jackshoegazer | Entries tagged with friends

Jacquelyn is at book club and Ethan is hunting through Halo2 for The Golden Warthog. I'm trying to relax, but feel like I should be working, which is odd, since it's usually Jacquelyn who can't relax when there's nothing to do, and I who has no problem relaxing.

I've gotten as much work done on my drama project as I can. The PowerPoint is almost done, the script is pretty much done. (Here is the first slide.) We have one more meeting, tomorrow evening, to make any changes, add anything, rehearse the timing and slide cues. One of our members, Ben, still hasn't done anything or shown up for a single meeting. I should feel a little sorry for him; he's a paranoid schizophrenic (for reelz, yo), obviously smokes too much pot, and is unable to afford the book for the class (or any other class from what he says), but shite man, we reached out and basically did everything else. All he had to do was a little research and show up.

Otherwise, it should be fine. I'm a little nervous about the presentation, well, actually just the in-front-of-everyone-acting part. The easy bit is that I'm playing myself and I feel pretty comfortable with my other group members. Steven and Greg are especially intelligent and funny. I would even hang out with them outside of class if such a thing presented itself. Imagine that.

On Friday night,

brdgt and

strangedasein came over for dinner. Bridget brought an excellent ziti (/drool) and Jacquelyn made a salad with arugula, garbanzos, red peppers, a special dressing, and much yumminess I can't accurately describe. (Probably because there was quite a bit of wine flowing at that point.) I had a really great talk with Joel about.. umm, well, stuff. Important self-knowledge, place-in-the-universe stuff. It's sometimes a challenge to find a common vocabulary since Joel has approached what I will loosely define as The Mysteries from a philosophical perspective, while I've tackled it through a sort of psychological/spiritual lens. It's nice to have someone I can talk to about these things; this spot in my life has been vacant for a while now. I will definitely be picking up some more philosophy, especially Nietzsche, very soon. My philosophical teachings have been very limited, mostly obtained by references through other writers.

Tomorrow morning, I have my follow-up for my wisdom teeth removal and a cleaning. Afterwards I have to write an extra credit paper for psychology on Orwell's 1984, then work some more on the drama project, and eventually head uptown to Michaelangelo's for the rehearsal. I think I have some "wimmin's work" to do in there somewhere as well. Egads, when did I get so busy?

Current Mood: excited

Good morning. Ok, so it's almost one in the afternoon, but I just finished breakfast so it's still morning to me. Later I will head out for some errand-running and laundromat-visiting, but for now, I am procrastinating to the best of my ability. Like playing around in Photoshop to make this portrait, this self-aggrandizing picture.

So now what, you ask? What's going on?

I haven't been around much, I haven't even turned on my computer this week. My power supply is all fucky so it takes upwards of a half of an hour to get it started. Ethan started school this week and between family time and dinner and whatnot, I don't have the energy or time to sit around and get it up and going. I've been checking in here and there with certain journals, but I haven't time to read everyone right now. I've got my weekends to try and catch up, but it's just too much. You people will just have to stop posting. Not.

Everything has been great, actually. Ethan is adjusting to his new school quite well, in fact it seems to be his favorite school and favorite batch of teachers yet. His main teacher sent a note home informing me that he is an excellent student, very smart and quite creative. I had a revelation about middle school as I dropped him off the other day. There was a trio of girls walking down the sidewalk, obviously 8th graders in the midst of puberty, appearing much more like high school students. Directly behind them was another trio of girls yet to be pillaged by adolescent hormones. They were small and looked like young children. MIddle school is this strange place they put you for those most awkward years when we transform. The middle school chrysalis, the junior high cocoon.

Jacquelyn has overloaded herself with coursework as usual, so she's sufficiently challenged and fretting. We made a brief appearance at the Geography Department picnic. I mostly talked with her advisor's wife about child-rearing. I don't know jack-patooty about geography. Most of the people seems to be broken off into little groups talking shop. I felt sufficiently silenced by that, uncomfortable in the way of a family reunion where you barely know anyone and feel like you should talk to people but can't bring yourself to do so.

Afterward, we went to

kiwikat and

shevus' place to get caught up as we haven't talked to them in quite a while. I had a headache from hell on top of major sinus congestion, so add that to a week of waking up at 5:30am, we didn't stay too long, but ties have been sufficiently reconnected, reconstructed and now I've seen some good videos of a guy juggling to music. All is well in the world.

