December 25, 2005 + "Christmas."
    Robert Frost was/is a standardbearer for American Poetry, and rightfully so.  So when I saw him this morning on "Meet The Press" reciting a poem of his from memory both on an old version of "MTP" and on tape from the Kennedy inauguration doing the same, it was a bit disheartening to me.
    You see, I have trouble remembering my poetry and, well, my lyrics as well.  Always have.  This is nothing new.  Have always had less trouble remember other folks' work, though.  Here's how I've chalked it up:  when I write, it is a cathartic experience.  Once the words are out on paper, they're out of my head.  Many (and I do mean many) ideas are always percolating in my noggin at any given time, sometimes finding it hard to coalesce and get out in a tangible form.  When they do, I seldom edit.  Robert Frost edited quite a bit.  And his path, his road less (or more) traveled (knew that would make an appearanced, didn't you, fair readers?), is good for him.
    They're gone.  They're cathartic for me.  Then reliving them, reciting or singing them, is difficult for me as it is reliving that emotion or period in time.
    But poets and artists and musicians do that all the time, right?  With little to no problem?
    But what of classical, or proper, musicians and they're charts & notes and music?  Or some choirs?
    *sigh*
    Who knows.  In Secret 9, both Tim and I had our books on stands with us on stage.  Didn't bother me then and, truthfully, wouldn't bother me now.  I've never cared much for the status quo but, and trust me that this isn't an "appeal to the masses," as in a logical fallacy, when I know that Adrian Belew and Michael Stipe have both done it, well, that's okay with me.  And in S9, truth be told, I only looked down at my book twice, that's a good sign.
    Maybe it is all about memorization and familiarity but when it comes to connecting with an audience, I would rather have the tools at my disposal to do that rather than grabbing a gun and wondering if it is loaded or not.
    Oh, and a Christmas thing.  I never liked the song "Silent Night."  Here's why.  When I was young, I thought that the one line, instead of being "sleep in heavenly peace" was actually "sleep in heavenly peas."  Yes, folks, the bathroom is indeed on the right.
    Current Reading:  Spook by Mary Roach (yes, a Christmas gift...thanks Tracy!)
    Current Listening:  the best Christmas album ever...The Known Universe by Ass Ponys and the newest Bill Hicks CD from a gig in England in, I believe, 1992.
    Christmas was good.
    Now on with the show.

December 24, 2005 + "Idiots."
    So we're at a local eatery last night and, even beyond the typical Christmas idiocy, things got worse.  A waitress, young, probably late-teens or early 20's, is trying to vacuum her area with one of those industrial, but largely silent, vacuums because the dining room leader, who she obviously loathed, wanted her too.  So she's vacuuming and I'm watching over Tracy's right shoulder as she's attempting, for a full two or three minutes, to vacuum up some cracker and bread scraps.
    It is quite obvious that the vacuum, though on, is not performing the appointed duties.
    She turns the wand upside down and puts her hand to the opening once...puzzled look...twice...frowns...thrice...and declares to the entire restaurant that, "I have no suction power!"
    No lie...I damn near choked on my burger.
    But it got better.  The dining room leader and other staff ignored her, and her response was thus:  she continued to "vacuum" for a full two more minutes, making no headway.  Then, she put the chairs back and put the vacuum away.
    Idiot.  Oops.  I shouldn't say that, should I?  I'll get suspended from the human race for statements like that, or something equally nefarious.
    So Merry Christmas to all.  I hope your holidays are grand.  Here's a quick list of the year for Scot, some good, some bad and some just there.  I guess heading into the new year, I felt like recapping a bit.
  Good:  started new band after quitting band I'd started three years ago where things went terribly awry, finished typesetting on new book (out in 2006), had great year with Tracy and the cats, family is all reasonably healthy and somewhat happy (I hate speaking for others' happiness), learning new bass things and expanding my musical universe, etc.  lost some friends who it turned out weren't really friends...I guess this should actually go up in the "Good" section...let me cut & paste
  Bad:  still diabetic, still wear glasses, we're outgrowing our house, lost some friends who it turned out weren't really friends...I guess this should actually go up in the "Good" section...let me cut & paste, had a bad year at work for a multitude of reasons and not just including recent issues but going all the way back.
    The good far, far outweighs the bad, which is good.  Yes.  Right.
    Current reading:  nothing.  Again.  Hoping for some new books or book store G/C for Christmas.
    Current listening:  Manic Street Preachers - Lifeblood, Joy Division - Permanent, Iron Maiden - The Number Of The Beast, The Dresden Dolls - The Dresden Dolls, Motorhead - Rock & Roll, Heather Nova - Siren and Warren Zevon - Bad Luck Streak In Dancing School
    I sort of feel like Bill Lee, especially at work.  I'm not quite the Spaceman that he was/is, but the way Zevon expressed his life is prototypical for me.
    But, stemming from that, I do indeed bear a great dislike toward Christmas and the holiday season.  Far too many obligations to uphold.  Now, I don't mind obligations as long as they make sense to me.  But, as with most of the world, these do not.
    C'est la vie.  Look for Journal IX coming in January, long, long overdue (this one here is WAY too long.)
    Oh, and a quick note:  I started journaling at the behest of my best friend, Bunny, back in '99, long before there was such as thing as "blogging" and, though tempting in some ways, I don't intend on doing some other site for these manic ramblings.  While the idea of allowing my readers (I know there are at least three of you out there) to comment on my notes has some merit, I don't think it's going to happen.  Sorry.  You all get coal in your stockings and, if you want to comment, there's an e-mail link up top...Merry Christmas!!!

December 18, 2005 + "Winners & Losers."
    So the NFL playoff races are underway and this means two things to me:
    1)  I'm utterly disappointed in my Buccaneers, who laid a goose egg on Saturday to the Patriots, 28 - 0, their first shutout since 1999 when they took a trip to Oakland and got dessimated, 45 - 0.  That was okay, though, because they whooped the Raiders in Super Bowl 37.  (Isn't it weird to see it not in Roman numerals?)  But now the Bucs are a game back in the NFC South race and are likely hoping for a wild card entry into the playoffs.  Maybe it is just me, but when I watch the Bucs these days I see the offensive line and wonder how much Bill Muir is getting paid to coach those guys...they let the Patriots have mile-wide lanes to burst through to disrupt the running game and gave Chris Simms a taste of what it's like to be David Carr in Houston...ugliness.
    2)  But the Bengals beat the Lions 41 - 17 to clinch the AFC North and their first playoff entry since 1990.  I feel as happy for them as I felt for the Bucs in, what was it, '98?  The Bengals have officially been de-bungle-ized.  I'm most happy for players like Rich Braham, Willie Anderson, Brian Simmons and guys like that who've been there for a good number of years and worked the most to turn the franchise around.  Hats off to ya, Bengals.
    In other news, I pose a question to all of you:  which restaurant is more prone to give you a heart attack, Cracker Barrel or Waffle House?  I would say Cracker Barrel for the following reasons:  more food for the money, just as much grease content and those darned rocking chairs on the front porch, which allow you to not walk it off, but collapse upon exiting the place thus giving the cholesterol time to find previously unclaimed arterial territory in which to settle.  Yes, we had breakfast at Cracker Barrel today.  Yes, I even ate my grits.  Why?  To feel more, I guess, authentic where I live?  Truth be told, they only taste good with lots of butter.  Grits are part of the government's plan to fatten the land.
    Work this week is four and a half days.  A half day on Christmas Eve (or, in our case, Friday).  I may have touched on this in previous years, as I've worked at my present job for nigh on a decade now...or, as they say in the south, a coon's age.  But in that half day in previous years, there has been so little to do that it is silly.  However, that's what the company says, and that's what the company gets.
    Just so everyone knows, George Bush is spying on you right now.  Really.  Don't believe me?  Ha.  Reasons to believe that George Bush is spying on you as you read my journal:
    1)  I have a degree in Philosophy.  Two of my friends in the program believed, and I truthfully don't really doubt them, that the CIA keeps files on anyone who attains degrees in, or studies, Philosophy or Political Science.
    2)  I am wearing a Team Canada (hockey) hat.  With relations between our neighboring lands a bit tense at present, I'm especially unpatriotic right now.
    3)  My favorite bands aren't American.  Seriously.  Manic Street Preachers, U2, King Crimson (most of 'em...well, used to be most of 'em), Iron Maiden, Motorhead.  I have a lack of affinity for a lot of American rock music, except for, like, CCR, Zevon and people like that.
    4)  I have a button on my backpack denouncing George Bush.
    5)  I am a registered Independent and, thus, completely dangerous...y'see, I think for myself.
    6)  I've signed various petitions for various issues/ideals completely 180 degress from the Republican POV.
    7)  I have a computer and know how to use it.
    8)  I have links to Amnesty International & The Carter Foundation on my website.
    9)  I'm an artist, writer, musician and am therefore dangerous.
    10)  If you're here reading this, you probably share a lot of my views...click here.
    *sigh*  But back to reality.  Gonna take a shower, read for a bit, ponder my existence and fall asleep next to my lovely wife amid dreams of utopian grandeur....
  LATE ADDITION
    The Silent Screen has a drummer/percussionist!  So we shall be venturing forward into our "rock" music.  It is rock, that much is sure, but so much more.  Quite a few odd time signatures (odd only in that they're not 4/4, not so much that they're odd by any other standard), very textural, use of sound as opposed to just instruments, if that makes sense.  Looping and working with different musical ideas.  And I just feel the creativity ready to burst forth, strange as it is to type that out.  How about this?  I feel that there are very few, if any, boundaries to what we're doing.  Regardless of the "success" of the band, the mere creation that we're working on is it's own reward, but with the quality of that creation, "success" will be attained in some form.
    Can you tell it's late and I'm tired?
    The other thing is that our new drummer is someone that played in an early, early version of the band I left a few months ago and that I stayed in touch with as a friend.  That situation notwithstanding, some things I thought at that time have proven to be quite true.  Hindsight is 20/20, as the cliche goes, but it is true.  For me?  The lesson learned is this:  trust your gut instinct as opposed to the clammering words and ad hominem attacks of others...democracy is no reason to avail yourself of hasty generalizations and weak arguments.  I'd have been better off for it then, but I am doing very well now regardless.
    Okay...bed...must go to bed...must go to *yawn*...uh...*zzzzzzzzzzzz*...ajvyugi6 v678tfgo7to *head hits keyboard*

December 8, 2005 + "Bone Chillin'!"
    Shew, doggies, it's cold!  Sorry...trying to be in central KY character, just a bit.  Oh, before I get too carried away....
    Current listening:  Pearl Jam - Binaural, Adrian Belew - Side Two and (againA) Iannis Xenakis - Electronic Works I
  Current reading:  back to nothing, really...I finished The Enchiridion while in Frankfort on Monday, waiting to take a test.  And then I reread it in between tests.  It's not long on words, but it's long on depth.  Stoicism...yes.
    I want to watch Schindler's List again.  Yes, I know, it is one of those movies that most folks are more than happy to have only seen once, but it, like Gladiator, Star Wars - Episode IV and Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead is just one of those great, great films that I can't get enough of.  It is, at once, sickening/appalling and heroic/uplifting.  As most great art is.  There must be enough of the suffering of humanity, that tribulation of spirit, to connect it to all of us, and also enough of the hope, that great hope, for the betterment of the situation that extends into each of us and begs us to rise the next day.
    I rise each day with hope.  It weakens throughout, but it remains, ever so slight.
    Boo to the Cincinnati Reds for trading Sean Casey, by the way.
    I had an interesting week at work.  Nothing I can, or would, speak about in this forum, or really any other, but let us just say that, occasionally, regardless of how you try to do the right thing, some folks have their own ideas and will follow them to the end(s).  I work to earn money to pay my bills and cover my insurance, to aid my wife and I in our other life goals.  I give 100%, which is often not enough, but I will give no more in the future.  As I've said so many times, c'est la vie.
    The Silent Screen is coming along quite well.  Staggering the differences between this musical venture and my past couple, spanning about five years.  And we haven't even found a drummer yet.  New ways of playing, new ways of hearing things, getting more confident and accustomed to my singing voice, which was only previously really used in Secret 9, many moons ago, when my friend Tim McNally and I shared lead vocal duties.  I'd link to it, but The Silent Screen's website is still more of a Scot-ad-for-musicians right now...that'll change soon.  Flux and growth...ah, the beauty of it.
    And, by god, it is cold.  Let me reiterate that.  Sleet, rain, ice and snow...ah, I love it.  The nastier the better.  I remember getting snowed in at Record Alley one night...spent the night with albums and CD's and guitars...what a great night.  Except for falling asleep in the office chair in the back room...my neck wasn't the same for weeks.  I remember seeing the then-current version of Duran Duran play acoustically on some late night talk show.  Believe it was the version with Warren Cuccurullo on guitar and Sterling Campbell on drums?  Can't remember exactly...all I do remember is Simon LeBon's voice sounding pretty darned ragged.
    Songs running through my head:  Australia by Manic Street Preachers and Gravity by The Dresden Dolls

November 26, 2005 + "Playing."
    Current listening:  U2 - HTDAAB, Manic Street Preachers - Lifeblood & Iannis Xenakis - Electronic Works 1
  Current reading:  (whoo-hoo!  something to read!)  Epictetus - The Enchiridion
    Yowza.  Just got done practicing a little bit (FYI, it is 8:23 PM as I write this) and working on some things.  Worked mostly on a tune called "Feed My Tragedy" that The Silent Screen has been working on, wrote a little counterpoint bass lead for transitional purposes, sort of a bridge.  A moody, textural piece.  Lots of room for everything to spread out.  And room for some bass distortion...got's to love that.
    Realized too, as working through a few of our other new songs, that I really need to put my thinking cap on in some of them.  The lines I've been doing have been fairly root-worthy, but the songs are working their ways up very organically.  The parts will come as we play them, but they're difficult to "compose" to on my own.  For example, the little counterpoint thing mentioned above I heard in my head at our last practice and picked it from the branch here at home.  Will it stay, or work in the grand scheme of things?  Who knows?  That's the great part of writing...there are very few rules and, often, accidents are the most soulful things you do, especially when you realize that what you just did wasn't an accident at all, but a moment when you let go and, voila, found the path you needed to take anyway.
    Of course, sometimes you just suck.  But life ain't all milk & honey, is it?
    Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, you turkey murderers, you!  I can't help but wonder what we'd have eaten on Thanksgiving if Ben Franklin had gotten the turkey as our national bird?  Eagles, perhaps?  Mmmm, love's me some fresh roasted eagle....mmmm, mmmm.  With some wild rice and grits on the side.  That's good eatin', baby.
    I think I need some sleep...obviously, I'm getting nowhere writing, eh?

November 20, 2005 + "Sniffles."
    Current listening:  The Dandy Warhols - 13 Tales From Urban Bohemia and U2 - Achtung Baby
  Current reading:  still nothing....
    So I'm typing this, sniffling, alternating between being quite chilled and being overly warm.  I cannot, and will not, be ill.  Though I am now.  Meaning, I shan't be attending a music session today, much to my, and I'm sure my partner's, chagrin.  A speed bump, only, though.
    We saw the new Harry Potter movie yesterday.  Thoroughly disappointing.  Love the books, liked the first two films, haven't liked the last two.  Partly due to casting, partly due to directing.  C'est la vie.  Like in music, where the studio and the live stage are two utterly different things, between novels and films-based-on-novels, the same dischord exists.  I'll say this:  the effects are grand.  I just wish they'd spent as much time on the script/story as they did the effects.
    And I'm losing consciousness even now.  Back off to bed.  Perhaps up in time to watch some football.  My picks are the Bucs over the Falcons (of course) and the Bengals over the Colts.

November 18, 2005 + "Last Chance, Music & Notes."
    Current listening:  The Dresden Dolls - The Dresden Dolls, Peter Gabriel - 3, Motorhead - Inferno
    Current reading:  nothing...for once, nothing at all...zip, zilch, nada
    So, tonight the remnants (for lack of better terminology) of my former band, Season One, are playing a show in Lexington.  Of course, I told them I would be leaving after this show about a month and a half ago and I was asked to not return and that I would not be needed for the two shows we'd booked in October & November because, as it was put to me, everyone would be "uncomfortable" with it.  C'est la vie.  Yet again, I was the pariah.  I would have liked to go, at least tonight, but out of respect I've decided not to.  It's their show and I wouldn't want to pressure them or cause discomfort.  I hope they play well and have a good show, regardless.  It would be a shame if they broke up because they're quite good, their vision and mine just didn't dovetail into cohesion.
    On the other side of that, having hooked up with an insane (in the best possible fashions of the word) guitarist, I'm in the process with him of starting a new band.  In the month we've been playing, we've got the nucleus of a sound and are building a foundation that's extremely exciting, vibrant and fresh.  Very textural with a pop sensibility, but musical and lyrical depth...if you just want surface, it's there, but if you want to dig in, there's plenty to find.  Already ten songs in the sharpening stages...amazing, really.  It's nice to be excited about music again.
    I got suckered into watching bits of one of those "nanny" shows on television a bit ago...happened to pass by while Tracy had it on (she's feeling a bit ill and was zoning in front of the tube).  I swear, it amazes me.  To see these little kids taking swings at their parents and throwing crap around is absurd.  Perhaps it's not the fruit of the day, but had I done that, my father would have quickly knocked some sense into me, in every literal sense of the phrase.  Until I was around ten or eleven, I sort of lived in mortal fear of my father.  Granted, his temper was quite bad then (I've been accused of having gotten his temper and I must say I disagree...mine's worse...or it was;  it's better now) and we, ironically enough, during my teens, became a terrific father/son tandem, but when I was young there was just no way around it.  I behaved because, if I didn't, Dad would get mad and there was nothing...nothing...not the first day of school, not girl cooties, not hearing "We Are The World" on the radio, not going to the library at our school, was quite as bad as that.
    However, I must say that, given the 20/20 vision of time passage, I'm quite glad of it.  My Dad's discipline has made me much of who I am.  I do not accept.  I question.  I work hard.  I listen...intently.  I'm strong.  Of course, that's 50% from my Mom too...they worked very well together, and still do.  But the discipline came from Dad, moreso.
    And the corporal punishment?  Not a problem.  When you're five, six, seven years old, reason and the art of syllogisms and pondering the morality of obeying orders...they're not part of your lexicon.  Sort of like the pot on the stove...you touch it, you get burned, you learn not to touch it again.  You learn about heat and what causes it and the intrinsic danger later on, once you're able to cognate about it.
    But, then, I'm sort of talking out of my ass.  We're not having children, so who am I to ramble on about such things?  No one.  Like someone who complains about the president, but didn't vote, my thoughts on this topic are essentially worthless.  And thoughts & opinions are like mothers.  Everyone's got one, it's just a matter of quality of one's mother that is in question.

November 9, 2005 + "Under The Sun & Over The Moon."
    Where does god come in?  Where does country come in?  Why do some people get blinded to reality by both?
    All questions to ponder, but not right now.
    First, another list.  This time, my most undervalued/unknown songs that everyone should know.  Nice title, huh?
    10)  11th Street Kids - Hanoi Rocks
    9)    Goldilox - King's X
    8)    Australia - Manic Street Preachers
    7)    Tie Me At The Crossroads - Bruce Cockburn
    6)    Time Waits - Adrian Belew
    5)    Rime Of The Ancient Mariner - Iron Maiden
    4)    Illumination - Rollins Band
    3)    Gravity - The Dresden Dolls
    2)    La Tristesse Durera - Manic Street Preachers
    1)    Black Coffee - Black Flag
    This list is just songs that I know probably 9 out of every 10 people on the street won't have heard a single one of and that, my friends, is a shame.  A pure, crying shame.  As a matter of fact, I may go burn myself a CD of these tunes just to listen to on my way into work tomorrow.
    I'm having a writing block too.  As in, I know what I wanna say, and I'm saying it, but not in the way(s) I want to.  Does that make sense?  Of course not.  Creativity seldom does.  So I wad up the paper and throw it away...as Picasso said, every act of creation is first of all an act of destruction, after all.  Write, wad, throw...repeat as needed.  Open up a vein and let it pour onto the page, smear the blood to make a picture that fits your mood.
    And so the lion sleeps, chin resting upon a paw as the flies and sun go down.
 

