I'm gonna put the kibosh to satan

day baseball on the radio

2011-05-17T12:55:00.000-07:00

is a excuse.

blog is still on hiatus.

writing around a block

2011-05-13T16:16:00.000-07:00

I have a writing block.

Will try to find a solution soon.

Here's t0 24 being a good year.

willie mays is 80!

2011-05-06T15:00:00.000-07:00

the purposeful porpoise

2011-05-05T14:54:00.000-07:00

It's Thursday now and Osama Bin Laden is still the lead story. The viewing public is processing a slightly unpleasant idea, that is, the Navy Seals weren't sent in to capture Bin Laden, they were sent to kill him. He was, in a sense, assassinated. I do believe he was an enemy combatant, and given the chance I'm sure he'd have loved to take out a few Navy Seals on his way to the next life, yet, the emerging details suggest he could have been captured. It was a long road to frontier justice and if anything, this proves that the US still partially abides by the code of the west. Myself, I'd have liked him to have been found guilty at trial and then left to rot in prison for the rest of his life. We could have used frozen and seized al qaeda funds to pay the bill and after locking the cell denied him every last bit of due process. Keep him alive and give him years and years to sit in a dark concrete room and only turn the lights on long enough to pass on whatever great things America accomplishes in the future. Perhaps even rig up a projector and stream American Exceptionalism onto his wall. But I might be misguided in this idea. Perhaps shooting an unarmed man in the head and then feeding him to sharks was the best path to justice.

Osama Bin Laden

2011-05-02T13:13:00.000-07:00

Last night, shortly after hearing that Osama Bin Laden had been killed by US forces, I hopped on facebook and flippantly made a comment about how his death doesn't help Pablo Sandoval's wrist. Sarcasm and humor at the dawn of history, or something like that. It's been nearly ten years since 9/11 and nearly 13 years since the attacks on US embassies in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi. In that time, and particularly after 9/11, Bin Laden became the face of global terror. There was a time in my life where he was the most feared and hated man in the world. That he survived the months immediately after 9/11, as the collective western world attempted to bring him to justice, remains remarkable. It was briefly possible to believe that the war of terror was a war on something other than a transferable idea. Of course, I should have been smarter. Terror is abstract and ambiguous. Terror isn't symmetrical. Removing the Taliban from Afghanistan has made us safer, centralizing intelligence has made us safer, restricting funding to terrorist groups has made us safer, killing Bin Laden has made us safer and increased awareness and security has made us safer. But yet, we will never be completely safe. Bin Laden's death will only embolden the al-Qaeda cells in Yemen, Egypt, Iraq and Afghanistan, amongst other countries of the world. Terrorism is a cancer that only spreads and like cancer, it only takes one cell to cause damage, one little cell to start the whole thing over again. And when did it start? When did someone decide that asymmetrical warfare was worth trying? Think back and go further and you'll see it never 'started' and look forward and you'll see that it'll never be 'finished.' Osama Bin Laden's death doesn't change anything. As an enemy he was already neutralized, as a leader he was of minimal value. But his death did bring to some amount of closure. The bogeyman is dead and we were able to chant and wave flags, the bogeyman is dead and one cycle has come to a close. The bogeyman remains, always, in the shadows, ready and waiting for the next opportunity to strike again. It's a peculiar kind of calculus. The costs and damage from 9/11 far exceed the costs and damages inflicted against America on that day. The trillions of dollars spent, the thousands of military causalities, the hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths, the erosion of our civil liberties, the military misadventures around the world and the economic decline of the American empire can all be traced to our heavy handed response.

Our reactions were exactly as Bin Laden planned.

He got what he wanted.

He is gone, but he changed America like few Americans ever could.

Are we safer? Are we better?

nostalgia

2011-04-29T13:01:00.000-07:00

In 1990 I went trick or treating on the Strip. The Stardust had just remodeled and they had these planters that also would shoot a jet of water three or so feet, kind of a lob shot, from pipe to pipe. As a little kid, (a dumb little kid) I found these to be remarkable. The water would just shoot out and then land, without even a splash. The Stardust, of course, was across the street from the Silver City and next to the Westward Ho. There was a McDonalds on that block, and also the Frontier, which might have been the most depressing casino ever. Even as a little kid I was terrified of the place, though, many years later we'd sneak in for bikini bull riding. To the north of the Stardust was Circus Circus and the Riviera and past that was the El Rancho and after that was Wet n' Wild and finally the Sahara (if you ever want to test someone that claims to be from Vegas, ask them if they remember the time and temperature display on top of the Sahara). Now, 20 years later, the Stardust, Silver City, Westward Ho, Frontier, El Rancho and Wet n Wild are all gone. The Sahara is closing next month and the Riviera will be shut down and destroyed just as soon as the economy recovers. Circus Circus seems safe, and maybe that's meant to be, I should have one place that I remember growing up in. When my mom was living at the Salinda we'd walk down the strip past Fun City and the Bonanza and the Ihop and go to Circus Circus to play the games. I was pretty good at the one where you shoot water to blow up a balloon and get a prize. We'd usually win a few stuffed animals and walk back home, often stopping at Vegas World for hot chocolate in the coffee shop, it came in thick brown mugs and I was allowed to draw on the keno slips with crayon while we waited. And don't forget, Vegas World is gone as well. The apartments where my mom lived were destroyed to make room for the Mirage and the Salinda is now a parking lot. Fun City is gone but at last check the Ihop might still be standing. Going north of the Stratosphere, there are still places I remember, but I suspect they are gone just as well. My life got pretty settled by 1989 and I can always go back home to the east side but yet I feel something is missing. The memories that a kid makes from five to nine are important. Those are major developmental years. Many of mine were made on the northern Las Vegas Strip and all the places are gone. I've been fighting this nostalgia all week long, even going as far as searching youtube for vintage vegas videos. But you know what? It's all gone, and all the super 8 in the world isn't going to bring that part of my life back.

The Ho.

Vegas World. A truly nutso place.

Silver City

The Sahara. The clock is just beneath the S on the top of the tower.

Fun City.

The amazing fountain.

The El Rancho. Wet n Wild can be seen in the middle bottom of this picture above the van.

wanting a clean slate

2011-04-28T16:04:00.000-07:00

I've been think lately about what a fresh start really means. Easter is the time for resurrection and redemption. Easter is the time to move into the light. In my life I've made many mistakes. I've let down those closest to me, shunned my family, lied for my own benefit, cheated on women I've loved and chosen to be defensive and mean when I should have been open and understanding. Currently I am in the middle of an average book. The central character, in his youth, professed his love to a woman. She told him she could never be with him because he wasn't capable of being tender and loving. Though he felt that at that time, in his youth, he was capable of being tender and loving, it later became a curse, a guiding principle, a lingering question, he may not have been that way then, but ever after it could only be true.

Words, actions and memory shape so much of who I am and how the those in my life feel about me. I want to forgive those that have hurt me and be forgiven by those I've hurt. The mistakes we made, all of us, instead of being curses, I want to break them apart and leave them behind. Life is terribly long and very hard and I waste so much of my energy on what I can no longer influence or control. There is always a next move and I'm going to try to make whatever I do next as positive as possible. Nothing from the dawn of time to this moment needs to matter anymore. It's the season for resurrection and redemption.

putting the bullets away

2011-04-26T15:20:00.000-07:00

I work in West Oakland and it's a violent place. There have been 11 shootings within three blocks of my office in the past three years. Most go unreported because most of the time no one is hit. A young man with a modified assault rifle shooting from a moving vehicle isn't the same as a trained Marine. It's often times more dangerous being a bystander than being targeted. Early Monday morning two men were murdered inside a club around the corner from this desk. The details are sketchy, but it seems like four men rolled up in a Dodge Avenger and one got out and tried to rob several patrons of the club as they stood on the sidewalk. At least one person resisted and several men ran back into the club. The assailant signaled to his cohort who then stepped out of the car with an assault rifle, walked several paces to the door of the club and opened fire on those inside. Six people were shot: two died, two suffered life threatening injuries and two are expected to fully recover. This took place four blocks from the Oakland Police Headquarters and a block away from Jack London Square. Less then an hour later there was another shooting at a club even closer to my desk but this time only one man was superficially injured. The difference between a superficial injury and a mortal wound is frequently a matter of inches, only luck kept the body count down. Four hours after the second shooting we were back open for business, another work week started and nothing had changed because nothing ever changes. West Oakland is West Oakland is West Oakland. It's cliche that this is the wild west and I think that might be wrong. The wild west had a code. There isn't a code here. Out this way, you can be sitting in a bar, minding your own business, and then catch a bullet because some kid decides to light up the whole room for no sensible reason. You can be walking to your car and catch a bullet from a block away, from a flare up you didn't even know existed. It's always hard to write about this stuff because I don't believe anything will change. Everything has changed. Human life is less and less valuable and you can see it everywhere you look.

plans, never realized

2011-04-21T10:33:00.000-07:00

We bought our house on Florrie St. in 1989. It wasn't all that much to look at but it was ours. As a kid it seemed huge. I remember thinking I'd never be able to jump and touch the ceiling in the living room. Not long after, maybe the next spring, my uncle and some cousins visited. It was the first time we hosted our family in our home. I distinctly remember my dad giving a tour of the house and pointing out all the modifications and remodeling he wanted to do and seeing him kind of bask in the feeling of owning a home and showing it all off. Now, this was 1990, money was good and I think my dad wasn't quite tired yet. We talked about putting in an above ground pool and a deck and planting a vegetable garden. I was even allowed to sketch it all out on butcher paper that I always borrowed from the school teacher next door. What I didn't know then was how hard it can be to take the last few steps to reach a dream. All the modifications and remodeling never seemed to actually happen and what did get done...a back patio, some cement work and a cinder-block fence...it never actually got finished. We managed to put beautiful tile in the living room and hallway, but never got around to putting the baseboards back down and the cinder-block fence was never sealed and capped. The kitchen island was torn out and never quite reconstructed. Money for these projects would come in but then just as fast bleed out. The booze and slot machines had to get their take and raising kids couldn't have been cheap. All the focus on getting custody and buying a house must have been exhausting. My family's home entered a long and slow decline. I'm not sure why I've been remembering all of this. Those early days were a long time ago. Maybe the deck and pool and garden never happened, maybe the unfinished patio is being lost to the elements, we were still close to having those dreams fulfilled. Close might only count in horseshoes and hand grenades but it feels better than getting nowhere at all. I sometimes think a sense of incompleteness has become central to my personality. And maybe if we planted that garden, it would all be a different story.

swinging for the fences

2011-04-20T15:18:00.000-07:00

Monday afternoon I discovered that a squirrel ate one my strawberries. In Las Vegas we didn't have squirrels that would eat a strawberry. There weren't squirrels at all. Plenty of lizards though. Thankfully lizards don't bother eating strawberries, they only eat insects and rice krispies. I've been researching ways to handle the squirrel problem and think I might have to trap them in a stove pipe and then release them over by the soccer fields. I don't go messing with their acorns so they shouldn't be messing with my strawberries. There is a website out of Mississippi that has a good diagram of a trap, I printed it out and am going to tape it to my window, a sort of warning to the bushy tailed rats. Keep munching and get trapped! Might be a good idea to also put up a photo of a squirrel in a stew pot and really drive home the lesson. Keep munching and get munched!

Hey man, I can't have strawberry shortcake unless I take a stand now.

