I went to the Cleveland Auto Show today and checked out what is going on the in the world of automobiles. Boy was it a zoo. I don’t like crowds that consist of myriad groups of people all going in different directions with attentions not necessarily directed in the direction they are directing themselves, all moving at different speeds. Especially when I want to walk slowly and look at things. Saw a couple of cool things, including a V-16 1000hp batmobile looking thing called the Cadillac 16. Apparently they run about $300k and are special order items only. They probably only get 5 miles to the gallon as well. The car I liked best is a Saturn concept called Curve, which I think, is due to be released next year. It is quite sharp looking and around $20k, or so rumor has it. I saw a Volkswagon Phaeton [a sweet name that I am glad has been brought back, even if by a foreign car company]. It was a $104k Volkswagon though, which was incongruous to say the least.

Then I went downstairs to where the classic cars were. One of the first I saw was a 1961 Corvette Convertible, one year younger than my dream Corvette, but in almost all other ways identical. There was also a sweet, Auburn Boattail and even a Hudson. I think one of the reasons I like well maintained and restored classic automobiles is that each one is a testament to the love and dedication their owners have for these works of art. Each car has its own story and they are all so much different than the cookie-cutter autos of today’s manufacture, that I can’t help but be drawn to them.

Here are some pictures:

I really like this redesign. Although for whatever reason, IE doesn’t like parsing it like a normal browser should. That is why there is an uncoded break between the flame banner and the div containing all the text. for whatever reason as well, though the images are the same width as the div, the layer appears to be one or two pixels longer. Only in IE that i have seen however. The site looks perfect in Firefox.

Something happened last night that scared the tar out of me and pissed me off at myself to no end. I uploaded the redesigned pages and when I ran the rebuild in MT, some miscoding on my part started to eat my archives. I thought I had lost a full year of entries. I checked 5 or so random individual archive files and they all looked the same. the master archive index also linked to all dead files. thankfully i was saved by my daily entry archives, which i have never linked to but exist nonetheless. once i calmed down and realized this, all was well and i got some sleep. i’m always going to backup my archives before this. MT has recommended it, but i never really listened. this call was too close for me not to respect the instructions in the future.

I once spent an entire day driving a penguin around New York City. I didn’t exactly ask to do this but I’ve been paid to do stranger things. My boss was a six foot four inch Samoan with a chipped incisor and permanently affixed antique aviator glasses. I was only allowed to call him Mr. McFitz. I knew that wasn’t his real name but he didn’t pay me to ask questions. What he paid me for was precise and accurate delivery of whatever was in the boxes that I loaded onto my rental truck.

One day after I had the truck pretty much full, McFitz [as I called him to myself] brought me my delivery route. He had this penguin behind him too. It was a strange penguin, didn’t really look like it was in a tuxedo, didn’t look particularly interested in anything either. It shat on the floor as I watched. McFitz said to me:

Take my penguin with you today. Give it whatever it wants.

Sure thing, Mr. McFitz.

I replied. I picked up the penguin, which smelled like fish for some reason, and buckled him in the passenger seat.

My first stop was the City Cricketstocker. The penguin didn’t do much on the way there, just looked at me out of its little eyes and shat again, this time on the seat. I thought it might be a little warm for the critter, even though it was winter, so I turned rolled down the windows and turned on the air conditioning. I got some paper towel from the guys at the Knick to clean up the penguin shit in my truck. When I came back out, the penguin has somehow managed to unbuckle itself and was waddling around on the floor near the gearshift. It had also shat again, this time on my delivery notebook. I could tell this wasn’t going to be the best of days.

I hopped back into the truck, picked up the penguin and was promptly bitten. I figured it must be time for the penguin to eat so I got back out of the truck and went into a bodega for a tin of sardines or some anchovies or even lox if the place was kosher. I ended up getting all three, but by now I was way behind schedule. I was going to have to pick up my pace. Damn penguin. I opened the can of sardines and chucked it over to where the penguin was supposed to be. I said ’supposed to be’ because the penguin wasn’t there. Shit. No, really, there was just a larger pile of penguin shit in the passenger seat. The penguin was sitting on the dashboard right behind the steering wheel and was staring at me.

I picked it up again, got pecked again, plopped it unceremoniously in its own penguin poo and took off for a place that specialized in jerked chicken and black market golf equipment. The penguin ate its sardines, quite sullenly I might add, and behaved itself.

When I came out of Ludwig’s Hole-In-One Jamaican Food, a short and fat and old Hispanic lady was peering intently at my penguin. For the record, I’d like to say that the penguin was peering just as intently at the old woman.

How much for el pollo?