November 6, 2005 + "Smoothing On."
    Just imagine, if everything went smoothly, worked as it should (or was advertised to) and hassle was a word that had been created for fictional stories.  Pretty boring, huh?
    That's just what I woke up today thinking about.  No particular reason.  Just a seed in my mind.
    Also finished lyrics and partial music for a song that had been percolating for a while, called Feed My Tragedy.  It's a little more on the light/hopeful side than the title may suggest, but still a bit down.  I think the music will pick it up, though.  Yet another in the Zevon-esque series with happier music & downer lyrics.  Got's to loves me a little bit contrast, baby.  Have some other ideas zooming around, not the least bit stirred up by learning piano.  Actually, I'm doing quite poorly in my piano attempts, but it has proven a catalyst for bass & guitar, strangely enough.
    Also, the new band on the horizon has stirred a bit of creative juice.  And punched up the fire that had been sitting idle beneath the cauldron.  Some things are more clear than ever in my mind.  They include:
    1.  Leaving Season One was absolutely the right thing to do.
    2.  I write for myself.
    3.  After iten # 2, I write for everyone else, but the dividing line is there.
    4.  This (items # 2 & 3) is why I have trouble remembering my lyrics, verses, poetry, etc.  Much of it is written to deal with, describe, remember, compartmentalize, handle, soften, explicate, wear down, ease, transmogrify things that I see, hear or do in everyday life.  Not just mine, but everybodies.  Once it's done, I think my mind see it as done and moves on.  Remaining rooted and reliving some of these things is at times painful or seemingly unnecessary.  Or happy, yet still unnecessary.  Strange.
    5.  Apples are good.
    Tracy and I went to the Farmers' Market in Lexington yesterday when we got stuck in traffic due to the UK/Auburn football game.  Got some apples.  I had totally forgotten how good fresh, real apples are.  Not the ones you get at a store, but ones grown out in the weather and sunshine, picked by a real human just days ago.  Teeming with juice and perfection.  The orchard we bought them from is Reed Valley Orchard and I highly recommend their stuff.
    In all, strange days.  Heading into the "holidays" I have nothing to say but...well.

October 29, 2005 + "Moving/Frenzy/Deliberate/Time."
    A quick series of thoughts, this time...
    The new band is coming together slowly, but surely.  It's a good feeling to have found a solid guitarist that is so into textures and in-depth composition, but that also recognizes the implicit greatness and necessity of spontaneity within music.  I feel good things coming.  The quest is on for a drummer, now.  This band, methinks, is destined for trio-dom.
    Work is nearing new depths of sewage.  Same old thing(s), complaints have been lodged, along with suggestions for rectifying the issue(s), but they seem to be falling on deaf or indifferent ears.  The old days came and went.  I was lucky enough to have been with the company for a good while when common sense and business sense dovetailed into a cohesive management structure.  Those days, alas, appear long gone.  Even sent out a resume to a job lead elsewhere this week, but have yet to hear back from it.
    The new book will be released in early 2006 as a sort of commemoration of DKP's 10 years of existence.  I think about this in a couple ways.  I'm sorry it will have taken a little over five years to put this book out, what with the previous ones having a year or two in between them, tops.  It is great work, though, so it will be worth the wait.  But, then, how to find that niche poetry market, especially in Central KY which, oddly and strikingly, has nearly no literary scene compared to my former stamping ground of NKY/Cincinnati.  Whodathunkthat?
    Writing more lately, mainly little bits here and there.  No excuses, because they're worthless, but the job has become a monkey on my back that is giving way to a black dog on my shoulder (druggies or Churchill fans will understand that statement...sorry to everyone else.)  But I'm breaking through.  It's a great thing to have  family and friends that make every day wake in a blaze of sunshine, otherwise my world would be dormant and dark.
 

October 17, 2005 + "Tripping."
    This past weekend was spent tripping toward Chicago and back again.  Here's a snapshot of events....
    Friday 10/14 - travelled to Chicago by day, arriving in the late afternoon.  Traffic was not bad, found our hotel in the North side of the city and then went in search of good food and good times...found both.  I can't remember the restaurant's name, but it is a smallish Japanese place around the corner from the Chopin Theater and it was, in a word, exquisite.  Divine, actually.  Best spring roll I've ever had and incredible sesame chicken.  Well worth the money.  Then we went to the Chopin and saw the Uma Productions presentation of Craig Wright's (Six Feet Under) Recent Tragic Events.  Unbelievable, really.  A great play with great players in a small theater full of people expecting, and receiving, intensity and emotion.  Well done.
    Saturday 10/15 - a trip downtown (and I must say, I love the trains in Chicago...who needs a car?) to The Art Institute and walking amongst the natives.  Odd, but tremendously friendly, folks.  Then, in the evening, The Dresden Dolls at The Metro, which I found out is just around the corner from Wrigley Field.  I think, in a city like Chicago, a lot of great things are just around the corner from other great things.  We got there a bit late because, unbeknownst to us, the Dolls were the early show and the Dirty Three were later in the evening.  We got there in time to see Devotchka, who were magnificent, and the Dresden Dolls were everything we'd hoped they'd be.  Intense, creative, exemplary musicians and performers.  Quite easily one of the best shows I've seen in years, though it was cut short.  And Brian Viglione is officially in my top five drummers ever...utterly fantastic.  From their opening spoof of The White Stripes through their originals, just fantastic and inspiring.
    Sunday 10/16 - breakfast at Walker Brothers which, as I found out, is a nationally known pancake house.  Ate too much, but it was so darned good that I went for it all.  Then we went off to a many-storied mall, I think it was called Woodfield?  I had a wicked insulin reaction (overbolusing for breakfast plus much walking equalled horror) and spaced on some of what happened.  Then, I found Chicago stays awake past six o'clock on Sundays because we went out for hot dogs of the Chicago variety and caught a movie, all after nine o'clock.  Cool, huh?
    Monday 10/17 - drove home, stopping by my folks' on the way to give them their Anniversay present.  And now, we are home.  Long trip, but exciting and good.  Good to see the cats, though, and good to hop in front of the computer.  *sigh*...and back to work tomorrow, what fun!

October 9, 2005 + "Observations."
    Just some observations from recent life.
    1.  Karma is real, whether you dig that p.o.v. or not.
    2.  Doing the right thing is often misunderstood by others, but staying true to yourself will work out.
    3.  Government barters today and thinks not for tomorrow, nor for the constituents it represents.
    4.  The United States has creditors.  They include nations our government calls enemies.  Would you bank with your enemy?
    5.  The world economy needs an overhaul.  I could do with a few less McDonald's and such if we could even things up a little bit.  Granted, parity, in some sense, has hurt the NFL, but overall it has made the game much more competitive and that is to the benefit of the fans who are, in fact, consumers.
    6.  You can try to be as nice a guy as you can, do things the right way and try to help out, but you'll still get your gear left out on the porch for you to pick up as thanks for your professionalism.
    7.  And then, you can still do the right thing and not go back on your word and continue to let others use your PA, and in the end you'll still get looked at as an enemy.
    8.  Love is a wonderful thing.
    9.  Cats are wonderful things.
    10. Fall is a wonderful and beautiful thing.  It is time to cut the grass one last time, plant bulbs for winter & spring and tuck in for the new seasons.

October 2, 2005 + "Winning Is/Isn't Everything."
    Oh, to be a football fan in my shoes.  And, hey, look at that...I'm in my shoes.  With both of my favorite teams standing at a supremely healthy 4 and 0 start (Tampa Bay - because years & years ago I saw and fell in love with their old creamsicle uniforms before I even knew what football was, at age 6, and Cincinnati - growing up in Cincy or NKY sort of makes you a de facto Bengals & Reds fan, regardless of anything else).  And today, with two nail biters for wins, I'm a very happy Scot.  Whoo-hoo.  Haven't checked scores on the baseball playoff situations, but the Yankees are in, so things are bad.  Go Houston!
    I'm looking for new bandmates again, but this time by my choice.  Sometimes, making the right decision is the very most difficult thing you can do.  Sometimes, even when you're blinded by other things and the right decision is staring you in the face.  So I'm leaving after our second show in November, unless I get an e-mail saying they've found a replacement, which I think they'd have an easy time doing.  I wasn't going to leave them hanging as that's not my style, but we've been out of communication since my decision, so who knows?  See here for info on what I was (three years ago) and am trying to do.  There are clues in there as to why I'm leaving Season One too.  Nothing at all to do with my bandmates.  All stylistical, which on some level is even more difficult, and yet better as well.
    My anniversary is coming up.  Three years in mid-October.  To celebrate, we've planned a trip to Chicago to see The Dresden Dolls at The Metro.  It should be a raucous time, and a lengthy drive to and from, made tolerable by the company of my lady and our Sirius Satellite Radio - best Christmas gift ever, for those of you seeking something for your better halves.  Matter of fact, I first heard the Dolls on Sirius channel Left Of Center.  Cool, huh?
    Lemonhead, the stray kitten that Tracy and I had tamed (mainly her, though), has found a new home with my Uncle's wife's mother.  Is that right? ...yes, it is 8^).  Lemonhead, a beautiful orange & white tabby, started coming around our place in early August and wouldn't let us within ten feet of him, but would come around when we put food out, very tentatively.  Gradually, we (again, mainly Tracy, who has the patience of god sometimes) got him to let us touch him, then scratch him, then hold him briefly, then hold him in our laps, etc.  With three kitties already in our domain, and with very little space at present, we just couldn't take him in, though he was and is a sweetheart.  My Mom was helping us to try to find him a home as we'd already decided to get him neutered & either find him a good home or bite the bullet and "make space," as it were.  Many thanks to Art, Lisa and Lori (did I spell that right?) for helping out with Lemonhead, rechristened Lemon.  He's a great cat and, from what we've heard, he's taken to his new domicile quite well.  As a wrap-up, here's Lemon from around September 20th, on a chair on our patio, lovin' life...ah, to be a cat:

 

September 10, 2005 + "Cowboys And Indians."
    So, first off, I was on my way to the grocery a bit ago and saw a large pickup truck driving down the road with a very, very large Confederate flag on a pole stuck in the bed of it, waving in the breeze as it traveled.  Now, I don't know about you, but things like that interest me.  For one thing, by the strictest definition, it might be treasonous.  Not that I particularly care, but someone might.  The other thing is that I wanted to interview the young guys (a cabful of 'em) about why, exactly, they were flying the stars & bars in the middle of 2005.
    However, I recognized a couple of things:  1) I'm one guy and there were at least four of them.  2) They may very well have had intense socio-political viewpoints as to the south rising again and/or secession from the Union.  3) They may also very well have had no idea why they were flying that flag.  4) They could have been prejudiced, bigoted rednecks.
    It was the fourth reason that threw me off my idea.  Partly because I was wearing my Cleveland Indians hat and, well, if they're not into blacks, they're probably not into Indians either.  Still, I wonder what would make someone fly that flag on a big pole in the back of their truck.  I mean, I have a Manic Street Preachers sticker on my car, and a Northern Kentucky University license plate, because I support those entities.  I just want to suss out what these guys were supporting.
    And that led into something else that Tracy and I had talked about a few nights ago.  Indians.  Specifically as far as team names go.  You know the old argument, that the Washington Redskins, Cleveland Indians and other such-named teams, pro or college, are apparently insulting to Indian and Native American groups.  I understand the point of view, but check this out....
    Teams are named for strong creatures, people and things.  The mascots, as it were, are points of pride and points of respect to the teams and their supporters.  When Paul Brown founded the Cincinnati Bengals, it was based on the ferocity and strength of the cat and, I believe, tied in with the Cincinnati Zoo's history with Bengal and White Bengal tigers themselves, so it was a point of pride for the area as well as the team.
    You wouldn't hear of a team called, say, the Akron Hot Dogs, right?  Or, better yet, the Wichita Caucasions?  Or the Vancouver Invalids?  To me, I believe that the teams with Indian/Native American names are sources of respect for these peoples that, yes, white America of past centuries and, unfortunately, to some respect, today, disenfranchised and committed genocide against.  If not for these teams constantly conjuring images of strength and pride based on those peoples, some aspect of them would be further lost to history.  I cannot step into the shoes of today's Indians, but if I could, I think I would be glad that someone respected my heritage enough today to find strength in it.
   But, that might just be me.

August 24, 2005 + "Hypocritical."
    So, much has happened since the last of July, but little of any true note.
    I recently finished reading On The Beach by Nevil Shute and, I must say, it was one of the most depressing, uplifting, glorious, harrowing reads of my life.  I found tears in my eyes at several points.  A wonderful comment, from John Osborne, the scientist in the book:  "It's not the end of the world at all.  It's only the end of us.  The world will go on just the same, only we shan't be in it.  I dare say it will get along all right without us."
    Indeed.
    In our age of terrorism (or Tara-ism if you speak like our president), evangelicals calling for death upon heads of state (Pat Robertson has truly lost it this time) and nuclear posturing (North Korea, Pakistan, Iran, U.S., etc.), I think everyone should go back and reread On The Beach.
    Not with a bang, but a whimper....
    And I'm sick of hypocrits.  At work, at play, at all.  We want to do this...well, not that, exactly, but this.  We're willing to do whatever to get this going...well, except that...and that.  Um, and, no, not that either.  But we're desperate!
    I don't know what I mean by that.  I just see & hear some things and I almost wish I'd have been more deliberate several years ago in charting a course.  Democracy can certainly work with, say, 100+ people in a group.  If you've got 100 or less, you're more than likely going to need a benevolent dictatorship for any success.  And it can be, say, a triumverate, if necessary.  But it has to have actual leaders.  Otherwise, it seems, the treading of water will overtake the successful strokes taken in the water of creativity.
    I am going to start updating more frequently soon.  I need catharsis some way, somehow.
    I've drained my tank, it seems.  Typical days leave nothing for imagination.  The lubrication in my engine is sapped and I'm going to throw a rod soon.  Any suckling at the teats of routine only provides a dust of frustration on which to choke.
    I'm ready for new things, I guess, creatively.  But, ah, where to find them.  And how.  The why of it is quite simple, but the execution will take planning, something I realize has to be done this time.  No loose forms or weak coils of ideology, but an actual plan, goals and projects to get somewhere.
    C'est la vie...off we go to band practice.  But first, dinner, which my lovely is cooking right now.  In some ways, life is indeed so good.

July 31, 2005 + "Pointed."
    Current Listening:  The Posies - Every Kind Of Light, The Newbees - Songs From A Dilapidated Apartment, The Decemberists - Her Majesty..., Henry Rollins/Mother Superior (Rollins Band Mk. II) - Get Some Go Again Sessions, and Vic Chesnutt - Is The Actor Happy?
    You'll note several The *** bands in there.  For some reason, every band I've been in, going back to high school, has been terribly, utterly and brazenly against being The *** anything.  I don't know why...I've always been the single member that liked the idea.  Except for "The Fugue," which lasted all of about six months, there have been none.  C'est la vie.
    And, amazingly, this is my first update in nearly a month.  Apologies to those of you that check back often and, at this point, may never be checking back again.  Honestly, not much to say.  I have been writing.  But not much there either.  It has been the summertime deadtime blahtime.  Heat sucks the desire to do much of anything right out of me.  Once it gets down to a normalized temperature of about 60 degrees, which lasts for about three days in my part of the world, I'll be all for going out, sitting down on a bench and writing all the time.  When it gets down to a daily temperature of about 30 degrees, I'll be all for sitting in a window seat and writing a lot and reading a lot and praying for snow a lot *smile*.
    My wife'll kill me for typing that out, as if an omen or prophecy....
    Speaking of prophecy, much to my chagrin I've become a full-blown Harry Potter fan.  Weird, eh?  The Half-Blood Prince was done rather quickly.  I suck, really, being sucked in like this, but I am utterly confounded by the stylings of the books.  It really is excellent literature on so many sides and in so many ways.
    And I'm so disappointed in so much music nowadays.  So much of what is "hot" and the "next best thing" is nothing more than a few more turns around the same old track.  I'm really glad I took a chance on nabbing a Vic Chesnutt disc, though (see above.)  Cool stuff.  Along the lines of Phil Cody, just pretty darned cool music, folk-based but rockin'.
    Revolution.  Revolution.  Revolution.
    Till next time...listen, learn and prepare.

July 3, 2005 + "Turn Me On, Turn Me Off."
    And now, a list of other stuff I'm currently listening to....
    Rachel Z - Grace (she was keyboardist/backing vocalist on Peter Gabriel's Growing Up Tour)
  British Sea Power - Open Season
  ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead - Madonna (note: Madonna is the album title, folks)
    Rilo Kiley - More Adventurous
    The Dresden Dolls - A Is For Accident
  Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible 10th Anniversary Edition
    Things in commone with most of these bands:
    - you will hear very few, if any, of them on standard, commercial radio in the U.S.
    - they are all more soulful and artistic than most, if not all, music you'll hear on standard, commercial radio in the U.S.
    - a few of them, even though I'm a musical adventurer, I would never have picked up were it not for Sirius Satellite Radio (specifically, The Dresden Dolls, Rilo Kiley and Trail Of Dead.)
    So where does this leave us?  Scot hates standard, commercial radio in the U.S.?  Well, hate is a strong word.  Dislike?  Disgust?  Alan Freed would be a rich, rich man these days.  More payola scandals going down.  More tax write-offs in the form of generic bands signed to labels with sham PR departments.  Mmmm...corporate greed run amok in the name of art and commerce and their evil child:  platinum.
    And, yes, I know that even Da Vinci had a patron.  The artistic life is always bordered by walls made of who you sell your art to.  Renaissance painters didn't starve, well, not always anyway.  Gotta have a Medici in your life, baby.
    I'm rambling.  The bands noted above turn me on right now, and will likely continue to do so.  Heck, I've loved the Manics ever since I heard their first US release, a five-song promo ep that I just happened to pop into the tape deck (yes, folks, that long ago) at Record Alley one Saturday night.  Awesome stuff, from You Love Us through Empty Souls.
    I suppose that I'll sign off with this:  adventure.  Get a Sirius (best Christmas present I've gotten in years, man).  Get out and see bands that you've never heard of, especially local ones in your area.  There is more art out there than what Clear Channel says there is.
    Oh, and Happy Fourth Of July.  Pray for peace, honour and understanding and that this country can one day stand up and become what we all dreamt it could be.

