where the miniscule roam..

i see strain in a world. the muscles all vascular and tense at the sight of millions of dead bodies strewn across the ground, a stench of wasted life resembling purple ionized flesh.  that image just explodes into my mind.  i see this body; all tension, huge, purple varicose, ripped and weighted down to the earth by some intricate root structure, pulling us down like gravity, until finally we stop struggling. we sink into earth and root, rock and dust or even as ash. the lucky folk alive do not dispute the difference between dust and ash from day to day as they lift it with paper towel or sweep it into a pan.  they see dust and ash alike, no?  that dust is remnants of us.  it is our tough fibered skin, hair, broken tissue into small fragment cells.  you breathe this every day.  its why we change our sheets. it is visibly invisible.  these parts are dying all the time.  they die wanting to bond with ground. 

i see all the hair on my head fallen to the barber's or the bathroom's vinyl flooring, flicked away from my teeth fingernails, toilets and window sills teeming with toenails, sun-burnt flesh rubbed away at a park, or the beach, scratched off with sand.  living cells that are demolished and plucked away, floating gradually with the ether.  holy fuck! i mean part of me just dies and floats away? these are small bits, not so contrary, even keeled amongst us and we take solace knowing; it happens to everybody.

but they don't float so far sometimes.  that dust on my bookcase is due in large part to me.  i mean i'm shedding the shit each day and not being especially tidy in a month or so i place my finger drawing against the grain and flip my finger 180 degrees. ewww. gray like some tint of foul mopwater.  this is what these tiny morsels of self have to look forward to. how lame.  

something Spicoli [once he opened an Italian restaurant] would term; Spaghetti Alla Lameonara.

i'm not telling anybody to save their nails or boogers or whatever but its kinda fucked to think this; you shed some skin one night as you sleep with your window open. little particles of you seep out the window and into the window downstairs where your neighbor or you stranger takes a deep breath and sucks that little part of you away and now its with them.  

every minute a piece of us is dying and most times we just sweep it beneath the carpet.

spend an empty day.

At around 9-9:30, I rise from my dark brooding bed, always clutching to the colder side of the bed for the beautiful woman that isn't there.  I stumble, like a sullen monk, swaying back and forth down the hall till i reach the toilet.  I piss for a solid minute and a half in circular sweeping motions, making a mess of the bowl and the surrounding ground.  i take a handful of toilet paper clean up the runoff of urine outside the bowl and bathroom floor, and then heave to yank the chain with a downward thrust.  i shimmy my way, walking almost sideways toward the shower. i let the hot water run too hot against the floor of the tub so that when i transfer it to the shower placing my feet in, the air is instantaneously polluted with a colorful display of expletives.  i shower for a long time, sometimes for a half hour, letting the grime of my life wash off me over and over again till the top layer of dermis begins its ascent toward a peel.  i get out of the shower opening the window to let the half hour of steam merge with the surmounting or dissipating fog. i don't use a towel. i air dry with all the extra time. it is restorative to my hard-water damaged skin.  i stare at myself in the mirror, not in a vain way.  in a meditative, don't worry its the psyche that's telling you you're ugly and you must defeat this mentality, way. i  brush and floss [sometimes]. i don't comb my hair. i dress quickly, a light coat of moisture still dripping from my legs.

i get in front of my computer and go through craigslist looking for jobs, but i never find anything.  i check my email, then i cruise craigslist again for a missed connection, but i never find anything.  I build a massive sandwich. i do my best to remember what day it is.  i drink a beer. i watch Maury Povich.  Chamida has the six men she slept with the nine months before Tavon was born.  Maury says the same thing to all six men. 

"In the issue regarding baby Tavon, you are NOT the father!"

All six men have the same reaction.  They stand on top of the horrid looking furniture and exclaim to all mighty that they knew they were right. meanwhile Chamida scurries backstage, her hands in her face, wailing like a depressed manatee.  Maury comforts her telling her backstage, that he and his producers will help her continue the search for the true father of baby Tavon.  Then they cut to a commercial.

Commercials during the day are geared towards losers. They know its a bunch of couch potatoes and unemployed slackers watching Maury each day so the commercials try to inspire these people.  One commercial is for J.G. Wentworth a claims attorney specializing in helping those hurt at work [the only suitable excuse for watching TV during the day].  Another is for Wyotech, where you can get your technical degree in 18 months as a technician or a mechanic or as a dental assistant.  the gecko is selling insurance.  Another is for baby wipes. 

