Answer #156 - Joel Washington

Had lunch in town today with my brother at the Village Deli.  Their motto is EAT AND GET OUT. We more or less did.

Coming out of the restaurant, I ran into Joel Washington, a friend and one of the talented painters in Bloomington.  He just did a commissioned portrait of Quincy Jones and presented it to him at the IU School of Music.  He has a show running currently in Bangkok.  I have a painting of his in my house.


Then I walked around the square to the Wandering Turtle and bought some thank you cards and a      Hmong Heart for a friend.                     

This is Jaime -  it's her store.   At least one of Joel's pieces is always in the Turtle. Jaime has a new store manager who just graduated with a degree in Music Business.  It's probable that I will get to know her better because I could use an education in music business and she was nice.

I walked across the street to Scholar's Inn Bakehouse and bought two loaves of bread - one day old.  Day old is 1/2 price.

Then I went to Big Red Liquors and picked up a bottle of Primitivo.

Adventure Boy and I are having dinner tonight with our good friend, Steve, and I've been instructed to bring bread and wine, my two favorite things.  He only looks like this at Halloween, though, and is generally in the company of an upright bass.  He'll tour with us in Michigan and Canada this month.  Say hello if you see him. He's very friendly.

 
After dinner, we will see a show at the Indiana Theatre, now called the Buskirk-Chumley.  We'll see Amjad Ali Khan   Carrie Newcomer and  
                                                 Tangamente as part of a World Music festival called The Lotus Festival.
  Who'll design this year's Lotus Poster, you ask?

This year, Joel Washington.  Can't wait to see it. 

Answer #155 - Deep Fried Oreos

The GPS lied and cost me an extra hour on the way to Holiday World this morning.

Still, it was worth it. 

Holiday World is located in Santa Claus, Indiana.

Think I'm kidding?  I'm not. This is one more reason that I can't leave Indiana.

I'm writing today from Halloween Land in Holiday World, where rides are named names like The Goblin and Hallow-Chair...  I'm heartened by many things: Happy families of all sorts and economic placements; smiling kids snapping mental pictures of highlights of kid life, for recall and embellishment later; but mostly, I'm heartened by my selflessness in agreeing to get in a car and drive this distance to sit on a bench and watch pasty Midwesterners (my tribe) walk by on the way to another cup of free soda.

All the water and soda at Holiday World is free.  I brought my own coffee, though.


"What's in that bag?", the nice white-haired lady asked me at the gate.


"Coffee, a laptop, some chips, some carrots."

"Why?"

"Er.. well, I'm mostly just here with other folks and I thought I'd sit somewhere and get some work done.  No rest for the wicked!"

(hesitantly) "Well... (eyeing the green picnic tote suspiciously) okay I guess."

"Honest,  I won't try to sell anybody my carrot sticks - how could I compete with the deep fried oreos? ha-ha.. heh.."

(nice lady's not laughing but still eyeing the bag, silently)

"Well.. guess I'll get in there then.  Bye!"  I say, cheerfully, and wishing there were something illegal or at least sellable in my bag.  There's not.

I sip my coffee and soy milk concoction in the shade.  The breeze is cool - the 77 degrees are perfect... and maybe, just maybe, I'll ride the Legend.

Answer #154 - Sometimes, I look through a keyhole and miss the whole world

It started with the Dean Koontz novel.  Yes, I relented after the Hiassen and went with scary mystery involving labrador retrievers and evil, pointy-nailed platinum blonde sub-demons.  Yes, crap fiction, still, if you can get past the ridiculous attempts at artistry in the descriptive language, he can put a story together.

That said, and excuses aside, it all started with the dogs in the story.

And love.  And this idea that love is the key, and that it should be multiplied and given without expectation.  The way dogs give it.







And the hosts for the evening were both artists.  He, as it turns out, specializes in the wisdom and art of dogs.  Eric Keller.  His link is to the right.  And there was a plant - a strange cactussy-looking thing, and I swore, as I washed my hands in the home of my hosts, that it was reaching out to me.  So I reached back and touched it's fingers.

