June 30, 2005
I’m sitting in my studio right now, drinking beer and listening to David Gray. That might clue you into what kind of mood I’m in right now. To tell the truth my mood has lightened a little from what it was earlier. I don’t know what happened to me today, I felt all right for most of the day, but then I became overwhelmed by an unexplained sadness. So I did the only reasonable thing and went out to get food. I went to Chip’s Pub in Clinton ordered up some grub and a couple beers, and began to feel a little better. I don’t know, maybe I’m just feeling lonely, I think sometimes the absence of someone creates a vacuum, and it just sits there next to you pulling at your soul, bit by bit sucking away all of you comfort and sensibility. I don’t mean to be so gloomy but that’s just where I am right now.
I went down to the shore for a while, to try and pull some solace from the water I guess. Sometimes being near the ocean helps me to clear my head. It helped to ease some of my restlessness at least. It was awfully calm down there, the water was like glass, and the fog was just hanging over the water hardly moving. I felt a little bit like an intruder, it didn’t seem like there should have been any human presence at all, as if the world was going to sleep and I was keeping it from shutting its eyes.
It was just barely raining on my way back home and I drove with the windows open in an effort to blast some of my uneasiness away. It was a rather surreal experience. This area at dusk is truly something to behold. Driving past lakes as the day was shutting down I was once again made to feel like something of a voyeur, watching nature’s private moments through that weird green/grey haze of twilight with the most subtle of mists floating by.
David Gray is just about the most perfect accompaniment to this sort of ambiguous depression. He’s been a big help tonight. So has beer, big ups to beer. I apologize for the sullen note of this entry and I promise to get back to light hearted ramblings as soon as possible, but writing this has definitely helped me to shrug off some of this ickiness. I’m sure this happens to everyone, it’s all part of the human condition I suppose. I guess it’s part of our nature to assume that our pain is unique, but we all have a lot more in common than we might realize, it has to be in sharing these feelings where we find comfort, if we just continue to internalize it we’ll go insane, hence this entry.
All right I think I’m just about tapped out, I feel much better though. I promise my next entry will be much more enjoyable.
Peace
Rold
Posted by harold at 06:57 PM | Comments (0)
June 26, 2005
I’m afraid my Buffy obsession is getting a touch out of control. The other night I had a dream that I went back to college and all my friends were the cast members of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was a little creepy. Though I have to admit I was kind of bummed when I woke up and Willow was no longer my best friend. She’s such a cutie.
This weekend has been mad hectic. I worked on Friday from 12:00 pm until 8:30 pm I got home close to ten, ate dinner, watched an episode of Buffy and went to bed. The next morning I woke up and went to work at 10:00. Work was insane, I had this huge project to do and there were what seemed like thousands of silly people asking me the most inane questions. Dave says that there are no stupid questions, just stupid people. I think he’s right. Anyhoo, so I got to leave at 2:00 thanks to Collin being super cool and coming in to cover the rest of my shift, then I drove to Ivoryton for Dave’s birthday party. Happy Birthday Dave! It was a splendid time and the food was fab. From there I drove to New York to go to a wedding. The first thing I did was get lost in Ivoryton, I’m such an idiot. I ended up driving around Ivoryton and Westbrook like a moron for about a half hour. I drove over route 95 three times, I could see the on-ramps from the overpass but for some reason I couldn’t manage to find them. Eventually I ended up on route 1 in Westbrook and found my way to 95.
95 was a mess as always. I cursed and shook my fist at other drivers all the way to New York. I was rather late but everything worked out just fine. The wedding was a blast; I had a good amount of gin & tonics and danced my sexy little ass off. I’m paying for it now though, on top of a rather persistent hangover I’m sore as hell from dancing all night. Good times.
I woke up this morning feeling less than human and proceeded to drive back to Connecticut. I drove to my house, took a shower, then drove to work and I was only ten minutes late. For breakfast I had coffee, beef jerky, and Corn Nuts. I love Corn Nuts; they may very well be the perfect food. They taste a little funky with coffee, so does beef jerky to be completely honest, but that’s what the rest stop was offering.
I got out of work at 5:00, came home to find that the Red Sox won again (yippee,) ate some dinner, and now I’m here writing this. I’m feeling pretty harshed up though; I think I might take a break from thinking and go watch some Buffy.
All right, I’m back. I watched only one episode, but it was enough to mellow me out. I’ve only got one more episode left of season three and then I move seamlessly into season four. It feels so good.
