pete_is_stupid

Self Portrait

2007-02-01T14:51:00.000-06:00

291104293_dab45cfd6c_o Hosted on Zooomr

Hello

2006-11-27T13:50:00.000-06:00

I don't think anyone actually reads this because it's been so long since I've written. I know, I am a bad friend. In the past year, I got a job, went to a sad funeral, sold my car and rode my bike to work every day, moved cross town twice in two months, got engaged, went to Samoa again, got married over there, had a reception over here, and moved to Texas.

I started a photoblog to mark our move to Texas. Check it out:

onethirdvignette.blogspot.com

Thanks.

--Pete

Happy Birthday to me

2005-08-23T11:20:00.000-05:00

So Friday was my 29th birthday. It's also Bill Clinton's special day. Why the world didn't stop and throw a parade for the two of us, I don't know. I did manage to wrangle 18 or so of my friends to Saha for a birthday feast. Sorry if I didn't invite you, it wasn't intentional, it's just kind of hard for a restaurant to accommodate such large groups.

Saha bills itself as "Arab Fusion" which is about right, what with lamb appearing on the menu as often as tofu or edamame. I chose Saha because they had an extensive menu with meaty dishes (including steak, for those types, seafood, vegetarian and vegan dishes. Anyone can eat there. And everything was quite affordable, especially because of the 30 or so tapas-style small plate dishes. It's also kind of obscure, so it wasn't crowded on a Friday night, which is a good thing in my mind.

Ahh, but the food was an incredible yummy yum. I went prixe fixe; in this case soup of the day, a small plate, and an entree. The soup was carrot-ginger-coconut cream, so it was rich and decadent with a slight spike of spice from the ginger. Next up was the BBQ Mushroom and Tofu small plate, for which I lack the vocabulary to describe its tasty savoryness. My entree was a okra, tofu and quinoa stew. Again, I could never be a food critic because word do no justice to the flavor sensations exploding in my mouth.

Sweet Tar made arrangements for Maggie Mudd to deliver one of their legendary vegan ice cream cakes. Candles were lit, that song was sung, the crowd chanted "speech! speech! speech!" and when I stood up to thank everyone, they yelled "boring!" Half the cake was my favorite, the subtle and delectable lychee-coconut. The other half was Tarmac, a concoction of chocolate, peanut butter and oreo chunks (right?). People were shocked and baffled by the vegan-ry of the cake, because it was so yummy.

Jem showed up with her cousin Pete, which was a pleasant surprise because she went to the Liz Phair show earlier, and you know what happens at rock and roll shows. By the way, Jem's band, Jean Marie, is the best. Please go to all their shows. Or at least listen to their songs on mySpace.

After dinner we walked to the Edinburgh Castle, to occupy the front room. We rolled dice, people bought me shots, Smith showed up, Ryan B. drank too much Jaeger. It was a gay old time. All in all, it was one of my better birthdays. Thanks everyone.

The next day I made a run for the hot sunshine of Ukiah, leaving the cold cold fog of San Francisco behind. Even though he never said actually said it, Mark Twain was on to something when he didn't say the thing about the coldest winter was a summer in San Francisco.

Ukiah is so hot and nice right now. In the evening the coastal breezes roll over the western hills and gently push the hot air around. I've been wearing flip flops and shorts for three days straight now. My toesies are so happy.

On Saturday night I went to a Lu'au fundraiser for the Grace Hudson Museum in Ukiah. Grace Hudson live in Mendocino County around the turn of the century and she documented the native Pomo Indians with beautiful oil paintings. I've lived in Ukiah most of my life, and have been to the museum a few times, but I guess I mature enough or something now to appreciate both the aesthetic and anthropological value of her work.

The Lu'au was kind of junky. It should be said that I have attended many a fine Lu'au this summer, but this one a had a typical catering menu but with Hawaiian music playing in the background and mai-tai's served in plastic cups. And for a fundraiser, it seem liked the 100 or so people in attendance were either on the museum board of directors or already volunteered.

Highlights of evening included an older dude who grew up in Hawaii giving a talk about the slack key guitar music of the islands and it's connection to country western music and the steel pedal slide guitar. I was totally into that, especially when he supplemented his talk by playing some tunes.

After the lu'au, I drove around Ukiah for a bit, hoping to see someone I know wandering the streets or something. I drove by the Forest Club, my old haunt, in the hopes that an old bro of mine might be smoking out front. I should have just gone in, but it's been a long time since I hung out in Ukiah and I just don't know too many people around here. The Forest is kind of rough sometimes too; I've never walked in there alone. It isn't always the most inviting place.

The cops were out in full force, which is pretty typical, but kind of shocking when one is used to the laissez-faire approach the SFPD takes. I was followed twice for tens of blocks by patrol cars. After running up on my bumper for several blocks, a patrol car darted into the next lane and pulled up next to me. I am not a kid anymore and I wasn't doing anything wrong, so I gave the cop a "what the fuck do you want?" look as I am tax paying, speed limit driving citizen. Once he decided I was cool, he dropped a block back and left alone.

I saw two patrol cars parked and surveilling the entrance to the Forest Club, yet another reason to not go in there. Perhaps there's a Fatwa out on the Forest Club and the Ukiah PD was protecting it. It's not like the Ukiah Valley is a police state, but those effing guys get bored and have nothing better to do than to harass those that are out on a Saturday night.

Sunday I had brunch with my family. My dad got bummed when he found out the sausage was vegan. I collected my loot. I did pretty good this year. Tar took me to Chico to see Alfalfa, bought me two shirts, a Dears CD and this killer box set of 80's underground music. Becky and Ian gave me a gift certificate to Millenium and my family gave me a bunch of photography gear including a nice Bogen tripod.

The city of Ukiah sponsors concerts in the park every other Sunday in the Summer time. It's prolly a lot like the Stearn Grove concerts in the City, but without the fog and the Arctic Zephyr wind. So I totally went. There were several thousand people there and I was terrified of running into people I used to know and not remembering their names.

I did run into a few whose names I could never forget, like my old friend Scarb. Scarb showed me his new motorcycle, which was pretty sick, and his two year old boy, Waylon. Waylon had a mohawk. It kind of made me want to have kids, so my boy could have a mohawk and grow up hanging out with Scarb's kids.

I had a several awkward conversations, mostly with old friends that now have kids. It kind of made me crazy and I had to leave. As the sun set, I took the long way back to Hopland, along the scenic East Side Road which winds through pear orchards and grape vines. I almost kept going straight on through to San Francisco, but I decided to stick around for another day.

I spent Monday hanging out a Freedom Skate Shop with Justin and Scarb. It's a good way to spend the day. Freedom recently expanded, so now the skate shop and the neighboring Freedom Girls occupies the whole building. I had sushi with homeowner Scarb and he tried to talk me into buying a house. While that maybe possible in Mendocino County, it's impossible in the absurd Bay Area real estate market, so it took us a while to understand where the other one was coming from.

I could write more, but I should cut it off here. Thanks.

The O-A-K

2005-08-18T10:24:00.000-05:00

Last night Tar and I went to the "Least Bay" to see Jean Marie play at Mama Buzz Cafe (23rd and Telegraph) in Oakland. You all should see Jean Marie. Jem and Jasmyn play precious, delicate lullabies that are meant to sooth you to sleep. In fact they are playing tonight at Amnesia Bar in SF.

Jem has a real intimate whispering style of singing. I've said this before, but it's easy to imagine I am sitting cross legged on the floor of her bedroom, while she sits on her bed and tells me all of her secrets. Jasmyn is self taught on drums, so she often throws in refreshing, unconvential rhythms and patterns instead of banging away at 4/4.

After the show, we tried to go to a DIY shop next door called Rock Paper Scissors. Alas they were closed, but we could see people milling about inside. We were about to leave when a happy, friendly crew of people walked passed us and went in. One of them held the door open and asked if we "were getting onion facials?" We responded with confused looks on our faces.

Then the very friendly proprieter invited us in to look around, but told us the cash register was closed. Inside the smell of cooking onions teased our olfactory sensors while we looked at tons of cute and creative hand made, locally produced clothing, jewelry, zines, music, and assorted trinkets. It was pretty rad and inspiring, and the people were warm and inviting.

It seems like East Bay has more of this kind of thing going on. Over the bridge, you get the sense that people are just doing things because they can't help it. It's not a conspiracy to party and get laid like it is in San Francisco. Please, please prove me wrong tho.

Rounding out our East Bay adventure, Tar and I went to Golden Lotus (13th and Franklin) for some yummy dinner. Golden Lotus must be the sister restaurant to Golden Era in San Francisco. They have nearly identical menus and the food is so yummy good. Get the Vegetable Combination Soup, it is truly magical. There tons of mushrooms, cauliflowers, carrots, tofu, and veggie ham in a clear Vietnamese style broth. I could eat it everyday all day.

It's nice evenings like these that make me think I could really enjoy living in the East Bay. Sure, it's not San Francisco, but there's lots of good restaurants, the weather is always warmer, a fella's rent money goes a little bit further, there's all sorts of creativity going off there and life seems to be a bit more mellow and relaxed.

I took a picture of the sun setting in front of Mama Buzz. You can see it at my photoblog. Thanks.

Chico! Wooo-ooooo!

2005-08-17T17:51:00.000-05:00

So Tar instant messaged me on Friday afternoon, told me to pack an overnight bag for hot weather, and to be ready to go Saturday morning. She decided we should get out of town to celebrate my birthday, which is this coming Friday, the 19th. I kind of ruined all the fun by making her tell me where we were going, so I could plan the trip according. I am kind of a logistics monster, and I can't help myself.

You see, last Christmas she adopted a goat at Farm Sanctuary on my behalf. Farm Sanctuary rescues animals from factory farms, nurses them back to health, and gives them a nice farm to while out the rest of their days without fear of becoming dinner. They have two farms, one in upstate New York, the other in Orland in California's Sacramento Valley.

The Orland farm is over 300 acres, nestled in the rolling hills of the valley wall near a small mesa, with creek cutting across the cow pasture. It's roughly three and half hours away from San Francisco. That means it's peaceful and rural and idyllic and I could live out there. I've been there a few times now, for their annual "Feed the Turkeys" vegan Thanksgiving dinner. There's an impressive quietude there. It sounds corny, but a fella could really start feeling like one with nature and it's cycles in a place like that.

A cow homey

That's all to say, I really like it out there, so a trip to Farm was a great birthday present. And I got to relive my college days in nearby Chico.

We rolled out of the Bay Area early Saturday morning, like 8 AM. Traffic was light, which is good because Californians do not know how to drive. I've been trying a new thing, what with gas prices so high. I lock the cruise control in at the speed limit. It's really bizzare to have 85% of the traffic going a much faster than I am, but there's less drama and congestion. I don't know, maybe I am getting old... maybe I've had a few too many close calls... maybe I think because in the past 5 years I've driven about 100,000 miles, including two times across the US that my time is up... it's just not safe to speed.

There's something going on in our culture. That's the understatement of the decade, but anyway, just about every car commercial emphasizes power, performance, and Fun FUn FUN. Led Zeppelin soundtracks cars powersliding across wet pavement or blasting through the Utah desert. NASCAR is second only to the NFL in popularity. Most drivers seem to see the freeway as some sort of Indy race that you win by passing close, strategically changing lanes, letting the other guy know he's going to slow by tailgating. The California roads are really dangerous; however I can assure that vast stretches of our great land are asshole free.

We got to the Farm midday, and it was effing gee dee hot. We took a quick tour. In some ways, being there on a random Saturday was better than the crowded Thanksgiving event because the tour guide was able to tell is some of the stories behind the animals. There were less animals out tho, because they were all trying to avoid the blazing hot rock in the sky. I've been a vegan for four years now, so I've heard a lot of the horror stories, seen the movies, and it's always a bummer to hear how cruel us humans can be. But... It's incredibly uplifting to see how happy these animals are now. The cows lie in the sun, the pigs splash around in the pond, a kitty cat naps with the bunny rabbits...Have you ever had a turkey, or any other bird, walk up to you and request a pet like a kitty?

A piggy homey avoiding the sun, smiling from a belly rub

Tar pets a turkey

I met my bro Alfalfa. I may have mentioned that it was really hot, so the goats were keeping it pretty mellow. Alfalfa liked the extra attention, and he seems like the kind of dude I could have as a pet. Goats are great, although we were told they are quite mischevious.

Alfalfa, my special goat homey

A boy and his goat

After broing off with Alfalfa, Tar and I headed to Chico, in search of a motel that was near downtown and had a pool. Chico doesn't really have quality lodging, unless you want to stay on the extreme north or south sides of the college town, and the rooms book up fast. Motel #1 was booked up. #2 only had a smoking room #3 was booked, so we settled for the slightly seedy Thunderbird Lodge. To Ukiah types this name evokes the seediest of all motor lodges out on south South State Street past the airport, where people don't stay so much as they live there, selling drugs or fixing their cars on the motel lawn. To Chico-ans, the Thunderbird is a curious oddity on the edge of downtown; nobody knows anybody that has stayed there and there's just something weird about the place. I am pretty sure they are ownded by the same people, but none of the employees could verify that. Both the Chico and Ukiah Thunderbirds are trad, like they were built in the 1950's, and neither has been renovated since then, I'd wager.

Our room was quiet, mostly because of the cinder block walls. The wall paper was pealing, the bathroom tile linoleum need to be replaced, random screws in the walls suggested that art had once adorned them. The door had been kicked in at one point. But the TV was brand new. And there was a pool.

First, we decided to go on a bike ride to earn our dip in the pool. We were smart and brought our bikes to enjoy Chico's flat landscape. We rode through the empty Chico State campus and I showed Tar all the highlights like the creek running through campus and my old dorm room. Then we rode over to Bidwell Park, which is the nations 2nd largest municipal park (Central Park in NYC is #1). In all the years I lived in Chico, I never once went on a bike ride in Bidwell. I effed up. Bidwell is rad. In fact, a casual afternoon bike ride through Bidwell alone is worth the three hour drive to Chico.

Tired and sweaty, we changed into our swim gear for a dip in the pool. The beer cans and cigarrettes in the poolside ash tray were not encouraging. I dipped my legs in, when Tar saw a used band aid stuck to an inflatable pool toy that was floating by. We skipped the swim and went to dinner instead.

