My co-worker Tom has died of brain cancer. He was a really great person who lived an exemplary life. Many times, he could have fled this tiny roller-coaster of a company to go get big bucks somewhere, but he stayed out of loyalty and because he loved this place and the work we do. That was all more important to him than glory or flashiness.

You all know really great people who are like this. Please find those people RIGHT NOW and thank them for being who they are, while you still have the chance. Love and honor and respect are all we have.

I Call My Baby Pussycat

Actually, I don't. She'd punch me. I also can't admit that I think Teresa Heinz Kerry is hotter than Cate Edwards, either. That's the way it goes.

Me on Pastor Troy in PopMatters. If I was O-Dub I'd get dissed on Troy's next record.

I had a little bit of an emotional breakdown here at work today, but fortunately I was able to vent at the person I know who least needs it. So that was good strategy. Pretty amazing when your boss is also your friend. I'm better now, and was also helped by a steady diet of P.Funk and a great email from a high school friend to whom I hadn't talked in 15 years. She's still cool as hell. She's a librarian.

Is J-Chizzy being unfair to Barack Obama? Or is he so on the money that we should call him Salmon P. Chase? You decide.  I think he's a little unfair, myself. J wants everyone to burn with the holy fire of revolution; I am more Democrat than Marxist right now. Bush did that.

Chauncey is coldbloodedly SLAUGHTERING the NBA off-season. Witness.

"...don't patronise us, we know better than you who is great and who is not at the club, and we'll be the judge of how great you are, not you. Okay son? All we want you to say is 'I'm going to run till I drop in every game. I'm going to sweat blood for the club. I will not rest until I have helped this club succeed.' And look like you mean it. Every one of us on the terraces would say that and we wouldn't need 50k a week to make us look like we meant it." I heart John Nicholson so much.

A Need for Punks in Science. (Link courtesy of the great Mark Desro.)

What does it mean when a website asks for contributors, and you write to them, and they never write back? Does it mean "Don't try it, boyo"? Does it mean "We're too busy"? Or is it a sign from the Universe that dammit Matty old bean you do not need to be writing for any more damned websites than you do already, the contrary is true actually, deal with it? Either way, if they get back to me I'll let you know.

bailalo como tu quieras

Brilliance.

Idiocy.

Pseudo-brilliance, although the author seems to have fallen asleep towards the end.

A Fan's Notes. (SF-J on Dizzee: "Could probably rhyme over Joe Lieberman's haircut and wreck shit." Man.)

Terrifying. My boy Hought-diggity in Brooklyn told me about this yesterday. WTF to the bazoomillionth power. How come we don't know this stuff? WHY DOESN'T AMERICA KNOW THIS????!!!!!

ska voovie boobie baby

which is probably right now the greatest single ever made, Inspector bringing the Mexican Ska Insanity like no one else, incredibly sexist silly video, Big Javi singing sweetly and growling out some toastmaster jive, oh man

Julianne: you own this narrow world.

Although I'm happy for Brazil in re: Copa America campeonidad, I was so psyched for Argentina's goal, and so shocked when Adriano equalized in stoppage time (although he's been their ace all through the tournament, so maybe not shocked so much, but Argentina was bringing mad heat the whole game so it was actually kinda surprising that Brazil got a shot at all). Then to lose it because Julio Cesar is a wizzard in goal and when Heintze beckhammed the pelota up into space--oh, hell, I know you don't care. Fun game to watch though; Sammy and I got to check the whole second half because the girls went to Target.

Caleb was always the guy we could count on to have read the books we were supposed to have read.

