30.4.04

results of the Haibun Best Friend contest, america yawns

haha "america"

Anyway, our winner is the wonderful Ellen N. of New York City, who was the only entrant in the contest. Ellen and I were best buds at college for a while, but had fallen out of touch for years until she discovered me this week through the link at Caleb's blog. Her winning entry, in economical haiku form:

leverett and loeb
youth is wasted on the young
friends once - now again?


(Inside Harvard-specific reference in first line, kinda spooky that it echoes gay thrill-kill duo) So, now that I'm back in touch with the great Ellen N., and her husband Sam and daughter Isabelle, this damned weblog has done ONE GOOD THING and can be retired at any moment without notice.

Runner-up: Anthony Miccio, who wrote to tell me that he would have entered the contest except that he already has a best friend. Hey, I don't wanna come between people and their actual real-life best friends.

Tied for last: all the rest of y'all, who suck.

But I'm busy listening to Cypress by Let's Active, so I just don't care about anything bad. This was my favorite tape the year I met Ellen N. The circle is completed.

28.4.04

microwave popcorn

The morning sun when it's in my face makes me feel my age. I'm busting down I-94 East to a young author's festival in Menomonee Falls, Gretchen Wilson's "Chariot" bringing happy gospelized tears to my eyes, 75 on the dime, passing trucks like my '98 Saturn is the Blue Flame. But the saudade is strong within me. I know it's all going to come to an end someday soon.

sip this bad coffee
whip on by this slow-ass truck:
april morn commute


I've had an easy ride these last few years, working at a nice wonderful good company that makes great products for kids, getting unlimited time to make school appearances as an Important Guest Author. I'm really good at these visits, it's kind of the job I was meant to do on this earth. And yet the end is near, the forces that drive the green fuse are driving me out of this comfort zone. Which is good, opportunity beckoning, etc. But I just don't see drives like this in my future, sun in my eyes, adoring throngs of bright shy loud funny hyper-serious kids waiting for me to make them laugh and make them work hard and tell them something interesting. Everything changes, every single day, every googleplexth of a second. Sun in my eyes.

one cloud in the sky
only notable for this:
its pure solitude


And then Gretchen is done, that last song is a killer, all about how she's the biggest thing that ever came out of Pocahontas Illinois, how she's gonna make them proud, very much the same [arrogant] way I used to feel about myself and Canby Oregon, haha, I'm not that arrogant anymore. I put on Montgomery Gentry's new CD, so Nietzchean in its stout hearty belief that we all make our own fortune and road in life, no whining no regrets no looking back no time for tears, the first song comes on all about how just making a living for your family is Something To Be Proud Of. I know that's my path to follow. So, with a little sigh of regret, I turn up the stereo and drive on to what will be one of my last gigs.

eventually
all the morning glare dies off.
stop squinting. see clear.

26.4.04

wheaties with frozen blueberries and rice milk

A. I'm not claiming any inside knowledge here about what will end up as Miccio's #1 album of all time, but he dropped a big fat hint, so I already know what it's gonna be. Suffice it to say that an answering machine is involved.

B. It occurrs to me that I haven't yet talked about the greatness that Hua Hsu's blog is turning into. Dude's got the life: opening for Quannum, then heading to Fenway.

C. The best blog running right now belongs to my good internet buddy and occasional Popmatters cohort Priya Lal. NOT ONLY is she a talented writer with a unique perspective, and NOT ONLY does she write travel better than anyone since Laurence Sterne, BUT ALSO she likes the same Indian techno music as me, which makes her the #1 CHIEF ROCKA.

D. Word to the wise: Never do a contest to have people be your new best friend unless you love having no one enter it. Like Busta says, "There's only five days left!"

21.4.04

pear/banana/blueberry/raspberry/grapefruit/ricemilk juice

I write about the greatest concept album in music history,
and then I write about some nice mellow stuff (although Uncle Kenny better heed Auntie Julianne's advice),
and then I write about the uncoolest record in the whole world except I love it.

All I do is write. Not much of a life, but lots of writing.

Now go read some Tom B. and work on your poetry. There's only nine days left!