After some yummy pizza, we started our evening out with $3 teas at Panama's. The giant glasses start with shots of vodka, gin, rum, and triple sec like a Long Island Ice Tea but Panama's has a menu with 30 different variations on that theme. Tar and I each had two and we were feeling pretty good walking out of there.

Next stop was Normal Street Bar. I used to live across the street from Normal St. and they were always good to me. It had some punk on the jukebox and the crowd was just swordy enough to be bearable. And they served the "Poor Boy Special" which was a shot of Mad Dog 20/20 fortified wine and a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon for $1.25. I promised Joe I would get a Poor Boy Special on his behalf. Tar and I walked in and it was unreal. It was like every jock, frat boy and meat head in a 250 mile radius crammed into the bar. There was some intense Godsmack/Staind type jock rock farting very loudly from the jukebox. We were totally the oldest people in there, and we're not that old. We stayed long enough to use the bathroom.

Dejected, we walked to Duffy's, a Chico favorite. Duffy's Tavern is like many an Irish pub that you might find in the Inner Richmond, but it's also been a refuge for people like me to escape the people like those at Normal St. The crowd was a bit older. I felt comfortable there, but it was just kind of boring, so we made one more attempt at bar hopping. We went next door to Mr. Lucky's. This place opened up after I left Chico, but I had some great times there cutting a rug with Smith, Fritch, Trevor, Joe, etc. during our many trips up to Chico in the early 2k's. Tonight however, a handful of ugly chicks swayed on the dance floor while a suspiciously underage looking couple made out in the corner. That shit was D-E-D ded, so we called it a night.

Chico was fun, but it made me feel very old. I'd like to go there with posse of homies with bikes so we can go for a nice ride and not feel so old.

I left out a bunch of stuff like the fact that we rode our bikes downtown that night, or the 1965 Mustang that Tar almost bought on the spot, or the good food we ate at Grilla Bites, or the English Bulldog boxers I bought. All in all tho, I had a great trip and Tar is the best for sneaking me out of town.

2005-07-28T17:35:00.000-05:00

I can't stand it anymore. I've started four different posts about Samoa, Hawaii and the week I spent on tour with Billy Corgan, but I just haven't committed the time to finish them.

So here you are. See 100 of my favorite Samoa photos here. See 24 of my favorite Hawaii photos here. Both photosets are in my "Recent Work" section see you can see some of the other stuff I've done recently. Coming soon, photos from the Billy Corgan tour.

The Mall photos made the cover of Mesh Magazine, an every 6 weeks or so arts & music tabloid here in SF. I really like the photos and those guys were great subjects to work with, and their music is really good. Listen to them here and check out the upcoming show dates while you are at it. Although there's some Casio keyboards in there, I like The Mall a lot because there are doing something outside the mind-dulling dance-punk that seems to own San Francisco right now.

Also up are promo photos of Danny & Linda Fetzer of Jeriko Estate Winery for a new wine magazine coming out of Mendocino County. I ended up doing that one totally unexpectedly. After getting back from Billy Corgan, I went up to Hopland/Ukiah to recover my car, which I stashed at my parent's house back in June. The sun was setting, and I was hanging out with the old man on the porch. My parents live next to Danny & Linda and the Jeriko Estate. He gave them a call about some sort of neighborly thing, and they lamented their inability to take a good looking photo. So my dad, being the good man that he is volunteered my services.

It was the exact right time of day for those kind of photos. Thanks to the wonder of technology, I was able to shoot 150 photos in about 45 minutes. Then I uploaded the photos to the laptop. I chose 25 of my favorites. From there, the Fetzers, my dad and I narrowed it down to 5 finals. I spent a few minutes color correcting the photos and the whole job took about 2 hours from the first shutter click to me handing over a finished CD to the client. With film, it would have take literally days to accomplish the same thing.

Ahhh, but these days my primary focus now that I am back for reals, is getting a jobby job. I am ready to work. I need to work. And my photography career is taking off in such a direction that I could stand to have a regular day job, and have photography to live for when I am not slaving for the man. Please, I need your help. If you work and your work like hires people and stuff, I am a pretty capable guy. I have a whole lot of project management and supervisorial experience, plus a grab bag of other skills so I can fit in just about anywhere.

I am trying not to do the San Francisco art-o thing of living in the Mission, working at a bar or restaurant, etc so I can focus on my art. For one, I am getting a bit old for that, and I need to start getting somewhere besides sidetracked in life. The truth is San Francisco just doesn't offer much for a creative but also employable/business minded late 20's guy like myself. If I were willing to live in NYC or LA, I think my employment situation wouldn't be so bleak. I love San Francisco, and I think the old girl still has a bit more for me, but the hard truth is that SF is dead, and well, I'm not the one to get things going.

I haven't been too crazy about new music these days, but in the past few weeks I've picked up a few albums that I can't stop listening to. The Crimea were openers for Billy Corgan. They sometimes remind me of Bruce Springsteen & The E Street band but from London 2005 instead of New Jersey 1975. I listened to their EP "Lottery Winners on Acid" on infinite repeat for like three days straight, and I am the guy that effing hates it when people listen to the same songs over and over again. They have an album on Warner Bros out September, but the label is kind of giving the run around so they may suffer from a lack of promotion. But they are brilliant, so get it. Or go to their myspace page and listen to a few of the songs.

The thing the broke me out of my Crimea trance was Rilo Kiley "More Adventurous." Joe M recently admitted he gets giddy every time Rilo Kiley comes on internet radio and is a yuppie because of it. I guess because they had a song on The OC and I bought the CD at Target and Jenny Lewis's lyrics are scientifically engineered to appeal to directionless late 20's-ers, then yeah Rilo Kiley is for yuppies. Well then, I am King Yuppie. For my money, this is like my album of the year. Lewis's voice is intensely beautiful, her lyrics clever and intelligent, and the recording has beautiful layer upon layer, just the way I like it. There aren't boring guitar wankery solos, but rather carefully chosen subtle over dubs. This is the kind of album you listen with the headphones on.

Oh yeah, I am really starting to warm up to the new Oasis album. Thank you.

american samoa, day 2

2005-07-08T11:35:00.000-05:00

i've been waking up around 6:45, which is pretty early, but then again, that's almost 11 am back home. my morning routine consists of doing some writing, reviewing my photos from the day before, taking an icy shower and perhaps reading if tar isn't up yet.

(as an aside, i am reading "mark twain's letters from hawaii" which he wrote for the sacramento union when he visited the islands in 1866. he's still a young writer at this point in his life, but it makes for an interesting read nonetheless.)

at around 9, i decided to emerge from my room and walk across the yard to tar's grandmother's house to see if tar is up yet. tar's grandmother is both a kind hostess and a vivacious character. she doesn't speak english so much, although after a few days i am figuring out that she understands a lot more than i originally thought. i've had a lot of conversations with her now, but all are made up of short sentences by both parties. often, after saying something in english, she'll laugh, and i haven't decided if she is amused by her own use of english or if she's being jovial but it's prolly a little of both.

tar & her grandmother

this morning she welcomed me as i walked in, told me tarita was still asleep, and asked if she should wake her. i gave her a conspiratorial nod in agreement. she walked over to the bedroom door, stuck her head in and said "tarita! the boy is up! he is out here. get up and make him breakfast!" tar and i had breakfast similar to that described previously, and i helped her make it.

in the afternoon, peti, tar's mom, took a break from her samoan language conference and we went for a tour of the island. the roads are pretty good here, but it's not like there's an interstate. there's not even a way to circumnavigate the island. mostly driving is done at a mild 20 miles an hour, and the drivers are exceptionally courteous. samoan drivers are constantly yielding their right of way to cars making left turns across their path. people use and also acknowledge turn signals. it's really the complete opposite of california, where drivers are selfish and territorial, impatient and dangerous. "no man is an island" is the rule of the road on this island. but, this can make for some slow going, especially if you get stuck behind and exceptionally safe driver that goes slower than the usual 20 mph.

although there aren't many accidents here, the drives can be mind numbingly slow. a drive to "town", ie the harbor village and capitol city of pago pago can take 45 minutes or more. and it's only 12 miles! growing up in the sticks in ukiah, i know what a 12 mile drive into town is like, and they take things pretty slow up in mendocino county too, but 45 minutes is something else.

pickups rule the road around here, although SUVs are pretty popular. (i've even seen a few SUVs with outlandish dubs and one with spinners). i can count 1 motorcycle and perhaps three or four honda civics. pickups are popular because the elevated suspension is good for some of the less developed roads, it's easier to haul stuff around, but most important--you can cram a whole lot of people in there. besides the buses, which i will write about later, the most common way to get around samoa is in the back of a pickup. it's common to see five or six or eight people piled in the back of a pick-up, and it's not just kids. grandmothers, uncles, brothers, aunties, they all ride in back.

on this afternoon, we traded uncle john his swank toyota 4-runner for his toyota tacoma pick-up and i rode in back with teenagers sam, lu'ai, and tatiana. it's a great feeling to be out in the sun in the back of a slow moving pick-up, but the slow moving traffic on the winding coastal rode makes for a long day. we drove nearly the entire length of the coastal main road that runs along the southern edge of the island. i saw so many charming villages and so much natural beauty that my meager words or modest photographs can do little to describe or represent its scope.

sam (left), tatiana, & lu'ai go for a ride

driving from one side of the island, you get a sense of just how friendly samoans are, as everyone waves and smiles when you go by. i'll talk about samoan kindness and generosity later, but i will say samoa has to be the friendliest place in the world, and their casual and welcoming regard for strangers is abundant.

sam in the back of the pick-up

the definite low-light of the day's trip was the tuna canneries. like the beauty of the samoan islands, words cannot describe the awful dry tuna-fishy stench that blows out from the canneries. i am not really sure how people can work there, but the canneries employ 34% of the workforce, and supply 30% of the canned tuna to the mainland. it must be like working at a paper mill or something; after a few days you just can't smell it anymore.

ok. time for a quick geography lesson. there are roughly a dozen samoan islands, with a distinctly western group and an eastern group. the western group is samoa (aka western samoa, aka independent samoa, but locals in both countries call it "samoa"). the eastern group is american samoa; with the majority of the 60,000 residents living on the island of tutuila. tutuila is where we've been staying. i should mention, people freely call the island "pago" because pago pago (pronounced pango pango) is the commercial and government center of the society. when i speak of "samoans" i am usually referring to people from either island group; when i use "samoa" i usually mean the whole.

the biggest disappointment about tutuila is the lack of beaches. i really expected more, but there just isn't any. in fact, despite the lush greenery and rugged landscape, tutuila is kind of worthless. as a volcanic hunk of rock in the middle of the ocean, only about 15% of its land is arable, so naturally, roughly 15% of the land is inhabitable.

the only thing tutuila has going for it is the naturally deep volcanic harbor, with a coastline that encloses it protecting ships from rough seas, while the steep mountains protect the harbor from high winds. naturally, the US navy fell in love with the harbor and built a coaling station there in 1904. theodore roosevelt was president at the time; as a former secretary of the navy, roosevelt made it the country's top priority to build up the navy to be the strongest in the world. in 1907, roosevelt launched the "great white fleet" of 16 brand new battleships (painted gleaming white), which circumnavigated the world as a show of the US's new naval might. in 1908, while the great white fleet cruised the pacific, a squadron of ships was dispatched to pago pago, should the fleet need reinforcements.

so, back to no beaches. there's a few, but the only beach suitable for a tourist such as myself would be tisa's barefoot bar and beach. tisa, an old school chum of peti, runs this legendary beachfront bar with her australian boyfriend, an aus who is totally awes. tisa's bar is like something out of swiss family robinson; everything is improvised, the bar stools are made of coconut tree stumps, and fishing nets are the primary decor.

tisa's barefoot bar & beach

we got there after the sun had set over the steep mountainside, so it was kind of cold. the sand was rough, but it sure was nice to get in the water after spending the afternoon in the back of a pick-up. while us kids swam in the ocean, peti went up to the bar to see her old friend (just missed her), but ended up talking to a pair of americans that were staying in tisa's guest cottage. peti forgot their names, but there were big time mountain climbers, having scaled everything from everest on down. they were in samoa to relax and to climb the islands' tallest peaks.

it had been a long day, and we rode back during the samoan rush hour. with only one road around the island, around 5 pm, the roads get clogged with slow moving busses and overloaded pick-ups. again a frustrating experience especially because we had to go from just east of pago pago to about 45 minutes west to leone. in leone we had to drop off the kids, and change into to dinner clothes, and then drive 45 minutes back to pago pago. oka oka!

pago pago harbour

because samoa is fairly close to the equator, the sun rises and sets roughly the same time (6:30 and 6:00) year round. in the hour before the sun goes down, samoans of all ages gather in the malae (village commons) and play football (soccer and american) volleyball, etc. to end the day.

evening sports at a malae

as we rushed back to leone, the hour of 6 was approaching; night was falling. although there are streetlights, it's still pretty dark on the island after the sun sets. bells started ringing. stern looking gentlemen with matching lava-lavas (cloth waist wraps like a sarong, worn by men and women) started lining the road. with their hands on their hips, some holding pipes or sticks, or crossing their thick arms across their chest, it was clear something very serious was going on.

it's an ancient samoan custom the men of the village make sure the night falls without incident, so they stand watch on the streets. they also make sure people hurry home for evening prayers. every village does things its own way. in some villages, the men wear matching lava-lavas in the village colors, while in a larger village like leone, the men cruise around in pick-up trucks. in some villages the curfew lasts for an hour, while in others, everyone must be in for the rest of the night.

tar and i joined her uncle tony and aunty salu for dinner at sadie thompson's inn in pago pago. sadie's is one of the best and oldest restaurants on tutuila. we had the good fortune of salu's company for a second night in a row. her daughter diana was home for two weeks from iraq, so salu has a short break from caring for diana's three children.

sadie's, tony tells me, is named for a famous madame that ran a brothel in the building the restaurant/hotel now occupies. the internet tells me sadie thompson is the main character of the short story "ms. thompson" by somerset maugham about a san francisco prostitute that tries to start anew in pago pago. the story became the play "rain" which was later made into the movie "sadie thompson" starring gloria swanson in the title role. it wouldn't surprise me if both were true.

the dinner was excellent, but the main reason we dined at sadie's was, like the night before, peti was attending a dinner for the samoan language conference. after stuffing our faces, we went to the patio to watch the floor show. sadie’s has the best floor show on the island, the locals tell me, but normally it features dance styles from all over polynesia. because of the language conference, all dances tonight were traditional samoan dances.