There is a cricket living in my studio. Right now he’s about an inch and a half away from my big left toe. He seems real calm at the moment, hasn’t moved in a while. I realize I’m just assuming it’s a he, I don’t know how you could tell what sex a cricket is, I’m just guessing it’s a dude. He usually doesn’t make that much noise, unless I’m trying to mix some tracks and I need to be able to hear, then he’s quite vocal. Maybe I should name him. What’s an appropriate name for a wicked calm cricket? Hmmmmm, I’m going to have to ruminate on that one for a while.
I’m planning on going to see the new Batman movie tomorrow; it’s playing at the IMAX Theater in Manchester. I’m pretty stoked, I pegged Christian Bale for Batman years ago, he’s just great. He’s one of those guys who makes you wanna switch teams. Like Chris Isaak or Ewan McGregor.
Oh my cricket's on the move, he traveled six inches and stopped. Maybe he’s just lazy, or tired. Perhaps I should feed him, I wonder what crickets eat. My friend Tim is an entomologist, I should ask him for tips on the care and feeding of sexually ambiguous Buddhist crickets. Oh Oh, I’ll name him Isherwood. It’s perfect. I realize it’s a little obscure, but good god it’s a stroke of genius. I hope my cat doesn’t try to eat him.
I was trying to listen to this Gavin Degraw album, and I just can’t seem to get into it, I’ve tried on several occasions and it just never grabs me, so I switched to The Replacements. Good old Paul Westerberg. He’s the best.
Anyhoo, I’m just about out of crap to write about. Big love to all the people I saw this weekend who I wish I could’ve spent more time with. May life be nothing but pizza fun days and Muppet Uno.
Peace
Rold
Posted by harold at 06:57 PM | Comments (0)
June 20, 2005
Buffy season three has arrived. I’m getting back on the horse, time to feed the addiction.
I’ve only watched four episodes so far, but I plan on watching a few more today. It’s good to have the slayer back in my life.
My big decision for the day is going to be what to have for lunch. I think I’ve decided on Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, but I still haven’t ruled out tuna fish or pierogies. Yesterday I ate an obscene amount of sushi, it was fabulous. My friends and I went to a place called Maru in Clinton, CT, an establishment I recommend whole heartedly. I had a dancing eel roll, which was simply divine, plus some bean curd Inari. I also sampled a wide variety of foods from my friends’ orders, as seems to be the custom when eating sushi. I even had some Spanish Mackerel!
After some careful contemplation I think I’ve finally decided on Mac & Cheese. I’m not ready to start cooking yet though, so I’ll put it off a little longer. What I could use though is more coffee!
Hooray for more coffee! I really think we should replace Columbus Day with “Hooray for the Guy Who Invented Coffee Day.??? If anyone deserves a national holiday it’s that guy. I’d even take Spongebob Squarepants Day, anything would be better than Columbus Day. My spell-checker does not recognize Spongebob Squarepants as real words. That’s going to have to be fixed as soon as possible.
I’m currently reading an Umberto Eco book entitled “The Island of the Day Before.??? It’s a little odd, I just read an entire chapter on the allegorical significance of doves. Why? Typically with Eco everything will have some meaning by the end of the story but I’m still pretty confused. It’s taking me longer to read than I had anticipated and I really want to start reading the new Douglass Preston/Lincoln Child novel, so I think today I’m just going to have to buckle down and finish it. That is if I don’t get distracted by Buffy.
Well I think I’ve put off Mac & Cheese long enough. Time to start boiling some water, it’s a mundane step, but crucial nonetheless.
Ok my water’s set up for boiling. They say that adding salt to the water helps bring it to a boil quicker. I, for the life of me, can’t figure out why, but I do it just the same. It can’t hurt I guess. I’ve never seen Rachael Ray do it, so right there doubt has been cast, because we all know that Rachael Ray is all knowing and all powerful. I understand she’s getting married, and not to me. This is all very disappointing. I was sure we were meant to be. Oh well, I guess I’ll just have to settle for Gillian Anderson.
Well, it looks like my water might be boiling so I’m going to try and devote my full attention to the Mac & Cheese.
Peace
Rold
P.S. I apologize for the tardiness of this entry, you can blame SBC.
Posted by harold at 06:56 PM | Comments (0)
June 14, 2005
So the Takashi Miike movie I was talking about turned about to be not so much a movie but rather the first two parts of a six part mini-series. I was less than happy about not getting closure. As I’ve already mentioned Miike’s films are traditionally pretty damn confusing, and MPD Psycho was no exception, and seeing that it was only a third of the complete story it was even more confusing.
I did some research and found out that the next two parts won’t be released until August which makes me even happier. I need closure damn it!
Well if Miike is the Japanese equivelant of David Lynch, then MPD Psycho is definitely his Twin Peaks, and it seems all the folks on-line are thinking along the same lines. All the reviews I’ve read make lots of comparisons to Lynch and also express their dipleasure at not being able to watch the whole thing.
