Syntax of Things

I've Been Tired

I know I've made it a custom to chime in at least once a week and proclaim that I'm spent, that I need a day away to take care of business, or that I'm going to the dentist. Guess what? After being sick for a week and having a tooth pulled, I'm too far gone to do much more than sit with sore mouth and wish that I could hit the pause button. Anyway, I'm taking a mental health day. Be sure to check out some of the sites that I've linked to on the left. They continue to be a great source of daily news, entertainment, and inspiration. (Big thanks to Gwenda for pointing out Syntax of Things.)

If you feel like reading about Wal-Mart, check out this blog, Always Low Prices--Always, a balanced presentation on the pros and cons of the place I like to call a little piece of hell on earth.

Have a great weekend, and Scott, thanks for the Pixies DVD.

Thursday Three--The Exile Version

I'm a Southerner living in San Diego, exiled nearly six years ago because I don't eat grits or shoot deer, and I purged the word fixin' from my vocabulary. And I couldn't just move to one of the border states, you know, those states that pretend not to be Southern but really are (I'm talking about you Virginia). I had to relocate clear across the United States and far enough away from Santee (local joke) to make my life a little safer than otherwise. But like any exile, I miss the South. So when Largehearted boy (via possumblog) posted this last week, I had to give it some thought but couldn't avoid answering it:

If I Had a Thousand Bucks

Maud points the way to a great resource for finding streaming video for countless writers and critics: Guide to Poetry & Literature Streaming Video.

Actually, I just mention this because I wanted to join the multitudes in congratulating Maud on her award. Don't spend it all in one place.

That's it for me. I think I may have broken my own record for most posts in a day. Now it's time to prepare for the Braves game against the San Francisco Bonds by eating some soup and chewing on a Tylenol 3.

While I Slept

Hubert Selby Jr. passed away on April 26th.

Leave it to the NYT to fail to mention a certain Selby book, one that was turned into a pretty good movie, Requiem for a Dream.

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I hope Rolling Stone writer Neil Strauss received hazard pay for this article. A night with Courtney Love these days probably rivals an evening spent in Fallujah:

Dressed down in a T-shirt and sweat pants, she is holed up here in hiding: from the paparazzi, from her manager, from the government, from the bank, from a man, from herself. She does not answer her phone, in case someone calls her "with some bullshit news about some fucking thing." One more turn of events for the worse, it seems, would push our thirty-nine-year-old protagonist over the edge.

"I have all the leading indicators for suicide," she says as she drops a cigarette butt into a bottle of Stewart's root beer. "Loss of child, loss of spouse, public humiliation, civil arrest, financial collapse, displacement from home."

After the scene in Boogie Nights in which William H. Macy shoots himself comes on the screen, Love turns and comments, "That's the first time I watched that scene without closing my eyes. After what happened, you can't really watch a scene like that. Sorry to . . ." She pauses, then begins again: "After ten years, it gets easier."

The Boogie Nights scene that really affects Love these days is when Julianne Moore loses custody of her child. When she sees it, her face flushes red and tears drip from her eyes, as they do every time anything comes up that reminds her of her eleven-year-old daughter, Frances Bean Cobain. One fateful night in October, Love was arrested outside the home of her ex-boyfriend for disorderly conduct and being under the influence of a controlled substance; later that night she called a hospital because she was worried she had overdosed on the prescription painkiller OxyContin. As a result, the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services came to her house the following week and took her daughter away. Love is currently renting a furnished apartment in L.A. that she despises, while Frances lives at home with Love's stepfather, Frank Rodriguez. Love is allowed to visit her daughter but not spend the night with her.

"Listen," she says. "I can't live through this. I can't." The allusion to the Hole CD Live Through This seems accidental.

Then her face reddens again, and she flaps her arms about, trying to hold back the tears. "But I don't have the option to not live. I have a responsibility to somebody. So I'll be the most miserable person in the world and service a child." The tears begin to escape now. "I've been waiting for her to get to this age, because that's when I'm best. That's when I'm best with her. I put her into school a little late. I had to tell her about when her dad died -- I had to give her the visual -- a year earlier than I wanted, because I didn't want someone else to tell her first."

She pauses, and her face is drenched now. "I'll kill them," she sobs. "I'll kill them, Neil!"

For My Wife

Because she was nice enough to take care of me yesterday and make sure that I didn't drown in a pool of my own unconsciousness, I want to spell it out in words, in this somewhat public forum: Thank you! If I could buy you a swimming pool and a kitchen like the one in that magazine, I would. Remember, the only good dream is the one that you're in.

