Gravitational Constant: G = 6.67 x 10-8 cm-3 gm-1 sec-2 (AKA More Shit Taken For Granted Until It's Too Late)

INT- 4843 BRIDGEMONT LANE, SPRING, TEXAS, 77388. NIGHT.

The year is 1993, and a young DAVE SMITH sits five feet from the television, watching Headbangers Ball. His parents and brother are all sound asleep, as they usually are at this late hour. DAVE is entranced by the current video, which appears to be a song by a band of imposing, vampiric Eastern Europeans surrounded by hot women and freakish extras. The frontman of the band plays an upright bass like a guitar, rolling his eyes back in his head and flashing literal fangs. DAVE tapes this video and watches it numerous times, sharing it with his brother SCOTT on the old TV the family bought years earlier in Italy. Time changes DAVE's understanding of what he's seeing, but it doesn't change the meaning. He has discovered Type O Negative.

INT- SOMEONE'S FAMILY'S APARTMENT, CARACAS, VENEZUELA. NIGHT.

1996. DAVE SMITH sits in a tile-floored room with several friends, listening to Type O Negative's cover of "Paranoid," but only DIPTO CHAUDHURI is into it to the same degree. It seems like everyone these two dudes hold dear is leaving, and they revel in Type O's amazingly bleak take on Black Sabbath's classic, playing the song over and over.

INT- PETE'S CAR, HUNTSVILLE, TEXAS. DAY.

1999. DAVE SMITH and PETE SWULIUS sit in the latter's car, smoking cigarettes and absorbing the first minutes of Type O Negative's newest album, World Coming Down. "It's Type O," they say approvingly.


These are my three strongest memories involving Type O Negative. There are more, of course, but these are the ones that come to mind when I consider the news that Peter Steele, TON's frontman, died yesterday of heart failure. I remember when Yi-Lei Wu came back from a trip to the States with a copy of October Rust. I remember smoking a bidi with the Swulii outside Numbers after seeing Type O in '99. I remember buying Life Is Killing Me years after it was released, during a period when I realized I hadn't listened to TON in a while. I remember Fran Torres playing keyboards for my brother's band, Last Eve, and looking particularly like Josh Silver, hair- and playing-wise.

I remember a lot of things that have involved Type O Negative over the past seventeen years, but of course it takes Peter Steele's death to make me remember just how much I loved, and still love, this band. Maybe that's what death is for, aside from being something to fear and make hilariously tasteless jokes about. I don't know. Every time I think I'm getting a handle on things, shit like this happens and I realize the scope of my assumptions about life as I know. Christ.

Hail Type O Negative. Requiescat in pace Peter Steele. Those chicks in the "My Girlfriend's Girlfriend" and "Black No. 1" videos were hot. Thanks for everything.

Sinister.

Among the recent things I've done is a short-lived attempt at doing things with my right hand. Being fortunate to have been born in a time not insistent on having my natural tendency toward things sinister rather than dexter beaten or cajoled out of me, I took an opportunity last night to try to brush my teeth with my right hand. My teeth ended up clean, sure, but it was not an easy task. My brain knew what to do, and my hand valiantly followed orders, but in a manner most awkward and tedious. A task that would've normally taken two minutes took more like six. Afterward, I tried writing English words and Chinese characters right-handed, which was an even clumsier undertaking. Ambidexterity might be achieved some day (or month, or year), but I think I'll postpone attempts until something tragic happens to my left hand... in which case I won't be so much ambidextrous as unidextrous, albeit with my new dominant hand.

It's Tuesday night, but it feels like Thursday, because this week's academic hurdle came, and was overcome, earlier in the week than usual. I've taken to staying up until well past midnight on Thursdays, writing and generally soaking up the witching-hour atmosphere, but tonight I can't afford to do so. Duties call, so I'm going to torch one more gasper and call it a night. I won't even read any of Anathem before turning out the light.

In lieu of delving further into my well-over-a-decade-old obsession with late nights enjoyed in quiet domestic environs- a situation in the midst of which I again find myself- I instead urge you to listen to the Mount Fuji Doomjazz Corporation's Succubus. Accompanied, perhaps, by tobacco and alcohol, and silent rumination on subjects best left undiscussed.

Good night.

Itinerary.

48 hours from now I'll be in San Diego, California, enjoying the first leg of a trip up and down the Golden State (or, as Erik Davis would put it, the Visionary State) with my girlfriend.

Twelve and a half hours from now I have a Chinese midterm.

Right now I'm not studying. Right now I'm enjoying some DCPD Bangerz, sipping tequila with Peychaud's bitters, Controy, and water, and daydreaming about skateparks and other assorted things.

I'll try to write from Cali-forn-eye-ay. Failing that, I'll drop whatever verbiage I concoct out west here when I get back to H-Town. (I'll also try not to use ridiculous nomenclature, though that's a dodgy proposition.)

Zaijian, pengyou.

"this is my curb"

"this is my curb"



"Skate curbs, smoke cigarettes."
...say hi to groms, moms, dads,
ice cream man.

That ain't wax,
that's aluminum. Months and months of Trackers and Indies
laid down on these curbs, mere yards from 35,000 square feet
of high-grade Grindline concrete.
It's easier out here, if you don't count pedestrians
and the occasional Parks and Recreation vehicle
rumbling through.
Stoge sessions sometimes, bitching about work
or just the rough concrete,
but mostly just Sk8-His and a set of 160somethings:
remember to lean back
and soon you'll be showing axle and
blowing the fuck out of some orange Khiros.

"Drink coffee, skate curbs."
snapshot: coffee grind
(backside 50/50, joe in hand).

Book it: only way to go. Remember to lean back
or you'll never enter the kingdom,
'cause bails don't count.
"how's it going, man?"
It's going, man.
It's
going. Let me see if I can nail this
feeble,
dig this fenceposted sunset and crank up the Rockboxed
metal before I have to go back in
and do what I'm gettin' paid to do.

Be back in an hour
for ten minutes of Tom Knox action. This
is my curb.

interstitial pome, number whatever

That was, in its way,
accidental:
the Tao of the house
seeing fit
that the rubber bat
stays aloft.

2.10.10

Apexin', dude

I remember it like it's tomorrow. Chris puts down his pen, looks up from the notebook full of BBS numbers and game maps he keeps next to his computer, and blinks. He takes a long swig of Coke, glances at the pack of cigarettes his dad left behind when he called it quits for the night, and almost reaches for one but doesn't, knowing he's already got an addictive personality (and besides, his dad will notice any missing smokes; he counts them carefully since he's trying to quit). Takes another swig of Coke.

"It's messed up," he says, "but this is what people are going to put on a pedestal. It doesn't matter how fast their machines get, what their baud rates are, or even if they've got computers that fit in their pockets. They'll get nostalgic about playing computer games in basements with wood paneling. Shitty graphics will be awesome. Nobodies will be heroes."

Before he sits back in his chair he plucks a Marlboro from the pack on the desk and lights it. "This is it," he grins behind the cigarette. "Apexin', dude."

"this is not the heart sutra speaking"

There will be no return to form.
There was never any form
to begin with. This is not the Heart
Sutra speaking; this emptiness is the
one we know, the one we fear, the
shape and texture we think we
associate with the darkest of nights.
Emptiness cultivated by trying
to hold it at bay. We'll return,
there's no doubt of that; it's just
a question of what we bring
back, or what we leave behind.
When we've returned, thinking
the sun has banished whatever
we just did, it won't be to form.

I've been much more silent than I intended. It's been a busy month; I feel like the 3.5" disk that runs my brain's OS has been swapped with a different one containing an operating system that handles school and work programs and very little else. Ugh.

A little somethin' for 2010.

LADIES & GENTLEMEN, the brain tonight isn't moving in the unexpected directions you may have expected given the circumstances, but rest assured there are still sirens screaming down West Alabama, holes in the elbow of someone else's sweater, too many minutes spent surfing (oh, OUTDATED!) increasingly few websites, bursts of laughter and temperatures that make putting beer, NA variety, in the fridge an unnecessary move, movement all done in cars at this hour and degree Fahrenheit, 'cept for the hipsters earlier bookin' it westward (swig) on their bikes; all the accoutrements and claptrap but as of yet none of the loneliness that the bottle and House of Pies sing to (why drink? why eat? Food's in the fridge, hombre) or sang to, so much seems past tense, definitely past and still sometimes tense, shoulder muscle tense, tense you don't find in Chinese, quite a blessing for the student of 中文 if you don't mind the cold fingers & copybook rote practice of 汉字, not me, that shit is great- hope the cat isn't too lonely, bet she's fine, we've got an understanding, 'cause sometimes, solitaire nights and that shoulder all tight again, you just have to be home, where the office is a mess and Elvira's watching you do zazen, all outta page and there goes the 78, later, folks, but no more than one or two-

Zero hour minus 13.

I've got my Chinese 1501 final tomorrow. Once I'm done, I hope to use my winter break (from school, not work, naturally) productively, in a writerly sense. We shall see.

Let's just hope I don't forget a semester's worth of Chinese in three weeks and ruin my current academic respectability come springtime.

"Barrows"

Barrows

We opened the tombs of
our ancestors, kings and heroes all,
only to find them empty,
quiet homes of dust and memory.
Our sacred myths founded on vacant architecture
and lies our great-grandfathers told
to keep the nighttime silence at bay.

No splendid treasure-hoards,
no bones to brighten the microscope's
eye, no spells to
ward off the other side's ravenous denizens,
only the tombs, hillside after hillside,
hewn stone mouths speaking
for nobody, nothing but the earth.

Thoughts on output.

I've been more prolific, in some ways, this past year than I have in a long while. One of my biggest problems with defining prolificity is the issue of length: have I written anything longer than a few hundred words, much less a proper short story or, even better, a novel? Not really. I've merely been amassing vignettes, poems, and fragments of ideas that if properly fleshed out could be seed material for longer works. I've also written a few episodes of the new iteration of Unheimlich, which if I haven't mentioned was revived by Andy Link in the form of a next-generation Xbox Live game. It's still in the daydreaming and scripting phase, but if it never gets past that, it's a better fate than its ancestor, Unheimlich the novel, faced.

