Tacos and Chocolate Rollerskates

It seems like Pitchfork used to be a lot more creative and nutty, if you will, in their reviews. I remember a series of reviews by one writer where he did them all in the voice of a different off-the-wall character, like the Chiquita banana lady, stuff like that. I guess with their growing readership they've lost that spunk. It'll resurface every once in awhile though, like in this badass review of the new Basement Jaxx single, "Hush Boy".

It was bound to happen sooner or later, the morning you woke up next to a first Jaxx single and you didn't really want to get down with it. Still pretty and sweet-smelling and you'll always want it around, but it would really have to break out the freaky shit to get any sort of rise out of you at this point. The only thing to do really is drink a little wine on Saturday night and let it dance around in that new lingerie to some mid-tempo Earth, Wind & Fire, light some candles, maybe smoke some reefer, and then fall asleep reading Terry McMillan to each other.

And in your pinot dreams, the two of you will float on clouds of sequins, eat tacos out of chocolate rollerskates, and feather each other's hair until the ecstasy overwhelms you. You will embrace it, passionately, and say, "New Basement Jaxx single, I love you as much for the things you do do for me as the things you don't do for me. You are my Xanadu." And it will say, "Hush boy," as its skull rips open, revealing the head of Dikembe Mutombo who yelps, "if you want me for your girlfriend!" And that's when you wake up with a total nightboner.

It's a little hard to tell, but I assume it's a positive review. I mean he gave it 3 stars. Regardless, more Jaxx is always a good thing in my book.

Exploits of a Guinea Pig, Part 4

Not much to report really. I've spent most of today in bed reading 100 fucking Years of Jose Arcadios Buendias. Yeah, I like the book, but it's a little frustrating when one family gives five similar names to fifty people. It also might help if they would stop having sex with their cousins.

Speaking of sex with cousins, something really great is happening right now: all four PCs in this computer lab are currently being used to look up Registered Sex Offenders on this awesome site. It's pretty hilarious really. This crazy old guy sitting next to me, who I actually thought might be an RSO himself (he told me that he has done time but not what for), was looking for offenders in his parent's neighborhood and now everybody in here is doing it. Oh man, everytime he finds somebody who looks especially creepy, he yells out "Freak-o!" and then tries to guess what fucked up thing the offender did. I love this guy. He also kept muttering "BITCH ass!" while we were watching the series premiere of The Contender, for no apparent reason.

Oh Wow, and I just found the scariest motherfucker ever:



Freak-o! This guy, who appears to be melting, lives at 31st and Speedway. So, watch your ass. And your children's ass.

Let me remind you that I'm being paid about $13/hour for this. And for sleeping, and picking my nose, and peeing in a plastic jug, and playing pool, and arguing with Jewish people who think that everyone in Lebanon should die just because a terrorist organization has infiltrated their government. Sweet dreams!

Future Martyr?

I failed to mention how I think this display of power by Israel, meant to teach Hezbollah and the rest of the Arab world that they are really 'serious' and that they 'mean business', is going to blow up in their faces. I don't understand their logic, and I am desperately trying to. It's almost like they don't think the Middle East hates them enough, so they want to try to push them over the edge. Regardless of their reasoning, everyday their aggression is converting thousands of former fence-riders into supporters of Hezbollah and Islamic extremists.

-----Right after I posted this, I ran across this article in the NYT. It backs up my case (although it focuses on American foreign policy, aren't Israel and the US tied so closely at this point that there isn't much difference between the two, at least in the eyes of the rest of the world?)

“What is creating radicalism in the region is not authoritarian regimes,” said Mustafa Hamarneh, director of the Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan. “Mainly it is American policy in the region — survey after survey shows that.”

Middle Eastern Blogging

Did anybody else just watch that car chase in Houston? Damn. Dude drove on a golf course!

Meanwhile, in less important news, Israel continues it's batshit crazy attack on Lebanon. Surfing the internet is kind of frustrating here at PPD, as the computers are ancient and slow, and people are always waiting to get on them. But I have little else to do, and I have been meaning to write an entry on this subject since the conflict began, so here's what I got right now:

To start with a positive note in an otherwise completely negative and ugly thing, I've found that there has been a very strong dialogue between citizens of Israel and Lebanon, through the blogosphere and bulletin boards, forums, etc. This is pretty fascinating to me, and unprecedented in human history that during a war the two sides involved are able to communicate with each other directly, ignoring the media outlets that have previously been the sole means of exchanging information. I think this sheds a small light of hope on future generations being able to work through these age-old problems a little better, because they grew up in this information age and are better equipped to communicate.

