• {EDITORIAL NOTE: This one's going to be a little longer than usual.
"Blog," as a word, is some kind of abbreviated portmanteau that, I think, comes as close to describing the thing itself as any other term in this dumbed-down and ridiculous "parlance of our times." Or at least the term "blog" suggests how I use my blog. (Yikes. "My blog." Try to say that out loud in earnest and you'll marvel at how easy it is to repulse yourself.)
My blog, typically, is a space for me to be glib, and to keep in some kind of loose contact with an irregular and far-flung group of friends, and - from time to time - to direct The Reader's attention to some extraordinary or entertaining aspect of our popular culture. The guiding principle behind Curtains For You, Kid seems to always be: "Keep it light." Or, just as often: "Keep it."
But, occasionally, I think, this blog could serve as a space for me to showcase material for The Reader that reflects my actual feelings about a personal event.
The other day I was asked to speak at the funeral ceremony for my beloved and recently departed grandmother. What follows is the text, slightly altered, from the speech that I gave. - TDH}
• I think that Eleanor, "Freckles," my grandmother, was given a gift - life - by God.
I think that Gramma Freckles herself would be much more qualified to make that statement than I am, but I don’t think that that makes it any less true.
Eleanor was given the gift of life by God, and in return she gave Him the gift of a life gracefully and remarkably lived.
At this time I feel that this metaphor bears extension. It is easy for me to imagine Freckles' life as the vessel for the present that she gave to her Lord, in the same way that a little felt box might contain a lovely necklace.
Into her life, into this parcel that she dedicated herself to preparing for God, Gramma Freckles packed the unceasing care and support of those around her. In addition, she packed into her life her loving relationship with her husband Gilbert, to whom she was married for some sixty years, and with whom she raised three exceptional children.
Perhaps most importantly, the present Freckles gave to God was packed to overflowing with her own energy and vitality that seemed, I think to all of us here, to be limitless.
When Eleanor passed away, she did so as peacefully and as gracefully and as elegantly as she had lived her life. And although I was initially overcome with the emotions that accompany the loss of a loved one, it didn't take long for me to consider the idea that the way she passed was, in some way, the wrapping and the ribbon she put on her own personal gift to God.
Gramma lived her life as fully and considerately as anyone ever had. If she could talk to us today, I think that she would remind us all that there is nothing to be sorry about. We ought to take this time to celebrate the life of Eleanor, and to continue to be inspired by her life to make our own lives into the kind of beautiful and exquisite experience that she had.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Two Little Drawings
• I've been, um. Yeah. Kind of like. You know how when you just want to not think about anything for a while and you end up making dumb little sketch joints for a couple hours? And then even though they're not that good or nothin' you Photoshop 'em anyway because whatever. I probably would have liked for them to be saying things. I'm looking for a resource of a bunch of speech balloons somewhere. So. Holler at me. More later. Probably, technically, today.
• (I don't know how many of you have a flickr page or whatever. But after you upload some pictures and describe them, you click this button that says "Save This Batch." I would like to be able to customize it to say "Save This Biatch." Ns;js.)
Monday, December 24, 2007
• I'd like to start out with two, like, editorial notes. First of all, even though it is Christmas Eve and I seem to be posting to this blog with increasing irregularity, I'm not necessarily implying that this will in fact be the last post of 2007. (Like you care.) Secondly, I kind of can't stand year-end lists. But fucking everybody seems to make one, or at least every magazine. And I think I'd like to work for one of them one day. So. I figure I might as well just start producing year-ending list-type text.
• While I consider The Darjeeling Limited to be, on the strength of its visuals alone, the Best Movie of the Year, and while I thought at the time that watching that last Pirates movie on super-packed opening night with my former neighbor while she drank sneaked-in beers and seriously talked through the whole thing was unusually awkward, it was, in retrospect, the best experience I had watching a movie in 2007. (That last sentence, though, might qualify for Longest Sentence I Wrote This Year.)
• Best Blog Based Entirely On Another Blog of 2007: Wear Palettes, which takes the photos from The Sartorialist and reduces them to color palettes. In order to, I don't know, better track, like, color trends. Or something.
• As far as the Best Album of the Year is concerned, I think it's only fair to call it what it is: the Best Record I Heard All Year. Because there were a lot of records I just didn't listen to this year - even ones that it seems like I would have listened to. I think that this is the case because (a) there's no place to buy new CD's anymore, (b) the Good Shit Catalog died, and (c) the last time I was hip was in October of 2002.
So. All that said, for me it comes down to Da Drought 3 and Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. I'm not just trying to exercise some, like, one-rap-record-one-rock-record white guy blogger diplomacy here. Or maybe, on some level, I am. But I think I'm just really into extremely hardworking musicians who manage to sound completely effortless and cool all the time.
UPDATE: You know, the more I think about it, the more I think that Rock Band might be the Album of the Year.
• Fuck this. End-of-year lists are exhausting. And they only ever talk about general crap. Like the Best Book. I don't even remember reading any books this year. But I'm sure I must have. I'm just saying: I've never read a magazine where some guy lists, like, his Proudest Personal Achievement.
• Proudest Personal Acehievement of 2007: (fucking finally) graduating from college.
• Hardest-Won Photograph I Took This Year:
this one.