 They are selling advertising space to stay at home moms and losers without jobs.  I turn the television off.  I walk to the coffee shop. I order a large coffee and write a lot of nonsensical blather. I try to write one thousand words. Today after this sentence I'm at 590 words and as usual, its fucking nonsense. A friend told me once that when i write with too much structure like a daily account [like this piece of shit], or something linear, it's usually shit.  He said, the only time your shit is great and compelling is when you get weird. just get weird.  so i crack another beer, a china beer and I'm going to write something weird.

HOTCAKES

I, mumbles out a the devastator, the ground all porous in sinkholes.

where-what comes rapid-style quicksand that eats you up;

your idea, your thought, all the motivators sucked into a vacuum.

awake in a room that is one solid bed. the doors open inward,

so you can't get out. you're stuck like a shut-in, in a room, so just sleep soundly, curled

up fetal position, like you are back their safe in mumsy's womb.

sleep so that the backache moves up each disc, all wiry spindles of tension.

you wake one with the word. lithe. lithe for the lifetime.

let inspiration seep away with your finished china beer. 

tan sedan of modest horsepower is a feeble modifier of your future.

truculence and the capriciousness sure to conjure itself from thin air.

big words symbolize a lack of depth in your pants, but i recognize,

take hold, find a new pallet to blend the flavor of your disgust with yourself.

make it up, hold it steady to your temple, feel cold steel, a metal taste,

a minor tremor from the feet, up your legs that shakes the discs into 

massaged comfort.  breaths of cold fog, swelter heat beneath blankets,

a drapery of leather constricting, the chase around the playground.

strip myself down; take off nice swede shoes, argyle socks, my dumb khaki's,

button downed collar bullshit, a solid tie.  down to my god-damned undies.

all he's got to do is stop hating himself long enough for everyone to believe he

doesn't hate himself. its compensatory illusion and it sells like hotcakes.

have a nice weekend friends. I'll be on my way.

smell of the wind

in the last month or so I've been knee deep in my own metaphorical shit.  my mother and father tirelessly proselytizing me within an inch of a buzzcut, a fresh shave and a teeth whitening.  i told them where to shove it, not literally but softly, with the kindest, most unstrung words one can utter. how about a bold step?

Yes, I was laid off from my last job and that's about as nice as I can put it.  it hurts to feel like you aren't needed or more to the point; necessary. they sat me down, produced a litany of excuses and rationale to justify my dismissal and then as if changing the subject my supervisor turns, winces and looks over at me out the side of his sagging eyeball.  he takes a deep breath as if searching for the words.  he wants so badly to soften the blow. he sits upright as the HR manager leans in as if preparing herself to be assailed by me. 

"We're gonna let you go."

there are a million moments in your life that pass right by you with so many words and options to choose from. this one is a spike in my vein. be careful of the wanton desires of the ego.

I, being the self fledging pansy-ass that I am, held my tongue, save for a silent out lash of frustration at the fact that I had to work the whole day.  Even in the moment there were symbols and innuendo, expletives and cursed images.  you have that moment in your life, and its testing you.  its testing your fear.  i walked out of that building ashamed, not cause i lost my job. jobs come and go.  I was ashamed I let it lay there in front of them.  i took like a bitch. I could've said something to let the sting fly from me to them. instead i packed up my shit, shook hands with my fellow colleagues, gave my boss the stink-eye and walked the fuck out. how lame! 

so that's why i haven't been posting. i was blogging a lot at work, they found out about it and used it as ammunition to get rid of me. now I hope to be more studious with this blog and please accept my apologies for not keeping up with it. 

there's a whole lot of shit in the wind. 

here i go again on my own...

whitesnake wisdom to pass down on the upcoming solo valentines day;

"Here I go again on my own
Goin' down the only road I've ever known
Like a drifter, I was born to walk alone
An' I've made up my mind
I ain't wasting no more time
I'm just another heart in need of rescue
Waiting on love's sweet charity
An' I'm gonna hold on
For the rest of my days
Cos' I know what it means
To walk along the lonely street of dreams
An' here I go again on my own
Going down the only road I've ever known"

Yes, Whitesnake and a stripperesque Tawny Kitaen sliding around a white Jaguar sucks pretty bad, but not nearly as much as Valentine's Day on the whole. What a shitty contrived excuse to sell flowers, chocolate, greeting cards, construction paper and jewelry. I've been alone for most of the vdays of my short tenure but I have to say the few where I was fortunate enough to have someone weren't spectacular or enriching or markedly more romantic than any other day. we as a society buy into this push for mass consumerism and god damnit I think it needs to stop.