June 24, 2005 + "Werk...Werk...Play."
    Current Reading: (just finished) Auschwitz by Dr. Miklos Nyiszli...(next up) Anger by Thich Nhat Hanh.
    Current Listening:  Demon Days by Gorillaz, Everything Must Go by Manic Street Preachers and X & Y by Coldplay.
    Needless to say, nothing remotely American or Americana is gracing my eyes or ears lately.  I'm so terribly down on my homeland and the experience of Western Society.  Depressing.  Very depressing.
    Art, as well, has become a shambles.  Feeling somewhat nosed-in and stifled all around.
    However, a new song has reared a head and I'll be demoing it, probably on Sunday.  Or attempting to.  It'll not only be to demo, but to practice my computer recording savvy, what there is of it.  In other words, my cool new song may be wrecked before it even comes to a form palatable (did I spell that correctly?  Better question:  do I care?) to take to the bandmates.  C'est la vie, baby.
    I have a new button hanging by my desk at work, announcing the "Level of service will be determined by my mood and your attitude."  I'd like to underline the your attitude part for certain folks.  Check that, certain folk, singular.  In truth, my job's pretty fun except for certain, minor things.  Well, check that too.  My job's pretty boring, but it is not offensive except for certain, minor things.
    Well, to move on.
    Things I really dislike:  Golf.  Nascar.  Right wing vs. Left wing arguments.  Neo-nazis.  Egocentrism.  Cutting grass.
    Things I really like:  Bass.  Football.  Baseball.  Truth.  Tao.  Expressions in foreign languages.  Sleep.  Hard work with something to show for it at the end.
    People I really dislike:  Politicians.  Willfully ignorant people.  Soapbox chasers.  Cheap pornographers.  Journalists.
    People I really like:  My wife.  My friends.  My family.  Most of my co-workers.  Truth-seekers.
    Gotta go tune my Spector again...changed the strings last night, the intonation's out and I'm trying to doctor her up.  Actually, doctoring her down would be more accurate as my skills in luthiery as akin to my skills in, well, doctoring.

June 3, 2005 + "Lay Off, Already!"
    First, if you haven't yet, hit the link from the May 13 entry and give it a read.  Well worth the time & effort (it is rather lengthy.)
    Okay, on to other stuff.
    I turned 32 a few days ago and...well...things aren't a whole lot different.  They seldom are, though, are they?  After you're 21, birthdays just sort of lose a bit of magical appeal.  I did get some awesome gifts, though, so it's all good.
    I'm on a serious diet now.  Not that I'm huge, because I'm not, but I need to stop.  Considering how I live my life, fast food and other assorted junk is just far too easy to consume and it is taking a toll.  I've never liked the way I look, but to wake up, look in a mirror and truly hate oneself, aesthetically anyway, is tough to take.
    Also, my sleep study came back.
    Yes, thank you folks, I have sleep apnea.  However, I took some distrust away from my doctor visit.  He showed me a couple numbers on the study report and wrote me a prescription for a BiPAP machine to maintain air pressure in my windpipe during sleep.  I asked him about my weight and he sort of wrote that off and dismissed it like, well, maybe it could help and all, but you need this machine to try out and then come back and see me.
    I took a pass for several reasons:  need to check to see what my insurance covers, need to do research on the machine itself and I didn't feel comfortable doing it yet.
    I got the paperwork for it though, which included the report.  And, lo and behold, what is the first thing the report suggests to make this all better?  You guessed it, and give yourself a prize if you murmured this like an REM lyric under your breath while you're reading:  weight loss.
    So, a diet it is.  Like last fall except that I cannot, will not, allow myself to go off of it.  Perhaps I'm just now confronting demons of a decade ago, like with my (luckily) minor eye issues, but face them I must.  Do or do not.  There is no try.
    (Last two statements in the previous paragraph are (c) Lucasfilm Limited...god knows I don't need to get sued by a hero of mine...that would just be the icing on the damned cake.)
    Like echoes of a past, but in a photo negative.  Strange way to start the weekend.  For those interested in such things, here's my full current listening menu:
  Freekbass - The Air Is Fresher Underground, Sideways Eight - Lost In Time, Angie Arnold - Letting Go, Life After Liftoff - S/T, The National - Alligator, Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, Black Lipstick - Sincerely, Bruce Dickinson - Tyranny Of Souls and Palomar - Palomar III The Revenge Of Palomar.
    Till next time...forward, march!

May 13, 2005 + "Dominion?"
Check out this link for some interesting reading.  Credit to muppet for passing it along to me.

May 10, 2005 + "Teaching Bill How To Drive."
    Now, before anyone gets the wrong idea, the "Bill" referenced in the title of this entry is not any "Bill" that I actually know.  It is a reference to a movie from the late '70's, I think, starring Mickey Rooney as a mentally handicapped adult that is befriended by some guy and he ends up owning a coffee shop.  It was one of my favorite movies as a youngster, one that they showed seemingly every weekend on channel 19 in Cincinnati when it was an independent station (pre-Fox.)  I think there were sequels as well...awesome stuff.  Now, if you've ever seen the film, or if you have a copy (and will dub one for me!), you know that the process of Bill learning anything is strenuous at best.  Teaching him how to drive would be a task unparalleled.
    And that brings us to the two women at the Chinese buffet in Lexington on Monday evening.
    Tracy and I were there munching on MSG cakes flavored as chicken and other things.  Two women, obviously a mother (approximately 65 to 70 years old)  and daughter (40's?) team, came in and sat behind us.  I had a clear view of both while Tracy could only hear the goings on.  Points to ponder:
    - at any given time, they had at least two full crabs on their table while still making return trips to get more
    - the mother was eating with a crab fork (small, 3-tined type) rather than a regular fork and was having much trouble hitting her mouth even though she was cutting food into tiny, tiny pieces.
    - daughter seemed oddly perturbed the entire time and was acting as a mother, a full role reversal
    - daughter: "Mom...Mom...you got it?"  mom:  "I've got a knife...I've got it...I've got it!"  daughter:  "Do you want me to cut it for you?"  mom:  "I've got the knife...got a knife...I've got it...yeah!...I've got it!"  And she did have it but, alas, missed her wide open, gaping maw of a mouth while trying to insert the bit of General Tso chicken.
    It was a hoot.  I chuckled through the meal.  Not mean chuckling, mind you, but I just couldn't help it.
    Then the masterpiece.  The final straw.  The triumph.  The most awesome thing.
    I love watching my wife's face, especially during some of the things we see when we're out.  We (or I) seem to be a magnet for utter and extreme weirdness.
    Tracy was watching over my shoulder, toward the buffet, and I was watching the daughter, who was dressed in a vibrant, sun-defying orange mumu, cram more crab into her mouth.  Tracy's face went absolutely ashen, like a vampire had nipped her neck and drained her in a second flat, and she said, "Oh my god, I can't eat any more...she just...I can't believe she did that...OH!  she didn't!" and this dissolved into dumbfounded laughter.
    I couldn't look.
    I knew what happened.
    I'd seen mom take her crab fork up to the bar with her.
    Mom was taste-testing at the bar and, unfortunately for those following her, putting back pieces that didn't meet her fancy after she'd tasted them.
    Tracy was near hysterics when mom waddled back to her seat, mere inches from Tracy, with a plateful of food (yet another...their table was darn near covered by this point in the maelstrom of mastication.)  I paid the bill and we ran (literally) for cover.
    Apparently mom had, in Tracy's plain sight but no one else's, forked a shrimp, taken a bite, recoiled and put it back into the pile on the buffet.  She did this with a few other items as well.
    So be careful folks.  The sneeze guards on buffets keep nasty snot outta the food...but who can protect us from the senile old ladies of the world?  Hmmm?

April 20, 2005 + "Up Your Nose With...A Fiber Optic Camera!!!"
    "You were snoring, then you stopped and I counted...I counted to about ten before you took another breath."
    That's what my wife told me a few weeks ago after we'd awoken to a Sunday morning.  For quite a long time, I've slept soundly, or so I thought.  I never, ever felt rested.  I don't remember what it feels like to not be exhausted.  It is my normal operating mode.  I don't remember dreaming either, though I assume I do.  My sleep is a blank that accomplishes nothing.  That's partially why I don't like to go to sleep.  What's the point?
    However, along with a myriad of other health issues, my doctor and I talked about the potential of sleep apnea after working through other courses of treatment for a variety of either a) sociopathic disorders or, b) just plain being f*cked up.
    I'm not sociopathic.  My conscience, to be truthful, is huge.  Too huge, to me.  I'm far too empathetic (emphasis on the "pathetic" part of that.)  I wish I could just close my eyes sometimes.
    Anyway, so I went to a sleep doctor this afternoon.  I went in and the fellow seemed very nice and very concerned.  I liked him right off the bat.  But if you age him about 25 years and let his hair grow long, he's the butler (can't remember his name right now)  Riff Raff ed. from The Rocky Horror Picture Show.  I began singing Time Warp in my head immediately.  Just a step to the right.
    I digress....
    We talked and then he told me he's going to mist my nose.  Interesting.  He hooks up the mechanical stuff and puts the end in my right nostril and, voila, a mist into my nose, not unlike Neo-Senepherin (I used to love that stuff.)  He said I could wipe my nose, but not blow, and he'd be back in a few moments.
    OK.  I hadn't planned on any weirdness.  My main thought was, okay, he's going to take a culture of some kind, right?  A minute passes and I'm engrossed with a diagram on the wall.  Then I turned to a cart in the room...with a television screen...and a machine below it with a handle on a cord and a long tube at the end...hmmm...interesting...and my nostril has become numb, I notice...long tube...numb...holy shit.
    I had my epiphany as the good doctor reappeared.
    I'll spare you the minute details...let's just say that when I awoke this morning, the last thing I thought I'd see 12 hours later was the inside of my sinus cavity, my throat and my vocal cords.  And, yes, the feeling of having a fiber optic camera shoved up your nose is, well, shall we say, something not to be missed.
    And the verdict?  "...based on what you've told me, your history, the diabetes and blood pressure issues, plus what I showed you in your throat, I would be highly surprised if you didn't have sleep apnea."
    Great.
    For those keeping score, here's the rundown:  Diabetic since age 11 (currently 31...happy 2 decade anniversary!!!), high choesterol (under control with drugs), high blood pressure (under control with drugs), mild diabetic retinopathy (a couple laser surgeries, but doing just dandy), migraines (yeah, well, if you worked where I do, your head would hurt too) and now a sleep disorder.  The sleep thing, while highly likely, is just weird.
    You mean, I'm not supposed to be exhausted all the time?  I can say this:  I will not wear a pressure mask while I sleep...I just couldn't.  But, then again, I do sleep like the dead (pun intended.)  Or, god forbid, surgery?  Who knows.
    All I can say is this:  I do believe in reincarnation.  So I would therefore, at this point in time, like to call dibs on a halfway decent, functioning body on my next turn around this amusement park.  There...you all heard me.
    Now go back to sleep....

April 8, 2005 + "Mistakes."
    John F. Kennedy said, "This administration intends to be candid about its errors.  For as a wise man once said, 'An error does not become a mistake until you refuse to correct it'...Without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed - and no republic can survive."  This was sometime shortly after the Bay of Pigs.  I wish that our current administrators had the same valorous aims.
    Our country, my friends, is being run by thieves, spoiled brats and warmongers with no pretense about their lies and deceit and willingness to do whatever it takes to 1) avenge the "mistakes" they feel were made in 1991 after the first Gulf effort, 2) garner as much profit as they can from "rebuilding projects" in the Arab world and the oil reserves there, 3) make nice-nice with the Saudi family (I can't tell anymore if the Bush family tree has a Saudi vine of lineage around it, or if the Saudi tree has a Bush growing at its base), and 4) to make the U.S. into the one and only, sole megapower now and for all eternity.
    A few notes:
    - Empires don't last.  Ask Great Britan, Japan, Spain, Rome, etc.  They eventually eat themselves due to a variety of things including laziness, greed and stupidity...three things the U.S. unfortunately has in great abundance, especially in the formerly hallowed halls of government.
    - There weren't many mistakes made in the first Gulf effort...the same issues happening now were forecast then.  Amazing, huh?  I'm surprised Bush Sr. hasn't called W. with a simple, one sentence message:  "Son, I told ya so.  Bye."
    - Forget oil.  Forget fossil fuels.  Hydrogen.  Water.  Air.  The Sun.  All there for the taking...ah, but there's the rub, Hamlet.  Just as a diabetes cure would knock out the market for syringes and sustaining drugs & supplies, thus negating a huge market for healthcare providers, knocking out oil would kill a huge profit-generating part of the economy of many countries, especially Arab countries.
    - And for the "rebuilding projects"...one word:  Halliburton.  Okay, one more:  Cheney.  Um, another?  Money.  Yeah.  Not a bit of complicity there, huh?  Not a single shred of insider interest there, huh?  I'd like to take both Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld back to their days in the Ford administration, or the Reagan administration, or the Bush I administration, and have them actually learn a little bit about what it means to be an American...oops...I guess we'd have to go back beyond those guys too...and to a Democrat.  Hell, or even a Whig, maybe?
    I'm truly skeptical of everything I see and hear anymore.  Most of us in this country don't even listen, otherwise we'd all be just as pissed off as I am right now.
    Oh, and one other thing:  the whole cause for the current war?  Sorry.  Saddam and Iraq didn't have any WMD that we hadn't given them (germ/chem types) or they hadn't already used up on the Kurds.  They may have had a program in place but, sorry folks, nothing there.  Of course he said he did...good Lord, if you lived between Saudi Arabia and Iran, wouldn't you want them to think you could hang them out to dry if they attacked you?  It was a ruse he had to maintain.
    And our ruse is that we're not into building an empire.  But we have been.  The U.S. has pursued it in covert and noncommittal ways, never saying the word but in hushed tones over DOD breakfasts and State dinners.  But it's there.  If you listen closely, you can hear the Romans whispering back to us..."it is not worth the price you will pay...."

March 25, 2005 + "Variety Of Things."
    So I know I'm quite behind in updates, but it couldn't be helped.  Much going on.
    We'll begin with a couple lists:
  Things I really like right now:  Ass Ponys (band from Cincinnati), Over The Rhine (band from Cincinnati), writing, the challenge of learning to record on my computer, H.R. Giger's "Birth Machine," Warren Zevon, Manic Street Preachers, Hunter S. Thompson, baseball, Tony Dungy, Ben Chandler
  Things I really don't like right now:  steroids, the challenge of learning to record on my computer, people that think they know it all based upon 10% of the knowledge necessary to accurately assess a given situation, Bruce Allen & Jon Gruden (who decided to waive Joe Jurevicius, who has now signed with the Seahawks), Jon Gruden in general, basketball, Sports Illustrated, any given network news program, the entire Schiavo family (both sides), the U.S. Congress for their meddling in one family's affairs when our country has a whole lot of larger issues to be dealing with
    Cat Saint Jane has changed our name to Season One, partially in an attempt to get a name everyone can enunciate fluently and partially to distance ourselves from our past (members and sound.)  CD is recorded, manufacturing is upcoming and, god help us, gigs should be imminent.  I'll get up a new website...er, change the name on the current website, shortly.  I shan't be the webmaster for the band, though...I'm voting for Scott or Jon for that honor.
    Meet Cleaver Theatre will be filming again in a couple weeks.  Butch & Joan will be doing some appearances and we'll be getting back to filming once those are done.
  A note from the salt mines:  don't you hate it when someone you respect has to play politics and blow smoke up your ass?  Especially when you see through the smoke quite clearly, know the real truth and could smack the person between the eyes with it?  Utterly frustrating.
   More notes:
    -  You can't outlive your first impressions or change peoples' minds unless they're willing to look & listen.
    -  It is a pointless venture to continue banging one's head against a wall that will not be moved.
    -  If no one else has a problem, the problem must be your own...or else no one's listening to the complaints...or else it all comes down to the fact that no one cares.
    Till next time...boogie, baby.
 

March 4, 2005 + "The Fine Art of Trust."
    I've found over the course of my life that you can often tell more about someone indirectly than directly.  People will, unfortunately, lie.  Their friends, family and those they trust will not.  They may lie to your face, but their auras are usually much more visible to you.
    Especially the last one, who people trust.  I have a particular situation in mind as I type this and it is quite troubling to me right now.  Much of our life is determined not so much by our direct actions, but by who we take into our confidence and who we choose to trust and set up shop with.  Who we love, who we work with, who we play in bands with, things of that nature.  Sheer proximity is sometimes enough to throw someone off-track, much less buying into what a potential moron may be selling you for his/her own progress and good.
    So I offer those words of wisdom:  look not at your subject, but the context of the subject, for the truth of the situation.  And always be prepared to cut yourself out of the picture if the foul words and deeds of the fool sour the splendor of the grapes on the vine, waiting to ripen.

February 26, 2005 + "Bounding."
    It is early morning as I type this.
    I am a creative ball of confusion lately.  It seems to happen every so often.  Like a shoelace knot that just gets pulled tighter and tighter in the vain hope that, maybe, by asserting more force it will come undone.
    Which it, of course, doesn't.
    The softer approach, to look from several angles, find the lynchpin, as it were, and gracefully coax that string from the hiding place, the key to untying the knot, is very difficult.  It is what I am doing right now.  Both writing-wise (poetry, etc.) and musically.
    Sometimes there is very little to say.  Sometimes there is so much that the vents (hands, voice, etc.) get strapped and cannot even move to give forth anything of worth.  I have so much built up right now, from political confusion to social commentary that it seems I have a maelstrom just sitting over my head, not moving, just thundering and pouring the rain.
    Such is life.
    On the homefront, we're redoing our living room, making bookcases and rearranging, so everything's in a state of flux and the cats are having a field day with new piles of things to climb on and knock over, then climb on again.  Our Christmas tree is still up due to our inability to get our garage door open.  You see, the previous owners of our house, along with being electrical wizards (they tried to see how many wires, some live and some not, that they could fit into every outlet and light switch hole in our walls, among other things), hooked up an electric garage door opener, but without any other means of access if it failed or the electricity failed.  Unless you're inside the garage at the time, and then you can pull the little release cable.  Great.
    But it's all good.  Fun.  Sometimes it takes rearranging, like I've done in my office, to help urge you toward a different point of view, like I mentioned above.  Bang your head against the wall and be negative or make attempts to sway the situation, to fit the environment to your life?
    I'm trying to reassess my environment, creatively and at the day job as well, to make it more suitable.  The knots are tight, but I'm seeing stray flairs of fiber that may just provide the keys.

February 18, 2005 + "Collective Bargaining."
    So the NHL season is toast, thanks to the greed of both the players and the owners in the league.  Both are to blame, to me.  Sometimes you have to give for the greater good.  To have ended up so close after so long is a shame.  I feel worse for our neighbors to the north, to whom the professional hockey season is akin to the NFL season here in the US.  It is a terrible shame as well that so many NHL teams make their homes in the US.
    My plan, such as it would be, for the NHL would be to fold four teams (from the US) and move four more to Canada.  Let's face it...the US doesn't care a lot and until you can truly market the game, which Gary Bettman and his NHL hierarchy have not been able to do, you need to stay with your fanbase.  Of course, you keep US teams like the reigning champion Lightning in Tampa, Detroit, who has a rich, rich NHL history and a huge fanbase, the LA Kings just because they're in LA, and the two NY teams.  However, teams like the Nashville Predators, Phoenix Coyotes and Columbus BlueJackets...they need to go.
    Anyway, enough hockey.  There is still minor league hockey going on, thank god.  ECHL and AHL hockey is just as exciting and fun to watch, so check them out if there are teams in your area.  If you're lucky and live in Cincinnati, for example, you have the Mighty Ducks and the Cyclones, so enjoy it while you can.  At least I think they both still exist...I need to go home sometime, I guess, and find out.  Have a hockey weekend or something.
    The band is getting set to record again, with our renewed and revitalized lineup.  Revitalized so much so that we're going to change our name, it looks like.  Seems that many folks, when we tell them our name is Cat Saint Jane somehow hear Cats In Chains.  Now, I love cats, so the thought of cats being in chains bothers me.  It also bothers me that, perhaps, we aren't enunciating well enough to get our point across, but c'est la vie, eh?
    And that is life right now.  Been feeling very tired lately.  Guess its the winter blahs, though I love winter.  I guess I'm just due for a change.  We shall see...change, when progressive, is good.  Regressive change is a death knell.