• I feel that the Year's Biggest Disappointment For Me, Personally was and continues to be the Raichile's unceasing negligence of what really ought to be the greatest blog ever.
• I just looked at the clock. It is now 4:31 in the a.m. I guess I could keep typing until January, but at some point enough's enough.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
The Reign of Blank-Blank has Begun
• Let's begin at the beginning, then, hey? Okay. So. American Gangster came out, and I was and remain embonered about the whole thing. The only thing that I thought was disappointing about it, really, was Lil Wayne's verse on "Hello Brooklyn 2.0." You know. Because it's not all east coast -sounding and super lyrical. But then I listened to it a bunch of times, and I decided that it's one of the best parts of the album. Wayne's part on it sounds like a Delta Blues singer performing with the New Power Generation. Or, you know, like Prince with a drawl. Also, the track so reinvigorated my love for "B-Boy Bouillabaisse" that I made this little thing. (What do you call these things? "Mashups?" What a dumb term.)
• Can't find anything to buy for Thee Famous Person - who doesn't "believe in" Christmas but still wants presents? If I was you, I'd try here.
• I converted pounds to dollars and, at press time, it'll cost me $39.62 apiece. But still. Don't think I'm not going to make the next Devil Himself mixtape (tentatively titled "Protected Everywhere") available on these bitches.
• Tadanori Yokoo? More like Radanori Yokoo.
• So. I've had this one post going for a couple of days now, because I saved it, and decided I would finish it at some point down the road. I decided today that today was the day, though, just so I could finish it with the new shit. (What? Yes.)
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Two-Fer Tuesday
• I figured it'd be a good idea if I broke this up into two posts, for the sake of. I don't know. Continuity? Something? I just personally never like reading long-ass text-heavy blogs. I tend to tune out. I suspect that you might as well.
• The other day I put a Mogwai song up here. Mogwai's one of those bands, man. Where, like, I've never really considered myself a capital-f Fan, but, like. I really like them. (I'm the same way about Busta Rhymes.) I guess somebody synced up one of their songs with an Iggy Pop interview and put the shit on YouTube. I say to that person: Thanks, buddy!
• The new Vanity Fair - I know - has an article concerning the suicides of East Village/LA artists Jeremy Blake and Theresa Duncan. I certainly don't mean any disrespect, but the first thing that occurred to me was the late Mr. Blake's series of really great haircuts. Here's an embed of Blake's "Sodium Fox." (Because, you know, apparently at least seven of you watch these things. (There's also a video of Duncan's "The History of Glamour" on the Vanity Fair site, but it's like forty minutes long so, of course, I haven't watched it yet.))
• Ike Turner died. But you knew that already, probably. (Just trying to stick with the dead celebrity theme for this installment of CFY,K. I guess.)
For Personal Use
• As for the delay , I am easily distracted. So.
• I spent the better part of last week in New York City, staying and working with Old Raver, trying to get my country-boy-makes-good on. I think that if I had tried to post before now, you all would have had to wade through a bunch of environmentalist rhetoric and links to helpful tips for green living.
• I will say that Raven Simone, for her part, has exceeded all reasonable expectations in terms of "Good Looking Out." I think that I might formally discontinue my own personal usage of the term "Ravenize" in honor of this. Maybe.
• Also: I managed to get to the big city just in time to give the kid Shamanzo a proper Sarchichan send-off. I think he's in China now. Or somewhere. (A hallmark of Sarchichans, I think, is their innate ability to to arrange their lives in such a way as to be able to just drop everything and go at a moment's notice.) Safe travels, Monsieur Rabbitt.
Saturday, December 01, 2007
Sleep Till Four Or Whatever
• First things first:
Dear Viva Voce,
I don't want to sound like a dick. Because I'm flattered. Really. But, um. The next time you make a song about me, you could go a little easier on the jangle-pop and go for more of a "brooding menace" kind of vibe.
Cheers,
TDH
• Okay. And that said, I think that the wintertime is the time to chill the fuck out 'cause it's boring.
That's "I Do Have Weapons" by Mogwai, by the way.
• So. Um. About that. I got this poll here. There's a whole, long-winded thought process behind its inclusion, but I'll spare you the particulars.
• It's a little funny when a band with the kind of cultural cachet that The White Stripes commands makes a video for a cover song. What's weird to me is how often they, in particular, do that. But whatever. Their new video, for "Conquest," originally written by Corky Robbins and performed by Patti Page, is hilarious and awesome.
• Now. Again. YouTube embeds. I'm not sure if they're worth it. The kid needs feedback.
• You know what's funny? Married to the Sea.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
Jush Is Radocasting As I Write This
• When you're stuck, kind of, at your parents house, you end up watching the most bizarre movies ever because they have a gigantic TV and you can't just take Jacuzzi baths all day.
• Speaking of television, If I had my own channel, it would look a great deal like this Grupthink poll. I know I mentioned it there, too, but in the interest of being thorough, I can't figure out how to embed that old-ass Flipmode Squad video for "Cha Cha Cha." It would totally also be in heavy rotation on my fantasy TV station.
• From the Not Sayin'; Just Sayin' File: We here at at Curtains For You, Kid are at our parents' house, as you may well know, where there is always an insane glut of celebrity gossip magazines. And maybe we're connecting dots that shouldn't be, but in light of recent events, the Breaking News out of Hiebradond just got a little weird.