20.4.04

a hearty vegan breakfast

OMG Caleb has a blog! Not only is he one of the most intelligent critics out in the world, and not only is his blog (which I discovered last night because I found people coming here from his link to me) one of the most tasteful and learned things around there, but I've seen him drunk and hungover and underdressed. We were friends in college (where I once bitched out one of his old girlfriends for casting aspersions on his sexual preference, only to find out that it was true), and then he let me crash at a flophouse Somerville Mass apartment with like six other guys. It was the closest thing to frat living for any of us ever, although we didn't really do anything all that crazy.

Anyway, check out his blog, it's good, he's one of the great ones. And he gave me the greatest compliment ever at the wedding of our friend and former flophouse roommate Craig, after white-knuckling the Taconic State Parkway in major fog from Queens up to Boston: "You know, for a straight guy, you have great shoes."

WHICH LEADS TO...the first ever Haibun Contest!
I've realized that I have only about three friends in real life, and no longer really have "a best friend." So nominations are open. In 100 words or less, compose a poem about why you'd like to be Official Best Friend of Haibun. All good entries will be posted here, and I will select my new Official Best Friend on May 1. If no one applies, I wouldn't expect a huge spike in my self-esteem level.

Send your entries here. Extra points for not sucking. All entries will win something intangible, like Truth or Beauty or some shit like that. Deadline is April 30 at midnight CST. Get started, y'all.

17.4.04

leftover jasmine rice with peanut sauce, organic coffee, a banana
this is actually a haibun

Try to slip out of the house early without waking anyone. Sammy stirs when I reposition him in the bed, kid never sleeps in his own bed anymore hardly, but he drifts back off next to his mom, safe. Grab some shorts, socks don't even know if they match, sweatshirt Liza wants me to throw out, shoes, Discman, Dani Siciliano CD. Gone.

Hearing chirping birds,
tempted to ditch my headphones--
screw nature. push play.


Walking is the only thing I do for me. Okay that's a lie. But it's the only time I'm alone. Okay that's a lie too. I'm a bigger liar than Bob Marley when he said everything's gonna be alright. Everything is not alright, yet. Maybe it will be, someday. Maybe it already is, who knows, I don't know. All I know for sure is that Dani Siciliano has my back, and that there is freedom in walking alone at 5:45 a.m. on a Saturday. It's almost like last night never happened.

break into a jog
break into a lovely sweat
break away from me


This electro-pop pingponging around my head. This rabbit I've frightened, sorry little dude. This feeling that I stomp around my life, rending my garments, wailing, gnashing my teeth. This morning sun in my eyes. This woman in sweatpants with two dogs, we say hi. This disconnect. This pattern to my footsteps, sometimes on the beat sometimes not. This realization that it is the beat that is irregular, nice one Dani. This wallowing in sadness. This thing Jon said on Thursday. This wonderful wide world that admits the presence of ducks, that allowed Sammy Sosa and Moises Alou to go yard in the bottom of the ninth yesterday while my son Sammy and I watched on TV and cheered and high-fived each other, this earth with its myriad miracles. This song. My footsteps. This song. My footsteps.

I walk straight ahead
as the fog lifts in the park.
Nothing more to say.

14.4.04

folgers, bananas, still groggy from Monday's all-nighter

ah-one: New link: Blogging the Brewers on Al's Ramblings!!!

ah-two: Check the Chang for a great William Hung story.

ah-three: Me on Paulina Rubio in the Voice.

ah-four: Me on Allison Moorer on Music-Critic.

ah-five: If any Freelance Mentalist who has not yet contributed to the site is reading this, send me something in a week or you're off the masthead. I mean it this time. I love you all madly, kiss kiss, but still.

9.4.04

"martika's kitchen," wasabi peas

How the hell did I not know about this website before now?
sunflower seeds for breakfast because the brewers are 3-1, brady clark hit two homers yesterday, junior spivey went yard, oh my gawd I love baseball again

Another review of which I'm proud. Why On!Air!Library! gets the top Friday spot over this, I don't know. Serves me right for getting Usher on top on Tuesday.

This is pretty amusing, too. Yes, Chuck asked me for permission before starting this thread. No, he didn't really need to start it.

Slate is messing up Condoleezza Rice. Like, pretty badly. I still think Scott Seward wins, though, with the Family Circus "not me" analysis.

Next week, I have a meeting that might determine my short- and long-term future in life. Wish me luck. I also start therapy again. Less luck is needed for that. Maybe they'll pump me full of antidepressants! Woo-hoo!

