Emily and I are babysitting for some friends tonight. We decide, after the child is in bed, to order some pizza. We decide on Little Caesar's, because there is one close to the house. I call them to place our order. The conversation goes something like this:
LCG (LCG = Little Caesar's guy): What would you like?
Me: A large pepperoni pizza.
LCG: Anything else?
Me: An order of crazy bread too.
LCG: Great. It's ready. You can come pick it up.
Me: Thanks.
I hung up and as soon as I did, my eyebrow went up. What? It's ready? How the...? Holy crap. The only way it could have happened that fast is if they employ precogs over there at Little Caesar's. All that 'what would you like?' business was clearly so much chin music. They knew.
When I went to pick it up minutes later, they played dumb. "How did you know?" I asked. "Know what?" they said. "Don't be funny with me," I said, "How did you know?" But they wouldn't say.
We ate the pizza, and it was good. But the mystery of the prescient pizza place remains.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Friday, June 5, 2009
The punkest thing I ever did
I'm sitting here listening to the Sex Pistols. Emily is out for the night. I'm home alone, which is the perfect time for blasting the Sex Pistols. I think if you could take all of me, my brain, my body, my blood, my thoughts, my feelings, everything and stick it all into a giant pot and turn the heat up and boil it and boil it until just a residue essence of me was left in the pot and then, somehow, you could scrape that me-residue off the sides and somehow listen to it, it would sound like punk rock. I can't get enough of that rawness that you get with the Ramones or Sex Pistols or Rancid or...whatever. I'm saying, the first time I heard punk rock I loved it and I thought I might grow out of it, but I haven't yet. It still turns me on and turns me up every time.
The summer after I graduated from high school, my friends Lee and Andy and I were in a punk band. Some background: Lee didn't like Andy, and for a long time, I didn't think Lee liked me. He was cool and popular and the captain of our soccer team. I, on the other hand, had messed up my ankle and basically sat out the whole prior season with a cast on, which many people, including Lee, made fun of me for. Lee, I was sure, always regarded me as a king dork. Which probably has some basis of truth to it. Anyway, somehow, me and Lee became friends.
At the beginning of the summer, Lee and I said, "We should form a band." I had just begun to teach myself how to play guitar. I maybe knew three chords. At most. I wanted to buy an electric guitar, but didn't have enough money. One day, Lee and I were walking down the street in North Canton and we went into Zampino's Drum Shop. They had a lot of different instruments, not just drums, and the next thing I know, Lee buys a bass guitar. First one he sees. Just buys it. I don't know where the money came from, maybe he held up the store while I was looking at guitars or something. But there we were walking back to my parent's car that I drove us around in, past the YMCA and City Hall and the Catholic Church up there and Lee with this bright red bass slung over his shoulder like he was carrying a fishing pole. I'm pretty sure no two guys in the world ever felt as punk as that. So, that pretty much solidified it for me. I saved up some money and finally bought a knock-off Telecaster because I couldn't afford a real one and a used Dean Markley amp (that I still have) with a buzz in the speakers so loud it nearly drowned out the sound of the guitar. I got them home and immediately began trying to figure out what settings on the amp and guitar, in combination, would give me the dirtiest, rawest, busted-up sound I could get.
We could only think of Andy as a drummer. We didn't know any other drummers. I was sort of friends with him and Lee was friends with him because we needed a drummer for our band. The difference between Andy and Lee and me is that Andy was good on the drums. We knew that but we didn't care that he was on a whole different level, skill-wise. We called our band Io, after one of Jupiter's moons. Then we figured we should get together and do something. So, one night, we set up a practice in Andy's basement. It was such a freaking thrill. Lee didn't know what the hell he was doing on the bass. I knew about 5% of what I was doing on the guitar. Andy was just plain old good at drumming. We didn't play any songs, we just rocked out on a few chords that sounded good to us. And by good I mean loud. We looked at each other. It was dirty and ragged. We loved it. We thought we sounded punk as hell.
Then we broke up.
Come on! I can't think of a punker thing to do! Get together, practice once, break up! That's the whole rock n' roll ethos, you know? Live fast, die hard! Punk!
Andy went on to play drums for this local group called Happy Orange. They broke up and he went to art school in Pennsylvania. I recently located him on Facebook. Lee went to Malone College on a soccer scholarship. I don't know how things worked out for him there. I have no idea what he's up to these days. I haven't seen him since that summer. And I live in Chicago. And I'm still really, really, really punk. Really.