I never learned how to make decisions

2011-04-19T14:56:00.000-07:00

I've got a decision or two to make in the next several weeks and I'm relearning something I've always known, plainly, I'm not great at making decisions. There is part of me that remains terribly impulsive and another part that is quite restrained. I'm sure this has been completely maddening to those around me. It's maddening for me to feel indecisive. But really, I have no idea what I'm doing right now. There are choices that can be made, but none of them have to be made. The eight ball is on the table, but I'm somewhere in front and not behind. Now, I can spit out cliches about this all day long but I don't have any that will get me closer to figuring it out. And since this blog is vague by definition, and I'm not even telling those closest to me about any of this, I can't really write it all out and ask for help. Maybe instead of help I need guidance. Or maybe what I need is a sign. Catholics are always looking for signs. My life has become disjointed and rambling. That is the truth. More to follow, as it develops.

whoosh

2011-04-15T17:26:00.000-07:00

darren ford

the cavalcade of broken body parts

2011-04-14T14:05:00.000-07:00

Since Sunday I've been battling a cold. Not a big deal. I usually eat these fuckers right up and this one is your standard cough cough, sneeze sneeze type. I've been drinking hot toddies and taking dayquil and don't feel all that bad. Truthfully, I shouldn't have played soccer Tuesday night but had I missed the game my team would have been drastically short. I spent the first 45 minutes playing goalie and trying to stay warm. Whenever the ball came near me I'd just blast it as far forward as possible. At the very end I decided a few minutes in the field might be nice. I made it all of ninety seconds before tripping and landing square on my right knee. The diagnosis? A scrape and a contusion plus general soreness. I woke up yesterday morning feeling better about my cold and stiff in the knee. My buddy Kelly had organized a team called Godzilla's Revenge for a charity soccer tournament benefiting Japan so I was set to play again last night and told myself I'd take it easy. A few minutes into the third game some gorilla man on the other tried to shoot from 25 yards through traffic, about the most ineffective tactic possible on a small goal. The ball made it maybe five yards before slamming into the side of jaw and knocking me to my knees. The game didn't quite stop, but quite a few people were concerned. I was seeing stars and thought my jaw might have been broken. After a bit I was able to figure out that I wasn't bleeding and the stars kind of went away and the only long term damage seems to be a sore jaw and a loose molar and it kind of feels like my bite is misaligned. We finished that game and I played in the next with few problems. After that we had one more to go and it was maybe thirty seconds in before I tried to step through a challenge and took a knee straight to my quadriceps, maybe six inches above the bruise on my knee. For the second time in forty minutes I was all fucked up on the field. I hopped off and walked the injury out and managed to play in the second half, even clearing a ball off the goal line. It's all fun when you're warm and loose and it was horrible when I got up this morning and nearly fell the first time I put any weight on my leg. I'm working now, in an office chair, with one leg shooting straight out under my desk. The consolation to all this misery was winning our bracket of the tournament. My leg will heal and my jaw will stop hurting and I'll always know that Godzilla's Revenge got the job done.

i get jokes

2011-04-12T13:34:00.000-07:00

Remember the joke about how many ____ ethnic group it takes to change a light bulb?

20, one to hold the lightbulb and 19 to pick up and spin the house?

Somewhere in the world someone has modified that joke and made it about how many women does it take to compose a 25 word text message. And I'll find this joke on the internet and tell it again and again. Not so long ago I listened to four women, with a combined 21 years of post secondary education, spend nearly 40 minutes dissecting and assembling three text messages.

Benjamin Franklin wrote most of the Declaration of Independence in 40 minutes!

jay eee double eff

2011-04-11T13:22:00.000-07:00

The Giants won two of three over the weekend. Opening day and opening night were both fantastic. I had to miss the end of the game on Friday to make it to my soccer game and we went down 3-0 before rallying back. I didn't contribute very much beyond a fantastic cross that their defender kicked into the goal. So it was sort of an assist. Opening day was about the fans while opening night was about the players. They each received their rings and a warm moment to bask in the love and affection of their devoted fans. My friends and I were sitting in the bleachers, and it was terribly cold, but in the end everything was perfect. Giants were down 2-1 and got a two out rally. With runners at first and second, Miguel Tejada battled and eventually crushed a ball to deep left-center. From where I was sitting I could see the ball being held up in the wind and also drifting away from Colby Rasmus. It was going to be a tough play because of the wind but without the wind the ball would have been three rows deep. The ball disappeared from my view just as the crowd exploded. What I couldn't see was the ball glancing off of Rasmus's glove, what I could see was the Giants racing from the dugout like they'd just won the World Series. I immediately began hugging everyone in sight and then ran down the aisle to reach over and pound the wall and just scream. Baseball is back, the Giants are back, LA is in town, the weather is warming up and all is right in the world.

another year in the sun

2011-04-07T11:54:00.000-07:00

This is a blog. Sigh. I should post more links. Very true. I just want to write about the Giants, I just want to write about love.

The Giants are 2 and 4, a not quite dismal record. And tomorrow the season finally starts. There are many things I would change if I ran baseball including eliminating the DH, unbalanced schedules, the lack of doubleheaders, an international draft, banning Vin Scully and perhaps most importantly, I'd issue a decree that whichever team wins the World Series, they always open their season at home the following year. Tomorrow afternoon the title defense really begins, tomorrow we're raising the flag. I'm about half way through Fever Pitch, Nick Hornby's famous account of his Arsenal obsession, and I now have the words to describe what I feel about the Giants. Last September and October, that trip across the Rubicon and finally to the promised land, will stick with me for the rest of my life. It was, day by day and pitch by pitch the absolute best experience a baseball fan could ever have and I was there for so much of it all. The Giants clinched all three series on road and I emotionally missed the parade, so tomorrow will be the first time I am able to fully celebrate the 2010 World Series.

And yeah, I'm looking forward to another year in the sun.

i have little in the way of explaining this

2011-04-05T14:16:00.000-07:00

The video below was put together by the Horn of Justice for a class assignment for AP Government. It's been unearthed and uploaded to youtube. Though I am in the credits, I have very little screen time, I'm pretty sure I was being a good kid and visiting colleges when the majority of the filming took place. I remember coming up with the rough outline of the video with my friends and feeling quite proud of how it all came out. And now, 11 years later, I'm just amazed that we weren't all kicked out of school. There isn't anything I can write here that will do justice to what you're about to experience in the next fifteen minutes. Just um, watch, and I'm sorry, to everyone...but also, I still got small American birdhouses, if you're interested.

wacky misadventures

2011-04-04T14:24:00.000-07:00

I was at Sloat twice this weekend. That's the garden center. I've got it in my head to have a garden but know nothing about anything relevant to having a garden. I've got no clue about the composition of my soil, how much sun the various areas of my garden actually get and most importantly have not the faintest idea what actually grows in my micro-climate. So I go out to Sloat and wander around, trying to happen upon something that will be easy to grow and difficult to kill. I've got it in my head to grow blueberries, though I only really like them in cereal. The Sloat man told me they needed five hours of sun and acidic soil. I looked him straight in the eye and asked how can I even tell if my soil is acidic? His answer was complex but the solution simple, buy a bag of acidic soil and mix it with my soil. I'm not the proud owner of two blueberry bushes that better fucking give me some berries. If all goes well, there will also be strawberries, tomatoes, raspberries, lavender and spearmint. The spearmint is growing pretty good. I like to chew on the leaves before making my rounds in social ramble. The girls find spear-minty breath to be preferable to PBR breath. I also planted some flowers and one vine type plant that might cover a fence and attract humming birds. Those little wigglers are always fun to have around. The big mean cat that is always stalking through isn't fast or smart enough to chase down a humming bird. There is also a mole that is digging around. I might need to flood his subterranean lair and trap him in a cage. Not sure if he and his friends are the types to eat blueberries but it isn't worth the risk. No way I spend all this time trying to coax precious berries out of a bush next to a fence and then lose my bounty to an animal that lives beneath the ground. I'm reminded of a story about a girl I know. Well, not really about her, about her mom. Apparently this girl came home from school one day to find her mom cackling like a maniac and repeatedly bashing a mole with a shovel. Blunt force trauma delivered to a one pound rodent. I don't want to say I approve, but really, who likes their garden fucked with?

baseball! baseball! baseball!

2011-03-31T12:44:00.000-07:00

Shortly, as in four hours from now, the San Francisco Giants begin their title defense. The team is largely the same as the one that captured the World Series on 11/01/10. Same rotation but without Edgar Renteria and Juan Uribe and with Miguel Tejada and Brandon Belt. This is good. The Giants are built around starting pitching and they have it in abundance.

Tim Lincecum
Matt Cain
Jonathan Sanchez
Madison Bumgarner
Barry Zito

Just typing it all out feels pretty remarkable.

oh...try this....Buster Posey.

wwwwwwwwwwoooooowwwwwwwwww

Feels good.

I feel great about this season and this team. I think they are going to win the West and then make noise in the playoffs. I've got them finishing with 94 wins and Brandon Belt winning Rookie of the Year. The five starters are going to combine for 70 wins and Brian Wilson is going to save 46 games. Aaron Rowand is going to be released by July 1st and Miguel Tejada is going to be a serviceable shortstop. The Giants are going to draw 3.2 million fans, though, only the die hards are going to come out to see the Pirates on a cold Monday night.

Let's go Giants.

and that was that

2011-03-30T12:18:00.000-07:00

My Tuesday night soccer team just wrapped up a completely mediocre season. We went 0-5-2 and only managed to score six goals in seven games. I personally put a fat zero onto the board, continuing a scoring slump that goes back several seasons. Our deficiencies are numerous and solutions hard to find. Going into next season we need a central MF, a sweeper and our forwards to actually score goals. We also need to increase our fitness, hold shape and play with better pace. In addition, our tackling is inadequate and our set pieces wasteful. But hey, we sometimes go out for beers after the games and mostly manage to not spill all over ourselves or fall off our bar stools. Next season starts in two weeks and with any luck it won't turn into an ever fucking disaster again.

i can wait

2011-03-29T11:05:00.000-07:00

I got a family friend who is locked up for murder. She got caught up with drugs and sex and the party. One day she invited a drifter to her house to do some handyman work. They got involved in the drugs and sex and party and at the end of it he was dead and buried in her back yard. Now here is where the story gets fuzzy. The facts are as above, they partied, fucked and did drugs. He ended up dead and buried. Several years later a particularly strong thunderstorm roared through and washed away enough top soil to reveal the man's hand and her roommate was surprised. The body was exhumed and found to have been burned over and chopped up and an autopsy, which suggested death by strangulation, was ultimately inconclusive. It took seven months and the help of America's Most Wanted for the body to be identified. Our friend was arrested and she said it was self defense and that she got scared and buried the body. The state says she should have called the police instead of burying the body. There were enough inconsistentcies in her story for the prosecution to get her on manslaughter charges and she is currently serving a seven to 20 year sentence. She might have been able to claim self defense at trial, or might have been convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to death. Taking a plea was a safe bet for all involved. According to court documents, the murder took place in March 2000 and the body was found in July 2003. In those three years I saw this friend many times, both at family parties for my brother and I and also occasionally at the Stardust where she worked as a 21 dealer. She was a friend. When I graduated high school she gave me $5o and wrote me a nice card encouraging me to do my best at college. When I graduated college I would have had to write her in care of the bureau of prisons and my letter would have been scanned and censored. My dad remains in touch with her, they've been friends for nearly two decades. Her letters suggest a maturity and sense of purpose that might have been missing during the years of endless party. Two years into her term she was diagnosed with breast cancer and has received treatment. Her cancer is in remission and she is 45 years old. She is also now eligible for parole. Whether or not this happens, I can't say, but all developments suggest she'll soon be starting her life over. I shouldn't write that I admire someone who choked a drifter to death, even if it was in self defense. Yet, I admire her. She got caught up in something awful but has otherwise handled herself with dignity. Her letters are thoughtful, introspective and warm. Someday soon she'll be able to restart her life on the outside. Someday eventually there will be other family parties for her to attend. I'd like to tell her that I succeeded at college and still remember her laughing and sneaking me beers at my brother's HS graduation party.

I have a hard time being patient. It's not one of my better qualities. Whatever I want, I probably wanted it fifteen minutes ago and I'm unhappy to have waited that long. I talk a good game about taking the long view but mainly want what I want, and right now. It's been made pretty apparent that I need some more patience with a few things in my life so I've been thinking of this friend, locked away, doing her time and waiting to restart her life. She wrote my dad once, telling him that we're all doing our time, one way or the other and all we can do is make the best of the world around us, words for me to take to heart and words as a reminder.