And why haven't I reached back before?  Did I see the extended arms?

And the Japanese carved statue.  Was it a woman or a man?  There was writing all over it. Hirigana? Katakana? I don't know which, I can't discern... but in the state of anthpomorphism in which I viewed the inanimate, I thought it looked like it needed someone to pat it's head.  So I patted it's head.

And then I played a show and met many nice people.  And Eric's wife, Laurie Brown, a jeweler and actress, showed me the website of her artist son in East Berlin.  Daniel Keller.  His link is to the right.  And his work is love and pushing love and screaming love and branding love on leather couches and dripping love down fountains that light and stream when the good fight is being fought, and then she handed me a necklace that she'd made.

A silver chain, at the end of which is a beautiful little metal envelope covered by a metal hand with a heart set upon it.

And inside, on a metal letter, was the word.
  I'll drive home from Chicago tonight with love on my mind.  And I'll plot the revolution.

Answer #153 - Because rich folks like others to read to them

A large squirrel is bouncing across the lawn here at Hiram College.

Bouncing like a sine wave.
 

The venue last night had no air conditioning.  In northern Ohio this time of year, it's warm.  The moist air clung to my skin.

Clung like rain drops on glass.

I listened to Carl Hiassen romp through the Everglades while I drove.  I resisted the temptation to rent crap fiction at Cracker Barrel.  It was there, and plentiful - but I opted for Hiassen - he's no Joyce, but then I've got the attention span of a fruitfly. and let's face it, he's always up for a good time.

I nearly rented The World is Flat when I couldn't find Into Thin Air on the Cracker Barrel rack.  I will down the road.  I looked for Into Thin Air at Borders.  It was on the shelf.  It cost $40.00.

So, Why are books on CD priced outside of the reasonable market?  
$40 bucks is hard to pony up when the paperback is $12. 

For now, I'm heading out again - leaving Hiram and driving to Detroit by way of Sandusky.  The college dorm room last night, where the university housed us, was less nostalgic then you might think.

But the table full of hungover boys next to me this morning, talking last night's Crown shots and the high probability that they'll head back to bed.. ah, now that takes me back.

back in time... and I feel like I did, and the world looks like it did, and there I am, like I was

like sitting at the impact point where two trains collide. Ah.. memories.

Answer #152 - Maybe the future smells like Peppermint

On the road today without Adventure Boy.  4 shows.  No Adventure Boy.

I'll probably eat junk food.  Adventure Boy doesn't like junk food.

I'll make many phone calls, listen to NPR some, and AM radio some.  Some crap fiction.  Maybe some non-crap fiction.  I've been reconsidering my commitment to crap fiction on the road, especially since The Nanny Diaries (which, incidentally, still makes my stomach hurt).  I'm hunting for a copy of Into Thin Air by Krakauer.   Still haven't listened to it - but I think this trip is it.

Right now, I'm listening to a 15-year-old from India- in the studio on the other side of the door - singing a well-written song, with a lilting voice, not unlike the singers from the Sundays, the Cranberrys and the girl who sang Kiss Me.. (6 Pence None the Richer?)  a vocal quality I like quite a bit - the ultra-feminine aspect.  I don't embody it, but I like to hear it.

Writing a good song isn't much of an anomaly anymore.  Everybody's shooting for writing a great song, at one point or another - but it's a strange, changing world.  Good writers are everywhere - artists are everywhere - it's an incredibly prolific-seeming period for American creative culture.  I postulate, on occasion, it's not unlike the dying tree that bursts with an enormous crop of glistening fruit as it's last, beautiful exhale.

But those are in dark minutes.  Maybe it's a brighter thing - maybe the technology that has allowed so many voices to enter the market will spark the collective imagination of this great human beast- to save itself - and exhale an unspeakably beautiful future?

 I watched the documentary of Dr. Bronner, crazy soap guy, last night. I wanted a peek into the brain of the man with the diatribe-covered soap bottles. I was hoping for something other than egomanical nutjobness.  Didn't get it - but others may argue.

