Hmmm, maybe watching “The American Nightmare” on IFC right before bed WASN’T such a good idea.
Because of what happened in Madrid I started thinking a lot about “That Obscure Object of Desire” and decided to use the money I’ve recently made off eBay to get the Criterion DVD.
Andy and I settled on Las Pinatas for dinner tomorrow (again). We were just there like a month ago, but darn it, Margaritas on Friday after work is a tough habit to break.
I wish I was sleepy.
I just found out that my colleague at work has found a job elsewhere and so his position will be open in about 2 weeks. I work at Thresholds Lincoln Laser (www.thresholdsri.org) in the office as a sales/shipping clerk. It’s a great job, pretty easy really, and pays well! If you or someone you know might be interested, I can be reached at randomcha@earthlink.net. This is a full-time position with great benefits after 90 days. Let me know ASAP!
Why do I have allergies today? Or is it a cold? Ugh.
I got a supercool mix CD from nofunk81 in the mail over the weekend. I love making mixes & trading ’em! He has awfully good taste. Out of the 18 tracks, there are only 2 or so that I’m not crazy about. There’s a wonderful cover of Bjork’s “Unison” by Dave Douglas, a great song called “Collide” by Rachael Yamagata, “Where the Ocean Meets the Eye,” by The Stratford 4, a great Ryan Adams track, and one from the Dandy Warhols, and “Love” by John Lennon, already one of my fave songs by him. It’s nice to be listening to at work today. If anyone else out there wants to trade …
Yesterday, Andy and I spent several hours rearranging the furniture in the front room. I figured since we just resigned our lease, now was a good time to try some changes. Andy agreed. It took forever to get things the way we wanted them. But I’m liking it so far. Andy bought two more CD towers at Ikea. Now, between his and mine, it’s one whole wall of CDs. Ah, joy.
We found ourselves watching “The Blackboard Jungle” on TCM last night. Was this film always cliched or does it just seem that way now after decades of constant appropriation? Poitier was excellent. Adult Swim was all reruns, but they did have the awesome episode of “Harvey Birdman” where Scooby and Shaggy get arrested for allegedly being high (incessant giggling after being pulled over, a van strewn with empty pizza boxes and bottles of eyedrops).
100SP is now at 3 Barbara’s Books locations. Next stop, Oak Park. O, and a reader’s copy is on the way to A Different Light in San Francisco. I hope they want to stock it! I really need some gay bookstores in my distribution.
“Have you seen any of the new Bush television commercials? Well, they’re getting their money’s worth, aren’t they? In one of the commercials you see George Bush for 30 seconds, in another commercial you get to see George Bush for 60 seconds … kind of like his stint in the National Guard.”
People here at work have been saving up their iTunes Pepsi caps for me. I think I’ve gotten like 6 free songs out of the deal. Last night I downloaded “Stoney Street” by Amon Tobin. His sense of texture and rhythm are glorious. It’s as catchy and hypnotic as anything since “Long Cool Woman” by The Hollies. I ended up replaying it about 5 times. And then this morning I got out my VISA and bought “Bricolage” online.
I love Amon Tobin. And I could kick myself for not going to see him when he was at Empty Bottle a month or two ago. Ryan went to the show and all he could say was, “It was dull. He was just up there behind a bunch of machines.” But damn, the music must have been great. I see that he’s coming into town again this month as part of a multi-artist tour at the Metro. I don’t like seeing shows at the Metro that much. It’s one of those wide-and-narrow theatres with terrible acoustics and the kind of annoying audience that loves carrying on loud, pointless conversations the whole show. Still.
Why do I like him so much? Well, he takes my own inate sense of eclecticsm and blows it up to its logical conclusion: utter eclecism both resembles ALL and NONE the sum of its parts. When you smash up so many ‘disparate’ materials, they inevitably GO TOGETHER. It’s a fusion. And when you do it with as much artfulness and ingenuity as Tobin does, there’s an exquisite harmony and rightness to the end result. And it doesn’t quite feel like any other kind of music. It’s not really jazz, not really techno, or IDM, or D&B, or whatever other labels you can think up. It’s just Amon Tobin.
March 16: David Byrne’s new album, “Grown Backwards.” Includes 2 duets with RUFUS WAINRIGHT. Instant orgasm.
March 19: theatrical release of “Dawn of the Dead,” an “update” of the classic Romero film (which is in my all-time Top 10 fave movies).
April 26: DVD release of Robert Altman’s brilliant film “3 Women.” I remember writing to Criterion and demanding they put this on DVD, and damned if they didn’t.
Your boyfriend says to you, “Sleeping together is about staying on YOUR side of the bed!”
Today after work I head over to Barbara’s Books in Old Town to set ’em up with some copies of 100SP. Should be swell. I had some time to kill on Friday before meeting up with Andy at Las Pinatas for dinner, which is also in Old Town, so I browsed at Barbara’s just to refresh my memory. I’m pretty sure the last I was there was when I was a freshman in college (!); I saw Laurie Anderson do a book signing for “Stories From The Nerve Bible,” which I didn’t have the money to buy at the time. How sad is that: the bookstore is right here in Chicago but I haven’t been to it for 9 years! Time just slips away.
Also in Old Town is the very first adult bookstore I ever went into. It’s still right there on Wells Street. I went past it. They sure spruced up the outside. It kind of looks like an old-timey toy store now, nice window display and a hand-painted sign and everything. Wild. It’s just called “24 Hour Books” I believe. I bought my first-ever porn video there, “Love Muscle.” I don’t have it anymore alas, but I remember the first scene was VERY hot, these 2 young guys going at it in a locker room. One of the guys had very dark curly hair and bore an uncanny resemblance to a very-young Jerry Harrison, keyboard/guitarist for Talking Heads. I’d always thought he was cute, but somehow “Love Muscle” cemented it for me.
Over the weekend I did a little checkup on how 100SP is selling at the other locations. Haven’t sold any at St. Marks Books in NYC yet!!! Tsk tsk. I’m counting on you NYC readers to head over to St. Marks in the East Village and sell out their stock! Quimby’s hasn’t sold any copies for awhile now either. Hmm. I need to do some more promo work I believe. One of my close friends, who also designed the book actually, is in a semi-regular poker game with some of the NRP crowd, including Ira Glass. If I could ever-so-discreetly get a copy into his hands …
Last night svenny came over for pizza and “Morvern Callar.” Whoa, melancholy as all get out but damn fine film too. Exquisitely shot. What a soundtrack. Afterwards, Andy said something like, “That soundtrack was basically made up of stuff from my CD collection.”
I don’t care what anyone says, a pair of jeans should NOT cost $135.