Apparently she thought the penguin was for sale and thought it was some sort of chicken. The truck gave a lurch and rolled over the woman. I looked in the driver’s side window and saw that the penguin had released the hand brake. It was now firmly positioned behind the steering wheel and it gave me a look that said ‘Get in the passenger side or get lost.’ I clambered in on the passenger side, got penguin shit on my hand and was forced to sit in the poo that I had put my captor in not long before. I noticed that it had the imprints of two webbed feet right before I squished down on it.

The penguin took off, going the wrong way down The Avenue of the Americas, barreling toward Chinatown. We knocked over everything in our way. I still don’t know how many people we ran down, how many street vendors will vend no more. It was terrible. When we got to Canal Street I lost consciousness.

Two minutes later my alarm went off.

Within the last week I have been in conversation with three different people, at different times, on the same topic. I say things that hurt the feelings of my friends and family and, apparently, I do it pretty often. There was no hesitation on the part of two of these people in saying so, once I brought it up. I have known that I put my foot in my mouth and say the wrong thing on a regular basis for years, but I didn’t realize I hurt so many people that I care about. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, so I don’t know why I get so mouthy. Maybe I do want to hurt people and just hide it from myself. It seems like I come at life from a negative point of view, always dissatisfied. I need to understand why I am like this. Does my dissatisfaction arise as the result of being taught to accept only the highest quality of work and behavior from myself? Did I pick up my ease at verbal abuse from being yelled at by my father? How can I exist in both of these paradigms simultaneously and without apparent complication? More importantly, how is it that I have friends who put up with my shit? They are some damn good people. I was looking through my first posts from two years ago and it doesn’t look like I have changed very much. I thought I had gone through some personal growth, but fundamentally I remain a grouchy, hurtful person. Even this post is indicative of my problem. I need to figure out how to change, how to make my happy, gentle and easygoing side my basis instead of what I struggle for. First off I am going to have to stop teasing people and only be frank when people ask me my opinion. I need to learn to keep my mouth shut. I’ll add that to my list of things to work on.

Mardi Gras is over and now that Lent begins it is time to repent for all the crass, vulgar, indulgent and legion other sinful things that I have done since last Lent. I wonder if forty days is long enough. More than the long stretch of Ordinary Time during the summer, more even than Advent and, masochistic as it sounds, I like Lent. It is a time for sackcloth and ashes, recognizing mortality and attempts to whittle away at imperfection. Since I tend to spend most of the year in a state similar to this, Lent is a natural favorite. So, I am supposed to sacrifice something for the forty days and I am supposed to strive to improve something. This is supposed to make me a better person, and what it boils down to is discipline. If I have the grit to hold on to what I am working on and the gumption to deny myself some sort of pleasure then I should end up stronger. [possibly more annoying to people, but that is there problem].

This Lent I am giving up sweetmeats, candies, pastries [not muffins though] and most importantly, chocolate. If I want something sweet, fruit will do. I am going to improve my patience [especially while driving], which has been in relative short supply since my time in NYC] and to admit when I am wrong, or ignorant on some topic. [this will be hard because I never know what I am talking about].

So I’m walking around today with a smudge mark on my head. Someone told me I look like I’ve been punched. I’m also fasting. No meat. I had a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast and will have macaroni and cheese for dinner. I might put some tuna and some veggies into the macaroni as well. Even though Fish on Fridays [and Ash Wednesday] was initially started to feed poor fishermen, I feel that it is useful still. Now it is another sacrifice that is a reminder of the sacrifice that Lent culminates in.

Many of the people bitching about The Passion of the Christ, which opens today, complain that it is violent or anti-Semitic or historically inaccurate or blah blah blah. Well, it is supposed to be violent, it is about the arrest, torture and crucifixion of a person. As for anti-Semitism, there might be subtleties that I am unaware of [not having seen the film] but people who complain that it makes the Jews seem responsible for killing Jesus are fools. Jews and Romans or Romans and Jews if you don’t like the order of the billing, were there. The type of people that killed Jesus isn’t the point, that people killed Jesus is the point. The fact that it opens on Ash Wednesday, when the Church enters a time of repentence and recognition of mortality [Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return] is no coincidence. Humans suffer and die. Jesus, a human, suffered and died. Other humans did this to him. I was taught that Jesus went through the torture and indignity and crucifixion willingly, for humanity. I really have no desire to see The Passion of the Christ, I have not seen any Mel Gibson interviews [since I don't have cable] but I think the point of his film is to make us aware just how much was sacrificed. I don’t talk about religion often because it makes me sounds like a fanatic instead of just a lunatic. If you are still with me I am surprised.

Hollywood Video has this great coupon gizmo going on where you can rent up to three new releases for the full five days at 99 cents each. last night i rented In the Cut, Lost in Translation, and Solaris for 5 days and a measly $3.21. without this wonderful coupon [a pile of which i have at my apartment] renting one of these films would have cost me $3.79 plus tax. adding to this coolness is the fact that if i get In the Cut back to Hollywood Video before midnight tonight [actually i returned it this morning] i gain $1 dollar of credit on my next purchase. this might not sound like hot shit to some of you, but when you are poor and like to watch as many movies as i do then it is ver’ ver’ nice.