So, despite being used to writing long-form works ("used to" being an increasingly inappropriate phrase, given my overall literary silence for some time), I'm faced with a plethora of short pieces that in the old days wouldn't amount to shit, but these days do. The sheer amount of small things I've cranked out lately- I've filled all but a few pages of a pocket notebook in seven months, whereas in the past it would've taken considerably longer to do so, and there are probably plenty of scribbles and vague textfiles floating around my house and hard drive- serves as the main metric by which I consider myself "prolific." There's something else to take into account, though, and that's whether producing a great deal of work counts for anything if said work isn't being pushed into publication.

I'm torn. Part of me, the much younger, militantly authorial, part, says "if you're not publishing, or trying to publish, then you're a dilettante," whereas another part of me- which the younger part understood, even back then, though it was hard to come to terms with- says "You're writing. That's all you've ever wanted. Stop beating yourself up about whether anyone reads it, much less pays you for it, and just write."

I tend to think the latter approach, which has always been the real reason for writing but is hard to stomach when you really want to make a career of writing, has the upper hand in my current inner debate about whether I'm writing a lot. I'm definitely enjoying writing for the hell of it, even if it I'm still frustrated that I can't seem to cough up anything longer than a page or two. I suppose that kind of dilemma's an intrinsic part of writing- not that it makes it any easier when you're up late at night wondering where all your ideas have gone and whether or not people will ever read something of yours that isn't maudlin, self-indulgent moaning.

Whatever. Fuck it. I'm happy with how much I'm writing, and I can see certain changes (for the better, I think) in how I write. I'm even posting more regularly to this web log, which I've missed dearly. Who cares if I'm not submitting work left and right or writing another novel?

Good enough. Good. Enough.

Happy Bodhi Day.

-DAS 12.8.09

"Field Recordings"

The sound of two-inch tape hisses and rustles in the weeds. Someone's forgotten they were supposed to be making field recordings, left their gear behind. That was 1971; since then kids have been discovering the machine and replaying the sounds the tape never captured. They don't know how it works- the batteries are corroded slugs- and they don't care. They press play, rewind, play again, fast forward, rewind, judging the permutations of blank soundscape. Nobody thinks to take the machine home, clean it up. It's been in the same empty lot forever, as much of a secret landmark as the curb behind the convenience store, the crucifix nailed upside down to that one tree in the woods. Silence, waiting for encroachment from a child's aeon ago.

(12.3.09- revisions 12.7.09)

D.A.'s Favorite Five Records of 2009

D.A.'s Favorite* Five Records** of 2009

It's close enough to the end of the year for me to make some assessments of the albums I acquired in 二零零九年, or as the Chinese say, deuce double ought nine. It's been a tough year for music, I think, mostly from a personal standpoint: I spent a quarter of the year unemployed and the rest of it saving as much money as I could to pay UH's insane tuition, so I lacked the usual discretionary record-buying funds my income prior to 11/08 allowed.

Not buying records on a near-weekly basis has left me out of the loop. It used to be that I knew what had come out in the recent past and what was coming out in the immediate future, so I could pass more informed judgments about the state of music (music that might interest me, that is) for any given year than I can at the moment. For example, a year or two ago the appearance of a new Nile record would not have caught me completely by surprise, and I would've been aware that Portal would be unleashing another disc of extraplanar death metal, but not this year. It's not just poverty that keeps me from being a record nerd, of course. Between work and school I have a lot less free time than I used to, and I turned 30 three months ago, which officially makes me old, befuddled, and out of touch with the hip kids, so I'm not pulling from as extensive a list as I normally would.

Now that the excuses and rationalizations are out of the way, here are some records I really dug this year. Even if your taste in music differs from mine (which it inevitably does; don't worry, I won't mock you too much), these are albums I'd recommend to anyone. Whether or not you'll like them is, of course, a decision for you alone to make; I hope you take the time to check them out and make that decision.


Current 93- Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain

Matt, my brother from another mother with the same last name, turned me on to Current 93 about ten years ago. I won't try to describe, much less explain, this band (which is one dude, David Tibet, and a revolving handful of comrades) here, other than to say that they make folk music if folk music were written by an English prophet/artist even more obscure than William Blake who was into children's rhymes and prog rock. Or some such shit; the point is that C93 is unique, and "Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain" is unique among their discography, mainly because it's a pretty heavy, electric guitar-oriented record. Part of me doesn't want to talk too much about it in the hopes that my silence intrigues you enough to hear it for yoursel-and because silence is sacred- but another part of me could spend a solid hour talking, and maybe two hours writing, about this album. "Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain" is probably the best record of the year in my book.

N.B. If it's worth anything, I bought this on CD and on vinyl. Side 4 of the double LP has all the album's lyrics put to a piece of music not included among the normal tracks, and it works really, really well. I also got hold of a copy of "Monohallucinatory Mountain," which is a mono mix of "Aleph at...", through questionable channels (read: downloading). I'm not an audiophile, but I can say the difference between the regular and mono mixes is noticeable, and changes the atmosphere of the album in a way worth hearing. Yes, I have this album in three different formats, and it's completely worth it.


Deströyer 666- Defiance

Long story short: this is a band I blew off for far too long because I didn't care for their name. In late '03 or early '04 I got my shit together and bought "Cold Steel For An Iron Age", their latest record at the time. They promptly became, and remain, one of my favorite metal bands, and they exemplify the widely recognized excellence and brutality of Australian heavy metal. "Defiance" is their first full-length in six years, and while it may initially not impress fans in the way their older work does, after a few spins there's no doubt that this is quality stuff, and by no means a slack effort. As an added bonus, it contains one of the best lyrics I've ever heard: "have the gods not failed enough that we must conjure more?". Take that, theists.

Mastodon- Crack the Skye

I almost didn't include this. I listened to "Crack the Skye" about a thousand times in the month after it came out, and I saw Mastodon play the entire album live three weeks ago, so I'm almost burned out. Luckily, I already wrote a review of it, which you can find here at this very web log. 'Nuff said.


Wolves in the Throne Room- Black Cascade

Definitely harder to get into than their last full-length, "Two Hunters," and I'm still not sure why. At some point I thought I'd figured it out, but I've forgotten what my theory was. No matter; this is yet another stellar release from one of the newest crop of American black metal bands. All of their albums are near-masterpieces, and their sound and ideology, both of which have been criticized for numerous reasons but to little lasting effect, are a logical extension of and welcome addition to the black metal scene. Perhaps it's their roots in Washington State, and/or their Thoreau-like appreciation of nature, but Wolves in the Throne Room strike me as an alternate universe Beat black metal outfit. I don't know if the band would appreciate that or not, but I don't care: as I see it, if Jack Kerouac grew up on Romantic poetry and heavy metal tales of pagan forests, he may well have tried (and knowing Kerouac, likely failed) to start a band like this. Listen to "Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog," especially the last two and a half minutes, and maybe you'll see what I mean.


YTCracker- Chrono Nurga vol. 1

"High five for the Cat5, and a fat drive, and a quarter of weed."

That pretty much sums up YTCracker's attitude on this album. If you aren't familiar with nerdcore hip-hop, of which YTCracker is a progenitor, imagine hip-hop with geeky subject matter: in this dude's case, spamming, Nintendo games, programming, defunct sodas, and nerd life in general. "Chrono Nurga vol. 1" consists of raps laid down over beats lifted from the old RPG Chrono Trigger, which I'm ashamed to admit I have yet to play despite hearing nothing but good about the game. You'd think such a project would have little more than novelty value, but you'd be wrong. (Such an argument could be made for nerdcore as a whole, but again, you'd be wrong.) Peppered throughout the album's eight tracks are lines that strike a chord, and not only because part of me is somehow still surprised by poignancy in music like this. "Chrono Nurga vol. 1" doesn't have the range of "Nerd Life" or even "Nerdrap Entertainment System," but it's a solid album in its own right, lyrically and musically. YTCracker, despite all his bragadoccio, most certainly knows what it's like to be a nerd. Be prepared for obtuse references, crudeness, and the us-versus-you attitude that so many of us who've always felt at odds with our less intelligent but somehow socially superior fellows have adopted from time to time. Don't sweat it if you don't catch some of the references, because I didn't either. What matters is that a dude ganked some old Playstation beats, threw this thing together in a day, and did it with enough heart and wit to beat out albums that might otherwise have made this list.

"Show that nerd life off, never hide it."



* In no particular order.
**Not just records, but CDs, tapes, mp3s, whatever.

(as of yet) untitled poem + a recommendation.

The song of harlots and saints
resounds in chambers without walls
or walls of bone, smooth curvature of bone.
The stars hide behind light and a hundred
wheels spin.
Children grit their teeth, prepare to fall,
as parents demand more. Young masks
tear at the edges when ten thousand
tomorrows arrive today.
But today
there is no today, only now,
the moment of noise and lines.

11.11.09
----

YTCracker's dropped a new one, chrono nurga vol. 1. Dig it. Nerd life.

Unsummary.

Iced tea and a cigarette. Geocities comes to an end, and with it the internet as so many of us knew it. The ego as time bomb. New YT Cracker release awaiting extraction from a .zip file. A day of rain. That cold-weather smell, not because it's that cold but because it's just cool enough for an extra layer. Abyssal power struggles. Locks in need of powdered graphite. Too many appliances. Pumpkins awaiting faces. Move along.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood!

(tl;dr version: nice weather and skateboarding rule)

It's been a weird year for Houston, weather-wise. June was brutally hot. July was, to nobody's surprise, also hot. August was a little more mellow, but only in comparison to what it usually is. September sucked: the temperatures didn't seem to drop, and the humidity was awful. October, when most of us would agree that H-Town starts catching up with the seasonal rotation thing, has been a little more forgiving, though it's still been humid as shit. Today, however, Mother Nature has dropped a boon on my fair city in the form of mid-70s temperatures, clear skies, and steady breezes. This, my friends, is the way things should be. Like I told a buddy at the skatepark earlier today, I understand why people are willing to shell out the fat cash to live in SoCal, where days like this are routine.