Ditch of Iniquity and Tears

Los Angeles is a long 100 miles from my point on the map, 100 miles that might as well be 1000 on most days. On more than one occasion I've planned three hours to make the trip to Dodger Stadium and without fail I end up cursing the god of traffic. Six, sometimes seven lanes going one way and no matter what time or what day the 5 will be a crawl. Even in clear weather or sans traffic accident, one could finish most of a Norman Mailer novel in the time it takes to get from San Diego to L.A.

That being said, I had thoughts of going to the L.A. Festival of Books this past weekend, but the lingering illness and fear of that drive kept me at home. Thankfully, TEV's Anonymous Roving Correspondent filed a nice report:

I moved on to more pleasing pastures, if you will, and sat among the young bodies who congregated at the panel about independent magazines, which was presided over by Dave Eggers (McSweeney’s), Tamara Straus (Zoetrope All-Story), Edwin Frank (New York Review of Books Classics) (Hunh?) and Lawrence Weschler (Omnivore). The topic was “Can Independent Magazines Survive” which amused Eggers and perplexed Weschler, who stole the show with his inspired rant against “the reign of the Pavlovian address” that dominates media today with its mission to “jolt, salivate, spend.” Eggers used cheap laughs and easy applause whenever he didn’t feel like giving a straight answer, which was always, and I can’t say I blame him. An independent magazine’s ability to “survive” is a weird question since the last time I looked into the matter, no one trying to kill them off. (A prey without a predator isn’t really at risk, is it?) Whether an independent magazine “survives” is largely a fiscal question (the psychiatric state of those who undertake such ventures notwithstanding). Still, young people laughing is better than old people hacking and we’ll volunteer to sit quietly and gaze at Zoetrope’s blue-eyed editrix any day of the week. That was enough panels for me, and I left UCLA in search of a burrito and a baseball game, and ended up at the public library, which is a little like leaving a demolition derby and rear-ending an uninsured motorist on the way home.

A burrito at a baseball game sounds good right about now. And damn if the Dodgers aren't playing good baseball. It's April; plenty of time to fill the bandwagon before it reaches the cliff.

A Day Without Me

I've survived another trip to the dentist. What I can't tell you is how it went because I remember absolutely nothing save for a repeat request to change the radio station from Dashboard Confessional to "anything jazz" (I did the same last time and remember succumbing under the spell of Coltrane; this time I don't recall much other than a song that sounded eerily Kenny G). I do have one less tooth to worry about and in some ways that saddens me. Too much denial on my part for too many years. Too much neglect then fear then more neglect and denial. In a way the tooth was a victim of dentistry. Years ago it held the bracket that anchored my braces. For five years, it bore the metal noose that would eventually help to straighten my teeth. By the time that war had been won, the tooth was no longer what it once was. Before it came out, it had become a shell, a hiding place for anything small enough to escape into its grasp. The dentist told me that there wasn't much that could be done to save it. I could spend a couple thousand bucks but there was no guarantee that in five years it wouldn't have to come out anyway. I said, "Pull it."

So at age 33 I'm short one molar. I have some work left to be done, but it can wait until the insurance catches back up with the costs.

I came to at 7 pm with a sore jaw and bloody lips, a piece of gauze stuffed in the hole now the color of spoiled beef. My wife reports nothing out of the ordinary: no pleas for "lovin'," no rampages on why I should take sleeping pills on top of what the dentist ordered, no attempts to call work and, well, act the fool. In fact, I was a gentleman, as much as that's possible for me.

And to think, I didn't even get to keep the tooth to leave for the tooth fairy.

Whatever I Say (Redux)

7:15 am - Today's the day. Dentist. Visit. Number Two. I'll be popping the pills in a few minutes. If a post appears on here that makes less sense than usual, you'll know why.

Song on the Brain (4/23)

The day started out with a hole in the bottom of my coffee cup, a hole I didn't discover until halfway up the elevator. Knowing that the cup's contents offered my only hope at actually being productive for the first three hours of the day and realizing that I now had a nickel to my name, I did the only smart thing: I plugged the hole with my index finger. Hot coffee on the nerve endings tends to wake me up almost as quickly as drinking it. If we could ever get decent office coffee, I'd not only save a buck fifty a day but I wouldn't have to rely on cheap paper cups and the whim of the barista to have the best brew going at a quarter to seven each morning.

