Loud Yip

Howdy, friends. I've been too busy living to blog, but ideally you've been a part of the unemployed, malt-liquor-lubed bouncy ball that has been hurtling downhill at blur-like speeds that my parents refer to as my "summer in DC." I still don't have much to say (except, "bomb the blogosphere!"), but I did want to share this ridiculous video my new friend Chris showed me. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Latest Read

I've been posted up at home this past week, doin' my normal thing (reading books and watching movies) and enjoying the solitude of country livin' until I go back to DC (tomorrow). The last book I read had a really notable quote and extract that I wanted to share, and thus hopefully pick up this blog's ashes in time to reincarnate it for the summer.

Dave Eggers, in his first lengthy work of fiction, You Shall Know Our Velocity! (2002) speaks to the scatterbrained nature of this blog:

“Nothing was true. Nothing in the guidebook was true but the maps. Are maps true? Nothing else was true. The word fact could not exist. All facts changed on the way to the printer.” (321)

And now, this incredible paragraph that delves into the atmosphere of a middle school dance, and the psyche that accompanies it:

“This is the way of Champagne Snowball: First, a slow song. “Open Arms,” “(Here I Am) The One That You Love,” anything by Spandau Ballet. You scope, you choose, you find someone, you say these words: “Will you dance?” and then lead them to a spot crowded enough where you won't be easily seen. Put your skinny worthless arms, arms you've vowed you've to work on, around her waist, while she puts her arms around your wet neck. Everyone is already soaked from the fast songs, from Dean and Hand initiating an elaborate group-dance routine to the 5-4-3-2-1 Major Tom song, so expect your partner's back will be moist. She will smell of Sea Breeze. Her temples will drip onto your shoulder. Feel the heat of her chest against yours. Feel the heave. You will never know heaving like that again so soak in that heave. Put that heave into a small velcro pocket in the parachute pants of your soul. If she's as tall as you, and she probably is, move closer and set your face upon her hot cheek. When it gets too hot switch cheeks. Hope she won't ask you if you have a pen in your pocket while knowing it's not a pencil. Hope you don't pee. Why would you pee? You don't know. She will blow her face cool with her lower lip outstretched, her bangs floating briefly upward like banners tied to balconies. Know her hot chin on your hot shoulder, know her chest breathing into your chest. Wonder if she likes you in a making-out way. Wonder if you should (sexy!) or shouldn't (queer!) rub your woody against her inner thigh. Wonder where your friends are. Wonder what time it is. How much time is left—you needed more time! See Jack dancing with Annmarie and roll your eyes. Watch him act offended and start to fake-cry. Laugh and when your partner asks what's funny say, “Oh, the comedy of life.” Feel the cooling of the sweat on your partner's back. Let your hands drop a little. Wonder if she'll be a good kisser.” (305-6)

WHOA

Well, there didn't seem to me any better time to post the quarterly update of a nearly-defunct blog than in the heat of a back-to-back all-nighter during finals week. Studying for my Psychology as a Natural Science gen-ed class, I came across this startling quote:

"Rather than arriving in the world with a fully developed brain that may or may not meet the requirements of its environment, human beings arrive with brains that do much of their developing within the very environments in which they will function. The fact that our underdeveloped brains are specifically shaped by the unique social and physical environment into which we are born allows us to be exceptionally adaptable."®

While I've also learned about the Flynn effect, which highlights generational IQ increase, I'm deeply concerned about the youth of the future. Between video games, increased cell phone technology, digital media and so on, they might just evolve into some real fucking idiots.* This is not to say all hope is lost in my little brother or his generation, but his kids might be a completely separate story.

®I'm not going to bother citing this. For one, I'm still annoyed it was mandatory I had to pay for the online text. Secondly, I need to get back to studying. Lastly, I may or may not be blatantly breaking some copyright law; knowledge is wealth, and I believe in sharing the wealth.

*Unsure if I swore in such a crude fashion on the blog, it's been that long.

Thanks

Thanks for competing you guys! That contest was awesome. The winner was ____________.

Sike my readers suck.

Poppin' Bottles in Prison

Upon reading a wild article about a death-row inmate in Esquire, I came across this wildly inventive technique the inmates use to make booze. If anyone is so brave enough to try it at home, don't bother to tell me about it; I'm assured you will have vomited and brought great disgrace to your family honor.

“Real death-row parties, however, require a batch of pruno, the prison hooch: Take the grapefruit that comes with Saturday breakfast, peel, crush, and place in an empty milk carton. Enzymes remaining inside the carton, combined with natural yeast from the air, trigger fermentation within a few days. Dump into a garbage bag and add a pound of sugar and a pound of canteen-bought prunes per person. Let sick for a sick, occasionally (and when no guards are around) burping out excess gas. Strain pulp through a sock. The alcohol content...is as much as 12 percent, and the taste is about what you'd expect from something filtered through a sock. Still, if you can stomach a couple twenty-ounce cups, pruno provides “a good escape.” (123)

Finkel, Michael. "When Christian Long asked me if I wanted to watch him die, I told him I did." Esquire. January 2010.