• Two books I want: 111 (nsfw), and the new Walton Ford joint.
• Every once in a while you get the impression that maybe Nick Catchdubs is a little too awesome, and gets more intrawebs love than anyone else ever, and you wonder how in hell he ever got to that position, but then he drops a Justice remix with Wale on it and it all makes sense again.
• The thing about this article - apart from its inclusion here officially making this CFY,K entry a little heavy on the celebrity news - is that at first you're like "Man. Sucks for the old Hulkster." And then you think about how it's all you're going to hear the Bobo Howard Sterns talk about for a while. But then you do a double take, read the shit again, and say "New American Gladiators?! YES!"
Saturday, November 17, 2007
• P.S. I don't actually own a gun.
• I think that my life changed for the better since I changed my ringtone to the opening lick from Gimme Shelter. Now every time I get a phone call it's like Martin Scorsese is directing a little moment of my day.
• This is the best still frame from a cartoon show. Ever. For so many reasons. But really just the one.
• I've been thinking that I should, by all accounts, address the passing of Norman Mailer. Since he actually wrote novels, whereas I sometimes write about writing novels. I came across this story that, I think, deals with Mailer's passing - as well with as the "death" of contemporary authors' striving for The Great American Novel - pretty well.
• It's getting cold outside, and that means it's the time of year for introspective gangsta rap songs that prominently feature pianos. This is "Kill My Dog" off of Cam'ron's new mixtape.
• Thank you, Drawn!, for providing me with a couple of other places to screw around on the internet for no reason.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Good Mornian
• It's not really my place to be specific on this, so I won't. But I will say that there are interesting new developments going on over in Hiebradond. I guess you'd have to know old Anvil Shamanzer, like, personally. His new song, however, is for all to enjoy.
• When's Blogger gon' let me do those embeddable little expanding flash players for em pee threes? Oh wait. (I'ma get on it.) {Update: fixed!}
• I just wrote a résumé, which, I think, looks pretty impressive. I'd hire me. I mean. If I could stand me. (What are you supposed to do with a résumé again?)
• You know how when you go to a comic book store and they have those hundred boxes full of back issues of Rom, Spaceknight that you can buy for ninety-nine cents apiece? No? You don't? Because - what? - you're not completely nerdified? Whatever. These boxes: they got 'em. Marvel Comics, though, is digitizing their archives. So that way, I guess comic shop owners can free up more space for grown-ass people to play Magic and Pokémon. (No links to these things. One must draw the line somewhere.)
• On my personal wishlist: 58 Rodeo. I mean. If me and El Amar are ever going to make rock posters. (Me: "It's just hot chicks and skulls, right?" E: "Yeah. And fonts!")
• My Dad brought home season one of Weeds on the same day that my sister came over with a DVD collection of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, which are like the two things on TV that I watch that don't come on the Mojo network. (Especially since Adult Swim straight ganked my snake-for-an-arm idea. (Possibly NSFW)) So. They're talking about alternating pilot episodes. I'm gonna go.
Thursday, November 08, 2007
• I was sitting around the house the other day, you know - 'cause that's most of what I do - and Caddyshack came on. And you know. It had been a while since I heard that one dude on some "Ahoy, polloi," and somehow FP had never seen Caddyshack, which I thought was bizarre. Just because, like, so many old dudes are constantly quoting it. So I guess now she'll know what they're talking about.
I started thinking, though, what the hell happened to Lacey Underall, that singular paragon of 80's hotness? It turns out she's not up to much. But that's okay, because I can relate to that. This website retroCrush interviewed her. I need a job like that, where I get sent out and paid to holler at Mia Sara.
• I remember I put something up about this before, maybe years ago at this point. So I figured I'd follow up on it, even though I know that no one cares. That Ghostface doll is finally coming out. My thing, though, is like, the shit costs $500. How big a market can that possibly reach?
• Jush is gonna be rich.
• But the real story of the week in my own personal life is that the new Jay-Z record came out and that the shit is good. I suspect, however, that you guys aren't all that interested in where I think it rates among Jay's other albums, and how I feel about particular tracks. So I figured I'd just embed the Roc Boys video because it looks like the most awesome party ever that you would never, under any circumstances, be invited to.
• I have long maintained that Shannon Sharpe could only have ever played for the Denver Broncos - never mind that he played two seasons for the Ravens - because he is, in fact, a bronco. He looks more like a bronco than even John Elway, who is at least half bronco. But now there is a new contender for the title of Athlete Who Most Resembles His or Her Respective Team Name: Chris Bosh. If he ever gets traded, I hope it's to some future expansion team called like Les Pterodactyls de Montréal.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
An Orchestra of Penguins
• The winner for this year's CFY,K Halloween Costume Contest goes to Old Raver and her roommate, who went all the fuck out for a sick Statler and Waldorf getup. I, of course, did not dress up, because I am a perennial hater, but I did carve a sick demon-in-a-hellpit pumpkin.
• I must be honest, though. Because I don't really care one way or the other about Halloween. I'm making this post pretty much solely because Saul Williams has released a new album on his own, that you can get for free - free is harder to come by these days - or pay five bucks for. It's a sweet deal either way. Trent Reznor did a bunch of production on it, which is weird. But whatever. I love Saul Williams. Go get it!