However I am pleased with what I've seen, the two episodes I watched were entertaining and Miike does some very interesting things with digital video effects that I wasn’t entirely sure were intentional at first. I look forward to watching the rest of the series but I am frustrated at having to wait so long.
Saturday I went to the Noma Gallery in Middletown, CT to view the artwork of Jeff Korp & Monika Malewska. You can check out Jeff’s paintings at jeff.club806.com but I highly suggest going to the gallery to see them in person, the paintings are much more striking when you get to see them first hand. The paintings will be on display until the 24th of July. Noma’s hours are a little sketchy, they suggest calling for hours, as do I. Their phone number is 860-344-0768.
(You may have noticed a distinct lack of segues. It's primarily due to laziness.)
I’ve noticed myself, on occasion, describing an album’s prowess by claiming it would be in my “Top 5". And that led me to wonder: What are my Top 5 favorite Albums? This proved a tougher question to answer than I had originally thought. Trying to narrow it down to only 5 albums was really difficult. But I think I finally narrowed it down. Bear in mind these are in no particular order, I couldn’t bring myself to take it that far. It already had taken me four days just to narrow it down to five albums, sheesh.
Ok so here goes:
1. Faith No More - King For a Day, Fool For a Lifetime
2. Massive Attack - Mezzanine
3. Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti
4. Prince - Come
5. Stevie Wonder - Songs in the Key of Life
There you have it, I don’t know what it’s worth, but there it is.
I think I just swallowed a lemon seed.
I guess that’s all I have to say today.
Peace
Rold
Posted by harold at 06:53 PM | Comments (1)
June 10, 2005
I have the day off, I’m just sitting around waiting for my bank to call and let me know if I can have my money back. I think banks intentionally make every aspect of their establishment ambiguous and confusing so that when they make a mistake you won’t notice until it’s too late. Then they treat you like a moron for not understanding the most confusing and nonsensical policies and procedures ever conceived. I can’t understand why I should pay someone else to hold on to my money.
Oh well, I would watch some Buffy but I finished the second season this morning. It was really sad, and not just because I have no more Buffy to watch but everything went to hell, I feel so bad for those poor fictional characters. Happiness is so fleeting in Sunnydale.
I do have plenty of stuff to keep me occupied though. I rented a Takashi Miike movie I haven’t seen yet called MPD Psycho. I’m sure it will be thoroughly disturbing, that’s sort of his trademark. His other movies include Audition, and Ichi the Killer, both are quite unsettling. If you enjoy less than coherent foreign films that make you shudder I highly recommend delving into this guy’s world. Another gem from the less than coherent foreign film category is Last Life in the Universe. I believe it is a Thai film, most of the movie is in Thai, but it also switches to English and Japanese occasionally, which doesn’t necessarily help the coherence factor. The lead actor was also in Ichi the Killer, a nifty little coincidence. It was a high quality film in my view. Of course so was Spice World, in my view.
Hooray! Yipee! The bank just called and they’re giving me all my money back. Happy day! I’m so freaking thrilled. It’s nice to triumph over the bank for once. At first they told me it couldn’t be done, but I wouldn’t take no for an answer. Perseverance, it is grand.
So now the question is what do I do with my day now that I don’t have to wait around for the bank any longer. First I’m gonna go meet my friend Chris for cheap Corona’s and free tacos. From there the possibilities are endless. So yeah, I’m gonna go eat tacos now.
Bye bye for now.
--
Ok so I’m back from free taco land, it was fabulous. Now it’s 8:40 on Friday night and I aint doin’ a damn thing, I’m sitting in my kitchen trying to think of stuff to do, so far this was all I could come up with for fun. I was supposed to go to Philly for the weekend but thanks to my bank my plans were dashed.
I’m reading this book right now written by Jennifer Toth called The Mole People. The book is all about the homeless living in the subway tunnels underneath New York. I’ve gotten to a part in the book where she’s been brought down to a couple of different underground communities and I ‘m truly amazed by the stability of these particular communities. The people down there have very strong emotional bonds, and an enormous sense of commitment to their fellow tunnel dwellers. It seems to me that a lot of these people are living pretty decent lives that would be impossible above ground. They display the exact type of morals and values that appear to be missing more and more from the citizens of our country. I don’t think that people above ground have the capacity for that level of commitment to others. I can’t think of any communities on the surface that represent the strong human values that these homeless people embody.
The one thing that separates us from them is money, and I think money is precisely the thing that is keeping us detached from the rest of humanity. It’s virtually impossible for anyone to commit themselves to the betterment of their community because we are too busy securing our assets. If we let up at all in our struggle to stay ahead the economic consequences could be dire. Is it our fault? I don’t think so, we have no real choice in the matter. You can’t renounce money.