Society

So, it's about time for a new contest. I figure this one should be more exclusive; I have 29 followers on Twitter, but only about 4-5 of you that comment on my blog on a tri-monthly basis. The challenge: use the title of this post and the picture above to come up with the most eloquent, creative, and accurate metaphor you can. The contest ceases in exactly a week (at 12:06!), and the prize this time will be tangible. Click on the picture for further detail, if you think it may help. GO

*Winner*

Some weeks ago, I initiated a really informal contest on twitter, asking about the lyrics to the following song, which is dope music video if you haven't seen it



Anyway, my good friend Peter won. I think the greatest prize I could honor him with would be to post his picture on my highly-acclaimed blog. After all, this site receives about 500 hits a day. You're welcome, Petron!

King* Peter




*All my friends are kings.

Utopian Strivings

As I've been reading The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe, this excerpt really stuck out as capturing the value system of the Merry Pranksters and the youth at large in the 60s. Post your opinions or reactions if you're so inclined.

“Most of them were from middle-class backgrounds, but not upper bourgeois, more petit bourgeois, if that old garbanzo can stand being written down again—homes with Culture but no money or money but no Culture. At least that was the way it struck me, judging by the Beautiful People I knew. Culture, Truth, and Beauty were important to them...“Art is a creed, not a craft,” as somebody said....Young! Immune! Christ, somehow there was enough money floating around in the air so that one could do this thing, live together with other kids—Our own thing!--from our own status sphere, without having to work at a job, and live on our own terms—Us! and people our age!--it was beautiful, it was a...whole feeling, and the straight world never understood it, this thing of one's status sphere and how one was only nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two or so and not starting out helpless at the bottom of the ladder, at all, because the hell with the ladder itself—one was already up on a ...level that the straight world was freaking baffled by!” (page 134)

*Italicized text by choice of author.

I Don't Think You or I Could Say Anything About Art that Hasn't Been Said Twice Already

This is not to say people should stop making art, or evening thinking about what art means. But it also implores people to consider everything that's been made, said, written, conjectured, theorized, and every other action verb pertinent to originality before voicing anything of their own. This is a daunting task. GO!

So, enough with the philosophical bullshit. I just finished watching "Beautiful Losers" and was inspired by all of the artists' respective opinions on a number of things, which led to that tirade. Moving on, I just wanted to let my beloved (non)readers know about two blogs that are poppin right now, as we speak. First, I wanted to share with my DC heads that Fixed in DC is back in action, and yours truly will be contributing. Check it out if you have any interest in fixed gear bikes or bicycling in the Diamond District in general.

Also, wanted to give a shout out to my good friend Pat White, whose blog has been consistently updated with some great photography from all over: Cali, DC, Alaska, and assorted islands, among other places. Check out his work here: Pat White Photography. Below, two of his recently posted pictures to lure you to his site.

Babysitting Lessons

Today, the manager at the leasing office shitted on me hard by poking fun at the fun that I'm a nanny/babysitter/mentor. I say, FUCK HER! She must subscribe to the Merriam Webster's Children's Dictionary "Word of the Day" or something and stigmatized me as a hippie. I accidentally came across the definition entry today at my job, which really cracked me up:

"a usually young person who typically has long hair, is against the values and practices of society, and often lives together with others."

How true.

Recent Reading

When I began telling my mom about my upcoming plans to see Jonathan Safran Foer speak this upcoming Tuesday at the Sixth and I Synagogue (come with!) regarding his new work on vegetarianism, she reached into her bag of Christmas presents and pulled out an early gift. I've been reading the book in between extended spurts of Slavoj Zizek (for the paper I still haven't finished), and I'm thoroughly enjoying his refreshing arguments about ideals I've already committed myself to. Below, a passage I found particularly insightful:

“Humans are the only animals that have children on purpose, keep in touch (or don't), care about birthdays, waste and lose time, brush their teeth, feel nostalgia, scrub stains, have religions and political parties and laws, wear keepsakes, apologize years after an offense, whisper, fear themselves, interpret dreams, hide their genitalia, shave, bury time capsules, and can choose not to eat something for reasons of conscience. The justifications for eating animals and for not eating them are often identical: we are not them.” (page 63)

Avoidance

Well, the paper I mentioned in the last post has once more been subverted to a more favorable activity, that being the creation of a list of bands I need to see. Check it out below:

Los Campesinos!
Wilco
TV on the Radio
Band of Horses
Phish
Public Enemy
Beach House
Grizzly Bear (missed opportunity at Radiohead)
Wu-Tang Clan, entirety (RIP ODB)*
The Hold Steady
The New Pornographers*
Belle and Sebastian
Daft Punk
Morrissey
the Talking Heads
De La Soul
The Arcade Fire
Beck
Gorrilaz
Explosions in the Sky
Wolf Parade*
Sufjan Stevens
TL/RX
The National
Broken Social Scene*



The asterisk indicates I've seen individual members or related acts perform before. I figure I'd publish this as a blog post if only in the event that my computer crashes and I lose the document I saved. Consider it a to-do list before I die.

