things.

my union is lame. i will not be picketing tomorrow. i was also going to be a scab, but a judge said we couldn't strike. oh well.

i had an interview with greendot. hopefully all goes well and i get hired.

roger ebert wrote a nice bit about up! im am excited. here is the lynk. here

i'm sick.

out dog.

the smiths, bryants, and gosssses have babies. danny gans dies. wild. zany. stuff.

babies are a poppin'. things things:

finishing credential.
writing cool things with friends.
itching to make a rock album.
running again.
open housing.
helping the simmons family move soon.
some other things too.

i had an eye appointment yesterday. i got contacts. my insurance lets me get contacts and frames, or frames and lenses. contacts and frames really makes no sense... or so i thought... turns out, the nice person at lenscrafters let me get sweet rayban aviators and contacts-- substituting the sweet sunshades for regular lenses. me 1- life 0.

this makes me excited. i am going. you should too.

everybody laughed at me when i picked the blue jays and the dodgers on draft night. i don't see any laughing now. all i see is crying. tears. regret. booyah.

baby sitting a belt tonight... jen and maya are having a girls night-- HO!

going to nowhere tomorrow. tonight i will get my amp fixed and finish watching paris texas. then i will watch husbands and wives and go to sleep.

did you know that the hollywood bowl is open for picnics, hiking, and such on off concert days? it is designated as a public park. i would like to take some snacks and eat in the seats when nobody is there.

in other news of the day... my mom and jack came to work today. it was bring your child to work day, so he came and danced on the tables. he also said ball and did some sign language. then my mom showed pictures of me when i was young.

robyn thinks randy newman lives up the street from us. she thinks she's seen him a couple of times at a house we jog by. i wanted to walk up to his house and pretend i'm doing a survey on lausd or something to see if it is him. she thought i was being creepy. maybe later on.

so sleepy. we made some fun music last night. time for third period. the dodgers are playing well.

thursday. got up earlier, so i'm finished with getting ready for the day (i usually write these posts from my classroom). ate italian with folks in highland park last night. watched the dodgers squeak one out on the television. clayton kershaw was on it like a comet. i will call him the comet. i am drinking coffee from the stanley. not much else. just watching the door until class starts. making sure kids don't sneak in and steal my cool set of graphic novels. i should probably move the shelf from the door at some point, but it would ruin the flow.

i've also put up a blog for the trip to kenya. check it out. i will be going this year with the wife. we will be going in august. i'm not looking forward to leaving the boy behind. it looks like we will be getting back on the 13th, so though it will be a bit rough on the sleep/ missing baby side, i may be able to swing le bachelor party after all. we'll see though.

i am watching the tudors. good game today. gary and sara(h) came over for dinner. they are nice and it was fun.

here is more of jack being cool.






and sad times in baseball land.

we had a fun time last night at the show. good people. good friends. good rock. we will be going to the zoo today. it should be fun. i also bought this last night off woot:



it is unopened from 1978. i am excited.

show tonight. sadie is asleep at my feet. played ball with jack for a while. saw i love you man last night. it was funny and all right. a good netflix movie i suppose. i did some fantasy baseball stuff. i will probably brush my teeth and shower soon. when robyn gets home i will go on a job i suppose. i also might go meet andy in ojai and watch him record music with tim.

early dodger game today. playing a benefit tomorrow. hanging out in ventura with the family. jack is walking around with rain boots on. i just ate an egg sandwich. i am drinking coffee. i will get new contacts today. peace out.

i will probably write more about the trip on the hobosoul blog, but here is the run-down:

arrived. hung out with paul wignall and dr. d.
fly-fished. ate sardines around a fire. made a bomb with oil and blew it up in the fire. slept in the backseat of a volvo. woke. fished again. ate french toast. prospected for gold and shot rifles at cans. drove home. stopped and ate good cheese at a weird cheese place. met a cool neighbor and made future plans to go to the red lion. came home.

In our sun-down perambulations, of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing "base", a certain game of ball...Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our close rooms...the game of ball is glorious.

Walt Whitman, July 23, 1846 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle

i just finished watching Pierrot le fou. it was good; it was cool. now i'm watching flying down to rio on tcm. singing and dancing. jack is shaking his booty and kind of moon walking. yesterday we hung out in the morning, went to bible study, ate my taco, and (i) fell asleep watching casino royale. i could finish it now, but i kind of like flying down to rio. friday we went to the long beach aquarium with the belts. then we ate in-n-out at their house. keith and karen joined us. it was nice. i will put up pictures of the aquarium visit sometime soon.

tomorrow i will go on a short road trip with vern.

my parents came down last night and hung out through dinner. it was fun. my mom made good enchiladas and people ate them. matt o'brien and mike sycz made surprise appearances. they were going to see bp billy harnist and his magic band. we had practice and it was fun. break starts today. we're going to an aquarium.

went and saw annie b last night. she ruled the roost. fun stuff. i also ate salmon and mashed potatoes. they were also very good.

check out www.theriobravo.com for things about folk music we make.

abortion doping?

snopes.

the pools came by last night. we ate pasta and chatted. it was nice. i might be going on a road trip with vern next week. should be cool. i tried messing with my rio bravo blog last night to make it look like a real website, but i messed it up. there are real websites on the internet and i would like mine to look like a real website, but i don't know how.



and...

this guy rules:

i hung out with vern last night. it was fun. the school stopped protesting after school meetings. i do not agree with this decision. the baseball season starts soon. i wrote some baseball songs. i might post them over at theriobravo.com. my wife and baby are the best. i ate mcdonald's yesterday as a quick after school snack; it was delicious.