Looking through some blogs, I found an interesting point of view at The Lebanese Bloggers. I only had time to read the first few entries, so I can't vouch for the entire thing, but most of it seemed fairly rational (as opposed to fanatical). They make a great case for Lebanon having been sold out by the US in one post by pointing out that Bush's idea of a "solution" (at least the official one, without the cuss words) contains no mention of Lebanon: "In order to be able to deal with this crisis, the world must deal with Hezbollah, with Syria and to continue to work to isolate Iran."

They also had a transcript of Prime Minister Seniora's impassioned speech to the parliament, which is definitely worth reading:

...Is the value of human life in Lebanon less than that of the citizens of other countries?

Can the international community stand by while such callous retribution by the State of Israel is inflicted on us?

Will you allow innocent civilians, churches, mosques, orphanages, medical supplies escorted by the Red Cross, people seeking shelter or fleeing their homes and villages to be the casualties of this ugly war?

Is this what the international community calls self defense? Is this the price we pay for aspiring to build our democratic institutions? Is this the message to send to the country of diversity, freedom and tolerance?

Only last year, the Lebanese filled the streets with hope and with red, green and white banners shouting out: Lebanon deserves life!

What kind of life is being offered to us now?

I will tell you what kind: a life of destruction, despair, displacement, dispossession, and death.

What kind of future can stem from the rubble? A future of fear, frustration, financial ruin, and fanaticism.

Let me assure you that we shall spare no avenue to make Israel compensate the Lebanese people for the barbaric destruction it has inflicted and continues to inflict upon us, knowing full well that human life is irreplaceable.

You want to support the government of Lebanon? Let me tell you, ladies and gentlemen, no government can survive on the ruins of a nation.

People aren't just exchanging words, on Flickr you can find plenty of images and discussion about the war. Be warned, some of the pictures are pretty horrible.


My stance on this whole issue is not entirely anti-Israel; I understand and support their desire to feel safe from Hezbollah. But I don't understand at all how any Zionist could possibly rationalize the killing of so many innocent Lebanese civilians to achieve this. Such fanatacism on both sides, it makes me sick. And all of it in the name of God. Additionally, it seems as if Israel's air war might have been pointless for the most part. As another blogger pointed out, it is hard to justify support for Israel when an eye for an eye is raised by 2 orders of magnitude; For 1 Israeli eye, 50-100 arab eyes + 10 bridges + 3 airports are required in exchange.

I don't have time right now, but I'm hoping to find examples of Israeli citizens showing dissent for the actions of their government. If you know of any let me know.

Also...what the hell happened to the Palestinian front of this "war"? I haven't heard a thing about it in the news since Israel turned on Lebanon. It always frustrates me when the press jumps on one main story, makes some fancy "Crisis in the Middle East!!" graphics, and no longer feels the need to report on anything else for a week or two.

Oh, except for that sweet shot Tiger Woods made in the British Open. He's Back!!

Seriously though, they cut from Anderson Cooper in Beirut to talk about TW. The female anchor made a lame little female anchor joke about it and then goes "back to you Anderson...". The pained look on Anderson's face, who had just gotten back from bombed out Hezbollah territory, was priceless. I like that guy. He's got some serious juevos. As he was driving into the Hezbollah controlled area, you see a swarm of armed cars come out of nowhere. He says "Well, I guess we have an official escort now."

Everyday Art Ch. 2: spam email

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Sure, it's spam, but honestly, thicket vociferous paddy in verve? That's fucking brilliant. If I took this to open mic night I would clean up. Cheers to you, spam poet.

This post is one of an ongoing series highlighting what I consider to be art in unexpected places.

Exploits of a Guinea Pig, Part 3

Well, today was a pretty hectic day, the busiest day that I'll have here by far. Here is a quick recap, in the military clock format that I have come to know and love:

0725 - Woken up by yet another burly nurse-man brandishing yet another needle in my face. I soon found out that this was a new kind of needle than the ones my arm had previously been introduced to. This was a 'cannula', which is kind of like a catheter. This was to be put in my arm and left there for seven hours in case my blood sugar dropped so low that I needed emergency infusions. Good morning to you too!

0800 - About fifteen different ECG pads were attached to my chestal area, ankles, and shoulders. These are like suction cups, except instead of using suction they use a type of adhesive that apparently makes you want to cry when you are ripping it off your skin, something I just recently found out. So I looked like a neat combination of these two pictures:












I think my resemblance to that guy on the right is really striking, don't you? I included the picture of the old guy because I like that he is being attended to by a hot schoolgirl. It gives a decent representation of the hot nurses here. Really, there are a lot of hotties. And everybody is really nice for the most part. I get a lot of conflicting emotions, simultaneously wanting to flirt with someone at the same time they are stabbing me in the arm. "So are you from owwwwwwwstin?"


