A VERY DANDY XMAS

After more than a year after their rain-delayed-and-thusly-quite-shortened KEXP BBQ show, the lovely and talented Dandy Warhols returned to Seattle last night, playing this time at Neumos. They are one of those bands where I like just about everything they do, so I POUNCED yes POUNCED on tickets for this as soon as they were announced.



“This Friday, Saturday, and Sunday Caffe Vita will help us to celebrate a Fellini inspired Italian Holiday fete…Vita will be providing free espresso at all three shows, and free gelato at the Seattle show.”

Is that just the nicest thing? Band comes and plays and gives ya espresso and gelato for Christmas! Thank you, The Dandy Warhols. May Santa bring you many sweet licensing opportunities and stockings filled with royalties and shiny new guitar strings. I love you.

I late-started from home last night and was hungry past what I thought gelato could fill, so once again stopped for a quick salame pizza at Via Tribunali. The very pretty young waitress did not know who the Dandy Warhols were, she said, but wished me an excellent time and got the pizza out to the table in record time. She said she works every weekend and therefore has no fun. We agreed that there are pros and cons to that. There were no pros to the situation I faced at VT’s bathroom, when I discovered that the fashionista who had preceded me had decided to pee all over the toilet seat. I hope she gets violated by a reindeer.

As expected, Neumos was packed as I arrived about 15 minutes before the Dandies were to begin their set. A view spot opened up on the floor close to the stage so I grabbed it, which meant there would be no leaving for espresso and gelato. This was a sad thing, but we do what we must. The stage looked pretty with little white strings of lights around the mic stands and thin diffuse smoke, thankfully not from stank cigs. It quickly became obvious that tonight’s Ruiner was about 3’ in front of me: a loopy woman in long brown pigtails who perhaps had been on an Ecstasy drip. It’s never a good sign when you have someone dancing like a whirling Woodstock hippie to the pre-show audio over the PA. She smiled and smiled and bashed herself all over everyone standing next to her, completely clueless that people were getting upset. The nice couple in front of me got into it a bit with her, and the tall dude next to me got into it with them, cursing was had, and the nice couple gave up and left their spots.



When Ruiner looked at me and sloppily said, “Isn’t anyone here to see the DANDEEEE WARHOLLLLLLSSS??” I looked at her with the most blank expression possible, rendering her very essence invisible. The band began playing, she did her “my arms are forks in the sky!” dance for a few songs, looked at me again and said, “This isn’t the Dandy Warhols show I thought it was,” and drifted away permanently, hopefully to join Fashionista Fail Pee in the alley with Blitzen.

The Dandies sounded great. They know their stuff and their sound and they've got it down. They did not continue the Italian Christmas theme to their show, and I was very mildly disappointed by that – I was hoping Zia would come out as Sophia Loren and Courtney would be Marcello Mastroianni or Pope Paul or something. But they did play a cool version of “Little Drummer Boy” (you can download that for free at their website), which I did not catch on video because my arms were completely tired after shooting these. It's really hard to hold still like that, you know.













It was a long set – must have gone over two hours – with no encore. I don’t blame them, what with the generous regular set and a drive back to their home base of Portland still to come that night. The sound varied from crunchy garage to pep pop to swirly synth-psych in the Dandy Manner. Courtney’s voice was starting to shred a little towards the end which seemed to concern him a bit, but he’s all pro and worked it out. The crowd was for the most part happy and enthusiastic save for a few tired hack hecklers who thought their brand of funny was adding to everyone’s experience. I actually think these guys go to every show I go to just to shit on the band. Have I got a reindeer for them, the lesser-known “Donger.”

I left Neumos happy to have seen one of my favorite bands again, sweaty and tired and caribou-free, which is just how it should be.

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UNPRO

Ah, man. I really have mixed feelings about this. As I often mention, I am a huge fan of Little Steven's Underground Garage channel on SIRIUS XM satellite radio. But I just don't agree with his take on the state of music and the music business here. He has launched fuzztopia.com, which I would like better if it were not so technically buggy still, and that it didn't seem like one big ad for his Wicked Cool label. From the cnn.com article:

"The idea is to bring together musicians of all styles and countries to do social networking and development, (Van Zandt) says.