• I mean. I guess there's other stuff going on in the world of the intrabutts. Killa's finally got a new song out. Dog the Bounty Hunter is a total racist. Lil Wayne is properly releasing all those leaked Carter III tracks, and may be going to jail still. Wired Magazine having an article about VBS.tv (nsfw) is like Wired having an article about Wired from ten years ago. But seriously. Saul Williams has a new record out.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Straight to My Mind-Hole
• I'm pretty sure this guy was an actual zombie, but he didn't eat my brain. What he did do was seek out a decent light source for me to take a picture of him with my shitbox cellphone camera. This zombie fellow was so nice that I now believe all zombie movies to be anti-zombie racist propaganda.
• I just got back from spending time in Asheville, North Carolina. In between fending off attacks from vicious pitbulls with heads as big as stop signs and being stranded on the outskirts of town with El Amar and an odd collection of moonshine-drinking locals, there were three concerts at the Orange Peel. Some notes on these shows follow.
• Spoon. The first night me and thee Famous Person got into town we saw Spoon. We showed up late, because we, together, are incapable of leaving town for a trip before four p.m. So we missed The Ponys, which sucked, because FP was really excited about seeing them. Spoon ruled, though. They played their melodic, piano-driven pop songs with a kind of funk-laden slow groove that built, occasionally, into incredible crescendo. There is something blue-collar about their consistency and their "no-frills" (by which I mean, of course, "no eyeliner") look. The bass player plays his instrument exactly like it should, in my opinion, be played. FP says that the lead singer sounds kind of like Billy Joel, which makes sense, since Billy Joel also totally rules in a blue-collar kind of a way.
Spoon used an effect to mimic, I guess, the sound that a ghost might make for "The Ghost of You Lingers." FP thought that they were tying to emulate the sound of the truly big-ass fan attached to the ceiling of the venue.
{Editorial Note: The hyperlink immediately above leads to the Big Ass Fan company, which makes, yes, big ass fans, including the one at the Orange Peel. But I wonder what the percentage is for visitors to their website who are fans of big asses. - R. Ronsonol}
Spoon closed the show with "The Way We Get By," which, despite its inclusion on the O.C. soundtrack, remains a perfect pop masterpiece. The crowd was pleased.
• They Might Be Giants. I didn't actually go to this show. I felt, at that point, that I needed some time away from thee Famous Person in order to preserve my own tenuous grasp on sanity. You know how it is with siblings, man. I will say this: the chicken parmesan sandwich I had while this concert was happening was delicious. That and I have seen TMBG a bunch of times, and they're always really good, and I suspect that they did not disappoint.
• The New Pornographers. I spent the whole time wondering what it must be like to be Carl Newman, who seems to be the de facto leader of The New Pornographers. Everyone, even die-hard fans of this band (among whom I am not), clearly seems to like Neko Case and Dan Bejar - both members of TNP - way more than him. And since both Case and Bejar have pretty successful solo careers, are they, like, doing the less-successful members of this band a favor by showing up at all? I mean. They are. But I wonder how aware everyone is of this.
For a band that I don't particularly like, The New Pornographers put on a pretty amazing, high-energy concert. Neko Case - yawning intermittently throughout the show - adds a nice little twang to the Mamas & Papas-style harmonies at play.
Bejar, by the way, was rarely on stage. He sauntered on to sing lead vocals on about every tenth song on a - roughly - thirty song set. I think he knows that he's the secret weapon of the band. Also: you can add him to the list of celebrities, along with Patterson Hood and Hyde from That 70's Show, who look kind of like Cruton.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Dude With All the Dudes
• The lady Mz. Higginbotham has a new, completely pro-fee-essional gig these days, with an office, she says, that is big enough for a ping-pong table. I can't imagine when she'd find the time to actually play ping-pong (The Heroic Sport of Heroes), though. Maybe she could spend all day training with a robot. Then she might have a shot at one day beating me. (I wonder if the Robo Pong 2040 is in anyway related to R.O.B.)
• I am under the impression that Stephen Colbert is running for president entirely for the lulz, and entirely in character. Is there like a legitimate term for when the joke-thing begins to have an effect on the actual thing?
• Winsor McCay may well be the best that ever did it.
• The White Stripes Lomo joints are really, really awesome. (Though I can't decide whether the Jack or the Meg one is the most awesome.) But I can't imagine a set of circumstances under which I'd actually buy one.
• Bring it back already. Shit.
• What the hell is "Gocco printing?"
• I love it when the DJ you like so much remixes that band you like so much and it turns into a remix you like so much. Word to Discobelle.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Pour The Coffee In My Eyes
• Hearing about my exile on Elba, S. Higginbotham came to visit this week. Ping-pong was played. Attendant injuries were suffered. Pork chop sandwiches were consumed, and attendant food comas were endured. It was like a morale-boosting care package that you'd get on a rainy day at summer camp except, like, in human form.
• "You's a seven-time felon. What you doin' with that?"
• I want someone that I know, likesay the aforementioned Higginblatt, to make their own font, and then to tell me how that went, so I can decide if I would like to do so as well.