The summer after I graduated from high school, my friends Lee and Andy and I were in a punk band. Some background: Lee didn't like Andy, and for a long time, I didn't think Lee liked me. He was cool and popular and the captain of our soccer team. I, on the other hand, had messed up my ankle and basically sat out the whole prior season with a cast on, which many people, including Lee, made fun of me for. Lee, I was sure, always regarded me as a king dork. Which probably has some basis of truth to it. Anyway, somehow, me and Lee became friends.
At the beginning of the summer, Lee and I said, "We should form a band." I had just begun to teach myself how to play guitar. I maybe knew three chords. At most. I wanted to buy an electric guitar, but didn't have enough money. One day, Lee and I were walking down the street in North Canton and we went into Zampino's Drum Shop. They had a lot of different instruments, not just drums, and the next thing I know, Lee buys a bass guitar. First one he sees. Just buys it. I don't know where the money came from, maybe he held up the store while I was looking at guitars or something. But there we were walking back to my parent's car that I drove us around in, past the YMCA and City Hall and the Catholic Church up there and Lee with this bright red bass slung over his shoulder like he was carrying a fishing pole. I'm pretty sure no two guys in the world ever felt as punk as that. So, that pretty much solidified it for me. I saved up some money and finally bought a knock-off Telecaster because I couldn't afford a real one and a used Dean Markley amp (that I still have) with a buzz in the speakers so loud it nearly drowned out the sound of the guitar. I got them home and immediately began trying to figure out what settings on the amp and guitar, in combination, would give me the dirtiest, rawest, busted-up sound I could get.
We could only think of Andy as a drummer. We didn't know any other drummers. I was sort of friends with him and Lee was friends with him because we needed a drummer for our band. The difference between Andy and Lee and me is that Andy was good on the drums. We knew that but we didn't care that he was on a whole different level, skill-wise. We called our band Io, after one of Jupiter's moons. Then we figured we should get together and do something. So, one night, we set up a practice in Andy's basement. It was such a freaking thrill. Lee didn't know what the hell he was doing on the bass. I knew about 5% of what I was doing on the guitar. Andy was just plain old good at drumming. We didn't play any songs, we just rocked out on a few chords that sounded good to us. And by good I mean loud. We looked at each other. It was dirty and ragged. We loved it. We thought we sounded punk as hell.
Then we broke up.
Come on! I can't think of a punker thing to do! Get together, practice once, break up! That's the whole rock n' roll ethos, you know? Live fast, die hard! Punk!
Andy went on to play drums for this local group called Happy Orange. They broke up and he went to art school in Pennsylvania. I recently located him on Facebook. Lee went to Malone College on a soccer scholarship. I don't know how things worked out for him there. I have no idea what he's up to these days. I haven't seen him since that summer. And I live in Chicago. And I'm still really, really, really punk. Really.
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Requip
I am hopped up on Requip right now. That's the stuff for RLS...Restless Leg Syndrome. Man, I wish it had a cooler name. Let's look at the word Requip. A combination of the words 'equip' and the prefix 're', meaning to do again. So, this pharmaceutical's name leads me to believe that it can equip me once more. For calm legs. I am equipped for calm legs. Thanks, Requip.
Interesting side effects...drowsiness, fainting...and, oh yeah, compulsive gambling. So. Can't wait for that one to play itself out.
Interesting side effects...drowsiness, fainting...and, oh yeah, compulsive gambling. So. Can't wait for that one to play itself out.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Ho hum
Yeah, I don't know. I'm angst-filled now? Maybe? I don't know. I'm usually strongly against writing something unless have something to say. I don't have much to say right now. But I feel like writing. I feel like writing a lot.
Here's a thing: I'm going to the doctor tomorrow. I can't sleep. I can't remember the last time I got a good night of sleep. I think I described my perfect night of sleep quite a number of blog entries ago. That might have been the last time. This is my sleep pattern: Light goes off. I toss and turn for awhile. I lapse into some light sleep. I wake up a little later and stay awake for a long time. Usually, I drift back into a little sleep about an hour before my alarm goes off. This is how it is every single night. I'm usually always exhausted during the day. I really hate it. What keeps me awake...for the last several years, I've had this deep pain in my right hip that comes and goes. Hard to say what triggered it. It used to be that it would come around every so often, but not too much. The last couple of months it has been every night. It's been so severe that I can't go to sleep. I don't know what it is. Hip pain. Like the gears are really grinding in there. Hopefully I need a mechanical hip replacement with wolverine claws so when I get pissed off, claws shoot out of the side of my jeans. Probably that won't happen though. The other thing, and for some reason this makes me feel stupid to say, but I think I have RLS...that Restless Leg Syndrome thing. I was reading about it, and it turns out it's actually a kind of sleep disorder. Anyway, that happens every night too. So much so that I can't go to sleep, and if I do somehow manage to drift off, it wakes me up. It might as well be the manifestation of a demon. It's that torturous. Which feels unbelievably petty to say, because jillions of people can't sleep at night because of real torture or because of real terrible diseases. So, blah blah. But I'm going to see a doctor about that stuff tomorrow.
