the Accelerated Regularization System(tm), for now I share my observations with all ten of my readers for free.

Tonight’s discussion is how to recognize when you have reached regularity. Normally this is not a big deal, it’s just a side effect of finding a place you like to be. There was a bar in Pacific Beach, the Second Wind, where I was a regluar, but not frequent, patron. Eventually Suzanne, my favorite bartender there, came to recognize me, as did other regulars. There was no magic moment when I became a regular.

However, in the Accelerated Regularization System(tm), you have to watch for the signs. Once you know the signs, you can make sure you cross the thresholds more quickly. Here are the measurements:

The greeting from the bartender:

  • Unknown: Hi! How are ya?
  • Recognized: Hey! [Eyebrows arched, upward head nod]
  • Regular: Hey, Jerry! (the first time, it may be the name on your credit card, which is a good time to tell them your real name, and shame on you for making them guess)
  • Fixture: Where’ve you been?
  • Fly: You’re late.

The bartender asking your order:

  • Unknown: What’ll you have?
  • Recognized: Was it the IPA?
  • Regular: Here ya go.
  • Fixture: We just blew the IPA, but you’ll like this.
  • Fly: [beer is waiting by the time you reach your stool. Your bartender knows what you want better than you do]

The regular sitting next to you says:

  • Unknown: How’s it going?
  • Recognized: Good to see you again.
  • Regular: Hey, Jerry, what’s new and exciting? [That’s my phrase, when the guy next to me asks, that means we’ve had more than one beer together in the past]
  • Fixture: [immediately starts talking about something mutually interesting, be it sports, politics, Vegas, or whatever]
  • Fly: And then I said… [picks up conversation from where he fell off the stool last night, as if nothing happened]

To the unknown sitting next to you, you say:

  • Unknown: studiously ignore
  • Recognized: “Hey”
  • Regular: “Her name’s Rose. She’ll be right back.”
  • Fixture: [After listening in on conversation with the bartender] “You should try…”
  • Fly: “Her name’s Rose. She rocks.”

At last call bartender says:

  • Unknown: Last call.
  • Recognized: Last call.
  • Regular: Last call. Jerry, you want anything?
  • Fixture: Last call. Are you coming out with us after we close here?
  • Fly: [There is no last call]

When you decide to go in:

  • Unknown: when you see the sign
  • Recognized: When the urge strikes you
  • Regular: When you know your favorite bartender is working – or your second favorite, or any of the ones you know
  • Fixture: When you know your buddies will be there too, which is most of the time
  • Fly: You can’t come in if you never leave

It is possible to be a regular without sitting at the bar. While it is possible, it is not easy to become a fixture without sitting at the bar. I managed to pull this off through many years of sitting at a table writing. It is not part of the Accelerated Regularization System(tm). You cannot be a fly from a table.

When in San Diego, I have a favorite bar I started going to the week they opened, fifteen years ago. Triska and I had our wedding shower there. During my ‘married’ phase I didn’t get in so often, but I was still regular. When I began writing in earnest I started going in very often, and became, more or less, the laptop guy. One day, I went in with some friends. I waited at the “Please wait to be seated” sign, and Hope just pointed me to my usual table, then stopped short when she realized that there were other people with me. “Oh! You have friends!” she said. In retrospect, I think that was confirmation of my fixturehood. (Melinda, you might be interested to know that Hope is largely responsible for how much sex there is in Rio Blanco.)

As far as accelerating your regularization, there are two really, really, important things. Learn your bartenders’ names, and make sure they learn yours. Of secondary importance is learning the names of the other regulars. Those who know me will not be surprised to hear that there are people I have sat next to on a barstool for years and I have no idea what their names are. But I know which ones will give me a good argument when I say “Raiders suck” or “George Bush is an idiot”.

Thanks!