• So what if I don't have a functioning automobile or any discernible source of income? Fuck it. I'm going to see Spoon. Because I can't think of a good reason as to why I wouldn't do that. I mean. It only costs money and is happening hundreds of miles away. (Happy birthday, FP.)
• I'm having one of those days where I'm not dying; I just can't think of anything good to do.
• From the "More Evidence That This Blog Has Become Less About the Strange Activities of One 'The Devil Himself' And His Far-Flung Associates and More About the Goings-On Within the World of Rap Music That Nobody Who Reads Said Blog Cares About Other Than Its Author, 'The Devil Himself'" file: Lil Wayne is going to be on the new Jay-Z record. We here at CFY,K consider this a win. (Also: Here's hoping that there's some little kid sitting in front of his computer with a notebook full of scribbled sixteens thinking, 'Oh. That's how you do that.')
Saturday, October 13, 2007
• The above artwork comes from a Love & Rockets collection by Jaime Hernandez called The Girl From H.O.P.P.E.R.S. I highly recommend it. (You should really probably buy it from Fantagraphics, just to keep it real, but I could only find a direct Amazon link.)
• So now that new Hova joint "Blue Magic" has its own video, in addition to the aforementioned trailer. Hype Williams directed the new one, and it looks gorgeous. (Hype Williams should offer to do his best work for Jay-Z for free, in an unceasing effort to make up for "Sunshine.") See also: "Roc Boys," which is also classic Jay. (I am getting my hopes up for American Gangster. I can't help it.)
• You know who I like? Graphic designer Charley Harper (RIP). I think old FP has a poster of his somewhere in her house. And Habitiat Skateboards pretty much unabashedly got their whole stee from him.
• If you were thinking of making the best music video of all time, you'd probably want to combine the following ingredients: a freestyle intro from Big Daddy Kane with human beatbox provided by Biz Markie, sing-along shots of authentic eighties-style hip street kids on a basketball court, where Spud Webb (!) is playing some ball. Then you'd think, "fuck it, go nuts" and throw in a John Madden cameo in there for giggles and grins. What if I told you that that video already exists, for Paul Simon's perfect pop song "Me and Julio Down By the Schoolyard." You'd have to like that, because you love that song, and it would save you a ton of impossible work.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Corndog Victory in the Final Seconds
• What I think is funny is the idea that having a degree in English makes a person somehow less able to communicate with the people around them in the world. Like. I wrote this little thing for my friend the other day, just a little write-up to appear in a local publication, about 150 words, and I honestly had no idea how to do it. Perhaps I'm only capable of long-winded and convoluted academic critiques. And half-assed blog posts. (I mean. I did it, and did it happily, as my friend is the hardest-working person I have ever met in terms of charity. She really, actually, thinks globally and acts locally, which is a rare thing, despite the proliferation of bumper stickers intended to convey that same philosophical message. What I'm trying to say is that writing that 150-word thing was way more difficult than a longish paper, but it took a while for me to say that, because I have an English degree and therefore have a hard time saying anything.)
• So, um. Lil Wayne got arrested. But I guess it's cool now. Or something.
• Speaking of Lil Wayne, and other rap-related news, what the hell happened with Still Listen To Gangsta Music? That shit was my favorite. I'm beginning to think that whoever made that blog is secretly, actually Cam'ron, and has, as such, disappeared from the face of the earth. Luckily, my dude over at Jesus Piece still holds it down.
• Rave-on sends me links to good stuff like small-time producers send Kanye soul records to sample. This one's good, about an art collective that moved into the mall. Although I must say that living in the mall sounds like the place I would like to live least. But whatever. Art kids and their damn statements.
• I have not finished Marisha Pessl's book. Nor have I fully explored that book's website. But even a cursory perusal of these things suggests that Pessl is pretty, pretentious, and approximately half as talented as she thinks that she is. I think we ought to get married. (My book, for the record, seems to be selling for upwards of one hundred dollars. Take that, suckas!)
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
The Kid With the Most Knowledge
• I think I have gotten more "post titles" from "Ghost Deini" than from any other source. HST had The Book of Revelations. I have Supreme Clientele. This is reflected in our respective prose, I think.
• So, yeah. I drew this picture of Buddha for some reason the other day. Figured I'd, you know, share it with you fine folks.
• I, also, would like to apologize to all the people whose phone calls I have only been sporadically answering as of late. It's like this, see: my car's broken down. In order to do anything, therefore, I have to get a ride, usually with Thee Famous Person, who has been graciously carting my stank ass around town every day. I have this thing, though, where I refuse to talk on the phone for any substantial amount of time when I am in the, like, physical company of people. Especially in the car. I can't stand it when the person you're in the car with is all on the phone for a long time. You can't talk to that person, listen to music, or have your own phone call. You can't do shit but listen to, like, half of a conversation you don't care about anyway. So I don't do it on principle.
• The other thing that's been suffering lately is this blog. Having a blog is something that you do when you have some time by yourself, which is rare these days as well, and for much the same reason. (It's also the same deal for, like, dicking around on the intrabutts finding out about stuff, which also makes the blog suffer. Like. When have I ever gone this long without a link to something?)