“We’re going to have a part of the Web site that suggests that yes, you can sell your stuff if you want to, or you can choose development – and at that point you will enter songwriting seminars, producer seminars, engineer seminars, performer seminars, and go through a kind of a course,” he says. “And hopefully, that will … help professionals or people who want to be professionals.”

Details are still being worked out, he says, but one thing he’s focused on is selecting a handful of musicians to be personally mentored by experts. He talks about ideas like the old Motown charm school, which educated that label’s musicians how handle their careers.

“It is similar to that in that I’m asking people to think beyond writing a song their mother’s going to get a kick out of,” he says. “Let’s learn this craft a little bit and you’ll find it’s quite rewarding. … This whole instant gratification culture we’re building, we have to address it … and we have to address it in a real focused way.”

Bah.

Now I am all for networking amongst musicians and grass-roots marketing and word-of-mouth and all that. I am SO not for the old-style "artist development" model. So so so so so so NOT. All that makes me think of is exploitation, and taking something and making it honed and all shiny and acceptable and big-market-friendly, and that is just not real rock n' roll to me. If you are determined to be a professional musician, yes, you need to learn what that means and what it takes to survive and/or thrive in an incredibly-difficult and broken business. But the whole idea of mentoring just creeps me out completely, I'm sorry. You should listen with an open mind to the opinions of professional musicians because they've walked at least part of the road you might be taking. But seminars on how to craft a song, how to perform...man, you either got it or you DON'T. No pro is going to make you unique or cool or give you some formula to be awesome. They can tell you how to craft something like something else that already exists, because many people like to buy things that seem familiar and sound the same. If you want to do this, have at it. But at that point, to me, you are a business person selling a product, period.

Little Steven, to me, starts with good intent but is hopelessly lost in a time long gone. Musicians want information and help and support in being successful, sure, but who the hell would want to go back to the heavy-handed paternalism of the Motown "charm school?" There's a reason creative people left Motown, you know, despite the success they had there. When you've got some Big Daddy telling you how to look, how to move, how to construct music to make it palatable to the masses, eventually you are going to lose whatever was truly original to you or you are gonna bolt.

Writing or performing a song that your mother would get a kick out of is cool. Ask Elvis Presley.

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GERMANY, THE POLKA, AND THE RAMONES

MissSeven is doing a report on Germany for her class Multicultural Presentation next week. She knows that she has German ancestry, but still asks exactly which part of her is German, half of her face or an arm or what. If I wanted to be really evil I would give her all kinds of information about India and Japan and Colombia and have her make her report from that: “Germany is a small, densely-populated Asian island, its official state dance is Bollywood, and its main export is cocaine.” Ahhh. It’s so tempting.

Well, it got me thinking again how my kids really don’t have any strong cultural traditions or identification. They’ve lived their lives in the suburban Western United States, aware of the strong Hispanic presence in Colorado and the strong Asian presence here in Washington State, but it’s not theirs to own. Their culture is just Generic White American, formed more through television and videogames than any rich ethnicity. I too am a GWA, but at least my Wisconsin heritage loaded me with GERMAN STUFF. If you too are from there, you know what I am talking about. Bratwurst und bier und Käse, everyday language peppered with German words and phrases, and that pesky German work ethic abound.

It wasn’t until I left Wisconsin for good when I was 22 that I came to the eventual realization that not everyone knew how to polka, and some people didn’t even know what the polka WAS. What?? I don’t care if you are a nurse from Rhinelander or a crack dealer on North 24th St. in Milwaukee – you know how to polka if you are from Wisconsin. You can hear polka music on the radio, watch it on TV, and every event, from the small town carnivals to Summerfest has a polka band. No one sat out. The music would start and, depending on bier intake, it would not be thought of as odd to see a nasty biker dude dancing with a grandma, two teenage girls polka-ing, little kids on daddy’s shoes learning to polka, and anyone else that you thought would never ever get up and dance to anything, they’d be out on the polka floor. It was fun and funny.

So…I can’t cruelly subvert MissSeven’s German report, but I can provide you with a smile, inspired by all of this. My little Christmas gift to you, The Ramones and The Polka. Genießen Sie bitte!

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A FLAMING LIPS CHRISTMAS

For the person on your list who has everything...