In the Cut is only the second Jane Campion film I have seen [the first one being The Piano]. I liked the feminism of The Piano, but not of In the Cut. Every man seemed a rapist, every look directed toward Meg Ryan was a violation. It is hard to tell if any man is a good man until the very end. I’d have to watch The Piano and In the Cut again, and next to each other to tell for sure, but I think Campion might just be rehashing the same old thing again and again. [I think she had it right in The Piano except for the very end of the film.]

It seems like only men care about looking in In the Cut. Meg Ryan and Jennifer Jason Leigh only seem to care about ‘getting a dick inside [them].’ The camera makes both male and female bodies into beautiful things. In fact, the camera makes everything it sees into a beautiful thing. I’ve got no complaints in that respect. Campion knows how to pick her people. There is a lot of hand held, long lens, shallow depth of field, blurred focus stuff going on that I think is supposed to reflect the uncertainty of the thriller genre. But for me it also seems to say, ‘I don’t know how to answer the questions I’m asking.’ Of course, Campion’s point could be that the questions can’t be answered.

As a thriller [they don't do much for me] it reminded me of any Scooby Doo episode. The villain could be any of several characters and ends up being one you never really expected. It was well done in the sense that I never knew who it could be until I found out who it was. Its worth a watch, if just for how pretty it is to look at. I’d like to talk it over with my film theory professor. I might send her an email asking if she has seen it. Kevin Bacon is in the film too.

Tonight I watch Solaris.

I love language because it is a code; because it is so malleable. I love watching young people pick it up and turn it into their own code. My Classical Greek professor once said that babes and children create and change language more than adults. I suppose this is because children are still being indoctrinated, don’t know all the rules, make their own. His example was caca, a baby word for shit. Once children becomes expert enough working within the language, I suppose they start working within the code, changing its periphery instead of its nexus.

Where I am now, as a relative adult, I can love language because within this code others can be created, codified, destroyed, reinvented. Simile and metaphor are perhaps the most basic of codes within The Code. Puns, riddles, double entendres - these are, perhaps, the second level of speciation? If I am in a conversation with two people, I can speak one sentence that has vastly different meanings to each person. Or, at least, I can do it if I am sufficiently skilled in creating these codes.

This breaks down when a code is misinterpreted [always a threat] or when a code is only understood by the person creating it. Skill level comes in when a code is created and disseminated. The skill is teaching others how to read the code. Communication is an art, and Art is communication. blah blah blah.

Poetry, painting, sculpture, these are art forms that to a great extent have become estranged from general society because their code is no longer accessible. Or, perhaps, it was not accessible for so long that most people lost interest in it. or maybe its just TV. yeah that sounds fine.

to die:

1. see: to live.
2. a process that results in death. Also, dying.
3. often misused in place of dead. Example: He died. Instead of He is dead. This is like saying He lived. It is obvious and therefore needless. He is alive is much better. see also: When You Die, You’re Dead. This usage is similar to the use of balding. A thing is either bald or not bald. The process of balding takes so long as to be meaningless.[NB]

death:

1. The liminal state between dying and dead.
2. The last instant of life. [Assuming dead is not a state of being.]
3. The first instant of being dead. [Assuming dead is a state of being.]

dead:

1. No longer alive.
2. An objective state [only to those alive] in reference to the body of someone who who has finished dying and experienced death.
3. A subjective state [only to those alive] in reference to the sentience/consciousness/soul of someone who has finished dying and experienced death.
4. An objective state [only to those dead] in reference to their body. [Assuming dead is a state of being].
5. A subjective state [only to those dead] in reference to the sentience/consciousness/soul. [Assuming dead is a state of being].
6. A meaningless word.
7. A word with too many meanings.

Jack was the last one in the office. As usual, as soon as the door cut off the view of Ms. Cramer’s mini-skirted backside, a stream of muttered expletives issued from around the cigarette in his mouth. Too many distractions. Jack spun in his chair and glared out the window at the lone streetlight illuminating the parking lot. Ms. Cramer walked out to her coupe and then bent over in quite unladylike fashion. It was amazing what an extra half-inch of thigh could do to his imagination.

She is teasing me; always teasing me.

‘Oh, just her keys.’

Ash from the cigarette fell onto his tie. The waspy smell of burned polyester brought Jack’s fist into contact with the mahogany desk. He had to do something about that bitch. That bitch and the goddamn Thompson account. He settled down, but as soon as things became quiet, it began. A tendril of parmesan stench seeped into his cube. A sense of foreboding filled his chest. Then he heard it. Something dripping. From Ms. Cramer’s desk.

Jack approached slowly and then was viciously murdered by an anonymous egg fork.