EDIT I forgot to mention the list is in no order of priority, only the order in which I thought of them.

What's Good This Morning?!

"Facts are simple and facts are straight
Facts are lazy and facts are late
Facts all come with points of view
Facts don't do what I want them to
Facts just twist the truth around
Facts are living turned inside out
Facts are getting the best of them"



Been up all night with intense amounts of work, but I did receive a pseudo-extension from my professor at 10:30 earlier last night, which was great. In hindsight, I didn't need to really be awake this long, but on a positive note I did get to watch the Talking Heads' live concert dvd, "Stop Making Sense," three times while I did my work. I'm trying to get a cute girl to watch it again with me tomorrow, it's that good. I was also inspired to be David Byrne circa 1984 in his ridiculous oversized gray suit (EDIT) for Halloween. (My mind obviously wasn't working on the level it normally does, as I only completed half of my thought. Confusion, clarified.)

In other news, I wanted to issue a public apology to my good friend Drew, one of the last living readers of this blog. He was in DC this weekend, but for any number of reasons on both our parts we didn't manage to meet up. My apologies, Drew-Tang.

Interesting Pictoral Analysis*

Click to enlarge. Via twitter; someone or other's tweet



*Helps understand everything as simply as possible. Great academic resource.

I don't know how I got so apathetic about blogging, but my attitude probably isn't going to get any better. The good news is this:



That's right, St. Vincent. Gorgeous and talented. Last week I got to see her open for Andrew Bird, and I got to see them perform together, which was incredible. And I got to see her soundcheck. And I got to do all this free by volunteering for HeadCount and engaging concert-goers by prompting them to engage the issues. Pretty cool, and good looks to Tazewell for hooking me up.

Girls

I love girls, and more specifically women, but I'm also a big fan of the band Girls, as turned on to me by Drew, yesterday. This video is as fun as the song. Enjoy!

What I've Been Doing

This semester at American has proven to be one of the most fun yet. Below, in list form for the sake of ease, some exploits and experiences I've undertaken/had:

the free Dan Deacon show at a warehouse in NE

the free Matt and Kim show in the tavern

meeting Ghostface at the Adidas store in Georgetown, and having my picture taken with him in addition to getting a free copy of "Ghostdini: The Wizard of Poetry"

seeing Michael Chabon speak at Lisner Auditorium / GWU ($6)

the free Dinosaur Jr. concert @ the 9:30 Club (tickets compliments of the Onion AV Club)

DC Vegetarian Festival at GWU

Words Break Bars festival in the amphitheatre, featuring Ra Ra Rasputin

As you can tell, my semester has been full of free cultural experiences that I definitely wouldn't have had in Pennsylvania, or probably anywhere else. I've probably forgotten some cool things, but I'll try to throw some pictures up when I can, particularly of Ghostface and my latest pair of kicks.

EDIT The above post has been corrected to read Ra Ra Rasputin, the band I really saw, not Ra Ra Riot

The Present

I'm alive and well. And in the library at 12:45, working towards the weekend. After my computer crashed the first week of classes, I fell off the map, know? Blogging to come.

Throwback

To completely steal a picture and mimic a post from my former roommate Thom, I present to you:



Let it be known that this picture encapsulates some of the best days of my life. I was going to insert some form of 'fuck' in there, but then I decided it wasn't necessary.

Treatise on Twitter

To be more accurate - a paragraph on Twitter.

Earlier this summer, I deleted both my Facebook and Twitter accounts in an attempt to separate myself from the superficiality of the Internet at large. While this effort has been overwhelmingly successful, I recognize the social value of both networking devices; for this reason, I will once again re-enter the Twit-osphere, if only halfheartedly. Almost immediately after D-Day (deactivation day, that is), I started another Twitter account because I believe tweets are easier to follow that RSS feeds. It is much more convenient to get headlines from sneaker blogs, the NYT, Huffington Post, NPR, Pitchfork, etc. As of today, I'm going to use this account to once more follow intimate friends in order to keep and touch (and to always know where the party is). I will not at any time post my own wit, plans, quotes, favorite lyrics, or useful links. I probably would have just started following and not have bothered with this 'treatise,' except I have a lame account name and an even more lame 'real' name. I opted to open an account as 'Alexander Supertramp,' only because it uses my real first name. Otherwise, I think Chris McCandless was a selfish bastard and this emulation is personally humiliating, if only slightly. There you have it folks!