i had a fun jack and me day yesterday. robyn was in bakersfield. we played games. walked to the store. and ate good food. it was very fun. jack was in top form. right now he is wearing my dodger hat. we just finished watching sesame street. it, too, is still in top form: except for when the puppets rap (although that might be the best part). sesame street is usually followed by thomas the tank engine: a boring british show that should not still be on the air.

today, we have our first official meeting for the africa trip. it should be good.

i've also started updating hobosoul and the rio bravo blogs. check them out if you like.

oh wait... thomas is not on. it's actually a creepy rainforest show. i think it's called animania. yes. it is. it is a green show i think. about animals and mystical ways to save the planet. this episode is called "the mist of time." yes, i believe i will watch.

and... if you are in ventura on the 10th... come to this show...

i had a tommy's cheeseburger and chili dog last night. they were very enjoyable. i'm watching the tudors. it is pretty good. jack is drinking baby gatorade. jack is saying ut-oh a lot. in other news...

fantasy baseball should be fun.

i'm having a day with jack as robyn is going to bakersfield. we might go ride the train in griffith park. he is sick though so maybe not.

spring break is in a week. we are playing a benefit in ventura to kick it off on friday the 10th.

i've got to take an online test in about an hour or so.

that is all.

i went to the movies last night and saw knowing by myself. it was cool. i loved it. when i got home i went to bed. then i woke up at 11:00 or so and traded off jack duty with robyn. he cried uncontrollably for about four hours. he's been sick. i am a little sleepy now. it reminded me of what the first seven months of his life were like.

i've been a little sick lately. so has jack. we watched lost last night. it is fun again. we are listening to tennessee ernie ford in class. students are coming in. i should get going soon.

a student just tried to sell me a key chain. i said no.

i love roger ebert. i really do. he's probably influenced me more than any other film related individual. his reviews are fantastic, honest, well-written... i've even had the privilege of meeting him a couple times: once at the oscars and once in the kilborn green room. we talked about the royal tenenbaums i think. i say all this because i just went to his rogerebert.com and saw that he gave knowing four stars. knowing. really? i guess i ought read the review.

baseball today. i watched snsyefeuifsuybaf, new york last night. i thought it was amazing, but i wouldn't recommend it to anyone. when it was over i went in the garage and wrote a rock song. then i ate a bowl of cereal and watched disc one of ken burns' baseball. out fool.

i had a free screening of i love you man but it was sold out so i went and saw watchmen instead. it was cool.

rad pujols article.

so... i got me some pink slip.

Kirk Douglas

I saw Kirk Douglas do a performance about his life. I'd seen a Danny Kaye thing a while back and this reminded me of it some, except it starred the real Kirk Douglas.

Saturday we had an immensely fun Ramble. Many fun people came out and played many fun instruments.

super fun weekend...

started today when i rode a train to ventura.

ramble saturday.

sunday i am going to see kirk douglas perform. i assume for the last time. i need go watch paths of glory tonight for to get all pumped up and whatnot.

striking.

duke minus toupee.

ramble numero dos

ramble 2. special guests: aaron ballard (and friends) and pedal/ lap steel, vibe, and mandolin phenom charlie peterson... others maybe... you if you are a friend and you know where my house is.

i had jury duty yesterday. it was cool. amber watched jack today and robyn and i went on a date. it was fun. we had my taco and walked around pasadena and had cheese cake. i had some borrego tacos that were muy awesomes. today in class one of my students did an interpretive song and dance routine to the velvet underground's pale blue eyes. it was rad. i was like mr. keating without the academic rigor.

i just spent five minutes too long looking at the kahana sunset website. it may take a week to recover.

For LA folks, we're playing the Key Club on February 21 with Jayson and the Big Tweed.

I was able to get my 2009 Disneyland employee sticker put on my pass yesterday. For obvious reasons, I didn't get it put on last year. For not so obvious reasons, I was able to get it put on again this year. I assume my boyish charm played a part. We didn't stay too long because it started raining.

When we got back we relaxed some and ate food. I waited at the Kogi Korean BBQ taco truck for about half an hour. It was windy and cold. Foodie types were all around. Someone behind me kept talking about duck fat and how he wanted to cook everything in duck fat. Aside from the lame foodie types, it was worth it. I got three short rib and three spicy chicken. I'd go with all short rib in the future.

Today I will relax with my baby and wife. We are watching Elmo's World. He just rapped. The rap ended with him saying, "Yea' Boi'." No joke. It ruled. Jayson once said that Elmo is like crack for little kids. I say Elmo is to babies as duck fat and Obama are to hipsters.

Now I will try and think of something to write. A short funny thing. Maybe about a guy who loses his job (topical) and tries to make a public access TV show in his living room. Maybe. It's missing something though. Like a point. Zing.

Happy V.Day.

who wins in a fight of awesome?

don draper. mcnulty. swearengen. anthony bourdain. eckstein.

this is my 500th post. i am watching the new baseball network. i am eatinga whole pack of prosciutto and drinking a frosty beverage. a show about the dodgers from the mid-90s is on. it is a little dumb, but cool. i went to find a dead dot com and read this thing about janet leigh. then i remembered i met her at an awards show. nobody was talking to her and her daughter introduced me to her and my mind was blown. it was at a party for a bunch of older stars who weren't invited to the awards shows any more. gregory peck was there. weird al too.

Good thing I didn't go listen to John Updike speak at UCLA a couple months ago.

That decision's now up there with the 2001 World Series.

i was going to put this up as a joke. i like jokes and i thought this would be one... turns out, it happened to be one of the most beautiful things i've seen and heard in a long time.

good times.

we're watching obama today at school. it kind of messes up my pacing plan, but whatever. we had a fun weekend. the first ever ramble featured a rad special guest in the form of former bob dylan drummer mickey jones. he told us many fun stories and was a true awesome man (his wife was nice too). we played him a cover of memphis. he's played it both with johnny rivers (whose band he was in for a time) and chuck berry. it was surreal. it was also surreal when he made a comment about andy and matt playing well together, to which i responded by asking what it was like to play with rick danko.

the next one will be taking place march 14. between now and then, we should be shooting two short films (one with mickey as a whaler) and one with singing and dancing.

in other news, i had a lot of fun with my wife and baby in ventura yesterday. it was sunny. we saw wyatt and his wife. we played in the sand.

i've too many things to grade. that is all.