the dancers were the waitresses, wearing beautiful red puletasis. a puletasi is a women's formal wear in samoa, made up of a form fitting ankle length skirt and a long, form-fitting top. the patterns are usually colorful and hair is worn in a bun. puletasis are very beautiful and an important part of samoan culture, like the lava-lava, but i can't help but note they represent the westernization of samoan culture, as they came about after christian missionaries de-heathenized the islands. before christianity, women were topless. the puletasi is like the exact opposite; extremely conservative and covering most of the body, although newer designs are more revealing in the bodice.

traditional dancing is an important part of samoan culture, and often i would see women subconsciously making the hand motions to the dance from their seats. which is to say, everyone knows the songs and the moves to the songs. at several points during the show at sadie’s, audience members were called up to dance based on where they lived. peti jumped up on stage when all the californians were called.

peti dances at sadie's

about halfway through the show, an overwhelming odor blast of gasoline came over the crowd. i thought i was sitting on top of an old lawnmower. all concerns were erased when the fire knife dancers took the stage. the fire knife dance is a traditional samoan dance, which i always thought was hawaiian from TV. it's so traditional and samoan that it was first performed in golden gate park in san francisco in 1946! Letuli Olo Misilagi was about to perform the very traditional samoan knife dance for a shriner's convention, when indian fire-breathers and baton twirlers wowed the audience. letuli upstaged them by lighting his knives on fire, and arguably the most famous expression of polynesian culture was born.

sadie's is a small place, so the we could really feel the heat from the flames, and i got sprayed with gasoline a few times as the dancers whipped the flaming swords around. it was pretty incredible. so incredible, i didn't take pictures. sorry.

alright, well, that's like 2400 words, so i'll stop here. more to come tho.

curse of the traveler

2005-06-29T14:47:00.000-05:00

hi. we got back from 4 days in west samoa last night. it was really great, and i have so much to write and hundreds of photos to share. that's the good news. the bad news, and it was bound to happen, is that i ate or drank something funny and have been laid up with the gripper since monday night. feeling a bit better today, and maybe later on i will post a whole bunch more.

american samoa, day one some more

2005-06-21T10:30:00.000-05:00

many of the showers in samoa skip the hot water altogether, a fact i discovered all too quickly this morning. after my chilly rendezvous with cleanliness, i walked across the yard to see if tar was up.

we decided peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and fresh papaya would make a fine breakfast. as we constructed our sandwiches a neighbor or a cousin or both showed up with a steaming casserole dish of cocoa rice. this chocolaty treat is rice prepared in coconut milk with cocoa mixed in. a few minutes later, someone else showed up with two bowls full of samoan pancakes, which are donut hole sized balls of banana batter deep fried to make yummy goodness. what started off as a modest PBJ snack turned into a samoan breakfast feast.

after breakfast, we walked through the beautiful and lush garden that surrounds tar’s grandmother's house. i don't know what an acre looks like, but if i had to tender a guess, i would say her property is at least an acre's worth.

tar's sister tatiana walked us around the corner to the neighborhood market run by a relative. the village is littered with small markets that are much like the bodegas in the mission district or in nyc, although some are in the front of people's homes. after stealing their cousin lu’ai to be our tour guide, the four of us set out the explore the expansive village of leone. i can only put this in terms that i know, so bear with me. leone, i guess, must be about the size of willits, which is to say it's several miles long and has a few thousand inhabitants.

we made the swimming holes our first stop on our late morning walk. the swimming holes are actually a network of caves in the volcanic rock that the local kids swim through. them things looked kind of scary to me, but then again, the tide was out, so the holes looked deep and dark. the ladies climbed down the lava rock-ed cliff face to put their feet in the water, while i stood above them taking pictures.

it was agreed that spelunking was not the day's charge, so we headed east towards another swimming area favoured by the locals. again, we had to climb down some lava rock, this time to a small beach. the beach was mostly worn down chunks of coral and a pockets of rough sand.

i got to put my feet in the water this time, and it was the best. when i was a wee lad, i went swimming at a beach in Santa Monica, but i've never experienced warm ocean water before. none of us were clothed for swimming so we splashed around in the water for a while. this mostly involved lu’ai taunting tatiana with a sea cucumber, and picking up a handful of water and dumping it on tati's head.

at certain point tatiana decided she wanted to go for a quick swim, but her gray shorts immediatly turned translucent. a group of boys roughly tatiana and lu’ai's age came hacking through the brush with a machete and jumped in the water. one of them used the machete to flick crabs off the lava rocks at his swimming friend. i think the girls got kind of shy around the boys, so we decided to leave. tatiana borrowed la’ui's lava-lava to cover her translucent shorts.

tar and i were pretty tuckered out from the morning's activities and decided to relax with a game of cards on her grandmother's front porch. being lunch time, it wasn't long before the food started arriving again. this time it was boiled breadfruit smothered in coconut milk, boiled bananas, and oka which is like a ceviche of raw tuna soaked in the lime juice and coconut milk with slices of green onions, tomatoes and cucumbers. the breadfruit was good, especially with some salt. the starchy fruit tasted similar to, but not exactly like, artichoke. i am not sure why they boiled the banana, because it rendered it incredibly bland. the banana wasn't bad once i dipped it the oka sauce.

still kind of jet lagged, tar and i retired to our respective quarters for an afternoon nap. i woke up before tar, and went with her mom, peti, to drop of her friend at the other side of the village.

it's really hard to describe what leone looks like. there aren't any zoning laws, which explains why people open business in their homes. some houses have sidewalks, some houses are built right next to the street, while others are way back from the street. every once and a while a house is parallel to the street, but usually they are canted any way from 5 to 45 degrees off the street. the houses a are generally made of cinderblock, presumably to withstand the hurricanes that blow through here in the winter months. most of the roofs are made of the ripple corrugated steel.

obviously everything is intensely green, and every front yard looks like it has been masterfully landscaped, but that's probably more of nature taking it's course than anything else.

there are dogs everywhere, and i am told i should carry a stick when i walk because some of the dogs will come at you. they are responsive to threats of stick or stone, though. all the dogs on the island seem to be of the same genetic mutt stock. they are small, maybe 25 pounds, lean bodies with long faces that give them a sort of an ancient dog look. they are usually brown or tan, but sometimes they have black markings. there's a few scrawny pathetic looking cats around too.

people don't keep dogs and cats as pets here like they do in the mainland. in fact, while any bodega back home would have a pet food on its shelves, i think you'd have to drive pretty far to buy actual dog food. the cats are totally feral, and live off of table scraps and whatever else they can scrounge up. they are tolerated because they take care of vermin, but you never have one those filthy creatures hop in your lap for a petting and purring session. although cute because kitties are cute, samoan cats are contemptible scrounges like pigeons, and like the dogs, they have an ancient, lean look to them.

you don't pet the dogs either. the dogs have it a little better. most dogs are freelancers, and they'll enter a contract with a family, exchanging vicious barks at strange cars or people and general protection duties for choice table scraps. the dogs act like regular dogs, wagging their tail excitedly when you come by or acknowledge their existence, and they take long naps in the shade of the carport. but they drink rainwater out of buckets and puddles, and scrounge for human leftovers.

later that evening, tar and i had dinner with her auntie salu and her uncle john at the equator restaurant, which is connected to the clarion suites tradewinds hotel. the hotel is prolly one of the nicest in american samoa, but was exactly what you would expect of a clarion suites anywhere's in the US. during the daytime, tar's mom peti has been heavily involved with a samoan language conference at the nearby american samoa community college. this evening the tradewinds hotel hosted a buffet and floor show for all the delegates. after dinner, the four of us walked over to the poolside floor show and met up with peti.

what can i say? the evening was absolutely stunning. we pulled up some chairs to the edge of the pull and watched the traditional polynesian dances from behind the stage. the almost full moon rose up the sky directly in front of us, illuminating the tops of the coconut trees. an occasional gentle breeze caressed our faces. it was one of those moments to sit back and enjoy, while thinking about how nice it is to be alive.

american samoa, day one

2005-06-20T09:30:00.000-05:00

it's day break in leone. after getting about 6.5 hours of sleep, i am awake, ready to see samoa. but i prolly have to wait a few hours for everyone (tari, mostly) else to wake up. there are all sorts of birds making tropical bird noises. and there chickens, which i am told fly around and roost in trees. and a rooster, who desperately wants us to know the sun is up.

it's pleasantly warm here. i've been warned about the heat and humidity, and how it is vastly different from san francisco. it's not much worse than ohio or the sacramento valley this time of year. maybe more humid, but after 75%, who's counting anyway?

the two flights were long and uncomfortable. i might as well take it from the top. my shuttle van to SFO showed up 15 minutes early, which was fine because I got up at 5 AM to get ready anyhow. i got to say my proper goodbyes to marvel, my kitty, who greeted my affections by slipping off my lap to nap under my bed. at the airport, i walked straight up to the Pago Pago check in line. as i approached the counter, a hawaiian airlines employee came up to me and asked "sir, can i help you? what are you doing in this line, sir?"

when i responded that i am traveling to pago pago today, she apologized saying "it's just that you don't look like one of our regular customers."

i flew to honolulu, where i had a layover for many hours.

tar made her connection from las vegas, and we waited out the layover sipping mai tais and eating a fresh fruit salad, which rested in a bowl fashioned out of a cut in half and hollowed out pineapple. we got to the gate early, and relaxed in the empty terminal until a grumpy old man armed with a vacuum cleaner told us rudely to get out! i took us a few moments to realize that we needed to be at gate 29, and we were in gate 26.

we took off on the runway that serves as an emergency back-up runway for the space shuttle, a fact, which I am sure every person that has flow into to honolulu knows, because they mentioned it when we landed, and when we took off. i, of course, am deeply impressed by this fact, and leaned over tar to examine every detail of the black asphalt as we accelerated over it at 180 miles per hour.

flying is bizarre, especially when you do 10 hours of it. it's like sitting in classroom that occasionally bumps around and sometimes your ears pop. especially on the big planes, there's almost no sensation of motion or travel.

when we touched in pago pago, there was a light rain that came down in sheets like it does in the movies. even though it was almost 10 PM, it was 80 degrees. we disembarked directly onto the runway. as we walked up to the terminal, tar and i looked back to see the massive 737 we just came from and the long line of people exiting the plane. she said that would make a good picture. i showed my agreement by leaving my camera in the bag, which was stupid because now all i can think about is what a good picture it would have been. i guess i was kind of overwhelmed, worried about getting my luggage, etc.

pago pago international is an open-air affair, therefore it feels more like an agricultural inspection station in the sacramento valley than an international terminal. while we waited almost an hour for all of our luggage to show up, various geckos skitted by, and a giant moth bounced off my temple. tar told me that was a dead relative checking up on me, according to samoan folklore.

tar's mom peti and her younger sister tatiana, as well as various cousins, greeted us. the village where tar's family lives, leone, is about 25 minutes from the airport. on the way home, we stopped at a corner market that was just turning off its lights as we pulled up. the korean proprietors kindly reopened the store and we bought PBJ making supplies. the store, which was surrounded by tropical flora and fauna and had 50 lb bags of pigs feed stacked in front, was called "California Mart, inc" which only proves it is impossible to escape california.

we were greeted by various relatives, so many names and faces that it all escaped me. i certainly met tar's grandmother, who greeted me by kissing the top of my hand.

i also met a small mutt of a dog appropriately called "brownie." samoa is full of feral dogs, looking for a kind family to feed them table scraps, and brownie is the latest in a long and storied line of dogs that have made their home in the tuitele's yard, including a legendary three legged dog from years past.

i am sleeping across the yard from tar's grandmother's house at her uncle john's house. i have her cousin daniel's bedroom to use. this means that her cousin daniel gets to sleep in the living room. thanks daniel, i know how that is. i thought i would have trouble sleeping, but the fan kept me cool enough that i didn't touch the air conditioner.

so here i am in leone, american samoa, waiting for tar to wake up so we can start our day.

(i know i haven't yet delivered the goods as far as photos go, but have patience...i've already shot over 200, and i have some 2000+ words to post later.)

the morning after

2005-06-02T17:18:00.000-05:00

ok. so i am going to cheat a little. usually i save the words for this, and pictures for the photoblog, but my most recent post could really go in either, so i am posting it in both. sorry if that bores you. please check out the photo this post goes with here.

I am not sure if the woke up just before the gunshots, or if it was the gunshots that woke me up.

"Pwack..Pwack...Pwack.Pwack.Pwack"

The five thuds were more percussive and deeper sounding than the firecrackers I've been hearing in the weeks leading up to last weekend's Carnaval parade. It sounded like it was right outside my window. Given the three shootings this year in or near the projects at 26th and Harrison, I was sure the shots came from that area.

I looked at the clock. 3:14 AM. Shit.

I've had a police scanner since my days as a staff photog then photo editor at the college paper. As a weekly, we didn't cover a lot of spot news, but it was generally the photo editor's job to catch that kind of news. In college I had the misfortune of covering, among other things, a SWAT raid on a crazy with a rifle, couple of shootings, including an extremely gruesome shotgun rampage that wounded a handful of people.

I am man enough to admit after seeing the cops hose the fleshy remains of a victim's arm off the hood of a car, I had to put my camera away, sit on the curb, and sob at the senseless horror of it. After a few moments, I pulled myself together and got on with it. I’ve never been able to enjoy violent movies after that long day.

Anyway, since college the scanner has been generally gathering dust. Now that I am home a lot more, and I don't live in the boring Richmond District anymore, I’ve turn it on every once and a while.

When the gunshots went off this morning, I turned it on and waited to hear if the medics had arrived on scene. Generally speaking, the medics won't go in unless a scene is safe enough for them to work, which means it's safe enough for me. Some guy was shot and wounded at 25th and Florida, one block from my house, but the opposite direction of the projects.

I got out of bed, threw on some clothes and grabbed my camera bag. Usually, when there are lights and sirens, there will be curious neighbors lining the yellow police tape watching the show. This time it was two fire trucks, an ambulance, a several squad cars and me. I walked up just as they lifted the victim onto a gurney. I hate this shit, so I kept my camera in the bag, took one last look at the scene and walked back home.