Even better, it's my Saturday. I had a rad green smoothie for breakfast, then went to the skatepark to make the most of the weather and drop off some Tracker Fastracks for a buddy looking to set up a cruiser. I saw, for the first time in months, one of the guys who was a stalwart of the 8 AM scene when Jamail still opened that early and when I didn't work there. Threw down some increasingly solid feeble grinds on the curbs outside the park, and started plotting my conquest of a particular quarterpipe via backside rock n' rolls. Stopped at Half Price Books and walked out with a couple promising books, one of which is by Stephen Batchelor, who I can't recommend enough if you want a clear, meaningful, and modern approach to Buddhism. Came home, drank some Koenig Ludwig weissbier- 'cause it's that kind of day, dudes- and jammed some MC Frontalot and 3 Inches of Blood. Later, I'll probably go lay waste to some neighborhood curbs and/or do some/all of the following: take a nap, read, visit my brother, smoke cigarettes, go back to the skatepark, and maybe some things I haven't even thought about yet. Days like this are why we're put on earth.

Shout-outs to Aaron Estrada, War Master, Santa Monica Airlines, D, Daniel, Richard, tahini, cheap lighters, and West Alabama Street.


Impervious to fire, impervious to steel,
D.A.S.

Some words.

"Every waking moment is a footstep deeper into a labyrinth where the meaninglessness of life pursues us like a patient minotaur." -Lina Strade

Notes on the transportive function of music

(As always, the text below is not to be taken as fully fleshed out, or likely to be completed.)

Some pieces of music- riffs, melodies, whole songs- perform one of music's most potent functions, which for lack of better words I'll term the transportive function. This term can be broken down into specific types of transport, since not all music serves the same purpose, but I'm going to focus on temporal transport, i.e., the removal of the listener from the present into the past or future. Further subclassification is possible: there are riffs and songs to remind one of their actual past, free of whitewashing or embellishment; music that filters the listener's past through the lens of nostalgia; music that evokes a mythological past that never happened at all; or, looking forward, music that launches the listener to a future that may never be, or provides a more earthbound sense of the possibilities down the road. I'm not going to concern myself with examining each of these responses to music- too exhausting- but stick to musing on the general transportive function.

The right piece of music can cause the listener can enter into a state of mind similar to, perhaps almost identical to, one they've been in before. There are a number of variables that go into determining whether a given song or riff will do the trick, all of them personal and therefore outside the scope of this piece; besides, anyone who's serious about music is usually aware of why certain songs affect them the way they do. Anyway, the music producing this result need not have been heard previously; indeed, one of the most fascinating things about the transportive function is that it doesn't require familiarity, instead working as a sort of instantaneous, hands-free time machine. I can't say for sure if the first time one hears a piece of music is the most powerful in terms of the transportive function, but I lean toward a negative answer, based on personal experience and because engrossing oneself in a piece of music allows a listener to hear more deeply, which can make the transportive function either more effective or cause it to function differently. It should also be noted that specificity, in regard to precisely when in time a piece of music moves the listener, can be a non-issue. I'd hazard to guess that most people's experiences with the transportive function can be described more along the lines of "this takes me back to the fall of '04" or "that song is, like, what I imagine music will be like twenty years from now" than "January 12th, 1989, in my brother's room." Whether the music takes one to a vaguely or clearly-defined time isn't that important, although that could be argued.

One thing I'm unsure of, probably because it just occurred to me and I'm too impatient to stop and think about it, is whether the transportive function is completely involuntary or not. I don't think it is, because one can react to a song one way for X amount of time only to react differently later- e.g., one associates a song with a good (or bad) time in their life, only to reevaluate their feelings later and find that they loathe/love the song now. That said, people don't often actively change their response to music, for whatever reasons or lack thereof, and I suspect the transportive function has something to do with this. People like associating a song with a specific time and/or place, whether or not thinking about why that is would, in the long run, allow them to get more from the music. I'm as guilty of this as the next guy, and I'm not blaming anyone for anything.

That's all I've got for the time being. If I think of anything else to add, I'll try to remember to do so, but I'm already planning my next entry. It should be up within the week, if all goes well.

Zaijian!

-DAS

P.S. The song that got me thinking about the transportive function in the first place, and that has been listened to numerous times since I started writing this entry, is "Ghosts of Grace" by Nachtmystium. Where does it take me? I'm still trying to nail that down.

Run ragged.

Things I've done in the past couple weeks: started my new job at the skatepark, moved closer to finishing this semester's Chinese class, and absorbed a great amount of new music. What I haven't done: meditate. For the past eight or nine months I've been pretty strict about getting in 30 minutes to an hour a day on the ol' meditation cushion. It's been a useful habit, and when I miss more than the occasional session I notice a distinct difference in the way I perceive and react to things. It sucks.

My failure in the past week to meditate each day has been taking a toll on me. I don't think of myself as being particularly susceptible to stress, but just because I believe (or don't believe) something doesn't make it true; the confluence of recent events seems to be wearing me out, moreso mentally than physically- though that's a factor too, given that I'm standing around in the heat all day for a living now. On top of my non-diminishing to-do list, I've been listening to lots of new music, much of which is intricate, heavily textured, raw, and/or laden with textual and philosophical meaning. It's a lot to digest, and I've only begun cramming my mouth full and trying to chew. Alongside that comes a fair amount of reading about said music, via metal 'zines like Oaken Throne and Convivial Hermit, which expands the range of my thinking about what I've been hearing. Summa summarum, I've been overloading my mind and underutilizing the decompression tool of meditation, and it's no good. Interesting, maybe, but mostly exhausting.

This isn't a complaint, by the way, but rather an analysis. I'm aware of what's wrong and how to alleviate it, something I don't know that I could have done even a few years ago.

Good night.

a quick note

Something I'll try to expand upon later:

One of the reasons I love heavy metal is that it is a channel for the expression of ideas and sentiments that are usually at odds with those professed by the majority of people. Not boring political issues, but metaphysical and philosophical concepts. It's good that metal is there to provide a framework for understanding my periodic nihilism and distaste for mankind, just as I'm glad that metal has provided such an extensive network of resources for delving into the esoteric, heretical, and left-handed.

The Perils of Astral Projection in Late Imperial Russia

All right, here's some heavy metal musings at long last. Today's topic: Mastodon's latest record, Crack the Skye, which is a concept album of sorts. I'm not going to go too deeply into the details of the concept part, as such information is readily available online. Better yet, you could listen to the record and read the liner notes. The latter course of action is unquestionably the superior one, because as cool as it is to read that Crack the Skye deals with the accidental adventures of a paraplegic astral traveler who ends up in Rasputin's body just before Rasputin is offed by Yusupov and company, among other things, it's far more rewarding to absorb the songs and their lyrics as the band intended. Mastodon's graphic design is, as always, top notch, so the liner notes are an aesthetic treat unto themselves.

Blood Mountain, Mastodon's last record, didn't really do it for me, or at least I don't remember it doing much for me. It had its moments, but I seem to recall a lot of stuff that didn't strike my eardrums the right way. When I heard about Crack the Skye I decided to listen to Blood Mountain again to see what I thought of it a couple years later. To my dismay, I found the CD case but not the CD, so I said "fuck it" and went ahead and bought Crack the Skye. If my fears that the new album would be too much like the last came true, it wouldn't be the first time I was burned by giving a band another shot. (Note that Leviathan, the album prior to Blood Mountain, was fantastic, and after digging the hell out of it, I went back to my copy of Remission, which I hadn't cared for, and found that it was more to my liking the second time around.)

Crack the Skye marks the second time I've been pleasantly surprised- nay, fucking floored- by this band, and establishes, in my mind at least, a Star Trek-like one-good-one-bad pattern. The musicianship is incredible; it's expansive and intriguing without lapsing into wankery. It's got a great texture to it, which the production does an excellent job of emphasizing. It's heavy without being conventionally so, and no, that's not code for "downtuned," "lots of blast beats," or "merely heavier than what you'd hear on the radio." (It is the latter, but really, what isn't unless you're listening to KTRU?) Importantly, the heaviness is tempered by- or provides gravitational force to- a kind of ethereality that pervades the record, which is in keeping with its lyrical concept. Everything flows, too. While each song is very good on its own merits, they all work together exceptionally well to give form to that increasingly rare specimen, the album. Kudos for Mastodon for structuring things so well and promoting repeated, extended listening sessions; then again, if they hadn't done so, the record wouldn't work too well as a concept album.

One of the things that turned me off of Blood Mountain was the vocal work. It sounded like Mastodon, but not really. Crack the Skye continues in the same vocal direction, but this time the band has figured out what I imagine they were aiming for on their last release. There's a lot less harsh throatwork here than there was in the past, but it couldn't be otherwise; this is Mastodon's tribute to prog rock, and while there's certainly room for death metal vocals in such an approach (viz. Opeth), the material here requires the mostly clean melodicism found in the vocals. Some vocal effects are used, but they don't come out of nowhere or fail to make sense, keeping with the overall flow mentioned above.

When I first conceived of this little essay, I intended to spend half of it venting my spleen about the absurdity of autocracy, particularly in the form of czarism and even more specifically as personified by Nicholas II. I was also going to wax venomous about the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia's decision in 1981 to canonize the Romanovs as martyrs. I shit you not. These are the kind of mental tangents listening to Crack the Skye inspired. I doubt anyone else would end up thinking along those lines, but I'd say it's a testament to the album's power that it not only creates a fascinating universe of its own, but that said universe seeps out into the minds of those who encounter it by listening to the record. Even if one sets the lyrical content aside, there are all kinds of riffs and melodies here that will fasten themselves to your skull like tentacles. Just as further expeditions into the depths of Leviathan yielded new insights, spinning Crack the Skye several times will provide not only hours of entertainment, but a greater understanding of, among other things, the nature of heaviness and progressiveness- not to mention the precautions that should be taken when leaving one's body for the astral plane.

-DAS, 4.16.09

Coming soon!

Hopefully within the next week- probably the next few days- I'll be writing about some records I've been diggin' as of late, and the satellite ideas I have about them.

The records:

Mastodon- Crack the Skye
Darkthrone- Dark Thrones and Black Flags
Wolves in the Throne Room- Two Hunters

Check 'em out for yourself in the meantime.

The perils of (non)alcohol.