Kind of about that: Liza and I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 this weekend. I just want to publicly scold all liberals who feel the need to distance themselves from what are, supposedly, Michael Moore's "tactics." Have you people never seen Year of the Pig? Weekend? The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie? Okay, so Moore is neither Godard nor fit to carry Bunuel's piss in a bucket, but still, y'all, seriously: stop treating him like he's some kind of Fox Pundit In A Liberal's Suit. He's a filmmaker. He's allowed to manipulate his audience, to present one side of things, to influence people to his way of thinking. The only thing that tsk-tsking him accomplishes is to once again place ourselves in that famous lefty "we enjoy being in the one-down position" position. It's the Hour of the Wolfowitz, anything that is savage and bold and angry needs to happen now. Do I wish Moore was more fair-handed and even-keel and blanded-out and self-effacing? I do the hell NOT; that's what the rest of us are busy doing, in a stupid move for acceptance by those who we secretly feel we're better than: the undecided middle. Well, I sincerely think that those people want Democrats to fight just as hard for their hearts and minds and guts as the Republicans do. And I sincerely think that we have more to offer undecided folks than the other side does. (Plus nobody else is talking about the racial implications of all this the way Moore does, and there ARE implications, and by ignoring that like it's all over we're being morans.) So yeah: great movie (with good cameo by Madison's own only-out-lesbian-in-Congress Tammy Baldwin, soon coming to your TV as a DNC speaker), no worries on my end about someone actually taking a stand, be proud of what you believe no matter what side you're on. I'd love it if I knew that there were any dyed-in-the-blood-of-the-lamb conservatives out there reading this (hi mom!), but I fear that there really aren't any.

Except this is the wrong way to do that.

Man, against all odds, this newest Los Amigos Invisibles album is pretty danged good.

A Tonga da Mironga do Kabulete...or not

ALPHA     Well, my prediction about the dangerousness of Uruguay came true; they tied Brazil in their semifinal game, but Brazil came through with the penalty kicks 5-3, so the final is set for Sunday: Brazil, my favorite country in the world, vs. Argentina, a country I've come to have a great (if distant) sympathy for, considering my favorite writer (Cortazar) and my favorite band (Bersuit) are from there, and that they've been having a tough time lately. So I don't know who to root for. But it doesn't matter, as my wife's birthday is Sunday, so I probably will not be watching the final game on Univision.

BETA     If you do prayers or magical thinking or good thoughts or any of that stuff, please direct them to my co-worker Tom, who we just found out this week has a brain tumor. We've already lost another co-worker to cancer last year, and another guy killed himself at work a couple of years ago. We're starting to feel a little cursed.

GAMMA     I'm thinking of giving up reviewing. (See DELTA.)

DELTA      I'm thinking of trying again to actually be a writer. (See GAMMA.)Watch this space for details.

WHATEVER COMES NEXT     hmm. interesting.

sweat, rain, mexican techno

1.  Okay what the holy hell. What exactly happened here? Why does Portland continue to break my heart, basketball-wise? (In other regards, not so much.) I'm guessing that the Rose Garden is built on a Native American burial ground.

2.  Busted! It's a real-life Notting Hill adventure. HG's inamorata is the British ex-wife of one of India's top cricketers. She doesn't look very Indian.

3.  Um, duh. I guess now is a good time to reaffirm that I am vegan (although I cheat sometimes), definitely vegetarian, and that people who accuse PETA of being wild-eyed fanatics and/or Nazis and/or 'taking away our rights' are, themselves, being assholes and scoring convenience points at the expense of their karma. Sorry if this means you. If you want to eat meat, just eat it and stop complaining about the people who want you to examine that impulse; you've got 90% of everything on your side anyway.

4.  A lot of people were waiting for this, I guess, and that's the way the game is played; you talk shit, you get shit in return. It would have been better if things had remained literary, but c'est le guerre; apparently, the Revenge store was out of horse-whips and duelling pistols. Watch someone get shot out of this ish.

5.  Did you see Juan Pablo Sorin's header for the third goal in this game? Probably not, but it was wicked. Looks to me like it's going to be Argentina vs. Brasil in the final for the Copa America, but Uruguay could surprise if Brasil lets down. The games are being shown on Univision, which I get, and Telefutura, which I don't. I love S.A. futbol, much more physical, fewer flops*, mad skills.

*Although that first goal in that last Brasilian game should never have been allowed, that was puro mierde de vaca.

6.  I get it, people, and will comply: No more poetry.

7.  Oh, and ew.

100 Words About the Zen Blues
 
Got the Zen Blues baby
This monastery is congenitally unfriendly
My ass hurts from inadequate pillowing
Ain't had nothing but broth for four days
Dave says I'm close to a breakthrough
Dave's in for a breakthrough if he doesn't shut up.
 
Man the bottom's gonna fall out of my bucket
But I ain't gonna learn nothing new, no one does;
Only learn the mirror language
Where you parrot the master
Learn it well enough he won't kick yr ass in.
 
One of these days I will grab that stick and
teach some lessons of my own.
Until then, count breaths.

Okay, um, no one to blame for this one but myself. 