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MOM WAS RIGHT, AT LEAST FIVE TIMES

In honor of my mom’s birthday today, I would like to list five things she told me that I used to blow off but now think were good pieces of advice. This kind of thinking happens as you become an adult; you get some distance and realize that your parents were not completely right, then completely wrong. Some of the stuff they knew was from VALID SYNTHESIZED EXPERIENCE. I’m just glad Oprah wasn’t my mom because she’s so damn smug. I’d be compelled to do everything the opposite of what she said. I’d be out there beating up Rhianna and never starting a school for underprivileged anyones and I’d be able to maintain a healthy weight by eating right and exercising. F U, Mom Oprah.

Anyway, Happy Birthday Mom, here’s your life validating moment, courtesy Diarrhea Island. Aren’t you proud?

1. Cold? Put on a hat and socks. Growing up in Wisconsin, you get cold a lot. Starting in September, my town would apparently be renamed “Goddamn Siberia” by my father and would remain so until about May, when he would start calling it “Shitville.” In the Goddamn Siberia months, I would complain terribly about the house being cold, walking around in a t-shirt and maybe pants, maybe not. I would turn up the furnace and then my dad would yell, “YOU THINK WE’RE MADE OF MONEY? TURN THAT DOWN!” and my mom would tell me that body heat is lost first through the extremities. I would frown horribly at everyone and think, “I SHOULD HAVE TO WEAR A HAT AND SOCKS IN THE HOUSE? COME ON!” But mom was right. You do feel significantly warmer if you cover your head and feet. I say this now as it’s 24 degrees outside today, I have on no hat or socks and I am sneezing.

2. Don’t drink and drive. I solved this problem completely by waiting until I was in my 30s to get my driver’s license and had little interest in alcohol.

3. Natural whole foods are better for you. In the ‘60s and early ‘70s, my mom really got into growing vegetables in our big garden in the front yard, and the books of nutritionist Adelle Davis. Oh, did I give her crap for this. For one, I hated all vegetables except corn and potatoes and peas. Rutabagas? Beets? Sprouts??? Get out of here! Secondly, I hated weeding that garden, a miserable endless backbreaking dirty task, fully on view to all those driving by on the busy road in front of our house. I think I heard HA HA! shouted at me more than a few times. And finally, Ms. Davis did not believe in food additives or colorings or unnatural anything, which totally discounted CANDY, so she SUCKED. When she died of cancer in 1974, I went up to my mom and said, “HA HA! LOOKS LIKE SHE WAS WRONG!” and my mom said, well, maybe so, maybe so. But she wasn’t. The crap we eat from the supermarket is a horror show and it does affect us. This is why we have 8-year-old girls getting their periods, 200-lb. Kindergartners on Maury, and everyone has cancer of the everything all the time. Garbage in, garbage out is true true true. I still despise the idea of weeding, though.

4. Education is a gift. I also despised school, so I was just completely skeptical when my mom would tell the story of how at 17 she left home to go to college at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and how thrilled she was. Not happy, not pleased – thrilled. Her parents thought educating girls was a total waste of time and were actively hostile towards her plan, but she did it anyway, and paid for it by working two or three jobs while going to school full-time. I thought this was madness and couldn’t understand her hunger for knowledge, her need to get that degree, that anyone would work so hard to listen to some drone in a lecture hall. But once again – and it took me a long time to get this, too – she was completely right. Having access to information and the experiences and knowledge of others broadens your world immensely when you are actively engaged in learning and sorting it out through your own skill set. Watching the news and the History Channel is not the same. Listening to and interacting with lots of people who are all learning and thinking and reaching is stimulating, and changes you in unique ways. It is a gift, and as it is said, no one can ever take it away from you.

5. Manners are important. Oh my gawd, there were so many little things to remember to do – hold the door for people, put your napkin in your lap, don’t burp, say please and thank you and you’re welcome and excuse me, don’t chew your mouth open, don’t speak with your mouth full, don’t speak until spoken to, don’t fidget at the table, don’t talk at the movies, never fart anywhere, never say the word “fart,” rinse the soap off after you use it, rinse the tub out after you use it, put a new roll of toilet paper on the roller if it runs out, never ask people about money, politics, or God, pretend to pray at the dinner table even if you are an atheist, pretend to say the Pledge of Allegiance even if you don’t want to, don’t clank your silverware on your plate, take small bites of food, don’t reach for food at the table, don’t ever take the last serving of food, ask to be excused from the table…I could keep going on like this for a page or more. There were so many “don’ts” that I thought were stupid and repressive (that whole don’t speak until spoken to thing was SO not going to work for me). But for all that semi-neurotic instruction, I am better for it. Good manners make us more thoughtful and less ape-like. You get in the habit of thinking how your actions might impact someone else's experience, which is why now when I go to concerts I don’t stand up and dance in front of sitting people or throw up on them.