Since I quit drinking last August I've taken to drinking non-alcoholic beer. I don't drink as much of it as I did real beer, but it's a decent analog- or so I thought. Last night I drank about four bottles of O'Doul's; several hours later, I woke up with nasty gut pains, which were as surprising as they were unpleasant since I rarely have gastrointestinal trouble. The pain continued through the night and into the next morning, finally easing up, for the most part, late this morning. By mid-afternoon, I felt more or less normal, though I was still clueless as to what caused the episode.

Tonight I had another couple NA beers, and within an hour I had both a slightly upset stomach and a sudden realization. Maybe it's just O'Doul's, but non-alcoholic beer looks like it ain't gonna sit well with me if I want to drink more than a couple over the course of an evening.

I just had another realization: I've hit a new low, whining about non-alcoholic beer. Jesus.

tonight.

Wearing yesterday's (or day before's) socks, drinking from reused water battle sans cap, wallet empty, Tommy Guerrero and YT Cracker jams on the hard drive, hundreds of old skateboarding ads scrolling by. Floodlights and pretty smooth concrete over at Target sound like fun, but there's nobody to skate with now. Quitting cigarettes is harder than breaking up with girls. Coffee- sure, but man it's gonna fuck with the dreams.

I never stay up late anymore. I hated doing it when circumstances forced me to, but now I miss it. Huh.

Christ almighty!

It's been almost a year since I posted here. I forgot my password, had mail server problems getting it back when I realized (months after the fact) that I'd forgotten it, made an aborted attempt at another blog, lost my job (not because of the blog problems)... yeah, here we are again.

Let's see what happens.

Carving the middle path

Here are your options. Choose at least one.

a) Meditate and destroy
b) Skate and destroy

Which will it be?

How about both?

Yeah, that sounds good.

It's been a good week. It pays to try and be mindful.

This is why I hate talking to you when...

The older I get, the less I have to believe in. I remember a time when things didn't sound like bullshit or totally devoid of value. I love life, but it doesn't mean shit, as much as I want it to; I want to be a good little existentialist, but I fail at it because I can't find or create the personal meaning that makes life worth living. I'm running on fear, laziness, and what passes for hope.

"Almost always the idea before the thing itself- in art, love, and all of life." -Rudi Tannemann

lectric chile (go)at (skate)

Tommy Guerrero, former Bones Brigade skater turned musician, said in an interview I read a few weeks ago that his music isn't exactly suited for skating, except for the walk back up a hill you just bombed. I can't say for sure, since I don't listen to music when I skate, as much as I'd like to (aural cues, such as the sound of approaching cars, are handy when you're cruising the neighborhood and don't feel like getting run over, and headphones tend to diminish said cues). However, for late nights like this, and contemplative mornings, it's a perfect soundtrack. I imagine it'd be good for laid-back cruising sessions, too. Whatever the case, the guy's music is killer, and makes me want to buy a Walkman and some headphones so I can jam it the next time I get to skate in the hour before sunset.

If you couldn't tell, I think about skating a lot these days.

Weighing In - II

Sometimes I sleep in the master closet, stretched out between rows of shoes, a winter coat added to my usual pile of blankets. The air does not move, and there is an odor of cedar that seems to grow stronger the longer I remain. The closet is similar to what I would want in a tomb, and is therefore a fine place to meditate on death. My closet renders death a warm, familiar, pleasantly scented thing.

-Marcus Gill, New York, NY, 2000


Writing cannot alert a reader to the purposelessness of life intending to give the reader hope. Once the world's mask has been removed, exposing the void where a face should be (or where we believe one should be), it cannot be put back on. Writing can remove that mask, and on rare occasions replace it with a new, temporary one, but that is all. Words cannot create meaning when meaning does not exist.

-Patricia Sklar, Marblehead, MA, 1952

I'd buy booze from this dude.

http://slanginliquorinthehood.blogspot.com/

Good stuff.

At least...

I'm drinking plenty of coffee these days.

Apropos of nothing, I know, but I was compelled to mention it.

Weighing In - I

It is imperative that unpleasant activities and environments be mitigated as much as possible, internal unpleasantness not necessarily excluded. However, the means of lessening the world's unpleasantness is one that should not be taken up without careful contemplation. I might suggest a method or two, but refrain from doing so, knowing that most who would apply such methods have no desire to be taken for miscreants of the highest order.

-Hernán Ochoa Dagú, Mérida, Yucatán, 1937


"Life's work" is bullshit. Everyone dies long before they've done anywhere near what they thought or hoped they'd do. Believing there's a master plan or some list of achievements laid out for each of us is stupid, and acting on that belief is even more stupid. It sets us up for disappointment and doesn't let us enjoy what's actually here in front of us. That kind of thinking takes away all the worth of leaving things unfinished, or never started at all. Failure becomes a mortal sin (and you can fucking guarantee people who believe in "God's plan" or their "life's work" believe in sin). What a joke! Why miss out on the beauty of failure or incompleteness or not doing something because we think our lives have some grand scheme? It's delusional, total self-delusion. God fucking forbid we admit we don't amount to much of anything, as far as our neighbors and the universe are concerned.

-Star Miller, Helena, MT 1988

escape

I'm drunk, just so you know. Doesn't mean any of the following is untrue (or sensible). Not that much will follow.

-Life, generally speaking, almost never excites me these days.
-I wish I'd been more of a miscreant in high school.
-She. Oh, she!
-Neck hurts.
-Bully soundtrack: missing only one crucial song.
-Marbles/ball bearings: check inventory.
-I miss Floyd boy.
-"Con su gusano.: Down the hatrch.
-I wanna move to Bullworth Vale.

Like I said, drunk. Thanks to every poor soul that's ever come on you.

Behold the bastard's blade!

After spending ten or fifteen minutes looking for parking on choked side streets, I forced myself through the packed downstairs bar at Rudyard's, got my hand stamped, and went upstairs, where the population was even denser, the temperature at least ten degrees higher, the humidity almost 100%, and the wait for a beer anywhere between five and ten minutes. Everything took forever, except breaking out into a sweat. I'd be sweating for the next two and a half hours- not some weakling forehead sheen, but the kind of sweat that saturates your clothes and seems to replace your skin.

Why did I do this? Because The Sword was playing, and since it was at Rudyard's, it was one of those rare occasions I could actually see a show after work- a show I was pretty excited about in the first place. I liked them when I saw them in 2006, their new album is solid, and this video is a stroke of brilliance. Last night they put on a good show, played what I wanted to hear, gave me reason to headbang like a fool, and sold me a classy t-shirt.

Worth the sweat and hassle, no question about it. Joe Bob says check it out.

Proud alumnus.

I've been playing Grand Theft Auto IV lately. Great game, across the board. My buddy Andy sent me the following link to this article which discusses why the GTA series has been so groundbreaking, among other things. I recommend reading it if you're a GTA fan and/or interested in the narratology of video games in general. It's also pretty damned funny.

As great as GTA is, however, my favorite Rockstar Games product has to be Bully. I'm playing it again, this time for the Xbox 360, and loving every minute of it. I got the soundtrack in the mail a couple days ago, and have spent more than a little spare time trying to track down something resembling a Bullworth Academy t-shirt. My Halloween costume this year will, if all goes well, involve someone sewing a Bullworth Academy crest onto a sweater for me (said sweater will then become a regular article of cold-weather clothing). The 360 version hasn't bugged out on me more than once, to my surprise, and while it's (thus far) not substantially different than its older PS2 ancestor, it's been very much worth buying again for the improved graphics and, well, just to play again. I'd much rather ride my bike or skate around Bullworth, tossing eggs at assholes and putting firecrackers in toilets, than committing vehicular manslaughter in San Andreas or Liberty City... but not always. There's no real comparison between the two games, in my opinion, as the tone of each is sufficiently unlike the other to nullify any "Bully=GTA with training wheels" comments. (Yeah, I know Bullworth Academy shows up tangentially in GTA IV, but I reckon you get my point.)

So yeah, two good games, two engrossing premises, two different overall moods, and yours truly gravitates towards the, ahem, "juvenile" one- unabashedly. Make of it what you will.

See you on campus, folks.

-DAS
Bullworth '06

The brown sound.

Been digging the hell out of Brant Bjork's newest offering, Punk Rock Guilt. Recorded in '05 but only released this month, it's another album of his where he plays all the instruments, and features some songs that have shown up on other albums in different forms. It's not rehash, though; the songs maintain enough similarity to previous versions to be recognizable, but are restructured in such a way as to be fresh and vital. Really good stuff, and not a bad introduction to the man's solo work if you haven't had the good fortune to hear him before.

I'd write more, not just about Brant Bjork, but I've gotta get to bed at something resembling a reasonable hour so I can take my madre to the airport tomorrow.

Later.

A stroll down Danny the Street

My parents are celebrating their 33rd wedding anniversary this weekend, so I'll be up in Jasper Saturday and most of Sunday, along with my brother, Tracey, kt and Altoid. I doubt there'll be anywhere to skate other than the driveway, but if space permits I'll probably bring my board with me.


I'm close to finishing the final volume of Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol run. Like a lot of comics, I bought the first volume, liked it, and then bought all the other volumes within a relatively short span of time, which works out fine if the whole run is available but sucks when you have to wait months for the last volume to come out. This volume, Planet Love, feels like an epilogue for some reason, despite containing some rather massive developments on par with events from prior volumes. I should probably read the whole lot again, one right after another, and then comment... hey, maybe that could be an actual project of sorts. I'd probably enjoy doing something similar with Welcome to the NHK, another series that hasn't been released in its trade-paperback entirety yet, much to my vexation.


I suspect that regularly feeling that things will return to normal, or fall into place, or make sense (I can't decide which, if any, of these, is the right way to describe it) real soon now is not a good sign. It reeks of a misguided approach to the here and now, which bothers me. Gotta work on that, somehow.



Enjoy these Simon Bisley Doom Patrol covers while I help myself to a cigarette. G'night, y'all.

97a

I started skating again last November. I'm not any good, and I don't practice nearly enough, but I am going to visit the new skatepark opening up in town on June 1, armed with my Powell-Peralta Ripper reissue and rolling on (reissue) Rat Bones. I've never skated bowls, pools, vert, ditches, or anything other than streets, so it'll be a trip going there and watching kids less than half my age tear shit up. Luckily for me, I'm not too concerned about impressing anyone; I'm more or less content cruising and enjoying myself.