January 28, 2005 + "Puppies."
    Remember Yuppies?  Young, urban professionals?  They eventually gave way to dot commers?  There's apparently a new phase of evil upon us and Tracy and I have dubbed them puppies.  Punk-Yuppies.  Pierced and tattooed, yet still able to snazz up into a business suit and screw their fellow man or woman via internet or direct sales.  You'll find many of them working at law firms, financial institutions and car dealerships.  Be forewarned...they may seem cool and their noses may be wet, but their bark is generally much worse than their bite.
    And a "wintery mix" is approaching Kentucky tonight.  Fear, terror death and destruction are upon us, apparently, so the locals raided the local grocery to grab their milk & bread in preparation for the worst.
    Why milk & bread?  If you're going to get them, why not get some ground beef and flour too so you can at least make SOS?  What can you do with bread and milk?  Break up the bread, pour the milk over and pretend that you have soggy cereal?  Make dough balls from the bread and throw them into a bowl of milk for warm, meatless wonton soup?  It is just absurd, and yet it happens every time.
    Me?  Gimme some diet soda, popcorn and goetta.  If there is to be no electricity, I'll have my milk with raisin bran, thanks.
    Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow....
    I am proud of myself this week, though...I kept from killing someone.  Not that I'm generally homicidal, but sometimes people drive me closer to it than I'd like, being the non-violentist that I am.
    Also, I was able to sell a guitar on eBay, but the buyer is from Italy.  My luck in shipping overseas has been 50/50.  I should have, in retrospect, made it US only.  It's just such a hassle to do the paperwork and it costs so much...just a headache that I don't like going through.  But, the fellow's getting a very cool guitar and the money will go to finance some recording gear so I can jump back into doing some webradio work and further demo recording at home.  As the saying goes, its all good.
    Until next time...watch out for the puppies...you can site them by the lights glancing off their nose rings.

January 21, 2005 + "Several Fires."
    Customer service is dead.  We learned this a few nights ago at a local eatery.  A long time to get our order to us, two things missing from the order, one thing not correct, they tried to charge us for the incorrect item as opposed to what we got and argue with us over it.
    Astounding, really.
    Welcome to America.  It's not about you, Mr. Customer, its about the money you're paying for our service.  And you'll get the very least we can get by with so that our profit margin maintains a very high level.
    I'm somewhat dissatisfied with capitalism, yet it can be a great thing.  As long as you maintain that all-encompassing golden rule of treating others as you would like to, or expect to, be treated yourself.  The problem comes with those that take advantage of the system, or any system for that matter.
    Sort of like teamwork.  We all know the silly cliches about there being no "I" in "team" and that sort of thing.  Problem is, it is true.  Support and you will be supported.  Work with and you will be worked with.  Aid and you will be aided.  Stand alone and you stand alone...there is no other way.  In work and in play.  We humans are innately solo artists, but we still perform much better as teams, for the most part.  Especially in work and especially in customer service.
    I work in a service industry and, really, DKP is a service industry as well.  I maintain that service is different than "to serve."  I serve no one.  But I do provide needed services.  There is a difference.  It is indeed a fine line to tread, but a very important one regardless.
    I suppose, in short, we should all look a bit more closely at how we service not only our customers, if we have any, but ourselves as well.  After all, we are our most important customers.  We ourselves and we, our teams, families, coworkers, etc.  It is about relationships and attempting, striving for something better as opposed to treading meaningless water in a vast ocean of never-spoken hopes.
    There is something better out there...but we must all be on the same page.

January 14, 2005 + "My, How Time Flies."
    Okay, so I'm a bit behind as far as updates go.  Apologies out to all.  And Happy Birthday to Bill, an avid reader of this meaningless drivel that I toss onto the net, like a chef with his pasta against the wall, hoping something sticks.
    I wonder what it must feel like to be utterly hated.  I occasionally tick people off, most of us do, but I wonder what it must feel like to be completely and utterly despised and yet live in a world sponsored by faux niceties such that people pretty much have to treat you in a civil manner as they wish you dead.  Or, perhaps not dead, but at least in some painful predicament.
    Well.
    Current listening includes:  Manic Street Preachers - Lifeblood, The Dresden Dolls - The Dresden Dolls and The Hives - Tyrannasaurus Hives.  Current reading includes: Vaccine A by Gary Matsumoto and Gatewood Galbraith's autobiography.
    I've sworn off flu shots.  In just the first several chapters of Vaccine A I've come to trust those that create vaccines much less than previously.  We're all guinnea pigs, folks.  And doctoring, except for a few shining stars (and I have two of them in my health care team), is guesswork in a lab coat.
    Geez...I just typed "health care team"...I need to be shot.  Get it?  Shot?  Chortle, chortle.
    My office is currently resembling something akin to the coast of India...an utter mess.  And as much as I want to clean up and organize, and often do, it comes back to this.  So, perhaps my surroundings simply echo my head.  As with the final poem in my new, but yet-to-be-released, collection, Like My Head, an homage to Iannis Xenakis, avant composer & architect/mathematician, it's all tumbling and stumbling and cycling around.
    I have trouble focusing anymore.  Well, I have for a while.  It's as if I can't keep track of my thoughts, they zip in and out of my head so quickly.  And when I do occasionally catch a tiger by the tail, it escapes just as quickly.
    I need to cut my hair too.  I have a mohawk that's grown in on the sides and that, much to my chagrin, resembles a mullet when I'm wearing a hat, which I do much of the time.  The horror, my friends, the horror.
    And I need to change the strings on four of my basses.  I have the sets of strings, but I'm avoiding the world like the plague.  I hate, hate, hate changing strings.  I don't know why.  Probably fear of damaging one of the basses, which I don't think I would ever do, but it's just that nasty fear.  Changing strings & setting intonation on a Fender P-Bass is no problem.  My Tobias, with its dual-truss rods?  Another story altogether, to me anyway.  I should go do it now...but it'll wait.  The strings on the Spector are shot...the Tobias will ride with me to practice tomorrow.  Or perhaps I'll treat everyone to a cameo by my Dad's Rickenbacker...add my overdrive pedal and, suddenly, Cat Saint Jane becomes Motorhead!!!  Awesome!
    So much for now...CSJ is going to be recording a new demo soon and hopefully be playing out soon.  Our new drummer, Jon, has picked up on things in a lightning quick manner.  And I almost forgot...many congratulations to our vocalist, Tessa, and her husband, Kelly, on the birth of their daughter!!!  The new addition is doing well, from what I understand.
    Until next time, check out an SK musical sale check out Elements and other DKP releases, and MCT...more soon....
 

December 30, 2004 + "Stranger Things Have Happened."
    Somehow, weirdness generally follows Tracy and I on our many adventures out amongst the folk.  Well, not weirdness, but just things that are certainly not run-of-the-mill.  Mostly good, as with tonight, or I guess it was good.  I guess I'll just tell the tale because that, my friends, is usually the best way.
    We'd gone to Jo-Beth, a local book emporium, after a rather outstanding Indian dinner.  I was wandering about the music section, pondering purchases, and decided to go look at books on zen gardening.  Yes, seriously.  You see, the previous owners of our home were older folks that planted all kinds of flowers, sort of hodge-podge all over the yard.  I think an actual planned garden would be pretty cool.  Never mind that fact that my green thumb is only attuned to cutting grass, not growing plants.  That led to the Japanese zen gardens, possibly something of a sand & rock sculpture type of thing.  So off I went on my quest for a book or two about them.
    I got to the section and was looking through when I happened to glance over and saw a girl sitting, reading Diabetes for Dummies.  As many of you longtime readers know, I've been diabetic since I was 11...lord, and I'm 31 now so that's two decades, for crying out loud, so my curiosity was piqued.  I kept looking at books, though, because I'm, contrary to what you might thing, not the kind to just start a conversation with someone out of the blue.  The books were a waste of time...nice pictures and some decent tips, but no real depth for what I want to do (as with most projects like this, I think I'll just wing it if I decide to go with it.)  I noticed that the girl seemed a tad upset so, against my normal ways, I introduced myself and asked why she might be reading that particular book.
    I won't give her name, just in case you, dear reader, know her, for fear of calling someone out, but she's 18 and thinks she may indeed be diabetic.  We talked for a bit, I answered questions and such.  It was interesting because, I guess, though I've always been one of those "there for you" kind of people to my friends, I've never had that kind of interaction with a) a person I've not met or, b) with someone regarding diabetes.  A gentleman that I assume to be her boyfriend came up and the three of us continued to talk.  I think she's going to go to her doctor and, though I do hope that she's not diabetic, she certainly had the right attitude to handle it and seemed to be strong enough based on our brief encounter.  I gave her my card and said to contact me if she had any questions or anything, and I meant it.  Having been there, I know how much having someone to talk to that had actual experience with the condition would have helped me.
    But it also, on our way home, gave me pause to think while talking with Tracy about what had happened and about how much being diabetic has affected me and my life.  Not in the bad way that you might think, either.  It instilled a sense of responsibility that, though it would have been there from my parents, was reinforced due to necessity.  I realize how closely we all live with our own mortality, whether we realize it or not...frightening, yet exhilarating at the same time.  I realize how much some other folks might take for granted.
    Then again, in the end, I live with it.  It does not define me, though it is a part of me, like your hair style may be a part of you, or your choice in music or food you like.  As the saying goes, control your environment - don't let your environment control you.
    So, to the girl from Jo-Beth, I wish you the best and I'm glad we met.  You got my brain thinking along some different lines and that's always a good thing.  And, like I said, if you need anything, give a yell.

December 23, 2004 + "Wisdom From The Dinner Table."
    Before I throw them away, I thought I'd share with you all some of the fortune cookie wisdom that I've collected in 2004.  It's something of a strange thing that I normally keep the papers from my fortune cookies in my wallet.  You never know when you'll need a quick pick-me-up after dinner, you know?  Anyway, here goes:
   "There's a secret romance blooming!  Go for it, in spite of your hesitation."
    "You are almost there."
    "You're transforming yourself into someone who is certain to succeed."
    "Your lover will never wish to leave."
    "All the effort you are making will ultimately pay off."
    "God of Fortune is beckoning you."
    Amazing how optimistic those cookies are about me, huh?  The only one I have a problem with is the "secret romance" because I have no need for any secret romance...my romance with my wife is wonderful, thanks.  The cryptic "you are almost there" is frightening in how open-ended it is...where am I almost?  Huh?  WHERE?
    How about a couple quotes from Alien Agenda by Jim Marrs?
    "Perhaps a master system of intergalactic ethics dictates that no planet may have contact with another until is has subdued its own self-destructive violence.  Maybe the Earth is under some sort of quarantine."  - Lance Morrow, Time Magazine
    "(War can be used to) encourage populations to think in ways they would not otherwise do, and to accept the formation of institutions that they would normally reject.  The longer a nation involves itself in wars, the more entrenched those institutions and ways of thinking will become."  - William Bramley, regarding the profits of war
    So not only is Bush keeping us down and trying to turn us all into Republicans, but he's keeping E.T. away too!  The bastard!
    Can't we all just turn on our heart lights???
    *chuckling*...Merry Christmas, folks!

December 19, 2004 + "Colder & Older."
    Something is very wrong.  I remember from '91 to '95, while I was in college, having to park at the back lot at NKU and, literally, having to walk about a mile to get to any of the buildings I had classes in.  Rain, sleet, snow, freezing cold to the heat of summer, it never bothered me.  I love the winter, I must add.  Love snow and the cold.
    Until now, apparently.  For some reason, perhaps I'm becoming a fossil, the cold turn our weather has taken this week is killing me.  Can't handle it.  And I'm the guy that, with snow a foot deep, would walk out to get the mail wearing a t-shirt and shorts.  No longer, my friends.  I'm quite sad about this.  Prepare my room in the home....
    Check out Elements, while you're nosing around the internet.  A new offering from DKP.  Nifty wallets at a mere snip of a price.
    This will likely be the last entry for a week or so, so I will wish everyone a happy <insert holiday of choice here> and a happy new year.  Let's hope that 2005 brings some peace, compassion and understanding to the world.
    I may be getting older, but I can still dream, right?

December 10, 2004 + "Random Acts Of Alienation."
    There is a school of thought amongst the UFO/Alien community that certain races & creeds of alien life have been using the Earth as a living petri dish for milennia.  That human beings, and other life forms here, are essentially containers for DNA and biological information, having gone through, depending upon whom you read, 50 to 65 different genetic mutations over time.  Along with this, they say that religion & government are merely tools to keep us from killing each other like the animals we are.
    I believe this could very well be true.  For example, if you look at the history of human mutations, it seems that certain developments seem to happen nearly overnight, as opposed to genetic scrolling through generations.  Not all, though.  Also, the mind control of religion.  And the fervor with which we tend to defend it.  Is there a god in the sky ready to rain down wrath if you don't believe?  But keep in mind that he loves you...as long as you believe.  Otherwise, he doesn't and you're off the Christmas card list.  Of course, if you don't believe, then what would you be doing with Christmas cards anyway?
    I've been reading up on UFO/Alien information more lately.  Sort of a departure from my Governmental Conspiracy stuff that I had been delving into during the fall.  Some interesting connections between the two, as you might imagine.
    Let's just say that my trust in the government has always had some holes in it.  Whether true or not, there are startlingly plausible ideas out there that make more sense than what the evening news delivers.  The idea that we may all simply be pawns in some game(s) is not out of the realm of reality.  And that the religions that we hold dear may be part of those games.  Which leaves you, yet again, at the ultimate questions of reality and knowledge (Ontology and Epistemology, respectively,  for you Philosophy buffs out there).  Where do you go from there?
    Truth.  Emotion.  Love.  Happiness.  The Bill of Rights.  Walden.  The Tao te Ching.  Music.  Art.  Soul.  Creativity.  Noble Knowledge.  Science.
    I don't know.
    I do know that the new book, Rendering the Impossible, has been shelved until 2005.  DKP is going to marketing some nifty wallets that my wife has designed & manufactured.  Those will be out very soon and are called Elements (website coming shortly).  Scriptus Live is to be resurrected in mid-spring of 2005 as a web-radio program.  I'm researching recording equipment and hope to start doing some testing for that venture soon.
    And now, I'm going to bed.  It's been a long day and I didn't even get the tree put up....

November 26, 2004 + "Oh, I'm Back...."
    Okay, I know it has been a while.  I apologize.  My old computer ground to a halt...literally, the hard drive ground to a halt.  Luckily, I was able to save my most necessary files (like the new book, the web files, etc.) prior to the demise of ye olde computing machine.  It was 6+ years old and, truly, had a wonderful life.  Worked hard and, well, is dead.  RIP.
    And, even more luckily, my friend Bunny had a computer that was in need of some work, but was completely usable and, for a mere snip of a little over 200 smackers, I'm back in business with my old mouse, monitor, speakers, etc.  I love it...I can get online and do proofreading without hearing my hard drive growl at me...ah, sweet silence.
    With the holidays around the end, though, and as posted elsewhere on the DKP site, I was hoping that Rendering the Impossible would be available for Christmas but, as things stand now, the computer issue put me about 3 weeks behind schedule and that's just enough to kill the planned release until early 2005.  I know, I know, it was supposed to be out in early 2004.  I hate that it's been this long since The Mirror Suite.  I'm hitting a "writing period" too, so I'm coming up with a lot of good stuff that won't make it into this book.  There may be two releases in 2005 the way it looks now.  And since I'm doing all the work, right down to the manufacturing, myself, it'll be cost-effective enough to actually do, I think.
    Then again, maybe not.
    Sort of like shipping an electric forklift in the rain...it might work when the rubber (or poly) hits the road, but probably not.
    *chuckling*  By the way, my job gets funnier and funnier.  It's not nearly as annoying now that a certain someone left a few months ago.  There are still the thorns in the side, but they're getting easier to take.  However, the morale of others seems to be slipping.  Strange days.  I should've gone into a career in fast food.  Or done the smart thing and pushed either English or Philosophy aside and done Marketing instead while in college.  Not nearly as much fun, but more lucrative.
    Off to bed now...to all a good night....Ciao, baby....

November 5, 2004 + "This Is How Bush Won."
    So I met my wife for dinner after dropping a part off to a friend this afternoon (this friend also happens to be a coworker) in Frankfort.  The restaurant we were headed to happened to not open until 5:00 and, with 15 minutes to spare, we headed to Big Lots, much to my chagrin.  But, being an avid people-watcher, as my wife reminded me, there was sure to be something entertaining.
    Oh, how right she was.
    We were taken in by the Halloween leftover piles, all marked at being 75% off the marked prices.  How could we truly pass up Halloween candles and strings of witch/goblin/ghost lights?  Obviously, we couldn't.  And at these prices!  The light strings were marked $3.99 each, as were the candles.  Fine.  We got two of each, figuring on a less-than-five-dollar Big Lots spree that would garner us some nifty home furnishings.
    Have you ever shopped at a Big Lots?
    My advice is, unless you're fully strapped & packed with ammunition, don't do it.
    We got to the cash register and the lady was nice enough, greeting us in a warm, Kentucky way.  Then she rang up the two light strings as being $3.96.
    I was transfixed, for some reason, but my wife spoke up, saying that they should have been a dollar each (neglecting, as any sane person would, the penny-less-than-four-dollar issue.)
    The woman looked like a man suddenly smacked in the balls.  Ever seen that happen to a guy?  There's the initial shock and the look on the poor soul's face that asks of anyone nearby, "How much is this going to hurt?" before crumpling to his knees, rendered fetal by the pain creeping up his torso into his throat.
    The woman said, "No, I rang them up as $1.98 each."
    "Yes, but they're 75% off"
    A blank stare from the cashier.
    The fellow at the next register, a customer, mind you, offered, having scoped out the situation, "75% of $4.00 is $1.00"
    The cashier called the other cashier over, either to actually get help or to get back at the butt-insky guy.
    They agreed, upon their review, that $1.98 each was indeed 75% of $3.99
    I was still just in utter disbelief.  My brain short-circuited.
    "75% of $3.99, or $4.00 for the sake of argument, is $1.00.  These should be $1.00 each, like the candles," my wife said.
    The cashier then scanned a candle which, amazingly, offered itself up on the register as being $1.00.  This exacerbated the cashier's frenzy, as she really got mad at this point.  The other cashier was backing away, sensing a volcanic eruption about to be loosed upon the Big Lots.  But, no, instead our cashier called over her manager (or I assume she was a manager.)
    The manager had a lazy eye.  No problem there, we all have issues and I'm not fashion model myself, but she was looking at the register and the candles & light strings at the same time though they were separated by at least three feet.
    Horrifying.
    But, lo and behold, of the three, this one had a firm grip on math.  It took her a while, but using the aged calculator on the counter, she was final able to figure out that, yes, 75% of $3.99 (or $4.00 here) was about $1.00.
    "But it didn't scan as that," our cashier complained, sensing defeat.
    "The candles did.  Just ring up four of them," cried our savior, the manager and owner of a gaze as wide as the horizon.
    And, with that and $4.24 (our candles & lights, plus tax), we were off to eat our Thai dinner and spin endless yarns about the idiocy of our nation.
    This is how Bush got reelected, folks.  We're a nation of morons.
    Quick:  75% off of $4.00 is?
    Yes, correct...$1.98.
    All those that got the correct answer can stay after & clean the erasers.

November 3, 2004 + "Feeling."
I Voted
The election was for the president
To lead into the twenty-first century,
Along with several other races.
The bickering and backbiting had been heavy,
Typical,
Nothing unusual.
I cast my write-in vote, as I had planned,
And then cast votes for those
I trusted just a little more than others.

American politics in the new century -
A web of hope that catches flies dressed in
Armani suits, with perfect coifs and not a trace
Of truth.

I wore my sticker,
Proclaiming in red, white and blue,
"I Voted,"
Like a purple heart.