I just finished Oh The Glory Of It All by Sea Wilsey which was excellent. I've started Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. I've been a book devouring fiend. I'm pretty much on schedule for my FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE. I'm going to shower and get motivated. There's alot to be done before Ethan comes back from his mum's place, wo I must bid you adieu!

I finished that post-DEMF flyer in the specified two days. The All Jacked Up guy never showed up or called with my cash. I hope I don't have to have someone kick his arse and get his party busted. I don't do my own arse-kicking. It's so uncivilized. I have powerful minions in low places to do such things for me.

I'm an evil genius, a chaotic mastermind. I shouldn't learn German and I shouldn't scheme. So says my psychologist.

For those who want to see my exquisite skills in text layout and color selection can see the final versions of the FRONT and the BACK of the flyer for FREQUENCY RESPONSE. Or if you're going to be at the DEMF and you want a cool after-hours party to go to, you can check out the lineup. AdamX is going to be there. He rules.

The house is almost ready for our guests tomorrow. We still don't have a grill, so we may, just may, have to cook the meats in the oven or something. First thing in the morning we have to go grocery shopping for a few last minute supplies and then Jacquelyn will be cooking up a storm. Literally. She bought clouds and some lightning, but we totally forgot to get thunder, so we need that. Unless you're deaf, then that ingredient isn't so important.

My anxiety is ebbing a little bit. See a few of you tomorrow.

Sincerely,
Holstein McWebbersmitts, Ph.D.

My hair is the longest it's been since the winter of 1996. I've been too lazy to get it cut and I'm kinda digging the shag. It matches the beard quite nicely. It almost makes me wish I never got LASIK surgery; I could get cool hipster frames and look like this guy. You know, if the illustration had a beard, and I had an iPod.

I baked my first batch of cookies ever. Technically they were Ethan's cookies, his gift to his mom for Mother's Day. They were Ghirardelli chocolate chip, both semi-sweet and white chips. Some of them were too small and malformed, but the majority were normal-looking and they all tasted excellent nonetheless. Let this be a lesson to you: Don't judge a cookie by it's shape.

I'm starting to get anxious about the housewarming party next week. Many of our attendees are fellow LJers and almost all of them I have not met in person. There have been times in my life where I have been a social butterfly, however, the last few years, I've been much more selective and somehow this has translated into a bit of social anxiety. I'm sure it will be fine and I will be my normal, charming, charismatic self. But in the meantime, I think I'll worry I'm an idiot and have nothing to say and it will be a slow, awkward death.

In other news and other realms entirely, I wrote this as a comment in someone else's journal and liked it enough to replicate it here:

I think that's a common misconception. People, especially Buddhists reference "killing the ego" but the ego is the focus of consciousness, like the lens on a camera, the what the ego focuses on is our reality. Most people's egos are totally and rigidly focused on their selves, the little 'I' if you will. When we perform various consciousness-expanding exercises, be it meditation, psychedelics, ceremonial magick, yoga, tantra, etc... we learn to refocus our ego on larger and larger parts of ourselves. Thus it is not our ego that dies, but it's rigidity and narrow focus, leaving us not fractured or damaged, but fuller, more whole individuals.

So I guess that's about it for tonight. Another week begins soon. Another Monday. Another alarm clock. Morning traffic. Breakfast cereal. Phone calls. Lunch breaks. Evening traffic. Dinner. You know the routine.

Thanks.

I'm totally piggybacking one of my neighbor's wireless signals right now. They must be Douglas Adams fans, as the name of the network is deepthought.

The first few days there was no internet signal here, but then day-before-yesterday, poof! there it was. Perfect timing too, since we just got our wireless DSL modem in the mail last night. Oh well, deepthought is slow as Martian molasses anyway.

We're still unpacking, our bedroom is a complete disaster. We pretty much have the kitchen squared away and the living room looks amazing. Pictures would be forthcoming but Jacquelyn's camera decided to go autistic or dyslexic on us, maybe both.