I do wish I had folks to skate with, though, which is why I joined the Old Man Army, a group of older skaters who are in for the fun. With any luck I'll get to know some folks well enough to start skating with them; with even more luck, they'll either be way better than me and can impart wisdom and skills, or they're just as bad as I am and we can look foolish en masse. Either way, good times will be had.

Never here

I finally bough a copy of The Radio One Sessions Elastica did. A few of you may know of my long-standing love of Elastica, which started when I saw the video for "Connection" on MTV in Venezuela, so the fact that I waited this long to get what was essentially the last thing the band released (or had released in its name) is inexplicable. That it's such a good record makes my delinquency even less acceptable.

The Radio One Sessions is one of those cultural phenomena that Britain seems to specialize it. You'd never see it in the States, at least these days: a band is invited to the radio station to play some songs, which are then recorded and (eventually) released. The only American thing I can think of that was similar- 'was' being the operative word here- would be the King Biscuit Flower Hour, which is defunct and focused on concerts. American radio is almost uniformly wretched, and it seems satellite radio isn't much better, but everyone knows these things already. I just wanted to comment on how sad it is that something as important as American radio- well, as important as American radio could be, and was- can't even provide an interesting outlet for musical performance anymore. Shit, maybe Radio One in England sucks too, but at least its existence results in good records.

Bitching and moaning aside, if you like Elastica, buy this record. It'll make your day better.

Memories far and daydreams wide.

Here I am again, maybe for a while. The bones have fallen in a pattern auspicious to my return to regularly clogging the internet's arteries like so much bad cholesterol, though it might take some time to get back into the swing of things. I considered starting a new journal, wherein I'd focus on specific topics that may or may not have been covered in my old writings, but fuck it. At least partially, that is- I may fire up a new website proper in the near future, once I'm done familiarizin' myself with Ubuntu, which is the OS I'm trying to use these days (read: since I installed it on my girlfriend's old laptop). Said website may feature exciting discourses on topics such as:

Blue Öyster Cult
skateboarding for tired old fucks
television shows
pastels
Ubuntu for tired old fucks
V8 juice
my current literary undertaking

and maybe more.

Don't bank on it happening soon, though. I'm a lazy, lazy man, so the aforementioned discourses will probably end up right here.

Adios for now, y'all.

-D.A. Smith

I got nothin'.

Almost six months since I last wrote anything here, yesterday excluded, and I still have nothing of substance to say. It's starting to feel like that'll always be the case.

Damn.

Long time...

...no see. I'm just dropping in to say howdy for now, but I'll probably write more later.

Store hours are now officially sporadic.

Because a) I've grown very tired of spending time in front of the computer at home, b) silence is more appealing than blather, and c) this site no longer functions as a viable news source for what few readers I may have, and not only because I rarely have news to share (only truly noteworthy thing as of late is the heartbreaking demise of Dr. Oliver Long Ghost, ferret extraordinaire, which I'm sure you already knew), I hereby warn y'all not to expect The Corpse to Speak here very much from now on. I may occasionally type up the odd bit of prose poetry, just so it doesn't languish in the back pocket of my jeans, but honestly, I reckon things'll stay as generally quiet as they have for the past few months.

I could be wrong, of course, but I wanted to make it quasi-official.

If you need to reach me, your best bet is on the
front_porch_of_Asgard@montrose_houston.texas. Bring some beers, will ya?

Still writing, but in a whole different headspace,

D.A.S.

Wu-wei redux.

My break from writing fiction has seemingly extended to writing commentary here, too. Hell, the only writing I've done lately is some reviews for Enslain, a heavy metal fanzine that I picked up a copy of a year ago. I wrote to the editor offering my services, just for kicks, and a few weeks ago she wrote back. Next thing I know I've written ten reviews and gotten my name on the masthead as the copy editor. Works for me.

Lessee. My brother's having a kid in August. I saw a handsome cat in the driveway yesterday. I've been reading lots of comic books, listening to records, sitting on the porch, etc.- whole lotta nothin', really. I enjoy it, which should come as no surprise, but I think my sedate existence is a bit more pleasant than usual because I'm slowly getting comfortable with the notion of not really worrying what to do with my life. Achieving x, doing y, putting z on my resume: not so interesting, and not really all that crucial. I'm not completely abstaining from effort or a modicum of ambition, but I'm not interested in striving toward anything resembling success by this world's standards, either.

Later, y'all. Stop by the house sometime and enjoy the porch!

-D.A.S.

"By action without deeds
May all live in peace."
-Tao Te Ching (Lin Yutang translation)

Since I haven't felt much in the way of a creative urge in, oh, several fucking months, and when I do I can't follow through to save my life, I've decided I need something else to do with myself. Unfortunately, since time travel, mastering Chinese overnight, and/or becoming the world's best sniper are out of the question, I have no idea what that something else should be. Suggestions would be welcome, if I didn't suspect that they'd be almost useless.

Good thing there's always the old standby: comic books. Life, you ridiculous noun, meet your new best friend, the adjective Vicarious.

Demon Cleaner (again, probably)

I'm sure I've posted these lyrics before, but fuck it. This song is that important.

"Demon Cleaner"
Kyuss
Welcome To Sky Valley

I've got the demons in me
I've got to flush them all away
I feel the demons rage
I must clean them all away

Yeah (yeah)

Inside i see more
Cobwebs in the way
The magic cleaner will
Shine his smile over me

I am the demon
Cleaner to save the day
I get the back one
Important they'll always stay

If only one thing that you'll know
Impostors from the show
They'll try to trick you into
Normal treatment
Oh don't you listen to them say
Shush them all away
I am the demon cleaner
Madman saver
I am the the freedom bleeder
Standing naked here to say
I'm the only way

Every little thing helps.

While I don't have all the details just yet, I learned today that Dr. Long Ghost's biopsy revealed that he does not have cancer. Sweet blessed god(s), talk about good news. I'll find out more when I pick him up from the vet tomorrow.

It's not only the good news about Oliver's health that's got me feeling more positive these days. Last week- yes, xenisucks.com readers, I know how well those two words serve to diminish any sense of authority I might otherwise have- I started doing yoga. It's very much the kind of modern, feel-good, suburbanite-friendly yoga, but I don't care. It's a good introduction to what I hope becomes a regular part of my daily routine, and I actually do feel better. As everyone knows, I'm a lazy dude, adverse to many things that require time and/or effort, but I can manage twenty minutes a day on top of my regular strollin' around the neighborhood (which I'll do more of once the weather grows warmer). I've been pretty good about reducing my booze intake- not so good at quitting smoking, alas- and it seems like a natural progression to get some decent exercise as long as it doesn't feel like exercise. Going vegetarian almost a year ago was the first step in the right direction, i.e. being a conscientious, healthier, more relaxed corpse. Here's hoping that yoga will get me a little further down that road. Maybe one day I'll be able to touch my toes without my lower back shrieking in pain.

Credit where credit's due: I owe my introduction to yoga (holy shit, I just found myself looking forward to it tomorrow morning) to Dave. Merci beaucoup, monsieur.

Lessee, what else? The ever-excellent Rachel sent me a bottle of shou wu chih. I finished Lawrence Sutin's biography of Aleister Crowley today. They put a computer in the proofreaders' pseudo-office at work, so I'm even more isolated from people than I was before- thankfully. The weather's been gorgeous lately, so much so that I'm reluctant to check the forecast out of fear of jinxing it. Mucho Brant Bjork vinyl should be arriving shortly. Dave bought a teapot, so I've been drinking tons of pu erh the last few days. Asgard is shaping up slowly but surely. Writing is as frustrating as ever, but I'm working on changing that. I've found all manners of things to burn, especially dragon's blood and Solomon's Seal, that please the olfactory glands and clear the mind. On top of it all, I'm glad to be writing here again.

Yeah, life is all right. Hope y'all can say the same.

Love always,
D.A.S.

P.S. I know it's a little late, but happy birthday, Jen! Get well soon, and please forgive me for not calling or writing lately.

Como andas, D.A.?

Well, then. Looks like I owe what few readers I have an apology for my protracted absence. Simply put, I haven't really felt like writing lately. Sometimes writing stuff other than fiction or (bad) poetry is a reasonable substitute, but such hasn't been the case in 2007.

So, let's play catch-up, shall we? Como andas, D.A.?

-I moved. In early January the house in front of my former, rather troglodytic residence was vacated, and Dave and I jumped at the opportunity to rent it. Given the new place's amenities (a porch, gas heat and a gas range, a big kitchen, twice the square footage, hardwood floors, an abundance of windows), the increase in rent is well worth it- and believe me, the increase wasn't too hard to swallow. Odds are you've already seen the new place, which Dave and I have christened Asgard, but if you haven't, swing by sometime.

-I'm single. Wait, that's not news, that's the status quo.

-I have been writing, just a bit. Unheimlich merits an occasional thought, and I'll probably extensively revise Critical Hits over the course of the year, but there's not much in the way of new fiction on the horizon.

-Good ferret news: Tim Finnegan is doing extremely well. His fur's grown back, he's put on a lot of weight, and it seems that the medication for his faulty adrenal gland will continue to work well. He's also taken to sleeping in my bed ever since I moved into the new house. It's hard to kick him out.

-Bad ferret news: Dr. Oliver Long Ghost is dangerously ill, and the vet suspects he may have cancer. He's going to perform a biopsy on Monday so that he can make a proper diagnosis. It goes without saying that I'm worried sick about ol' Longtoast. Everything else this month has seemingly gone in my favor, or at least just been on the weird side of bad, except for Oliver's rapid decline. I hope he pulls through, but- and I hate to say it- I've got to remain realistic. Poor fatty.

-Miscellanea: Been catching up on my reading. Haven't been going out much (and don't really want to, either). Cutting back my drinking has gone pretty well, though I'm still smoking cigarettes. I also can't wait for warmer, sunnier weather.

And that, dear reader, is it for now. I'll try to start writing more often, but in the meantime, happy birthday to James Joyce, and y'all have a good Imbolc and Groundhog Day.