School is about to start. I went to the YMCA both last night and this morning. I am proud of myself, though I find it hard to finish a workout with the nice whirlpool and steam room waiting for me after. I'm trying to pump iron. We'll see how long it lasts.

In other news, Jack turned one. He had a fun birthday and a fun Christmas. We went to Colorado and participated in a fun wedding. He wins the universe award for awesome and best. Robyn comes in second.

We've a ramble this Saturday. Come out, if you like and if you are a friend. It's at the house. The show will start at 7:00 and will feature us, assorted members of the Romany Rye, a possible rad special guest, and some Chuck Berry tunes. Sleeping babies and such will move the after-party to Cha Cha, but we'd love to see you for the show if you are a friend and not a creep. It will take place in our garage.

I'm also shooting a movie with Vern at the end of the month. It will be about a whaler and it will star Rick Steve. We could use help if you are talented at things that are hard and usually time consuming and expensive.

Happy Burf Day!

Pictures of the now one-year-old Jackson Duke! He will be celebrated.

And Rafael Furcal is back. He will play with grace. He will be honorable.

Break starts this weekend. Super.

The Gentleman's Jam. 1st official. Will be January 19th. Special guests. For real.

I had to scrape ice off my car this morning. First time in LA.

UPDATE:
McNulty is in the version of A Christmas Carol we're watching in class. I keep waiting for him to end up under the London Bridge having a taste with Cratchit, for Tiny Tim to find his older brother's gun, and for Scrooge and the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come to have the following exchange:

Scrooge: I see you favor a .45.
Spirit: At night I do. And I keeps one in the chamber in case you ponderin'.

I haven't posted on here in a while. I think it has something to do with a certain someone freaking me out about my sentence structure. Maybe it was something else, I'm not sure.

We're living in a new house and Jack is starting to walk. He's just taking a few steps and he smiles and laughs when he does it. I like him. He is cool.

We're not really playing much music, but we should start again sometime soon.

I haven't been watching too many movies. I watched The Long Goodbye. I really liked it. I want to go driving up the coast, I think. I'm listening to Leonard Cohen in my classroom and it is raining. I think it's making me want to play hooky. I think it is making me want to play hooky from life in general. I am reading The Naked and the Dead . It is very nice. We're going to have a concert in my garage soon. Jack turns one on Thursday. Things are happening. Things are moving. Things are just chugging right along.

Obama

It would be stupid for Obama to give up a 20 year smoking habit on the eve of becoming the president.

Garage Sale!

We're having a garage sale. 2738 Locksley Place. We'll probably start around 8:00.

Cool.

This weekend was fun for several reasons. On Friday, I went with Jayson, Am-en, and some other guy to the Ben Folds concert. When the concert was over I went back to Jayson's work and had a free beer. On Saturday, I cleaned up around the house (the new house that we are now living in) and then in the evening, I took Jack to the super-rad Salon thing in Long Beach. While in Long Beach, I saw many friends and Jack saw many girls who he made become his girlfriends. He works much faster than I ever did in my prime. We didn't stay until the end because he was quite spent, but it was very fun nonetheless.

Today, we finished our weekend of fun by going to church, making delicious combination of pureed meat, fruit, and vegetable (for the boy), and eating Korean BBQ with Kevin and Tisa. The place we ate at featured many parts of the cow and pig. I liked the pig parts the best.

Nebraska's "safe haven" law is the lead story on CNN.com right now. The whole thing is pretty sad on a number of different levels. Because of the urgency of the article, I was under the assumption that hundreds (or even thousands) of children were being dropped off and legally abandoned. It turns out, however, that only 34 minors have been affected.

In 2005 (the most recent data found on a quick search), 3220 abortions were performed in Nebraska. To put it in perspective (based on the approximately 26,000 children born in the state), nearly ten percent of the children conceived (that doesn't sound right; that can't be right, right?) were aborted. If these people were at least responsible enough to get their abortions in nearby Kansas, their dead fetuses could have been receiving the sacraments from this horrible man.

The lesson of the day is that it is better to murder than is it to abandon. I guess.

We've moved into our new place officially. It's a little strange, but I'm excited. There are way too many things to take care of, mostly relating to things in need of purge. It'll all get finished soon enough, though.

I don't really have anything else to add. John Updike is at UCLA tonight. I'd kill to go see him, but we need to finish up stuff around the house. The argument might be made that the house will be there tomorrow and John Updike will not, but like historic World Series games prior, it is really better to be responsible in the present. Not.

Echoing Darren's recent thoughts, I can't fathom, on any level really, how irrelevant abortion has become in regard to reasons to vote for a candidate.


link

via one of Darren's friends:

Remembering Collective Shame

By Uwe Siemon-Netto

This column requires a caveat: I am not an American citizen and therefore neither a Republican nor a Democrat. But as a German residing permanently in the United States I believe that I have a duty to opine on at least one aspect of the upcoming elections – the question whether years from now Americans will have to wrestle with collective shame, just as I have had to deal with collective shame over what has happened in Germany in my childhood for my entire life.

It was West Germany’s first postwar president, Theodor Heuss, who coined the phrase, “collective shame” contrasting it with the notion of collective guilt, which he rejected. No, I cannot be expected to feel guilty for crimes the Nazis committed while I was still in elementary school. But as a bearer of a German passport I have never ceased feeling ashamed because three years before I was born German voters elected leaders planning the annihilation of millions of innocent people.