I am a little blurry here. But this is pretty much me. Photo by Liza. 

but ONLY if your fiance activates

Here is the Google translation of "Dale,  Don, Dale," by Don Omar, who was recently voted "El Rey del Reggaeton" by a newspaper in Puerto Rico. I have to go get his new live double album immediately, if but just for the nine-minute salsa medley and for lyrics like this. I should have paid more attention in Spanish II.

"Gocho! Don, Don! (M-v-p) Dale Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves the Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to which Boster slips dale, dale Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to that one slips (Boster, dale) I it cogo maquina Pá to pillar it in a corner Like rum, that fine Tremendous assassin combs itself and guilla gets dressed and Traquila is made up, chiquilla Or feel to you in my chair Today your you are going to be mia the Don Safe you desafia in my via Cuidao if she throws to you and if your fiancè activates I I activate guerilla and if the Boster you pilla is not going to give nor cosquilla to him Dale Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to that slips Boster dale, daleee Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to the one that one slips (Boster, dale) They say, mami to me, that tonight your these algarete (Dale, papi, that toy loose like gabete) They walk to you hunting the Boster and mozalbetes (That is thrown, that toy loose like gabete) Darte is a row of prattling pá fuete (That gets ready, that toy loose like gabete) Then tirate well loose, like gabete (Dale, Omar, that toy loose as gabete!){bis } I am his cat She is my cat in fervor Wants to look for rebuleo of the good one Wants to pretend that it does not like the blin-blineo and when song until down with my perreo By ahi walks its fiancè in a fantameo verda? that tonight it goes to have a Dile shooting that I walk with my cat in the patrulleo (and to which lamba, jurao me I take it) Dale Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves the Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to which Boster slips dale, daleee Dale, Don, dale Pá that moves Yale Pá to activate the abnormal ones and to that one slips (Looney Tunes, dale) They say, mami to me, that tonight your these algarete (Dale, papi, that toy loose like gabete) They walk to you hunting the Boster and mozalbetes (That is thrown, that toy loose like gabete) Darte is a row of prattling pá fuete (That gets ready, that I am loose like gabete) Then tirate well loose, like gabete (Dale, Omar, that toy loose like gabete!)X2 Looney Tunes! Cheka! And Noriega! M-v-p! Nobody is no pá, pa '! Nobody is no pá, pa '! Don! (Omar)"

Oh, and I just got an instant message from Ethan a.k.a. Trife a.k.a. Plum Drank. He was bored in a museum in Italy. He wanted me to tell everybody he's aight. He also says that Maroon 5 and Eamon are bigger over there right now than Beenie Man.

nuevo:

item! This design.

item! Many links.

item! Really good CDs by Afroman, Heart, Angie Stone, Beenie Man, and Gustavo Cerati. (Well, okay, Siempre Es Hoy is two years old, but it's new to me.)

item! My attitude.

some truth-based things

I want poetry
I want sun and rain and truth
I am that cloud, THERE

The dishes aren't going to wash themselves, obviously; I've tried it, and nope. So I dig in: new pink sponge, new environmentally friendly dish soap, CrazySexyCool on the box, baseball highlights on the portable TV, I am the king of my scene. It is six-thirty a.m. I was married 12 years ago today.

every dish stacked
on the drying towel so--
evaporation

It's a strange morning of a strange day: Monday so back to work, L. starting a new class this morning, had friends to see (what up 'Nardo) and lots of events this weekend (the Blitzkrieg went well, I liked my play but I knew it would be confusing, turns out it was. My brother: "It's not like it tanked" or anything...."), exhausted, emotionally wrought, wanting more and better and warmer and calmer and less predictable and more predictable and happier and weirder and more normal and everything all at once on an organic cracker. With some hot sauce but without the digestive effects. Story of my life et cetera.

Shut off the water
Shut off the thinking as well.
Just dry dishes, eyes

I have been up a lot late thinking about these things, thinking, grinding what I like to think of as 'the facts' all up against each other like stones in a bird's stomach, like stones in my passway, like a giant making bread out of an englishman. I am chasing things that do not exist, the way I've always done--the problem now, of course, is that my pursuit is taking me away from more important quests, ones that I had pledged to myself longer ago than the phantom ones I've come to believe. I've been chasing waterfalls rather than the rivers and the lakes I am used to.

take care with this glass
it meant something to someone.
you may be someone.