• Wait. You know what's awesome? Taking, like, dialog from Frank Miller's Batman and visually remixing it with Adam West-style Batman. It's the shit. (Via Drawn. (Are we still, like, crediting link-sources? I do it intermittently, 'cause fuck it.))
• More soon? Let's hope so.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
That's Okay With Me
• So. You'd have to know, by now, that I'd be all stoked to see the thirteen minute prequel to The Darjeeling Limited. (Trailer here.) It's called Hotel Chevalier, and it's free on iTunes. (Get iTunes, already. Sheesh.)
• And speaking of movies, old Raver sent this next thing my way. (I have to give credit where credit is due, lest I be accused of "ravenizing" anybody's shit.) Right in the middle of Robert Redford trying to re-legitimize his career, Tom Cruise seems intent on letting you know that he is still, in fact, doing his thing.
• You remember when that Shyne joint "Bad Boys" came out with that ill-as-fuck Barrington Levy cameo? Foxy Brown has made that song again, and it's still a pretty good song.
• My favorite Simpsons episode of all time is called "The Mansion Family," and it's on Season 12. I consulted Video ETA, but they don't know when the shit's coming out.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
We Now Return
• "... to your irregularly scheduled programming."
• That picture is supposed to be like an early rough draft of this weird little comic project I'm supposed to be working on with my sister, thee Famous Person. Because when we are around each other, that's what we do: begin little comic projects and then never finish them.
• I finally - on a related note - got that book that Paul Pope released. It, like the rest of his work that I've seen, is kind of uneven, but when that dude hits, he kills it.
• More art crap: Have I talked about Nicholas Roerich on CFY,K before? I might have, in some incarnation of this blog. But then I forgot his name for a long time, until, like, two days ago when it occurred to me again. Roerich is the shit. I'm putting this up here as much for your benefit as my own. You know. In case I forget.
• I think you guys know how I feel about TDB's - that's Traditional Dutch Bicycles, by the way. So. I found this blog, right? And I'm not saying it's, you know, "rule 34" status, but it might as well be.
• I don't even wear glasses, but I would wear these. I do, however, wear sunglasses, so if anybody wants to come up off some Persol 649's on the cheap, holler at the kid.
• Making an album, after, let's face it, a pretty lackluster coming-out-of-retirement joint, based on your reaction to a movie was, when I first read about it, either the best or the worst idea that I had ever heard of. But then Hov dropped what I guess is a trailer for his upcoming single - which, I know, is weird - and the shit is ill. (But, I mean. I'm biased.)
• The Orange Park Kennel Club is neither decadent nor depraved. It is, however, for suckers. You spend all your time trying to figure out the difference between, like, a quiniela key and a box superfecta. The odds listed on the racing program mean nothing. A 13-1 shot, from what I could gather, has exactly as good a chance as winning a race as a 3-2. (Meanwhile, of course, I am naturally allergic to numbers and, therefore, bet entirely on instinct and the humor-quality of a given dog's name. This, I have come to learn, is an ineffective method.)
• Ok. More. Soon.
Monday, September 17, 2007
The CFY,K Travelogue Phase Three: Colorado
• As has been made, I think, pretty clear by the first two "phases" of the CFY,K Travelogue, I spent a great deal of time on this trip not actually doing much of anything. I found this to be refreshing, coming off, as I was, a hard summer of the final throes of college classes, and all the attendant nonsense therewith. By the time I got to Denver, though, it seemed like it was time to get on with the business of some hard-core tourism. Luckily for me, old Lo-Ha, my lovely hostess, was as bored and as unemployed as I was (and, by the way, am), and therefore ready to seek out whatever action there was to be found in the Centennial State.
• If you laugh "a special kind of" laugh when you're hanging out with Nebraska, then it's sort of a constant thing with Lo-Ha. At least with me. Everything that happens when you're hanging out with her is hilarious, due in no small part to the fact that she's there. It's one of those things like if Lo-Ha was reading out of the dictionary, it would be really, really funny that she was, in the first place, reading out of the dictionary.
• I think our shared inability to take anything seriously came in clutch when we visited - for the purposes of continuing a sort of trip-long theme, as well as research - the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at the Naropa Institute. I had read about this place, but I don't think either of us were prepared for the weird brand of, like, militant freak they have running around that place. Indo-Tibetan Buddhism majors engaged in poetry slams with students of transpersonal psychology. There were strictly enforced rules as to which color of meditation pillow was allowed where. All of it: too much. After a half-hour we commandeered the sole computer in the school's tiny library to purchase baseball tickets online.
• The real highlight of my time in Colorado, I think, was a trip we took from Denver to Aspen by way of Independence Pass. The route is closed during the winter, because the road is high and treacherous. We almost hit a deer to the tune of "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)." Along the way, one fact became clear: everything in Colorado is mind-bogglingly beautiful. Even the mechanics. I kind of couldn't really deal with it. Once you get to Independence Pass, you're over twelve thousand feet above sea level. So. Even in the middle of the summer, it's awfully cold.
• At "Aspen's hippest hotel," old people play Connect Four at a large table in the lobby at all hours. Aspen is weird. It's surrounded by gorgeous mountains and peopled with citizens that seem nice enough. Be warned, though: they can sense that you are not in possession of a Black Card before you enter into any restaurant, and the wait staff treats you accordingly. Although I felt like some kind of impostor when I was there, I don't want to come across like I had a bad time in Aspen. It's incredibly picturesque and relaxing. It makes sense that rich people spend so much time there. But, really, for me, it was getting there that was the most fun.