I hear myself passing these things on to my own kids. I am sure they think as I did, OH WHAT BILGE, but maybe it will sink in similarly over time. Note to my children: I’ll babysit my future grandkids, but I AIN’T GONNA WEED. Get out of here!

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JEALOUS NATURE

Today I was listening to KEXP, finishing up getting dressed to go out in the chilly sunshine. I had not forgotten what day it was – the day John Lennon was killed – but I had set it aside, thinking about my day and all the small rattle-y details of things to do that fill up my mind like multi-colored stale gumballs in a decrepit penny dispenser machine. The radio was playing some beep bop boop electronica track, I went in my closet to get my clothes on, and then Lennon’s “Jealous Guy” came on. I stood for a moment and listened and, with some surprise, burst into tears. I didn’t indulge that for long – after all, those gumballs all need to be chewed and spat out, one by one.

It’s such a beautiful song, surely one of Lennon’s finest, and arguably his best. It is sparse but not cold; terribly sad, but not maudlin. It is a showcase for his remarkable gift in marrying an absolutely lovely melody with heart-wrenchingly honest lyrics:

I was dreaming of the past
And my heart was beating fast
I began to lose control
I began to lose control

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I was feeling insecure
You might not love me anymore
I was shivering inside
I was shivering inside

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy

I was trying to catch your eyes
Thought that you was trying to hide
I was swallowing my pain
I was swallowing my pain

I didn't mean to hurt you
I'm sorry that I made you cry
Oh no, I didn't want to hurt you
I'm just a jealous guy, watch out
I'm just a jealous guy, look out babe
I'm just a jealous guy.



That’s a bit hard to watch now, but I can and do. I am always especially thrilled to see artists at work, and to know the process behind what they do. I didn’t know until many years after the song was released in 1971 and more unreleased material began to surface that “Jealous Guy” began its song life with completely different lyrics – “Child of Nature,” originally intended for the Beatles’ 1968 “White Album.”

On the road to Rishikesh,
I was dreaming more or less,
And the dream I had was true,
Yes, the dream I had was true.

I'm just a child of nature,
I don't need much to set me free,
I'm just a child of nature,
I'm one of nature's children.

Sunlight shining in your eyes,
As I face the desert skies,
And my thoughts return to home,
Yes, my thoughts return to home.

Underneath the mountain ranges,
Where the wind that never changes,
Touch the windows of my soul,
Touch the windows of my soul.



I felt a bit disappointed when I found this out. I guess I had assumed that “Jealous Guy” was written all in one go, straight from the soul to paper and piano, some brilliant natural marriage of music and emotion. But that wasn’t exactly the case. “Child of Nature” was scrapped in favor of McCartney’s “Mother Nature’s Son,” that being the better song. There’s nothing too insightful or remarkable about Lennon’s musings there from his India trip; they come off of blandly hippie and self-consciously poetic. But because he was a professional, he knew that he had a really good melody and construction it in, and saved it until the right words came along. It was a disciplined and admirable move on his part, although it is also possible that he too found the old lyrics trite after some time had passed and/or it had been published as a Lennon/McCartney track with Northern Songs. Professionals also must be aware of Business.

In the end, Lennon’s “Jealous Guy,” although not a hit single, became a song that resonated very deeply with millions of fans. The melody rises and floats and grounds again effortlessly, adding a feeling of hope and redemption to the shame and regret and sad self-awareness of the lyrics. The singer knows his faults all too well, knows he probably will repeat them, but is able to at least, once, say how very sorry he is for what he has done. Lennon was able to put to music something so many have felt yet were unable to say, giving those listeners so much more than a piece of pop. That’s a kind of genius or gift or skill, something that added to the world.