Take my time. Be patient. Have faith.

the questions and answers

2011-03-28T16:18:00.000-07:00

I'm asking questions that I know can only be answered when we take away the space between our bodies and let our heart beat as one.

tell the story about being bored on the fire

2011-03-25T11:12:00.001-07:00

The summer I was fighting fires was my greatest adventure. It was the middle of July and the West was starting to burn. We were on top of the list for an off forest assignment and as such were monitoring all the big fires. Our most likely candidate was a complex of brush fires outside of Battle Mountain, Nevada. We were quite surprised to be sent all the way to the Clear Creek Fire outside of Salmon, Idaho. It took a day and a half to drive that far, all the way across the Sierra's, through Nevada and up 93 into Idaho. When we got to the fire it was clear that an all call for equipment had been made in anticipation of what was then a small fire growing into an epic fire (and this proved true, when we arrived the fire was at 30,000 acres and when we left it was at 285,000). We knew we'd be there for 21 days and got settled into fire camp. Our first week was spent covering the back side of a ridge. The work, while important, was also terribly boring. From dawn until dusk we'd sit, spread out along a mile of road, and watch for spot fires. In a sense, we were charged with making sure the fire didn't creep down the ridge and then burn up the other side of the road. The weather and terrain was severe and the fire was growing daily on every front but ours. Towards the end of that first week we were losing our minds. We were trained up, well fed and ready for some action. Watching the helicopters drop retardant could only hold our interest for so long. The road we were stationed along fronted a wide and shallow river, maybe 35 yards across. One afternoon we got to wonder if the pump on the engine could send a stream of water clear over the river and to the other side. Our pump was designed to push water a long way through hoses, not necessarily to allow us to put water on a fire at any distance. We decided our only chance was to use and inch and half hose with a half inch straight bore nozzle. This was not recommended. Four of us manned the hose while our engineer steadily increased the pressure. The hose was pushing water about half way across the river when the pressure started to pull the nozzle from our hands. We were in our heavy turnouts with helmets, gloves and goggles but they wouldn't have made a difference against a bronze nozzle flopping around with all that pressure behind it. At 80% of the pumps capacity the hose was ripped from our hand and started dancing and bashing into the ground before shooting straight up and then bashing down again. It would have split our heads down the seams or broken our backs. On an engine like ours you couldn't just cut the pressure, it had to be bled down. In the mean time we scrambled safety and for the only time that summer I did something entirely and instinctively right without having to think through the correct course of action. I jumped out of the way of the hose and dove under the truck and into the mud. With my body protected I was able to watch the hose dance and smash while everyone dodged and ran. After a few long seconds the pressure decreased and the hose fell to the ground. The four of us on the hose were splatted with mud, soaking wet and terrified. We didn't reach across the river, but we did stop work for a snack and a canteen of water and our clothes dried quickly in the scorching sun. Being bored at work has never been as thrilling as that week.

fighting the good fight...friendship!

2011-03-22T11:34:00.000-07:00

asb

2011-03-21T10:54:00.000-07:00

I have good friends.

The Giants have a rolling road show of great vibrations. The fans have never been louder, more engaged or excited. Buster Posey, Cody Ross and everyone else might as well be Paul Bunyan crossed with Johnny Appleseed wearing Jimmy Doolittle's pants. And Brian Wilson stands above them all. Last season he bought the Beard of Zeus in a Tenderloin pawn shop and has been unstoppable ever since. I've never really experienced a title defense. It's been easier than I had anticipated.

Whenever anyone starts talking shit I just remind them about the 2010 World Series.

needing some theme music

2011-03-16T10:43:00.000-07:00

I've long been a fan of the word desultory. Last night was desultory. My soccer team lost 4-0. The game was in the rain. The score suggests the game was close. In reality we barely touched the ball. We were completely dominated. I got drenched and had to jump over a slippery fence to get back to the car. I tossed my running shoes over the fence and they landed in a deep puddle. And then I jammed my toe while climbing the fence and drove home half naked so I wouldn't get my roommates car wet. Usually we get beers after the game but last night everyone kind of split off on their own. The car was fogged over and the drive through Bay View was more atmospheric than usual. I was considering the Ides of March and watching the rain hit all the concrete. For a moment I felt like I was somewhere else, somewhere out of my mind. I could have just drove south, bought a plane ticket and vanished. A moment later I drove past the Jack in the Box and realized I wasn't heading towards my house. One illegal u-turn later I was headed back towards Alemany and was on my way home. Eventually all roads lead me back home. Once there I left my wet clothes in the garage and wandered the house, half naked, looking for food and drinking beer. What I found was a package of ramen noodles, perhaps six years old and I paid no heed to the assumed age and cooked those noodles in a pot and then dumped some pace salsa on the top and washed the whole damn thing with a cold tecate. Wherever I might have gone, I was all the way back home.

the three way sucker punch

2011-03-14T17:03:00.000-07:00

1. an earthquake
2. a tsunami
3. a nuclear meltdown

Japan is um, fucked.

God bless the rescuers and good luck.

the man lied

2011-03-14T16:20:00.000-07:00

When I was growing up my dad used to tell me that if I told the truth I wouldn't get in trouble. This was a trick used to extract the truth. He should have told me to tell the truth and I might get in less trouble for shortening his investigation into which of us broke the window. There was always ways to lie about how the window got broke, but none of the lies were as plausible as the truth, see, we were kicking the soccer ball off the back wall, but someone cheated and one of us threw a wrench at the cheater and the window broke. That truth involves numerous ways for each of us to get in trouble, so it was better to say we were just trying to close the window and it slipped from the frame and broke. Despite the implausibility of such an action spraying glass through the bedroom, it seemed better then admitting to hucking a wrench at our friend. Once I learned, irrefutably, that telling the truth will frequently get you in trouble, I began to learn about saving my ass by omission and lying until the death bed to keep me from dying an immediate death.

This lesson carries to this day.

craving an ak-47

2011-03-10T12:17:00.000-08:00

I've been reading a history of the AK-47 and it's variants. I should of been a gunsmith. Armaments history is pretty fascinating to me, though, I suspect I might be a bit strange in holding this fascination. It isn't like I grew up in a military family or around guns. Basically, my experience with firearms was limited to shooting guns at an abandoned car in the desert behind Sam's Town. Back when there was a desert behind Sam's Town. We're lucky none of us accidentally blasted each other. I've done some skeet shooting, not that kind, the other kind, and shot plenty of flare guns when I was fighting fires but I have no experience with assault rifles. After learning so much about the history of machine guns and specifically of the AK-47, I want to go find someplace where I can try firing one. Someone told me that the Gun Store on Trop lets you shoot all kinds of guns so I've got something to do next time I'm home. This post isn't going anywhere, but there still is this:

there ain't no easy way out

2011-03-08T15:46:00.000-08:00

It's been a frantic afternoon here at the shop. Certainly a rare occurrence. I'd like to say I handled the whole thing with aplomb. That's one of those words that I'm not sure how to pronounce even as I'm sure of the definition. This happens to me a lot more than I'd care to admit. Books are my weakness and they improve my vocabulary but don't make me into a more eloquent speaker. When I was in high school, for reasons I can't explain, I had to say Vallejo out loud. Since I was generally a moron, I pronounced it valley-joe. Everyone in the room laughed at me, hell, maybe everyone in the American Southwest laughed. I don't know. It seemed to last forever. Even before that, when I was a little kid, I asked my Uncle Larry what it was like growing up in Illinois and I didn't keep the S silent like I should have. He pinched my ear and told me I was obviously ignorant. It was a rough message for a seven year old. We got along well on occasion, but always managed to fight when he'd take my brother and I to the Boulevard Mall to shop for presents for whatever holiday was next. Our fights were almost certainly petty, though perhaps he was right to not want to spend so much time in the massive Woolworth's with the three aisle wide toy section. It was almost certainly there that he bought me a childrens book about Dolphins that I eventually must have had him read to me a thousand times. He hated that book and didn't want 'to ever read about that stupid dolphin ever again.' As was my nature, I was persistent, though he had the last laugh when he made me watch Jaws with him and told me that the shark got that big from eating dolphins and that the only dolphins left in the world were the dolphins at the sad little exhibit at the Mirage. My uncle Larry died in 1994, same summer as the World Cup. In the end he was staying with us but was so sick that sometimes he'd just lay on the ground in the bathroom and shit himself. One summer morning he made a big mess in the bathroom and I was worried my dad would be stressed out, as having two kids and a terminally ill best friend in the house was hard for him. I kind of pulled my Uncle Larry out of the bathroom and onto the back patio and used 409 and an old t-shirt to clean everything up. It was an inelegant solution and I remember that being my first time I was near someone who was dying. A week or so later our limited care was becoming rapidly inadequate and my dad made my brother and I pancakes and told us to stay in the backroom playing video games while he cleaned and made a phone call. It was only later that I learned that while we played Mario Kart and ate pancakes, the ambulance came and took my Uncle Larry to the hospital where he spent the last 36 hours of his life.

I think I ate pretty well all weekend

2011-03-07T14:30:00.000-08:00

A short list of establishments in which I was able to dine or imbibe:

Pier 23, Nizarios, The Lucky Penny, Peets, Point Reyes Vineyards, Hog Island Oyster Farm, Nick's Cove, The Marshall Store, Ragazza, Danny Coyles, Kingdom of Dumpling and one random girl scout cookie dealership.

Maybe eating well is the best revenge.

taking it to the world, giving satan the kibosh

2011-03-04T16:36:00.000-08:00

Maybe I've been laying back in life a little bit. Resting and waiting for things to happen to me instead of making things happen for me. This isn't to slam laying in the weeds, that's been a strategy that has worked before. This is to say it's time for more aggression and more action. When I was senior in high school a group of us sat together at a table for US Government AP. We became fast friends and we're all very funny and very bright. Somewhere along the way a running joke developed about putting the kibosh to Satan with something called the Horn of Justice. When we weren't making jokes or dominating class discussions with our irreverent commentary we were constructing elaborate scenarios in which each of us defeated Satan. Eventually my buddy Gavan, who was a very talented artist, made these scenarios into reality on our groups shared and ancient computer. I think he might have used MS Paint. What you see above is me jumping the fence from Mexico into Hell to blast Satan with the Horn of Justice. Note the Mexican fence climbing shoes I'm wearing, the sombrero, Satan as an INS agent, the bottle of beer and the angry sun. Satan had no chance of survival as I was taking the battle straight to him, straight to hell. The Horn of Justice blasted him into a river of fire and eventually all was made right in the world. It feels like it's time for me to climb the fence and blast Satan again. I'm going to dust off the Horn of Justice and make all of this happen.

just like the song i leave behind me

2011-03-01T12:40:00.000-08:00

I was startled and delighted this morning when I saw the new date on my ipod. It's finally March. February started on a beach and then just dragged along. March has always been one of my favorite months. Growing up it was when the winter ended and before summer really started. That means more when summer is five months of shimmering heat. March was when swim season would start again and the end of the school year would come into view. March was when college basketball started mattering, thus, March Madness. And most importantly, March is when baseball comes back. Last season ended November 1st and this one starts March 31st. It's the shortest off season I've ever known and that's all because the Giants won the World Series. It's still slowly sinking in and I hope it takes a lifetime. I got to see five of the seven home playoff games, I went to the parade, I lived it all alongside everyone else and it was remarkable. My absolute favorite memories included the standing ovation Matt Cain received in game three of the NLCS, the Edgar Renteria home run in game two of the World Series and Tim Lincecum striking out 14 in game one of the NLDS. That was the first moment I started to believe. The division title was terrific, but in itself it was just a stepping stone. The Giants were going to need something special to win the World Series. I wasn't sure what that would be until I felt the energy in the park when Lincecum came out for the ninth and put the Braves down in order, striking out Jason Heyward and Derreck Lee to end the game. That was the first moment I believed. And now it's March and I still believe, everything that was true then can be still be true now.

this is the weekend

2011-02-28T12:29:00.000-08:00

First, home. Hurry home. Change clothes. Get soccer things. Shin guards, red cleats and a black long sleeve shirt. Race to the pier. It's fucking freezing. So cold. And your team forfeits. Not enough players. Take part in an entertaining scrimmage. Score three goals. Volunteer to play goalie for a bit. Freeze. Freeze. Ask out of playing goalie. It's just too cold. Admire the steam from your head. Catch a ride downtown and buy a tallboy for the train. Get home. Watch Goodfellas. Back out, weirdly enough, to the Marina. Drink at the Comet Club after talking your way around the cover. Meet up with your roommates. Get late night hot dogs. Be endlessly amused at your endlessly amused roommate. She is smitten by a hot dog with french fries and garlic. End the night on the short couch with a tecate and a quesadilla. Get into bed. Sleep. Sleep. Sleep. Be amazed that you're able to make a 1 pm brunch at Pork Store.