Today I went back. Just a few hours before, something horrible, something life changing happened. With the exception of some double thick latex gloves laying the gutter, and a small piece of crime scene tape fluttering in the breeze, you'd think this was just another intersection in the Mission. Nothing in the news, either. It’s like if a tree falls in the forest.... did this shooting really even happen?

System of A Down Review up

2005-05-15T14:09:00.000-05:00

hi. a few weeks go i shot pictures and wrote a review of System of A Down at the Fillmore in SF. I don't think i know many SOAD fans, but i am pretty happy with the review. The review is now online here. Since they butchered my photos, you can view those here. Thanks.

oops

2005-05-11T02:36:00.000-05:00

20050510-204116

one would think i learned back in '99 not to cut my own hair, but i guess i am doomed to repeat some mistakes. i wish there was still a barber in my nieghboorhood so i don't have to go all the way into the financial district to get a decent haircut. it was that laziness and reluctance to go to a pro that caused me to do this to myself. i left it by the way.

parklife

2005-05-04T10:39:00.000-05:00

in the television world, so i hear, when your show is put on hiatus that usually means your shit has been dropped. in my world, when my four year relationship is put on hiatus, it means i have trouble sleeping at night.

tar and i are taking a break. actually we've been taking a break for a month now. in the mornings, when the fresh air is breezing through my apartment and i can hear the sounds of the neighborhood kids walking to the nearby catholic school, i think this is a good thing. we've been together for almost four great years, but we've gotten pretty lazy with our social lives, developing watching-TV-instead-of-going-out-type habits. we needed a reset, a chance to grow outside the relationship.

i've spent a lot of days here, what with no jobby job. my dreams and fantasies of freelance work paying the bills haven't quite materialized. now i might have to choose between doing things i love, taking photos and writing, and getting a "job" that pays "money" and hopefully has "benefits".

i try not to let the stench of failure overwhelm my stuffy little apartment, but some days it feels like a prison cell, but with all my stuff and a spotty WiFi internet connection. there are days when all i do is think. by late afternoon, i break out of this dump and go for walks around my neighborhood.

in the movies when you live in an ethnically diverse neighborhood like mine, whites like me fit right in and say things like "con permisso" when you are trying to get through a crowded sidewalk, or "salud" when the old man on the steps sneezes. when the lady at the local market sells you some tortillas, you say "gracias" or even "cuanto cuesta?" if you are feeling adventurous.

i don't feel especially welcome in the my neighborhood. maybe it was a recent afternoon in the aisles of the local produce market where an older gentleman exhaled "pinche juero" under his breath as i walked by. in case you weren't invited to the spanish slang party when you grew up, he basically called me a "fucking honky." i can't really take offense to what he said, because i am kind of a fucking honky when it comes down to it.

those that know me, i would think, could say that i am pretty upbeat in the face of adversity. i don't mean to sound so negative about my life and times. i've always found that once i complain about some shit, the intensity of the situation eases and i can move on. so i complain a lot.

for the past few days, i have been fucking around with my computers. i have an older spare computer that i intend to use a fileserver and backup for my photo files, so naturally i loaded linux on it. i also have a 24 port switch an old employer donated to me after the bought some new switches. all i want is for my win2k box to talk to my lnux box. because i don't have a router in the mix, i want the linux box to also serve DHCP. but after 3 days of reading every tutorial on the internet, swapping out hardware, etc. i still can't get them to ping each other. i've done this before. why is this so maddening? part of the problem may be that i get my internet connection on my win2k box via WiFi, so i am running two network interfaces, each trying to go to its own network. if you have any idears, don't be shy.

in other news, i shot pictures at a System of A Down show last week. You can view those here. i also wrote a review for synthesis.net, but they haven't posted it online (it's out in print). as soon as it goes up, i'll post the link, dog. i am an unstoppable multi-dimensional threat, ready to dominate the media. yesterday i shot photos of a hotel workers protest here in SF. these people have been without a contract since august and were locked out of their jobs for 51 days last fall by 14 of the largest and most successful san francisco hotels.

finally, as i was eating my granola in soy milk (that's what all californians have for breakfast) this morning, the new backstreet boys video debuted on VH1. it ain't no "i want it that way" but it's pretty good, reflecting a matured look and sound for them and stuff. AJ looks like a media stereotype terrorist from an 80's action movie.

my new friend

2005-04-30T11:51:00.000-05:00

i have a new friend, and you can see him at my photoblog. his name is marvel and i adopted him from the SF SPCA. it's really a great place to adopt a kitty because unlike most shelters they have a no kill policy and each animal has its own "condo" complete with chairs and tv and toys to simulate a real living environment. pets from there are happy and well adjusted because they haven't been caged up for months at time.

if you considering getting a cat or a dog, i suggest getting an adult instead of a kitten or puppy. they require less effort to train, they will love you just as much, and it is harder for them to find homes. i chose marvel from some 60 adult cats, and he was on a short list of 5 really great kitties, any which would have made a great pet.

photography

2005-04-09T14:18:00.000-05:00

if you care, sorry i haven't been posting so much here. i've been busy assembling my photography website, which i can now say is done. well, done enough to show. i have a feeling i will continually tinker with it. anyway, here's the good stuff:

petegeniella.com

check it out and let me know what you think.

thanks.

pictures

2005-03-18T00:08:00.000-06:00

i am launching a website to showcase my photography. in addition to the website scoring me prestige and fame, i am hoping it might get some work that earns cash money.

my business plan, to borrow a cliche, is as follows:

1. launch photography website
2. ???
3. profits!

phase one of my plan for focal (not fecal) domination is a "photoblog." you can check it out here:

photoblog.petegeniella.com

i like comments to my written words as well as my images, so don't be shy. please. thank you.

eventually, i will have my portfolio, etc posted at petegeniella.com, but i'll keep you posted on that.

best day ever

2005-02-22T17:19:00.000-06:00

i declare unemployment day 20 to be the best day of non-workery yet.

living in the mission district, while also spending a lot of time at tari's house that overlooks the mission, it's pretty easy to forget San Francisco is actually a coastal city. i spent the best day of unemployment at ocean beach, a long strip of sand that is the western shoreline of the city. when taken in the context of San Francisco's dramatic vistas, bridges and buildings, ocean beach is an understatement; just miles and miles of sand. ocean beach is a fine beach, don't get me wrong. but a fella goes to ocean beach to forget a city that hides behind the sand dunes.

it's a stunning day, somebody really out did themselves to put this one together. to the north, puffs of yesterday's storm clouds float over the domineering marin headlands. the midday air is so clear, i can just make out the farallon islands, some 27 miles offshore.

just over the dunes and across the great highway, i think i've found a new unemployment hangout--the java beach cafe at la playa and judah. there's free wireless and a solitary wall outlet for my laptop which is so old and bootsy, it has no battery. i drove here, but the n-judah line terminates right out the window, making this point easily reachable via public transportation.

have a nice day.

redundancies

2005-02-02T19:17:00.000-06:00

redundancies. that's what they call layoffs in england. it's what i call my new life. i just got sacked for lack of work. i can't say i am shattered, because i've had some plans steeping for a while and now i have the time to make them happen. and no more commuting across the bay bridge. but i plan trying to find a job as quickly as i can.

i should have kept my mouth shut

2005-02-01T11:55:00.000-06:00

remember how the other day i was talking about how great 2005 is going to be?

i should have kept my words to myself. i don't have the energy to describe the lame specifics, but i am facing a potential layoff, or at least a drastic restructuring of my workplace. if you know of any jobs for a fellow that is both talented and handsome, email me . pgeniella AT gmail.com

oh, yeah

2005-01-26T16:27:00.000-06:00

hi. hello.

both phil and tari have updated their blogs this week, making me feel pretty lame for neglecting mine. like tari said, i had me some really good holidays this time around. currently, work is regrettably and mind numbingly slow. i have a good feeling about 2005, like some things might really come together this year.

ok. thank you.

blue star

2004-12-09T12:12:00.000-06:00

hi.

my brother luke is selling some shirts to promote his album blue star at cafePress. the design is really neat, so even if one isn't into the music because one is mentally ill, one could rock one of these shirts and look quite fetching. the girl hoody and the organic tshirt are american apparel, which means they are high quality 100% cotton, made in downtown LA, non-sweatshop guilt free garments. my brother has a few songs from the album on his website. if you likey like, you can then purchase his cds via the CDBaby link on his website, or on iTunes.

also, read his blog.

thank you.

i roam and ramble and i follow my footsteps

2004-12-06T23:20:00.000-06:00

despite the storm flagellating across the the city's spiny curves, the mission district sparkles below me. i am at tari's apartment on buena vista hill, which overlooks a lot of the city. to my left i can see the gilded dome of city hall. dead center is pac bell park, with oakland off in the distance. the mission district sprawls out across most of the view, and to the far right i can see hunter's point and the bayview.

on a good night, which tonight is not, i can see the landing lights of six to eight planes lined up as they make their final approach to SFO. air traffic controllers call it the "string of pearls."

i've been pretty busy lately; i do have quite a few things to write about, but tonight my sentences are coming out clunky and my thoughts are rambling. maybe i just don't have the will to complain about what troubles me or the spirit to celebrate what keeps me from complaining.

the other night, i met some friends for dinner in north beach. i can promise you, the food was nothing to write about, but something funny happened on the cab ride over. i am sorry if you heard this story already, but a fella's got to have something to talk about.

traffic on this friday night was typically hectic, and my cab driver was especially un-shy about his feelings on the matter. he hangs a hard right onto broadway from franklin, and we are moving, until the shiny black mercedes in front of us absent-mindedly takes up both lanes, impeding our progress.

"this guy, he can't make up his mind," i say.

"it's like this every friday night, they don't drive all week, and then they don't know what they are doing," he says, raising his voice over the crackling CB that is humming with a dispatcher's dull voice, sighing pick up requests that seemingly fall on deaf ears.

the light at the upcoming intersection melts from yellow to red, and the mercedes takes to the right lane. we pull up to the black car, which has loud caribbean music pouring out of it. i am not impressed. as my cab waits at the light, my face is exactly a foot away from the driver of the mercedes. i take the opportunity to mean-mug the richie, just to let him know what i think of his careless driving.

the driver leans over the mahongonied interior and kisses the attractive lady in the passenger seat. at some point, he feels the burning heat of my pooh face, and looks up at me. well shit. it's benjamin bratt. and the purty lady is talisa soto. we make eye contact for less than a second. just as my hate-face drops into recognition, the light turns and the handsome actor hangs a quick right onto polk street.

all of the time, we're together, in dreams

2004-11-16T19:25:00.000-06:00

i had a very upsetting dream the other night.

now, i know listening to a person describe a dream is kind of like hearing them describe the car accident they almost got into on their way to work. it's impossible to visualize the scene, and the crux of the event is always somehow described with not-so-salient details.

that said, here's the dream.

well, here's the back story for the dream.

when i was in 7th grade, there was nothing this boy wanted more than a puppy by his side. i went through the typical filibustering of parents. i spent hours researching different breeds, and this was years before google, let me tell you. after some concerns voiced by the speaker of the house, my puppy initiative barely passed by two ayes.

my parents buried a rider to initiative, which i must have missed as the last minute votes were earned and political favors granted. it turns out, i would have to clean out the side yard by the pool and renovate it into a puppy corral. i stacked bush, i trimmed hedges, i sunk posts and i wrangled fencing into place. there was sweat, dirtied brows, a garter snake or two, but in the end i had the satisfaction of a job well done.

my mom and i, well mostly my mom, decided an australian shepherd would be the right dog for us becauseof their medium build, mild temperment and intelligence. contrary to the name, australian shepherds are actually from california, by the way.

we found an ad in the paper for chocolate brown puppies in cotati. my mom and i drove down, discussing my new responsibilities. we bought our pup from a breeder for $50. (my dad would often joke "and to think we actually paid money for this dog.") i chose her because she was the most vocal of the bunch. the breeder told us that she would often take walks through her garden, and our puppy would follow her, making doggy noises almost conversationally. the poor thing got real car sick on the way back up to ukiah, and threw up repeatedly for the hour long drive.

i spent several days trying to come up with a name and settled on "Aussie." later, i would be ashamed of the name. i guess i felt such a sweet dog deserved a better name than some colloquial moniker for her breed.

aussie, despite being a total ding dong, or maybe because of that, truly became a member of our family. and quickly, too. like, so quickly, i am pretty sure i spent more time building the puppy corral than she actually spent in it.

aussie was very protective of our family and our home. she proved this often by leaping up to with window and furiously barking every time my dad walked by. she had a special regime against UPS trucks. my mom received frequent UPS shipments for a side business she ran, and sure enough aussie was in the driveway defending my mother every time a brown truck lumbered down the street.

one day, my mom profusely apologized to the UPS driver, explaining that our dog was real protective of our house. the driver kindly acknowledged my mom's explanation, and added that aussie must be real protective of the entire neighborhood, because she is always running his truck down whenever he's in the area.

although she loved and was loved, aussie had a hard life. prolly from some poor breeding, she had terrible skin allergies and was horribly allergic to fleas. so many evenings we would be in the family room, enjoying the blanketing warmth of the woodstove, watching a movie, and then aussie would start gnawing on an itch on her back. we'd yell at her to knock it off and she would resist until the itch became too much ignore. this repeated itself ad ifinitum for the rest of the days of her life. her ears were terribly prone to infection, and her violent surges to the window as the old man walked by led us to believe her vision wasn't so great either.

in so many ways, aussie was a sad case, but she was so sweet and loving, it was impossible to merely pity her. and she kept the fly population down. all the windows in our house had doggie nose smeared along the bottom, because aussie developed a connoisseur's palate for house flies.

after college, i lived with my folks for almost two years, living the ukiah dream; workin', drinkin', fightin'. etc. you can get a sense of that period of my life by reading the archives. to cop a phrase, when in rome...so i bought a ford f150. it was a big white beast, with an extended bed and mean 302 under the hood. i had it for a few months before the water pump gave way.

it took me a few days to to replace the water pump. i kept my work area clean, dutifully put my tools away as the sun sunk below the western ridge of the ukiah valley, and i would hose away any anti-freeze that may have puddled up on the driveway.

one day i was careless. this was to be a very bad day, so events are muddy in my mind.