For lunch I decided on a cup of soup, but getting the soup became an adventure I'm not sure I wish to repeat. I had to stand behind a paranoid woman at the ATM. She kept staring at me in the little mirror over the machine, making sure that I couldn't see over her shoulder to steal the precious four digit code that locked away the perfume money. She even gave me some attitude as she walked away. Keep in mind that I was at least ten feet behind her, but I guess that's not enough when you have business to transact and you're paranoid. Then the diner where I get my French onion was packed and the line wrapped around to one of the outside tables where a woman sat alone carrying on a grand conversation with no one. I thought she was talking to me at first, but I could only make out one word: Awake. Two or three sentence-like structures, complete with hand gestures, but nothing that made it across the communication divide. I guess her imaginary friend understood because every so often the woman would nod her head in agreement.

When I left the diner, the woman was still chatting away. I noticed that she had two open cans of Red Bull in front of her, but I'm not sure if they were both for her or if the "other person" was enjoying the mid-day rush along with her.

Now it's Tuesday, another day I've dreaded for over a month. I won't remember anything, but I'm pretty sure that the part of me that is awake will be crazy.

So for all of this, I give you this installment of Songs on the Brain: Pylon's "Crazy."

Ovoidance1

For those of you waiting for the May issue of Spin for further evidence that Dave Eggers has contracted a nasty case of hypergraphia (also known as Joyce Carol Oatesism), you're out of luck. From the table of contents, listed as page number π, comes this

And Now, A Less Informed Opinion
"I was informed that this month's column was too good to be seen by the human eye. Next month, I will write a less good column, which will be visible to all." --Dave Eggers

¹Apologies for the title. Another SoCal heat wave has rendered my creativity useless.

The Piano Has Been Drinking (?)

Billy Joel + Car =

At this rate (three wrecks in two years), Joel will be down to driving Hyundais if someone doesn't yank his license.

From the Shitroom Shelf

The May issue (not online) of Spin features Marc Spitz's interview with Morrissey. [An aside: Business is difficult to conduct with Morrissey's face staring at you from the magazine stack; easier just to pick it up and give it a read.] After reading Burned by the Sun's review of a recent Morrissey show in Los Angeles, I found this paragraph very telling:

When he resumes touring in May (commencing with a birthday concert in Manchester, supported by Scottish acolytes Franz Ferdinand), films the video for Quarry's first single, "Irish Blood, English Heart," and returns to The Late Late Show for a weeklong residency, I wonder if the Morrissey he'll be presenting is the Morrissey that fans will be expecting. Nearly every lapel badge of T-shirt depicts the singer in his early 20s. With his temples now flecked with white, and his slightly fuller countenance, same may be disappointed. Morrissey seems aware of this, but he is not too preoccupied by it.

In a way the piece reads like the last chapter of or an addendum to Spitz's novel, How Soon Is Never?, in which a fictionalized version of the author goes on a crusade to reunite the Smiths but ends in disappointment when the main character cannot secure Morrissey for the reunion. The novel is only mentioned in passing and not as part of the interview as presented in the magazine, but one trip to Spitz's message board turns up a fragment that didn't make the final cut:

S: I hope that if you haven't read it yet or if you intend to read it, that nothing upsets you.

M: Well I get very nervous about reading the Smiths things because they're always so glaringly inaccurate, and they're always written by people who've never met me at the time that they write. So, I often wonder well, what could they possibly know? I mean, it's all very well if they're writing from and appreciative position of the music. But people don't write that way. They have to have the soaring inside knowledge about everything, and I often wonder how they can possible feel they have that if they haven't met me or they haven't been involved.

S: Right. Well, in my book, you're not a character. There's never any real discussion with you. You don't really say anything because we didn't see you in real life. There was nothing to base it on.

M: That usually doesn't stop me, honestly. And I'm not being funny. Everybody knows and understands the real me more so than I do.

Everyday Is Like Doing the Sunday Collapse

So after 39 albums and 6,487 songs (so I exaggerage a little), Guided by Voices will be no more at year's end.

And to think, Sunday is usually coffee, a book, and my fantasy baseball lineup. Now I have this to weigh me down. I guess the Pixies et al. prove that nothing is ever really finished, only abandoned.

From Guided By Voices.com:

After almost 20 years, assorted lineups, and countless albums, EPs, singles, triples, stolen bases, misdemeanor convictions, and broken hearts, Dayton, OH's fortunate sons are taking leave of your senses. 'Half Smiles Of The Decomposed,' to be released August 24 on Matador Records, will be the final album from Guided By Voices, one of the most acclaimed independent rock bands of all time.