Our new neighborhood is the weirdest ever. It's a very multicultural area of Madison, as we've seen just about every ethnic/racial/genetic variety at one point or another as we've gone out and about. We have several parks and a community garden. The new pool is going up not far from here. There is an old man, who I suspect of being from Guatemala, who wheels a hand-made push cart up and down the streets here, jingling little bells. The kids across the street run out to him and buy ice cream treats.

Yeah, I feel like I live in the Twilight Zone sometimes.

Last night

kiwikat and her husband stayed over. They lost their electricity is a vast tsunami which wiped out parts of Wisconsin and Minnesota. We ordered pizza and watched funny shit on the internet. Have you people seen what Stephen Colbert did the other day? Jesus fuck! Balls of steel! Thank you Stephen!

One last note before I leave you, dear reader, first shift is a breeze if one remembers that one is being paid to work and not being paid to watch movies. Though I did get several pages into Jim Morrison's Adventures in the Afterlife by Mick Farren.

Not bad, Mickey, not bad.

In other news, I am now going to shamlessly promote my roommate's musical career.

His band's name is either Antilogic, Dripping Wet and the Muse, or Jack Disaster, or something else. They haven't decided yet.

He just posted some songs, just he and his guitarist doing an acoustic thing, on his MySpace Music site. They just recorded them on a CD recorder right here in the basement. He's been in the studio recording them for real, but alas, he's put up the ghetto recordings for now.

The song "Thoughts to Bare" is particularly good.

Check him out. Tell him he rules or he sucks or you want to have like 10,000 of his babies or whatever you think.

Ah, dear reader, welcome back. I've been neglecting you as I've not felt the urge to expel the recent developments of my life, as there really haven't been any. I worked through Generic Solstice-Derivative Gift Exchange Ritual, Jacquelyn and I exchanging gifts in the morning after I got home, before I slipped off to SleepyTimeDreamLand. Being poor, we went spare of the lavish gifts, but we seemed to zero in on things we both desperately wanted. Being as such, I received a lovely money clip, as I hate wallets and had been using a large binder clip instead. I presented Jacquelyn with a ceramic tea kettle, which effing rules as a double pot/kettle which you can put right on the burner because ceramic rules.

Later Jacquelyn bought me this an amazing leather jacket, which we could not leave at the store because, as

kiwikat said, it looks like I was born in it. I'm assuming that means it looks good, and not that it's wrinkled and covered with blood and amniotic fluid. Jacquelyn's parents also sent me a gift card which I used to purchase an amazing hat, which is amazing in its own right. See, I've never owned more than one hat at a time, same with necklaces and sunglasses. Though I would like to have a collection of these items, I rarely am able to find another of said items before my current one goes the way of the dinosaurs. Yes, I mean dead and fossilized, or occasionally roaming a remote Amazonian jungle or Scottish loch. Kat also gave me a gift certificate which I used to purchase a t-shirt blatantly advertising A&W root beer. Usually I avoid advertising, but I like it so shut up.

Yes I realize this is quite the self-indulgent hey-look-what-I-got post, but you know, deal with it and look what I got! Yes, it's a picture of me with all my new stylish duds. I told you I was being self-indulgent.

HAVE A HAPPY
GENERIC SOLSTICE-DERIVATIVE GIFT EXCHANGE RITUAL
AND A MERRY
GREGORIAN NEW YEAR!

I am a horrible person.

I am an intellectual spider. I will trap you in my web and you can never argue your way out.

Even if you're right.

Because the truth is:

I am not a smart man. I am clever and quick, but I am not smart.

Generally, it takes a while for me to process new information, to incorporate it into my cosmology. Occasionally, and usually only with grand revelations, is this process instantaneous. Mostly, I have to let it sink in, turn it over, ponder it, play with it, like a newly planted tree, allow it to root and grow.

But I can't lose face, I can't ever be wrong.

So I use my almighty powers of argument, my lightning cleverness to refute your points, like temporary road blocks, momentary doors to hide behind. I leave you trying to climb up and around, to somehow get around these traps to give my people, a.k.a. my intellectual processes time to digest.

While it may be frustrating and seem that I am not open or accepting to what you are saying, it is actually the opposite. I am just too embarrassed at my idiocy to allow you to see it. Astrology would describe it as Saturn acting in my natal third house, instilling me with a fear of appearing unintelligent. It's not an excuse, just a description.