Oversleeping beneath the algiz rune

Half-assed apologies for the lack of writing lately, folks. I've had the holidays and work and general apathy on my plate, but things are looking up. One thing in particular, but I'll leave the details for later, when everything's in order.

ASGARD AWAITS.

Behold the solstice!

Hope y'all enjoy the longest night of the year as the great wheel keeps turning. It's a comforting thought.

Anno Futilitatis in review

Once again, a survey stolen from Elspeth, and once again, my phone's fuckin' dead. Jesus.

--

1. What did you do in 2006 that you'd never done before? Gone without eating meat. Exchange writing on a semi-regular basis with other writers. Work at a law firm.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I didn’t make any. Next year’s consists solely of doing something, anything, to make my life less banal.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? She’s not that close, but yeah.

4. Did anyone close to you die? My grandma and Natalie.

5. What countries did you visit? Just Texas.

6. What would you like to have in 2007 that you lacked in 2006? Gainful unemployment and a novel worth writing.

7. What days from 2006 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? The day I took my brother to the airport to leave for New Zealand. The day I found out about Nat’s suicide. The day of Nat’s funeral. The day of my grandma’s funeral. Thanksgiving with Dave and Andy.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Aside from sticking to vegetarianism and proofreading my pops’ book, I achieved virtually nothing this year.

9. What was your biggest failure? Wasting another year writing a book I realized I cared nothing about.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Nope.

11. What was the best thing you bought? No one thing in particular.

12. Where did most of your money go? Rent, food, booze, and records.

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Nothing.

14. What song will always remind you of 2006? Ask me when it's not 2006.

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:
Happier or sadder — Sadder.
Thinner or fatter? — The same.
Richer or poorer? — Richer.

16. What do you wish you'd done more of? Write more worthwhile stuff than Unheimlich. Walk. Get the fuck out of Houston.

17. What do you wish you'd done less of? Work on Unheimlich. Hang out at the bar. Talk to strangers. Work.

18. How will you be spending Christmas? With my folks.

19. Did you fall in love in 2006? Oh, that’s rich.

20. What was your favorite TV program? Metalocalypse.

21. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year? No.

22. What was the best book you read? It’s a toss-up between Stillwell and the American Experience in China 1911-45, A Floating Life, the His Dark Materials trilogy, and Against the Day.

23. What was your greatest musical discovery? Greatest? Hard to say. Lots of good shit, though.

24. What did you want and get? A new job, though that’s a dubious “want.”

25. What did you want and not get? Peace of mind (not that it exists). Inspiration.

26. What was your favorite film of this year? Shit, what new movies did I see?

27. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I turned 27. I sat in my driveway with a bunch of friends and got less wasted than I expected to.

28. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Getting paid to not work, and using that time to write something I didn't hate.

29. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2006? Same as last year: hessian.

30. What kept you sane? Books, records, friends, cooking, and video games.

31. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Nobody in particular, though I liked David Lynch’s bovine loitering promotion scheme.

32. What political issue stirred you the most? That clusterfuck of a war we’re involved in in Iraq.

33. Who did you miss? My brother.

34. Who was the best new person you met? Ryan.

35. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2006: Frustration is as omnipresent as oxygen.

36. Quote something that sums up your year: From me: “Days like loose pages in the wind.”

i/o

My phone's not working. I hope the battery simply died after I got to work, but I'm not sure. Oh well; that makes two things that aren't functioning, the other being myself.

Another shitty, stupid, paralytic autumn/winter. Way to go, self.

Fuck Xmas parties without a date, deadlines, missed shows, and everything else:

MY FUCKIN' BROTHER WILL BE BACK IN TEXAS IN LESS THAN 24 HOURS!

Godspeed, Smitjoll!

Godspeed You! Black Pudding

an ounce of ashes:

wounded shoulders
friends looking at the war horizon
(Lord don't let any more go)
dust on more than one stylus
lifelong layovers on the way to
America's oldest town
winter as elusive as the mythical She
ill beasts
a veritable Heavenly
(Infernal?)
Host of small mean concerns
on and off the clock.

no alchemical fix here.

Some more prose poetry.

-the end isn't near, it's only last call-

All the upbeat indie pop songs that color the world shades of neon red hopeful are just gloss on the lips of a beautiful face subtly ruined by the bad bone structure beneath. Doesn't mean it's all false or cosmetic, only that everything musical comes down to gnarled roots and lonesome reverb against the thick dirt of life packed hard below the permafrost. What was merely lost in translation becomes a mangled attempt at a dead language. 4/4 time devolves into strangled chords that never got mapped to staves. Innocent chatter from pretty throats tilts in the aether, and on its new axis sounds like acrimony and bathroom tales of sexual conquest and the comparison of garish makeup colors. Planes overhead- we all live in their flight paths these days- spew roaring remains of dreams and carbon in the most beautiful of patterns.

There's no denying the glory of skylines, badly lit bars, burlesque dancers in their street clothes, and poets in unlikely quarters, but to ignore the dread, the roadside weeds, the misspoken words, the ankle-wrenching potholes and heartbreaking glances across the room at doom personified, well, that's a shrug and a quizzical look when what the world demands is an honest acknowledgement of how tainted it really is.

D.A.S.
November 26/27, 2006

This really ain't Mr. Finnegan's year.

I feel like a fool for not taking Tim Finnegan in to the vet when his hair started falling out in September. It turns out that it's not a symptom of old age: he's got adrenal disease, which may or may not be due to a tumor (benign or malignant) or hyperplasia, which means the glandular cells are enlarged but functioning normally. Whatever the case, odds are that his left adrenal gland, which is far larger than it should be, will have to be removed. Dr. Jordan mentioned the option of giving Tim a shot (I can't recall the name of the medicine) once a month that might do the job, but that'll only work if the adrenal gland isn't cancerous. Ergo, I think I'm going to go ahead and have Dr. Jordan perform the surgery.

Thankfully, Mr. Finnegan doesn't seem to be suffering too much. He has lost weight, which I couldn't notice because, well, his baldness threw off my perception of his size, but he hasn't become lethargic, which is another symptom of the disease. He doesn't seem to care too much about being bald, though I reckon he'd say otherwise if he could.

I'm going to call the vet back tomorrow and schedule the surgery for sometime in the next week. More details as I get them.

On a less depressing note, Thomas Pynchon's new novel, Against the Day, came out today. I've read the first 40 or so pages, and so far, so good.

I LOVE FICTIONAL WOMEN

Dora
Faye
Pen-Pen
Raven
and even
Hannelore
(Ellen should be on here, but she wastes her time reading the almighty Kierkegaard to fuckin' dolphins, so fuck her)

I reckon I should have titled this post "read Questionable Content, because the female characters are rad," but what the hell. I'm drunk and listening to "Sliver" by Nirvana on repeat. That clearly exculpates me from something; what, I'm not exactly sure.

I've also eaten nothing but motherfucking potato chips today.

Other web comics worth checking out include Templar, Arizona and Toothpaste For Dinner (of course).

I blame music.

Time-related obstacles are overcome, and then others crop up when I hear a certain song.

Sometimes I think I am pathologically unable to grow up. Lord knows I don't want the responsibility.

I could quote from Fear and Trembling now, but I'm gonna listen to Last Eve and... well, you know.

Someday.

-D.A.S.
Squire of Infinite Resignation

I could talk about politics...

...but I don't feel like it, really. Suffice to say that I'm glad to see America has taken a step in the direction of sanity for the most part, even if my fellow Texans decided to act like sheep and re-elect a shitty governor.

Anyway, life is, well, life. Nothing particularly interesting to relate to y'all, alas, aside from recommending warm rice wine from handmade ceramic cups (untold thanks to Sara for the handiwork) and Red Pine's translation of Poems of the Masters on cold nights of solitude.

Kings, academicians, heathens, gods, and corpses.

Namely, König Ludwig weissbier, Li Po, Borknagar (specifically their albums Quintessence and Origin), that which is known more or less as Yahweh, and yours truly.

When you get such a diverse group together, there's bound to be friction, and since I'm the one who convened this eclectic, clashing pseudo-democratic Althing, guess who's playing moderator.

Being a human being is an honor that is very, very hard to best.

It's still Halloween by the Welsh method of delineating days.

Drunk folks in bad costumes

stench of sweat beneath
polyester:

Let's leave Halloween
to the kids and pagans.

Bring on 2007.

Christ, I hate wishing for time to pass any faster than it does, but I'm really looking forward to the new year and the potential tabula rasa it'll bring. I'm in the final stages of proofing shit for my dad's book, which seems to be an interminable and increasingly daunting process because so much is riding on it. I'm proofreading a second book for Len Bracken this year, both of which have come within the past month or so. Unheimlich is angrily gathering dust on the writing desk in the back of my skull. There are impending birthdays and holidays to attend to. My attempts at teaching myself Chinese are half-assed at best. I've got almost a dozen records and CDs that I've only barely listened to; same goes for books, though I'm making more headway with those (only 1800 or so pages left of Three Kingdoms!). I sleep too much, but not enough. On top of all this, I'm trying to cut back my drinking and smoking.

It's not even that I lack the time to get all this shit out of the way by the deadlines I or others have set. I don't know what it is, really. I'm definitely unmotivated, but not as much as I think I am. Frankly, I think I've simply got too much going on, which is as difficult to deal with as having absolutely nothing to focus on.

I hate having plans.

82

Involuntary removal from the driving population puts this corpse back on the bus for a few days. Exhausted midnight riders of all stripes, white and blue and no collar, stinking of late shifts and clothes worn for weeks on end. Cell phones clamped to heads in doo-rags, low sweetnesses or impending plans muttered to distant someones, though not all the souls with voices direct them across the ether: some folks talk to the invisibles, others bombard the driver with tales of conquered chicken fried steaks or exegeses on the bus schedule. Most don't talk, too beat by their jobs or themselves to waste the energy, and so remain silent testaments to the horrors of labor or introspection or monthly payments to the demiurge that tells all of us, in tones seductive or bland as television, that yes, it's worth it, keep it up and the world will be yours.


I get off the bus, my soul getting paid overtime tonight, and walk into the noisy neon where we all try desperately to earn ourselves another day.