maybe i went inside to get some lunch. maybe i saw the puddle of antifreeze under my pick up and didn't think much of it. maybe i took another break in the afternoon, and i noticed the aussie was walking sideways and crashing into things like she was drunk. maybe this was queer, but it was a little comical.

maybe we started to get concerned later in the night when aussie started vomiting, but on the other hand, she was always eating garbage and rolling in horse shit, so it wouldn't have been the first time the dog ate something her stomach didn't agree with.

the next morning, aussie seemed to be better.

when a doggie, or kitty, or deer, or bear, or your little brother, ingests antifreeze, their liver is ravaged by the ethylene glycol. the drunken staggering, depression, and frequent urination occur because the victim is literally drunk on ethylene glycol, which is an alcohol. the liver metabolizes the ethylene glycol, and makes compounds that are toxic to the kidneys.

the second stage of antifreeze poisoning is a rapid onset of kidney failure. when aussie retreated to a corner of the bathroom, and resumed the vomiting, saturday afternoon calls to the vet were made. dogs have 50-70% mortality rate after ingesting antifreeze, we were told, so maybe aussie would get past it. however, a teaspoon of antifreeze is enough to kill a typical dog. as the kidneys fail, they stop producing urine, and fatal levels of toxins build up, ultimately killing the victim.

aussie spent the last few hours of her life, convulsing with seizures on the bathroom floor. i cannot describe to you how painful it is to watch a loved one die, while their body is quaking uncontrollably, with a panicked look in their eyes. my eyes are actually watering as i type this. near the end, aussie was experiencing seizures about every 15 minutes.

the sun had set, figuratively and literally. fortunately for aussie, our friends, the merritts, had been her veterinarians for several years, and agreed to make a special trip into town and do what needed to be done late that evening. we loaded aussie in the back of my mom's blazer, but i couldn't go.

the next day, we buried aussie on the hillside overlooking the horse pasture where she used to run through the tall grass and roll in the horse shit.

so the other night i had a dream about aussie. this is one of those dreams that sets the mood for your waking life. in this case, i've been rattled for a few days now.

i feel like i was in some sort of factory farm, which not exactly a nice place for animals to be. i opened a door and aussie ran up, greeting me by wagging her tailless butt, and excitedly whinnying the way she did whenever i came home from college, or even a long day at work. she was so happy to see me, as if she was saying "there you are! i've been waiting for you for so long!"

i reached down, putting my arm around her neck and rubbed her chest.

she was so happy to see me.

wordy

2004-11-09T01:33:00.000-06:00

saturday night found me freezing my ass off at 9th and gilman in berkeley. well, not that 9th and gilman. the one across the street. with all the yuppies.

tari, posse-ed up with her ex-work-but-still-homey dan, wrangled me to the built to spill show at the pyramid brewery. now, i've been to the pyramid brewery many times whilst attending a show (punk!) across the street at 924 gilman street (or "the gilman" as some call it like some call san francisco "frisco"). nothing makes you feel like an old sellout like going straight to the pyramid without having a show at the gilman to go to. as we walked up, i made tari and dan cross the street so that none of the real punks would jeer at me for being a micro-brew swilling yuppy.

while i crossed the street, i looked around nervously, like a creep about to duck into a vid store. my own actions reminded me of the countless times i saw the skumfukiest-crusto-anarcho punks get dropped off a few blocks away by mercedes station wagon equipped walnut creek moms. at the very intersection the three of us were now crossing, the punks would shrink into the shadows only to emerge from the night, moments later, like they had been squatting in the sewer the entire time.

really though, i should start from the beginning. i'll be honest, my first show at gilman street was july '95.

i'm a poseur.

loose change, that venerable ukiah pop-punk institution, was opening for john cougar concentration camp. i drove my mom's station wagon, later affectionately dubbed the "grocery getter," down to berkeley with jon (the fot master), joe m, and darcy.

i had attended a handful of punk shows before this warm summer night, but because this was my first trip to "gilman street" i thought it wise to wear my work boots in case i got "moshed" in the "pit" by some "punks" engaged in the act of "slam dancing" to "punk rock music." after parking a few blocks away because we didn't want anyone to realize the grocery getter's occupants were us, the three of us joined a large group of ukiahians. somebody, was it JB or maybe garrett?, greeted me with some phrase that i now recall to be at least intoned if not actually said "nice boots, dickhead." there's alot more i could say about this weekend, like i could talk about cashew's mack-10, i could get into "fucking el charro" or how we almost met skee-lo, but i really must stay on track.

that was the first of many nights at gilman street that were characterized by intense bro-rodery of the ukiah crew at the time. an important part to seeing any show was actually spent missing most of the show in "ice-800" alley. i forget how this alley got it's name, although i bet spanky had something to do with it. who is spanky? someone besides myself could do more justice to the question so i'll leave it at that.

ice-800 alley, named after a particular virile stripe of olde english 800 malt liquor, is along the south wall of what is now the pyramid brewery. at the time, the grounds of the brewery were occupied by an abandoned warehouse that was representative of the industrial squalor that used to define north berkeley. aaron cometbus has written about how punks moving into some horrible neighborhood is always the first step to the area's inevitable redevelopment (gentrification?). maybe the area around gilman street is a good example of that, what with all the pyramid's and r.e.i.'s and chipotle's that have sprung up in recent years.

about 100 yards from the street were a collection of logs were we could be found, most often with bottles of cheap beer in our hands. i think most shows i went to must have been in the winter because i remember my fingers numbed, but my spirit warmed by the company of my bros, as cheesy as that sounds. a favorite thing to do with an emptied bottle was to fire it through one of the hundreds of windows yet unmolested on the side of the empty warehouse. this was punk. looking back, i can't believe none of us ever tried to get into the warehouse. there was an incident that involved a jeep getting tipped over or something, but someone else will have to tell that story because i wasn't there.

let's jump forward a few years, actually a lot of years, to june of 2002. the pyramid brewery has been open for about 5 years. that wasn't without controversy, if i recall, and was clearly the first of many for the neighborhood. this was a fairly typical night in my latter gilman street days. i ran into some friends on the corner in front of gilman street, prolly ducked in real quick to get a new membership card and a stamp for the evening's show.

it would be easy to say we are old now, skipping the opener in favor a drinks across the street, but really, that's always been the case, except the beer is a lot more expensive. anybody that thought the music was the best part of going to a show wasn't up to the same shit i was.

the explosion was playing on this particular night, and we met up them across the street. million dollar matt had discovered a keen loophole in pyramid's beverage serving system. if you buy a 64 oz "growler" for $12 you can take it oustide to their beer garden and get wasted on one giant magnificent fuck load of beer. he also discovered that if you relax your fingers and the growler plunges to the ground, it will shatter and then pyramid employees will escort you and yours off the premises.

soon after the shattering glass and beer splashing and the words exchanged, the explosion were on stage playing a passionately drunken set, encouraging the attending crowd to "fuck that place across the street."

last saturday i find myself back on the grounds of the pyramid brewery. they set up a tent in the parking lot, with a stage at one end. outside the tent were the beer stands, with a race track for the kegs-on-wheels against the gilman street fence, we are all old here, drinking microbrewed hefewiezen, with a lemon wedge please. tari described the scene a having "an adult warped tour/aging fraternity vibe" which really sums it up far better than the 133 words i was going to use.

the show, advertised as a benifit for "bay area search and rescue" was also a "launch party" for a new "seasonal" beer. there were free samples and men dressed as beer bottles circulating amongst the crowd, flirting with the ladies and snapping polaroids to give away. we fucked up and didn't get our picture taken with the walking six pack. i really wished they would go away; i couldn't drink my beer around them. it'd be like eating a hamburger in front of a cow.

built to spill, a band i am not so familiar with, not because of a lack of praise, played and they played quite well. maybe it is because doug martsch, et al, look like grad student teacher's assistants, but there was something collegiate in the air. my guess ist that most, if not all, built to spill types have spent at least a few hours in college lecture hall. there was a definite sense that going to a built to spill show at a micro-brewery, whilst wearing fleece and perhaps a goatee, is what a fella does for kicks as the ten year college reunion approaches.

for an open air affair, the sound was really good, with a stereo mix even! everyone was wasted. there was a scuffle, not quite a fight, and some dickweed threw a cup of beer at the band. his voice echoing from the vocal effects that give his vocals their distinct ethereal quality, dr. martsch told us between songs,"in case you were wondering, we don't like having beer thrown at us. if you don't like us, we can't stop you from doing that. but just in case you thought we might like that, we don't."

i've heard the crowd was good for a bay area built to spill show. i can imagine a lot of crossed arms and nodding heads whenever they do their annual 4 night stand at slim's every year.

besides mist from my exhalations, there was the sticky-icky perfume of marijuana hanging in the air, and surprisingly, a few open-toed sandals on the ground. i took a lot of notes during the show because built to spill plays a kind of experimental (shoot me for using the phrase) indie rock that really lets your mind wander between the harmonized intertwining guitar solos.

i was thinking about how funny it was that in college i read douglas coupland's generation x and it had quite an impression on my impressionable mind. at the time i was struck by coupland's idea that our generation, or at least those folks just a few years older than i, suffered from a lack of history. while our parents partied with the kennedy assassination, the civil rights movement, woodstock, some weak-ass shake, watergate and LSD, all we had to show was maybe some punk songs about reagan and the challenger explosion. i think i wrote a paper bemoaning the horrible lack of history i'd have to live through.

shit fuk, i sure god dam got what i asked for. i should have kept my fuck tard mouth shut.

chop & drop

2004-11-05T13:25:00.000-06:00

chop & drop

sorry about the shitty camera phone image. last night this once proud ford mustang convertible was dumped on the sidewalk in front of my work. a reminder that despite my proximity to berkeley or emeryville, i definitely work in oakland.

bonfires burning bright pumpkin faces in the night

2004-11-04T23:31:00.000-06:00

spooky

what do hamburglars do after a long night of burger thievery? they toss off the hat, lose the mask and drink scotch out of plastic cups.

although shit's been pretty serious lately, the combination of a pre-emptive strike on tari's birthday and halloween yielded some good times. this picture is from last friday's halloween party, hosted by tari's work homey.

on saturday, after feet were dragged by me and words exchanged with tari, we got it together enough to drive to victor's party in santa cruz. i am not crazy about santa cruz, but at 22:30 tari inspired enough impulse in me to drive an hour and a half to a party to which we would arrive at midnight and most likely leave at 01:00.

tar's mummy costume left her hot and bothered, mostly because of the hour it took to put on friday night, and the lack of an urine exit strategy once the costume is on. she ditched it in favor of a suicidal surgeon get up. i drove down sans costume, lest i get pulled over for perpetrating crimes against the hamburger possessing public.

when we arrived, i discovered that my tie, the cornerstone of my costume had floated off in to the aether, or at least a gutter near tari's house. so i showed to the party as a dickhead. no costume needed. victor's party was pretty good, except for the boring music he kept putting on.

one attendee was dressed as sexy yassir arafat. this prolly warrants some more description. there are two absolutes about halloween. well, there could be more, but i only want to talk about these two. number one is that dudes that want to experiment with their sexuality often dress up like slutty or sexy girls. number two is that girls that want to experiment with their sexuality definitely dress up sexy or slutty.

stuck with you

2004-11-03T13:37:00.000-06:00

We've had some fun, and yes we've had our ups and downs
Been down that rocky road, but here we are, still around
We thought about someone else, but neither one took the bait
We thought about breaking up, but now we know it's much too late

i woke up this morning with "stuck with you" by huey lewis running through my head. my arms and thighs ached. my head hurt. my right ear/sinus system was clogged from sleeping on my side. my stomach burned.

We are bound by all the rest
Like the same phone number
All the same friends
And the same address

the alarm went off at 6:15, but i think my eyes opened at 6:03. i lay in bed, thinking about last night. the shockingly expensive dinner. vegan irish coffee gut and anxiety. anger and confusion. adrenaline and disappointment.

let me start from the beginning. yesterday was tari's birthday. because of it's proximity to election day, and her dad's 3 unsuccessful bids for DA, birthdays have been rough for her. i tried real hard to make it special for her.

after an afternoon of furious mouse clicking and browser reloading, i took tari out to dinner at millennium. although we were reluctant to leave the TV for a few hours of vegan decadence, millennium was once again a flavor symphony in my mouth.

for a starter, i had a kombu and avacado salad, served in a martini glass. tari ordered the raw-violi. both dishes were so good, i could have stopped there. for my main course, i had a squash, resting on black forbidden rice rissoto, stuffed with tofu and smothered in a gravy. tari had a stuffed pablano chile, that was equally good, especially with a a spicy un-cheesy sauce drizzling the plate.

dessert made a brief appearance as the aforementioned vegan irish coffee, and a little chocolate cake with chocolate sorbet. a bottle of vegan organic red wine, a mojito and a yellow rum cocktail snuck onto our table at some point during the meal. not really sure how that happened.

several times through the meal, i tried to get election results via SMS on my cell phone, to no avail. we left the restaraunt at around 21:30. we walked up geary to edinburgh castle. the bar was crowded, tense and festive. CNN flickered from a projecter aimed on the wall above the pool table, while smaller TV's crammed between top shelf liquor and empty pint glasses belched the latest analysis.

every time wolf blitzer projected a state in kerry's favor the sizable crowd erupted in cheers. when ohio was brought up, people would bellow "OOHHHHIOOOO" with disdain. joe and kana k showed up. i drank a lot. we discussed expatriation options. around midnight, we took a dizzy cab ride home. i watched the election fade into the night until my eyelids and heart became heavy.

Yes, it's true, (yes it's true) I am happy to be stuck with you
Yes, it's true, (yes it's true) I'm so happy to be stuck with you
'cause I can see, (I can see) that you're happy to be stuck with me

right now, i am at my desk, listening to john kerry officially concede on the radio. my coworkers in the art department are circulating a picture of "president" bush with text that reads "we're fucked." our british customers are calling us, asking us how we feel about the results. jokingly, my coworkers respond by asking for a room to rent or a work visa. our colleagues at fat wreck chords get the day off to go get drunk. at least they'll be able to sell their "not my president" shirt for another four years.

they say that "moral values" was probably a deciding factor in this election; that george bush had a firmer grasp on these things. is war mongery and contempt for social justice representative of these "moral values?" is it moral to ignore obligations of world citizenship? where's the morality in senseless death?