I am certain that in 1933 most Germans did not find the Nazis’ anti-Semitic rhetoric particularly attractive. What made them choose Hitler, then? It was the economy, stupid, and presumably injured national pride, and similar issues. This came to mind as I read the latest Faith in Life poll of issues Americans in general and white evangelicals in particular consider “very important” in this year’s elections.

Guess what? For both groups, the economy ranked first, while abortion was way down the list. Among Americans in general abortion took ninth and among white evangelicals seventh place, well below gas prices and health care. Now, it’s true that most evangelicals still believe that abortion should be illegal, which is where they differ from the general public and, astonishingly, from Roman Catholics even though their own church continues to fight valiantly against the ongoing mass destruction of unborn life. Still, 54 percent of Catholics and 60 percent of young Catholics have declared themselves “pro choice,” according to the Faith in Life researchers.

What I am going to say next is going to make me many enemies, of this I am sure: Yes, there is a parallel between what has happened in Germany in 1933 and what is happening in America now. The legalized murder of 40 million fetuses since Roe v. Wade in 1973 will one day cause collective shame of huge proportions. So what if this wasn’t a “holocaust?” This term should remain reserved for another horror in history. But a genocide has been happening in the last 35 years, even if no liberators have shocked the world with photographs they snapped of the victims as the Allies did in Germany in 1945. And it has the open support of politicians running for office next month.

If most Americans, and shockingly even a majority of Catholics, think physicians should have the “right” to suck babies’ brains out so that their skulls will collapse making it easy for these abortionists to drag their tiny bodies through the birth canal; if even most white evangelicals think that economic woes are a more important concern (78 percent) than legalized mass murder (57 percent), then surely a moral lobotomy has been performed on this society.

I agree it would be unscholarly to claim that what is happening in America and much of the Western world every day is “another holocaust.” No two historical events are exactly identical. So let’s leave the word “holocaust” where it belongs – next to Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen and Mauthausen. Still there are compelling parallels between today’s genocide and the Nazi crimes, for example:

1. Man presumes to decide which lives are worthy of living and which are not. “Lebensunwertes Leben” (life unworthy of living) was a Nazi “excuse” for killing mentally handicapped children and adults, a crime that preceded the holocaust committed against the Jews. Notice that today fetuses diagnosed with Downs Syndrome are often aborted as a matter of course in America and Europe.

2. In German-occupied territories, Jews and Gypsies were gassed for no other reason than that some people considered it inconvenient to have them around. Today, unborn children are often slaughtered because it is inconvenient for their mothers to bring their pregnancies to term.

3. Murder I is legally defined as killing another human being with malice and aforethought. The Nazis killed Jewish and Gypsies with deliberation – and maliciously. But what are we to think of babies being killed deliberately simply because they would be a nuisance if they were allowed to live? No malice here?

4. Ordinary Germans of the Nazi era were rightly chastised for not having come to their Jewish neighbors’ rescue when they were rounded up and sent to extermination camps. Ordinary Americans and Western Europeans might find the fad to kill babies disagreeable, but as we see from the Faith in Life poll, most have more pressing concerns.

Some future day Americans and Western Europeans will be asked why they allowed their children to be slaughtered. They would even have less of an excuse than Germans of my grandparents’ and parents’ generation. In Germany, you risked your life if you dared to come to the Jews’ rescue. In today’s democracies the worst that can happen to you is being ridiculed for being “a Christian.”

As a foreigner I have no right to tell Americans whom to elect on Nov. 4. Recently, though, a friend asked me: “If you worked in an office and a colleague asked you at the voter cooler, whom he should vote for what would you tell him?” Well, I would say: “I am not here to make up your mind for you. But personally I could never give my vote to so-called pro-choice candidates.”

This would doubtless lead to a heated postmodern dialogue. Perhaps the colleague is not a Christian; he might chastise me for mixing politics and religion. “If you as a Christian oppose abortion,” he could say, “then by all means don’t get involved in an abortion, just don’t impose your religious views on the rest of us.” How would I answer that? An evangelical might yank out his Bible and quote passages pertaining to this issue. But to a non-Christian the Bible is meaningless; I am not sure a political debate around the water cooler is a great venue to start individual evangelization.

My Lutheran approach would be different. I would argue natural law, the law God has written upon the hearts of all human beings, including non-believers. Unless they really have undergone a moral lobotomy they should be open to this story: Down in Wichita, Kansas, there is a physician by the name of George Tiller. On his website he boasts that he has already performed 60,000 abortions, mostly late-term, and week after week he is killing 100 more unborn babies.

Dr. Tiller does not think of these fetuses as clusters of cancerous cells. He knows they are human because he baptizes some of them before he incinerates them in his own crematorium. You don’t baptize non-humans. Dr. Tiller knows that. He is a practicing Lutheran. His former congregation, Holy Cross of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, excommunicated him as an unrepentant sinner. But the Lutheran Church of the Reformation, which belongs to the ELCA, communes him. Did I mention that he kills 100 human beings every week and has already done away with 60.000? Sixty thousand! In Nuremberg they hanged some fiends for murdering less than 60 -- zero point one percent of Tiller’s toll.

Perhaps this little tale will give even non-believers pause if they have not discarded their conscience, known to Christians as the law God has written upon every man’s heart. One day, of this I am certain, this will indeed result in collective shame – and God knows what other horrible consequences.

We had a nice weekend in Big Bear. We sat inside and watched babies crawl around on the floor. At night we talked some and made jokes. It was good.

I am listening to "Ballad in Plain D"; it is such a beautiful song. The bell rang; lunch is now over. Students are coming into my class; they will be finishing their narratives. A student just rang my bell; its sharp ting hurt my ear.

New York.