Chicken
Fried
Steak

Lose the rest of the day to bad HBO movies. Tina Fey and Steve Carrell are not that into you on Valentines Day. Also, Goodfellas is still on, it's always on. Poor Spider still gets blasted. Later, maybe much later, drive to the Rickshaw. No Age is on at 11. You've never seen them and don't know what to expect. And ninety minutes later you walk out of the club, a stumbling, sweaty, deaf mess. They were good. Very good. In the running for show of the year good. Drive to the pirate bar. Drink rum drinks and watch the bar lit on fire. Get a second round of rum drink, courtesy of the bouncer who was smitten with your date. Tip accordingly, head home and pass out.

Wake up, still buzzing, still jumpy. Thank No Age for making your night alive. And back to sleep. Wake up and watch the Carling Cup. Eat a cheesesteak. Regret the cheesesteak when your roommates drag you out for sushi. Hot sake is always a good choice, and unagi. Two meals in two hours and some ice cream for dessert. And remember to race home, the Academy Awards are on, and they are good for watching and relaxing and don't fret, Goodfellas is still on, Spider is still going to get whacked and Henry is still going to be a snook.

Count your blessings.

true love waits

2011-02-25T17:13:00.000-08:00

I'm not living
I'm just killing time
Your tiny hands
Your crazy kitten smile

keys to your room

2011-02-24T13:39:00.000-08:00

The major word on the street is that it might snow in San Francisco tonight or tomorrow. Several years ago the same thing happened in Seattle and some friends went sledding down a prominent hill. I will predict this, if the same thing happens here, someone will die. There is an outside chance it will snow tomorrow night during my game, a result that would be delightful. If this is the case, I'll have a flask in my sock and will be drinking the 7 on the field. After the Seattle snowstorm, which was quickly blamed on global warming, a friend of mine bought a case of aqua net and paraded through the Marina spraying hair spray at the sky in an attempt to flood the atmosphere with cfc's. He was just doing his part to pollute the air, hasten global warning and bring snow to the city by the bay. When I was in third grade there was a hail storm during recess. We assumed the hail was snow and began flinging it at each other. The hail stones made welts on our faces. Later my dad said I was stupid for not knowing the difference between snow and hail but I trumped his insult by reminding him that to that point in my life the closest I'd been to snow was ordering an icee at the flea market. I eventually learned a little about snow, but I still don't like it all that much, especially when I get into terrible sledding accidents or the snow goes up my pant leg and freezes me. Still, snow in San Francisco would be a blessing, anything to break up the monotony of this crawling month. Cactus league games start tomorrow though, we're almost through to the other side.

the cool dark night

2011-02-21T14:23:00.000-08:00

There might just be a single reader that will get the reference in the title. It was from a long ago time in my life when I was fervently chasing someone that I loved a great deal. She was scared and had pushed me away to be with her perfectly safe ex boyfriend. In my mind I decided I wasn't going to quit, and I crafted a daring plan to win her back. That fucker had no chance, but he didn't know it and neither did she. The whole thing happened fast and to this day I'm proud of my home wrecking abilities. Given an inch, I made a bloodbath. I'm not supposed to be this way, I'm not supposed to be so gleeful about the times I've done everything I can to get exactly what I want, despite the costs to other people. That time the costs were high and the third person in the picture got hurt the worst. I might have felt some sympathy, if he knew what we were doing while he so dutifully tried to live the right way, but I'm not sympathetic and I'm not sure I even want to be. One of the reasons this whole thing has been on my mind is because I'm seeing Godspeed You! Black Emperor tonight and back when all this was happening, when I was stealing back who was rightfully mine, I was listening to GY!BE all the time. They took me back to a different place in my life, back to that summer I spent all over the west, fighting fires and becoming a man. Sometimes when it got late at night and I was lonely I'd pop F sharp/A sharp Infinity into my Discman! and walk along the side of 108 up towards Long Barn. I'd be far enough off the road to not really risk getting hit, but close enough that I felt as if I was taking a tiny chance with my life. That record, heavy and very dark, was my introduction to disconnection, those nights, not a person in the world knew where I was or where I was going and as such, I ceased to fully exist as the man I was, I could be anyone I wanted. My walks always circled back to my little room with one bed, one hot plate, 12 channels and no phone or computer. It was as simple as my life would ever be and I miss it so damn much.

let's try to breathe

2011-02-18T14:20:00.000-08:00

The tension within my professional life is starting to red line. This is a public website so I can't say all that much. I should be better at the CYA special. I'm not though. I'm just not. Everything passes muster, everything moves downhill. This too shall pass, and onwards and outwards and inwards and upwards. Got to learn the CYA special. And I'd strongly recommend not asking yourself whether or not what I'm doing matters to the larger world. Your answer won't be any different than mine and neither are pretty. We're all just little cog's in machine. I wish I worked in the clouds and made sprockets like the Mr. Jetson of my dreams. I wish money didn't matter and that I could live in an Airstream somewhere, maybe by a pretty creek with fishes that would swim around and splash out of the water and straight onto my grill.

Fuck it, times like this are when I need to remember those exact times when I've actually lived the dream...like drinking a cold beer in a speeding golf cart while looking out at the endless sea.

This week is over and let's hope it stays dead. Professional strife seems to climb out of the earth and follow me numbly, like a zombie, with a cheap watch and no ideas beyond droning endless platitudes and failure. The thing with zombies though, you can't let them catch you, they might be easy to kill but they are fucking relentless. I guess I'm loaded my shotgun and am getting ready for the onslaught. As my dad said, often while drinking, it's better to be safe than sorry.

the drenching monsoon

2011-02-16T14:49:00.000-08:00

Last night I played a soccer game in the middle of the monsoon. There was hail, gusts of wind and sideways rain. A girl on my team was knocked down my a gust and one of the pieces of hail hit me straight in the eyeball. By the end of the game I was wet all the way through my clothes, even my underwear was soaked. When I got home I had to strip nearly naked in the doorway so I didn’t get too much water on the hardwood floor. It was a really fun night even though we only tied. We were down 2-0 at halftime and scored twice to get the tie and at the end we really had the other team on the ropes. I scored a goal, but it wasn’t very pretty, just a little tap towards the far post that spun in the wind and inched across the line. In the end they all count the same. I guess some people would think me crazy for taking so much joy from running around in the freezing rain, getting cold and wet and risking an actual cold. It's just recreational soccer...right? No, wrong, it's more, much more. It's one night a week with my best friends, it's a chance to be competitive and reckless, it's something that takes on added importance because it's different than almost anything else in my life. The games don't matter as much as the experience and camaraderie and playing in the rain, in a truly miserable storm, it's a terrific experience.

I was happy last night. Really happy.

it's a special fucking day

2011-02-14T15:02:00.000-08:00

See, three things are special about today. The third most special is that it is Valentines Day. I'm not sure I really care all that much about this. I mean, I should, and I'm lucky to have a Valentine, but still, this year, it's just not catching my imagination. Though, if I get a truly awesome present, which might happen, the day can still be fully redeemed. Otherwise, get me through the night and we'll be back at it tomorrow.

The second most special thing about today was that I woke up this morning to news that the new Radiohead album is being released this week. I've been listening to Radiohead pretty much daily, if not hourly, and last night I managed to the get Talk Show Host inadvertently and perhaps permanently jammed into my head. My obsession probably knows no limits, yet, even more Radiohead can only be a good thing. I've already ordered the vinyl and am counting the days until Saturday.

The most important thing about today is that pitchers and catchers reported. In warm and beautiful Scottsdale, Tim Lincecum and Buster Posey are having a laugh with Brian Wilson while Sergio Romo and Matt Cain tease Eli Whiteside and Madison Bumgarner works on his calf roping and Barry Zito strums the guitar. It's that magical time of year, hope springs eternal and the Giants are the defending World Champions.

And if the Giants remake this music video I'll be the happiest man in the world:

this a photo of the sun setting upside down

2011-02-11T16:24:00.000-08:00

I was living on a cloud that day.

three little words

2011-02-10T11:36:00.000-08:00

I and love and you.

I and love and you.

I and love and you.

I've thrown those fuckers around just as much as I've guarded them like they should be guarded. I've used them to gain favor and privilege and also to hurt people around me. I've held onto them through the darkest nights. They've gone with me around the world and they always find their way home with me again. I've got a list of those that have merited the sentiment and a list of those that never did. Three words that mean everything and nothing at the same damn time. Three words that can set you afire or tear you apart.

I love you.

the start of the garden

2011-02-08T16:51:00.000-08:00

My dad was good at growing things. Er. Is good. Really good. Especially because whenever something dies he pulls it out of the ground and returns the whole dead plant to Home Depot. They have a series of return policies that he exploits. Like Carl Weathers in Arrested Development. Apparently it's never going to rain again so I decided to make a trip out to Sloat and start my garden. The Sloat folks don't have such crazy return policies. If my raspberry bush decides to die, it dies without me getting a refund. If it gives me basket after basket of tasty raspberries, I'll hoard them in my room and eat them until I piss purple. Won't be the first time. I planted strawberries and tomatoes as well and even a little hybrid spearmint plant that grows sticks of spearmint gum. I'm not much of a gum guy, but figure I can sell it as an organic if I market myself appropriately on twitter. These days you have to have a web presence and a pretentious product. Assuming the weather holds I'll get more in the ground this weekend. Anything to make February pass quickly. It's the slowest month of all, by far, and ever so close to baseball, precious baseball. The Giants had Fanfest over the weekend, and this time around I didn't go, it couldn't have matched last year and it's good that I passed because it was so crowded they had to lock the gates, the park couldn't hold anymore love. I hope, by the harvest, that my garden is overflowing just as much, that it won't be able to hold anymore tasty fruits and vegetables, and that will be deep into the baseball season, into October, another long spring and summer from now.

the sand in my hair

2011-02-04T15:05:00.000-08:00

I think I should make a frank assessment.

There are parts of this world that are beautiful beyond words.

It is my duty to find more time finding these parts of the world.

the warmth of other suns

2011-01-28T11:03:00.000-08:00

The ten day straight warm spell has broken. I woke this morning to clouds and put a coat on, you know, like it was actually January. A few weeks ago I went hiking along the bay ridge trail, I was interested in exploring a couple of NIKE sites along the way, while also taking in the sweeping views of the bay and ocean. The path was well worn and I was able to hike to the locked gate above the San Francisco watershed. It was a warm day and there were few people on the trail. The NIKE site was suitably wrecked, generations of kids looking for a place to drink brought down the walls that once held missiles. Graffiti and weeds as a testament to capitalism's ultimate victory. There were hawks riding the winds above Pacifica and I counted 19 rabbits as they scurried out of the underbrush and across the trail. They were little guys, with small ears and brown coats. Years of pro rabbit propaganda prevents me from making jokes about their suitability for gloves or a warm hat and I guess, that even if I was armed with a .22, they were too cute for shooting. I finished my hike as the sun was setting over the Pacific, what had started in the sun was finished in the gloaming.

And with no attempt at an awkward transition, I also wanted to say something about the Egyptian protests. I'm not qualified enough to offer much analysis of what is happening, or why anything is happening, except to say, people don't mass and march in the streets unless they have a grievance. The President of Egypt has been in office longer than I've been alive. Their system of government is democratic in name only, nothing ever changes, everything remains the same. Hosni Mubarak holds power not as an elected official, subject to the wishes of the populace, but as a dictator, propped up by US military aid. The Jasmine revolution, much as the Cuban revolution once did, has given hope to those oppressed under dictatorships and now, finally, everything is going to change. The eyes of the world are on Egypt, and good luck and godspeed to those in the streets, pushing for change, yearning to shape their own destiny.