- Scot N. Kaeff  (c) 2000
from the forthcoming collection, Rendering the Impossible

    I wrote the preceding poem just after voting in 2000.  It stands true today, except that I didn't write in a vote.  I voted for John Kerry.  C'est la vie.  Four years from now, where will we be?  Who knows.  C'est la vie.  Buy the ticket, take the ride.  Watch the deficit grow, watch gas prices rise, watch more young men get shipped home in body bags.  That's what the population wants, hey, who am I to stand in the way, huh?
    Explain this:  we attacked Iraq for having WMD's...we thought they did, anyway.  We knew they had bio/chem-weapons because we gave them to them.  Fine.  So, we know for a fact that North Korea has nuclear poetential.  Why didn't we attack them instead?  Not that I'm for attacking anyone, really.  The Taliban/Al-Quaida?  Sure.  Retaliatory.  Fine.  I was okay with that as it made sense.  Iraq?  It didn't and doesn't make sense.  However, we're there now.  And to stay.  Forever.  Long time, folks, long time.
    And now we have our resources of Middle Eastern oil.  Good.  Fine.
    Blood for oil.
    Votes for fear.
    Fear of righteousness.
    America.

October 24, 2004 + "Hypocrisy."
    Okay, so if someone can explain to me how, at one point in time, you simply cannot do A without B's full permission and acqiring B's full permission takes repeated phone calls and conferences, a year later you do A without even caring what B thinks or says even though, in this instance, B has changed to a bigger tiger that is more likely to rear back and smack you?
    That, of course, involves work.  As Alice Cooper said, though, "Personally, I don't care."
    *sigh*
    CSJ is moving right along, new tunes, working acoustically and searching for a new drummer (again.)  Drummers are hard to come by, and good drummers, with a good feel and groove, are nearly impossible to find.  And when you find them, they're usually playing with several different bands at once because they're so in demand.  A vicious circle for a little band with big aspirations that needs a fully committed fourth piece.  Not that any drummer is going to be a savior or anything close, but to continue progressing, our circle needs to be complete.
    Rendering the Impossible is in its final stages, but has been pushed back to November for release.  I'll likely start taking preorders next week.  I'm still a bit perturbed by one piece in it, a more artistic piece than a poem, and I may do some modifications prior to the final manufacturing.  This book has had a longer-than-usual gestation period due to many things.  Moving to Central KY a few years back and, unintentionally, cutting cords with some folks up North that were a good circle of critical and other types of feedback.  Being busy with putting together and pushing the band onward.  Bah...excuses, all of them.  If you're an artist, you create.  If you're not, you work at a forklift company.  Oh, wait...that's a hell of a conundrum, isn't it?
    Political Thoughts:
    - No one is pro-abortion, rather they are pro-choice.  No one thinks abortion is good.  But it is necessary, for a variety of reasons at different times.  Arguing against it based on religious tenets is fine, but religions have different views too, so which religion do you adhere to when making law?  None, obviously.  Church & state are separate, right?  Or they should be.  You see, we govern based on all the people and the needs of the community.  And, couple this with that fact that if you take away the right to choose abortion, then it is a slippery slope to a dictatorship that determines for you when you will procreate, if at all, and what your children will be given as far as education and upbringing.  Extremism?  Perhaps, but the reality is there and it is more probable than simply possible.
   - The Electoral College needs to go.  I like Colordado's idea to split their 9 Electoral votes, 5 for the popular winner and 4 for the runner-up.  Talk about a shooting match in the Supreme Court if that one passes.  But it will be good.  I believe the popular vote is the actual vote.  Do away with the Electoral College and suddenly the nominees will have to go to every state in the hopes of gaining every single voter that they can as opposed to multiple trips to Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania and no visits to Maine or Montana, Hawaii or Alaska.  More money from their campaigns will go to regional visits as opposed to slanderous and vile television commercials.  Too optimistic?  Perhaps, but the Electoral College has outlived its need.
    - Congress and the White House both need an enema.  Maybe two.  Maybe one of those celebrity coffee-enemas.  Something, anything, to clear away the detritus that we've voted into office over the last six years.

October 15, 2004 + "Ironic."
    Folks, just savor the irony that, according to my calendar at work, tomorrow (10/16) is National Boss Day...and it's on a Saturday.  Anyone out there gonna celebrate with their boss on Saturday?  Anyone?  Don't be shy now...okay, me neither.
    Work is bugging me, not just with the constant change in management, but also in the rise in business.  One guy (me) doing this certain amount of work.  The certain amount of work rises due to adding more people that turn work in to me along with business-in-general picking up, but there is no more me to go around.  Thus, my previously normal 8.5 hour workdays have turned into, on average, 10.5 to 12 hour marathons.  Not just once or twice a week, but consistently.  I do not like it, Sam I Am, I do not like this work I have.
    The other side?  I'd love to go back to working in a record store, as I did during high school & college.  Very little pay, but what a job!  Music, all the time.  Friends coming in just because, well, what better place to hang out than a  record store?  It was a glorious time, just not very lucrative.  The art of music if fulfilling.  The money of music leaves something to be desired.  There are no get-rich-quick schemes that work, aside from winning the lottery (which is why I play), so what do we do?  We work.  We  play the role of the good, capitalistic hound dog, begging at our masters' heels for table scraps with which to live.
    We are, my friends, whores.
    But not just any whore.  Not just a mattress-backed-downtown-Covington-on-a-Wednesday-night whore.  No.  We're classy whores.  Cheap champagne & discounted, nearly dead roses whores.  Put us up for the night & hope we don't hork your wallet when we sneak out before daybreak whores.  We're shiny because we glisten in the glow of the Republican sun, in "tax rebates" that amount to squat when put up against the taxes we pay, while the 1%'ers make off with more and more to fill their coffers in preparation for the big break that's coming just ahead.
    I don't buy into socialism any more than I buy into capitalism anymore.  They're both, and all major economic/political systems, flawed.  Flawed by human greed.  Flawed by money.  Flawed by anger.  Flawed by fear.  The basic human emotions that religion is supposed to aid us with, but rather preys on itself.
    The only truth is inside, but we're taught from the time we learn to speak that truth is some illusory organism growing out there, past the horizon, somewhere over the edge of the world where, if we're quiet and go along with the program, we might get to sniff someday, just before we die and have the final, paralyzing thought:  "is this all?"
    I'm a whore, baby.  Let's f*ck.

October 13, 2004 + "Many Things Percolating...."
    Ah, the 2 year anniversary was yesterday and it was spent very nicely, sharing time between us and then with good friends over a fine Indian dinner.  If only every day could be as cool.
    Speaking of cool, it's my time of year...chilly, rainy and overcast...god, how I love the fall, the trees turning colors and and world falling into a dormant, chilled icebox of adventure.  Whoo-hoo!
    Speaking of iceboxes of adventure, I was hit last night with an opportunity that I had thought too far from being achievable.  That is, perhaps, just maybe there's a chance to bring Scriptus Live back to life, out of the icebox it's been in since mid-2001. If satellite radio is good enough for Howard Stern, then web radio should be just fine for me, right?  I've missed doing the show ever since I ended it (due to moving south) and I think this could be done.  Bunny's got a line on the technological end of it, so sometime in early 2005 I think it may happen.  Right now, CSJ and putting the final touches on Rendering the Impossible are taking my creative time.
    Short thoughts:  William Shatner's new album, Has Been, and Duran Duran's new album, Astronaut, are both well worth the price of admission.  Most bands that make a comeback with the original members leave a lot to be desired, but Duran Duran's is impressive, I must say.
    If George Bush wins in November, I have friends headed for places such as Caracas, Venezuela, Montreal, Canada, Hawaii and Washington, D.C.  The fellow headed to Washington concerns me (just a little...not really) because I feel his intent may be to "fix" the election.
    The choice is simple folks:  Vote Bush if you want oil companies making decisions and you want an even greater national debt or vote for Kerry if you think things can be a little bit better with someone with some common sense in the office.  But, more importantly to me, just vote. Keep in mind that there are people dying in Afghanistan and Iraq to try to engage those peoples with the ability to vote for their futures while it is something very few of us even utilize here...somewhat ironic, eh?

September 28, 2004 + "A Bit Of History."
   "Why, of course, the people don't want war.  Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece?  Naturally, the commen people don't want war; neith in Russia, nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany.  That is understood.  But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship...voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders.  That is easy.
  All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.  It works the same in any country."
    ---  Hermann Goering, Nuremberg Diary
  You can take the above quote one of two ways:
    1)  I am accusing President Bush & other current leaders of being Nazis in disguise, following Goering's ideology, or
    2)  I am accusing President Bush & other current leaders of following tried & true methods of manipulating the masses.
   Either way, you're sort of correct....

September 17, 2004 + "Would You Like Smoking or Non-Smoking?"
    So my lovely wife and I went out to eat tonight at a local establishment in our adopted hometown.  As we're leaving, a hostess was asking the small family the standard question of smoking or non-smoking.  I happened to glance at the gentleman's breathing tubes & canister of oxygen hung over his shoulder.  Now, maybe I'm overreacting, but I'd be really concerned if he opted for the smoking section.
    Oh, by the way, word up to Rock.  Aaargh, me buckos, shiver me timbers, it's a chilly night on these dank seas...arrgh!
    Current listening, for those that seem to write and ask me about such things:  Motorhead - Inferno, Cracker - Forever, Mira - Apart and various pieces & disks by Iannis Xenakis (while typesetting the new book.)
    Have you ever quit a job?  I've left a few in my time and there's always that feeling of losing something.  Sometimes gaining something.  Strange stuff.  We had someone quit where I work and both the reaction and the way it went down were odd.  You never realize, I don't think, how many people you've managed to piss off until you quit and then they come out of the woodwork ready to dance about like pygmies by a fire in glee and wonderment at the events that have transpired.  Personally, life goes on and we're in business.  Sentimentality should be left to Hallmark cards and remembering the glory days (cue that horrible Springsteen song here) of our youth.  And, with how she left, in a huff and not bothering to say see ya, goodbye or even kiss my ass, well, that just leaves the musty taste of sour grapes in one's mouth, now, doesn't it?
    Oh, and I assume that people have had massive keggers and raised toasts to my doom after I've left a few jobs myself, so there you go.
    Does it bother anyone else that the current state of music in the world is not a state of music but of business.  And maybe I'm being overly idealistic, but there is ART involved, or there should be.  Granted, the only real artwork involved in, say, Hillary Duff or folks like that is what their makeup team and choreographers come up with, but there should be that creative spark.  And yet the public eats it up on demand of the magazines and television shows that tell you that this song, just released, is a hit.  It's advertising to say it's a hit.  Is it on a chart somewhere?  Who cares!  It's a hit 'cuz we say it is, by god!
    We've living in an age of lies and deceit and we propagate and perpetrate it ourselves every day that we don't just give a screaming "No!" to the whole sordid affair.  As Herman Melville wrote, only the man who says 'no' is free."
    Which leads to a quick political rant.
    1)  If George Bush and John Kerry, out of a nation of millions, at least 10 or 12 of which are charismatic, intelligent leaders with enough sense to surround themselves with good, competent people, are the one two that we can get to run for President, then we're well and truly f*cked.
    2) I am, of course, throwing my full support behind John Kerry.  For a number of reasons.  As a registered Independent, I can only say that, of the two, I honestly and with all my heart believe he will do the best job and fix some of the economic and political insanities that have been sloughed onto us in the last four or so years.
    3) Do away with the Electoral College.
    4) Do away with both electronic and punch card voting.  A chalkboard and independent counters.  Let the election take three or four days.  Whatever.  But, by god, make sure every vote is counted and that every vote counts!
    5) Finally, if you have a driver's license or state/federal i.d., it should simply be MANDATORY that you vote.  This is not an option, folks, it is a privilege that people in other nations, and for that matter our own, have given their lives and blood to attain, and yet so many Americans treat it as some novelty.  That is why I hate it here some days, and why so much of the world hates us.  We don't realize what we have.
    In other news, I had a really good yearly review today at my day job.  Good in that my manager touched on some really in-depth things and has obviously, though he's been there a scant few months, observed and absorbed a tremendous amount about both me and the work we all do.  I was impressed.  And illuminated.  It was a good thing.
    This weekend is typesetting and relaxing.  I'm hoping to have a mock-up of Rendering The Impossible by Monday to sit with and ponder over.  Live with for a few days to make sure I'm good with the design, fonts, etc.  This one has been a long time coming.  And the next will be even longer, I'm sure.  As was brought up on my review today, the 90% you can reach is easy...it's going for that elusive final 10%, the part that most give up on and feel they can't reach, the great song that touches people instead of a generic structure of simple chords & phrases.  It's that final 10% that attracts me.  The struggle and the grind of making it through.  Whether it is a new book, a song or a workday...it's the effort and the journey.
    Or, as Lemmy from Motorhead said, the chase is better than the catch.
    Though, I must say, the catch is fun too....

September 7, 2004 + "If The World Ended Today."
    If the world ended today, I would:
    - be in the midst of typesetting my new book
   - be listening to Secret Machines
    - be reading several different books at once, each in a different room of the house
    - be tardy in changing strings on two of my basses
    - be looking after a new cat with my wife (Roger has been added to the Percy/Anitya collective)
    - be truly, truly hating my job...not just dislike, but a growing, glowering monumental hatred
    - be thankful for my wife
    - be thankful for my folks & family
    - be thankful for my friends
    - be thankful for MCT, CSJ and DKP (I'm surrounded by three-lettered acronyms for creative processes)
    - be ready to take up arms against my oppressors (ie government, entertainment, etc.)
    - be ever-hopeful that things can get better.

August 14, 2004 + "Marrying France."
    Okay, first of all, the whole thing with the gay marriage decision in California is just absurd.  Two people commit to each other and want to marry, thus making legal their personal coupling.  Why does anyone care whether it happens to be boy/girl, boy/boy or girl/girl?  What is the hang-up?  Religion, I assume.  Here's a newsflash, and this especially goes for folks that will lay the "when the first settlers came here it was for a moral & godly religious life," those settlers would call us all heinous sinners, my friends.  The world changes.  Contrary to popular opinion, ahem, it evolves.  Life evolves.  And, with life, law must evolve.  The Constitution was designed by the framers of our government to allow for evolution and development economically, governmentally and personally.
   And, even more importantly, why do all these people care who someone else fucks?  Or shares a bank account with?  Or has legal standing with?
    My take:  if you're a good person, you're a good person.  God may judge based upon your devotion (or professed devotion), but here on earth, we're based on works.  And who someone chooses as a mate, unless it is a child, someone infirm or otherwise distressed or Betsy the cow in Mr. Farney's hayfield, is not a work to be judged upon.  It's a personal choice of accompaniment.
    Just imagine if someone came to you, if you're married, and told you that they're dissolving your marriage because your spouse is blond and it's been decided that anyone with slightly Aryan overtones is not moral.
    And for the folks with the "Ban France" bumperstickers...get a life.
    France has made decisions based upon the same thing that the U.S. has lately:  money & power.  When the U.S. was supporting the Taliban or Hussein's government in Iraq, and we were making money from those investments, all was well.  When it came time to do business with others, or when those folks decided they didn't want to cowtow to the U.S. anymore, suddenly they're enemies.  France made a ton of money selling nuclear materials and various other items through Iraq, Iran and the entire Arab world.
    Don't get mad, folks.
    It's just business, after all.

August 3, 2004 + "Just Rock & Roll."
    Sometimes all you want is some good rock & roll.  No real frills, just rockin' stuff.  Now, granted, our views of what constitutes rock & roll vary a great deal, I'm sure, but for my money, you can't go wrong with these:
    Cracker - Cracker
  Steve Earle - Copperhead Road
  Alice Cooper - Billion Dollar Babies
  AC/DC - Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
  Warren Zevon - My Ride's Here
  Manic Street Preachers - Gold Against The Soul
  Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Ragged Glory
  Iggy & The Stooges - Raw Power
  Hanoi Rocks - Bangkok Shocks, Saigon Shakes, Hanoi Rocks
  Creedence Clearwater Revival - Chronicle
  Put those ten discs in your changer and you've got fuel to run, my friends, fuel to run hard.

July 31, 2004 + "Ahoy, Mr. Flynn!"
    First, a shout out to my favorite lead tech, Bill.  Howdy!
    Good things:
   1)  Filming for Meet Cleaver Theatre on Sunday.
    2)  Cat Saint Jane is working hard and coming up with some very good new songs.  In fact, in a manic twenty minutes at practice today, we wrote a new tune called PVJ...bonus points for guessing what it is about, and I'm not giving hints.  We've bid adieu to Kristian, who has moved back to Nashville, TN, and we're doing well as a four piece, having decided not to replace him.  Now in standard "rock format" (guitar, bass, drums, vocals) we're all stretching out and gelling really well, though Kristian's presence in our older material will be missed at times onstage.
    3)  New book, Rendering The Impossible is nearing the typesetting stage.  It has been set up, I know the running order of the poems and have the cover stock.  It's just a matter of rolling up the sleeves and doing the manual labor.
    Bad things:
    1)  Politics in general.
    2)  The music industry.
    3)  Capitalism as a personal philosophy rather than a business sense.
    4)  Television commercials, namely a certain few that I won't give further space to here.
    Current listening:  Scissor Sisters, Alice Cooper, Warren Zevon, CCR and Wes Charlton.
    Current reading:  no time at present...busy editing & beginning typesetting.
 

July 17, 2004 + "Random Acts Of Chaos."
" See, free nations are peaceful nations.  Free nations don't attack each other.  Free nations don't develop weapons of mass destruction."  - President George W. Bush
"Death has a tendency to encourage a depressing view of war."  - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
* source for both quotes: Disinformation Book of Lists, editor Russ Kick *

Current Reading: Hiroshima by John Hersey, The Inferno by Dante Alighieri & Stalin by Edvard Radzinsky
Current Listening: Know Your Enemy - Manic Street Preachers, Vertigo - Supafuzz & various stuff by Hanoi Rocks
    Okay, from the above quotes we know that death, according to the 1% that rule us, should not be depressing and, of course, if you read between the lines, that we are not a free nation.  Of course, were we really ever?  There has been that assumption of freedom, the idea that we might be.  Oh, we get to vote for President, but the Electoral College can essentially say what they want.  We elected officials that voted to enact the Patriot Act without having read it.
    We're America.  We could be a model of civilization, but we elect leaders that spit upon us.  We don't deserve the freedoms that our forefathers laid down their lives for.  But the Bush family and their Saudi friends need their oil money, don't they?  Oh, and all this has been simmering long before I saw Fahrenheit 9/11, trust me.  The film was okay, not what I expected and also, somewhat surprisingly, nothing I didn't really have an idea of or know before.  And to my Republican readers, no, I'm not a Democrat either.  I'm Independent.  Note the capitalization of the "I" in the word.  I'm one of your "fringe voters," one of the "swing votes" that "could go either way."
    I'm swinging on the fence about whether to vote at all now.
    There is a condition and a position whereby we could all get along.  It is without money, fame and power.  But humanity is inherently greedy, so it will never exist.  Democracy, Communism, Socialism, Dictatorship.  Take your pick.  Theology doesn't matter either.  Religion is a tool of power rather than the life guide that it should be.  Read The War Prayer by Mark Twain and then tell me that anything anyone is doing in the world is right, or that religion makes it okay.  Mr. Twain hits many nails on the head in that short piece.
    We're living in chaos, my friends.  Enjoy the show.