End User License Agreement

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There comes a time in every successful software project that one must establish one’s rights. It seems that what lots of people do is find some other company’s agreement and copy it and put their own company name in. They are pirating the anti-piracy language. That can’t help their case in the long term. Also there are templates you can buy with all the necessary legalese, but even they do not hold up in court, apparently. (As an aside, some companies sneak some pretty nasty stuff into those agreements, allowing them to install spyware and giving themselves rights to your work product). The fact that no one reads them and everyone knows no one reads them undermines their validity. Or something like that. I’m no lawyer.

Therefore I have decided to write my own End Users License Agreement, and being a fundamentally lazy person, I have decided to also make that agreement my blog entry for the evening as well:

By accepting this agreement you promise not to be a scumbag software pirate robbing hard-working programmers of their livelihood. I’m not doing this for my health, you know. You are welcome to install Jer’s Novel Writer on any machines you own as an individual. Corporations do not have that right. If you’re part of some giant novel factory you need to pay for a copy for each machine.

Heck, let’s just be reasonable here. Jer’s Software Hut (the Hut) is depending on people like you who know the right thing to do. You know the difference between sharing and stealing (sharing good, stealing bad). If you need to ask a lawyer if it’s OK to do what you want to do, it probably isn’t. Why bother? The lawyer will cost you more than dealing directly with the Hut anyway.

Just to make it clear, while you can buy a license to use this software till the cows come home, Jer’s Software Hut owns the code. It would be silly to do anyway, but you’re promising now that you won’t try to reverse-engineer Jer’s Novel Writer or incorporate any subset of it into some other product without express written permission from the Hut.

I will give you the right, however, to make as many copies of this agreement as you want, and modify it and use or sell it to your heart’s content. If you publish it somewhere, I would appreciate credit. (I can see my EULA-writing career blossoming now.)

Heck, you’re not reading this anyway. I don’t know why I bother. I could put in that I have the rights to anything you create with this software, and you wouldn’t notice. You’ve already clicked “accept” like a good little robot. I’m glad I went with the cheap lawyer.

—–
It’s not the final wording, but it’s close. I would be happy to consider any contributions you might have to offer. I think after I have a couple of beers I’ll be improving some parts.

There is actually a reason I use the tone I do (besides just for fun) – I know that no matter what the EULA says, it’s only as powerful as the lawyers I hire to defend it. I’m trying for a moral protection of my work, rather than a legal one. And if I ever did have to defend my rights in court, I think a reminder to the jury that stealing is stealing no matter what legal mumbo-jumbo they hear can only help me.

Thanks!

Taking the edge off

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15

“All rightey!” I hear you say. “Jerry’s posted something at last!” [Right. just who do I think I’m fooling?] It’s as if the doorbell rang and you’re expecting your favorite mother-in-law. But when you open the door, what do you see? A burning paper bag. You weren’t born yesterday; you know what’s inside.

That’s how I feel about the last thing I posted. You came for Suicide Squirrel II, and got a serious, if muddled, discussion about the role of government. I stand by whatever I said (I’m sure it will make sense in the morning), and I really hope I get lots of comments that force me to develop my thesis more fully. For the occasional random visitor to this blog, though, it’s pretty heavy.

Hey! Occasional Random Guest! Yeah, you! Don’t you care about our country? Or yours? Don’t step on that bag!

In other news, we got a hit on “car passed over” today. Who the heck would search on that? Got another squirrel guts hit, but it was from an insider. Also got “elevator squirrel ocelot guts rutabaga death cult” a couple of days ago from someone in the Albuquerque public schools. Now who could that have been?

Thanks!

Government

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First off, let me tell you that the ‘political spectrum’ is a load of crap. No thinking person can be fit under a pat label of ‘liberal’ or ‘conservative’. The whole left vs. right conflict is a false dichotomy created by interests who stand to gain from the oversimplification of the issues facing our nation and our world. The whole ‘right vs. left’ debate ignored the possibility that there may be points of view that are neither right nor left.