8.4.04

some NBA bullshit at ESPN

Shocking that everyone (Jack Ramsey, etc.) is all gaga over Hubie Brown as Coach of the Year? Hardly: he's been around for long enough, he's "due," he's "turned around" a franchise that has been mediocre for a long time, added some people that had been pretty good and together they seem really good.

And he's white.

Shocking that everyone (Sam Smith, etc.) is all gaga over Jerry Sloan as "rebel" choice for Coach of the Year? Hardly: he's been around for long enough, he's "due," he's "turned around" a franchise that lost its two best players (who weren't really all that for the last four years or so and Matt Harpring (who is now being lauded like some God of Scoring when in fact he's just Matt fucking Harpring), added some people that had been pretty good and together they seem really good.

And he's white.

Shocking that no one is talking about Terry Porter? Well, to me it is. He's taken a franchise that let go of its THREE "best" (name-recognized) players, rebuilt the whole team around one left-handed square-headed scoring machine from Ohio State, and defied every conventional wisdom thingie in the world. Let's quote from ESPN's pre-season guide:

"With the changes the Bucks made in the off-season, hoping for a playoff spot will be a little bit of a stretch. There is potential in Michael Redd, Tim Thomas, Desmond Mason and [T.J.] Ford will be charged with leading them.With the changes the Bucks made in the off-season, hoping for a playoff spot will be a little bit of a stretch. There is potential in Michael Redd, Tim Thomas, Desmond Mason and Ford will be charged with leading them. The other teams in the East are just too talented for the Bucks to compete with this year. Rookie coach Porter is getting his first shot at heading an NBA club and will be getting his feet wet along with rookie point guard Ford. It will be trial by fire for both of them."

See that: "ROOKIE COACH PORTER"? He's a first-year coach who got his team into the playoffs with a bunch of nobodies and a tiny little rookie. Daniel Santiago was our center for the first half of the season! Now it's Brian Skinner, no one's idea of an Ostertag.

But everyone's all HUBIE and SLOANIE and no one talks about what Terry Porter has done this year. Sorry to pull the race card but argh this drives me crazy.
100 words about the moon

The moon she just sits there idling this ridiculous night
I sit here idling too, my night isn't less ridiculous
We two in a staredown, hers benevolent but mine malevolent
I got a grudge and my liver's taken enough chewing
See it's all about femininity, about women's ways and meanings
Everything's a boy but the moon and the damn sea
Ain't no sea round here, who else can I blame?
Gotta be that menstrual circler full of herself up there
Checking me out but everyone else too, mooning us all
She disdains my our love every quarter half gibbous bit

6.4.04

no coffee yet, hungover from champagne at last night's seder, home with the kids all day

Kind of proud of how this one turned out.

This one too.

Oh, and this one, but mostly for the title, at least the first half, because Chuck must have written that second half.

Sorry about the own-horn-blowing aspect, but I'm in need of some ego-proppage. Dark days at Chez Haibun, lots going on, some of it not very summery.

But I love this time of year, Daylight Savings Day especially -- now that it's all dark in the mornings, I load up my Discman and go for walks which should really be runs in the morning, just me and 15 rabbits and whatever flava is in my ear. Of course I haven't gone yet, just thinking about it. Thinking about it more every time I see myself in a mirror, with my 15 pounds I don't need and my hangdog expression etc.

But, in good news, my great friend Lauri has had her baby -- no more waiting around for "the perfect guy" to come along, we got Science! -- and my kids are awesome and I get to stay home with them today, which fortune I will hopefully not ruin by obsessively checking baseball scores now that the season has begun (is it just me or is it wrong when Mark Loretta and Scott Podsednik are putting up monster stats next to Albert Pujols and Sammy Sosa? I know, I know, it's just one day, but still), and the world keeps spinning round, and I'm much better off than 99% of the people in the world....

Man I'm glad I'm re-starting therapy next week. And I'm glad of the new Dani Siciliano, and most of the new DJ Kane, and of the three or four people who read this stuff. Which means you.

P.S. You KNOW you're big pimpin' when you can take some time off your blog and people, like, volunteer to keep it up for you.

2.4.04

Blogger Is Second Largest Latino Employer in the Bronx

jajajajajajaja!