• The next day I woke up and embarked immediately to conclude the strange "literary portion" of my tour of America. Lo-Ha and I drove around Woody Creek, Colorado for hours until we finally came across the entranceway to a compound that may or may not have been part of Hunter S. Thompson's legendary Owl Farm. I'm satisfied that it is. But you never know. Lo-Ha was, after a fashion, bored. So, with a final stop at Buffalo Bill Cody's final resting place, and a protracted round of the "Famous People Name Game," we returned to Denver.
• I left Colorado and Lo-Ha and what was essentially the final leg of my amazing trip the next morning. I returned to Orlando to visit again with Higginbotham. (Note: never, ever, under any circumstances, expect any peace and quiet on a flight to Orlando. You will be surrounded be screaming children that are out of their goddamned minds with excitement at the prospect of spending any amount of time at all at Disney World, and you will curse plane travel and want, silently, to die.) I regretfully couldn't spend the night there, though, as there seemed to be pressing issues to attend to in my hometown, so I went to see my folks for a few days. Then my car broke down, and I am now stranded in their home as I type this.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
The CFY,K Travelogue Phase Two: Venice Beach
• Mere micromips after Higginbotham dropped me off at the airport I was throwing my bags in the back of Jenkin, Nebraska's own Heroic Warrior Honda. There is something, to me at least, completely fascinating about being on an entirely different coast of the United States than the one you woke up on, all before lunchtime. (Nobody else seems to think that this is all that remarkable, however. "Can you believe it," I'd ask. "Yes," they'd say, "you were on an airplane." They don't understand, though, that airplanes are powered by magic.)
• The first night I was in town, there was a Swillpro Records Revue at the Good Hurt, but it really could have been held either inside of Nebraska's own MySpace page, or during a particularly strange evening at Fluids Bar and Lounge. Face was there! Think of this! Maybe you don't think air travel is all that wondrous, but surely you could grasp the significance of randomly running into Face, right? What are you? A robot? Anyway, the kid Smithers' Jagger elbows could seriously maybe give Shamanzo's time-tested Kiedis joints a run for their money (Ns;js).
• After that night, though, Nebraska and I got down to the business of not doing a whole lot of anything. To paraphrase our own Anvil Rabbitt, 'you laugh a special kind of weird little laugh when you hang out with Shaved.' It's true. You do. We spent a good deal of time wandering around the Venice Beach Boardwalk, which, exactly as I remember it, is better than television. In the span of seriously, you might come across a fistfight between two mimes - they had dropped all pretense and were screaming at each other - and, equally random but thematically linked precisely, Jimmy Hart, the Mouth of the South. I did. I also bought Brown's Requiem at Small World Books and caught up on some reading while Shaved Wieners shrapled the gnar like it was '88. Then it was off to get our Animal Style on.
• Me: In your professional opinion, how long would I have to stand around on the boardwalk before I ran into Nyft?
Nebraska: I'd say about two, three months.
{Not true. I ran into that dude in like an hour. It was awesome.}
• Roughly half of my time in the Los Angeles area was marked by this hilarious tension. Shaved was visited, in addition to myself, by this beautiful young schoolteacher that he had met on - get this - an airplane. (I know. This type of shit doesn't happen to anybody, but Nebraska's a damn superhero now. At some point before I showed up, he saved a house from burning down.) For a while there, as a result, he could not decide whether or not he was going to be Johnny Cool Guy, 'cause this lady was around, or, like Ridiculous Onomatopoeic Party Favor Noisemaker Nebraska, 'cause, you know, that's how the Security Council rolls. So I would send over these little lob shots over his Cool Guy net just to watch him deal with it. More sample dialogue:
Me: Hey, you want to play a Man Cup?
Lovely Lady: What's a 'Man Cup?'
Nebraska: It's nothing. It's the first level of MarioK -
Me: It's when we put on those jock straps, you know, with the cup? And then we run towards each other at full speed, from across the room, and bang cups together. Whoever thinks it sucks first loses.
• All of this eventually boiled over (aided in no small part by this depressing little movie we were all huddled around watching) in a furious fit of recording in The Genius's amazing new apartment in downtown L.A. There is evidence of this madness, and it can be found here and here, if you have the patience. (E Lamar, click these shits!)
• Suddenly - at least as suddenly as I had arrived in California, I was back on an airplane, headed this time for the mountains.
• When you're leaving LAX by airplane, they make you fly out to the ocean and turn around if you're headed eastward. I remember looking down out of the window of the plane at the expanse of water below. Moments later, after we made the turn back east, I was above undeveloped green land, and it looked exactly the same to me as the ocean had. "It's like," I thought, "they're the same thing, it's just that the ocean is moving faster than the land." I surmise from this that it is quite possible that either Los Angeles itself makes you high, or that they're putting strange chemicals in the air inside of airplane cabins.
Friday, September 07, 2007
The CFY,K Travelogue Phase One: Orlando
• The whole time I was on this trip I was thinking that if I had a laptop, I could update CFY,K from the road. But then I thought that that would result, eventually, in me spending the whole trip "blogging," which would have blown.