The next morning Ms. Cramer slipped her stiletto-tipped legs from car to pavement and coyly ran her finger under the edge of her miniskirt and along her fishnetted thighs. She ineffectually tugged it down, and her trollish 5′1″ 325 pound frame was suddenly even more apparent because a falling anvil struck her squarely on the head. A head which exploded like a ripe grape in the mouth of a concubine.

The butler did it.

I think that I am a relatively disciplined and responsible person, but doesn’t that sound lame? I go to bed at 11:30 at night and wake up at 6:45 in the morning. The seven hours and fifteen minutes I give to sleep are necessary for me. I do not like the way I feel when I have not had enough sleep and when I am groggy I am unable to perform to the best of my ability. Last night I was asked if I ever stay up late when I have to work the next day and whether I do this because I care so much about my job. The answer is no, I never stay up later than around eight hours before I need to functional and alert the next day. I don’t do this because I care about my job, I do this because I take pride in doing good work. I have tried to stay true to the idea that if I am unable to do something to the best of my ability then I should not be doing it.

This, I think, is the foundation of my efforts at organization and discipline. The more I control the minutiae of my life, the more fulfilled I feel. I am by no means obsessive-compulsive, I make plenty of messes, I just hate looking at them. I am always fighting procrastination. If I leave dishes in the sink for over an hour after I done eating, I start worrying about it. I don’t like leaving things unfinished. If every job is completed, or at least organized, I feel quite satisfied in leaving it behind and directing my full attention to the next thing that confronts me.

I also worry that without strong discipline, I could lose all control. When I like something I don’t like half measures, I get involved in it. I haven’t and probably won’t ever use drugs and I don’t drink very often because I am afraid of what might happen if I release my discipline. When I seem quite detached with a new person, activity, or whatever, it is because I am judging whether or not this new thing is something that is worth investing some part of my soul in. This method might be a bit strange, but it protects me from myself and from the possible hurt that a hasty decision might result in. A bit selfish I suppose.

As strange as this sounds, my discipline allows me greater freedom, I can now do things spontaneously. If a friend calls, I can typically take off and hang out. Unfortunately, most of my friends around here don’t have jobs and are night owls. I haven’t hung out with them since my new job has started because they aren’t ready to hang out until I am heading to bed. And when I leave someone’s house because I have to go home and get some sleep, I always feel like a loser. Maybe I care too much about coming home to an apartment where everything is pretty much in place, maybe I care too much about making sure I can pay off my debts as quickly as possible, maybe I care too much about doing excellent work, maybe I should relax and not worry so much about responsibility.

I just find it hard to be enthusiastic about what is in front of me if I have other things to do.

I had my first real guitar lesson last night. I feel much more satisfied with this teacher than I ever did taking class lessons at Notre Dame or the few crappy lessons I took in Connersville. Since I can read music [or at least, since I used to be able to read music] we were able to cover four pages of the introduction guitar method book in the half hour. I learned 6 notes and the first three strings of three chords. This first book only covers the top of the fretboard and the subsequent books move down the neck and give a selection of guitar styles so a student can pick up some variety.

I have to buy a guitar case and new strings. I knew both of these but was unable to manage it over the weekend. So tonight I’m going to hitch on over to Guitar Center and spend some cash I don’t have so that my guitar is protected.

I’m glad to be learning something again. Actually, I’m glad to be learning anything. I need to have a constant goal of self-improvement for various reasons; the major one being that I get bored with my life if it only contains the same thing. I hate being bored when I have free time. I have reconciled myself to often being bored whereever I work, but if I don’t have something to do with my free-time I get batty. This is probably why I don’t have cable, as any time I watch the Idiot Box, I get bored out of my gourd. Thus, guitar lessons. I’ll stop rambling now.

If I could have a harem, these are the famous people that it would contain. Non-famous people have been omitted to protect my innocence.

• Judy Greer- She has played mostly small but important roles so far in What Women Want, Adaptation [briefly topless!], and The Wedding Planner. I love me a hot redhead.
• Winona Ryder- I don’t really know what all the big fuss was about when she shoplifted a few years ago. She had stolen my heart long before.
• Fiona Apple- She is some kind of sultry forbidden fruit. I think probably an apple.
• Laetitia Casta- Real Women Have Curves.
• Jennifer Garner- I’d like to engage in some covert operations with this redhead.
• Victoria Beckham- Sure she is married to a soccer-god. She also hasn’t met me.
• Elsa Benitez- I find it difficult to write anything about her because of all the drool that gets on the keyboard.
• Pen?lope Cruz- Tom Cruise needs to find a less attractive beard and free the lovely Pen?lope up for all us wolf-whistlers.
• Scarlett Johansson- In The Man Who Wasn’t There she looks so good it hurts.
• Anna Paquin- Just as hot as Ms. Johansson.
• Ir?ne Jacob- If you haven’t seen Trois couleurs: Rouge, do it tonight.
• Heidi Gluck and Freda Love- 2/3 of Some Girls, Phil gets Juliana Hatfield, but she doesn’t do it for me anyway.
• Sarah McLachlan- If you have seen the Adia video and the album art for her newest release, I need no justification.
• Ashley Judd- arghlarghlarghlarghlarghl.