0910 - Dosing! This is the big moment, folks. You know, where I get to take the mystery drug, the one with the mystery side effects on humans and all that jazz. It's like that one Dum-Dum flavor with the question mark on it, except it's a bunch of liquid in a little brown jar, and instead of tasting good it tastes like hamster urine, and instead of being a lollipop it's....a fucking mystery drug. They told us before we drank this stuff that it might not be very pleasant, but if it was, they "didn't want to know about it." Nice. Presumably this is so subjects who get the placebo won't catch on when you are making a throw-up face and theirs tastes like Hawaiian Punch. Whatever, I chugged my oily concoction down like a champ. Then they re-filled the jar with water, because I guess I looked like I wanted to taste it all over again, and that went down the hatch too. I sure as hell wasn't going to show weakness in front of these wannabe nurses.


0930-1440 - For the next seven hours my procedural routine followed this schedule:

• Sit upright for 6 minutes
• Vital signs (blood pressure, pulse)
• Blood draw
• Finger prick
• Lay flat on my back for 15 minutes
• ECG reading
• wait twenty minutes and repeat

It probably sounds worse than it actually was. I mean it wasn't a walk in the park, but I was so groggy that it went by pretty quick (I have been going to bed around 4am for the last month, so I stayed up way past our required midnight 'bedtime' , hidden under my blanket reading Me Talk Pretty One Day with my headlamp. It was fun, I felt like I was ten years old again.)
You just get used to the routine of it all. Plus there is always that dollar sign in the back of your head, pushing you onward with happy thoughts.

Some other moments worth noting:

• At one point I was interrupted from my book by a girl saying "okay, time for your blood draw," and when I looked up I was delighted/frightened to see the really cute girl from yesterday who made that poor old man bleed everywhere. She was as bad as I thought, and caused me much more pain than anyone else. But her name is Kimberly, and now we are friends. Ya gotta look on the bright side of life, ya know?
• Another girl came by, Glinda, who was pretty hot and Mexican although you probably didn't guess either of those things from her name. We got to talking and I asked her if she was in medical school or what, since I (foolishly) assumed that most of these technicians were in nursing school or premed or something like that. Her answer scared me more than anything else I had seen, heard, or felt all day. "Um, no, I worked at McDonalds' before I worked here. This is my third week!" Yikes. Thank god she was just getting my blood pressure.
• I have become friends with a guy with 1.5 arms. Yeah, sure, it makes for some freaky moments, like when he pointed out the needle marks on his whole arm with his stub, but overall he is one of the more normal people in here. Just a regular college dude going to Arizona State with one and a half arms. I'm hoping that we'll be good enough friends by the end of the study that I can ask him what happened.
• The guy in the bed next to me is SO OBNOXIOUS. He is one of those overly social antisocial types. If that makes sense. Absolutely no conversational skills, and yet he will not shut the fuck up. He constantly bitches about not being able to find someone to play Risk with. Yes, he brought Risk. I'm sorry, but I had to vent, I've been holding it in all god damn day.
• It is really amazing how much one person pees in a day. I never thought about it much before, but now that I have to keep my daily urine in a big canteen, it has been on my mind. The overall volume is really impressive. Try it, you'll see what I mean.
• Myspace drama is everywhere! That is all anybody does here, check myspace. Earlier today it was just me and this girl Shanonda in the computer labs. Well, she found out that her bf had been making some 'lewd' comments on other shorty's profiles. Busted! Well you better believe Shanonda called him up right then and there and chewed his ass out big time (and I was in on the whole thing!). Darnell, why would you post "Yeah, that's my way!" on a topless picture of your ex-girlfriend, especially when she is in your top 8 and easily accessed by your current gf?! What is this, amateur hour?

Exploits of a Guinea Pig, Part 2

Still chillin up in PPD. Took about four naps already, and finished God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater. In fact, I was late for lunch and dinner because I overslept, which means I get docked twenty bucks at the end. Everything is super scheduled here, so ten minutes late is a big deal. But hey, what's twenty bucks out of $2000? The food hasn't been awful; a very mediocre cheeseburger and a tasty but tiny salmon fillet. Unfortunately, nothing scary to report in that department.