We've had our doubts, we never took them seriously
And we've had our ins and outs, but that's the way it's supposed to be
We thought about giving up, but we could never stay away
Thought about breaking up, but now we know it's much too late
And it's no great mystery
If we change our minds
Eventually, it's back to you and me

what everybody else is writing about today

2004-11-02T18:45:00.000-06:00

i am sitting at work, watching the first of the election returns come in via the cybernet. this is the opening salvo of results; predictably bush is carrying GA, W.Va, IN, KY, while john kerry has VT. i've been tormenting myself with anxiety and anticipation in the weeks leading up to these very minutes. since august, i've followed the campaign daily, sometimes hourly. i've carried a mini cauldron of belching stomach acid in my gut since at least last weekend. i feel like i am back to drinking coffee. i slept restlessly last night, even woke up an hour early this morning.

during the debates i spent tense hours behind the steering wheel of my car fighting bay bridge traffic, listening closely on the radio, my heart rate jumping every time john kerry gave an answer. after a surge of adrenaline, my nerves would wane with each confident response by kerry, or each robotic retard reply by president bush.

i'll be relieved when today is over, but that will be a fleeting moment if bush is re-elected. i can't say what i would do that happens. it's not the america i want

spooorts!

2004-10-29T00:13:00.000-05:00

i used to be a big baseball fan.

after a 45 minute yellow bus ride through north ukiah's finest neighborhoods (including, but not limited to, empire gardens, the pinoleville res, and north state street) my brother and i would get off at the lucky angler, a mom & pop convenience store near the muddy shores of lake mendocino. chet and laura would sell us a pack of baseball cards, and before climbing up the hill through the horse pasture, luke and i would stop off at a log hidden from the road by an overgrowth of bushes. we'd tenderly free our cards from their wax paper packets, and hope for a don mattingly or nolan ryan card.

i spent a few hot summer days listening to a giants game on knbr. i even spent a few of the afternoons at candlestick, including game 5 of the '89 NLCS when the giants clinched the pennant against the forlorn cubs

now i could give a shit about sports, unlike, surprisingly, friends of mine who are hecka into sports these days. i haven't sworn off the whole endeavour; i'll still watch a game every once and while. i am a total fairweather giants fan, but it's hard not to be when one lives in san francisco.

i haven't so much been into sports since high school. i think the baseball strike in 1994 had something to do with it. or maybe it was exposing my tender mind to a world outside of the sleepy ukiah valley walls.

i got caught up in this year's ALCS and i actually watched about 30 innings of the world series. i am baffled at how dirty and baggy and hip hop the red sox of current are. i felt like i was watching the '93 phillies or something. the red sox of pete-fan days were clean cut and sometimes sported red moustaches. the relaxed curls, untucked shirts and ruggish stubble were pretty shocking to me.

almost with a whisper, the red sox finally broke the curse, yielding the lamest, boring-est world series in recent history. (although one could argue winning 8 straight post season games is an exciting feat.) last night i was pretty excited during the 8th and 9th innnings, mostly because i was convinced they would choke, but that prolly has something to do with various giants games i've seen in recent history. the four game roll over by the cardinals doesn't seem to do justice to the heartbreak of guys like wade boggs, roger clemens, oil can boyd or even bill effing buckner.

i don't expect to ever care about the game the way i did when i was a kid, but i don't mind remembering warm sunshiney afternoons with AM radios and rookie cards and wiffle ball bats.

bookworm

2004-10-19T17:03:00.000-05:00

so i've discussed my friend's material. here are a few more sites with which i pass the time:

Baghdad Burning is written by a 24 year old woman living in occupied iraq. she is university educated with a computer science degree; a former network administrator/database programmer. her account of daily life since our invasion is at the same time compelling and heartbreaking, and completely contrary to the bush administration's version of the occupation. here's a quote from a recent, september 2004 post:

You know things are really going downhill in Iraq, when the Bush speech-writers have to recycle his old speeches. Listening to him yesterday, one might think he was simply copying and pasting bits and pieces from the older stuff. My favorite part was when he claimed, "Electricity has been restored above pre-war levels..." Even E. had to laugh at that one.

A few days ago, most of Baghdad was in the dark for over 24 hours and lately, on our better days, we get about 12 hours of electricity. Bush got it wrong (or Allawi explained it to incorrectly)- the electricity is drastically less than pre-war levels, but the electricity BILL is way above pre-war levels. Congratulations Iraqis on THAT!! Our electricity bill was painful last month. Before the war, Iraqis might pay an average of around 5,000 Iraqi Dinars a month for electricity (the equivalent back then of $2.50) - summer or winter. Now, it's quite common to get bills above 70,000 Iraqi Dinars... for half-time electricity.

i was about to start my freshman year in high school when saddam hussein invaded kuwait in august 1990. let's not forget that life for the average iraqi was at least functional under saddam hussein...they had one of the world's finest health care systems, an extensive university system with a literate, well educated "middle class," a well developed infrastructure. most people in iraq didn't live in tents in the desert.

the sanctions against the iraqi government didn't hurt saddam hussein, they hurt common people. they kept babies from getting antibiotics. they made bridges fall into disrepair. they caused electrical brown-outs.

i guess the idea was the people would get so fed up the squalor the sanctions subjected them to, they would rise up and depose hussien themselves. after president bush sold out on the kurds right after the Gulf War, i can only guess that the iraqi people had little faith that we would support them if they rose up against saddam. and they were too marginalized by the sanctions to get past daily survival.

i perceive a general lack of regard (or is it a lack of knowledge?) for the people, history and culture of iraq. iraq is the birthplace of western civilization. some of humanity's greatest treasures and artifacts are there. iraq was a modern society with popular culture, christmas celebrations, the internet, etc. what is happening in iraq is a tragedy, and reading riverbend's blog is an up close look into the daily life of an iraqi, while offering the other side of history.

english national shaun atwood got popped on what he claims to be trumped up drug and financial fraud charges, and was subsequently sentenced to nine years in arizona state prison. he spent several months holding the infamous maricopa county jail awaiting a cell in the big house. shaun's descriptions of county jail, and now prison life are intriguing and disturbing. his posts about the county jail in particular have led to efforts to improve the shameful conditions there.

he writes his posts by hand, and his mother transcribes them into his blog. he's an interesting character, a former stock broker who practices yoga and vegetarianism in his cell, when he's not reading books from the prison library.

avid reader

2004-10-14T23:14:00.000-05:00

i haven't written for a while, but i have been coasting through my days at work, reading what ever website suits my fancy at that particular moment. on a given day i read my friend's sites first, so i'll start with that.

phil is one of my oldest friends. last june, he relocated to new york city to earn a masters degree by teaching spanish in the public school system. new york city has a massive deficit of qualified teachers, and it's been 10 years since phil has been in any sort of grade school classroom. although hardly a substitute for the flesh and blood version, phil has been keeping in touch with daily emails and frequent posts to his weblog, rocky hands. phil has an undeniable wit and a storyteller's insight that makes his words a compelling read. he's never taught before and if i were some shifty magazine editor i would write something like "read one man's account of life in the trenches of new york's public school system."

tari is my sweetheart. like her tender boyfriend, she's had a tough time making a regular habit of writing, but when she does i really enjoy it because so much of her voice comes through in her writing. she's a scientist at a struggling bay area biotech, so she's got a fair amount of free time on her hands while her company figures out how they are going to move forward. read it, and maybe post some comments or send her an email.

my brother luke lives in a cabin in the redwoods on the mendocino coast, with his sweetheart. he's working hard to get his music career of the ground. he's quite talented, and you can hear his music on the website. he incorporates sound samples with guitar and cello into his self produced recordings, and his lyrics are as finely crafted as his recordings. his kittens are so cute, after i look at their pictures on his website, i want to smash my skull in with a hammer.

i have six of them

2004-10-14T00:19:00.000-05:00

i have gmail accounts available if anyone
.wants one
.is actually reading this

if you would likey likey, email pgeniella at gmail.com. thank you.

thumbs up

2004-07-28T01:10:00.000-05:00

today i had the very first performance review of my working life.

this means i've been at my current job for 3 months. i feel like it's been far longer. this a good thing; an indication that i fit in very nicely. the review went well. my boss could have nailed me on a few things, but he was very generous, and rated me far higher than i rate myself. and i thought i was pushing my luck.

i am now an official employee, with access to all the privileges therein. i didn't get a raise, which i was secretly hoping for even though i don't think people always get those so soon in their tenure. we can only get raises when we get reviewed, so it's disheartening to think it'll be another nine months before i can obsessively, secretly calculate my new pay rate.

a good lesson to learn, and i've been schooled a few times now, is that things in life that are worth having are worth having because you had to work for it. you can only appreciate something if you have to earn it; usually your appreciation is proportional to the amount of work you had to put in.

as i mentioned before, i've never worked at a company were there were reviews and procedure for giving out raises. although i've steadily worked my way up the income ladder, i don't think i've ever been given a raise for simply doing a good job.

three dot journalism, without the dots

2004-07-21T00:50:00.000-05:00

i have a gmail account. my car has a five speed now. work is for jerks. summer is not hot in san francisco, which is ideal. i have one last payment to make on a credit card i've been maxed out on for 7 years. i've been hanging out with my friends a lot more. i started a savings account. my vegetable intake has increased. i talk to my brothere frequently. i read a book every single day. i haven't been sleeping enough. i drink tea several times a day. i've eaten at good restaurants recently. people are still rude idiots.

late night, maudlin street

2004-06-15T00:46:00.000-05:00

my parents moved out of my childhood home today.

i don't have a wholly formed idea of what this actually means to me. thoughts like "i will never go there again" or "where will i sleep when i visit" or "the flowers and birds and trees and the pasture were really beautiful the last time i was there" or "remember when it snowed" punctuated the day's otherwise normal proceedings. knowing this event is happening without me present made today feel powerless and distant like when planes fly into buildings.

this sure is fascinating, totally

2004-06-04T21:55:00.000-05:00

at this moment i sitting in a financial district coffee shop, sipping tea, passing time. a little black bird wandered in from the street and is pecking at the crumbs that litter the floor. it's near closing time, and the baristas are busy with their side work, but they haven't swept yet so there's no shortage of treats for the little guy.

luxury

2004-06-04T20:06:00.000-05:00

for a ride back to the city, i decide take an AC Transit bus across the bay bridge. i heard this is a good way to get to the city because the busses are rarely crowded, and the view riding high on the bus is worth it. i have seen the dark green buses lined up at the transbay terminal, shiny and new like some rock and roll tour buses. the windows are sealed, suggesting air conditioned luxury and i've seen rows of plush high backed forward facing seats.

i spent my day imagining the luxury, the view, the relaxtion while cruising across the bay in mass transit opulence.

you saw this coming, i know. if i had read the website above a little closer i could have avoided this. right now, i am sitting on a bench, facing perpendicular to the roadway. it's hot and smelly on this bus. it's the kind of general route bus i am used to seeing growling up the hills of SF, except this one has a blue trim instead of an orange trim. every time the bus gets moving, the engine roars and the wind whistles through the slat windows like a tea kettle boiling over. my fellow commuters, in this case a busload of teenagers, raise their voices to combat the racket.

i am uncomfortable. i am couched in hard plastic, vinyl, and stainless steel. This bus was built to be hosed out at the end of the day, not for glorious day trips through the bay area. the ride is rough, and i slide forward every time the driver gooses the brake pedal with his discount brand white high tops. it is nice though, and the view from up above is something new, even though i've been across the bridge hundreds of times.

cold and alone, loving it

2004-06-04T11:00:00.000-05:00

it's june. and there's a shocking chill to the morning, a fact i discover as i rush down the hill to catch a train to work. a fog has nestled into the valleys of the city, and the mist hanging in the air stings my face. now would be the perfect time for me to cite a mark twain quip (which he never said, by the way) about san francisco weather.

naturally, the train departs the station as i round the corner, so i decide to walk a few more blocks to a coffee shop. i pass a few moments with a cup of tea, and then i run to the muni train that just rolled past my present location. the hot tea slops out of the plastic lid, burning my numbed hands. in case you didn't know, these muni trains bound for the financial district are usually so improperly packed with people, there's no way an honest feller can drop a dime on the ride. i don't feel like much of a citizen when i do this, and would pay if i could. last car for BART too, because those cars are usually empty.

these days i work in oakland, just across the bay bridge from san francisco. to be precise, my work is situated exactly on the border of emeryville and oakland. we are in the business of making merchandise for the entertainment industry. that's a fancy way of saying we make tshirts for bands.

if i hit all the connecting trains just right, i'm over the bay in about 35 minutes, or just about enough time read 30 pages in one of the 5 books i am reading right now.

inspiration! aka, i'll believe when i do the 2nd draft

2004-06-03T09:47:00.000-05:00

in the little spare time that i have these days, (which is usually on a BART train between SF and Oakland), i've been working on a recap of the past three years. my idea is to start where i left off. it's kind of an interesting exercise; putting together a highlights reel of my recent history. so keep an eye for that.

here's an original idea

2004-05-30T18:47:00.000-05:00

i want to work at home. i am not sure i can can really do that, but i think that's the answer for this guy. my current job is pretty cool, but clawing my way up in somebdoy else's system is losing it's appeal.

will you feel the same 2 months later?