December 8th will always be a tough day for me and so many others who were touched by John Lennon through his music, but how and when he died must not ever be a focus. He was an imperfect man who was able at times to perfectly express human emotion of all kinds – joy, sadness, anger, pain, love, everything – which is why his work will remain relevant, long past his death and mine and yours and maybe even the super race of robot gumball machines that will take over the earth someday. Yes, maybe even past that.

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PLUG 4

OMG OMG OMG OMG. This is the COOLEST THING. This is sure proof that I am a geek, for I get way excited about the Neuhaus Laboratories T-2 Amplifier, which connects right to your computer to play all those thousands of songs you have on there, "you" being "me" and maybe also being you, but certainly me. It's a GAWJUSS vacuum tube amp that has a digital-to-analog converter built right into it, which means it takes the data straight from the original files in your iTunes or whatever, brings them into the analog tube amp, restoring the depth, warm, and clarity that simply cannot be provided by any speakers connected to the computer itself or a solid-state amp. Think of it like the difference between your favorite musical artist crooning to you over the telephone, or sitting in your lap, smiling and singing just to you. Hopefully your favorite artist is not Susan Boyle.

As explained on their website and confirmed by ME, that's "ME" as in Marianne, not MissSeven who is also ME on blogspot because her blog is linked to mine and such, tube amps RULE for sound. There is nothing, not even the very best and most modern digital approximation, that can touch the immediacy and power of an old tube amplifier. They are loud and noisy and hot and prone to problems, those old guitar amps, but MAN. Best sound ever.

I play music almost exclusively through my laptop or iPod now. I haven't even had a stereo set up in my house since I moved here five years ago, although I want to just to be able to play some of those of records I have hauled with me in VERY HEAVY BOXES through every move since I was a child. It would be a pleasure to hear everything more like the artists and producers intended from all the digital content I have now.



Now the tough part: it's $795.00, in whole real American dollars. For some of you, that is pocket change, and by "some of you" I mean the people across the street in the garish Moorish-Palace McMansion. For the rest of us, this is a chunk of change to dig up. But still, I am passing the info on and maybe Aunt Minerva will kick the bucket choking on a fruitcake slice this Christmas and she'll leave you a grand and maybe a couple of doilies to boot. You could then buy the amp, set it on the doilies, and play "Oh, Canada" through it in her honor. It doesn't matter if she wasn't Canadian. Like she's gonna know.

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XMAS MOVIES: A SUMMATION

I used to write one-sentence programming blurbs for Time-Warner cable. This was a strange freelance job I would do at home in one insane deadline-driven weekend a month, couriers bringing over stacks and stacks of material I had to very quickly read through and summarize in just a sentence or two per show or special event -- “stunt,” they called those. I realized pretty quickly after I started that no one was proofing my work; they were just sending it out to be printed for Cabletime as I wrote it. This was too tempting for me and I started writing stuff like “A Rambo Must-See Marathon For The Whole Family, WOW, don’t miss it, GONNA FLY NOWWWW!!” and “TBS proudly provides people popular pap!” Not bad for $75 an hour, huh? I was fired by letter about a year later. Three thousand other Time-Warner employees got canned the same day, so I am pretty sure they never did look at my writing. I have fond memories of madly typing away in my basement in a big red fluffy robe, quietly giggling while subverting the entertainment industry.

So in the holiday spirit, of which I have none, here are some very brief reviews of a few of the classic Christmas movies and TV specials that helped to form the character of people like me. If I had known I was getting fired, I would have written up the December Cabletime like this, for sure.

A Charlie Brown Christmas: Charlie needs Prozac and his tree is shit, no want wants to stop dancing to jazz, Snoopy mocks Lucy, Linus sucks up to God.

How The Grinch Stole Christmas: Bile-colored dumpy dude takes presents from weird-looking people in a valley, has a massive sack, commits animal cruelty, heart explodes when he sees people sing unintelligible song.

Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer: Gets inferiority complex when even his Dad thinks he’s ugly, runs away to chill with a gay elf, comes back to help Santa even though Santa was kind of a dick to him, gets a dumb deer girlfriend.

A Christmas Story: A kid likes a gun, his Dad likes a lady lamp, a bully gets his ass kicked.