Hey, the Cubs suck. That sucks. I still love them. But I'm mad at them. Yo, Cubs. Stop blowing games. They beat the Braves tonight, but that feels like a drop in the bucket.
I've been reading the short stories of TC Boyle. He's okay. In the collection I'm reading now, called "Tooth and Claw", he deals a lot with "gritty" issues. Things like addiction, broken relationships, things like that. Problem is, he makes those things sound pretty false because the language he uses is way too academic. A lot of fifty dollar words that seem inappropriately placed. I don't believe your characters, TC. But, he has one story in there called "Here Comes" which is a very authentic treatment of the spiral of alcoholism and first-time homelessness. I enjoyed it because it could be the story of many of the men and women at Breakthrough or Andre House. Then, for class, I read this story called "The Woman and the Blue Sky" by Ma Jian, who is a Chinese writer. Wow. This one peeled the lids off my eyes. I highly recommend it, but it's not for the squeamish. It has to do with a modern Chinese man essentially worming his way into rural Tibetan culture so he can witness a sky burial. He uncovers some gruesome truths about this particular Tibetan village he visits and does see a sky burial. A sky burial, but the way...this is where friends and relatives of the dead person take the corpse to a mountainside, cut it into pieces and feed the pieces to the vultures and crows. Buried in the sky. A very stark story indeed.
Alright, I have to get my laundry now. And continue to experience ennui.
Here's a thing: I'm going to the doctor tomorrow. I can't sleep. I can't remember the last time I got a good night of sleep. I think I described my perfect night of sleep quite a number of blog entries ago. That might have been the last time. This is my sleep pattern: Light goes off. I toss and turn for awhile. I lapse into some light sleep. I wake up a little later and stay awake for a long time. Usually, I drift back into a little sleep about an hour before my alarm goes off. This is how it is every single night. I'm usually always exhausted during the day. I really hate it. What keeps me awake...for the last several years, I've had this deep pain in my right hip that comes and goes. Hard to say what triggered it. It used to be that it would come around every so often, but not too much. The last couple of months it has been every night. It's been so severe that I can't go to sleep. I don't know what it is. Hip pain. Like the gears are really grinding in there. Hopefully I need a mechanical hip replacement with wolverine claws so when I get pissed off, claws shoot out of the side of my jeans. Probably that won't happen though. The other thing, and for some reason this makes me feel stupid to say, but I think I have RLS...that Restless Leg Syndrome thing. I was reading about it, and it turns out it's actually a kind of sleep disorder. Anyway, that happens every night too. So much so that I can't go to sleep, and if I do somehow manage to drift off, it wakes me up. It might as well be the manifestation of a demon. It's that torturous. Which feels unbelievably petty to say, because jillions of people can't sleep at night because of real torture or because of real terrible diseases. So, blah blah. But I'm going to see a doctor about that stuff tomorrow.
Hey, the Cubs suck. That sucks. I still love them. But I'm mad at them. Yo, Cubs. Stop blowing games. They beat the Braves tonight, but that feels like a drop in the bucket.
I've been reading the short stories of TC Boyle. He's okay. In the collection I'm reading now, called "Tooth and Claw", he deals a lot with "gritty" issues. Things like addiction, broken relationships, things like that. Problem is, he makes those things sound pretty false because the language he uses is way too academic. A lot of fifty dollar words that seem inappropriately placed. I don't believe your characters, TC. But, he has one story in there called "Here Comes" which is a very authentic treatment of the spiral of alcoholism and first-time homelessness. I enjoyed it because it could be the story of many of the men and women at Breakthrough or Andre House. Then, for class, I read this story called "The Woman and the Blue Sky" by Ma Jian, who is a Chinese writer. Wow. This one peeled the lids off my eyes. I highly recommend it, but it's not for the squeamish. It has to do with a modern Chinese man essentially worming his way into rural Tibetan culture so he can witness a sky burial. He uncovers some gruesome truths about this particular Tibetan village he visits and does see a sky burial. A sky burial, but the way...this is where friends and relatives of the dead person take the corpse to a mountainside, cut it into pieces and feed the pieces to the vultures and crows. Buried in the sky. A very stark story indeed.
Alright, I have to get my laundry now. And continue to experience ennui.
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