My wife, Robyn, sat on the end of the bed and complained that our son, Jack, would have trouble getting to sleep. We were in New York with my parents. A friend from college was getting married. We had eaten bowls of fettuccine and marinara. It was Paul Newman’s marinara. His face on the jar was rugged and his hair was gray. He looked good.
“Jack’s going to have trouble getting to sleep,” said Robyn. She was sitting on the bed reading a People Magazine. Jack had made his way under the hide-a-bed.
“Maybe we should put him in the bathroom,” I said.
“Really?” asked Robyn sardonically. “You really think it would be a good idea to put him in the one place people are going to be going in and out of through out the night?”
“Or we could put him in the elevator with a do not disturb sign on the crib,” I said covering some from the bathroom suggestion I’d thought made sense. Robyn shook her head some. My jokes weren’t amusing her.
“What time do you want to leave for Brent’s?”
“I’m not sure, I’ve got to call him.”
“Maybe you should do that now,” she said.
“I’ll call in a little bit,” I said.
“You guys should take a cab,” said my mom from the kitchen. She was washing dishes.
“The subways are safe, mom,” I said.
“We don’t want you getting mugged,” said my mom.
“Where’s it at?” asked my dad. He was looking at a plastic tourist map we’d bought from a drugstore earlier in the day.
“They live on Riverside Drive,” I said. My dad squinted at the map. He had trouble seeing in the dim light. Jack pulled at something on the floor and put it in his mouth. I think it was a string of carpet. “You guys get to go right through Harlem,” said my dad.
“Really?” asked my mom. I think she was hoping he was pulling her leg. “Yeah,” he said.
“We love Jackson, but we don’t want to raise him,” she said half-joking.
“I’d love to raise Jackson,” said my dad.
“Jeez mom,” I said.
“You know what I mean.”
“We’ll be fine,” I said.
“Gosh, Debby,” said my dad. We all laughed.
“You know what I meant,” she said.
“Do you have money in your wallet?” asked Robyn.
“I’ve that money we took out earlier.”
“That’s right,” she said.

I fixed my dark gray beanie in the elevator mirror on the way down. The floor ticked away electronic and red. The song Seal sang for one of the Batman movies played soft. It was quiet and intense. Very melodramatic. It sounded like it could’ve been in a high school production of Phantom. That’s how you talked about musical theater. Les Mis, Phantom… one word was all you really needed. It was a New York thing. New York tourist vernacular. Like Urkle or Tim the Tool Man.
“Which way do we go?” asked Robyn as we stepped into the cold night. It reminded me of walking into the produce section at Costco.
“59th street,” I said. “The Columbus Circle.”
“Do you know what that is?”
“No.”
* * *

pumpkin patch and octoberfest!

we went to the pumpkin patch with the pools, parents, poppo, and sister. we also watched the great pumpkin and ate meat at a german restaurant. i also had a reunion. andy smith and the pools crashed it. fun. fun. robyn is sick. pray for her to become not sick.

the dodgers lost. i'm still busy. i'm not sure what else. i'm resting after the half-marathon. i will rest for about a week and start running again, i guess. not much else.

i was in class for the game tonight. andy was sending me text messages. they were mostly lewd remarks about larry bowa. not much else. the classes are time consuming, but i should be completely finished by april--except for btsa--a fun beginning teacher support program full of busy busy work. lame.

i'm also getting ready to apply for grad school in the fall. the program will allow me to keep working. it looks to be rad. we'll see.

we'll also be in new york in a couple weeks for the wedding. should be super rad.

we also may (hopefully) be living in the new place next week. my uncle is giving us a player piano with a bunch of old rolls. i am excited. i think i'll put the piano from here in the garage for awesome future gentleman's jams.

robyn and jack are still alive. this is a blessing. jack claps, plays kazoo, piano, changes his own diaper, says dada, and opens bottles with his gums. he also recently said the phrase "waz up boi?!" in sort of a new yorkish asian jew type beastie boy voice. it was weird.

i also ordered an all-in-one remote from woot. i have not received it yet. i imagine woot is run from the back of some guy's car in norwalk--that same guy who tried to sell me sweet speakers one time.

i am very excited the dodgers are in a position to be awesome. i was at the clinching game with greg and it blew my mind wide and long.

as far as the games go, i plan on listening to them on the radio--or radio with the tv on and the volume down. this might very well be vin scully's last (potential) world series... really, honestly, the stupid people who run tv world need to let him broadcast the games. he is such a beautiful man.

i met him once. it makes me cry to think of it sometimes. i was supposed to pick darren up from the airport. it was raining and i didn't want to go. i ended up waiting in baggage claim for a while... after a bit, several hard-bodied men began walking toward the rotating metal luggage thing. one looked like gary sheffield. another, like kevin brown... after a few moments of awesome, i realized these greek godesque gentlemens to be the dodgers. i chatted a little with then pitching coach jim colbourn as i had gone to high school with his son and met vin. i was a bit frightened, but felt my life would be a little less awesome if i didn't say thank you... so i did... and shook his hand... and i haven't washed that hand since...

i went to the game last night with greg. it straight blew my mind.

it is early. i have a student helping me sweep up a bit. he came earlier than me. i showed him how to make a blog.

the dodgers are winning games. i am gong with greg on saturday. mike was going to come, but he is a little bummed.

i am listening to bix.

i really don't have any time right now for anything. a lot of school. three classes with a ton of work, my regular grading/ planning/ etc., and i'm in charge of the accelerated reader program--which means i've been spening ever spare minute here at school entering in each of the few thousand students into the system. since the classes are still moving some, there's a good chance i'll have to fix many of them after the fact.

i'm also working toward running a half marathon. i ran ten miles the day before yesterday. today four, tomorrow, two, sunday maybe ten again, rest... i can't afford the race right now, though, so i just plan on running the 13 miles next sunday on my own time. oh well.


i'm also getting stuff together for grad school. there's a program i'm applying to that i can take while teaching next year. it should be rad.

happy fall.

we went to bakersfield. i am sick. i will be working tomorrow and it will not be fun. i am also watching the wire. the last season. it is really good. i am playing a show in long beach on saturday. it's just me and keith. it will be in a park.

the wire is subtle, pulpy, and brilliant. so good.

i want to be here now.

via a pretty arbitrary random espn article on great stadiums:

"40. Dodger Stadium
Location: Los Angeles. Opened: 1962. Capacity: 56,000.