I'm going to be away for a few days, see you on the other side.

and it's the it's got to be

2011-01-27T16:34:00.000-08:00

I grew up in East Las Vegas, the eldest son of a 21 dealer. We didn't have all that much beyond exactly what a family needed. My clothes were never ragged, and also never flashy. My bike was a heavy BMX, with awesome five star wheels. Like many things in my life, it was a gift from some person or another my dad had worked with. The bike was too big for me when I learned to ride it, and actually had been designed to race on the hard pack out near Nellis. I was sometimes jealous of the kids with ten speeds, an obsession with quickness that I eventually outgrew. There were no hills to climb, but having those heavy gears was helpful for acceleration, so I lost my share of races. My bike was the best on the block for jumping shopping carts off of plywood and milk crate ramps. It had good balance and was sturdy. We jumped bikes all the time, both in the street and in the desert. Sometimes we would ride down the culverts into the wash and dodge abandoned furniture and homeless camps, though none of us was brave enough to ride into the tunnels. I can't even remember owning a helmet, let alone wearing one. A friend of mine would take his helmet off when he was around the corner from his house and then one day he got loose on some gravel and busted his head open. My memory fades, but I do recall him getting in some trouble for being foolish enough to bust his head while his helmet sat on the ground, discarded in an attempt to be as cool as the kids with parents behind the times. I rode that BMX with the bad ass five stars for years, easily, and I can't ever remember having to change the tires, or hit the chain with some 5 in 1 oil, even if I needed that stuff, I'm not sure how I'd have paid for it, I didn't get an allowance and was never cute enough to open a lemonade stand like my brother and his buddies did. I'm not sure where anything from my childhood came from, everything I needed was always there. And it was good, it was better than I remember, bikes and swimming pools and neighborhood to call my own. I'd pay big bucks now, for what I had then, that old bike with the bitching wheels, and warm weather, and streets to ride with my friends.

High Fidelity

2011-01-26T12:01:00.000-08:00

Many people have been flabbergasted that I've neither read nor seen High Fidelity.

I guess it seemed like it would go hand in hand with my personality.

I was not deliberately avoiding it, like the way I've avoided pixar films, it was just never the right time.

And I was right, High Fidelity found me, when I needed it most.

life as a packers fan

2011-01-25T15:49:00.000-08:00

For many years I despised the Green Bay Packers. Brett Favre, Reggie White, Mark Chmura, Antonio Freeman, Dorsey Levens, Leroy Butler, amongst many others, were some of the most hated people in my life. As a 49er fan, my Packers hatred approached a Dodgers level. I remember being keenly pleased when it came out that Brett Favre was pill popping junkie, Mark Chmura a pedophile and Reggie White a hateful and homophobic minister.

To this day, pulling for the Packers feels wrong, it feels ugly. Even with a serious norcal Aaron Rodgers connection, (who'd have looked so good in red and gold) I can't betray myself as a 49ers obsessed 14 year old.

I've got a friend from out that way who is as much a Packer fan as there can be. I once hustled her on a bet over a Packers/Cowboys MNF game, something that to this day can bring about angry words and hurt feelings. Teasing her about Brett Favre changing teams has been one of the great joys of my life. We finally bonded a bit over watching this youtube:

Soooo, when the Packers were dismantling Atlanta, and winning me a tidy sum, I texted her and said it made me happy whenever John Kuhn would get the ball and the fans would yell KUUUUHHHHNNNNNN.

She texted back that they were getting it out of their system.

Consider me a Packers fan, albeit tenuously, for the next two weeks.

KKKKUUUUUUHHHHHNNNNN.

the sunshine on my arms

2011-01-25T15:30:00.000-08:00

Sunday afternoon I beached myself on the ledge near my front door, literally basking in the sun. I was told I looked like a walrus. At one point I nearly fell off the ledge, and perhaps to my death, in a vain attempt to grab my cold tecate. I've lived the dream many times, in fact, at Santa Clara, I specialized in living the dream. Sunday was a day for living the dream. Warm weather, cold beer, thick steaks on the grill, pretty girls and lots of laughter. I didn't even mind being called a walrus as I floundered around. Hell, I even made some walrus like noises as I soaked up that precious vitamin D, though I was probably just aping what the sea lions at pier 39 sound like when they get excited.

Even as a walrus, I can live the dream.

remembering. electric love. track 18.

2011-01-24T15:47:00.000-08:00

planning for some stuff

2011-01-21T11:47:00.000-08:00

This summer there will be a rafting and hunting trip and three weddings and further pilgrimages to the temples of baseball. Spring training is already on the books as is a long weekend in Yosemite. Not that this blog is just a spot to list the things that make me happy. But still, fucking awesome.

I've been hitting the gym more the last two months. I've dropped nearly 10 pounds and feel stronger. Still a ways to go from my fighting weight, but I think I can get there eventually. Last night I decided to run the steps near my house. The kind of workout I used to chew up when I was fighting fires. It was ugly. Barely made it half way through my goal. I could have ran until I threw up but decided the posh homes adjacent to the steps didn't deserve such treatment. But I'll be back soon and you get stronger each time up to the top.

It's all part of the grand plan. Haa.

No plan. But better to be losing weight than gaining weight. Don't want to be one of those pudgy fuckers with the roly poly features and a sad look whenever it's time for a little manual labor. You know that guy, baggy clothes and always excited for Santacon where the girth is part of the costume. I've flirted with it before, I love me some choco-chip eggo waffles smothered in syrup and extra crunchy peanut butter but it feels like I should be trying to head the other direction. Heck, when I tell stories about hiking 30 miles on a fire line and people look at me like I could only hike laps if I was following a dim sum cart, it's probably time to get working out. There are a lot of times this year to have my shirt off and plenty of reasons to make my fighting weight, it's a fighting year.

trust is weird

2011-01-20T16:34:00.000-08:00

Say you're like me and you've been less than a saint in your life. You've done some lying, cheating, maybe a little petty theft, some graft on the government tit, you've stacked the deck at hearts and rigged monopoly and have willingly abused file sharing networks. I can't claim honesty as a virtue inherent to my character. I'm a confident liar, a good liar. Not so long ago I got out of a relationship with someone that wasn't so honest herself. And that might be an understatement. SO...I'm trying to figure out how all of this works going forward. See, if I'm honest about my past, about how I was able to lie and treat people poorly, then anyone new who meets me would end up immediately less trustful. If I lie about my past and keep my sins to myself, then anyone new would find me to be more trustworthy. And this, of course, happens if I treat everything clinically, black and white, like a simple report on what I did, to whom and why. That would be the right thing to do and it's not what anyone ever does. I learned many things from my last relationship, as I have from everyone I've ever loved, and while I don't want to focus on the bad all that much, learning about omission was not a good experience. Omission isn't lying in the traditional sense, it's a desperate grasp for a gray area where just some of the truth is revealed in a calculated bit of subterfuge. It's knowing the right thing to do and still doing otherwise. It's giving just enough to hide everything else. Leave out the critical details. Minimize facts and impact. All little bits of omission and it's very hard, if you're on the other side, to figure out exactly what has been omitted. You have to interrogate the person, flesh out their motives, parse all their words and never take anything at face value. You learn to be distrustful and it's unhealthy and unhappy and was never something I was very good at. Now say you're me how much of what I'm capable of doing wrong should I reveal? How much of who I've been should I discuss? Or would it be better for me to tell some of the truth and just omit all of the worst sins and mistakes, would it be better to claim as a a victory the progress I've made rather than make it black and white? These are the days for questions like this. Personal growth is never the zebra changing it's stripes, it's the zebra hiding in better camouflage. Whatever we were doing once, we're probably doing it again and I know that I don't trust anyone and I probably never should. Nobody tells the whole truth in this world, we just make do with broken pieces of trust. All of us liars, sinners and omission experts are just hunting for those that have yet to realize that same fact. Their trust is whole, their trust is pure. We can hit it again and again, like an addict reveling in finding a fresh and cheap source of dope and when it's done you get one more person with only the little pieces left. Wait and see if you don't believe me or if you believe the person you call your own is any different.

If it seems likes they are, they are just good at making it seem as such.

i've been wanting to remember something

2011-01-18T16:44:00.000-08:00

I think that all men want to be brave and gallant and have moments in their life that matter beyond the mundane. I still remember moments from my high school athletic career that have taken on near mythic proportions in my mind. In the grand scheme, they were beyond tiny, in my scheme, I still remember it all like I'd just landed on the moon. If I can ever be a hero, I'm sure going to try but in the mean time I feel like I've got to act heroic even in situations that suggest restraint. I want my own myopic quest. I want to nullify the evil in the world around me and walk out of the darkness and into the light. I want to live cliches until they become facts of my own existence, I want to make some memories, right now, memories that stick forever. Death or glory, as it were, all my life on a coin flip, and for nothing else but because I can put all my life on a coin flip. This desperate desire for meaning as explained in heroism and courage is a central theme to my own ennui. But maybe it's already starting, maybe I'm getting closer and closer to finding my fight. This year already has more momentum than years past. I'm not going to be storming the beaches at Normandy, but I am moving, ever faster, towards a moment that will quite possibly echo throughout the rest of my life. It's the way it's required to be, the way it always was.

2011

2011-01-13T16:42:00.000-08:00

Wait. It's a new year. This has been established. January 2010 was a pretty amazing time in my life. There were some amazing memories. Like taking a shopping cart two miles through downtown Reno and all the way into the hallway next to the room we were staying in at Circus Circus. Or watching Ricky dominate the cruel and mean spirited dealers. Or one of the many 'you always double on 11' moments. That was a good trip and it was a year ago this weekend. This January is turning into something amazing as well. It's fucking trite to quote an overly sentimentalized move, but as Red said to Andy before they kissed on the beach, get busy living or get busy dying. There are some good things coming down the pipe and I'm going to live in those moments, live in them drunkenly.

1.11.11

2011-01-11T18:01:00.000-08:00

this is going to be much cooler on veterans day.

the living on a prayer sing a long was worthwhile.

show me that there is a god.

the base elements

2011-01-07T17:10:00.000-08:00

The second weekend of 2011 is looking like a good time. There is going to be good things. Good people. Good movies and good games. Tonight I'm going to score a goal, probably a good goal. And after there will be some cold and good beers.

Good good good.

This other project I've been working on has convinced me that I've never left my best writing here. I mean, sometimes I've been pretty inspired, but since I insist on everything being hidden under a layer of subterfuge I always have to keep things close to the vest and away from the exacting words I'd rather use.

Better to keep everything vague. Vague is good. I decided earlier today that American men who prefer scotch to bourbon should be stripped of their citizenship. Fuck, what the hell is happening to America. Nothing makes an American anymore. We should all do it over and drink Hamm's and Jim Beam, smoke Lucky Strikes, bowl on Thursday nights, listen to baseball on the radio and never use an electric knife to cut the thanksgiving turkey. Everything has gone soft, the underbelly has become the outer skin, not tough, instead emotional, drenched in a attempt to never take a risk. So fuck it, I'm going to take some risks. God bless America.

I've always wanted to be someone else

2011-01-05T17:07:00.000-08:00

it's was nearly three AM...

2011-01-04T16:40:00.000-08:00

and I was insisting that Brian let me sleep on the pull out couch with him and Heather. He was insisting I sleep on the adjacent couch. Our argument escalated. At one point I through a hollow apple at him and then he took all the cushions off the couch I was supposed to sleep upon. Soon after more items wore thrown back and forth. Eventually he went for emotional damage, saying: "Bruce, you know what, fuck you, I'm your only friend. Don't forget that, I'm our only friend. You have no other friends." I was sufficiently damaged emotionally and decided to slink to bed. Friendless.

The next day we all changed our names. I became Carlos and he became Theodore. Carlos and Theodore began a tenuous friendship, like two mongrel dogs, slowly circling and trying to decide if they can trust the other. Carlos also has four friends, so if Theodore and him go the same way that Bruce and Brian did, well, it won't be nearly as much a loss.