A small history lesson on the origins of this celebration provided by my apostolic upbringing. St. Valentine was a martyred priest in Rome who was ordered to renounce his faith by Claudius II. When Valentine refused he was sent to the prefect of Rome who commended him to be beaten with clubs and then beheaded! According to liturgical texts this beating and beheading occured February 14, 270 A.D. [5 years of Catholic school does serve me on some level, who knew?]. Where does love fall into this? Well as a priest, St. Valentine was marrying young couples and centurians. Somehow this translates into millions of profits for all of said industries. this makes me want to vomit. people skipping around town joyously in love, spending money on useless material items and how do you think St.Valentines feels, forever entombed in his catacomb?

what a bullshit excuse to make couples spend money and those of us 'relationship challenged' people feel like shit for not having anyone. well guess what? not me! not this time! not on my watch, on my shift! i'm not staying in and i'm not hitting the town. i'm gonna stand in the street and yell at all the happy couples the sad truth of this bullshit consumer celebration. i mean who really benefits? people who are already having sex are going to have the same boring sex they always do except with some tacky neglige thrown into the mix, lonely people will feel a little more lonely and the fat cats at all those chocolate companies and those hack greeting card writers will be living big, fattening their wallets on a priest that was beaten and then decapitated.

as an exercise to relieve my sincere disgust at this putrid tradition i would like to shout a couple fuck-you's to the various heads of state that keep this miserable wheel turning. to hallmark, american greetings, the taylor corporation, carte blanche industries, 123 greetings, rennaisance greeting cards and sunrise greetings i just want to say fuck off and stop wasting trees for useless cards that will no doubt be taking up precious landfill space in a week or less. to hersheys chocolate for wrapping your kisses in that annoying foil that you can taste all outside the ediface of your kisses, i would like to say go fuck yourselves. to 1800-flowers, hoogasian flowers and all the florists across the country I'd like to say find a real job. to kay jewlers, tiffanys, the diamond exchange and all the hasidic jewlers of antwerp robbing john q public of three months salary and effectively enslaving the southern half of unindustrialized africa to get some stupid shiny rocks, let me just say, burn in hell you solace fucks. and finally to victoria's secret and your dreamcast of angelic models, destroying all hope, wreaking havoc on every american woman's body image, making me feel ugly with every browse of your catalog, every minute of your fashion show, enough peril in my blood to let it boil, enough envy and wrath at the unlikelihood to touch your soft supple breasts that the veins split and my arterial cavitys flood with bloody valentine red and seeps through my teeth let me just say, thanks for picking up adriana lima, she wouldn't have to do a damn thing.

good to get that all off my chest. so to conclude, valentine's day is a sham of the most flagrant order and it sickens me that some of you will engage in this but then again who am i to judge? just remember what you are celebrating and that's the fact that a roman catholic priest refused to renounce his faith and stop marrying soldiers, so he was beaten with clubs and then beheaded. HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

memory 84

it is minute something in my life and i press rewind to the moment i humped the ground in my first trip through 2nd grade. this story may be the very reason i was forced to endure a second go round.

this overzealous science prick that taught 7th-8th grade pre biology and chemistry assigned the seventh graders to take cotton swabs of the door knobs of each classroom. they do some shit with the swabs, scanning them or whatever for bacterias, i.e. snot, mucus, entrails and so on. they announced the god damn results over the loud speaker.

now keep in mind i'm seven years deep in the swimming pool, pretty weird and a bit spastic [i put that in bold because because there is a key to this whole incident in its root] . when they announce over the loudspeaker, that indeed mrs. welsh's doorknob had the largest quantity of bacteria, i lost it. i fipped back in my chair and began frying like an egg on the cheap smelly rug beneath me. i was gyrating, humping the floor in pure ecstasy until mrs. welsh came over and yanked me up from the floor. she shook me violently asking, "what's-a-matter with you?" i don't remember what i said back then, but i tell you what i would say now; 

"are you kidding me? we won you dumb bitch!"

spasm is defined as; an involuntary and abnormal muscle contraction. furthermore i would like to stress the idea of involuntary. INVOLUNTARY!

yes,  a bit of an over-reaction to begin to pantomime making love to the vomit stained carpet of my second grade classroom. that's a given. but lets be real here: is it grounds to make sure i have to repeat the whole fucking grade? when i was that age, anything vile or gross was of my interest. snot, phlegm, boogers, slime...these things are ingrained into young boys.  pre-pubescent girls reacting with the standard grossed out, "ewwwwww!" only stand make the problem worse. you do these savagely grotesque things to get a reaction, or more to the point attention. i was frail when i was that age, bullied around by bigger kids, so i couldn't play the 'go over there and hit the girl that you like card,' because most of them could kick my ass. being gross was the only way to draw attention to myself, albeit negative attention. so to answer your question, yes i was the kid that ate Elmer's glue, ink all over his mouth at the end of the day, his desk attached to the teachers at the front of the class, fond of spitting loogies up towards the sky then letting them fall brilliantly back in my mouth.

