Your leaking thatched hut during the restoration of a pre-Enlightenment state.

 

Hello, my name is Judas Gutenberg and this is my blaag (pronounced as you would the vomit noise "hyroop-bleuach").

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   cool fat elvi
Wednesday, September 22 1999 Fuck Hawaii, fuck New Orleans, fuck the police! I want to go to Ansonia, Ohio and hang out with Matter Eater Lad.

That's a reference to a geographical reference I heard in a Guided by Voices song. Today I found myself burned out on the vast rock and roll collection on the company intranet, so I went out to a cheesy Mission Valley Mall and paid too much for a copy of Do the Collapse, the latest CD from Bob Pollard and whomever else he considers Guided by Voices. It's produced by Rick Ocasek. Despite the fact that everyone in Guided by Voices was born as Fat Elvises, it's important for me to say that you know you're in your Fat Elvis phase when Rick Ocasek is producing your music. Whatever happened to Weezer? In Oberlin I socialized with the kid brother of the Weezer front man, don't you know, back before that brother became a real rock star. It's Rick Ocasek's work on the last Weezer album that led Bob Pollard to pick him as the producer for Do the Collapse.
Despite what they may say, despite the high-fi and occasional cheesy parts, Do the Collapse is yet another great Guided by Voices albums. It's a given at this point that everything that Bob Pollard touches turns instantly into musical gold. Where there used to be the hiss of tape noise, we now hear what sound like samples of old recording by the Cars. It turns out that Rick Ocasek isn't just twiddling knobs here; he's actually playing some keyboards on this CD!

And I'll take as many shits as creativity demands!

Perhaps slightly inspired by my recent artistic efforts and initial indications of her own talent, Kim is now taking an acrylics painting class. She's actually starting tomorrow, and tonight she was like a nervous five year old preparing for the first day of kindergarten (at least that's how she described it). She couldn't find any suitable carrying case for her vast assemblage of brand new supplies, including long-handled brushes that had never yet come into contact with either canvas or paint. She finally decided to use her AlphaSmart case, a considerably more stylish option than the styrofoam cooler I jokingly suggested.
There's still the possibility that Kim's classmates will make fun of her for her cheap "bad side of the tracks" acrylics, but I told her to hold her chin up high and ignore them should they taunt her, that sticks and stones may break her bones but that words would never hurt her. And should the paints prove, in the end, too embarrassing to use in her snobby class, then I'd find a use for them. I smeared a sample of her "crimson red" between my fingers and found it somewhat translucent, excessively purple and pink, but hey, it was cheap acrylic. You get what you pay for.

In other news, one of my correspondents sent me the following hilarious email today:

This has nothing to do with Sushi happy hours. My company had a booth at WorkWorld job fair [in Silicon Valley] last saturday. I was walking around checking out other attendees when I noticed a booth [on "IPO Row"] giving away little skateboards. Knowing that my youngest son would like them, I nabbed one and noticed the name of the company was [name of my company].

I thought, "hmmmm", I asked the booth ladies [one of whom was our "Schoolmarmish VP of IT"], "Excuse me, where are you guys located?", They answered, "San Diego!" I asked (not knowing if you went by Gus or Karl), "Does a guy with the last name of Mueller work there?" They all answered in a happy screaming unison "GUS! WE looove GUS!" I said, "I love The Gus too. I've virtually known him for a couple of years now" I don't think they understood what I meant cuz they said, "Yea, Gus is kind of unique, but we loooove him!!!"

Small world......

I'm thinking that this little incident just confirmed my co-workers' impression that I'm a total weirdo. Any "virtual knowledge" spanning "years" via "the internet" must indicate something frighteningly "outside the box" of Windows NT, stock options, shiny new SUVs and vacation homes in the tropics. I'm just glad that my correspondent didn't divulge my URL. I seriously doubt that the Schoolmarmish VP of IT would "get" what I'm doing in this journal, especially since an IPO is not the fundamental plot device propelling Randomly Ever After.

For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?990922

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