The eunuch in charge of these girls would be Dwayne Douglas Johnson [He is gonna end up fat and hairless anyway]. Thank you for your waste of time.

I live in an apartment building in Soviet Russia. The building is drafty and reminds me of my time in a gulag I have never been to. Instead of the smell of steaks in passageways, I tend to be assaulted by the smell of boiling cabbage and raw onions. Languages I hear on a daily basis include, but are not perhaps limited to, Lithuanian, Polish, Hungarian, Russian, and Romanian. Of course the Lithuanian and Romanian might just be Russian with a different dialect. I would feel like Dostoevsky if I were actually writing something interesting. If I had the strange tension between pride and desire - if I asked for an advance on my salary in order to buy a poorly made fur-trimmed cloak in order to impress a certain man and thereby raise my status- if I believed that another kopeck or two is all that stands between me and a life of love and leisure- if I thought that by killing someone as an expression of freedom I could change the world- if I knew that the guilt of any such action would be so crushing that it would destroy me- well then I might get somewhere. No where happy though.

As it is this apartment/compartment building does very little to keep things apart. The walls are thin and smells of cheap cigarettes and sounds of plumbing and words in different languages crawl under my door and curl up around my pallet and sing me to sleep. The line on the flagpole outside sounds like a caveman beating two bones together. It makes me feel uncomfortable, primitive and superstitious. I feel like I am in some sort of experiment in diffusion and osmosis. That one day, I too, will boil cabbage and have raw onions. One day I might beat two bones together merely because I can. Without thought or goal. Stuck in the gulag.

A very long time ago there was a boy named Jerry who had magic. He lived in a brown house in a brown town between a brown river and a snowy grey mountain. No one in the town knew that the Jerry had magic; so he was raised like most boys. When he was hungry he was fed brown bread and butter, when he tore his brown cloak it was patched with patches and when he was dirty he was rinsed off with a brown bucket filled with water from the cold grey well behind his house.

Jerry’s magic was simple and unrefined. A boy’s magic. He could change yellow straw into things that were not yellow straw. Jerry never knew what the straw would become when he changed it, but change it he did.

One day Jerry was watching his family’s flock of woolly brown sheep graze among the first grey rocks of the snowy grey mountain. Autumn was falling and so were the brown leaves on the brown trees at the foot of the snowy grey mountain. He had watched the leaves turn from green to red and to yellow as yellow as straw. Jerry, sitting on a rock and watching the sheep, was turning fresh yellow straw into things. He made a beetle and he made a knife and he made a wooden harp. He had one length of straw left when one of the brown sheep bleated in fright. It was being carried up the grey mountain by a man in a grey cloak and grey boots.

Jerry followed the grey man up the stony mountain and into a black cave. He had left behind the brown town and brown river and was soon very lost. He sat down on the damp cave floor to rest and pulled out the wooden harp. Sadly, he plucked the first string and listened to the brown echoes of the note come back from many directions. He plucked the second string and the note was twice as brown and had twice as many echoes. The third string he plucked was so brown it was black, and there was no echo; a note deep as the earth came rolling back instead. The black note smote Jerry and he stood up. He plucked the third string again and followed the black note into the cave. Each time the deep black echo died, Jerry would pluck the string on his wooden harp and follow it again.

The black echo led him deeper into the mountain until he came up against smooth and seamless stone. Despair overtook him. In the dust on the floor he found a bit of wool. It smelled brown like his sheep. He put the bit of wool into his pocket and found the beetle. Jerry pulled the beetle out of his pocket where it had been sleeping. It stretched its wings and flew out of his hand. Jerry was all alone. Even the sound of the beetle’s wings faded into black. He slept.

Later, he heard the faint wings of the beetle once more. However, this time they were on the other side of the smooth wall. Jerry cried out and hit the wall. It shuddered and opened into a dimly lit room with a brown sheep and a man in grey cloak and boots in the center. Jerry ran toward his sheep but the man held up a grey gloved hand.

‘No,’ the grey said. ‘Ransom.’

Brown brought out the knife and offered it to grey.

‘A weapon is no kind of ransom.’

Brown cut his hand with the knife and offered red to grey.

‘Blood is useless as ransom.’

Brown brought out yellow straw and changed it.

Into to yellow straw.

Grey smiled and took the changed yellow.

‘Your gift is ransom. You may go.’