First it's the cold, come down overnight,
long overdue,
that bites my ears to and from the bar.

Then, home from the corner table,
blood thinned,
comes the music.

Clamped to my ears,
warming them with Norwegian beats
and noir never filmed.

Then the body's tiniest bones
tremble at the voice of God
or a mortal echo thereof.

Raining antlers.

My laptop has been going on wildcat strikes the last couple days- or maybe it's either Firefox or Windows acting up like a bratty adopted child- so I'm writing from the crusty yet beloved warhorse that is my desktop for the first time in what is probably ages. I've gotta say, it's a welcome change of pace. Sure, the keyboard sticks, the wheel of my mouse has been gnawed to the point of near-uselessness by the ferrets, and I can't stretch out in my (uncomfortable) bed while I catch up on the news, but at least I can move freely without my cat5 cable dislodging and dropping my connection.

It's all very much like it was a year ago, but it's not. In some ways, I was happier then, but at the same time I'm almost where I want to be now. Better job, vegetarian diet, wheels, minimal hassle from non-Dave sources, etc. It's also nice returning to a position where I don't have to get up to flip an LP- my turntable is literally within arm's length.

I hope y'all are doing well, and that if I have to keep using my desktop, I have the wherewithal to get a new keyboard soon.

now playing: Greenland, Teeth of the Hydra

"Amusing Myself"

Face wine not aware get dark Fall flower fill my clothes Drunk stand step stream moon Bird far person also few

Facing my wine, I did not see the dusk, Falling blossoms have filled the folds of my clothes. Drunk, I rise and approach the moon in the stream, Birds are far off, people too are few.

Hanzi, pinyin, and literal/literary English translations courtesy of chinese-poems.com.

I know criminally little about poetry, especially Chinese poetry, but I know what I like, and I get the impression that this poem might have led to the legend that Li Bai drowned while trying to embrace the reflection of the moon in a stream when he was drunk. Worse fates than that, I reckon.

Speaking of poets, I seem to meet and/or associate with a lot of them lately. This is a highly excellent thing, be they the regular circle of hookah-smoking folks I've spent most of my Saturdays with, or the Shakespeare-tattooed bartender at the icehouse, or the long-standing poet and professor Robert Phillips, whom I also encountered at the icehouse today. I've gotta say that it's a rare pleasure having folks appreciate, or at least be interested in hearing, my bursts of language that aren't directed into pure conversation or my novels. Thank y'all, and keep up the good work and good spirits.

Zaijian, Meiguo.

Ni hao.

It's not a recent thing, mind you, but I've pinpointed much of what's wrong with my life... and I can't, or won't- or both- do anything about it.

A downer note to cough up after over a week of silence, I know, but there have been some good things. Got to see Destroyer 666 on their first American tour. Been plugging away, slowly but surely, at the ol' Potunghua lessons. Work's all right. Dave gave me a copy of Stephen Fry's The Ode Less Traveled, which is providing me the structural basis in poetry I've been needing for a long while. Speaking of poetry, the Saturday night writing group I've been involved in for a while now has yet to let me down.

Still, I really need to take care of some obligations, not least to myself, and hammer out a couple other outstanding moral issues, and maybe then I'll make it through the fall and winter without being ragingly disappointed with myself.

Not likely. Self-sabotage has become my modus operandi.

Good night, y'all. Sorry to be a killjoy, but blathering here doesn't do me or my attendant shreds of optimism any favors. Instead of reading this, go read a book or listen to a record that doesn't drag you down.


Love always. Always.
Dave Smith

Hours spent in exile.

No, I haven't been much of a hermit- the title comes from a Dark Tranquillity song, probably my favorite.

But being a hermit sounds pretty good sometimes. After all, odds are you won't be able to make morally dubious choices if you're engaged in prayer and foraging for sustenance most of your day.

I really don't like praying more than once daily.

My favorite thin line.

Years ago, in a Hellblazer TPB by the name of Dangerous Habits, John Constantine described the razor-thin line between the head and body of a pint of (literally) magical stout. Somewhere in my room I have said trade paperback, but I don't want to dig it out, because I'm too busy enjoying pretty much that exact same fine line. Instead of booze traded for my soul, however, I'm drinking booze traded for money, but man, I gotta say that a pint of Bridgeport Black Strap Stout, when poured so that there's that crisp line between the head and body, is an excellent physical representative of the more subjective fine line between clear-minded tipsiness and despondent drunkenness. Alas, it's so very hard to walk that line.

Y'all know which side I lean towards, but I reckon you won't lose too much respect for me for it.

Man, I wish it was a Friday night and my brother was around.

Resettlement.

It's been quiet, yeah, but Smith's been busy, at least by Smith's standards. New job is going mighty well. Writing's slower than I'd hoped for, but it's coming along, and I can almost guarantee that I'll be done with Unheimlich, though probably only the first draft, by the end of the year, when me and the other Christmas orphans assemble to commiserate and try to make the most of the Yuletide. Lots of reading going on, including Danielewski's newest, Only Revolutions, and Christian theology via Søren "that's what D.A. will name his son if he ever has one, God have mercy on the lad's soul, but not because of his namesake, but rather his misfortune at being D.A.'s son" Kierkegaard, Simone Weil, and the Book of Luke.

APE SHALL NOT KILL APE
SLAY THE WRATH OF MAN!

Listen to Cathedral, you wretched things. Even if you don't take my infallible musical advice, I love you nonetheless.

-D.A.S.

And so...

...the wheel turns again, ever faster. Freedom dissipates when confronted by financial necessity. Dead Russians speak through their long-dry pens, communication always welcome. A siren comes around then leaves at late hours, confusion her wake. Ash meets ceramic. Songs of snow, blood, fire, towers, dying birds, beds. Talk of Kerouac and Matthew Barney over the thick sweet fumes of a hookah. Phone calls missed and unreturned. Lamplight and coffee. Rain in the midst of sleep. Continual one-sided conversation.

This life, ideal? Not quite, but good enough. I am happy to be living it.

-D.A.S.

P.S. Bill, there are only three issues of Watching Days Become Years, and you can buy them all at http://www.sparkplugcomicbooks.com, as I did. Jeff Levine, the author of said comic, also has a lot of good stuff archived on his website.

Media rate.

One of the nice things about these two weeks I've had off from work is all the mail I've received. A couple months ago I resubscribed to Heavy Metal, and my first issue arrived today. The new Agalloch record came in last week, Iron Maiden's latest this past Tuesday, and two issues of Watching Days Become Years this morning. The stuff I've been meaning to send to my brother was taken to the post office yesterday, so with any luck he'll soon have a bunch of weird postcards and Ashes Against the Grain in his hands.

Man, I love the mail.

"Same Ol' Road"

I am only succumbing to romanticized sadness as much as I allow myself to.

"All you need is a modest house
in a modest neighborhood
in a modest town where honest people dwell."

Motivation.

I think it's thoroughly excellent that no person can ever truly know someone else. Really, why would you want anyone, even someone you love/respect/trust/etc. to be able to understand exactly why a certain piece of music, or a passage from a literary work, or nothing at all, strikes you the way it does? It's nice to know another person more or less feels the way you do about something, but I find almost repellent the idea of them knowing perfectly why and how you feel a certain way. Call it selfishness, pride, whatever, but what's mine is mine, and what's yours is yours.

I've said for years, usually to myself but not always, that I'm not terribly interested in people's motivations. Perhaps it's because I'm intellectually lazy (which I definitely am), or perhaps it's because I'm adverse to speaking for anyone but myself when it comes to the internal life, but whatever the case, I tend to focus on action (or lack thereof) rather than motivation. Maybe it's that most folks' motivations are boring and insipid? This is statistically likely, coming from the admittedly arrogant and demanding point of view of yours truly, but when dealing with the motivations of exciting, intelligent types, I still can't get too worked up. Let me see what's done in response to your motivations, and then I'll have something to say.

Possibly the only person's motivations that interest me (in a goddamned depressing way) are Nat's, because the action that sprang forth from them was so heinous, so jarring, so final. I cannot make any statements resembling definitive ones, though I think I understand why she did what she did. If I'm wrong, then please don't tell me if you know the truth. Not for a long while, at least. My point is that I reckon I've never dealt with such a concrete relationship between motivation and action, and certainly not one that's so troubling.

I guess I'm just thinking about my own motivations in life. I don't know if I have any, really; not the usual ones, that's for sure. I expect to leave this world with nothing save love, given and received, and I reckon that's all I truly want in the long run. I'm not thrilled by success, fame, wealth, et cetera. Nice, maybe, but not my reasons for doing what little it is I do. I'm here to do my best at being a human being, and trying to help others do the same. Everything else- hell, everything, sometimes- is an exercise in futility.

For the time being, I think I'm doing a decent job of coping with that notion.

Pardon the incohesion,
D.A.S.

Limbs.

I'm probably going out on one. Thankfully I have metal to keep me up, just as it always has.

Well said and always applicable.

"The task with which I was unceasingly confronted, which almost consumed me, and many times brought me to the verge of despair, was how I would amount to anything in the spiritual sense."
-Jakob Peter Mynster

Done and done.

Tonight was my final night at the Greensheet. I left without ceremony, just as I figured I would.

I calculated that I proofread 39,402 ads in the two years and a month that I was there. Ridiculous.

Here's to the next two weeks of writing, socializing, and good ol' life without working!

Drunk and happy.

I know I haven't coughed up the notable stuff lately, so I'll go ahead and do so.

-I got a new job. Interviewed Friday, found out I was the choice hire five minutes after coming home. The money they offered is, by my deadbeat standards, mindblowingly good. I'll be working as a proofreader for the tenth largest law firm in the world two weeks from now, and I am thrilled. Fuck my old job.

-Tim's in the hospital. According to one of the vet techs, however, he's on the mend, which is highly gratifying.

-Pretty much everything else is going well. Really, stupidly well, if you don't count whatever gastrointestinal ailment that's been plaguing me for almost a week know. Luckily, yours truly has a history of handling illness like a motherfuckin' warhorse, so I'm doing all right.

-Love always, all of y'all.

An unwell ferret.