Because if this stadium had a voice, it would sound like Vin Scully and it would tell you about Sandy Koufax, Steve Garvey and Kirk Gibson and a sun-dappled jewel in the Los Angeles hills."

nice, whatever.

i think i'm getting sick, though i really hope not. i'm knee deep in half-marathon training: getting ready for the race and loosing my gut in the process. i am running a lot and it feels nice.

today i hate recycling. here are some notable facts.

* In cases where recycling truly does save resources, such as with large scraps of aluminum, this will be reflected in market prices, and voluntary recycling will take place. Thus, there is no need for the government to mandate it.
* Tree farmers plant more trees than they cut down.
* Government mandated recycling is more expensive than putting the garbage into landfills, which means that this recycling uses up more resources than it saves.
* Some small towns with landfills are happy to import garbage from other cities and states because it provides jobs and tax revenue.
* Today's modern landfills are much cleaner and safer, and much less likely to leak and pollute than the landfills of the past.
* Regarding the claim that the U.S. is running out of landfill space, Tierney wrote, "A. Clark Wiseman, an economist at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash., has calculated that if Americans keep generating garbage at current rates for 1,000 years, and if all their garbage is put in a landfill 100 yards deep, by the year 3000 this national garbage heap will fill a square piece of land 35 miles on each side. This doesn't seem a huge imposition in a country the size of America. The garbage would occupy only 5 percent of the area needed for the national array of solar panels proposed by environmentalists. The millennial landfill would fit on one-tenth of 1 percent of the range land now available for grazing in the continental United States. And if it still pains you to think of depriving posterity of that 35-mile square, remember that the loss will be only temporary. Eventually, like previous landfills, the mounds of trash will be covered with grass and become a minuscule addition to the nation's 150,000 square miles of parkland."

In a 2007 article, Michael Munger, the Chair of Political Science at Duke University, wrote, "... if recycling is more expensive than using new materials, it can't possibly be efficient... There is a simple test for determining whether something is a resource... or just garbage... If someone will pay you for the item, it's a resource... But if you have to pay someone to take the item away... then the item is garbage."

couple things:

1. i'm itching to move. just down the street, but still.
2. i'm itching to shoot episode 2 of the tv show. the first episode was just me and jack.
3. i'm itching to punch the man on youtube who sent me this note on the video of me and jack in the tub: "cute hairy daddy. but why does he take a bath in a swimsute?" i deleted it and will soon delete every video of my son on the internet.
4. i'm playing a show with keith in lbc on september 27th at a park.
5. i'm needing to take the gre soon.
6. nothing else.


I could survive for 51 seconds chained to a bunk bed with a velociraptor

Created by Bunk Beds Pedia

death by caffeine:

126.98 cups of coffee. 68.2 nodoz.

we shot some stuff for the tv show last night.

that is all.

one of my favorite people on one of my favorite movies:

bourdain on ratatouille
" "I think it's quite simply the best food movie ever made,” Tony wrote today in an email. “The best restaurant movie ever made--the best chef movie. The tiny details are astonishing: The faded burns on the cooks' wrists. The "personal histories" of the cooks...the attention paid to the food...And the Anton Ego ratatouille epiphany hit me like a punch in the chest--literally breathtaking. I saw it in a theater entirely full with adults--and the reaction to that moment was what movie making was once--a long time ago--all about: Audible surprise, delight, awe and even a measure of enlightenment. I am hugely and disproportionately proud that my miniscule contribution (if any) early early in the project's development led to a "thank you" in the credits. Amazing how much they got "right."

tickle device? maybe?

On Sunday night's 60 Minutes, famed journalist Bob Woodward talked about his new book The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006-2008, about the Iraq war. During the interview, he made a vague reference to a breakthrough supersecret weapon or capability the US military has that he claims is comparable to the advent of the tank and the airplane. From CBS News:

"This is very sensitive and very top secret, but there are secret operational capabilities that have been developed by the military to locate, target, and kill leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq, insurgent leaders, renegade militia leaders. That is one of the true breakthroughs," Woodward told (60 Minutes correspondent Scott) Pelley.

"But what are we talking about here? It's some kind of surveillance? Some kind of targeted way of taking out just the people that you're looking for? The leadership of the enemy?" Pelley asked.

"I'd love to go through the details, but I'm not going to," Woodward replied...

"If you were an al Qaeda leader or part of the insurgency in Iraq, or one of these renegade militias, and you knew about what they were able to do, you'd get your ass outta town."

via boing boing, via somewhere else.

we're working on the tv show tomorrow night. if you want to help, give me a call. we're doing it in silver lake at the other house. it is staring myself and jack. we might need someone to play a female social worker who tries to tell me i am a bad father to my son suri. the character's name is nimphadora and the character will be sprayed with a hose during the episode.

monday. jack cried a lot last night and i couldn't get to sleep for a long time because my body was so wired from running 71/2 miles right before bed. i am training for a half marathon and trying to become less fat. the dodgers keep winning. this is good. and i have work to do.

i bought some molasses for my pulled pork i made last night. i also put it on my corn bread and added it to my cereal this morning. buy some. it is actually healthy for you. and it is very old timey for those old timey aches and pains.