"This feels like the last album for Guided By Voices," explains Robert Pollard, GBV's lone constant member, lead singer, and famously prolific songwriter. "I've always said that when I make a record that I'm totally satisfied with as befitting a final album, then that will be it. And this is it."

'Half Smiles Of The Decomposed' is the band's 15th full-length studio release, following 2003's 'Earthquake Glue' and retrospective box set, greatest-hits, and DVD releases. Although its tour later this year will be the band's last, Robert Pollard will continue writing, recording, and (possibly) touring as a solo artist. "I love the guys in the band, but I'm getting too old to be a gang leader," he explains. "There's a sense of maturity, and even integrity, I think, in continuing as one's own self."

{news and links from largehearted boy & chromewaves}

When the Head Is Full of Bees

Sickness, mostly a nice headache and all-around weakness, makes it difficult to do the simple things like post coherent thoughts about what I did today. Well, it's simple really. Slept, ate leftovers, watched the dumbest movie I've seen in a while, took lots of Alleve, regretted watching the stupid movie instead of reading but head hurt too much to read, slept.

Exciting way to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday.

Wha?

Can someone explain a) what the hell this googler is looking for and b) why I showed up on the search?

Search query: read long stories about people being forced to get naked then opening someone elses bell and lay in it until he entered

Death and the Movies

I would like to thank cinetrix for giving us reason not to return to our sick bed. Another afternoon wasted...

Oh, Julia Roberts, the actress that should die early in every movie she is in, has only two death scenes to her credit. More work needs to be done:

Steel Magnolias (1989) [Shelby Eatenton Latcherie]: Goes into a diabetic coma and later dies after being taken off the respirator. After the respirator is disconnected, the camera pans over to the monitor as she gradually flatlines, followed by a close-up of Julia's dead hand being held by Sally Field.

Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) [Patricia Watson]: Poisoned when Sam Rockwell switches their glasses so she drinks the poison she intended for him.

Weakness Week

I hope everyone is having a safe and fun-filled "TV-Turnoff Week." I'm not sure if this is what they meant, but I can guarantee you that my TV will be turned off at least once a day. You see, I have to have the TV on for baseball games. Then there's the VH1 Classic, which has become a favorite for the dogs during the day while we're at work. The wife can't miss her shows and...

But we'll turn it off, tonight, at bedtime, right after the news or possibly the Letterman monologue. And for next year, I'll read this list of helpful suggestions. I especially like number 3:

Major Judeo-Christian holidays fall during mid-April this year (Passover beginning on the 16th, and Easter falling on the 20th), and many people will use this time to turn off the television and reflect on our world and lives. [I guess this is a little dated, but good advice, huh?]

I truly am all about reflection. Just yesterday I was thinking about a particular episode of Leave It to Beaver. Does that count?

Not to be outdone by the anti-TV folks and perhaps in conjunction with their annual celebration, librarians everywhere are in the midst of National Library Week. It's always a great opportunity to see what the beautiful people are reading. {Link from Rake.}

In the past, I've anxiously awaited the beginning of Library Week. Many of the libraries I've frequented offered amnesty for us overdue books abusers. If only Blockbuster had the same sort of thing.

Speaking of overdue books, I still count one in my collection: The Mirror and the Lamp by M.H. Abrams. It's thirteen years overdue. I'd feel guilty about it, but according to the card still attached, I'm the only person to ever check it out, despite the fact that it went into circulation in the mid-70s.

In case you're wondering, Moby Dick is my favorite novel with Kerouac's Dharma Bums a distant second.

For Those of You Reading Along

The latest selection in the Oprah Book Club is Carson McCuller's The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. Oprah credits Julia Roberts for "reminding" her to read the novel, though she claims that it has been on her "to read" list for years.

See what happens when you're on the couch, both hands clutching the side of your head, and the remote is a good table-length away? You get stuck watching Oprah. The show did feature a nice wrap-up of the One Hundred Years of Solitude reading experience, including interviews with Shakira and Daryl Hanna about their love for the book and Gabriel García Márquez. Also, the show mentioned the oft told story of how García Márquez came to write the novel. While in the car on the way to Acapulco with his family, he suddenly had a flash of inspiration, turned the car around, and told his wife to take care of the family and the bills that he would be upstairs writing. A year and a half later, he came downstairs, plopped down the manuscript, and told his wife that it was finished. She looked at him, smiled, and handed him a stack of bills.