June 26, 2004 + "Old Shoes."
    Current Listening:  Minor Threat, Queensryche, Type O Negative, Juliana Hatfield, Joey Ramone & Rollins Band
    Current Reading:  Henry Rollins - Broken Summers and Thich Nhat Hanh - No Death, No Fear
  I'm in a bit of an aggressive mood.  Have been for a week or more.  Nerves are on edge.  Good health things happening though.  Eyes are doing well according to my eye specialist, a terrific doctor and swell guy.  Dr. Riemann is the kind of doctor that, if he were a dentist, I'd still go to see him.  Hyper-intelligent but one of the most personable and charming fellows you're ever going to meet, and on top of that he's one of the top docs in his game.  I'm a lucky guy to have him on my side.  Then my app't. with my endocrinologist went just as well.  Dr. Boggess is in the same boat as Dr. Riemann.  How the heck did I deserve to end up with these two great docs?  A bit of luck, I guess, but I'm thankful for it.  My HbA1c is 6.0, a fine number, and my bad cholesterol dropped from 120 to 68 in a very short span.  The diet my wife put me on is working, as are the drugs I'm taking, so things are looking way up on that front, one that I've been working on for some time.  Things are bright.
    Had dinner with an old friend tonight, Tim.  It's like putting on old shoes when we get together, like when I get together with Bunny.  Those old shoes you just can't bear to throw out because of the wisdom in the soles, the miles you've walked with them.  There's nothing that surprises you, yet the friendship remains at a constant boil just because of who you are.  Tim's band, Undone, is really good. He played me one of their recordings and, first off, he's done an awesome job with the sounds.  Then they're just a really good band, and they've progressed a lot from when I dropped by a practice last year.  Good stuff and I'm happy for them.
    Life is editing right now, writing more music & laying down demos.  Creation.  One second, a blank page, then life.
    Age is simply numbers.  Time is a marking of change.  There are changes coming and I'm looking forward to the action.  No more talk.  Let's do it.
 

June 11, 2004 + "Please Let It Stop."
    First of all, the next time some neo-conservative lunatic tells me about "the liberal media" and the "media slant" in this country, I'm going to be hard pressed to even acknowledge the words.  Since Ronald Reagan died, every channel, every news broadcast, everything has been in shock at his demise and in praise of his acting ability (which was questionable) and his political achievments (again, questionable).
    But he was entertaining.
    And he was charming.
    And he did have a way with the microphone, which commands respect from me.
    And I think, even beneath his loathing of "that dreaded "L" word...liberal, liberal, liberal" he was probably a decent guy.
    Well, as decent as any money-in-the-bank politico can be.
    No disrespect meant, and I honestly mean that.  I'm sorry the gentleman died and I'm very sorry that he and his family had to spend the last few years in the state that they did due to his condition.  I wouldn't wish that upon anyone.
    But, Ronald Reagan was not the second coming of either Thomas Jefferson or Jesus Christ.
    Folks, get a grip.
    He's dead, I'm sorry, now move on.  Keep the pomp & circumstance for the real heroes, like the men & women being sent to foreign lands on questionable missions by the people that inherited (use of the word intended) Reagan's office.  Or the police officers, medics & fire fighters in your locale.
    How about some reality for a change?

May 31, 2004 + "Another Year, Good & Evil, The Floods."
    Typically, I would put the photos below into a separate gallery page, but I'm not apt to right now.  For now, here are some photos of the last few days with a couple assorted comments.  Enjoy them as I pass into my 31st year....

This is our backyard during the recent storms which have contributed tornadoes and floods to the Central Kentucky area.  We got off lucky with just a stream running through our yard and our out-building flooding.

The dam by, I believe, Elkhorn Creek down from our house.  Normally this is a fairly calm waterway.  Not right now.

And our normally dry street flooded too.

Here I am, dressed as St. Corman (Patron Saint of B-Movies) at Scary Camp on May 29th chatting with I. Zombie, Lexington, KY's own horror movie host.

    All in all, it has been an interesting past few days.  From the chaos of a movie convention in Dayton, OH, including Cat Saint Jane gigs, to the chaos of hail, tornadoes and flooding back here at home, all culminating in a birthday in which I very nearly killed myself (unintentionally, of course)...ah, it's good to be on vacation.

May 20, 2004 + "The Return?"
    Let me just say that I'm living in fear.
    Fear of cicadas.  The 17 year variety that are making a comeback this year.
    And not for the normal reasons, mind you.  They're harmless critters.  Can't bite you.  Can be annoying, but that's it.  They've lived for 17 years underground, munching on roots and now they come up, shed skin, mate and become bird food.  Or fishing bait.  Bunny and I caught a good number of bass at a pond in Taylor Mill during the last "infestation."
    But that's why I'm scared, you see.  We tortured the little bastards.  Not only did we use them as fish bait, we also taped them to bottle rockets and sent them screaming off to their doom.  We created obstacle course with flaming hoops and pits filled with Elmer's glue for them to run through.  To be fair, they didn't run.  Some tried to fly away.  Others were prodded through the course.  Several died trying.
    The thing about cicadas is that they have the illusion of horror.  They look terrible.  Ugly.  Nasty.  But, in truth, they're quite funny.  Noisy, but funny.  And good fun.  Enjoy them while they're around.
    As for me?  I tortured many of these cicadas parents and I'm quite fearful that they're going to be looking for revenge this time around.  I'm hunkering down and am going to wait it out.  If you don't hear from me in, say, 17 years, send lawyers, guns & money.
    And there was something else I had on my mind to write about but, having gone off on my cicada tangent, all else seems moot...I can hear them coming....

May 4, 2004 + "Pizza Boxes."
    My grandfather (on my Mother's side) had a collection of pizza boxes in the spare room of his house.  The family found them while cleaning the house out a short time before he died, while we were having it fixed up for him.  A bunch of pizza boxes.  Some empty plastic gallon jugs, formerly filled with milk, too.  Old medicines, long expired.  The pizza boxes were the most interesting though.
    They were being saved, I believe, just in case.  Just in case there came to be a pizza-shaped thing that needed to be U.P.S.'ed across the state.  Just in case there was a cardboard shortage.  That type of thing.
    This came up over dinner tonight.  It was in reference to food, how we, both Tracy and I, seldom remember what we eat anymore.  Yesterday's meals?  Um...I'd have to think really hard.  Yet, when the hunger is there, it is a focal point.  It just disappears so quickly.  We fill ourselves with junk and then forget about it.
    I liken it as well to our minds.  We're ever so willing to fill our minds with junk.  From weakly-written television shows to fads to "infotainment" and "reality" shows, we take in the crap never knowing that there is finely prepared food just around the corner, on the page of a seldom-opened book or in the digitally read pits of a finely crafted disc.  We take the junk because it satisfies quickly, like a pizza, and we don't notice the rot that it causes in our bodies or our minds.  But the pizza boxes never go away.  They pile up, soldiers for a battle never to be fought.
    Lest anyone I'm tearing into my Grandfather, let me state that I am not.  I love him and he lived with quite a bit of grief before he died.  He was a good man.  He just succumbed to what we all are, I think.
    There is desperation among us and it is fed with the junk of our lives.

May 1, 2004 + "Definitions."
    While many may question the following entry, it's something that popped into my head a few weeks ago and has stuck, so I'm getting it out here.  Defining an era, in this case, of music.  It all depends upon personal perspective, of course, but so often we're inundated with others' views that we may lean away from trusting our own taste.
    For example, the 1970's.  To many, Led Zeppelin, The Who, Black Sabbath and others like that might define '70's rock.  To me, the '70's were Bowie, Alice Cooper and Genesis/Peter Gabriel.  See?  There are common threads, but to me, the pinnacle of '70's rock is Alice Cooper's Billion Dollar Babies.
   Not that I'm putting any kind of negativity toward others, or your personal choices, but I really hate it when people get that "oh my god - you don't like <insert schlock here>?!?!?!" look on their face when a discussion like this opens up.  Get this:  I worked in a record store for six years.  I tried just about everything.  I'm a music junkie, by god, and here's a fact:  I'm right.  Record-sales-be-damned, I'm right.  *chuckling*  You've got to take a stand, you know?
    Something tagged onto this is, of course, how we define ourselves.  The tags we put on things, animate and inanimate, reflect the tagger just as much as the taggee.  It is something to be very careful of when making qualitative judgments on music, or any other artform.  One man's department store, $13.99 window hanging is another man's Object To Be Destroyed by Man Ray.
    I suppose that, in short, we should all be careful about how we define things or people.  It can come back to haunt you.

April 7, 2004 + "Strange Events In An Otherwise Normal Life."
  Event # 1:  Monday evening, April 6th, Tracy and I went out to grab some dinner.  We chose a local place in G-town called The Plum Tree.  It's an Asian/Chinese restaurant, a little pricey but with really tasty food.  Upon walking in, we're greeted with music.  Cool, okay.
    Here's the thing...it was a bluegrass band.  We ate Oriental cuisine while listening to a group of about ten folks play "She'll Be Comin' 'Round The Mountian" and "Rocky Top."
    I should have known right then that I was in for a whopper of a week.
  Event # 2:  Tracy and I went to the Cubs-Reds game in Cincinnati tonight.  The Reds won it, 3 to 1, so Tracy's a little peeved (she being a diehard Cubbies fan).  It was the other things that happened that stole the show from a fine effort by the Reds and the coolness of Great American Ballpark, which is a super nice venue.
    In the 3rd inning, Ken Griffey, Jr. hits a two-run homer.  I stand up and am applauding with great gusto, unlike most of the folks in our section just behind the third base line (Cubbie land, it seems), when I'm grabbed from the side and someone starts shimmying with me.
    That someone is Mr. Red, the Reds' mascot.
    I'm jazzed, you see, because I liked the old Mr. Red, having grown up in Northern Kentucky and been a Reds fan.  I like mascots too.  I still have my hockey stick that was autographed by Slapshot, the mascot of the old Cincinnati Stingers of the WHL on the night of their last game.  It was a cool thing to have happen.
    So Mr. Red...and I must say, I think that the person inside Mr. Red was a Mrs., but I can't confirm it...and I dance for a short time, then he/she moves on down the aisle and we're all basking in Junior's homer.  Cool.  During the break after the inning ended, though, over the P.A. comes The Village People's "YMCA" and Mr. Red starts dancing with a few folks near the aisle (and I was in an aisle seat).  I turn to my left and, somewhat aghast, see Mr. Red bumping & grinding toward me, thrusting his/her pelvis toward me, then turning to the person across from me to do the same.
    Hmmm...strangely exciting...also mighty freakin' weird.
    "What'd you do tonight, Scot?"
    "Well, a major league team mascot gave me a lap dance - how about you?"
  Event # 3:  There was a rain delay in the game during the bottom of the 5th inning.  It started as a slow mist and built to a freaking downpour that got the grounds crew out to tarp the field.  Fine.  They do it and, weirdly, all the Cubs fans in our section got up to go under cover...then stopped.  We had moved into the stairway to go up, but the line stopped moving.  Okay...already soaked, we just stood by our seats as, amazingly, it let up.  Fine.  The grounds crew comes out and rolls the tarp back up and a few brave souls start moving back to their seats when, you guessed it, it starts pouring again.
    No sooner had the grounds crew moved back to their little holding area than they had to go out and tarp the field again...it was truly hilarious.   Those guys looked pissed.  Once re-tarped, and with the stairway cleared somewhat, we moved to go to the restrooms and walk around a bit.
  Event # 4:  After walking a bit, I had a hankering for some pizza.  Couldn't help it.  So we got in line and were just talking, minding our own business.  I am turned sideways in the line, looking at Tracy, talking, when her eyes went through, in a matter of three seconds, the following states:
    Bemusement...
    Bewilderment...
    Amazement...
    Muted concern...
    Fear...
    Oh sh*t...
    Seeing her raise her right arm up and sensing that something might be amiss, I turned to my left only to find myself staring dead into a rolling rack of buns and having it hit me in the left side.  I get knocked back into the people in front of me, but they and I recover.  I realize what this is...it's like a rack of buns you see backstage at a McDonald's, but it's rolling down the middle of a crowded concourse at Great American Ballpark!  I peek around the side of it and, just as I do, the person rolling it peeks around as well, I guess having just noticed that the pile of buns has hit some turbulence.
    It was a slow individual.  Retarded person.  I don't know the P.C. terminology these days.  Fine.  Not a big deal.  I am all for everyone that wants a job being given one but we must realize that some folks need more supervision than others.
    This poor person looked astonishingly like Gollum from Lord Of The Rings, but with a lazy right eye and a tad more hair.  As he peeked around at me, this was our conversation:
    "You ah-ight?"  said in a screeching voice.  I assume he was asking this:  "Are you alright?"
    "Yes, I'm okay."
    "You ah-ight?"  screeched again.
    "I'm fine."
    "You ah-ight?"  yet again, screeched.
    "I'm okay, buddy!"
    And with that he continued pushing his stack of buns.  Now this stack/cart of buns was about six feet high, maybe an inch taller than me.  As I said, the fellow was Gollum...all of four feet five, maybe.  And he was pushing them.  He couldn't see anything.  No more than ten feet away from us, with Tracy, me and our surrounding linemates reminiscing about our ordeal, he ran into someone else.
    How did I know?
    "You ah-ight???!!!???" echoed from the other side of the concourse.
    I shudder to think how many buns met their doom while in his caravan of miscues.

March 29, 2004 + "Where, Oh Where?"
    Current Listening:  Incubus - Morning View and Supersuckers - various
  I stand sometimes and just look around, just wondering.  Wondering what the point is.
    I truly feel completely, utterly, hopelessly lost most of the time.  Nobody's fault but mine.  I write to find a way home, a way to some solace.  My wife is my navigator much of the time.  I wonder if there is any safe haven at all, or if it is all just a journey.  Some words, lyrics, I wrote a short time ago, come to mind:

Lesson Is The Journey
(c) 12/17/03 SNK

To a fault, to the end
To where the wise seldom win
To wherever the footsteps of angels may guide

To a heart, to the soul
To whatever can make me whole
To the longest days of searching in this life

 I will walk in the shadow of no one
 I will stand in the grace of the light
 I will build a silence amid chaos
 I will be a wrong turned right

To a love, to the sin
To where these actions may wend
To wherever the darkened eaves will shelter me

To a speech, to the wrong
To singing a brand new song
To the healthiest breaths of a lakeshore breeze

 I will walk in the shadow of no one
 I will stand in the grace of the light
 I will build a silence amid chaos
 I will be a wrong turned right

  Through the guidance of a father
  With a teacher seldom there
  Through the lasting touch of vision
  To the darkest night’s prayer
  Through the giving of a mother
  Within the arms of conscience
  Through the lasting heart of beauty
  Given to this life’s transience…I strive

 I will walk in the shadow of no one
 I will stand in the grace of the light
 I will build a silence amid chaos
 I will be a wrong turned right

    It's amazing that so many times I write things without knowing what they're truly about.  It's like my heart gets ahead of my head most of the time.
 

March 20, 2004 + "Fending Off The Hordes."
    Current Listening:  Joy Division - Closer, David Bowie - Reality & Warren Zevon - various
  Current Reading:  in the process of final edits for Rendering The Impossible
  Ah, to be a leader of men.
    I'd rather not.
    Really, seriously, but then how can I question the decisions of others?  Damned if you do, damned if you don't.  Just damned.  As are we all, in a lot of ways, I think.  Perhaps that's too pessimistic.  Sometimes the ones you rely upon fail you.  Sometimes the decisions you make haunt you before you realize it.  I'm in that situation now, vaguely.
    But, hey, it's all entertainment, right?  Just part of the big show!  Join the circus and ride that puppy 'round!
    All I want to do is create and play music.  All I want to do is write.  All I want to do is create.  It's that act, of creation, that drives me.  Striving.  I do not edit much (understand that my "current reading" comment is more of typesetting in all actuality).  I flow and go.  I find it much more real.  The concept of l'art brut, the raw art.  Composition, I grant, is fun and exciting in its own way, but I choose the more raw aspects of creation.  That is what drives me.  Throw the notes up and see where they land - usually its pretty interesting.  Sometimes a trainwreck, but those can be fun too.  Throw the notes up, get a groove, find the basic structure and expand from there.
    And most songs, like paintings and poems, are never done.  They're wrung like washcloths and left, having given their due and been laid open like the vein of the poet on the page.

March 6, 2004 + "Recovery."
    Oh, the pain of illness.  Just kidding.  More like the weakness of illness.  If there's one thing I really dislike (not that anyone likes it), it is throwing up.  Yakking.  Vomiting.  Puking.  Yes, indeed...yum.
    It appears that I had the "24 Hr." bug that's going around on Thursday night & I stayed home from work yesterday.  Had to.  Wanted to go in because, well, I hate what happens to my desk and normal duties when I'm out.  But I was just out of it.  Couldn't keep my sugar down either, and hadn't eaten anything, so I know I had some sort of invaders (insert Maiden song here, especially the line about "pillaging") doing dirty work in my body.  As it stands, at 5:34 AM on Saturday 3/6, I have eaten one can of chicken noodle soup in 39 hours.  But, the good news is, I'm feeling hungry.
    Hungry for something lean, not greasy.  Something substantial, not typical.  I'm really tired of the way we (yes, Virginia, that means you) eat in the U.S.  We're way too fat, that is to say, it's way too easy to eat, and even easier to eat utter crap.
    I have work to do too.  Have to put together some notes on new songs & such.  We're auditioning a drummer today, so at least something's going well.

February 27, 2004 + "Influence (Under The)."
    Today was a strange day.  Working on a Saturday is strange to me anymore, unlike during high school & college, when I worked every Saturday & Sunday for seven years at Record Alley (r.i.p.)  It was interesting, but coming home with orange paint all over me was too much.  I thought I'd have more to say about it, but I don't.  It's over.  C'est la vie.
    Got acquainted with a cool fellow at Jo-Beth tonight too.  We'd spoken briefly some months ago as well.  He's a hockey fan like me and we struck up conversation due to my Canada team hat.  Now, I'm not about to say I'm the most knowledgable fan of hockey, being a diehard football fan, but I do love the sport & like learning more about it every time I can watch or go to a game.  It's cool having a sport like that, compared with football & baseball that I'm pretty in-tune with.  And why the Canada hat?  It's Canada's game, baby, and I'm sort of rooting at least for maybe Ottawa to make a good run at Lord Stanley's hardware.  Other favorite teams:  the Panthers (don't ask), Maple Leafs, Blues & Devils.
    This fellow's also a musician.  Amazing the people you meet.  And he's an Iron Maiden fan.  Tracy just sat in stunned silence as I'm sure we annoyed the other patrons & waiters with our commentary & dissection of Maiden's musical prowess & how much of a god-like entity Steve Harris is as a bassist & songwriter.  Quite fun.
    It also got me to thinking about influences yet again.  As I've gotten *gulp* older, my range of influence has widened a great deal and it has mixed with newer stuff.  So, essentially, I have my metal roots mixing with a variety of other stuff...then add in my own personality & style (such as it is), and you've got quite the musical weirdo.  In other words, I can and do write raging metallic-riff epics one day & turn around & write four-chord folkish songs the next day.  And I love it.  Eclecticism, while not a commercially viable trademark, is the most fun.
    So, here's a more current list of influences of mine, including bassists, songwriters & bands.  It's not so much that they work their way into my musical thoughts (as in, "Wow, that sounds like __________"), but more that they inspire me to dig deeper, play harder and open my mind wider than others do.  Here ya go:
    Steve Harris & Iron Maiden
    Manic Street Preachers
    Warren Zevon
    Tony Levin / Peter Gabriel
    Adrian Belew / King Crimson
   John Fogerty / Creedence Clearwater Revival
    Hanoi Rocks
    Over-The-Rhine / Ric Hordinski (Monk)
    Phil Cody
    Dennis Dunaway & Alice Cooper (original band)
    U2
    Mark Strand, William Stafford, Hunter S. Thompson, Noam Chomsky & Carl Hiaasen
    etc., so on and so forth...these are the people & bands that I always come back to, always buy their stuff and am always intrigued and moved by.
    Our influences inspire us to greater heights.
 