Home Alone: Horrible large rich family forgets to take one of their kids with them on vacation , kid beats up robbers, family is never arrested for child neglect.

A Christmas Carol: Crusty dude has a bizarre dream where he sees how he fucked up before, how’s he’s fucking up now, and how no one gives a shit about him in the future, and buys a turkey.

It’s A Wonderful Life: Suicidal dude has a short old creepy guy show him how great he was and how things would be apocalyptically-bad without him; annoying child hears a bell.

Frosty The Snowman: Happy Birthday, he dies.

The most entirely offensive Christmas show ever, A Charlie Brown Kwanzaa. Not Safe For Work, Children, Or Anyone. Please to enjoy.

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STOP THE PRESSES! 2

Tiger Woods lives up to his last name and some of his golf clubs, all in one gushing female tribute, Queen Elizabeth threatens paparazzi (what's she gonna do? beat them to death with a hat?), someone wondered for even a fraction of a second what's happening with Paris Hilton, Carnival's first "Cougar Cruise" should be subtitled "Fish In A (Floating) Barrel."

I suggest Tiger and the Queen sign up for the cruise, while no one takes photographs of Paris Hilton. There.

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XMAS 2009: MY DO NOT WANT LIST

I am a fortunate person. I have many, many awesome material items, my health is good, my children seem to be growing at the appropriate rates, and I don't need to toil under a merciless blazing sun picking grapes to be able to pay my cable bill. I abuse no substance, I require no adaptive equipment (oh, alright, the glasses then), I have no arrest record, and I have an expired United States passport with a really cute photo from 1987. My packaged hot cocoa even invites me to enjoy it while basking in warm chocolate memories:



I know what I have, and do appreciate it all. So another Christmas is here and because of the pre-described bounty above, there's really nothing I desperately need or want. I am pleased with the CD holder MissSeven made me in her woodworking class, some goodies in my stocking, and maybe that new mineral makeup that has a vibrating applicator brush. I already have my Dave Davies and Wilco and BRMC show tickets for 2010 even. That alone is huuuuuge! What I can tell you is what I DO NOT WANT. I am easily pleased, this is very true, but at the same time, don't tick me off with this godawful shit. Thank you in advance, Santa.

DO NOT WANT 2009:

1. Snuggie: Man, I don't understand this at all. Why in the hell would I want a huge blanket I would WEAR? Don't you people GET UP AND MOVE AROUND? It should say on it "WOW, I AM SO LAZY AND PROBABLY FAT BUT YOU CAN'T TELL UNDER THIS THING." How about a sweater and turning up your DAMN HEAT? It would only get full of dog hair and food crumbs and smell bad. Gross.



2. Kindle: I realize the great function of this digital book device, but damn. Doesn't anyone want to FEEL a book anymore? It's kind of like when LPs were replaced by CDs, now replaced in large by invisible MP3's -- there's something cool about holding a real thing, rather than the digital representation of the real thing. Get off my lawn.



3. Perfume or Candles: They both give me a headache after a short amount of time and I am pretty sure that the combination would start a fire. A good-smelling fire, but still.



4. Earrings: These also give me a headache and I don't want to poke holes in my earlobes just to hang things that you can't ever see because my hair hangs down over them at all times. This seems sensible to me.



5. Any sort of cleaning or cooking device: Get out of here, unless it comes with someone else to run them too.



6. Any music on Billboard's Top 20 Albums: No Susan Boyle, Andrea Bocelli, Adam Lambert, Rhianna, Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus, or Taylor Swift. No Carrie Underwood, Michael Jackson, John Mayer, Justin Bieber, Shakira, or NOW 32. No Casting Crowns, Michael Buble, or 50 Cent. No Norah Jones or the Twilight Moon soundtrack, because I already have those two. See, I'm not a total pop snob. But don't push me.



7. Candy or other holiday sweets: Dude. No. No, dude. No.



8. Any kind of small pet for the kids that I will end of having to clean poop from: Self-explanatory.



9. Puzzles or games: If I wanted more mental challenge, I'd get a Snuggie and watch the History Channel or something.



And finally...

10. A toad purse: Yes, this is made from REAL DEAD TOADS. I am breaking out in total skeeve just thinking about it. This doesn't need to exist.