2010, winding down

2010-12-28T16:52:00.000-08:00

We're coming to the end of this crazy and spellbinding year. It started for me at the Fox Theater with three people who are currently, for all intensive purposes, not a part of my life. And there might be theme number one, crumbling friendships and broken hearts. Theme two would have to delirious victory. Spain won the World Cup and then the impossible, the San Francisco Giants won the World Series. It was 8:30, Pacific Standard Time on 11/1/2010, to be exact, a moment that still lingers freshly within my heart. And the next day my new life started, something I was not prepared for in the slightest, from the first moments in my bedroom through this moment here, I've been unprepared for everything that has changed. And yes, I cried that night when the Giants did the impossible, and cried the next day and cried the day after, all the way through the layers and layers of unexpected emotion, all the way through this day. Theme three would be travel. After several years of mostly staying close to home I was able to take trips to the East Coast and Midwest and also was twice home in Las Vegas. I camped at Lake Shasta, gambled in Reno, hiked in Yosemite and swam in the frozen waters at Pine Crest. I'm in Oregon now, at a reunion of my closest friends and am thankful for all the bits of this wonderful world I'm able to explore. Theme four would be emotional intensity. The whole year was intense, even when I was acting like it wasn't. My heart was essentially broken because I let myself love someone openly and without fear or reservation. The pieces are back together now, or at least it seems that way. Who can ever tell anything about something hidden away from the outside world. At the same time I've struggled to hold my family together as best as I can. They are doing well, if not thriving. Theme five is understanding that it could all just as well be otherwise. 2011 is as wide open a year as a man could ever hope for. I'm going to make it into something remarkable. Stay tuned and see you on the other side.

just doing what I'm told

2010-12-27T14:57:00.000-08:00

Christmas was good. Got a few gifts. Saw my family. Was surprised a bit. Had some very good food. Bonded with my cousins. Deliveries were made, promises broken. I walked along the coast and drank at the Cliff House. Now I've got two get ups before I head north. NYE in the snow. 5/8ths of the best group of men in the world. Enabling. Drinking. Spirited and enabled drinking games. Hours of entertainment. Trolling the lodges for girls. Throwing snowballs. Sports on TV. Two more get ups. Just two. Out of bed, out the door. Out the door, back to bed. Out of bed, out the door, onto a plane, into the sky, order a beer, out of the sky and off to the party.

Christmas, baby please come home

2010-12-23T14:34:00.000-08:00

As I've gotten older and my family and I have grown into more separate lives, Christmas has become more of a bittersweet holiday. Growing up it was the three of us against the world, carving out our own small traditions, our own ways of making the holiday special. The past several years have seen those ideas erode as schedules have changed and priorities shifted. I doubt I'll ever again have a traditional family Christmas like we used to have. Traditional as in our traditions, as in what we built together. Last year was perfect, but it was my first without my family and that changed everything around. I was loved and welcomed into another family and I didn't have anything to compare those feelings to. This year will be different as well. My family is coming to me and for the first time in 22 years we'll be with our extended family. The last time that happened was the first Christmas we were alone. My dad bought us tickets on a whim because he wanted our family around. We left Christmas Eve and the America West plane had a red circle on the nose and was painted like Rudolph. We landed in Oakland and called my Uncle, having not even told him we were going to be in town and the next morning my brother and I were given presents that must have been put together suddenly. Colored pencils and paper, some small toys and candy canes. The trip was whirlwind, family everywhere, food, cousins and I'm sure that while I would have missed my mom, I also didn't feel like I was alone or without my family. And that was a Merry Christmas and this is hoping this year is a good one as well.

Take care of each other out there in the world.

look what you started

2010-12-21T16:46:00.000-08:00

It's nearly Christmas and I haven't bought a single gift. It's nearly New Years and I need a warm coat. The eclipse was beautiful but only flashed through the clouds. The moon was briefly vanquished but it returned all the more strong. Living this way can cut us to ribbons but it's the only way, this time around, it's the only way. If the trail falls away behind you, press onwards, if the hill becomes a wall, climb. These are going to be the stories we never tell but always feel, the truth in the midst of the lies. I know I'm waiting for a moment that might never arrive but if I'm right, I'm really going to be right. All the checks, all the dollars, all the hope, all the dreams, a space on the felt for all of it, life winding down to one moment, the one moment that we exist within, before it passes, that is when we'll know everything we need to know.

the part with the gripping drama

2010-12-17T15:14:00.000-08:00

When I found out my friday night soccer team has black long sleeve shirts I was just terribly excited. I can match the shirt with black shorts and socks and look like a bad mother fucker. My high school team wore all black at home. In retrospect, wearing that black kit to school on the day of a home game might have been the pinnacle of my fucking life. I was wearing that black shirt when I hit a fall away righty volley to beat Vo-tech. I can remember pulling it off (a painful proposition as I'd cracked a rib) when we lost to Palo Alto, to this day maybe the most heartbreaking defeat I've ever suffered.

ANYWAY.

My Friday night team, the Goal Diggers, we wear black. I'm terrifically amused. It's fun playing on the pier, the field is surrounded by a cyclone fence, the lighting is spotty and it's dark in the corners. The players and spectators all hug the field, there is even a clock and scoreboard. It's pretty easy to imagine you're playing to the death in a prison league. The games are even a bit rough as the tight dimensions encourage contact and physical play. It's all fast breaks and there is usually action going quickly both ways.

Tonight should be even better than usual. There is a storm rolling in, or a series of storms, rain all the way to Christmas Eve. The weather men say the first big punch is rolling over the coast in an hour and the second should be there just as we take the field. Soccer in the cold rain on a Friday night sounds just like heaven. When you look up to find a ball in the lights you can watch the rain fall in sheets and then make the trap, make the pass, slipping and sliding all over.

See you there, I hope.

such a lovely day

2010-12-13T16:12:00.000-08:00

There used to be something I was able to do. It wasn't a trick, it was the truth. There is more faith in this world than anyone can truly understand, a vast power, there to be shared. I used to have faith. Three different times I visited rural El Salvador and felt first hand what faith can do for those that keep it in their hearts. Living with faith was a healthy way to cope with a world full of pain. The faith was found in neighbors, the community, the land and the future. I would watch a community being rebuilt after 12 years of war, repression, crushing violence and desperate survival. My friends in El Salvador, men my own age, many of them had been born in refugee camps in Honduras and all of them lived a life behind bars in a broken land. When they were eventually able to return home they found a landscape wrecked by napalm, defoliants, massive bombs and also soaked in the blood of their family and friends. Everything was to rebuilt, everything was haunted. On faith alone their community was restarted. Each year things got a little better, each year the community grew stronger. The small church was rebuilt, schools put together. Children played again, commerce slowly started. The bonds of the community grew stronger and the pain of the civil war slowly started to pass. The amount of faith this took cannot be underestimated. Given a wrecked world, the people of that town took the long view, they believed they could make it better for themselves and then their children and grandchildren. They believed they could build something powerful enough to last, powerful enough to keep their families from heading north, powerful enough to make the civil war a part of their past and not the defining years of their history. Built on faith, from the soil up, dirt and blood and sweat, a stronger community, a place of beauty. And yet I can't find my own faith. Now, a time when I need it most, it's out of reach. I've fallen out of touch with the idea that good things can be possible and consistent. The blood in the soil is stopping all progress...

i'm struggling with creativity

2010-12-08T15:32:00.000-08:00

Blogging has become more and more difficult. I've written something like 1,100 of these. Some have been terrific, others not as much. I started just over five years ago, shortly before I turned 24 and went on my first cruise (completely unrelated events). I wrote through two trips to Peru, several relationships, my dad's medical and financial crises, a long stint working with adolescent drug users, personal unemployment and my eventual average professional career. My experiences with having this site have been generally good. Occasionally I was cyber stalked, but I always came out of it for the better. In time my life has settled down. I don't have anything to write about. I'm still insistent on leaving my close friendships and romantic relationships on the shelf. All topics may have been exhausted. As such, I'm uncreative and disenchanted. I don't want to completely get away from writing in this space, or another space, but I'm completely lost as to what I can continue to write. So, as a consequence, I just haven't been writing very much. Or maybe it's a block, maybe more is happening internally than externally. A confabulated explanation and apology, as it were, so forgive me soon and I'll write some more.

blogging requires something...

2010-12-07T16:55:00.000-08:00

that I don't currently have. More tomorrow.

and it's december

2010-12-01T15:50:00.000-08:00

2010 has been a whoosh. There is a month left to go. Spain won the World Cup, the Giants won the World Series. I visited Boston, New York, Washington DC, Milwaukee and Chicago. I saw the Strokes play twice, I saw Arcade Fire twice. I saw Thom Yorke and Jack White on back to back nights. I visited Wrigley and Fenway (and also Yankee Stadium and Nationals Park). I sat in the first row behind the screen at game two of the World Series. There was barbecued oysters on the patio at Nick's Cove and fireworks in Dolores Park. I took my family through Yosemite Valley and swam at Pinecrest. My soccer team finally won our league. I made memories on a rooftop that I can only share under extreme duress. The Elks would have been proud and maybe envious. Made two trips home and might have one more to make. I've been in love. I've woken up happy and fallen asleep content. Some of my dreams, my literal actual dreams, some of them literally actually came true. And maybe for that alone, it's been a good year and yet, kindly remember, it isn't over. There are still 31 more days to make memories and tie it all together.

29

2010-11-30T16:59:00.000-08:00

I am 29. Turned that way yesterday. It was a quiet birthday. I guess you could say I'm better armed against the enemies I fear. A few friends mentioned that this year might be special as I turned 29 on the 29th. Guess that can't happen again for 100 years. The year ahead is an uncertain one. It's the last of my third decade. So yeah, I'm going to make it count. Assuming this computer doesn't freak out tomorrow I'll have another post up soon.

really?

2010-11-29T16:21:00.000-08:00

this is a birthday? they feel like this?

and thanksgiving

2010-11-25T09:53:00.000-08:00

i had a big plan for a list of what i'm thankful for. i've been derailed. apparently i'm thankful for tacos and jameson and the giants. and my family, friends and loved ones. and you. always you.

and we're giving thanks tomorrow

2010-11-24T17:54:00.000-08:00

so tomorrow I'll blog.

a bit over this thing lately.

shoot me with that 30.06 + a grenade.

(the story remains unfinished)

2010-11-19T14:00:00.000-08:00

Last night I didn't dream very much. I also didn't sleep very much. So I was awake to hear the scratching fight in my back yard and smell the skunk spray that followed. I didn't open the door but did hide under the covers. It might have been the orange cat that eats my flowers who got sprayed, or it might have been another cat entirely, or even a raccoon or a possum. There is a zoo back there and I think one of these days I'll see a fox.

Not sleeping was a byproduct of a very challenging episode of my life that I can't write about here. This blog isn't for fear and I was afraid and didn't sleep as a result. When I was a kid I'd stay awake until all hours of night worrying about my future. I was terribly afraid of dying. The fear was heavy enough to make me feel weighted under my blanket. And then I started to grow up and put death into a compartment. I learned to fear new things.

Last night, when I did sleep, I had dreams where people close to me talk and tell me things. This has been happening off and on since I was in Chicago. I want so badly to believe some of what I've heard and to think that we can all communicate on a deeper level. Sometimes I've given so much of myself to someone that I think they have something of mine they can touch upon to talk with me in my dreams. Across the miles and hurt there is a way to make amends. And if this were true, what do I tell people in their dreams? Do I tell the truth? Can I say what I can't say? Makes promises I'm not sure I can keep? That place, between the blanket and mattress is the safest place to feel everything I've been feeling, but only with my eyes closed.

Once upon a time someone terrifically close to my heart made me a electronic love letter. It was snippets of songs from a mixed CD that formed a whole letter when read together. We first listened to it on a desolate stretch of road, driving away from a little oasis within our larger and turbulent relationship. And believe it or not, it was raining. Of course it was raining. Now I can't quote from her letter here, that's my memory, but I can tell you the last line was: "I hope everything's not lost." When I realized what she meant I got a lump in my throat and felt like I could drive that old shit kicker right from the road and into the sky. Sadly, we were only a few days from doubling down on sadness, but in that moment, everything was right and nothing out of reach.

an unapproved joke to my coworker who is obsessed with Mike Vick as a fantasy quarterback and role model

2010-11-17T16:41:00.000-08:00

gee, Aaron, did you hear on your commute over?

well golly, bruce, hear what?

well, um, see, they found that mike vick up to no good.