2004-05-12T16:05:00.000-05:00

today got off to a rough start. no reverse, so i circle the block about 8 times, looking for a suitable parking spot. at some point i say fuck it, and start heading for the bridge. i get as far as 5th and folsom, when 4th gear goes out. i decide to fight downtown traffic and double back to tari's neighborhood.

another 8 or so laps around the park, up and down the hills and i find a friday spot on Buena Vista East going up the hill, so i am able to roll back into the spot, and also be able to come out going forward. hopped on the N and then onto bart. 15 minute walk to work, and i was only 15 minutes late.

it doesn't make sense for me to sell the car, because i still owe like $8k on it, and the best i can sell it for is prolly $4-5k with the shot transmission. that means i'd still be making payments on $4k for a car i don't have. i would rather take a $2k hit than a $4k hit and still have a car i really like. the engine is strong and will go forever.

i'll start getting estimates from various shops and figure out how to pay for the shit.

i am dissapointed, but had been secretly expecting this for a while. it tough to plan for this kind of thing, but at least my car didn't fail on the bay bridge or in some parking garage. i welcome the chance to read for an hour everyday, and the 15 minute walk from my work to BART is pleasant

young turks be free tonight

2001-01-30T13:14:00.000-06:00

chico for the third weekend in a row.

this time joe came up from the sc-town and we kicked it deep. in addition, about 8 other people came up for chico party time. friday night was marked by some rug cutting at mr.lucky's, which has become a regular stop for my weekend lifestyle in chico. we cut up their floor so hard, we are getting a bill for damaging thier shit. rachael sprained her ankle, and i aggravated the ankle i twisted sno-boarding a few weeks back.

saturday night, lars frederiksen and the bastards played their first show ever. lars, you should know by now, is the lead singer of rancid, and the bastards were the key. they play some fucking punk, oi/'77 style, but it's mos def its own kind of thing. lars is kind of a punk rock bruce springsteen; most the song topics related back to growing up in campbell, ca. the lyrics were really good, the songs well written and set was going off.

joe defeated me by telling me to look at the sticker under the lars' pick hand. crappy sparkly silver media stereotype alien head. i got him back by pointing out the lars' tight SP, with his modification to the marshal logo to read "lars" on his gear.

the nerve agents went on next and delivered their usual brand of barely contained chaos, reminding me that i love seeing them live way more than listening to thier albums. the show was wrapped up by about 8:45, which left a whole night ahead of us. joe and i did a pretty extensive amount of shooting around downtown, as well as some posting up at the towne lounge.

the next day, everybody went their own ways...luckily i saw enough of the super bowl to see one matrix-style instant replay, and the new budweiser alien waazzzzaaa commercial, so i can now die a happy man.

redneck rainbow flag

2001-01-22T11:04:00.000-06:00

ended up in chico last weekend.

jesse and jon from flipwreck started a new band, belladonna, which debuted at mr. lucky's on saturday night. belladonna was cool; an amalgam of techno with live instruments. the synthesis claimed belladonna was a "lo-fi nine inch nails." i wish. it was the kind of thing you could dance to, and it wasn't particularly spooky. i helluv backed flipwreck, and it's good to see jon and jesse continue on.

abe, the former guitar player/singer of flipwreck was also there. it was good to see him. after a stint with HPA in the south bay, he's moving back to chico, and is planning on doing some solo work, along the lines of elliot smith. abe has some gosh darn talent, so i am looking forward to hearing what he comes up with.

before belladonna's set there was a drag-queen contest. the key was the posse, about 10 deep, of gay hicks that showed up in full hick regalia, including moustaches, goatees, wranglers, hankerchiefs around necks, and shirts. the gay cowboys were slipping their fingers into the back pockets of each others tight gay cowboy wranglers, and rubbing each others gay cowboy backs. the contest concluded with a lip sync by all the queens to shania twain's "man, i feel like a woman." never in my life have i wished more that i brought a camera or tankass. i think he would never sport wranglers again if he saw that shit.

hayfuck

2001-01-18T19:14:00.000-06:00

afi made into the most recent issue of rolling stone magazine as the first "random note." which is pretty baffling to me. the brief paragraph long article starts of with "All the way from the hayfuck town of Ukiah, California, come AFI...."

ukiah is exactly where i am leaving.

no more bad town

2001-01-17T19:18:00.000-06:00

i spent sunday atop hull mountain learning how to snowboard, which means i fell alot and twisted my ankle real bad. when i got home sunday night, there was a message from my mother:

"call phil ASAP. needs a roommate in the city. $432/month."

i called. i was wishy washy. phil wanted me to move in two weeks, which seemed kind of intense. about an hour after hanging up with phil, ryan calls me from phil's house on his celly.

"move in with phil. i will lend you money."

call waiting.

"pete, this is fritch, move in with phil."

you see, fritch too, was on his cell phone, and i was getting the press from my homies. ambivelent about making such a lavish change, i told them i had to think about it.

if it bleeds, it leads

2000-12-27T15:24:00.000-06:00

after discussing my desire to own a lomo camera with joe, and after he mentioned the lubitel, i came across this site that sells kommie kameras. futhermore, in webmonkey, if found an article on producing "cheap and cool photos." unnh. i am a stupid.

blue light special: black dickies

2000-12-13T15:08:00.000-06:00

fritch and smith showed up to ukiah, so i kicked it with them. kinda silly. smith had his leather binder thing with a strap that i call the "action purse" while the afi's call it the "doormat". he carries it around with him all the time in case he gets a call on his celly and has to handle business.

we go to walmart, and schatts and smith is getting all these calls and handling all this business on the street and in the walmart cosmetics section, because we are all looking for black eye makeup (which there was none).

and fritch just joined the cell phone posse. all black posse, all dudes, cell phones, action purse/doormat, comsmetic section of ukiah walmart. yeah, we weren't conspicuous or anything.

oh yeah, and smith's mom and little brother happened to be at walmart. his brother came running up with this toy called (no lie) "exploding head psycho"

later we went and saw "vertical limit' which i am backing. the best part of the movies was seeing the preview for the new sean connery movie, in which he says "who's the man now, dog"

to sum:

--action purse

--fritch has a cell phone, and his comedy is to claim the number is "g0t axe w0gy"

--exploding head psycho

--"who's the man now, dog?"

i think i've done this before

2000-11-21T15:08:00.000-06:00

an email i sent to my friends:

just seeing what you all are up to for thanksgiving. my mom said i could prolly invite a few friends over for dinner, perhaps joe or phil might be interested in this? are any of you coming up?

after we do our family things, and after fritch gets back from his grandparents, we should all party at the black hole. we should smoke a lot of "stotches" and get wasted on beer with spanky. nodnarb will supply the whiskey. every few minutes, creeper will stick his head out of the bedroom door and call in the next person to do a line.

we can drop by the forest club, and hang out with all the college swords in town for the holidays. tank-ass will sing in drill sargeant voice, i will spit that ill game to ill sword chicks, and "mr. prison ink" can almost get into fights with washed up jocks. then we can pass out at the black hole and sleep in blue cigarrette smoke all night long. when we wake up in the morning, our lungs will be splitting, our gullets tripping, and our heads aching. then we will walk all the way across town, a walk of shame if you will, to our cars. let's make this a thanksgiving to remember.

2000-11-08T23:40:00.000-06:00

time for an update, dog

oh my god, chico halloween 2k killed kenny, you bastards

2000-11-02T15:09:00.000-06:00

chico was pretty washed up for halloween this year.

also, every time i go there i feel like i am running a script. i hang out with the same people at the same houses, got to the same bars, have the same conversations, go home with the same girl, make the same walk of shame in the morning, get the same breakfast at the same restruant with the same lousy service and same good food. i am not so interested in going to chico anymore. are any of you up for a trip to chico on the 18th to loose change and union of the dead?

nod asked "carla, did you get hella jealous when you found out your boyfriend pete spent the night with another girl?" carla blushed and told him to shut up.

the best part of the trip was the words that came out of laura's mouth. laura is the 16 yr old sister of laura and belinda's roommate emily.

to carla, about the cd that was just put on her car stereo: "a gangster that listens to afi?"

to carla about her car: "i've never been in a gangster car before."

when carla and marcy (carla's mexican homie) explained that they are are not gangsters: "oh, i thought you were gangsters because you hang out with mexicans."

on the subject of oral sex: "that is so gross. i would never do that with a guy. i wouldn't even do that to mark wahlberg. he's pretty fine. i'd make out with him."

on penises: "they are so gross. gross looking, gross feeling, they don't feel good, i hate penises."

on san diego, where carla, and marcy are thinking about moving: "san diego is cool. it has everything. there's the beach, music, movies...there's even a ghetto for you guys."

unsolicited, after a long stretch of silence, on her lifestyle: "i guess i am what you would call a 'preppie.' being a preppie is cool. you wear nice clothes, get good grades. maybe you drink a little bit, but you don't really have a problem. some preppies are closet alcoholics, but preppies don't get all crazy."

unsolicited, on her music: "i really like limp bizkit."

as we roll into chico: "can we drive by all the frat houses? i bet there's some cute boys there."

also the trigger was pulled several times

2000-10-23T15:10:00.000-05:00

god. this weekend was pretty fucking intense. partied at cougar's both nights.

jevon was in town on friday night. watched nod get his ass kicked three times by jevon and scarb. heard pathetic "scarb, stop hitting me, come on, stop hitting me" come from nod. saw jevon drag brandon across the street, scraping up his back and the side of his face. nod destroyed the tree in front of cougar's house. shoddy unloaded gun play, talk of playing russian roullete with jevon's .44 mag revolver.

nod got in some sort of fight at the forest with some guy that claimed nod stole his ounce of weed from leverage's house. the guy said “not on state street,” so nod threw him into state street.

saturday night trevor hosted a libra party that was suppossed to be at brahma bull but got moved there. uk freaks (as in wierdos, not as in what i pop off with at the sunset) in the house, sober smith and pete, high on 3 red bulls each. wierd. sorry my sentences lack description, prefer not to relive any of it.

sailing in cape fear

2000-10-18T15:10:00.000-05:00

so, you know, i am posting up at carla's yesterday, kicking it with her, when a frantic cody barges in. he's covered in dirt, like he just got off work and has a 1000 yard stare in his eyes.

"you guys seen eli? where is he?"

"the other day he called my girlfriend a bitch, then he went to the cops and told them 'cody is going to kill me'. this was before i even knew about what he said to kim. then that little piece of shit went to kim's work and told her manager she was harrassing him and asked what he was going to do about it, trying to get her fired. where's brandon?"

to which he aburptly left. also, grimm, his best dog, died the other day. he was on a chain, and tried to jump over a fence, hanging himself.

about a half hour later eli showed up at freedom. brandon challenged him and told him to get the fuck out of the store, that he is only going to cause problems by being in there. i told eli he should get the fuck out of town, because it's not like cody is going to just bump into him on the streets, and maybe talk things out. he's across the street of your house at three a.m. with a a skinhead army. he is under your bedroom window. he has his black nike gloves on.

on sunday night, smith and garrett were walking down school street. they saw eli's truck and heard a scuffle in the bushes. thinking it was eli and his girl brandy messing around, smith yelled something like, "hey you two, settle down." the response was an emphatic "eli, get the fuck off me." smith went over and grabbed eli by shirt collar and put him in a headlock. brandy dropped a fucking dog to eli's face.

this is an understatement. i am glad i am not eli.

kid skater

2000-08-08T15:11:00.000-05:00

today, smith and i went to baskin-robbins to get sorbets. there were these trad 11 year old skate kids doing tricks out front. as we passed them smith told one of them, "you have to be able to ollie before you can do a heel flip." the kid was like "i know how to ollie!" and demonstrated how high he could ollie. the other kid told smith "you do it then." smith attempted to do a heel flip, but couldn't pull it off, even after 5 attempts. as we walked away one of the kids called smith a "faggot." we just laughed at the tradness of it as we hopped in the tradillac and drove off.

NoFX-mex

2000-07-30T15:11:00.000-05:00

went out for a night on the "town" last night. soren was in town, so everybody was in a pretty festive mood. started the night at the new brewery. that was fine. went to the forest. hung out with props.

heard this exchange on state street between garrett (smoking a jay) and an indian chick. it is for real:

indian "i am sober these days. i don't do that shit."
props "oh yeah? how long?"
indian "i've been off crank for two days."
props "i've been up for two days"
props "do you want a hit?"
indian "i only smoke weed laced with crank....speed weed."

then i went to the bathroom...as i worked my way across the bar, i heard scarb yell out "hey! hot chicks! let's get drunk and naked!" i enter the bathroom, and observe two mexicans snorting crank off the toilet.

later, a welcome relief to my intensly shitty night, i ran into kristian alto, monica and julie. we went back to julie's house with these mexicans we work with. they are pretty fresh. they showed me their ticket stubs from nofx/ramones at the hard rock cafe in culican and we may take them to see aging orange/teen idols/loose change show at the 'drie in sf .

[as an aside: kristian and i took jaycon to see the show, which ended up being the last show at the crocodrie ever. r.i.p. we saw exactly two songs of loose change's set, but jaycon was pretty baffled by the city]

it was pretty interesting talking to those guys. although by american standards their taste in punk is pretty fucking generic, those guys are pretty out there for mexicans. all them have their own bands back an mexico, and claim to play in front of 300+ crowds regularly.

sick leave

2000-07-03T13:05:00.000-05:00

last weekend was horribly weak. drifting in and out of fever (101 at it's worst), dizzy and nauseous at times, but not so fought that i couldn't work on my bedroom for a while. taking occasional breaks to deal with my "symptoms," i managed to drywall about half the room. i don't know what the fuk i have; i've been sick like this about every four weeks for the past three months.

after two weeks of dealing with my dumb mistake of ordering lp's instead of cd's, i finally got my discs from jade tree. promise ring nothing feels good is helluv good, more rockin' than very emergency. shorter, louder, faster is a proper second release from kid dynamite, but i still think they sound like good riddance or something, and don't really understand what the fuss is all about. joan of arc how memory works is also pretty good, but all the electronic stuff seems more like a gimmic than anything else. what do i know about any of it, though?

fritch called yesterday from thunder bay, ontario. the afi's tour is going really well, and they are about to join up with the east coast leg of the warped tour. we didn't talk long, but am looking forward to hearing his stories. merchie is selling his car. smiff and i should buy it and sell it on ebay.

seasick, docked

2000-06-30T10:30:00.000-05:00

i am wearing faded black 505's, a navy blue "hapiness is" bar t-shirt, a brown belt with my name "timothy" etched into the leather, and white tennis shows. i have a moustache. i play softball.

i am old and feeble. liver spots scatter across my face. i don't notice that my mouth is gaping open. nor do i register the string of drool stretching from my my tongue, which resting on top of my teeth, to my top set of teeth. i am hunched forward gripping the steering wheel tightly. i wait patiently at the intersection. i am sure it is not my turn. nothing is happening. what am i doing here.

spooky

2000-06-28T13:13:00.000-05:00

after seven months in europe, my brother is back in the uk-town. he brought back a hearty pile of postcards, including one from the capuchin cemetary in rome. since about the 1600's the capuchin monks took the bones of their dead and decorated their monastery with them. the remains of over 4000 monks adorn the monastery. death wielding a scithe, an hour glass with wings, all made of human bones. some seriously creepy shit. am totally into it. now i really want to go to europe. i could do a spooky/gothic tour of europe. instead of wasting my time in school, maybe i should head over after the pear season.

cody max applied here. mos def will put a word for him. pretty much demanded a raise today. will get crakked if it doesn't go through.

funny man fawns over my father

2000-06-27T13:24:00.000-05:00

ha ha. my dad was mentioned in dave barry's column last sunday. too bad dave barry suks.