Cancer is so limited...

It cannot cripple Love

It cannot shatter Hope

It cannot corrode Faith

It cannot destroy Peace

It cannot kill Friendship

It cannot suppress Memories

It cannot silence Courage

It cannot invade the Soul

It cannot steal eternal Life

It cannot conquer the Spirit.

If an incurable disease has invaded your life, refuse to let it touch your spirit.

Your body can be severely afflicted and you may have a great struggle.

If you keep trusting God's love, your spirit will remain strong.


Why must I bear this pain? I cannot tell,

I only know my Lord does all things well.

And so I trust in God, my all in all,

For He will bring me through, whate'er befall.
Anonymous

EACH STEP OF THE WAY

I'm following Jesus,
One step at a time;
I live for the moment,
In His love divine.
Why think of tomorrow,
Just live for today;
I'm following Jesus,
Each step of the way.

The pathway is narrow,
But He leads me on;
I walk in His shadow,
My fears are all gone.
My spirit grows stronger,
Each moment, each day,
For Jesus is leading
EACH STEP OF THE WAY.

Amazing grace! how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

AMAZING GRACE...nothing we did to deserve it!
But what HE did for us that day on CALVARY!

day three. yesterday was a long one. i've a bunch of stuff to do. busy, busy. nothing else. bye.

day two. we went to a dodger game last night. they won. it ruled. we ate sausage biscuits. they won and ruled too. today i have to go to class after school. i will get out at 10:00 pm. this will not rule and will be torture.

first day of school. i will be going to a dodger game tonight. tomorrow and saturday i have class. i am also training for a half marathon. and reading my antonia and watching john adams. and almost season 5 of the wire. this is going to be my lost weekend year--except all the cool things john lennon and harry nilsson did will be replaced by credentialing classes, apprehension, and night terrors.

have a nice day.

first day with no students. tomorrow is the first day with students. that is all.

i had this weird thing happen last night where i woke up and i couldn't breathe. i kept gasping and it felt like my lungs were filling with river water. i wasn't sleeping because it weirded robyn out too.

do i have a mighty big crush on sarah palin? mmmm...

back in my classroom. i like it here. it is nice. we were going to try and watch as many pixar movies as we could last night, but i fell asleep 3/4 of the way through the incredibles. weird al should make a movie called the edibles.

i am working in my classroom. it is good to be back. i'm finally getting a little excited about the coming year. ask me how i'm doing in a week. or not as i'll probably be mopey and melancholy.

anything else? i'm training for a half-marathon. and i might make some stew for dinner.

my brain.

my brain almost exploded this morning. i am touch and go.

i am watching john adams. and i am a bit tired. i got home at 2:30ish or so and got up at 6:30ish. jack fell asleep about 20 minutes ago, but now i'm awake and i don't want to ruin my day by sleeping through.

this is going to be a busy week. i have to get ready for school (starting next wednesday), i have to do homework for my class, i have to start moving things to the other house, i have to dig a trench for a pipe, and i have to do some other things too.

this movie is good. it would be better if he played john adams as harvey peekar and if laura linney played a. adams as her character in kinsey and if the guy who plays george washington played him in the same way that he played that guy in the movie with dakota fanning that made people a little uneasy.

i may change the name of the band to the sons of liberty.

we have a show on saturday.

i need some coffee.

i think i may watch the diving bell and the butterfly. and i'm drinking green tea with vanilla soy milk.

i finished in cold blood and am starting my antonia. it is neat and reminds me of the nebraska relatives--my mom's side. anything else? no. oh, yeah. we're playing a show saturday. come out. 7:30. 7.00.

i'm watching the sands of iwo jima and it is nice. i am finishing in cold blood and starting in my antonia. poppo was in the hospital with heart issues. we think he's good, but please be praying.

we are playing on saturday. come on out.

Barbie Cue Update...

If you are coming on Sunday... bring a lawn chair or chairs as we only have a couple.

we saw a family of four of these yesterday.



eagle rays they be.

tonight we ate at aloha mix plate. good local food. i had the look fun. it was. we then went to town and had a little walk and saw a rainbow and a sunset. we will come home tomorrow.

i just finished lolita earlier today. now i am starting in cold blood. lolita was for book club. in cold blood was because i wanted something for my last couple days here. i'm slowly going through some stuff that i should've read a long time ago. i plan on skipping the boring things though because life's too short to pretend to be smart, or prentend to be trying to be smart or learnededd. making fantasy baseball trades is way more fun. sometimes. we leave in a day or so. this makes me sad. real life. shrug. i'm starting a tv show though and i have a baby and wife. these things are good. we went and saw the batman tonight because jack has a lot of grandparents around right now. it was way cool. sirius totally died and then didn't. it was so wack. heath ledger just totally...

so come to the barbie cue. it is sunday.

we are still in hawaii. robyn is giving jack food and i'm making my igoogle page more rad. the parents went on a drive to upcountry leaving robyn, jack, and myself all by our lonesomes. we've taken turns watching the baby and relaxing by the beach. robyn is finishing her vampire book and i am finishing the book club book of the month. we also spent some time in town under the banyan tree. we met an old man from australia and ate sushi. really the best and freshest sushi is from the market. i've been a little light on the poke this trip, but all in all my raw fish intake has been decent. i almost bought some look fun noodles to make look fun when we get home. i'll probably pick them up tomorrow or the next day. oh well. home soon. boo hoo.

so, we are on the home stretch. i think we get back to los angeles on friday, but i'm not counting. we've had a fantastic time. a lot of the same old, same old, but seeing as the same old (fresh fish- raw and cooked, snorkeling, surfing, reading, writing, sitting in the sun, etc.) rules, we've really had a gas.