(long ramble about his six touchdowns)

and uh, i guess he was found in a basement in south philadelphia trying to saute a little yorkshire terrier in frank's red hot sauce. it's all over espn radio..

oh shit man, no, no. that can't be true, my team...

these hearts, dragged in the dirt

2010-11-16T14:37:00.000-08:00

Joe Posnanski wrote a blog the other day about his dad. It is perhaps the best piece of writing I've read this year.

Here it is in entirety:

Joe Blogs: The Promise

I keenly remember going with my dad to the IP to get his paycheck one early morning. We parked in the back lot and he knew almost everyone we came across on our way to the back office. We stopped in the break room to say hello to some of his friends and then went into the coffee shop and got donuts and orange juice. It was the first time I'd ever been with him to his work. Casinos weren't foreign places to me yet I was never in his casino. What he did was something I could understand, it was years until I learned how hard his job really was. I've got words from the heart about what that job eventually meant to him and my family but they aren't ready today. I'm going to stick with that morning, back in 87 or 88, we took the back way, down Viking and cut over on Koval. Parked on the ground floor near the employee entrance, right near the door because he wasn't working. That same floor used to flood sometimes, trapping cars and washing away cones. Up the ramp and into the back, into his other world, and it later occurred to me that his walk from the car was the only time in his life he was ever alone, his only time to himself. Once he was through the doors he was back on, saying hello to everyone, flirting with cocktail waitresses and kidding with the porters. That was his life and I'll never forget being part of it that morning.

and he said it all

2010-11-12T15:57:00.000-08:00

I was talking to my dad the other night, just catching up, nothing heavy on the agenda. As will happen with someone at age 68, things turned to his health. All the vital signs checked out and there aren't any red warning lights flashing on the dash. Being out of the casino has really helped, his asthma rarely flares up and he's even been sleeping a bit more. It's a bit harder assessing his mental health. Sometimes he'll cop to being depressed and feeling overwhelmed by the limitations of his life. Sometimes he just doesn't pick up the phone. The other night he said: "I've had a sad song in my heart my whole life and that's nothing I can change." SO, in a moment, a little throw away comment, he summed up depression and what it can mean over a lifetime. I guess everyone I share blood with has been depressed in some way or another. We've all felt the weight and considered all options for handling what is even hard to explain. Sad songs in our hearts. And I wonder if it's better to accept these feelings or too fight against the feeling that feels so natural. Enjoy the beauty in the sad song or look for something else, however disjointed that might end up sounding...

got to write an email instead of blogging

2010-11-11T15:57:00.000-08:00

Today at work I had a good idea that will stimulate the local economy.

Boom baby!

veterans day

2010-11-11T15:56:00.000-08:00

Kurt Vonnegut:

"When I was a boy... all the people of all the nations which had fought in the first World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month. It was during that minute that in 1918, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind. Armistice Day has becomes Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not."

starlight, by night

2010-11-08T16:27:00.000-08:00

Late the other night we all fell back an hour, back into time and that wasn't an argument enough to convince the barkeep to extend the night an hour longer. So we finished our sake and exchanged all relevant numbers (oh yeah, I'll text, love to see you again, sure, a great party still to happen). Promises made for next time, next time again. San Francisco is happy now, it can be felt in the streets and the bars. The Giants are holding everything together, a long deep fire, slowly burning away. I've been thinking about embers this week. Little specks of orange, searching for fuel and oxygen, fighting to stay afire. When I was a firefighter and we were on a fire we'd almost certainly spend the majority of our time mopping up, that is, searching for the tiniest embers and then extinguishing them. Knocking down the flames was the easy part, hacking into the earth to make sure all heat was gone and all that remained was cool ash, was so much harder. This was messy and exhausting work and deep inside we knew it was probably fruitless. As soon as we'd return to station all it would take was the sun shining the right way, or a bit or breeze or even a lightning strike for the fire to return, for the embers to light again. So we'd head back out and knock down the fire and fight the little sparks within the earth all over again. Fire requires heat, fuel and oxygen, if you can remove any of those three you can put out the fire but as long as those three are available the fire can return. And return it did, and return we did, over and over again. A long beautiful summer chasing bits of heat, hoping for only fires we could control and always remembering how small we were, smaller still than the embers, just tiny actors in a process of the millennium. There will always be embers, always fuel, always air, always waiting for the spark, for the conflagration to overwhelm all best considered plans, all hope for a quiet night, all hope for forgiveness, all hope for ease, all hope ready to be burned in that great fire just around the corner, maybe two corners from now.

tis so necessary for a bleeding heart

2010-11-04T16:26:00.001-07:00

The Giants are champions of the world. Sometime soon I'll have all my thoughts in order about this marvelous and life affirming event. For now I want to leave just a few words, a tweet really, from my favorite person. While everyone was celebrating in the streets I was far away but still able to monitor the parties, the beat writers and whole world's commentary. The internet makes everything three clicks away and I followed those three clicks all over that wonderful night. At some point the hyperbole faded and my emotions began to subside and I remember this clearly, it was only a few minutes after, my twitter claimed a new tweet and it said the following and my heart overflowed and I cried again, cried in happiness and sadness and love for my team, my city, my friends and the simple words she wrote, words that captured everything I was feeling, in depth and breadth, the whole expanse of my beating heart.

Goodnight you princes of San Francisco. You kings of the World Series.

the night i won't forget

2010-10-29T16:16:00.000-07:00

Like many a million Giants fans I was desperately wanting to see the World Series, live, in person and very loud. Nothing truly compares to actually being in the ballpark. Like the many a million I was shut out of tickets and searching craigslist, ebay, stubhub and even the cracks in the sidewalk for even something in standing room. I was also refreshing the order page on the Giants website, pretty much constantly. Did it for three hours Wednesday night and all day yesterday. After sending dozens of emails to folks on craigslist and staring at stubhub until my eyes rolled into my brain, I was about ready to give up. Yet just 90 minutes before first pitch, even after making plans to watch the game with friends at a bar, I tried the refresh and hope route one more time. And as miracles can happen (they can happen to you) the Giants kicked out a ticket. Well, not just a ticket, a ticket in the first row behind home plate. Like premium field club. I was kind of shaking as I entered my cc information, like they could somehow take the ticket away if I keyed a digit wrong. And then...I kind of teleported to the stadium...I don't remember much of how I got to my seat, like my brain was clearing room for all the memories to follow. I was sitting directly behind the backstop, in the first row. The field was in front of me and everything else behind. And as a final little bonus I was sitting in a row with a half dozen Santa Clara alums, including Dick Davey, the former men's basketball coach . Easy conversation all around and it felt like I was at the game with friends. By now you probably know exactly how the game turned out, it was first tense and later easy and I'll always remember turning and seeing Edgar Renteria's home run in silhouette against the dark sky. In truth, baseball is still baseball, even played at the highest levels on the grandest of stages. Last night wasn't the most dramatic game I've seen but it might turn out to be the most memorable. There are dozens of little snapshots running through my mind, moments that left me dizzy with joy and confounded by luck. Walking back out of the park, through the Field Club doors and into Willie Mays plaza was so fucking terrific. It was bedlam and when I woke up this morning my ears were still ringing. Here's two photos from my night...and go Giants. Two more. We're halfway there.

lksahfsdjbflwijfn

2010-10-28T13:58:00.000-07:00

JAZZ HANDS

there is no other life on this planet beyond the life in this city.

and wowzers

2010-10-26T14:38:00.000-07:00

Saturday night I ended up at the Philosophers Club for the last five outs of the NLCS. Upon the slider that I'll always remember there was bedlam in the bar. I do wish I had footage of everything going crazy at once. After a few minutes of hugging everyone within reach, pounding my beer, screaming, dancing and nearly blacking out from excitement I walked outside into the soft drizzle and listened to the city. Car horns, fireworks, yelps of delight, even in my quiet little neighborhood there was shared magnificence. Baseball as unity. 25 men as folk heroes. Beards, rituals and commonality. The Giants are San Francisco and we are all Giants.

the greatest sports lede ever written

2010-10-21T14:30:00.000-07:00

"Miracle of Coogan's Bluff," by Red Smith

(from the New York Herald Tribune, October 4, 1951)

What follows is what I believe to be one of the greatest pieces of journalism ever written. Red Smith was a genius, one of the finest of his time. The 'Miracle of Coogan's Bluff,' written on deadline, was his masterpiece.

Now it is done. Now the story ends. And there is no way to tell it. The art of fiction is dead. Reality has strangled invention. Only the utterly impossible, the inexpressibly fantastic, can ever be plausible again.

Down on the green and white and earth-brown geometry of the playing field, a drunk tries to break through the ranks of ushers marshalled along the foul lines to keep profane feet off the diamond. The ushers thrust him back and he lunges at them, struggling in the clutch of two or three men. He breaks free and four or five tackle him. He shakes them off, bursts through the line, runs head on into a special park cop who brings him down with a flying tackle.

Here comes a whole platoon of ushers. They lift the man and haul him, twisting and kicking, back across the first-base line. Again he shakes loose and crashes the line. He is away, weaving out toward center field where cheering thousands are jammed beneath the windows of the Giants' clubhouse.

At heart, our man is a Giant, too. He never gave up.

From center field comes burst upon burst of cheering. Pennants are waving, uplifted fists are brandished, hats are flying. Again and again, the dark clubhouse windows blaze with the light of photographers' flash bulbs. Here comes that same drunk out of the mob, back across the green turf to the infield. Coat tails flying, he runs the bases, slides into third. Nobody bothers him now.

And the story remains to be told, the story of how the Giants won the 1951 pennant in the National League....The tale of their barreling run through August and September and into October....On the final day of the season when they won the championship and started home with it from Boston, to hear on the train how the dead, defeated Dodgers had risen from the ashes in the Philadelphia twilight....Of the three-game playoff in which they won, and lost and were losing again with one out in the ninth inning yesterday when — Oh, why bother?

Maybe this is the way to tell it: Bobby Thomson, a young Scot from Staten Island, delivered a timely hit yesterday in the ninth inning of an enjoyable game of baseball before 34,320 witnesses in the Polo Grounds....Or perhaps this is better:

"Well," said Whitey Lockman, standing on second base in the second inning of yesterday's playoff game between the Giants and Dodgers.

"Ah, there," said Bobby Thomson, pulling into the same station after hitting a ball to left field. "How've you been?"

"Fancy," Lockman said, "meeting you here!"

"Ooops!" Thomson said. "Sorry."

And the Giants' first chance for a big inning against Don Newcombe disappeared as they tagged him out. Up in the press section, the voices of Willie Goodrich came over the amplifiers announcing a macabre statistic: "Thomson has now hit safely in fifteen consecutive games." Just then the floodlights were turned on, enabling the Giants to see and count their runners on each base.

It wasn't funny, though, because it seemed for so long that the Giants weren't going to get another chance like the one Thomson squandered by trying to take second base with a playmate already there. They couldn't hit Newcombe and the Dodgers couldn't do anything wrong. Sal Maglie's most splendorous pitching would avail nothing unless New York could match the run Brooklyn had scored in the first inning.

The story was winding up, and it wasn't the happy ending which such a tale demands. Poetic justice was a phrase without meaning.

Now it was the seventh inning and Thomson was up with runners on first and third, none out. Pitching a shutout in Philadelphia last Saturday night, pitching again in Philadelphia on Sunday, holding the Giants scoreless this far, Newcombe had now gone twenty-one innings without allowing a run.

He threw four strikes to Thomson. Two were fouled off out of play. Then he threw a fifth. Thomson's fly scored Monte Irvin. The score was tied. It was a new ball game.