If you will allow me, I will try to create a diagram of current accepted political wisdom:

<–wacko<—-democrat—-republican—>wacko—>

The biggest flaw in this model is that ‘democrat’ somehow implies Liberal, while Republican is synonymous with conservative. I don’t know how many tax-and-spend republicans we need before we wake up to that lie.

However, the Republican Lie and the Democratic Lie are not the subject of today’s muddled rambling. Instead I would like to discuss why we have governments in the first place. Governments are important, and they are actually good. Tonight is just the first step in developing my political theory. It is inconceivable that I am the first to think of government this way, so if any of you can point me to other references I would be grateful.

So here goes.

There are three major forces in our economy and out way of life. There is Business, Labor, and Government.

Business
Another name for business is ownership. Business has one goal: to make money. Everyone who participates in ownership, which includes everyone in a 401k plan, benefits from the mandate of business to create wealth through the efficient use of resources. Business at its best is a ruthless profit machine.
Contributes: efficiency, growth
Detriments: greed, corruption

Labor
Labor is the representation of the people whose sweat makes business work. The primary goal of labor is to ensure that the profits reaped by business are distributed equitably. Labor stands for fair treatment of workers and proper recognition of their efforts. (I will post later about just how badly labor is doing in the US, and what they can do to improve their lot.)
Contributes: equity
Detriments: inefficiency, corruption

Government
Government represents the needs and goals of society that are not supported by business or labor. For instance, neither business or labor are motivated to protect the environment. Both of them would sacrifice the planet for better return or higher wages. You can’t fault them, but you have to balance them.
Government ideally lies outside the traditional political spectrum. Ensuring the education of our children is not a liberal ideal, it is a pragmatic need of our society. Protecting borders and looking after collective security is another important role for any government.
Contributes: efficiency, education, sustainability, security
Detriments: inefficiency, corruption

Government appears to be a contradiction. How does it simultaneously provide efficiency and inefficiency? I’m glad you asked. There are certain unsung boons, like the bureau of weights and measures, that make business work better, There is antitrust law, which ultimately (when well applied) increases the efficiency of the marketplace and promotes competition. At the same time government is an impediment to efficiency, and well it should be. By recognizing a long-term value on a resource government ultimately makes that resource more expensive.

<added after posting>
Wow. I managed to talk about the inefficiencies of government like they were all good. I left out a bit. Bureaucracy. Red tape. You know the drill. I guess that’s the risk you take with stream-of-conscious political journalism.

I don’t always mark my updates so obviously, but that was a big omission.
</added after posting>

The idea of short-term hardship for greater long-term gain are lost on both business and labor. That is why we ask people from amongst us, people we trust to be wise and far-seeing, to represent our less tangible goals. It is also why we are disappointed with our representatives so often. It is why I am running for president.

All three vertices of my social triangle contribute corruption. Man, I’m a cynical bastard, but I really think I’m right. Another contradiction of government is the pursuit and reduction of corruption. You look at successful economies around the world, and the one thing they have in common is that everyone is held to the rule of law.*

I have a really neat diagram that shows the tension between the vertices of the triangle, but I’m just too damn tired to get it in here.

Before you get too carried away, my description of the idea role of government is not meant to be an endorsement or a criticism of current governments. I’ll leave that for another day. Trust me, I have plenty of beefs with the way things are going now. I feel it is important, however, to have an open discussion of just what the heck the role of government is. Only when we come to some kind of understanding why we have a government in the first place can we criticize the way our current government is being run. Any criticism or praise of current policy should ultimately be founded on such ideals.

———–

* Aaaaaaaaagh! I have to say it. I wanted to stay away from discussion of any specific policy, instead examining the higher ideals. But I have to say it. I can’t stop myself. Do you remember why you’re reading this footnote? If not go back and review real quick. Ready? OK, here we go, then. We’re doomed. Starting with Reagan, the US government has shown increasing disdain for the law. There’s a reason Dub has delayed the release of his dad’s records. Being above the law is also not a partisan issue. When our leaders stop answering to the law, we lose everything.