It does feel like a religion though doesn’t it. Hmmm…
I guess I could go on, I could follow this line of thinking to all kinds of deep philosophical conclusions, but I won’t. Frank Herbert did a pretty good job of portraying commerce as religion in Dune. If you’ve never read those books, I highly recommend them. The Dune series contains some of the most profound and stirring political and socioeconomic commentary I’ve ever read. Plus they’re wicked cool.
Well I think I’m gonna wrap this up, ya’ll enjoy your weekend and be good to each other.
Peace
Rold
Posted by harold at 06:50 PM | Comments (0)
June 08, 2005
I’m sitting in the mall at the moment. I work at the mall by the way, at a bookstore where I sign people up for our e-mail list and sell chocolate frogs. I’m here early, as I usually am when I have to come in at 5:00 pm. I’m only working to 10:00 which is pretty cool, I enjoy the 5 hour shift, and I like having a few hours before I have to be there to get shit done, although today all I’ve accomplished was watching two episodes of Buffy, and eating lunch.
I was hoping I’d be able to glom onto an unsecured wireless network here at the mall and do some work on the website but no such luck. Apparently the mall is hip to network security. So that’s why I have my laptop here, usually I come in , get a coffee and read but I figured if I couldn’t use the internet I might as well start on this blog. Which basically means I’m not going to get any farther in the book I’m reading. I’m almost guaranteed not to get any reading done at home thanks that coy little vampire slayer and her good looking friends.
My friend Collin is letting me borrow the first and second season and I would be lying if said I wasn’t completely addicted to that show. It’s like a drug, a very good looking drug. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to have had to have waited a week for the next episode, and then having to wait for the next season to start must have been unbearable. There is something fabulous about being able to enter into this type of epic entertainment immersion, I’m ingesting months worth of television in the space of days.
I did a similar thing with Twin Peaks, my friend Sue and I watched the pilot episode, the entire first season, and the movie in the space of 24 hours. Very cool but at the same time kind of unsettling. It was a lot of David Lynch to handle at one time.
I’m sitting here trying to think of something to write about other than television shows, and it’s rather hard. I looked around the mall for a little while trying to come up with something new to write about but my mind just started playing Magnum P.I. episodes.
Blargdigirapitapi! Toorapturandeflarp!
Just trying to clear my head.
I keep getting distracted by booty. So much of it keeps walking by! This mall is den of frustration.
I could use another cup of coffee, but I fear I’m flat broke, spent the last of my money on a sumptuous pepperoni calzone. It was worth it, what a grand calzone it was. I ate the rest of it today as I was watching Buffy. And now we have come full circle. All roads lead back to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’ve even totally ignored my season of Playstation baseball, which is almost unfathomable. I was thirty two games ahead in the AL East and was on a thirty game winning streak. It would be tragic if my team lost it’s momentum. Good thing it’s not real.
What other pointless information shall I spew forth? It is impossible to lick your own elbow! Go ahead and try. It’s fun to tell a group of people that and then watch them all try at once. I’ve tried on several occasions and it really does appear to be impossible. I’m afraid the only way you’re going to get your elbow licked is by someone else, or if you’re Gene Simmons, and if you are Gene Simmons I implore you to listen to my music and then get me a record deal. Thanks.
I still have a half hour and I am running out of things to write about, I would like to discuss something a little more profound, like the state of monkey health care, or the ratio of green to red M&M’s per bag. What’s the… sorry got distracted by female mall traffic again. There was a brief moment when it didn’t let up. Is Dolf Lundgren ever going to make another movie? These are serious questions. The world needs more Dolf Lundgren films, and a new Robocop movie wouldn’t be bad either. What the world doesn’t need is Paris Hilton, any more Cathy comics, and re-runs of Charles in Charge.
What’s the deal with Paris Hilton anyway. I just don’t understand the fascination there. She’s a talentless whore who made a shitty porn film, that somehow improved her reputation, whose only real skill is being a spoiled bitch. I could really care less. I’d rather watch a reality show about Mr. T. That would be great television. It would be like that other show with the stupid rich whore, cameras could just follow Mr. T. throughout his day, it would be fascinating. What does Mr. T. do all day? I mean really.
I would also like to be president or at least in a position to make some very important and pretentious people feel extremely foolish. I’d like to interrupt Rush Limbaugh’s radio feed and play old Howard Stern shows, Id like to give Larry Flint a Pulitzer, and I’d really like to punch Fred Durst in the face, though I’d take Sean Hannity as an alternate.
Ok, I guess that’s enough out of me.
Bye!
Posted by harold at 06:49 PM | Comments (0)