....Our next incident is described in a Dec. 15, 1998, article from the Santa Rosa, Cal., Press Democrat, written by Mike Geniella and sent in by many alert readers. It states that Sergio Gutierrez, a truck driver for Sea Products Inc., was driving a tractor-trailer on Highway 101 at 3:15 a.m. when he slammed into a bear crossing the road. Gutierrez was thrown from the truck, which then overturned, the result being that he was, according to the story, ``buried under an avalanche of frozen mackerel.''

i should mention, my dad is the writer, and not the truck driver.

career opportunities, or Ukiah is a majick place that i love

2000-06-25T19:49:00.000-05:00

the other night, the ukiah police were trying to scare transients out of the abandoned palace hotel by having the police dog bark into the patrol car's megaphone.

also, the bad place, aka the sunset, aka the spunset, aka the skumbset, aka perkin's street grill, is hiring for security.

seeing stars

2000-06-25T19:42:00.000-05:00

posted up at home last night. at about 11:30, i said fuk it, cleaned myself up a bit and went into town. happened upon travii, and went up to his place. girls, brews, and levi. drank a sobe zen blend to my dome, and got props from the ladies for being sober.

proper ukiah night prompted us to go for a little walk to the stoner park, aka 40 park, aka mcgarvey park, located across the street from the cop shop. we hung for a while...then i noticed the west-side constellation, cassiopea. a giant "w" in the eastern sky, whenever i look at it i hear dre's "let me ride" or eazy-e's "real mutha-fukin' g's." the west-side constellation is one of the best things about june.

my brother returns from europe on tuesday...am looking forward to that, may even take the day off.

BFD is right

2000-06-24T22:56:00.000-05:00

just saw joe's pictures from bfd. they totally rule. fritch and smith with fred durst. fritch and smith with pauli shore. that wacky joe. dumb girls. they'll be up on upupdowndown by the end of the coming week. unnnhhhh!

only had four discs at work today, so i listened to each like three times. now i have shades apart seeing things, hot water music fuel for the hate game, face to face big choice and rocket from the crypt scream, dracula, scream! stuck in my damn stupid head. also i am dumb, and bragging about my stupid music selection.

i wonder what show i missed

2000-06-24T20:21:00.000-05:00

fuk. spent 8 whole hours at work today, no breaks, no lunch. i am finally done with this project; this stupid, immense project that has sukked away four months of my life.

successfully missed my ride to the city. no fuking show for me. ukiah is going to be fun tonight.

get used to it

2000-06-24T18:19:00.000-05:00

yes. it is now about 4:15. am still at work. my ride to the city and the show leaves any minute now. this rules.

upupdowndown totally came together.

2000-06-24T15:00:00.000-05:00

hmmmmm. been breaking my back at work the past few days, trying to get the ammonia risk management plan i've been working on for the past four months done. on thursday i pulled a 16 hour day, friday a 12 hour day, and here i am in on a saturday. it's about 11:45 right now, should be done by about 13:30 if all goes well. the absurdity of this project....you can't imagine the kind of figurative red tape our governement puts businesses through...

as mentioned before, am going to the nerve agents show tonight at the cocodrie with co-worker and brother of garrett, kristian alto.

joe and phil won't go, as they are feverishly working to get upupdowndown online.

the other day kristian & i were talking about girl, interrupted . i realized i was generally pretty happy (delusional) up until the hours i saw that movie. i remember walking out of the ukiah 6 thinking, "i used to be depressed. i need to be more depressed. i was pretty sweet back then" and i woke up depressed the next day, and have been that way since. kinda weird how i turned this round on like a switch that i can't seem to turn off.

good summary of a Ukiah weekend

2000-06-21T10:50:00.000-05:00

the following is an icq transcript between ryan and i. all the events described herein occurred last weekend.

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:07 pm
tell me more stories about ukiah, you always have the best ones.

peteg 6/20/00 1:11 pm
at nod's party at capri's smith donned the germs leather that has at various times belonged to jade, merchie and smith, and he became "puke anarchy." he was sober, but staggering around flipping off chicks and bumping into dudes like he was bodhi or something.

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:12 pm
hahahhaha anarchers!!!!!! i've never seen puke anarchy, but he sounds all real. more stories! peteg's stories are the bestest!

peteg 6/20/00 1:12 pm
later, wearing the same gear, he took kevin graham's aviator amber shooting glasses and became a rock star. by my prompting, after every three sententces he would tilt his head back to show his nostrils and ask "am i cool?" and then brush his nostrils with his hand. it was pretty funny, because 3/4 of the people there took that shit for real

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:13 pm
hahahahhahahahha niiiiice. am i cool? excellent. encore! more!

peteg 6/20/00 1:13 pm
in the middle of the night that dave guy that always wears red and drives a blue caddy pissed on smith's feet, thinking the bed in capri's loft was a toilet. smith's pants, pager, feet got soaked

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:14 pm
bwahahaha did smiff kill him?

peteg 6/20/00 1:14 pm
smith got hella defeated. dave was too fuked up to know what was going on

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:15 pm
teehee. more stories! dont stop!! uhn

peteg 6/20/00 1:17 pm
on friday night i went to the 7-11 to meet up with the crew after listening to the new lc at travii's. i walk up and see cougar asking nod to beat him up. then a 14 yr old girl stuck her head out the 2nd floor window and per cougar's request, spit in his mouth.

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:17 pm
;lkasjdf;lkajsdf;j why was cougar asking to be beat up by nod?

peteg 6/20/00 1:18 pm
i round the corner to see a helluv drunk scarb leaning up against a pick up, dry heaving and staggering. i ask him what he's doing and he slurs "practicing random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty"

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:18 pm
you have the greatest anecdotes in the history of man

peteg 6/20/00 1:19 pm
cougar can be a nine ball. later cougar rolled solo to the sunset. he saw beverage pissing in the bathroom and reached between bev's legs and gave his nuts a little squeeze. beverage lost it, elbowed him in the face, and proceeded to beat the shit out of him. cougar has two shiners and a bruise on his forehead

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:20 pm
lmao "gave his nuts a little squeeze"

peteg 6/20/00 1:21 pm
early friday night i rolled up to low gap for nod's birthday bbq and the first thing i saw was n*** cutting a line of coke with an atm card on top of a milwaukee's best ice 12 pack box

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:21 pm
my....god.......im truly amazed by all of this

peteg 6/20/00 1:22 pm
i talked to n8 about klebold & harris and kip kinkel. it ruled. he loves human racists. when patricia commented that she couldn't imagine anyone even thinking of that shit, n8 got crakked and told her could.

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:24 pm
ahahahha. tell me more about people.

peteg 6/20/00 1:25 pm
i am starting to run dry...

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:25 pm
get to it big boy

peteg 6/20/00 1:33 pm
....nod, jerry & i were rocking out to "fade to black" as the girls got ready to go to the bar. patricia came up and turned off the stereo & announced it was time to go. baffled, we were like whatever. as we walk down the st. i say "patricia, you'll never be able to understand me because you don't understand rocking out" she got craked....

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:34 pm
sweet.

peteg 6/20/00 1:35 pm
soon after i started saying "you can really get to know a person, have a good idea who they are, really like each other, but sooner or later you get to a point where you just can't know a person any better, and you'll never know me because you don't know rokking out." she flipped out, told me to fuck off, told me i always make fun of her and i need to stop. it was fresh, everybody else told her she was crazy...

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:36 pm
hahah pete is making people crazy, sweet

peteg 6/20/00 1:37 pm
....they told her that i am a stand up guy, she's trippin'. she got punked. then she threw up in the 7-11. karma!

peteg 6/20/00 1:40 pm
cougar kept asking me if i thought he was gay the other night...
"yeah, sometimes i do."
"well i am not."
"i hope that works out for you. keep up the good work."
"do you really think i am gay..."
etc, etc, ad nauseum

pabst_ 6/20/00 1:40 pm
hahahhaah. cougar is just a sexual outlaw

peteg 6/20/00 1:44 pm
yeah, out of society's bounds. brown interviewed here yesterday. he is making min. wage at the brewery and is looking to the sheds for skrill. i told him the spanky story and in an ironic twist, he asked "when is that guy going to do something with himself?"

pabst_ 6/20/00 2:02 pm
hahahaha, that is a fantastic quote from brown.

peteg 6/20/00 2:03 pm
yeah, it was pretty nice. i wish i was you and only got to hear this stuff second hand instead of having to live it.

2000-06-20T22:27:00.000-05:00

fuk

see me use euro dating

2000-06-19T21:03:00.000-05:00

am posting this for posterity. it was in the ukiah daily journal on 11 june, 2000.

ARREST -- Nathan Daugherty, 23, of Ukiah, and Jeremiah Williams, 23, of Hopland, were arrested on suspicion of disorderly conduct at 2:40 am Friday in the 300 block of Spring Street. They were reportedly walking up the street screaming and kicking fences.

apparently jj was swinging from porches like a monkey. they were thrown in the drunk tank for the night. n8 kept playing with the intercom switch, and in some way roughed up jj. jj was passed out when johnny law brought them breakfast, so n8 ate both their meals.

or was it "yokayo pomo, fucker"

2000-06-19T17:06:00.000-05:00

unnnhhh! joy division permanent going off in my cd player at work. went to walmart on my lunch break and saw "yokayo pomo fucker" painted on a van's spare tire case. when i returned from lunch, kristian "k-rock" alto was in the office, just starting. we have tentative plans to scope the nerve agents at the cocodrie in ess eff on saturday. rumoured to open is the explosion...they are on jade tree records, but apparently are a '77 style punk mosh.

joe, fritch and phil did a bunch of work on upupdowndown yesterday. i think we can have that up by the end of the week.

molson ice and fork surgery

2000-06-19T11:04:00.000-05:00

spanky bailed this weekend, prolly from being high on beer, and opened up the wound on his thigh. instead of going to the hospital, spanky had scarb remove the staples in his leg with a fork. the leg, of course, got crazy infected. susan described scarb's medical "procedure" to smith as the "stupidest idea anyone's ever had since walking on bridge

last night, bob virgin took one look at spanky's leg and without hesitation, drove him to the emergency room. the doctors were shocked, immediately plugged an anti-biotic iv into his arm, and told him that if his leg got any more infected he could lose it. when they released your homey, they told him to keep the iv in for the night and return for another in the morning. of course, spanky took the iv out because he "wouldn't be able to sleep with it in" and grabbed a molson ice from the fridge.

oh, really

2000-06-18T18:05:00.000-05:00

smith and i broke our no-drinking binge in ukiah last night at brandon's birthday party. had a pretty good time last night, but am pretty fought today. helluv washed up, almost slipped into skandal with several of the wrong chicks and realized that soon i will be 24.

been rockin' ...and out come the wolves all weekend. that album is the key, i have prolly scoped it like 8 times in the past three days. also on hit....face to face, don't turn away. both these albums have heavy nostalgia value for me, and prolly, i am going off so hard to them because i have a certain amount of dissatifaction with the present. whatever. eff it.

heard the new loose change disc at chon's on friday night. it's helluv good. the first four traks are hard-melodic, in the vein of this good riddance or kid dynamite. # five is traditional loose change, and trak six starts off with an early 80's new wave, kinda inxs feel to it and merges into classic loose change form. chon does a duet-style on the vocals on this track and it sounds really cool. didn't scope a lyric sheet, but they sounded pretty good. have had the songs stuk in my head all weekend, so they must be doing something right. i can't wait for it to drop so i can scope the reaction to it. it's nice to see that band back in the swing of things.

i live in a world of fantasy regarding UUDD

2000-06-15T11:44:00.000-05:00

upupdowndown is limping along but should be out within the week, i hope, i pray.

smith and fritch hit the road with the afi's sometime early next week and will be gone for about a month. garrett goes to alaska for two weeks on sunday. so i am pretty much posting up in ukiah, pretty much. excellent.

kcin says there is a tiger army show with the nerve agents on july 7 in orange county. sounds all word, not sure if i can make it.

summer breeze

2000-06-15T11:19:00.000-05:00

so fuking hot in the uk town. nights have been nice. at night, smith and i have been walking from his house to mill street to get ice creams and then over to garrett's on grove. walks through the west side are always the key, especially when one is avoiding the skumbs that hang out in susan's pool. i always forget how key ukiah can be in june.

first concert in the park with pretty packed. nice change in that there wasn't a single person i went to high school with asking me what i am up to.
the usual assortment of skumbs and f-w's going off; it wasn't exactly hopping off, but it didn't entirely suk for once.

went to the new downtown brew pub. smith and i drank ice teas as we are currently on a bar ban/no drinking binge in the uk town, so i can't comment on the beer. they took the black bart bar from the palace, which is cool, and it seems to be a fairly sucker free zone, for the time being. drying out seems to be paying off for us pretty well. both of us agree that our game (the little to be had) is in top form.

wishing i could go to bfd....but the afi's play at like 4, and the shoreline is skandalously far away from here, and i have missed a lot of work lately to go off with various lifestyles...including peeping the punk-o-rama tour in chico.

the distillers cut out of their tour, so pressure point subbed for them in chico. the show went off. chico started singing bar room heroes at the murphys set their gear up, and the point crew led some seriously intense oi! chants. during the encore of "skinhead on the mbta" & "dirty deeds done dirt cheap" (ac/dc) the crowd rushed the stage. i thought the place was going to fall apart.

in other chico news, the union of the dead guys just self released an ep recorded at chico state. it's helluv good, i am backing it 110%. chico is a lot more punk than it was a year ago which is cool, although i think i would rather visit than live there.

...so it begins

2000-05-30T11:16:00.000-05:00

ok. you have no idea how stupid of an idea i think this is. i have this overwhelming desire to create websites at work. listening to hot snakes automatic midnight right now. it's pretty good, but kinda obscure. fuk it. goddamn html isn't coding right. i'll get it. hot snakes are now on their second rotation.

misanthropy and irony are in heavy discussion today, and i still can't get this shit to code right. fuk fuk. hot water music is on now. work dammit work.
well i supposse this ia an ok comprise, re: stupid html.