Thanks!

Bartenders

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I was sitting in a bar one day when Bad Bobby said to me, “You know why people go to bars? It’s not to drink. They could drink a lot cheaper at home.” It was a rhetorical question, of course, so I sipped my beer and nodded. You go to bars for the company.

I like bars. I like being a regular. I like being recognized when I go into a place, even if it’s just as “the laptop guy”. You can become a regular very quickly in at least two different ways: you can do something unusual more than once, like open a laptop and work on a novel, or you can talk to the bartender and the other regulars. Generally I go for plan A – I’m not a conversation-striker-upper as a rule. But when the battery is finished and my beer isn’t I’ll sometime come out of my shell.

Whether I join the rest of the ebb and flow of humanity at the bar generally depends on the bartender. Theirs is not a job to envy, on their feet for hours on end, serving the same old drunks and hearing the same old conversations, just trying to make ends meet, when the only thing worse than getting slammed is getting no business at all. A rainy day might mean you don’t make rent.

Yet bartenders are, by and large, a cheery and friendly bunch. I expect that the ones who aren’t don’t last long in the business. I have watched them give every appearance of being interested when some moron tells them the same story for the third time that night. I have watched them end fights with grace and diplomacy.

This may come as shock to you, but I especially like it when bartenders are attractive women. Let’s face it, that’s the only time a woman is going to bring me a beer whenever I ask for one, and it’s the only time a woman will laugh at my jokes (I tip well). Even better is when the bartender has stories to tell, opinions, and no compunction about sharing them.

Now I’m on the road, and being a regular when you’re not in the same place very long is difficult. I was definitely a regular at Charlie O’s in Scotts Valley, having visited four times in two weeks, and lingering the last two times to chat with other patrons (and, of course, Kristen, the bartender). Since then, I’ve been in a couple of nice bars, a chain bar, and up here in Tahoe a couple of “locals bars.” Not dives, but not fancy either. (Sam’s Place, my first non-California bar on the trip, made me remember that it was after the nonsmoking laws got passed in CA that I started going to bars.) I may be here long enough to regularize myself, but I have to find the right bartender first.

Specific stories about specific bartenders will have to wait, except for this one: Almost exactly a year ago I was with Mikie, Mike, and Art in Louisville KY for the Kentucky Derby. We were staying at the Sheraton Blah Blah Blah and the usual bartender in the little hotel bar was Heather. What a sweetheart. We had some great conversations, and I watched her pretend to have conversations with all the losers that were in there with me. On the last day, when everyone was pissed off that Empire maker had lost (except, notably, Mikie, who bet on Fungicide to win, Yours truly, who hit the exacta, and Art, who hit the trifecta), the bar was decidedly ugly. Everyone was drunk on mint juleps from the track, and there was a long-running feud between two groups that never got quite bad enough to throw them out, but the atmosphere was poisoned. She brought Art and me are drinks and said to me quietly in her charming KY accent, “I may be smilin’ but it’s fake.” She told me later after things had settled down that she had also just broken up with her boyfriend, but had nowhere else to sleep.

As a side note, I had been having beers with a guy in that same bar the night before the race, and he showed up again after, only to be mobbed by people. Apparently he was one of the owners of Empire Maker, who was the heavy favorite and considered to be triple-crown material. We managed to have one quiet beer before the hordes drove him from the bar. He was a nice guy, the kind of guy you want to have perched on the bar stool next to yours.

I haven’t seen Heather since that day, but she will always rank among my favorite bartenders. Wherever you are, Heather, I know you’ll hold it together.

Thanks!

Tahoe

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Location: Leza and Mark’s place (map) (photos)
Miles: 1726.5

I was moving, traveling through the hot California air, tunes playing, momentum taking me up and out of Silicon Valley and into the mountains. Stopping was out of the question. Still, there’s that big, poorly shielded (and getting less well-shielded as time passes) fusion reactor up there in the sky, bathing us all in dangerous radiation. Having managed to retain a tiny bit of wisdom from my radiation damage two days previous, I knew that sunscreen was in order.