 

February 24, 2004 + "God, Presidents & Idiots."
    Let me be the first to say that I don't know it all.  Sometimes I'm incredibly self-righteous.  Sometimes my tongue gets in front of my head.  But here are some things that are really bugging me.
    Just so you know:  in the 1980's, the US government created fear of Libya and various Central American leaders so as to give our armed forces workouts and spread our net over more of the world.  Fine.  That's fine.  We were also arming Iraq so they could fight Iran.  Fine.  You know what?  The only difference now is that Libya became Afghanistan and Iraq is on the other side of the fence.  We fight for democracy?  Get real:  democracy has been in a coma for years.  It got hit head-on by rampant commerce and suffered a brain injury called right-wing-versus-left-wing-politics-instead-of-smart decisions.
    It's on life-support...it may not recover unless treated quickly.
    And the whole "gay marriage" thing that has suddenly, inexplicably become the order of the day in Washington and other hot spots is just absurd as well.  If two people, be they man & woman, man & man or woman & woman are honestly, truthfully in love and willing to commit to each other (and that's the hard part - it's about commitment, not politics), then they should be "allowed" to "marry."  Marriage is a religious and state-run thing.  The state licenses you to marry.  I'm not sure why.  That never made any sense to me except that they need to track you for tax purposes.  Churches and/or religious organizations then marry you and forge a viable, honorable commitment between the parties.  Fine.  I am a reverend and I can perform marriages in some states.  I recognize this as a sacred honor and do not, nor would I ever, take it lightly.
    If the US government wants to pass an amendment to ban marriage except for the traditional man & woman set, then they're essentially taking away rights from religious organizations, aren't they (thanks to Tracy for making this argument)?  Suddenly, church & state aren't so separate anymore.  Suddenly, it's Fahrenheit 451 on Capitol Hill.  Suddenly, we're all taking Soma (don't worry, kids, it's just Prozac or Ritalin.)  Suddenly, life is pointless, there's nothing to shoot for and no reason to be or strive for anything.
    Why?
    Because some hot shots who care more about their oil companies and power think that you (yes, that means you, Johnny) can't handle your own life.  You need to be reined in.  You need to be told what you can watch, what you can think, who your enemies are and, by god, who you can fuck.
    Don't get me wrong.  If there's one thing that does bug me about any human interaction of the emotional/marriage/relationship realm, it is promiscuity.  And, let's be honest, sometimes that's a rampant thing in the gay community.  But, let's look behind the closed doors of others, hmmmm?  Yeah, you're right (note the sarcasm), none of the Kennedy clan ever got busted for rutting with a bunch of loose chicks, did they?
    We're all losers here.  Freedom is important.  So is government.  Or defense.  Yes, defense.  Hmmm.  We can destroy the world many times over, but we still need more nuclear weapons.  Sure.  Fine.  I'm glad I go to work to give Mr. Bush 30% so he can buy another trigger for a weapon.  It helped on 9/11, didn't it.  Great.
    In closing...gay marriage:  folks, get over it.  If two people love each other and are willing to commit to each other, leave them alone and get along with your own issues.  Government:  stop.  Just stop.  Get a grip.
    Sorry about the rants.
    I'll leave you on a positive note...as long as there are cats to enjoy my playing, all will be well.

    Anitya & Scot 2/15/04

February 12, 2004 + "Drugs & Those Of Us Who Need Them."
    You know that it's bad when your pharmacist's assistant rings up your bill, tells you your copays total $200.00 and says, "Wow, you need some real insurance instead of this."
    Ah, a day in the life of a diabetic in these times of overpriced health insurance driving up the costs of drugs and doctor visits.  And don't fool yourselves, folks, it is the insurance driving costs up, not the other way around.
    I take Humalog insulin, use FreeStyle blood test strips and am also on two other daily pill-type medications for blood pressure.  Here's the rub:  if I used Novolog instead, and a different test strip, and different types of the pills, my copays would be significantly lower.  The rub is actually this:  I used to use Novolog and Humalog works better for me and I have the empirical proof of it.  I could use any other test strip, but I have a FreeStyle blood glucose monitor and I'm not going to buy a new monitor just so I can use the test strips that my insurance company recommends.  And my two other pills?  Yes, indeed, there are other brand name equivalents that are close to what I'm taking, but they're not what I'm taking and what I'm taking has proven to work better for me.  Again, as with the insulins, I've taken some of the others and what I'm on works best for me.
   Insurance companies are, inherently, financial institutions, not "health care networks" or "provider networks."  That's a bunch of loosely-tied euphemistic bullshit.
   So why is my copy $50 each for these and not the $15 or $35 that my insurance company...aw, heck, I'll name them...it's Humana...could charge me?  Because drugs I'm taking aren't on Humana's "preferred" drug list.  And why not?  Hmmm.  Because the other drug company's kickbacks are higher.  You see, that's how you get on an insurance carrier's "preferred" list.  You pay them to be on it.  It has nothing to do with how effective your drug is.  Not a thing.  Regardless of the form letters' explanations that you get (or I've gotten) when you question these things.
    So I'll pay my $200 when I have to.  You see, to my doctors (who the insurance company's railroad too) and I, my health is what is important, not the almighty dollar.  Humana, I guess paying the $50 copay per prescription is better than the $100 or so per that I would pay completely out-of-pocket, but not much, especially when I know your true line of thinking & logic.
    And, to be fair, not all insurance is like this.  People like to complain about their auto or homeowners insurance in the same breath with their health insurance but, in all honesty, I find them to be radically different and I've not had a bit of problem with my auto or homeowners insurance (credit where it's due here, since I called out my bad guys above, goes to Safeco, which I've found to be a fantastic company in my dealings with them.)
    It's just frustrating, terribly frustrating, and seemingly hopeless, which is not the point of insurance or medical care.  But that's what we've got.

February 8, 2004 + "Where's Mr. Z?"
  Mr. Z himself has passed into the great beyond, but his music lives on and is nominated for five different Grammy awards this evening.  Awards of this nature don't interest me a whole lot.  It's the idealist in me that says that music isn't a competition, but rather a journey, a revelation in every note, a mirror in every harmony.  But, it is the music business, isn't it?  Just like doctors and lawyers practice their professions.  There's always fine print, isn't there?
    Regardless, I will watch the Grammy awards tonight in hopes of perhaps seeing (I would imagine) Jordan Zevon accept an award or two for his dad, one of the most criminally underappreciated songwriters of the last thirty years.
    And speaking of underappreciated, how about Phil Cody, who I nicked the title for this entry from (it's an ad lib/lyric in a song from The Mad Dog Sessions)?
    Music is a horrible affair.  Critics are horrible.  MTV is horrible.  Major record labels are horrible.  With all the horror, it is indeed wonderful that we can still love music, thereby proving correct the idea that the good within it can outdo all the evil that surrounds it.

February 5, 2004 + "Bluer Still."
    It is odd to run across people that are everything that they seem to be, or that you would tend to think they would be.  Dick Von Hoene was one of those folks.  Some may know him better as his character that hosted b-movies on Channel 19 in Cincinnati, that being The Cool Ghoul. He died yesterday at the age of 63.
    I came to know him shortly before DKP released my third book, Soliloquy.  I was snooping around for promotional outlets and happened upon Northern Kentucky Magazine, an interview show on the local cable t.v. provider where I lived.  I called, got information, spoke with a producer and Dick, who I hadn't, due to ignorance, connected with The Cooh Ghoul just yet, and appeared on the show.  I think it was my Dad who heard his name and clued me in.
   Dick supported the arts, always had interesting people on the show, folks that may not have had other outlets.  It was much the same idea as what I had behind Scriptus Live on the radio.  The greatest thing about it was that, unlike some interviews I've done, I knew Dick had read the book.  We didn't go in-depth on the air, for the camera, but from his questions and our conversation both in the commercial breaks and on the telephone, he'd read the stuff.  I was amazed (and honored).
    If you were a youngster in the '70's, you knew The Cool Ghoul.  Meet Cleaver Theatre is on much the same wavelength as what Dick did with The Cool Ghoul.  He was, as the article in The Cincinnati Enquirer called him, an "icon of the Queen City."  He was and is an inspiration.  When I appeared on Northern Kentucky Magazine a couple years later, in support of The Mirror Suite, one of the things Dick did was congratulate me on keeping up with DKP and following through, endeavoring to reach my goals.  (For those counting, yes, the new book is nearly done and, yes, it should be out by summer.)  Another great interview and a whole lot of fun.
    From what I knew of him, Dick was a lovely fellow.  Not a great man, and I don't think he would have liked to have been called a great man, to be honest.  He had fun.  He was fairly zen about life.  You're here, have fun with it, you know?  A creative soul and a supporter of arts.  I'm glad I got to call him, and get to remember him as, a friend.
    Here's to ya, Dick!  *insert trademarked Cool Ghoul noise here, (c) 1968 Ghoul Enterprises (seriously)*
 

January 31, 2004 + "Blue."
    Current Reading:  Hegemony Or Survival by Noam Chomsky
    Current Listening:  The Holy Bible by Manic Street Preachers
    I truly wonder sometimes how the world feels about the United States, once a siren call to those seeking freedom and now the bully of the block.  Well, I suppose that "now" is somewhat subjective coming from me.  In truth, "now" probably refers more closely to post-WW II, doesn't it?
    If I were on the outside looking in, I think I would sum up my feelings with the word fear.  Reckless propaganda and ruthless profiteering from the pain & misery of others, seeking to expand our culture of consumption into every crack & crevasse of the world.
    But we're the good guys, right?  God & country, right?  Truth, justice and the American way, right?
    Propaganda on the level of the Third Reich, my friends.
    Fact:  no WMD's found in Iraq.
    Why is it that no one has yet crucified the Bush administration for this?  That's why we attacked them, isn't it?  And isn't it also true that any bio-weapons that Iraq may have used and any technology for WMD's is almost surely to have come from their time as an ally of the United States?
    You do remember that, don't you?  Saddam was an ally until he decided to nip over to Kuwait.  His weapons were our weapons.  He waged war with Iran with our backing.  Yahoo.
    So, essentially, if we did anything in Iraq (and I offer my apologies to those who have died over there, are over there serving and giving their time and energy for this venture) it was to attempt to clean up our own mess.
    And, in the process, create an even worse mess.
    For oil, under the guise of liberation.
    For a proclamation of U.S. interests in the Middle East, under the guise of humanitarian service.
    As a warning to other leaders in the area that we are the law and if we can profit from you, you're done.
    And I am feeling so blue....

January 24, 2004 + "Futility."
    Ah, is that an election year that I smell?  I believe that it is, kids, and that means that you too can indulge in the mindless drivel and sophistic rhetoric that has made this country what it is over the past hundred years or so.  America?  Corporate entity.  Democracy?  We're not even close.  I believe the word is actually a plutocracy.  Can't remember right off.  In other words, the rich control everything, not the people.
    And so, who to vote for?  As a registered independent, the current hoopla means little to me from an actual vote-casting view.  However, I will say that our locals here in Central KY running for Congress are a hilarious couple.  Forgy-Kerr & Chandler should both be ashamed.  Perhaps its the creative person in me, but listen, we're all for better jobs, better education and being tougher on crime.  Fine.  I understand that.  We all do.  And we all think that the "Washington (or Frankfort) bureaucrats need to be taught a lesson."  Fine.  I dig it.
    And so you're a Sunday school teacher.  So?  And your family loves you and you play baseball together.  So?
    It brings back the mock elections we had in elementary school and then the elections in high school for the student government (which, like our own government, had very little power and bowed before those with power, the teachers & school board - just insert corporate entities for them).  A popularity contest with no real reason, cause or rhyme attached.
    Here are your stinking choices, America, now pick one and let's finish killing some folks over here, making the roadway safe for our oil companies to come in and drill, and spreading our enterprise throughout the world.
    And if you stand up?  You'll go to jail or, if you're a nation, well, we've got a Trident submarine off your coast with enough firepower to make your country look like a New York subway station after New Year's Eve.  Except even the rats will be choking on the radiation.
    Final comment - four lines from a newly written song:
    "When pleasure is your only goal
     And cries of terror are turned into reward
     As the structure of life swallows itself
     What is the point of hoping to save the world?"
     - from January Song (c) 2004 Scot N. Kaeff/Cat Saint Jane

January 1, 2004 + "All's Quiet...."
    Currently Reading:  The Culture Of Make Believe by Derrick Jensen
    Currently Listening To:  Streetcore by Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros
    Happy New Year to all.  Let us hope that this year will find us taking more solace in each other.  Let us attempt to reason and work with each other instead of fighting.  Let us turn off the television, or at least mute the sound when commercials are on.  Let us read more and let the books and ideas we take in help us to grow.
    Let us hope that perhaps, one day, we can have a New Year's Day in which we can celebrate peace, an end to power-hungry monsters in leathery corporate boardrooms and plush presidential offices and a society which embraces individuals as they are.
    Violence is a last resort and if we have truly reached the need for the last resort, we may as well all dig our own graves.

December 20, 2003 + "Sorry For The Album."
    So, I have to admit, I was taken aback.  Personally, I thought the entire American Idol load of junk was a clever marketing ploy by television & music companies to wrangle low-I.Q. folks into buying bad music.  However, it doesn't take advertising executives to do that.  Most folks do it on their own.
    Gee...am I opinionated?
    Yes, I guess I am.
    Anyway, Tracy and I were at a local music/book emporium and she called me over to a listening station.  She told me that Ruben Studdard (spelling?), the bloke that won American Idol, had his album out and it was there.  She said that the entire album was summed up by the large guy's first two words that he uttered and I had to have a listen.
    Okay, I'm game.
    The music starts...sounds like really bad '70's soul stuff that, unfortunately, seldom had any soul...Tracy's checking my reaction...and about 30 seconds into the song, titled Sorry 2004, Ruben whispers, "I'm sorry...."
    Oh, the hootin' & hollerin'...I was laughing quite a bit.  The guy, from what I did see of the show (because, yes, I'm a sucker and it does give me ample opportunity to vent about the state of (the art of) music, is a Barry White knockoff.  Granted, a good voice.  Sure.  Soul?  I don't know.  Creativity?  Hmmm.  I'll get back to you.  But flipping through the rest of the disk, I would venture that, yes, he did well in apologizing beforehand.  In other words, if you do listen all the way through, by god, he warned you.
    Having vented on that, and if you get a chance to sample the disk, do so.  It's worth it to hear that first part.  Cat Saint Jane is in the market for a new drummer.  Auditions begin in January.  Eclectic rock & roll with lots of soul, groove and not at all short on intelligence.  Damned good stuff, if I do say so myself (and if you ask me, I certainly will).
    Till then, to all, a happy holiday season from me and all at DKP!
 

December 12, 2003 + "Jimmy Carter And Other Tales."
    I had purchased President Jimmy Carter's poetry collection, Always A Reckoning, several years ago when it first came out.  It is indeed fantastic, and his work reminded me a bit of William Stafford's, a favorite of mine.  I'd also read a lot about President Carter, his humanitarian efforts and such.  One of the most interesting pieces was the interview from Playboy in 1976 just prior to his election as president.  My thoughts on him had been these:  highly intelligent yet down-to-earth, wise, hard-working and honest, which as we all know is generally a kiss of death in political affairs of the last 50 to 75 years.
    So, it would be no surprise that when his newest book came out, The Hornet's Nest, a novel about the Revolutionary War and how it was fought in the south, I picked it up (actually Tracy saw he was coming to Lexington's Joseph-Beth Booksellers for a signing session, which aided in the decision to buy it).  Stranger still, I'm enjoying the read a lot.  I'm not usually big on historical novels, but this one is written with the same depth of detail, yet brazen emotion, that his poems are.  And that's a good thing.
    So we went today and stood in the line (the local news said he signed more than 2,500 books today) and got to meet the 39th president.  Thoughts?  The most striking things were his eyes and his aura.  His eyes were incredibly intense and focused.  The Secret Service guys were scoping the crowd?  My guess is that nothing got past President Carter and he probably remembers most of the faces he saw today to boot.  Then his aura, for lack of a better word.  Calm, peaceful, yet resolute.  Kind and trusting, but ready to stand whenever needed.  He seemed, like no one else I've ever met, and keep in mind that due to the large crowd when I say "meet" I mean that he signed my two books, we exchanged greetings and that was the extent of it, to be a leader.  But not one born.  It was a wisdom gained through years of work and learning that showed in how he held the room.
    Simply amazing, to be brutally honest.  I was not in awe, but I was humbled.  And I regret the 12 years of Republican rule that followed President Carter's term all the more, no matter the positives that were there and that I duly acknowledge.
    But, here's the funny part, because it seems my stories of meeting famous folks always have funny parts.  Tracy and I walked from the book store, somewhat stunned, she in front of me due to the crowd.  We get to the hallway leading from Lexington Green to the outside.  I had noticed people glancing at her, then looking at me behind her, obviously putting it together that we were a couple, and giving me odd, troubled and, in some cases, slightly upset looks.
   I didn't understand...had I had a fugue during which I'd written "snugglebunnies" on her forehead?
    We reached the outside and she turned to me and I saw that she was now weeping openly.  Problems?  Pains?  Psychotic reaction to the crowd?  No.  She'd been overwhelmed by President Carter, meeting him, someone she greatly admires for many of the same reasons I do, and getting a dose of that aura I spoke of.  Perhaps I'm a bit jaded because I've met a few somewhat famous people before (though this was, indeed, different.)  I chuckled, we talked and walked to our truck.  I wonder what those people thought had happened?
    If they only knew....
    Also, there's a band, and I don't know where they're from, called Pagan Rage.  It sounds really good if you do it in a high-pitched surfer-on-acid voice:  Pagan Rage, dude!  It helps to give the surfer-inspired "hang loose" hand signal too.
    Tracy thinks Pagan Angst would be a better name.
    Me?  I'd change it to Vegan Rage.  Think about it.  The motif would be angry, angry vegans searching the countryside for whatever protein they could scrounge up, non-meat-wise.
    Vegan Rage...I'm calling Michael McKean and Harry Shearer with this idea....

December 10, 2003 + "The Way Forward."
    Sometimes, I think, the way forward is simply by realizing that the present is transient and the road backward is to step back off of the ledge.  The ledge you're on, looking down, could indeed be a suicidal leap, but it could also be a leap into newfound freedom, or the lack of carrying a weight on your back.
    And the weights we carry are sometimes very hard to see.  Sometimes we wake up one morning and realize that we're heavier than we should be and try to shake them off.  That can prove the most difficult, because by this time there are generally others wrapped up in those weights and will bear the fall with you.
    And it's times like those that make me happy for my friends and my wife.  They provide the balance and solace that are necessary when making decisions that are right, but difficult.
    Chemistry in emotion and personality is just like chemistry in dealing with elements and compounds.  Some things work and some, for whatever reason, do not.  Sometimes it is just aspects of things, little parts, that cause problems.
    Sorry for the vagueness...it is not intentional.
    All in all, things are well.  The holidaze are upon us and the only good thing that means is a minute amount of time off from work.  Of course, seeing family is good, but for some reason this time of year always gets to me.  Is it the rampant consumerism or something else?  I've not yet quite figured it out.  And yet I keep trying to.
    More later...must get ready for work...it is 5:12 AM as I type this....
 