What I must remember is that it is like emotional vulnerability. People don't really want stoic people who are never perturbed and hide their emotions behind closed doors. No one likes a perfectionist. To be accepted, to be liked, to be truly human is to show vulnerability, to admit flaws and fractures within ourselves.

And such I must learn to do in this aspect of my life.

I offer my apologies, especially to John and Jacquelyn who have suffered the most from this.

Though I say, no one likes a perfectionist, I still aim to be perfect. Learning and adapting to these lessons about myself and how they affect my life and the people in it is a major part of this path.

Let the light shine in.

Ok, so maybe I'm not horrible, but I'm not perfect and I have a lot to work on.

And it never stops.

My sleep was interrupted by a call from my friend Jared, who I haven't seen for several years. Jared is one of my best friends from high school and I've been friends with almost his entire family. He's been living in Chicago, walking dogs, DJing at a blue's club, learning to ride motor cycles, experimenting with welding in his art, and a lot more I will hear about in a little bit.

Jared is heading off on a Zen & the Art/Easyrider style cross-county motorcycle ride and I'm meeting him for a bagel and coffee before he heads out. I was supposed to go last night, but because of the snow, I babied out, as I didn't want to drive in the snow. I was supposed to meet him for breakfast, but I never got a call back. Why?

Apparently last night he and his brother had a vary wild night and got into a fight with some crackhead in a bar. He says he's ok. His jaw hurts and his brother had a cut on his nose from Jared's hand glancing off the crackhead and hitting him instead. Uh yeah, no thanks. Kinda glad I stayed in. Interesting note, last time I saw Jared he had just gotten into his Bukowski phase.

Coffee and bagel, here I come. This will be interesting to say the least.

**EDIT**

Ah, the ever amazing Jared! i often forget how confrontational he can be, how little shit he will take. He's quite the character, always excited about something, well, everything really. He is always ready to embrace life, whatever it is, from the highest to the lowest, and that is infinitely commendable.

At the end of his motorcycle jaunt, he will land in Los Angeles again, his third time living there. I think he's lived in most of the major cities in the country, always travelling, getting into adventures, living hte kind of life I imagined I would be living if the Universe hadn't rooted me here. I regret nothing, for I had no roots, no earth to speak of before, and I can see why the Universe felt I needed some grounding which came in the form of Ethan.

Jared and his brother, Orin, (I think that's how you spell it, oops!) were celebrities last night for ridding the bar of the crackhead. The crackhead was annoying everyone, running around saying, "I've only got $5 left, someone buy me a drink!" To which Jared replied, "You got $5! Buy ME a drink!" And it just escalated from there, with Jared and Orin coming out the better. They got all their drinks for free the rest of the night and the bartenders let them stay after close to finish.

Yes, exciting, fucking hilarious, but alas, not my scene. I haven't been in a fight since I beat a guy down for stealing $20 from me, and before that, decking a guy for calling my girlfriend-at-the-time a whore. That was something like seven years ago. My goodness, look how domesticated I've become!

Jared says I should visit him once he's settled in L.A. and I believe I will. It will also give me an excuse to meet some of the L.A. folk who read this journal. I've never been further west than Des Moines, Iowa, and by golly, I think that should change. I may be domesticated, but the nomad of my youth lives on.

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jackshoegazer

The ICONOMICON!

February 2012

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Page Summary

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together.
(no subject)
They aren't just for dinner, and they do serve as excellent pinatas.
In a lake around noon I discoverd a tune that would set the whole world free.
When preparing meals, it is very important to note the distinction between chips and chimps.
His silhouette killed his shadow because it followed him too close.
A long time coming, a short time gone. Or reverse it?
Opening the blinds this morning, I realized...
Old friends, new times, new conversations.

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THE MISADVENTURES OF AN ESOTERIC INVESTIGATOR

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Entries tagged with friends

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together.

(no subject)

They aren't just for dinner, and they do serve as excellent pinatas.

In a lake around noon I discoverd a tune that would set the whole world free.

When preparing meals, it is very important to note the distinction between chips and chimps.

His silhouette killed his shadow because it followed him too close.

A long time coming, a short time gone. Or reverse it?

Opening the blinds this morning, I realized...

Old friends, new times, new conversations.