No problem. I have a convertible, and I know that the sun is not my friend. I have sunscreen out the wazoo. I open the little console between the seats to grab a tube and an important reciept I had in there starts to fly out. I catch it before it takes wing, shove it under my leg for safety and fish out the lotion tube. Alas, it’s a poorly designed tube (can’t put it down with the top off – who thinks of things like that?) so I decide to choose skin cancer for a few more minutes rather than risk crashing. I set the tube in my lap.

Not long after that I crossed a bridge to discover when I got to the far side that it was a toll bridge. It was a good thing I had stopped at an ATM this morning. I grabbed a couple of bucks from my wallet but while shifting around I came to be sitting on the end of the sunscreen tube. I was unaware of this unhappy little fact for many happy miles. Now I have sunscreen on the wazoo. And on the upholstery. And on the important receipt.

On a happier note, I am now in a very nice place. As you can tell from the photos the scenery is spectacular here, and it is very peaceful. In my room is a microwave and a little fridge already stocked with a few beers. La Dolce Vida indeed. I will be adding to the photos over the next few days. Sunset should be good, looking west over Lake Tahoe.

Thanks!

Bits and pieces

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I finally hoisted up the printout of Jesse’s criticisms of The Monster Within. Got through part one tonight – the easy part, the part Jesse had gone over before. Part two is still undergoing a major rewrite. Man, it’s great to have friends who can tell you when you suck. That just makes the compliments mean something. John, I know you’re looking forward to the chance to tell me I suck, too. Just remember that it’ll mean all that much more later.

A pause for a joke before I get on to business:

A friend is the person who will come out in the middle of the night to get you out of jail. A REAL friend is the guy sitting next to you in the cell saying, “That was fucking awesome.”

Speaking of fucking awesome, Mom asked me for the URL for the blog yesterday. I don’t want to hold out, but to be honest I’ve already been censoring myself, and I’m not too happy about that. I’m no Hunter S. Thompson, but there have been times I’ve kind of pulled the punches. For the most part it has been as a recognition of the fact that most of my exploits are simply not that interesting. Any thoughts I have at those times that are perhaps even remotely interesting I am sure to share.

A few things I have done that don’t deserve their own entries:

Went to the DC United vs. San Jose Earthquakes MLS game. It was the first game in which Freddy Adu started. Kid could play. I was there. Got too much sun. (Why. oh why have I not learned? This time I put sunscreen on parts of my body, but I decided that my arms didn’t need anything. ???!!?. That’s like saying, “Oh, my stomach already has cancer, so I’ll go ahead and eat some plutonium.” What possible rational reason is there to not put SFP 1,000,006 upon your entire body?) I like hockey better than football from any continent.

The night before, I went to a dance club with a couple of Buggy’s hungarian friends. Buggy was there, too. The music was horrible. I know I’m just being an old man complaining about the so-called music the kids are listening to these days, but there was a point when I thought things were improving when the bass played a second note. Sorry, kids, Some guy shouting – givin’ it to ya – telin’ ya’ll uh huh hu huh – Givin’ ya’ tha’ sto-ry – tellin’ of the glo-ry – Step back kick stand frappuccino blow dry! is not my kind of tunes. Watching well-dressed Palo-Altites shamble aimlessly to the angry Hip-Hop was almost worth it.

But not quite.

I have of late compared paying Microsoft for anything to paying a tax. Only I get more value from my other taxes. Yesterday I paid Microsoft again. I got a virus. Yes, I admit I was a little careless; I thought I was behind a firewall and I wasn’t. Today I had the firewall on and I was infected AGAIN. It’s a new virus that exploits no less than six Windows vulnerabilities. OK, maybe five. Still, what are we paying these guys for?