Rum, Sodomy, and Links

I should know by now that it is probably not a good idea to nurse a pounding headache in an apartment with a dog that likes to bark at dust. If my head didn't hurt so much--self-diagnosis: stress and/or someone slipped me some chocolate--I'd come up with a way to scare the bark out of him, or at the very least I'd muzzle him after slipping him some children's dramamine. But I'm not cruel (yet!).

Even with the migraine, I had to leave my sickbed today to take care of two separate but equally unfun medical matters. The first I will file under TMI and leave you to your imagination; the second involved picking up the little pills of forgetfulness from the dentist. Sedation dental visit number two is next Tuesday, which means I'll have generous bouts of nervousness and regret for the next few days. Too bad I can't just down the pills now and get it over with. Or maybe I could give them to the dog (not yet!).

So that the day won't be a complete loss, I've scanned a few sites for links to pass along:

+ Geoff has posted his own ten worst songs ever. Without a doubt, those songs could easily replace mine. I was also reminded yesterday that I should never forget to include The Ace of Base in my list. True.

+ Shane MacGowan, former singer and all-around pretty boy (see for yourself) for the Pogues, suffered facial injuries in a bar fight. Here's hoping he didn't lose any teeth...(from TMFTML).

+ Ed writes an open letter to Bush supporters.

+ San Diego has been named one of America's most livable cities. Obviously, livable does not equal affordable.

+ Maud reviews Stephen Elliot's Happy Baby, a book that I looked for this past weekend but was unable to find. I did grab a copy of Elliot's A Life Without Consequences and will be placing an order for Happy Baby as soon as my next freelance check comes in.

+ Happy 57th to James Osterberg, aka Iggy Pop.

If I Never Hear This Song Again...

Sometimes a top "insert number" list comes along that is just too tempting, a list that screams for my attention. In its May issue, Blender serves up its opinion of the 50 worst singles ever. The USA Today story gives us a peak at the bottom 10, a handful of songs that I agree should be banned from radio play. But I have my own list of songs that make me race for the mute button:

Charlotte Sometimes

Choose one:

a) Charlotte Church high on coke
b) Charlotte Church naked
c) Charlotte Church high on coke, naked, and singing a song about you

{In case you think I've lost it, see this story}

The Hockey Player and the Hitman

What part of this story makes the least amount of sense:

The complaint alleges that Danton actually was trying to kill a male acquaintance whom he had fought with Tuesday over Danton's "promiscuity and use of alcohol." The complaint said Danton feared the acquaintance, who is not named, would talk to St. Louis Blues management and ruin Danton's career.

Since when did a professional athlete actually worry about promiscuity or alcohol use? Silly me, but I thought that both were included in a player's contract. This is all just a little too Tonya Harding for my taste.

(Update: This whole thing appears to be a bit more tangled and complicated than a simple pipe to the shins. According to this, the situation may have evolved out of an attempted "outing." I guess in retrospect Mike Piazza's press conference a while back seems to make more sense, though it was pretty clear at the time that the world of sports has a long ways to go when it comes to being open to people of all persuasions.)

The Unusual Suspect

When I saw the headline "Kevin Spacey: 'I fell for a con'," I thought he might be admitting that his role as producer and actor in The United States of Leland had been coerced by some contract trickery. After all, I plopped down my $6.50 (matinee) to see this movie this weekend, and I think I fell for a con, too. At times, I felt as if I might be at a new "Afternoon Special" screening, one in which the Pixies provided a few songs for the soundtrack. Nice formula, redone for the nth time: Brooding teenager fed up with the adult world escapes by committing a brutal murder. He can't stand the suffering of the outcast, in this case a mentally challenged boy, so he stabs him to rid him of the inevitable pain, to free the boy from not only his own dysfunctional family, but from a world full of dysfunctional families. I could go on, but I don't want to ruin the ending for those of you who might have nothing better to do this weekend.

Alas, though, this con was about Spacey's cell phone being stolen and the resulting false police report Spacey filed in hopes that the cops would nab the kid who tricked him. I wonder if the kid walked or ran away with a noticeable limp that disappeared when he got around the corner. That would have been classic.

Conspiracy

If you buy into conspiracy theories or like to look at the connections between certain dates and historical events, you might want to spend the next few days in your fallout shelter. Today starts it: Waco and the Oklahoma City bombing both took place on April 19th. Tomorrow, you have Hitler's birthday and the Columbine shooting. Of course, April 20th is also "Smoke out" day, so grab a bong and tie one on.

I'll be back with regular posting tomorrow.

If all goes well...