nothing much major. robyn's dad got stung by a jelly fish. we saw a rare monk seal. jack doesn't like sleeping. the dodgers made some trades i kind of like and kind of don't. nothing else really. time for a shower and aloe.

i'll put up more pictures i guess sometime.

here are some beaches with people.

hawaii is still fun. jack decided to not sleep last night so i am tired. very. we played dominoes late last night and i recorded two songs with jayson. the belts leave today. this is sad. robyn's parents come in some time next week i think. i'm just reading a lot and snorkeling and whatnot. nothing out of this world, just your usual relaxing awesomeness. i may make some coffee soon. we're going to mix plate for lunch to eat good hawaiian food. and we may go surfing again soon. like today. robyn's birthday is tomorrow. we will probably do something fun. oh, and the dodgers made a dumb meaningless trade. ned colletti and joe torre bug. here is my analysis via fire joe morgan. they wrote the words that were in my brains:

Dodger Fans, Rest Easy

There's a steady hand at the helm of your ship. A hand that wears a cowboy hat. A hand that also wears snakeskin boots. Ned's hand.

What's that? You just traded a 22-year-old catcher with a .994 OPS in 2008 and a pitcher with 335 strikeouts in 262.2 minor league innings for a defensively challenged third baseman with a career 106 OPS+ who turns 35 in a month?

And he's a two-month rental?

Relax -- there are good reasons for this. Excellent reasons. Reasons like -- Ned, you want to take this one?

"Casey Blake is a gamer," said Dodgers general manager Ned Colletti.

See? Don't you feel better now? What, you need more? Ned's got more.

"I think we improved the club," Colletti said. "Blake's a grinder with great character, a passionate player."

That's not all, Dodger fans. In addition to the privilege of trading away two talented prospects, you'll get the added benefit of continuing to block the progress of Andy LaRoche, who's racked up an .898 OPS in 1796 minor league at bats, has been heralded as a top prospect for what seems like hundreds of years now, was projected by PECOTA to OPS something like .850, and yet can't seem to ever be good enough to play in more than a handful of games in a row for the Dodgers. Ever. (LaRoche, by the way, has awful numbers in the majors this year, but he's been incredibly hit-unlucky (BABIP of .200) and he's walked more than he's struck out. Plus -- dude. The guy has gotten all of 59 at bats. Angel Berroa has gotten 89 at bats for Joe Torre's TerribleVetSquad already.)

It's not like Carlos Santana and Jonathan Meloan are sure things. Santana is kind of old to be in High A (and he's in the hitter-friendly Cal League), and Meloan has been terrible as a starter (though he should be a reliever anyway). But we're talking about giving them away for two hundred-some-odd at bats of Casey Blake. .336 career OBP Casey Blake. Bad defender in an already defensively suspect Dodger infield Casey Blake. Gamer Casey Blake. Grinder Casey Blake. Beardy Casey Blake. Casey Beard.

So yeah, I guess if I had to give this trade a grade, I would give it an A-. The only reason there's a minus is: there now appears to be a gamer surplus in the Dodger clubhouse. What happens when a team attains such a dangerously high gaminess quotient? Will Juan Pierre grow a thick, Baron Davis-style beard to prove that he's more of a gamer than Blake? What if Jeff Kent shoots himself in the foot with a crossbow just so he can play through the pain of a crossbow wound and be hailed as the gamiest Dodger of all? What if Nomar turns himself into a 5'6" white guy, and then Broxton transforms himself into Brett Favre in retaliation, and then Hong-Chih Kuo tops them all by becoming the ultimate gamer: a 5'6" Brett Favre?

I think the answer to all of these questions is: the Dodgers and their fans win, that's what happens. Casey Blake is the key to the World Series. Ned, you're a genius.

we have now been here a week. this is the first morning where i think nothing is wrong with my body. i will continue to take the strep medicine, though as it has made me who i am today.

we are playing a lot of dominoes and swimming in the ocean and reading. i am writing too. and reading. wonderboyz. a rock autobiography. the human comedy. lolita when finished.

made the annual trip to the whaler's museum. i will visit five more times this trip. i took jack. i hope he becomes a whaler some day.

i am trading like mad in fantasy baseball. propose a trade and i will accept. not. only if it will make my team stronger like the wind that is dolly. in texas.

word.

i have to go to the doctor today. i think i have strep or mono again.

the rio bravo and jayson belt are playing a sweet fun show at the key club on august 23.

buy a ticket!

first day. so far. got up early and wrote. robyn went for a jog, but my toe was still hurting so i stayed behind. we just finished a walk. i tried jogging a little. tomorrow i'll give it the full go. on the walk we ran into a man in blue board shorts. he was walking from his place about a half-mile from kahana sunset. after we ran into him we started talking about the baseball all-star game. nearing the beach we ran into a man wearing a 2008 all-star game t-shirt. my dad said nice shirt. san francisco giant announcer jon miller turned and said, "thanks."

now jack is napping and we are reading and stuff.

my toe hurts. jack is on the floor. we leave for hawaii tomorrow. i will surf and eat poke. i will probably also eat other raw fish and read books.

im watching round midnight. it rules. dexter gordon stars. you should watch it. we will go to long beach today. im not sure what ill do down there. maybe play whiffle ball. this movie makes me want to move to paris. but then i think back to paris and realize i didn't really dig it as i did roma. rome was more like the west. dry and dusty. we were actually in paris this time last year. or was it rome? we ended up with an extra day in rome because of a terror threat. someone tried to board a plane with a raptor in their pants.

im drinking coffee. hopefully my next cup wont taste burnt. it probably will. hopefully i will see more of my friends who live in other states. i think i may catch them all before the end of summer.

i should really play more piano.

this french guy in the movie has become friends with dexter gordon. i want to be friends with dexter gordon. my baby might start crying soon. when he does, i will pick him up. like now.