Nothing personal to Buggy, who challenges me intellectually more than anyone else I know, but I have to get the hell out of here. He has been a great host and a most valuable technical support guru, and all he has to show for it is a broken microwave and a depleted wine cellar. There is a pool here and I could get comfortable.

Tomorrow morning I’m gone, gone, gone.

Thanks!

Web Search updates

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7

Over the last couple of days there have been several search-engine-related hits, notably:

Google: indulgence hunky jesus contest pictures
aol: half baked idea
Google: squirrel guts
Google: Polkaholics

Lots of interesting things come up when you search on squirrel guts.

Just thought you might like to know.

Exciting Addendum!
This morning, got a second hit from a search on “squirrel guts”. This from a completely different domain. As a service to those who arrived at this entry because you were looking for squirrel guts, what you really want is Suicide Squirrel Death Cult.

Thanks!

American Road Myth, part 1

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Note: this episode was the seed for a more-developed treatment published at Piker Press.

I have mentioned a couple of times when I have been in one place too long that I am pining for the road. Some of my favorite moments on this trip so far have behind the wheel – just me, my machine, and my thoughts. And that’s what it comes down to. I think better when I’m alone.

The definition of alone can be squirrely. The old cliché ‘alone in a crowd’ certainly applies – I can wrap myself up in a little introspective ball in a raucous bar and pound away, while if I’m in someone’s house and they’re tiptoeing around trying not to disturb me I find that very distracting.

So here’s a theory – ‘alone’ is a synonym for ‘free’. In a crowded bar, the only time I’m distracted is if all the tables are full and people are waiting to eat dinner. I feel bad for hurting the bar’s and (more important) my server’s income. When I’m in someone’s house, it’s their house, dammit, and they should be able to act however they want in it.

That brings me to the road. It’s the thing I’m looking for out here, and sometimes I feel like I might just find it. The road has always represented freedom, but not, I have come to believe, because it takes you wherever you want to go but because when you’re on it you are nowhere. Lately I have been using the phrase “American Road Myth” to describe the romance our nation holds for the road, from Kerouac to Thelma and Louise to riding off into the sunset. We love the road, we love the freedom, but nowhere in the road myth is the idea of a destination. The road is about self-sufficiency and the unknown. It’s about finding stories, meeting people, but always moving on.

I take back what I just said: there is a destination in the road myth, it’s just not on a map. Paul Simon and an unnamed friend went to look for America, and never left the United States. As far as I know they never found what they were looking for. There is an implied quest for wholeness, for some kind meaning that is at the end of the yellow brick road. To find it, you have to be nowhere. You have to be on the road.

We Americans have created a new religion, an introspective and wistful belief system that few practice but all believe in. Freedom, solitude, the road. Independence and resourcefulness, hardship and thought. Hoppin’ a freight, sleeping under the stars, hitchhiking. Disconnecting. Escaping. For all our collective brashness and bravado, we yearn for the peace of the road and a glimpse of what’s over the rainbow.

If America has a heaven, it’s an all-night truck stop, with Mac in back cooking burgers and passing them up to Sal (you know by the embroidered patch over her respectable breast), who sets it in front of you, fries steaming and glistening, saying “Here ya go, Hon.” You haven’t eaten in 400 miles and the burger is perfect. There’s a trucker two stools down, and he’s flirting with Sal while the jukebox plays an old Hank Williams song you never heard before. Unlike any other heaven, though, this heaven is perfect because you are just passing through. You have a slice of pie, leave your money on the counter, and saddle up to move on to the next town. Sal says goodbye and tells you to come back in next time you’re passing through.

You just might do that.

Copyright © 2004 by Jerry Seeger. All Rights Reserved.

Thanks!

When did you say you were leaving again?

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5

Location: Buggy’s (map )
Miles: 1464.0

I have noticed that, between all the stuff I’m lugging around and all the space I need to set up shop, I am not the typical houseguest. On the good side, my hosts don’t have to worry about entertaining me, since I can always work or write. On the other hand, it kind of sucks when there is always someone working or writing in your living room. You feel the need to tiptoe around. (This is, in fact, completely unnecessary – I write in bars for crying out heaven’s sake.)

