sic transit gloria.

"is that Latin?"

Sunday, November 27, 2005

dear blog,


i am an ass. i'm every bit as guitly as those people who leave their dogs in the car without rolled-down windows.

it's true, i've been neglecting you. but before you get your panties or boy shorts or hot pants or whatever's hot on the streets these days in a twist, allow me to explain.

"you don't tell me where you go at night," you say. er, to bed early.

"i don't know what you ate for lunch yesterday." egg salad sandwich.

"i don't know what you're listening to these days." um, jon gake and dios malos and wolf parade. oh, and the clientele.

"i...i just don't fucking know you anymore," you say, fighting back tears.

listen. i know it seems that i've been avoiding you. but i can change. i'm trying my best. hell, i don't even know if this is worth a damn but i've even made a list of things with which to update you when i'm not busy with work, slumber, and grad school stuff. like when that italian supermodel (read: scam artist extraordinaire, danilo ripa) stopped me in hollywood and convinced me to give him 150 bucks and on top of that, tried to get me to buy him an 800.00 luis vitton bag for his fiance whom he cheated on with a latina he brought home from the stock exchange club downtown. fucking nuts, i know. this guy's account is essentially identical to mine. i'm an idiot.

i also want to tell you about this girl at work. most definitely a public apple eater. miss-i-have-perfect-posture-and-eat-only-organic-vegetarian-meals-and-am-so-much-better -than-thou. i don't know what the rest of her day is like, but i'll bet that she goes to the bikram yoga studio down the street, picks up groceries at whole foods, heads back to her silverlake condo where she'll unwind with tivo'd episodes of grey's anatomy, waiting for her motorcycle-riding law-student boyfriend to come home from the library so they can fuck to zap mama or ladysmith black mambazo or pink martini or whatever else is on their tantric sex mixtape. i'm just sayin.

there's so much more i need to tell you, but i have laundry to do. (just got a bunch of threadless t-shirts in the mail and am very excited about them.) blog, you've been good to me. i will try to do the same for you.

paz.

Friday, November 18, 2005

"mr. tony, do you like scary movies?"

asks lily, a wide-eyed curly-haired first grader who does karate kicks and jumps off benches.

"not so much, they give me nightmares," which is half true.

"i LOVE scary movies," she volunteers.

"then you are one brave kid."

"have you seen the one where the girl pees on the floor and her mommy puts her face in the pee?"

"no," i shake my head and repress the urge to ask her the title of this film so i can imdb it when i get home. "but have you seen the sponge bob movie?"

her unyielding enthusiasm in telling me about this movie renders her immune from the redirection tactic, which works ninety-nine percent of the time. "and then the girl throws up and another girl has sex with a god and then the girl's head is sliced off and purple snakes crawl out?" she acts out the beheading for me.

i say nothing, wearing an expression that is a mixture of bewilderment and defeat. she looks at me, grinning ear to ear and wondering why this grown-up has nothing to say after being told the plot of what is clearly, to her, the greatest movie in the world.

the bell rings and lily says "bye mr. tony!", does a jump kick, then gallops away. "have a good weekend," i call back, making a mental note to not ask her come monday if she saw harry potter and the goblet of fire.


Saturday, November 05, 2005

i love it when you read to me,


and you can read me anything.

i've been in a writing slump. it eludes me why i even have readers. here are five snapshots from the mess in my brain.

i awoke in the middle of the night with stephen merritt's "the book of love" in my head. why this happened, i have no clue; i don't remember what i was dreaming, nor do i recall when i last heard this song. i sat up, gave it a listen, then retreated back under the covers.


speaking of love, i've rekindled relationships with two past loves. the first one being with turkey sandwiches, the second with snood. concerning the former, i simply seemed to forget how great they are. more than anything snood reminds me of my second year of college, when at any godawful hour of the night i'd stroll a few rooms over to play snood at tracey's desk for hours while she and cindy were sleeping or not studying. everytime i'd look at the snood hall of fame on her computer with envy and say, "what if i delete your high scores?" to which she'd reply matter-of-factly, "then i'll punch you in the face." this is the closest i've ever been to having been punched in the face. cliff, if you're reading, just know that i heard about that high school kid punching you in the face. if i were there i would have definitely backed you up, but i don't promise that my 14-year-old-girl frame wouldn't elicit a 'are you fucking kidding me, daawg?!' from said thugs.

yesterday i came up with my halloween costume. it's not clever at all, and that coupled with the fact that i came up with it 5 days after the day for which it's intended reveals the uncreative state i've been in. the easiest-yet-most-creative costume award goes to my brother, who was a grad student hit by a car. all you need is a bike helmet plaid shirt and khakis with a rolled up pant leg and a neon velcro ankle reflector and fake blood. when he was at stanford he actually did get hit off of his bike by a car; he somehow managed to jump off his bike and land on his feet and was okay for the most part. anyway all i could come up with was sherlock holmes. that way at parties i could smoke pipe tobacco and someone would tell me to do that outside and i'd say no, because i'm sherlock holmes and it's part of the fucking costume, motherfucker.



i saw squid and the whale and enjoyed it quite a bit. jeff daniels does his best impression of bill-murray-as-delusional-self-absorbed-daddy. my favorite part of the movie is when his son and his son's girlfriend invite him to watch short circuit ("johnny 5 is alive!"), but he recommends blue velvet and they end up watching that instead.



i finally started work and the oki dog on fairfax is right across the street. perfect for the half-hour lunch break. i have to be up somewhat early, which means that i have to go to bed 5 hours earlier than i'm used to. so i hop into bed at around 1 or 2 and listen to david sedaris on this american life until i fall asleep. my all-time favorite has to be music lessons.