I shut off the water and put down the sponge and grab my head to keep the thoughts on track. I suppress a howl and then wonder why, and then wonder further why I even needed to howl in the first place. "What is so wrong?" everyone always used to ask me, "You have everything!" I didn't. But I did. But I didn't. But I did. But I don't. But I do. I do. Twelve years ago I said "I do." THAT is important. I have two children. That is what is important.

prismatic effect
sunlight through the faucet spray
rainbow in the sink

I will never win the Nobel Prize for Literature after all. I will not be the greatest music critic of my generation, nor its greatest playwright, nor even one of the 'best young poets'--I'm 38 for god's sake. My brilliant career will be as father, as husband, as friend, as brother, as son. I will always wash my own dishes, and the dishes of my people; I will accomplish the small things that will help my kids to achieve great ones, if they want to; I will be happy again, fun again, myself again. I pick up the sponge and get busy.

all the dishes clean
my work is done here what what
time to have a beer

listen, partner, I ain't no cheap thrill

a. Very sad news about the great Syreeta Wright. The woman co-wrote "Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours."

b. Here's what I'm doing Friday night. I've done it before, it's really fun but it's really hard work. Wish me luck.

c. Me, writing about Petey Pablo in PopMatters.

d. Me on Velvet Revolver and Ozomatli in Music-critic. I guess I really liked that Ozo album more than I thought I would!

e. My nominations for a new National Anthem on TFM.

f. It occurs to me that without my children I just disappear. It's like I don't exist, like there's no me anymore. This interests me.

good old raisins and peanuts

things of interest at the Madison Mallards game last Friday night:

1. The $3 veggieburgers
2. The organist (provided, as were my tickets, by Music-critic.com) busting out with not only the opening riff to "Blister in the Sun"--to which people were supposed to do the double double-clap but most didn't except me and my kids--but also a Miles Davis tune which I'll put here when I figure out what it was
3. The smart-ass announcer busting on dudes from the other team who walked back to their dugout after striking out: "Left, right, left, right, siddown!"
4. The $1.50 bags of peanuts, better value than the $2.00 bags of popcorn
5. Sammy getting bored in the 1st inning
6. The triple-mascot effect, esp. when Millie Mallard came and sat behind me and made fun of me
7. The smell of a real live baseball game still having as strong an effect on me as it ever did
8. The free Quench gum being given away
9. The anger of the crowd when the designated hitter from the Waterloo (IA) team failed to strike out, thereby denying them half-price beer for the rest of the inning
10. Emma getting all excited when a song she knew was played for pre-AB music
11. The rarity of #10 happening, most of it was boomer classic-radio greatest hits stuff
12. The "name this tune for free stuff" song was "Time" by Pink Floyd, a lot of crowd people knew the band but not the song, the m.c. was all like 'I can't believe you people don't know this' but does anyone really know the name of that song off the top of his/her head?
13. The serenity of the exhausted drive home

killin' it

a. Dave Queen about Fleetwood Mac. There is no better music writer in the world right now.

b. Nate Patrin about the Beastie Boys. This review might be unfair but I have no problem with that, nor inclination to do my own research.

c. OMG WTF, a triple for Seattle Weekly: Matos' book about Prince's Sign 'O' the Times should become the new primer for how to write about music, and oneself, and the world. Despite one or two minor quibbles with it (hard to know whether MM is talking about himself as a kid or as an adult sometimes, present tense is a sexy m.f.), I'm totally proud to know him and to occasionally get yelled at on the phone by him, and to get reviews ruthlessly brutally copy-edited by him.

d. Mark Cuban's weblog. Okay, so dude isn't gonna trade Dirk after all. Don't say he will or he'll call you a girl.

e. The new Heart album. It's like Diane Warren never happened.

f. Ivan "Pudge" Rodriguez, who just hit .500 for the entire month of June. I predicted before the season started that the Tigers would place third and that Pudge would get selected AL MVP. Watch Vlad hit a slump, I'll be proven right. But Jeter over Carlos Guillen for All-Star SS is a damned travesty, y'all. Plus Guillen is cuter, Jeter looks like Lance Bass.

g. Although I no longer link to her because she doesn't know who the eff I am and I'm trying to only link to those who link to this decidedly third-tier weblog, the stuff written up by Challenger's bass player is so very good that I read it all the time anyway. She's the cool best friend that I cannot have...only one person can have that.