the back of this memory is my first day of second grade for the second time. same school, different teacher. i walk into the classroom, my dad holding my hand. immediately upon crossing the threshold to my new homeroom, Caroline Helton stands up and points her long bony finger at me and says, "Elliott! You got held back!" hearing her say it like that made me feel about as tall as a blade of grass. i grabbed onto my dad's silks pants and bawled uncontrollably as all these kids, a year younger than me watched curiously. they are all thinking to themselves, no wonder he got held back. HELD BACK!

papa patted me gently, picked me up and took me outside. he pulled out his handkerchief and dried my eyes. he told me to be strong 'cause i'm an Armstrong. so i marched back in, my eyes still red from tears and sat at my new desk. i put my head in my arms and felt the cool surface of my desk against my face. i dreamt of third grade.

Zach vs. Slater, Kapowski vs. Spano

one of the least successful pickup lines i've ever used is to ask a girl who she prefers; Zach Morris or A.C. Slater. I used infer a great deal about the girl by their answers. If a girl said Zach, she is obviously looking for a manipulative pansy ass with a nice car, feminine looks and enough hair gel to stop time. If a girl said Slater, she wants an alpha male type frat boy with a g-curl who roofies her punch the first time he gets her in the sack. the girls who piqued my interest were the ones who said, "what about screech?" Screech is obviously not worthy of most girls given his horrible fashion sense, squelching hi/lo voice, irritating Jewfro and overall nerdiness. the mere mention of screech is an affirmation that this girl was one that was worth talking to. poor Screech forever annotated as Lisa Turtle's daily restraining order. A girl that excludes themselves from the douchebag paradigm of zach vs. slater is one that is thinking thoughts i can align myself with.

the only other reasonable response to this query is a girl who deflects the question by asking, "kelly or jesse?" again, lisa turtle isn't even mentioned. but i have to be honest, growing up it was all Kelly Kapowski. after the show ended and Jesse Spano became a water nympho in Showgirls, you were officially preaching to the converted. looking back, jesse spano was the obvious choice. flawed and strong at the same time, no one can forget the episode where jesse, kelly and lisa get their big break doing a dance/singing routine to the Pointer Sisters, "I'm So Excited," on television. the stress becomes to much for Jesse and she turns to methamphetamines/diet pills to keep herself awake. zach confronts her about her abuse and she exclaims, "I'm So Excited, I'm So Excited, I'M SO SCARED!" Hilarious, no doubt, but it paints a picture of imperfection that i love in women. Jesse was also the portrait of the feminist cause, constantly calling her jock boyfriend a 'pig'. to have her first big role, post opt Saved by the Bell, be a tart showgirl, who strips and cries, then cries and strips was such a departure that kelly kapowski was left in the dust. the love scene between her and Kyle McLaughlin has to be the most overacted scene in movie history. Even the look on Kyle's face in the scene is like, "what the fuck is she doing?" Jesse, aka Elizabeth Berkley has taken on a number of great indie film roles, including a nice turn with Jennifer Beales and Campbell Scott in the indie sleeper hit Roger Dodger. she makes out with an underage kid in this movie....nice!

Everyday, 4pm, Saved by the Bell, would come on TBS. I don't think i've missed a single episode. That show is a part of my genetic makeup. Just to update. Jesse, by far the most successful of the gang, is acting still on TV and film, Screech is making porn, Zach earned critical acclaim on NYPD Blue, Lisa Turtle does small bit parts in black comedies mostly and plays the love interest in various R&B videos, Slater is a reality TV whore, Kelly is doing crap television and Mr. Belding played a pedophile on "Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia."

They made this cheeseball reunion show about Zach and Kelly finally getting married in Vegas. Fuck that! They should've gotten married at THE MAX!

So now i put it to you faithful reader. Who do you prefer? Kelly, Jesse or Lisa? Zach, Slater or Screech? post your answers with a brief explanation and the best answer gets no prize whatsoever!