Then there is all the hardware I set up for my command center. Buggy now has wires all over his living room floor – power cables going one way, network the other, and a pile of hardware in the middle.

As a special bonus for Buggy, who has his own Web hosting business, his name server crashed for the first time in years soon after he set me up, and yesterday I broke the handle off his microwave. He took it very well.

Then, of course, there’s the Bad Influence Factor (BIF). having someone in your house who is more or less unemployed and on many days really doesn’t have to be all that responsible tends to make my hosts think of all sorts of reasons why they, too, shouldn’t have to work either. So instead we hang out, maybe have a beer or two, go do something fun, and generally enjoy the day at the expense of any pretense at productivity.

Take yesterday, for instance. Buggy shined work and we hopped in the ‘ol convertible for some sunny-day mountain-spring-drriving fun (SDMSDF). We hooked back up with John and enjoyed a Local Microbrew (LMB) (photo) and finished the day tired and happy.

When I put it that way, I’m not so sure my influence is so bad after all. Perhaps it should be named the WORIF (Work is Over-Rated Influence Factor). I know there’s a better name, but my attention span has not

Thanks!

Poetry Slam

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Reply

Buggy invited me along and I happily accepted. I’m a writer now, right? I’m supposed to do all that literary shit. It was a lot of fun. If there’s one in your area, you should check it out.

It is a competition, with judges recrtuited from the audience. I was offered the “opportunity” to be a judge and I’m very glad I turned it down. More on that later, maybe. The qualilty of the performances was more uniform that usual, Buggy tells me. The eight finalists tonight had to win preliminary rounds to compete tonight, so they were all pretty good, but there was a uniformness of voice among the competitors that I suspect is a reflection of the taste of the audience in the previous rounds. Many of the performers made heavy use of a Hip-Hop cadence that has become a poetic stereotype.

Here is the one image I took of a performer, as she began an animated discussion of her unnatural love of peanut butter:

Lots of good ideas, soem expressed better than others, and everyone understood that this was just as much about the performance as it was about the poem. All the finalists attacked their work with great energy and honesty, and some of the things I heard really made me think.

Unfortunately, I had only a couple of seconds after each performance before the big goofy jackass MC hopped up on stage and started shouting his schtick into the mike. After listening to a woman tell us how she was coping with bring molested as a child and having a friend murdered while she worked in a peep show, the last thing I wanted to hear was some douchebag clown saying “Look at meee! Look at meeee!” Sure, his job is to keep the energy up, but the energy of thought and ideas moving is sometimes better than just “get everyone making noise” energy. (Buggy pointed out that as a crowd the poetry circle is pretty self-absorbed and no one listened to each other’s work anyway.)

The judges were, as I mentioned, recruited out of the audience, and while they took it very seriously, they weren’t prepared for the task. The guy who went first put on a very good performance but as time passed there became an unofficial minimum score that the audience would accept, and that floor kept going up. It didn’t matter who went first, they were doomed. Had I accepted the role of judge, I would have been taken outside and beaten for giving scores below 8 out of ten. Any explanation of scale attenuation would have been wasted.

While I have dwelt for a bit on the negatives of the night, my overall impression was very good. I heard several very talented and very brave people spilling their guts out to strangers and (scarier) friends. It made me think about my writing and got my juices flowing again. Tonight I made some important improvements to the first chapter of The Fish by imagining myself reciting it as poetry.

The four winners now go to St. Louis for the national finals. Good luck to them there.

Thanks!

Chez Buggy

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Location: Buggy’s house, San Jose, CA (map)
Miles: 1378.1

The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and already it’s hot outside. Had a little work to do, but now it’s time to go splash in the pool. This isn’t bad.