Jerry grabbed his brown sheep, wrapped it in his brown cloak and left the room. No sooner had he taken a step into the black cave, he saw the exit to the snowy grey mountain. Jerry climbed down toward his brown house in the brown town between the brown river and the snowy grey mountain and the brown sheep went back to grazing. And Jerry could only change yellow into yellow ever after.

Last week, Organic Mechanic began a new series which seeks to explore a variety of the fascinating and controversial figures of the 21st century. Our first interview was with the infamous and rarely-interviewed Captain Spacepants. Today we interview his partner-in-crime of 15 years, Sidekick Suck–master of suckage, controversial performance artist, and author of the phrase “Suck it” which has recently regained popularity in the character of Karen Walker on Will & Grace.

OM: As you know, Sidekick Suck, two weeks ago we at OM were afforded the rare opportunity of interviewing Captain Spacepants. Now, you’ve been Captain Spacepants’ sidekick for 13 years. Is that correct?

SS: Smp smp. Smp smp.

OM: My bad. Looks like we need some new fact-checkers over here at OM. (chuckling) Anyways, in lieu of your 15-year relationship with Captain Spacepants, how did you feel when you found out that Spacepants didn’t mention you even once in the course of his interview?

SS (grimacing): Smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp; smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Was this argument what led to your final falling out and eventual estrangement? Or was it having to live in the shadow of someone with such long-lasting notoriety that did it in?

SS: Smp smp! Smp smp smp: smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp, “Smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp!”

OM: Okay. Well… then let me change the subject.
Now your arch-nemeses are the Committee on Moral Taste which has gone so far as to threaten both of your lives because of your “crimes against human progress.” Spacepants’ goal is more of a general sort, (and I quote) to “make the world more tolerant of those it considers ‘in bad taste.’” Now, as his sidekick, and as a well-respected performance artist as well, your work’s goals are more specific… Given your savant-like talents in the world of sucking, your goal became to “normalize” the world of sexual “deviancy” and to raise awareness about our ever-present mortality by bringing these issues back again and again into the public light, through both your art and your role as sidekick. What kind of opposition have you met against this?

SS: Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Yes, quite similar to that of Mapplethorpe. However, despite your best efforts, your work only seems to raise the hackles on your enemy’s (as well as the general public’s) neck. Might there be a more effective way to tackle the notions of sex and death that would more successfully take away some of their taboo?

SS: Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Intriguing. I suppose I’d never quite thought of it that way.

SS: Smp smp. (grinning)

OM: Now–and I’m sure you were expecting this question at some point–your superheroic talent has to do with the monstrous size of your mouth, correct?

SS: Smp.

OM: I’ve heard that it can expand to a shocking width of some 3 feet and a height of 2.5 feet, a trait that has made you popular with both the ladies (given your 6-foot long tongue and its four extra muscles) and the fellows, but rather unpopular with your enemies.

SS: Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Really? Well, I wonder if you might give us a demonstration. I know our readers at home cannot see what you will be doing, but we can do our best to describe it.

SS: Smp.

Sidekick Suck stands up on his chair. His jaw unlatches and his mouth opens to a remarkable width. His eyes and nose are blotted out like the sun during a solar eclipse. As though his face encircles a blackhole, large objects start to gravitate quickly towards it and he is forced to quickly close it.

OM: Impressive! So I noticed that your jaw unlatches like a snake. But how does the whole suction-thing work?

SS: Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Wow. Just like a blackhole but you can turn the power on and off. Amazing.

SS: Smp smp.

OM: And the digestion process?

SS: Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: This is one of the points of opposition against you, no? The fact that some claim you are a “vigilante,” a “bounty hunter,” taking the law into your own hands and forcing your enemies to suffer horrible deaths?

SS: Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: True.
Now given the way your jaw unlatches like that of a snake and given the Hoover-like power that comes from such a large mouth, rumor has it that this could not possibly be due to a genetic anomaly. That you in fact had your face surgically-altered on your quest for popularity in what first began as performance art but later evolved into quests of a more super-heroic nature. Is this true?

SS (sighing): Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Your mother died while breastfeeding you? My god, what a horrible tragedy. I extend my sympathies to you and your father. What that must’ve been like growing up…

SS: Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: Just a few more questions before you go, as I know you’re on a tight schedule and have a performance piece you are putting on in front of the capitol building in just a couple of hours… You were, in fact, the reason for the resurgence in popularity of the 69 position, correct, after a mishap at one of your performances in the late ’80s?

SS (chuckling): Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp. Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: And your book, How the Ladies Moan: Memoirs of a Ladies’ Man which was on the bestseller list for over two months…

SS: Smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp.

OM: In your memoirs, do you address any rumors about whether you and Captain Spacepants ever shared more than just a “work” relationship, perhaps a torrid romance that led to the dissolution of your superheroic duo? And would you like to discuss this topic a bit more, clear up any rumors that have been circulating, that kind of thing?