• The day I turned into an old man, I drove to Orlando, Florida, to visit one S. Higginbotham. It was 110 degrees outside the whole way, in the Volvo without air conditioning. I drank a gallon of water and never had to pee, you know what I'm saying? Making that drive was like playing soccer. By the time I stopped, I was wearing Okefenokee Pants.
• There, strangely, doesn't seem to be a whole lot going on in Orlando. We spent all day looking for where the cool kids were hanging out. What we came across, though, was people dressing up, like in suits and prom dresses and shit, to go to the mall. (We did go to a mall. This much is true. But, to be fair, old Higginblatt had like this gift certificate or something. So it was justified.)
• The campus of the University of Central Florida is like this gigantic sprawling utopia. Sort of. It's like if they shot The Prisoner in Orlando instead of Portmeirion.
• I don't, however, mean to suggest that everything in Orlando is bad. Because, first, that would be untrue. (Add to that the fact that S Dot had like just moved there when I visited, so it's not like she had shit like all mapped out.) The Higginhours have set up housekeeping in the nicest little house that any of my friends live in. They use a fun-house mirror instead of like a regular mirror. How do you not love that? And every building in Orlando is shaped like a food product! We saw a house that Kerouac lived in! I saw President Isenhour straight snipe a wasps' nest from a hundred yards! It was epic!
• The other thing was that me and Higginbotham were afforded ample time for some regular old shooting of the shit, which is what I came down there for in the first place. We are awesome talkers. In addition, our hanging out resulted in the creation of a new comic strip we made called "Split 7 Inch." I want to do more of these things, so we get really good at it. And then, like, set up Split 7 Inch's own little web presence, and then take over the whole nerdy world, like those other dudes who make that webcomic that you don't read but like a billion other people do. Split 7 Inch is awesome and can be found here and here.
• I had a lovely time in Orlando, but, too soon, I was waking up S. at like 3:30 in the morning or some shit to drive me to the airport. We drank Doubleshots on the way, and I had to take a Doubleshit on the plane the whole time, but refused to.
• Next time: Venice Beach is just as weird even when you know your way around.
Thursday, September 06, 2007
He Lives!
• Hey, how long has it been? A "while," you might say. And too long. During which time things have managed to spin wildly awry, the fact to which the dormancy of this here "blog" primarily owes. Forgive me, won't you?
• Previous to these developments - involving massive automotive trouble and financial wrangling - I had been having the best time of, maybe, my whole life. I'm planning to put up a long-overdue travelogue here on CFY,K. And I might as well. Because I am stranded in my hometown, with, seriously, nothing better to do. (This is a precarious position. If you're not doing anything, you can be made to do anything.)
• There is more to come. Sooner than you know.
Monday, August 13, 2007
• Just as a little protip, if anybody ever sends you a link with, like, "roflcopterd00d" or "halflife2.zoy" involved, do not click it. You'll hate it, 'cause it sucks. Skritch has gotten me with this delightful little prank like a thousand times by this point.
• Whose Tusken Raider do you prefer? E. Lamar's? Or Paul Pope's?
• Castle Magazine is all about illustration and design and is available for free download at their site. Definitely worth checking out.
• I figured I would update the old CFY,K today, since tomorrow I am going on the Friendship Tour 2007, with stops in Orlando, Los Angeles, and Denver, so I won't be posting for a little while. (I'm not sure if that matters, really, though, since I'm visiting like nine tenths of my readers on this trip.)
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Music Is My Hawt Hawt Secks
• The Border Disaster Episode Two - at long last - is now extant! Enjoy it. (Either here or on Happy's site.)
Friday, August 10, 2007
It's Too Hot To Think Straight
• I always forget that magazines are sold by the celebrities on their covers. I'm weirdly loyal to several publications, based on various reasons, so I generally don't care who's on the cover at all. But then the other day I bought a Paste Magazine - which I typically hate because it reminds me of an old dude at a rock show with like a meticulously maintained haircut - solely because the White Stripes were on the cover. I've talked about this before, like how White Stripes interviews are so off-putting because of how normal Jack White seems. But also, you spend the whole interview waiting on Meg White to drop some essential truth like she's Silent Bob or some shit. And sometimes she does. But she usually keeps quiet, which makes for great tension.
• Lately all I've been doing is drawing pictures and thinking about drawing pictures. So I think that the rest of this post is going to be about comics and illustration and drawing and crap.
• Are you guys reading the weekly Yikes that Fantagraphics puts up? You ought to be. Weissman rules.
• This is the best three seconds you'll have all day.
• My favorite Hernandez bro, Gilbert - Thee Famous Person's favorite is Jaime, who also rules, but I only mention it because FP's mad that she doesn't get mentioned more often on this blog - has a new comic out on Dark Horse that I'd like to read. But I can't because the comic book store in my town closed. Dark Horse is also involved with this web comic called "Sugarshock," but I'm not linking to it on GP, but it's worth reading, so you should find it and do so.
• Paul Pope has a new book out. (Someone out to be it for me since I'm about to officially be old as all hell, ha ha.) Paul Pope is my hero. You can tell he uses a brush in a lot of his work, and I wonder how he does that. I am scared of the brush.