So, then, maybe just get me a gift card to Safeway for some more Xanax-filled cocoa. Let's make it simple.

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BE SAFE

The call came in at 7:51PM, as expected.

“Rachel? It’s Mom.” Rachel always thought it was odd that her mother thought her own daughter wouldn’t recognize her on the telephone.

“Hey, Mom.”

“Well, he’s dead.”

Rachel paused for a moment, not really knowing what to say, or what to feel, so she said what she thought she should. “It’s good it’s over now,” knowing as she spoke there was never going to be an “over.” Her mother waited to speak for a second, and Rachel could hear the sounds of people in the background, talking and moving about.

“Everyone here was very nice and helpful. I’m going to get a ride back to the hotel and head home in the morning. I’ll call you when I get in.”

“OK, Mom. Hang in there. Be safe.” “Be safe,” was what her mother often said to her, but of course it was never just a toss away line at the end of a conversation.

“Alright, honey. Just wanted to let you know. Bye bye.”

“Bye, Mom.”

Rachel clicked the phone off and set it on her desk, where she had been reading a new manuscript that one of the senior editors was all excited about. She took off her glasses and set them down next to the phone, the desk lamp glowing with a warm, honey-gold light that glinted off the lenses.

Joseph Carl Edwards was dead at last. She ticked off emotions, trying to find one that fit. Happy? No. Satisfied? No. Sad? No. Angry? No. None of them were right. Numb, flat, indifferent? Was there anything left to feel? Joseph Carl Edwards had been a part of every day of Rachel’s life, and now he would be zipped in a bag, lifted into a hearse, taken to the crematorium, his body burnt to ashes, his matter changed into useless dust. Without him, without what he did, Rachel reflected, she probably wouldn’t even exist. There was no place to put that emotion, and no name for it.

All tied up, finished, nothing more to the story now. There were no more years of lawyers or cops or courts or anguished phone calls or reporters. There wasn’t anything left to extract, or to do.

“Toddler Abducted From North Shelton Home”

“Police Call For Volunteers In Search For Missing Child”

“Body Of Child Found In Field Confirmed To Be Emily Markowsky”

“Suspect Arrested In Sexual Assault And Murder Of Local Toddler”

“Edwards Found Guilty; Jury Recommends Death Penalty”

The ghost of her sister defined everything. Rachel only knew her through the newspaper headlines, kept in a box in her parents’ bedroom closet, photographs of a dark-haired baby with a wide smile and pink cheeks. As the years passed, her mother was able to talk about her, the little baby things she did, when she walked, her first words, what foods she liked and didn’t like, and that she loved dogs.

Everyone had encouraged her mother and father to have another child, a new baby to help take away some of the horror, something positive, to make the two of them a family again, to try to not let a monster take everything away. They tried really hard to smile and be happy for her benefit, Rachel thought, they tried as best they could. They loved her, they did. But there was never a day when Emily wasn’t there, or the weight of what had happened.

Her father never said much about it or about anything, and held Rachel sometimes too lightly and sometimes too tightly. He died when Rachel was 11. Even though he was barely in his 40s, no one seemed surprised. At his funeral, every time someone bent down to her and said, “He’s with your sister now in Heaven, they will take care of each other,” Rachel wanted to kick something. She nodded and said nothing instead.

Dead dead dead dead dead dead dead. Emily is dead, Dad is dead, Joseph Carl Edwards is dead. Rachel didn’t want to go with her mother to watch the lethal injection process. She felt like even that was giving him too much from her. But she understood. Her mother had never given up, through all the legal mess and frustrations and appeals and technicality screw-ups. She wanted him gone. Not locked up – gone. She needed to know she had done something, had some kind of control. No monster was going to outlast her. Rachel wondered if she would do the same, if she had a child and something awful happened to it. But she wasn’t going to have any kids.

The manuscript she was reading was another vampire romance novel. It would get published and it would sell well; escapism is always more popular in hard economic times. She switched off the desk lamp and went into the kitchen, hungry for a bowl of cereal. Her mom was going to be OK, Rachel knew, and wouldn’t have any problems sleeping that night at the Comfort Inn near the prison.