Earlier today, this guy who drove down here from Denton with three friends (the rest of his band?) got kicked out because he tested positive for weeeeed. Sucks for that guy. He was the goofiest looking dude too, wore the same polyester pants and an idiotic Gilligan hat on the three different occasions I've seen him. I overheard him talking to his friend, he was planning on hitchhiking back in to Austin and then catching a bus/train back to Denton. Seriously, that blows. What a waste of time to go home with nothing. Made me really nervous too...because...you know...I have friends who "like" the "herb". But so far so good. Crossing my fingers.

Exploits of a Guinea Pig, Part 1

Alright...I'm inside the joint. It's about 1pm on Day 1. Five minutes into the living quarters and I've already made two friends, checked my email, and signed up for a pool tournament. It's like summer camp with drugs and needles! I'm really starting to wonder when the bad shit begins. Oh, wait, I just looked at the schedule and we get our blood drawn 13 times tomorrow. So that answers that question. The only tense moment so far came when they were drawing blood this morning. There was a really anxious (but incredibly cute) girl poking away at this guy. The guy looked very scared. There was another very efficient and confident male technician, but the way the line was working I was heading for the girl. Didn't look good. Luckily, the guy she was poking started bleeding all over the place after she was done! So I got the experienced technician dude while she was cleaning up. Isn't that lucky? Wasn't that a fun story? Oh man, I can only imagine what else is gonna go down in this place.

Take Anything You Want!

WTmotherF??

Summer

What a sum-sum-summery day today was. After rolling out of bed at the crack of 2pm, I rode my bike to Quack's to meet up with Katy and Keith, aka KP 1 and 2, and then we played an extremely heated game of 2v1 tennis. The winner? Yours truly and Katy Pine. I would like to take a second here to quote a badass motherfucker:

We are the champions...of the world.

We also talked to a homeless guy who met Pete Sampras on campus once. OR SO HE CLAIMED. I think he was lying. Moving on...when I was returning my friend Marisa's racket, she offered me some freshly cut cantaloupe! It was sodelicious. Then I headed off to Shipe pool. As I rounded the last corner, I heard the sweet summery jingle of the ice cream truck! OR SO I THOUGHT. It was actually a sno-cone truck. Good enough for me though; I got a watermelon/grape combo that really kicked my ass in a good way. So then I swam, and then I rode my bike around Hyde Park looking at houses and listening to Joni Mitchell (more on Joni Mitchell to come in a later post) and thinking about how swell this summery day was.

I consider most "this is what I did today" posts an obnoxious waste of space/time, but I really want to remember this a couple months from now. When its not summer anymore. Thank you for humoring me.

p.s. I also got freebird's with Keith, and I might go on additional summer adventures with Andre after I post this. But this post is about how summerish today was. So basically, please don't feel bad Keith.

This Picture Israeli Crazy

I've been following the situation in Israel for the last two weeks with a little bit of shock, and a lot of anger at how pointless and reckless it all seems. I am still gathering my thoughts for a full post about it, for now I just wanted to put this stunning picture up.

Embracing the Urge

Gun Eye
Originally uploaded by adamadamadam.

I was bored at work yesterday, and it was my co-worker's birthday, so I made her a Xerox birthday card of cut-out letters that spelled "Happy Birthday Hilda!" and then my big face smushed down on the glass. I got such a kick out of making this that I spent the rest of my shift and two hours afterwards putting some "copy collages" together. It has been several months since I really embraced a creative or productive urge, and it felt good. Really good. Even though the rest of the library staff obviously thought I had gone insane. I think I used up most of the toner in the copier. Oops.

Anyways, here is 1 of 3. Click on it to view the other two on my Flickr page.

Like a Record, Baby

I recently stumbled across this fascinating look behind the scenes of mainstream media in the nineties.

"Artist Brian Springer spent a year scouring the airwaves with a satellite dish grabbing back channel news feeds not intended for public consumption. The result of his research is SPIN, one of the most insightful films ever made about the mechanics of how television is used as a tool of social control to distort and limit the American public's perception of reality."

It's long...57 minutes long...at this point I've only had time to watch the first twenty or so, but don't let the length scare you it's definitely worth checking out. My favorite moments so far are Larry King telling Clinton that if he gets elected Ted Turner will "work for him," and the footage of the whitebread news anchors dealing with the Rodney King riots. It would be laughable if it wasn't so awfully real.

It's pretty obvious why this film was ignored when it came out, and it is sadly ironic that this fact only provides more evidence of the mainstream media's ability to restrict and select favorable content.

But that was the nineties. They didn't have YouTube.

Everyday Art Ch. 1: espresso machine