As I suspected, something is indeed wrong with Tim Finnegan. I took him to the vet today and after a couple of hours learned that he hasn't been eating because he's got a bacterial infection and a gastrointestinal ulcer. He also shed a pretty good amount of fur while at the vet, due to being terribly freaked out by the shots, rectal temperature-taking, and forcible ingestion of medicine he had to endure.

Poor old man. As he ages, I expect things like this to become increasingly common, a thought that breaks my heart. A pleasant beast like Mr. Finnegan should be able to live out his last years in peace. That said, I'm not terribly worried, as Tim's gone through two prior bouts of illness/injuries and come out just fine.

Gah, I don't need any more hassle right now. Once it's 4 PM tomorrow, hopefully things will be evened out.

Things I've been listening to lately.

Satanic Warmaster, Strength & Honour- Raw Finnish BM.
Amebix, Arise!- Crust classic. "Arise, fuckin' assholes, and rejoice."
Voivod, Katorz- Their latest and possibly last. R.I.P. Piggy.
Ulver, Teachings in Silence- Possibly their best record to write to.
Cathedral, The Garden of Unearthly Delights- Spurred by Codi's gift of a Cathedral t-shirt.
Om/Current 93, split 10" - Om's most succinct musical statement so far.
Usurper, Necronemesis- Straight-up metal is always welcome in my house. Imagine that.
Tiamat, Wildhoney- A welcome reminiscence.
Deströyer 666, Terror Abraxas- One of my favorite metal bands for the past couple years.
Agalloch, From Which of This Oak- Their oldest release in anticipation of their newest.
Velvet Cacoon, Dizzy From Eternity- from fake yet brilliant BM to dreampop: a thrilling enigma.
Kalas, Kalas- Riff-based melancholy behind the wheel, at least for me. Fronted by Matt Pike.
The Gathering, Home- An improvement over their last, but something's still missing.

I look forward to cooler weather and greyer skies.

Some happenings.

The hole torn in the world just over a week ago hasn't closed, and never really will, but as the days pass I'm not staring into it quite as much.

I'm into the fortieth chapter of my pops' book on Stone's River. With a little diligence, I should be done proofreading and editing the whole book by Friday afternoon, and then come the unwieldy tasks of compiling the index, getting the pages laid out, making sure Kyle's making headway with the maps, and then working with him to create the final PDF to send to the publisher. I'm pleased that I've gotten so much done in such a relatively short amount of time, although I'm working on ensuring that pops' book ain't the only one I finish this year.

Oh, and I might have a new job within the next couple weeks. Here's hopin' and prayin' and lighting santeria candles and anything else that'll do the trick.

Love and death and love and life.

I bet y'all are getting tired of me writing about the never-ending aftermath of Nat's death, but I'll keep this'n short.

I wrote a few days ago that Major Briggs' fear that "love is not enough" came to mind when I heard about Natalie. I still believe that, although in an amended form: "love is not always enough." This applies to much more than just Natalie, but I don't want to expound on that right now; I'd rather just say that Nat's case was the most extreme one of love not being enough to get one through life, because so many things in her life simply wouldn't let it.

However, for those of us fortunate enough not to be burdened with overwhelming, inescapable self-hatred, love usually is enough, if not the sole reason we keep on keepin' on. The love I feel for, and the love I receive from, my friends and family is the most important thing in my life, and I know that many of the people I love feel the same way. None of us would be anywhere without it.

So, once more, I love you all. May you love others as much as I love you, and may the love you give and receive infuse your lives and overcome anything that might stand in its way. If it doesn't, please don't give up.


Yours,
Dave

Always. With a glass of cheap wine to boot.

I spent some time today summarizing in (hand)writing the myriad things I've thought and felt about Nat's suicide, and I suspect I'll be doing so for a long while. This is the hardest thing I've ever dealt with. I feel especially awful for Sara, Leslie, and everyone else who knew her for years before I did. If this scenario is troubling me- some dude who knew Natalie better than a lot of folks but still not that well- as much as it is, it's gotta be exponentially worse for the people who stood by her for the past decade or more. I'm so very sorry for y'all, and it might not help to know that I don't think I can really, truly talk about what's happened to anyone but her friends. I don't mean to be a burden, but damn if it isn't frustrating to be stuck with just the fuckin' internet at 4:14 AM instead of someone who went to class, got drunk, and talked about books and politics, with her.

I swear to God, if anyone really, really close to me ever does this, they're gonna regret it. The minute I reach the hereafter I'm gonna beat the shit out of, or ignore, them, whichever will hurt most, for several lifetimes.

Yeah, Nat, I'm pissed off at you, but try as I might, I can't begrudge your decision. I'm just heartbroken that's what it took to get away from it all. The only thing that would be more selfish than what you did would be to demand that you remain here, unhappy, just so we wouldn't be.

Fuck me, though, I'm sorry that I've thought more about you in the past few days than I have over the last two years.

Like I said at your funeral, take it easy.

What an incredibly trying day.

I love you, Nat, and I hope you don't hurt anymore.

27

Well, I'm twenty-seven now. Many good folks showed up Sunday to celebrate, bearing not only themselves- the most important gifts they could give- but all kinds of thoughtful and bizarre things: thousand-year-old eggs, daughter wine and plum wine, the complete run of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, books on doing nothing, manliness, and PKD pseudo-mainstream fiction, canned plants that sprout secret messages, blocks of tea, 104 unique Jack Chick tracts, thousands of matches, Shadow of the Colossus, and beer aplenty. Good times were had by all. I am a very, very lucky dude to have the friends that I do, and no amount of words can express how much I love you all.

Today's been spent drinking leftover beer, working on pops' book, and reading. I talked to my folks, too, which is always a pleasure, and I thank them more than anyone for giving me the opportunity to be here.

The pall of my friend's suicide hasn't been completely driven away, though it's not as oppressive as it was Saturday night/Sunday morning. Her funeral's tomorrow; I doubt that I'll be able to go to work afterwards, even though my supervisor wants me to. Christ, what a troubling, and troubled, scenario.

That said, thanks again to everyone who makes my life as excellent as it is, and may we be able to celebrate many more birthdays together, yours and mine.

Your Friend Always,
David Addison Smith

Someone I hadn't seen in a while, but nonetheless loved as a friend and person, killed herself Friday night.

I feel sick, angry, sad, confused, depressed, sorry, useless, shocked, fucked up. Mostly, I wish that the world still had her in it, and that her time here would be happier than it had been.

It might be tacky or whatever, but right now I echo the worst fear of Major Garland Briggs from Twin Peaks: "that love is not enough."

I am so, so sorry. I love you.

Scorched flesh and ruined denim= ALL SYSTEMS GO!

-Bills paid? Check!
-Money put into savings? Check!
-Credit card balance paid down adequately? Check?
-Groceries and gas bought? Almost-check! (I don't feel like grocery shopping or driving drunk at 2:42 AM, so I'll take care of those things tomorrow. I've already budgeted 'em.)
-Cigarettes laid in for at least a week? Check!
-Post-payday pleasure purchases? Check! (List below.)

via mail:

Iron Maiden- A Matter of Life and Death CD w/limited edition t-shirt
Agalloch- Ashes Against the Grain CD (2)- one for me, one for Scott.
Agalloch- Ashes Against the Grain t-shirt

already in hand:

diSEMBOWELMENT- (more or less) complete discography 2xCD

Man, I can't wait until Sunday, when folks will assemble here at the Hall of Justice to celebrate my birthday, and Monday, when I will have more good times! Thanks in advance to all y'all excellent folks that I count as my friends.

Obras futuras

I'm dying to get started on my next novel, but until I finish Unheimlich, I'm confining myself to making notes. Here are some elements/inspirations that will appear in the next book, unless I have another idea that demands precedence in writing.

Flannery O'Connor
Blue Öyster Cult, in every way
Pentacostalism
being the teenaged child of a Marine, c. 1980
marrying early with disastrous results
music journalism
The South
professional disgrace
alcoholism
James Joyce
Biblical apocrypha interpreted under the influence of drugs
heavy metal c. 1978

I can't wait!

In other news, I've started adding photos to my flickr account (http://www.flickr.com/photos/thecorpse/), courtesy of Tracey (who gave me the camera) and Dave (who gave me the cable). Thanks, y'all!

T-minus.

For what seems to be the hundredth time, I'm going to fall back on some half-assed observations, or whatever you choose to call them, instead of writing anything substantial. Not because I lack anything substantial to say, but rather that I've spent enough time today feeling venomous, and there's no need to cough it up again. So, here you are, readers, be you loyal or disloyal.

The new Slayer record, Christ Illusion, is something you should purchase inmediatamente. Easily the best thing they've done since Seasons in the Abyss (though Divine Intervention was admirable in its own way); as others have pointed out, Dave Lombardo's return means more than you might initially realize.

I'm actually looking forward to my birthday celebration, to the extent that I'm starting to think that Sunday, when said celebration goes down, is my real birthday, and not Monday. The only concerns I have are that I pace my drinking so I'm not already soused when folks start showing up, and that my birthday proper isn't spent on the couch, gagging on Sunday's cigarettes and flipping channels. And man, do I wish that some folks who can't make it could- Scott, Eric, Amanda, Bill, Kara, my folks (though they'd probably be unimpressed by their son's boozy idiocy), Tam, Pete, and many others.

Finally: since finishing His Dark Materials, nothing has really struck my fancy, reading-wise.

And with that, Smith out.

Deathklok!

I could talk about my weekend, and everything else going on, but why bother when I can just say

a) come hang out on my birthday, 8.14.06, or the day of general celebration, 8.13.06

and

b) WATCH METALOCALYPSE!

Drunken hard drive lullabies.

Does anyone else ever hear very faint, rather Celtic-sounding proto-music emanate from their laptop when they're sitting in silence?

Maybe my hard drive just spins in aurally pleasing ways, or maybe, just maybe, I'm imagining things. If I was soused, the latter (and, hell, the former) would make much more sense, but I'm not. Oh well; nothing's ever easy.

Which is how it should be.

Incarnation.

If God were to take a physical form other than of a human, I suspect He would show up in our world as a cat. At the moment I can't think of any other creature that's as simultaneously aloof, evasive, demanding, and loveable, all of which are qualities I find myself attributing to God now and then.