Still - he had imagination, commitment, drive, and exhaled a thing into existence.

Maybe the beautiful future smells like peppermint.

Answer #151 - Because my soul tastes yummy with lobster bisque

I drove to Durham, North Carolina yesterday.  One of the first trips where Adventure Boy was not along, not driving, and me not backseat driving.

Disconcerting.  But yet, I had crap fiction to listen to, and so I did.

The Nanny Diaries.
 
WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY???

I want my 4 hours and 40 minutes back.

I MEAN I WANT MY 4 HOURS AND 40 MINUTES BACK!  I WANT THEM BACK NOW!  I WANT THEM BACK AND I WANT TO REWIND TIME TO THE POINT BEFORE I HEARD THE TITLE, TO THE POINT BEFORE SOMEONE AND I CAN'T REMEMBER WHO HANDED ME THE THING AND I LOST 4 HOURS AND 40 MINUTES AND I WANT BACK THE HOURS AFTER THAT THAT I LOST TO THE STOMACH ACHE THE THING GAVE ME - THE THING THAT NEVER EVER SHOULD HAVE BEEN PUBLISHED BY ANYONE OTHER THAN INSIPID HOUSE PUBLISHING.

Yes, I know, tell us how you really feel.

I'm okay with Crap Fiction if it's not pretending to be other.  I had nothing else, so I popped it in - it was recently made into a movie (which I didn't see and which I'll now NEVER EVER EVER see) - and I'm a fan of Laura Linney's acting, as well as Paul Giamatti and Scarlett Johanssen - so I figured it might be worth while.  They all generally pick pretty good scrips (not always, but who does?).  Julia Roberts signed on to read it... so, I assumed a certain level of production quality anyway..

WRONG.  Not this time. And maybe some razzle dazzle screen writer turned it into something other than a dirge for the bloody stump of miserable, filthy humanity, which is apparently all that remains of one, once one moves to an address on Park Avenue - but I don't care.

I want my 4 hours and 40 minutes back.  And I want money for pain and suffering from the publisher.  And I want the writers to go back to nanny-ing.  And I want the whole miserable thing erased from my memory banks.  It actually bit off a small piece of my soul and ate it on a water cracker.  Now a small piece of my soul is gone.  Eaten.  I want it back.

On a lighter note, it's a beautiful day in NC - and I find that, since I don't live on Park Avenue, I actually have a renewed sense of hope and possibility!

Happy Solstice!

Answer #150 - United Airlines Demon Spawn

If you're going to play Kerrville, you have to play some of the 'campfires.'

There aren't actually campfires because of the dry season, but there are song circles.  Everywhere.  Sometimes people are dressed as pirates singing pirate songs.

There are 'invitation only' song circles, there are song circles comprised solely of famous writers and other song circles comprised solely of infamous writers.  I sat at two song circles with some lovely people - all of them talented.. and I played the accordion. It was challenging, because I don't play accordion on much of what I write, and yet, there I was, playing the accordion because carrying a piano through the woods is just impractical.


All in all, the festival was great, the people were great, the weather was hot, my hair was huge, the bugs didn't come in droves, the food was plentiful and I made it home, despite United Airlines' attempts to send me to Denver and the single nastiest  'customer service' representative (United Airlines, for the record) I've ever had the displeasure of having to associate with. Luckily, I learned that if you hang up on a nasty agent, you can call back and talk to someone else - and if you cry, they might actually let you get on a plane headed in the general vicinity of the airport your ticket says you're heading to.  Still, I probably won't be flying United Airlines again any time soon, even though the guy I cried at was much nicer than the demon spawn I originally attempted to speak with, though I didn't speak demon spawn and that may have been the problem.

What happened to the airline industry that customer service became the least of their worries?

Ah well... best to just quietly accept the new paradigm, eh?  No use crying over $7 mixed drinks and flight attendants who'd rather be working on that screenplay than hocking snack boxes.  Credit cards only.