While I’m thinking about it, I added a photo I took in Oakdale to the album (photo). Signs say the funniest things. I think for the rest of the day I’m going to put the blog down and do some actual writing. (I’m still waiting for the message from SiteMeter that says, “Dude, you can’t go checking the stats every time you get a hit. Chill.”) We’ll see how that goes.

Thanks!

Big Day in Blog-Town

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I’d like to say ‘hello’ to anyone who is happening by here because of the very nice things said about me (or at least the idea of me he has formed) here.

Hello!

For my regulars (Yes, I have regulars too! That hit counter didn’t get over 300 all by itself!), Dr Pants is someone who checked “other” under Plan. We have a lot in common. Except the Norwegian girlfriend – I don’t have one of those. Damn you, Dr Pants! There I am thinking I’m scoring pretty high on the footloose-o-meter, spending my days pondering the American Road Myth, and then you happen by, and sure you’re footloose and everything, but on top of that you have me 1-0 in the Norwegian Girlfriend competition. Someday, buddy, when you least expect it…

You’re probably wondering who I am, but really, I’m the last one to answer that question. If you take my word for it, I’m exactly the right height, IQ in the 300+ range, ridiculously fit, raconteur, philanthropist, and poet. And modest. Modest like you woldn’t believe. You should probably ask someone else.

If you’re looking around, you’ll see that right now almost all the posts are about my homeless tour. It started April 2th, my 40th birthday (purely concidence – really. That’s the day the sale of my house became final. Absolutely coincidence. That you would doubt my word hurts me.) The starting point of the tour was San Diego, the end point is Prague. In between, it’s kind of hazy, but I’m doing a bit of work along the way, so I have to stay close to the Internet for the nonce.

Besides the homeless tour, there’s politics (I’m running for president), Get-Poor-Quick Schemes (if any of you know much about robotics, I’d love to get poor with you. I need a robot nuclear reactor on the moon.), and a bit here and there in the other categories. Once I’m in Prague, there’ll be more in the Writing category especially.

As a side note, I am approaching public beta with a word processor I created for writers (specifically novelists) who suffer from the same deficiencies I do. Currently just for mac. There’s a link over on the side there somewhere.

If any of you have more information on the explosive exposé Suicide Squirrel Death Cult please be sure to leave a note. The sooner this tragedy sees the light of day, the more innocent lives can be saved.

So that’s it. Welcome to Muddled Ramblings and Half-Baked Ideas. If you lose the link, you can always search for “elevator ocelot rutabaga” and you’ll come right here.

Thanks!

Oakdale Dawn

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Location: Best Western Rama Inn, Oakdale (map)
Miles: 1271.8

I can just picture Mom, shaking her head with a look that says “I’m being patient, but I really shouldn’t need to be” as she says to Dad, “I told you not to give the boy caffeine after 6pm.”

Now the morning is here, like there’s some big damn rush to get the day started. The sun’s shining and there’s traffic outside the double glazing. I’m as jittery as a field mouse at a hawk convention, buzzed on green tea and Froot Loops to carry me through the ante meridiem despite the profound lack of sleep. On the desk next to the ol’ powerbook is the remains of a loaf of bread, the last of the soft cheese, getting softer and cheesier as I watch, and empty coke and beer bottles. Poor Man’s Speedball.

In the tiny freezer is a package of frozen potstickers. Don’t go shopping when you’re hungry. At least I’ll be able to take the fresh fruit with me, and the leftover beer will be appreciated tonight at Buggy’s place, I’m sure.

I cleaned up a little before I thought to take the pic, but it would have undermined my journalistic integrity to put the junk back.

I was taking some of my crap out to the car this morning and checking the mileage when some guy asked me, “Were you driving through Yosemite yesterday? With the top down?” They had been behind me in the line to get into the park.

My lower lip is twitching, the maid is knocking, I have packing to do, and checkout is in an hour. Then, it’s out into the world, on a quest to get to the bottom of the Oakdale Enigma. I’ll let you know what I learn.

Thanks!