SS: Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp. Smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp smp smp smp smp smp smp. Smp smp. Smp.

OM: I knew there had to be some sort of perk to that radioactive green mohawk!

SS and OM share a hearty laugh.

OM: Final question… Inquiring minds would like to know why it is that you only talk in sucking noises. This logically makes very little sense since a) it implies that I (an ignorant, culturally close-minded American) know your language (suck-ese?) and am able to converse with you, b) it makes one wonder why we failed to write in a translator to translate, and c) it seems to be a cheap and desperate attempt to get laughs (which I’m guessing are going to be few and far between nonetheless) .

SS: I don’t know actually. Ask the crazy bitch who concocted this interview. Oops. I mean, smp smp.

This interview was conducted by Miss Lauren Spisak, that crazy bitch over at My Defective Life. The views expressed should have been yours but aren’t since she wrote them first. The interview is under her copyright. It’s just published here.

I spent the weekend working in Medina on Save the Day. I ate much food, talked about the three main on-set topics [films i've worked on/films i've seen, drinking, and sex]. It was a long weekend, 66 scheduled shots, many of them involving fight choreography. I worked as sound assistant for awhile, did some lighting setup, moved a couple of sandbags and tumbling mats, and sat around on my ass eating more food.

I figure that I have only eaten one meal at my apartment in the last two weeks. All else has been provided for me either by working on set, being fed at work, or being fed at my friend’s or my friend’s parent’s house. I hypothesize that if I can keep a steady gig going helping on films that I might not ever have to fix myself something to eat again.

-Addendum-

The location Friday evening was a bit weird as fuck. Imagine, if you can, a room with two player pianos, a couple of ancient armchairs, and every last inch of wall and counter and shelf space covered with taxidermied animal heads and animals, lacquered cow and goat skulls, stuffed boars heads, a rack of weasel furs, a jackalope head, stuffed squirrels, snake skins, tanned hides, fish heads stuffed fish, wasp’s nests, a enormous moose head, an elk head, a gazelle head, several deer heads, skunk pelts, beaver pelts, you name a critter and I bet there was a dead one on the wall.

I went to an advanced screening of the new Viggo Mortensen vehicle, Hidalgo, last evening. The story story centers around Frank Hopkins [Mortensen]; his paint mustang, Hidalgo; and long distance horse racing. Hopkins goes to Arabia to compete in a 3,000 mile Bedouin race across the deserts. A dual review is found below, one praises the movie and one critiques it. There will most likely be spoilers.

I didn’t think it was possible for Hollywood to make movies like Hidalgo anymore. The story itself would not have been out of place anywhere in Classical Hollywood. There was no overt sex, little overt romance, and it was wonderful. I shouldn’t need to be shown a sex scene or even a kiss to know that there is some type of chemistry between two characters. I also shouldn’t need to see a character ready to pork at the first scent of seduction. I like to think that I am a bit smarter than that. The director, Joe Johnston, apparently recognizes that humans have the ability to infer attraction and defer copulation if they apply themselves to it. Thus, I am glad that Hopkins does not shag Lady Davenport [Louise Lombard], nor even kiss Jazira [Zuleikha Robinson]. It would have seemed incongruous studio fiddle-faddle if he had.

The violence is not gore, but of the action-adventure variety. It is entertaining and realistic without being gruesome. It is also not overused. The fight sequences last just long enough to keep a movie about a 3,000 mile horse race from becoming boring.

The raid and rescue sequence at the end of the first third of the movie was probably the best placed subplot/sidequest I have ever seen in a movie. Here I am sitting in the theater thinking: ‘horse race horse race horse ra..holy shit! Jazira just got kidnapped. Holy Shit! Hopkins just saved her. HOLY SHIT! HORSE RACE!’

The production values were refreshing. Night shots were underexposed, shots in the hell of the desert were overexposed, but both just enough to add to the scenes, intead of making them about the cinematography instead of the plot. In a scene in the tent of the Sheikh of Sheikhs which shows a subtle sunrise the characters features go from nearly invisible to being etched in the wan light of dawn, almost without notice. The normal wasn’t always the actor’s face, it was shot like people see.

The horse doesn’t die. This is key. I hate movies where animals are killed just to make you feel bad. Hidalgo teases the viewer with this but does not follow through. The ending is, instead, a wonderful bittersweet parting of great friends.
I completely recommend that you go see this movie. As a story and as a movie it is well crafted and a delight to partake of.

The movie is greatly concerned with blood, mixed and pure. In it, mixed blood triumphs over pure blood, both in horse and in human. An attempt is made to attribute the victory of mixed blood to a triumph of will, but this is faulty for one big reason.

-Since purebred versus mustang and infidel versus Bedouin are such a big deal, not treating the matter with more depth makes the perspectives seem racist, even though that might not be the intention.