 

November 22, 2003 + "Random Acts Of Serendipity?"
    So, it's been twenty days since my last entry.  Not because I've been all that busy, really, but I just haven't done it.  No apologies.  Just didn't want to.  So there.
    However, some thoughts:
    1.  Keyshawn Johnson got what he deserved and I can only hope that the Buccaneers and their stand against brash, mouth-before-brains egomaniacs gives courage to other teams to dump their loudmouthed crybabies too.  Where will he end up next year?  My guess is that Terrell Owens leaves San Francisco and ends up elsewhere and Keyshawn goes there where Dennis Erickson will give him free reign over the 49ers.  And they deserve that.
    2.  The Wachowski Brothers should be drawn and quartered for the farce that The Matrix became.  The first was great because it melded a tantilizing story with great, nouveau special effects.  Reloaded and Revolutions lost the storyline, split it into about ten different threads and stayed online with the same effects.  Great.
        If you're going to do this, first, write books.  With all the subtext and frame story possibilities, the three Matrix movies could have made J.R.R. Tolkien jealous if they had been well-written in novel form.  As it is, there are far too many unanswered questions and complete bullshit going on in the films to make any sense unless you get Cliff's Notes and sit down in study groups after each scene.
        And for The Oracle, Mrs. it's-the-choice-you-make-so-that-you-make-a-choice-and-that-is-your-choice-because-that-is-what-you-have-chosen-
and-thus-it-is-the-choice-you-had-to-make-to-make-a-choice-and-if-it-is-your-choice-then-I-cannot-tell-you-because-
the-choice-is-yours-alone-to-make-so-make-your-choice-but-take-a-cookie-to-help-you-make-a-choice-but-I-know-
you-will-not-take-a-cookie-so-your-choice-may-or-may-not-matter-but-I-cannot-tell-you-because-it's-your-choice, you
can kiss my ass as well.
    3.  Buy Flogging Mollies' CD "Drunken Lullabies" and drive really fast while listening to it.
    4.  Cat Saint Jane is in the mixing stages of our first recording.  Should be three studio cuts and a couple of live cuts if the plans hold true.
    5.  Television sucks except for the Law & Order shows and ER.  Everything else is drek, even football.  Sludge fills the airwaves and cable lines and it is our insipid laziness that allows it.  Anyone, and I mean anyone, that has been on a "reality show" should be strung up.  There's NOTHING real about these things, folks.  Get it straight.  They're as fixed as the freakin' Grammy Awards, Emmy Awards, ad nauseum.
    6.  I need to clean my office.  That shall be my excuse for not doing another entry until some of this bile spills.
    Thank you....

November 2, 2003 + "Currently...."
    Last Saturday, one of my best friends got married.  As I write this, I'm guessing their honeymoon is winding down and I remember back to last year when ours was doing the same.  All that work for a short program to tell the world what you already know *smile*.  But well worth it, as the following is.  To Bunny and Jeanne, all the best, my friends!
    Occasionally, I go through and catalogue my current situation as far as reading, writing and so on, just to get a taste for where I stand.  Since you're here, I'll share with you, if you like.
   Current reading includes:  The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Albom, Hardcore Zen by Brad Warner, Freeze Dry by Corson Hirschfeld, Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution by Dr. Richard Bernstein and 1 X 1 by e.e. cummings.
    Current music not traveling far from my stereos: Countrysides by Cracker, The Power To Believe by King Crimson, Document by R.E.M., Dance Of Death by Iron Maiden and sundry works by King's X and Warren Zevon.
   I've been dropping the rock on my 4-track a bit lately too.  Mainly bits & pieces, though I did complete one tune and have given it to Tessa for melodic doctoring.  The band, Cat Saint Jane is about halfway through with recording of our five-song demo disk.  For as little fun as recording is for me, hearing the final product involves a great deal of enjoyment, both in the creation and in the group effort it takes to do it.  A band isn't a band until they've recorded together.  It is much the same for putting a book together (which I'm in the midst of right now)...the part after editing, the typesetting and such, is a horrible affair, but well worth it once the collection is done and in your, or preferably someone else's, hands.
    Our elections are on Tuesday and I'm truly torn about who to vote for in Kentucky's governor's race.  Moron A or Moron B.  When each has a fair amount of negatives and a few positives, I just don't know where to go.  I think I'll write in our cat, Anitya.
    She'd do a good job.

October 21, 2003 + "Telephone Is Ringin'...."
    The "no call" list thing is driving me nuts.
    I support it in most ways, but not all.  You see, I used to get upset at pollsters and hucksters calling up during dinner time.  I used to get angry about politicians calling up...or, worse yet, when a recording of a politician calls up via computer to tell you about their family and ask for your vote.  Never about issues, always the same picture of a dude, his wife, their dog and two kids.  All hired hands for his political career, mind you.
    But, slowly, I grew to not mind them.  They became fun.
    All you have to do is pretend you're in a bad sitcom and start having a completely obtuse conversation with them.  If you want it to end quickly, ask them why style of underwear they have on right then.  For women, give them a choice of a nifty Victoria's Secret V-string or normal cotton panties.  You may want to include that you're more interested in hearing about the V-string, even if it's not what they have on.  For a super quick hang-up, use this method when a male telemarketer calls.
    Or you can start a disjointed discussion of Kant's Categorical Imperative using examples from whatever poll you're being asked to take.  Or talk about the Reds destruction of Cincinnati baseball.
    You see, folks?  Telemarketers are fun.  And it's more fun to do these things, to thumb your nose at them intellectually, than to simply hang up.  Of course, that is indeed fun too.
    The one thing that keeps a lot of this from happening anymore though is that I simply hate talking on the telephone.  I talk on the phone way too much at work and, in my job, 95% of the time, when I answer the phone, I'm speaking to someone that has a problem that they need fixed.  I get tired of hearing about someone's leaking forklift.  I'm desensitized to it.  Especially with certain customers whose trucks continually break down because they don't take care of them.
    Do I have sympathy for someone whose car breaks down because they never change the oil?  No.
    Do I have sympathy for the customer who has had another handle break on their stacker because the operators abuse the living crap out of them?  Nope.  Not on your life, there, Sparky.
    So, after enduring these things during the day, the last thing I want to do at home is talk on the phone.  Oh, I occasionally do it.  I have good friends that I can only get together with on the phone every so often and these times are cherished.  But, on the whole, the phone is a tedious inconvenience.
    So, the moral is:  Don't Call.

October 15, 2003 + "Phat!"
    My day started off horribly.  I mean literally rotten.  Daily paperwork that I usually have complete by early afternoon still sitting in my inbox, laughing at me, taunting me as one o'clock rolled around.  And at one o'clock, an employee appreciation shindig to Keeneland, a local horsetrack in Lexington.
   The only horsetrack I'd been to previously was Turfway Park in Northern Kentucky and that was when Bunny was in charge of the video operation there.  Horses, to me, are not a religion as they are to many of my fellow Central Kentuckians.  And it was a more high falutin' sort that was at Keeneland today, and apparently on most days.  Turfway is the sort of place you picture Charles Bukowski hanging out at.  Keeneland is where you'd picture Muffy and Buffy from Affluent High to sashay off to for some relaxation.  Not that that is bad,  not by any means at all.  I'm not making a judgement call here, just trying to give some perspective.
    Anyway, we had a nifty lunch and my manager, as we arrived just prior to the second race, had mentioned the name of one of the horses running in it.  That horse won the race.  So, Ryan and I decided to take whatever horse he picked in the third race and bet our dough on it.  Personally, I had a pittance of seven dollars to liveon till payday on Thursday.  Not a good sign.
    However, being the gambling sort, and with Kenny Rogers songs rolling through my head, I went to the window and bet on horse number six, named Phat, to win.  Ryan bet on Phat to win, place or show.  Neither of us, ironically enough, knew what we were doing other than possibly throwing good money away.
    Phat is a large, black horse and he looked pretty mean.  You never know, though.
    Phat started in the middle of the pack.  All seemed lost.  We were doomed.  I started to feel as if I'd have had better luck betting on the fat little man that blew the trumpet signalling the race's start to win.
   Phat started to come on...and was in fourth halfway through.
    Then third.
    Then he skipped right to first.
   Phat won the race by three lengths.
    I started to think about subcontracting my weekly lottery picks to my manager.
    I was actually excited about a horse.
    I was in a stupor, finally understanding how a guy like Bukowski could go to a track all day, drink himself silly, play the ponies and write poetry and do little-to-nothing else.
    Ryan cashed out at about $36.
    I didn't know what to expect, maybe a twenty spot or so, which considering the $5 investment, would have been awesome.
    But the fates smiled, I suppose.  Phat went off at 9 to 2 odds and my bet for him to win netted me $51.50.
    I could have stayed, I could have played more but, having seen what happens when this type of luck is pressed (for those who were present, remember the "lotto fever at Kroger" times of nearly a decade ago?), I left.
    As the kids are saying today, my day, which started so horribly, ended up being pretty phat indeed.

October 5, 2003 + "Something Greyt."
    Dogs.  That's what the world's gone to.  The dogs.
    Just kidding.  Sort of.  Tracy and I went to the Greyt Greyhound Gathering 2003 today in Cincinnati.  We were invited by our friends, Jim & Donna Cowperthwaite, who have been involved in greyhound rescue activities for a number of years now.  They also own two, the illustrious Flash and Sunshine.
    I'm sure most of you know about the treatment of these noble creatures.  Clocking in at speeds around 45 mph, which they reach in a matter of a couple of steps, by the way, they are the racehorses of Florida and other more remote locations.  Unlike some horses that are used to stud or put out to pasture, though, the grey is largely forgotten except for the valiant few that seek to give them good homes once their "entertainment" days are over.
    I can say this:  these are great...pardon me, greyt, dogs.  I'm not a dog person.  They're noisy, brutish and I much prefer cats for a myriad of reasons.  But there had to be a couple hundred greyhounds at this event and there was no howling (until the howling contest at the end), no fighting, no barking, no pawing, no slobbering.  These were easily and by far the most well-mannered and noble group of dogs that I've ever been among.  It was awesome, and I mean that in every sense of the word.
    And Jim got me to help M.C. the event.  I can't help it.  Put a microphone up and, chances are, I'll end up on it at some point.  It was a tough crowd though...not many of my jokes got chuckles.  Many smiles, but I'm afraid most folks didn't quite know how to take me.
    A greyt time was had by all, though.  And I give my sterling approval to those of you searching for a dog to look into a local greyhound rescue association.  Let me put it this way:  if you're rich and having nothing better to spend money on than a purebread beagle, then so be it.  But if you're on the search for a good dog, plain and simple, go to your local pound or look at a grey.  From what I saw today, you couldn't ask for better.

September 23, 2003 + "Beginning?  Sure!"
    And among the tribes, there was a great murmur...as if something new had just appeared in their midst:

    I can't help giggling when I see this picture of a fellow I work with (who shall remain nameless) taken by someone else I work with (who shall remain nameless) imitating someone that we both work with (who, if you're a friend of mine, I'm sure I've imitated around you at some point.)  Well.  Okay.  Sure.
    Horrifying, isn't it?
    In good news, the new band (no, we still haven't decided upon a name...give us a break, okay?) played at an open mic night in downtown Lexington last night.  It went exceedingly well.  The response was very good, much better than the typically stoic crowds one is almost sure to be met with at these types of affairs.  All in all, a good evening.
    More to report, but in good time.  I'm preparing to perform the marriage ceremony of my best friend in late October and that, along with preparing to record with ____ (insert band name here) ____ in the days ahead, is taking much of my time.  Never mind trying to prepare to release the new book.  A busy time, and those are truly the best.

September 18, 2003 + "Reckoning."
    And somehow things are going from better to worse and worse to better at the same time.
    Or, perhaps, those are merely perceptiosn that need to be fuses with a more objective viewpoint.
    I feel as if my projects, and the projects I'm working on with others, would benefit greatly from more direct, hands-on approaches.  However, sometimes that leads to general dismay among those involved.  At the very least, I'm not doing any good on them while at work.  And at home, sometimes I need a jump start to get into the groove of working, and then it's usually midnight.
    Perhaps it's all about timing.
    I've hit another creative dry spell, but I think this may be self-inflicted.  Rather than trying to repair the frayed ends, perhaps I should drop the rope altogether and find a new lifeline.

September 9, 2003 + "WZ."
    I've been hesitant to write this entry because I wasn't sure what to say.  Warren Zevon died on Sunday.  Utterly heartbreaking.  A more original voice, music has not seen in some time.  Covering the expanse of emotions and a wide range of musical styles, he was and remains one of my inspirations.
    So, rather than jump on the current bandwagon of Zevon appreciation (amazing how the press cares when you're dying, isn't it?), I'll simply give you an archival journal entry from last year.  Oh, and by the way, I'm just happy that Mr. Zevon was alive to see his latest and last album, The Wind, enter the charts at # 16.  I'm not a big fan of Billboard, Soundscan or any of that, but regardless, this is quite an achievement.

September 12, 2002 + "Ah-ooo, Werewolves of Kentucky."   REPRINT FROM JOURNAL VII
  Somewhere along the way, I remember standing outside the Kentucky State Police Northern Forensic Laboratory with my
friend Greg discussing the genius of the lyrics to Excitable Boy by Warren Zevon.  I remember my friend Kristian, a bit earlier,
and we're talking around '92 or '93 now, buying a copy of Zevon's Transverse City album from me at Record Alley.  I
remember buying A Quiet Normal Life, the best of WZ's Asylum Records albums and then, being the glutton for great music
that I am, collecting everything else of his I could get my hands on, along with becoming a fan of Hunter S. Thompson along the
way.  They just sort of go together.
    I got to see Warren Zevon live once, unfortunately only once, at Top Cat's in Cincinnati on his tour behind the Mutineer
album on March 4, 1996.  Funny one-liners from the show:
    "Relax people, I'm a folk singer now."  to the raucous and riotous crowd that welcomed him.
    "Just what I wanted to be...an oldies act."  to the crowd after he mistakenly asked for a request and, as one would expect,
got Werewolves Of London called out to him.
    Another funny event of the show was that Kristian, who went with me, and I sat right by the soundbard at Top Cat's and
Kristian was right next to the stage light faders.  The fellow running sound was in charge of sound and lights and asked Kristian
to bring the lights up as WZ made his way onto the stage so he could tweak the mix.  He did a great job too...and he gets to tell
everyone that one fateful night in Cincinnati, he got to run the light show for Mr. Bad Example.  My jealousy has never quite
subsided.  That show, along with being an incredible statement of how one man with great songs and a lot of talent can entertain
and enlighten an audience (with occasional assistance from Duncan Aldrich), was also the first time I heard Phil Cody.
    When Greg and I hosted Scriptus Live on WAIF 88.3 in Cincinnati, we had two theme songs over the five years we had the
show.  We began with Lawyers, Guns And Money and then began using If You Won't Leave Me I'll Find Somebody Who
Will.  At least every two weeks, a WZ tune found it's way onto the Cincinnati airwaves between our segments.
   Warren Zevon announced today that he has been diagnosed with untreatable lung cancer.  He's laying low in L.A. (at
l'hermitage, of course?) with his kids and writing and recording up a storm.  When Jeanne, my friend Bunny's fiance, e-mailed
the news to me today, I fell as quickly as the Bengals in their home opener this year.  WZ's last two albums, Life'll Kill Ya and
My Ride's Here, easily his best since the '70's, are almost foreshadowing what's happened.  Songs celebrating life, but with an
eye toward the inevitable.
    "I was staying at the Westin
    I was playing to a draw
    When in walked Charlton Hestin
    With the tablets of the law
    He said, "It's still the Greatest Story."
    I said, "Man, I'd like to stay
    But I'm bound for glory
    I'm on my way
    My ride's here...."
  from My Ride's Here (Zevon/Muldoon) (c) 2001

    "Don't let us get sick
    Don't let us get old
    Don't let us get stupid, all right?
    Just make us be brave
    And make us play nice
    And let us be together tonight"
  from Don't Let Us Get Sick (Zevon) (c) 2000

  Along with the obvious reasons, his talent, songwriting abilities, entertainment abilities, it is Warren Zevon's ability to juxtapose
the light and dark within the single measure of a song that so caught my attention and still holds it. Excitable Boy, a brilliant
swinging tune, tells of just that, an excitable boy.  One who takes little Suzy to the junior prom and ends up raping her and killing
her, then building a cage with her bones ten years later when he's let out of the asylum.  But the music is so incredibly happy!
And there's a social aspect there too.  A fun song, but especially heading into the '80's, it was a comment on society not taking
seriously the ramifications of actions.  The boy commits the crimes and is written off to the reasoning of his simply being
excitable.  A poke of fun, a wry turn of phrase, a bit of sarcasm.  A wink and a smile and some devilish piano playing, especially
on the live version on Learning To Flinch.
    I don't miss WZ yet (he being alive and all), but I will, once I cannot look forward to more music or the slim chance that he'll
be playing somewhere close to me so that I could catch him again.  I told my manager, Rock, of the announcement and he took
it as I did.  Then he turned and said, "Well, it's okay.  Someone'll dig him up and build a cage with his bones."
    A dark moment infused with that sideways smile that seems to accompany all the best Zevon tunes.  A perfect moment.  For
myself, I offer my thanks to Mr. Zevon for that one transcendent concert and the hours of fun and inspiration of his music.  Let
me hold the door for you, sir, your ride's here....

September 5, 2003 + "Never Enough."
    I don't think that a perspective can truly be attained on a bad situation without in-depth research or a bit of distance on the event in question.  My event from yesterday will indeed take both.  Perhaps a wake-up call to me.  Perhaps a series of bad decisions.  Regardless, yesterday's fiasco will haunt me for some time.
    And so the question to be answered is, "how will you deal with it?"
    My answer was that I will learn from it.  I will take it as a reminder about the fragility of my situation.  I will turn it into something good, mainly because it could have been so much worse.
    But then others that I spoke with about it last night simply took the most utterly negative paths about it, reminding me of the worst possible case scenarios...alas, things I had already computed, realized and had laid out on the table in my head.
    Apparently some people, no matter how much I assume they know me, sometimes don't know me well at all.
    I have no harsher critic than myself.
    To be truthful, I despise myself.  I loathe myself.  There was a great deal of time in my past in which I simply did not feel that I figured into the grand scheme of things a great deal and toyed with the idea of my not being here at all.  The events of yesterday brought that frame of mind back into the world.
    When all you bring into the world is negativity, no matter how much you try and try to do the right thing, to handle things the right way, to be good to yourself and others, it will certainly shake your grip on all things.
    My lovely wife helped me a lot, as she always does.  That's what a true partner and friend does.
    So, to all others, I'll get through this.  It was an event, not a tragedy.  I cannot change the event, but I can deal with the ramifications in a calm, efficient, professional manner.  And if that is not enough, then any other future health-related matters will not include you.  Not for your sake, because I realize your stake and concern, but for mine.
    You see, you can't be any harder on me than I already am on myself, and that's more than enough for anyone.

September 1, 2003 + "Past Few Days."
    Well, friends, welcome to the eighth installment of this Journal. This was begun way, way back in 1999 as a writing exercise and a way to vent some things on an unsuspecting world.  Or, perhaps,  you do suspect.  Do you?
    Over the last few days, I've spent time with friends at a local music club listening to Over-The-Rhine play an excellent show in support of their new double-disc, Ohio.  It's a good thing to hear quality, emotional music being played at a local club here.  From what I've been told and learned of the Lexington, KY music scene, it's been a bad past few years, but some new venues have opened up and are starting to support not only national musicians, but those of the local variety as well.
    Then my parents came down on Saturday, which is always a treat.  Got to chat with them, go out to dinner and reconnect a little bit.  It's not like Tracy and I live that far away from either of our sets of parents, but the visits always mean a lot.
    And yesterday was a day filled with filming for MCT.  Film, as I have learned, is so much like music or writing.  You don't come close to recognizing the amount of work that goes into it until you're actually involved with a production.  From camera operation to running around with a trash can (shrew-proof though it was) on my head and shooting bow & arrow as a Mexican wrestler named El Santo, it was a grueling and rewarding day.
    And so, on this Labor Day, I will relax just a bit.  I have a song running about in my head waiting to be birthed...or stillborn as most of my recent efforts have been.  We'll take some care and time with this one, though.  Sometimes it's all about letting it happen.