music

Nothing Else Matters

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Congratulations.

You are not too old, too unhip, too fat, or too phobic to go to a Tool concert.

You are, however, too old to deal kindly with the pot-smoking drunks below you.

You didn’t say anything, actually, to them, but you didn’t try too hard to stifle a giggle as one began blowing chunks onto the guy below him.

You did feel sorry for the other guy, however. You are, after all, a decent person.

“These damn kids these days,” you complain to your concert mate. “Most of these people weren’t even in elementary school, if that, when Tool first came out.” You gasp as you realize you’re experiencing the sublime metaphysical act of channeling. You’re channeling an ancient, ornery Irishman who calls you such endearments as Swampy and Gypsy and Daughter of the Cock Lady.

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Journey, music

Walking to New Orleans

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Despite my newly found calf muscles, I doubt that I’ll be doing that much walking.

It’s been over two years since I stood outside the Monteleone on Royal Street, listening to blues and realizing that I really, really had no clue what I was going to do with my life or my fear.

Pacing and talking with the Frazzle on the phone, watching the street musicians and drunkards stumble and tumble down the street like dragonflies–darting, dipping, and rising again.

“It’s just love,” the guy with the bad breath told me.

A lie, but a convenient one, and one I thought held the answer to everything.

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college

Going to Meet the Man

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Apparently I’m so boring that I put my computer to sleep and can’t wake it up.

I’ve had it for less than four days now; I apparently have some serious attention-holding issues.

I managed to present my paper in class last night, despite rushing around trying to finish it up and my computer doing its Sleeping Beauty act. More impressively, I managed to get through class without giggling at “erection,” the notion of one’s sexuality being determined by his ability to get one, and a myriad of other sexual comments. White Impotence and the New South was the title, although mis-named–it wasn’t actually the New South. It was on James Baldwin’s “Going to Meet the Man.”

I did have to hiss at Michael “Don’t laugh” from the corner of my mouth as I read. Had she emitted even a mere giggle, I would have lost it, and I was nervous enough already.

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college

Smile

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Was it because she smiled that everything changed?

Or did she smile because everything changed?

One of those things I’ll never know, I suppose.

I saw her getting off the elevator, and couldn’t place her. Vaguely familiar, like someone I should have known. I have horrible name recall. Maybe she sat in the back of one of my classes, never saying anything? The one I call the “Red Shirt Girl” although she may have only worn red once?

She smiled, said hi, and stepped out of the elevator.

I smiled, said hi, and stepped into the elevator.

Two ships passing, and all that jazz, and I didn’t have a clue who she was.

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Journey

The Impotence of Words

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I’m feeling all post-moderny right now, as opposed to writerly as I was before.

I still have papers, papers, and more papers to do, and three weeks left in the semester before finals. Which is bad, bad. Because I feel post-moderny, and not at all writerly.

Mostly I’m feeling helpless.

This is the death of something older than I am.

This is me, sitting in class, listening to literary applications of the Kubler-Ross model for grieving, as it pertains to Toni Morrison’s Beloved. This is me, pretending to listen, trying to keep from bursting into tears while some girl presents her article on the stages of grief.

This is the sound of The Bear talking about “capping Massa So-and-So.”

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random

Smells Like Cream

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  • Condition: Dirty
  • Comments: Smells like…cream. Possibly half-and-half. Sweet smelling.

I got a call from Best Buy and spent the night at work feeling like a kid on Christmas Eve. Today, I was getting a new lap top.

Apparently, in addition to my myriad of talents, one particularly shining one is killing lap tops. The above notes are direct quotations from their work order for my lap top. At least if it was dirty, it was sweet-smelling too.

There are several bits of good news with this. Because mine was a close out deal, (meaning, it was so bad that they had actually discontinued making it), I was able to pick out another for the same price, or I could upgrade and pay the difference. For about $20 more than I paid last year, I got 4x the RAM, and almost 4 X the hard drive space. Neat-o. Because it’s a new lap top, protected by all of the protections a new lap top affords, I was able to buy a new accident pro0tection plan.

Hopefully I won’t need it, and I’ve learned my lesson. But if not, I have protection.

I’ve also learned the lesson of backing up my stuff. I’m a slow learner sometimes; this was a lesson that took two laptops and two PC’s (in my defense, I killed neither one of those) to learn.

Of course, there is this whole Vista thing which I’m not digging on too hard.

But it *is* six days till Tool, and 25 weeks and 5 days till finals are over.

At least I have ‘net back, and don’t feel so entirely disconnected. As a bonus, I can do papers at home.

But I’m still wondering what they got an eye-ful of in my documents folder.

college

Twenty Seven Weeks

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I’m feeling kind of writerly right now. It’s a good thing, considering how I have another paper due, two really, if I want to give myself a wee bit of breathing room. My latest paper is on the gender and racial constuction within James Baldwin’s “Going to Meet the Man.” It’s a terrifically horrifying story, one that constructs one white man’s entire sexual identity as a negation of blackness.

It’s a fertile topic, anyway.

Since my lap top has gone to the Laptop Heaven in the Sky (or at least, Best Buy), I’m currently at a loss, doing most of my homework from a PC, which is a very strange feeling. Luckily for me, after the incident last year which involved my falling asleep over a fully caffeinated and sugared coke, I bought an accident protection plan which, oddly enough, expired five days after this year’s coffee incident.

Close calls, indeed.

Barring any major crisis, I have twenty seven weeks (or, more accurately twenty six weeks and 5 days) until my education as an undergraduate is over. This was the thought that kept me awake at work last night, enjoying that hour of extra pay while the rest of the world slept it away.

But for now, I’m off to write that paper before I totally lose that writin’ feeling.

It’s slipping away already.

recommended reading

Scream My Name, Bitch

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It’s been a while since I’ve heard my name screamed. Years, really, and it wouldn’t have been so memorable, I think, had those two piercing syllables not been hitchhiking on the back of a half empty vodka bottle, and aimed about an inch or two below my graying  widow’s peak.

Tonight I heard my name screamed. Squeaked would probably be a better adjective had it lacked a bit of volume. I wasn’t even first choice, which, given the situation, wouldn’t have been a bad thing.

We had a Rottweiler loose in the hospital.

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college

Sitting, Waiting, Wishing

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It’s unofficially official: I’m graduating in May. I’ve officially applied for graduation, and my degree progress has been officially approved by my adviser. Now it’s on its way to the heads and chairs and all those important people that I’ll never see.

This semester is tough. Next semester will be tougher; of that I have no doubt. But while I’m both dreading it and looking forward to it, it sort of hit me that I am constantly amazed by what I am able to pull off in terms of literary miracles. Now, I say “I” in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way. I know that, while my fingers are the ones that dance over the keyboard (particularly the backspace key), I am quite certain that I really can’t take all the credit for these so-called literary miracles.

Because, really, there have been a lot of them.

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blogging

Tagged by Grace

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Here it is, a trivia meme about me that has been passed on by Grace and is supposed to give you, my reader, some deep insight into the minutae of my soul.

After a bit of contemplation (and a friendly kick in the butt from Grace herself since I had drafted it yesterday, but didn’t know about the tagging part of it), I’ve decided to put a disclaimer on it. I won’t directly tag anyone since most of the bloggers I know aren’t into passed-on memes.

With that being said, if you’re reading this, and you have a blog, I consider you tagged. All of you. Every last one of you. A challenge, you see, one that can be accepted or declined and no one would be the wiser. If you’re a reader, though, I am very curious about you. Should you accept, I’d love to see you drop a comment linking your blog so I can read your response.

With that being said, here lies the minutae of my soul.

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