This opens up a whole slew of misinterpretations. Most notably, since the mixed Hopkins and mixed Hidalgo win the race on pure gumption, the question of blood is avoided. One gets the sense that if the Prince that rode Al-Hattal had not been such a whiner and dandy and had not felt so threatened by Hopkins, he would have won easily. At the same time the Prince is like a nervous purebred dog, and Hopkins is a mellow, friendly mongrel. Blood is only addressed in stereotypes.

There might be some anti-Arabic sentiment in the film as well. My perception of this might also be the result of my own skewed mindset of the rampant anti-Arabic sentiments of our time. Although there is no overt racism directed toward them, they are depicted as barbaric, oppressive, condescending, and resentful of American values. The sheikh, on the other hand, appears to want to be an American himself. Hollywood cannot seem to make films in which an ethnic group is content to be themselves and content to let Americans be American.

And a bunch of other stuff: The massacre at Wounded Knee is revised to make it appear as much of an accident as possible. Mortensen plays a half-breed, but apart from high cheekbones, doesn’t really look the part. The Sioux are killed but their horses are saved. We start the movie with dead Sioux, end with their freed horses and we somehow care more for the free horses than we do for the dead Sioux. All women want Mortensen and it is implied that this is because he is rough and strong, and also because he is a mongrel. It’s a new version of the old fright surrounding white women and black men. All of that is rather wearing and boring. The movie can be enjoyed if it is seen without paying attention to any subtext, intended or inferred. When you try to examine what else might be hidden in the film, things get mighty confusing. I’m just going to wind up by saying that this confusion closely resembles the way many Americans feel toward the Middle-East- diversity, multiculturalism versus the melting pot- it offers ideas but no conclusions. i think i’ve might ahve done the same myself. or just the opposite.

we seem to spend much of our lives in transit, or waiting. tedium. how many ways have we to take up all the listless liminal states of developed life? this entry for instance. portable video games, cell phones, cheap magazines and romance novels. the internet above all has become a redoubt for those afflicted with overbearing ennui.

this is why just about everything can be found on the internet. cheap art seems to fester when boredom is present. at least for me though, boredom kills whatever artistic rush flows through me. a perpetual neap tide. words flow but meaning sinks into the abyss. 20,000 leagues into inertia. hurry up and wait. kill some time because when we don’t need it there is always too much.

A list of some of the worst things in my world.

- A pile of week old, encrusted and molding dirty dishes.

- Sitting cross-legged on the floor for an extended period of time, getting up and feeling your kneecaps slowly squeal and grind against your leg bones.

- Being incapacitatingly allergic to warm, cuddly, fuzzy things.

- Being afraid to tell someone that you: like, love, lust, hate, revile them. Or want to dress them up in a hippo suit.

- Every time you have to stop doing something you really enjoy because you have ‘responsibilities.’

- Vehicle Maintenance.

- Being inspired and then losing it before the chance to use the muse has been fulfilled. Also see: being completely uninspired.

- Being in a hurry.

- The realization of futility or impotence. [this is sometimes the blackest of night before dawn though]

- Wet or sweaty socks.

- Low volume, high-pitched, continuous, unidentifiable ambient sound.

- Raw onions.

- The people in stores who go very slowly, take up the entire aisle, and roll their eyes at you when you ask to get by as if by moving out of the way they are doing the equivalent of donating bone marrow.

- Surly and impatient people in stores. [I become this when confronted with the previous]

- Riding an elevator and smelling rancid flatulence, most likely dropped by the smelly, cig-voiced fat lady that just debarked.

What are some of the worst things in your world?

I’m somewhat back in the saddle when it comes to filmmaking. For the next two weeks, as my schedule allows, I am going to help out on a Super 16mm film called Saves the Day, which concerns itself with a boy who thinks his older brother is a superhero. I’m just a PA, and the position is unpaid, but this is only natural since no one in the Cleveland film community has any idea who the hell I am. [and, indeed, who the hell am I when it comes to filmmaking?]

Saves the Day is directed by a first timer - appropriately googly-eyed over his film, but the D.P. is one of those guys who has been doing the film thing for so long that he doesn’t get ruffled easily. Everyone else seems to be the typical assortment of film folks, some stylish, some not, everyone constantly talking about sex, insinuation and innuendo galore. The sound guy acted like every other sound guy, the gaffer was more interested in hitting on the girls and finding crafty than replacing a burned bulb or finding a scrim. The camera assistants were like tribal shamans, aloof and privy to the mysteries of the camera [although I think everyone there was at least somewhat familiar with the Arriflex being used]. I was immediately at ease, since these are my people.

I have had a few ideas start to crawl ashore from the primordial ooze that is constantly sloshing around in my head. Whether or not their primitive lungs and flippers will permit them to evolve toward reality is another thing altogether. I am now getting the chance to see what other filmmakers are thinking about. It is nice nice.