The TV news in the morning would be the usual capital punishment debate again, which Rachel would not watch. She would instead get up, get dressed, stuff the manuscript back in her laptop bag, grab a coffee and a bagel at the café on the corner, and walk uptown to work, watching her own warm breath form bursts of tiny white clouds in the crackling winter air, safely dodging the ghosts and monsters on the way.

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HA 21

WHO CALLED TODAY?

COME ON! IT'S EASY! COME ON! WHO?

The Paramount. They found my lost phone.

HA HA!

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THIS AIN'T NO PARTY, THIS AIN'T NO DISCO

("Fashion" by David Bowie is playing on the car radio)

MissSeven: (mad) Heyyyyyyyyy...THIS IS DISCO MUSIC!!

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I-YIYI

I was most bummed to realize last Monday that I had lost my cell phone, likely at the Morrissey show on Sunday, a modern-life tragedy. To modify his “Everyday is Like Sunday:

Trudging slowly over wet city streets
Back to the theater where your phone may have been stolen
This is the Sound town
That they forgot to close down
Armageddon - come Armageddon!
Come, Armageddon! Come!

Everyday is like Sunday
Everyday is silent and grey
Without my phone.

Oh, that’s not really true. I don’t spend that much time on my phone at all, but I did feel uncomfortably naked without it. My safety net more than anything, I suppose, in case another van wants to slam into my car on a wet rainy night. I will miss my Samsung Blackjack for the cute photos of my kids on there, and a few amusing text messages now lost to the black holes of other lost phones, single socks, and personal dignity. Most people who lose their phones fret over the lost phone numbers, but hey, if anyone wants to call me to repopulate my database, they can, BECAUSE I GOT A NEW iPHONE, MAN! Santa somewhat reluctantly arrived early to repair my general anxiety over not having a phone, and I am pretty excited. I am a Mac person, after all, and this cool lil thing all links up with MY WORLD seamlessly, unlike the Blackjack. So now I am officially over-i‘d, with an iPhone, an iPod touch, an iPod Nano, two MacBooks, and a fried MacMini and a fried iMac. Staring at all these screens reminds me that I need new glasses, but that will have to wait because gadgets are more fun than acquiring sharp reading vision.

So in a few hours, I have almost completely loaded up my new 32GB iPhone with songs from my iTunes bank. I will need to pare this down. I don’t really need 5000+ songs with me on another device, and I would like to get a few new apps. I can see where people can go mental getting new apps for their phones because they all sound like so much fun, although many of them turn out to be not quite so awesome in practical use. I am certainly no appspert, but I can tell you a few that I have and like.

Arcade Hoops and Bowl Lite: I am not much of a gamer and do not need to blow up dudes in a bloody and realistic manner on my phone while I am out and about. These two games are both by Skyworks, and are very basic classic arcade games that even a monkey with a delicate touch could use.

Coffee Buzz: Finds the nearest coffeehouse by you and lets you Twitter about it if you like. Just give me the latte, phone, hurry up.

iTranslate: For me, mostly good for comic relief, just to see the sentence “You are a hideous malformed beast of a human” translated into German.

SIRIUS XM Online: Oh, this is very very nice. As a subscriber, I really appreciate being able to have this as I travel. I used to actually bring along my boombox and the radio and the antenna in my luggage and now I don’t have to – I can listen to Underground Garage and SIRIUS XMU and all the rest from my leetle phone.

Pandora: A nice change of pace from the above if I just want to listen to some fresh songs without the DJs for awhile.

Sit Or Squat: Yes, this finds the nearest available public toilet and provides ratings. If you are a parent, you know why I have this.

NY Times: Not as flashy as CNN, but not anywhere near as annoying and better-written. Shocking, huh.

I am looking forward to using the iPhone camera to do some new creative work, using Voice Memos to record spontaneous ideas or conversations from MissSeven, and I am most looking forward to not losing it EVER. And it is appropriately i-ish to be able to go into Garage Band, bring up your own recording (soon to be available on iTunes for your holiday giving pleasure), ask it to make you a ringtone, and there we ARE.




Heh. Fun. RIP, Blackjack.

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CURSES, FOILED AGAIN

Me: I'm bummed I lost my phone.

Mr11: I'm bummed my glass cat got broken.

Me: Yeah.

Mr11: Nothing lasts forever.

(very long pause)

Mr11: Except tin foil.

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