7X4=nuff said?

what an evening; an enchanting evening it was.


there were residual knots lining the lower region of my stomach, a scarcely visible drear all in eyes because i didn't sleep much the night before. i gotta be honest, i get nervous when i stamp my name on a party and this was by far the most public and risky venture i had attached myself with. my temper was also tried because this was the first birthday party i'd ever had. because of the proximity of my birth to that of JESUS CHRIST'S people weren't usually around as a child to partake in rollerskating rink parties or a trip to the local Chuck E Cheese. as i got older, it became less about the lack of interest in activities of celebration and more about the fact that it was placed between two obnoxiously inebriated holidays effectively draining all my friends essence or desire to partake in boozehounding the night away. so with a tummy of heebie jeebies, the help of some friends and a prayer all my angst was wiped away in one fowl swoop. URRIE!


to make my sweet sixteen a reality i recruited my friend Andy whose birthday falls a day after mine and my friend Meghan, who would bring an even ratio of vagina to penis, for once. Andy ended up inviting his friend Briane to hop on the balanced genitalia team for the big win, whose 27th birthday was the day before mine. further helping the dream was Ezra, who I need to take the time here to thank for securing 111 minna, dealing with the staff, getting the doorgirls and basically doing all the work while the rest of us buzzed off emails and composed ridiculously long guestlists. at that it was born; "HELLA FOLKS BIRFDAY"....I have to credit Andy with the title but as an aside, i urged him to keep it.


as a gift my best friend, Nat aka DJ Morse Code, aka MoCo, agreed to play for next to nothing which left only the expense of promoting the event. Andy made the flyer and we didn't print any, so we only had to pay for the bitchy doorgirls. oh and they were such bitches, it was great.


the day of the event i went looking for an outfit that would make me standout and i found it. i wore a grey cardigan, white dress shirt, a clip on red bowtie, black jeans and red original vans. i looked like a cross between a drunk professor plum, bill nye the science guy and pee wee herman. one of the best ensembles i've ever assembled.


upon arrival at minna there was still some rumbling nerves down south but the static in the air was palpable and gave me a sense of thrill at what might unfold. people arrived early to avoid the cover at the door and by 10:30 the place was filling out nicely with people. remembering always that this was my birthday, i let the dopamine inhibitors flow. it was so great to see such a thorough melding of various worlds. that's what i've always found so great about San Francisco; its the tiny pockets of peoples and worlds you acquire over time. when everyone is in the same room, as an individual its fucking thrilling.



as the night wore on more and more alcohol was being forced in my direction. i would humor almost everyone by taking a deep pound of whatever drink they got me and then find a spot to drop it off, never to be drank again. the only problem with this was that most people want to give you shots on your birthday so by about 11:30 I was toast! Toast! whenever i got that upchuckety urge, that woozy headrolling fervor i simply turned to the good old dopamine inhibiting, wake up juice and some water. everything poured becomes erased! ERASED!



nat went on close to midnight and threw down the bangers till closing. i got up on the stage and did my funny little dance moves in effect trying to hype the crowd with my Tuts, waves and hits. sometimes i look back on the night and i feel embarrassed, like i made a fool of myself. but, then unflinching the alcohol and inhibitors numb my resolve and i'm up in front of everyone making an ass of myself, perhaps.



at two, everyone filed out of Minna, grinning ear to ear, at least that's how i remember it. there was an audible declaration that everyone attend the afterparty at a big house on Fell street. what an eruption of people that turned out to be. more alcohol, more inhibitors, more friends, conversation, laughter, drama, debauchery and me out of my mind. i was there till close to 4:30 when upon much urging by Nat we were supposed to go to some other house to smoke some trees. my friend Tyler, who opened up with a nice set at the beginning of the night approached me and asked where i was going. i don't remember this, but days later he told me i came stumbling down the stoop, my clip on bowtie now dangling off to one side, my hair once smoothly coiffed now spiked out every which way, sweat beating off my brow, my jaw swaying in the breeze, beer spilt on my shirt, eyes dimmed down and my new red vans covered in filth. what a fine picture that must've been! the conversation went something like this;

"uh, where are you going," tyler asked as fragile as a lost puppy.
"i don't know some shit, wherever it snott gunna be fun."
"okay."
"yeah, so you just stay here and catsh cab and I see you later."
"okay."

we ended up at some random house where i preceeded to pass the fuck out and then wake up when the joint came my way. someone offered up a bed and more wake up juice but i declined and placed my filthy, new red shoes on the coffee table and whispered in a birthday girl's ear.

to say it was the best birthday of my life is to downplay the effort, the success. those of us who were there to witness saw that we were better or worse people afterward, from then onward. as Jordan, my roommate commented, I never have a memorable time at Minna, but last night was memorable. it felt good to give a gift while getting the same gift i was giving. i wish my birthday was once a month so i could have an excuse to throw this party all the fucking time.

i gotta say the money ain't bad either.