Wait a moment, though. Here's Pee Wee Reese hitting safely in the eighth. Here's Duke Snider singling Reese to third. Here's Maglie, wild — pitching a run home. Here's Andy Pafko slashing a hit through Thomson for another score. Here's Billy Cox batting still another home. Where does his hit go? Where else? Through Thomson at third.

So it was the Dodgers ball game, 4 to 1, and the Dodgers' pennant. So all right. Better get started and beat the crowd home. That stuff in the ninth inning? That didn't mean anything.

A single by Al Dark. A single by Don Mueller. Irvin's pop-up. Lockerman's one-run double. Now the corniest possible sort of Hollywood schmaltz — stretcher bearers plodding away with an injured Mueller between them, symbolic of the Giants themselves.

There went Newcombe and here came Ralph Branca. Who's at bat? Thomson again? He beat Branca with a home run the other day. would Charlie Dressen order him walked, putting the winning run on base, to pitch to the dead-end kids at the bottom of the batting order? No, Branca's first pitch was called a strike.

The second pitch — well, when Thomson reached first base he turned and looked toward the left-field stands. Then he started jumping straight up in the air, again and again. Then he trotted around the bases, taking his time.

Ralph Branca turned and started for the clubhouse. The number on his uniform looked huge. Thirteen.

it was what it was what it was

2010-10-20T16:19:00.000-07:00

Saw the Giants yesterday. Yeah. YEAH!!

YEEAAAAAHHHHHH!

Was walking down the ramp out of the game and the let's go Giants chant was deafening. Later, in the bar, everyone sang don't stop believing. It was also deafening. Cody Ross is like Paul Bunyan, so that's fun. And Matt Cain is a tough son of a bitch. My Giants love is so high right now that you could probably hit me in the head with a folding chair and I'd grin like an idiot all through the post concussion syndrome.

!!!

the story that moved from television to text

2010-10-14T17:22:00.001-07:00

As you might have heard, the 33 Chilean miners, trapped for 69 days nearly a half mile beneath the earth, have been rescued. The joy and emotional catharsis of the event was felt all over the world. It was surreal and fascinating to watch the rescue chamber descend into the earth, vanishing for 10 minutes, before seeing it again, on grainy video, arriving inside the mine. And then a man would climb into the cage and some period of time later, for it always seemed longer on the way out, would arrive at the surface. The rescuers cheered and chanted and the miner was greeted by his closest family before heading for further medical attention. Each man that ascended from the depths, returning to the surface, looked like a conquering hero. Those 33, beneath the earth for so long, they returned not as huddled and broken souls but as strong and thriving men. The 69 days weren't days of leisure, they were days of work, on a strict schedule, time regimented hour by hour until the final hours, when the work slowed down and they waited, finally inpatient, to return home. The longest shifts of their life have finally ended, the time clock has been punched and it's time to meet friends for a beer, to kiss wives and mistresses, tuck the kids into bed and enjoy a long overdue few days off.

notes! notes!

2010-10-12T17:03:00.000-07:00

I am obviously thrilled the Giants have advanced to the NLCS. The Phillies are a major and perhaps insurmountable obstacle and yet, they can be beat. This season the Giants own wins over Halladay, Oswalt and Hamels and might be due to score some runs, a team of streaky hitters has to eventually get more going than Cody Ross. Either way, win or lose, this has been a terrific season. We're playing on house money now, profits tucked away and luck on our side. The weirdest thing about all this is knowing the Giants won't play again until Saturday, in Philadelphia, a long time to consider rosters, ramifications and stress over the minor details. They will next be at China Basin a week from three hours ago, and I need tickets, desperately. The NLCS isn't an impossible ticket, just very expensive. In other news, yet related to the Giants, like everything right now, I shaved my beard. I'd grown one for luck, to help Brian Wilson and his Bearded Men and it's taken the Giants as far as I can help take them. I did keep the moustache though, the men in my family all wear them, but it feels nothing but creepy to me. Perhaps that is the unspoken unifier of moustached men, feeling like no one wants you around their sister.

By my own count...

2010-10-07T15:19:00.000-07:00

It's been 2,560 days since the Giants were last in the playoffs. I drank a beer a day in memorial. Or maybe it just feels that way. When JT Snow was thrown out at home, the only post season series to end on a play at the plate, I was a senior in college. That year, as a decent and kind man, I immediately jumped on the Cubs bandwagon and then they managed to lose a heartbreaking NLCS. Baseball was only going to get darker. I never thought it'd be seven years, I never knew it was going to be this long. The 49ers have been worse for just as long but it feels different, baseball requires a daily vigilance that rewards attention and also can make each setback feel crueler and deeper. With baseball, the first cut is the deepest, but each subsequent cut fouls the stitches from the first. 2010 has been a hell of a road with as memorable a team as a bleeding heart like me can ask for. It's nearing the end now, the final straight away, a dead sprint, tired players, excited fans, excited players and tired fans. Nothing past tonight can truly feel like a disapointment, we're allowed to see the promised land even if we might not get all the way there. It's 11 wins to a lifetime so come on, take my hand, we're in this together and it feels so fucking good.

nothing but fleeting thoughts all the way through friday midnight

2010-10-05T16:32:00.000-07:00

It is amazing how much time this week I've spent considering whether or not Barry Zito, a man with a contract that could be a GDP, should be on a roster for a five game series that means everything and nothing at the same time to sometimes even the same people. Barry Zito isn't going to determine who advances to the NLCS. His true value now is as a distraction. While everyone considers his fate, the rest of the Giants lurk and prepare.

I've also been remembering 2005. That was an altogether ugly Giants team, maybe the third worst of the decade. Armando Benitez was brought on to be the closer but spent most of the season hurt. When he pitched he was frequently mediocre and managed three or four blown saves that became losses. The Giants finished 75 and 87 and were given the 10th pick in the following years draft. They selected Tim Lincecum. Had Benitez been a league average closer, the Giants would have finished closer to 79 and 83 or 80 and 82. They would have drafted 12th or 13th and quite possibly would have missed Lincecum and drafted someone like Kasey Kiker. There are dozens of little choices, twists of fate and bits of luck that all came together for this particular team. Also consider Aubrey Huff as the third choice behind Nick Johnson and Adam LaRoche, or the once strong sentiment suggesting Jonathan Sanchez be traded for Corey Hart.

So much to ponder and so much time to kill. I'm a mess, delighted and thoughtful. God Bless em, and good luck.

patti smith oh wow

2010-10-04T16:16:00.000-07:00

a typical sf weekend:

jerry jeff walker, conor oberst, fountains of wayne, emmylou harris, elvis costello, randy newman, nick lowe, the avett brothers and patti smith. all for free. patti smith vaulted onto the top 20 shows of my life list. she was perfect and the prayer of st. francis was a good touch.

and let's not forget the arcade fire, who were terrific but not nearly as good as they were in chicago. the crowd in berkeley was so quiet, so nearly lifeless. the show felt like a recital, not a revival, maybe a bunch of people were there just to punch a tab on their credibility list.

all of this music was the big pieces, the small pieces were peets, the green chile kitchen, noahs, seeing old friends and oh yeah, A DIVISION TITLE!

one problem at a time

2010-09-29T16:50:00.000-07:00

The Giants, they got a magic number, and that number is four. And tonight, if all breaks well, the Giants, they could have a magic number that might be two. It seems like my soccer team might also have a magic number. It could be two for all I can tell. This season, I don't score any goals. Tis' frustrating, irritating, unhappy, goals are sex, goals are currency, goals have been nonexistent. Last night I blasted one over the top from five yards out, all of me behind the ball, not even an eyelash in the right spot and all I could do was groan and avoid the eyes of my team. Later, in the second half, I was psychologically rattled and attempted to dribble between two people, forcing the issue as it were, and in doing so, I never lifted my head and didn't see my completely open teammate. My shot was low, hard and wide and my eyes were again averted. This teammate of mine, bless his soul, he could have sucker punched me for my insolence but instead told me it was ok, and I'd be fine and that I was a winner and he was glad to help me feel included. Thus, I was able to realize that he might have considered me on loan from a special olympic soccer team. Instead of continuing with this farce, this assertion that I can play attacking soccer, I really should go back to helping coach special olympics soccer, that was rewarding and we always won.

The note on the wall

2010-09-28T15:50:00.000-07:00

In my office, or I guess outside of my office, their is a motivational poster advising me to autograph my work with quality. At the end of the day I feel slightly compelled to sign my monitor. Autographing it with quality. In my youth my penmanship despised my dad, he of the neatest handwriting known to man. Now I've got a signature as a scrawl, ugly and without anything suggesting its my actual name. Can I autograph my work with quality if my autograph is unsatisfactory? I am assuming this is not the case.

Earlier today there was a man being interviewed on KNBR and he sounded like he was going to die. I chatted this observation to several friends and each of them replied that they hoped the person being interviewed was a hated player on their respective beloved baseball team. We are all nothing if not predictable.

And maybe a last note, I finished Freedom last night and Jonathan Franzen is a fucking magician. It is my belief that he has mastered the novel. Freedom is better than The Corrections and is easily the best book I've read this year. The ending made me tear up and there were at least a dozen times I was so moved by a particular passage to be compelled to put the book down for a time, long enough to savor what I'd just read. Not so many of my friends really read anymore and I feel bad for the ones that do because I'm going to be hitting them with this love for as long as I can remember.

through the warm mission night

2010-09-24T15:54:00.000-07:00

Last night was really good. Old friends are terrific for providing a pick me up, a natural little high, some way to validate my life and relationships. It's looking to be a wide open weekend, warm and aimless. A good time to plant something new, to try and build out my own happiness. This has been a hard week but not for anything I was suspecting. I kind of feel like I got jumped. Suffice to say, it isn't going to become any easier. The great battlegrounds of my late 20's have been relationships and shifting friendships. My energy divided, dividends missed, disappointments assessed and categorized. Maybe all of this will take my eyes off battles I can't win and put me back into a place where I'm creating a future for myself that I can be proud of, that won't ever involve compromising my own self. We say that these are the best days of our lives. Running around, finally a bit of money to spend, friends all around, camping, drinking, being outside and I guess it hasn't felt as good as the best days are supposed to feel. Then yet, last night, walking out of the Homestead, that felt right and good and happy.

some things i've learned today

2010-09-23T15:53:00.000-07:00

No matter how much I try to make amends for the bad decisions of my past, no matter the price I've paid, even when my acts of contrition go beyond my sins, nothing I've ever done can be escaped.

At some point in the past my relationship with my best friend took a wrong turn. We stalled, as it were, for longer then I care to admit. Upon getting started again we went back to what I thought was who we were before.

The renewed success we experienced, a bit of traveling, a few late nights and maybe just the general understanding that we understood each other again, well, it made me happy.

Yet and still, so much of before wraps around into now. I'm measured as if I have a foot in the past and I'm trying to drag my life back into the depths, into the abyss created by what I once did wrong.

a weekend of close calls

2010-09-21T13:43:00.000-07:00

Let's see. Friday night I went to a bachelor(ette) auction at Mr. Smiths. Proceeds were to benefit breast cancer research, and really, who doesn't support eradicating cancer from breasts. I was clued into the auction because my lovely friend was going to be auctioned off. I set myself up with the idea that I'd bid her up and make sure she fetched a fair price and at the same time cancer would get a cruel kick in the ass. The first bachelor went for something like $400 so I was pretty comfortable opening the bidding at $50 and then throwing a few rebids out to keep the process moving. My idea was to get out short of $200 and let the big boys step in with their deep pockets and dreams of having blissful conversations and ice cream with my buddy. Instead, at $175, I inadvertently won the auction. I'm not a cheap guy, and I can support charity, but come on, no one was happy with this outcome. Come the end of the night I walked over the auctioneer and realized, at the least, I'd won the most bang for my buck. My friend was the cheapest bachelorette by at least $125. The woman counting the funds quickly collected my cash and congratulated me on my luck. Apparently a few people had asked that my friend be put back out to bid as they were not yet at the auction and had targeted her specifically for investment. Sensing an opportunity for everyone to win, I cornered one of these potential bidders and sold my date for a tidy profit which I then kindly donated back to the cause. Assuming he isn't a date rapist or the type of guy to wear Axe deodarant, it was a terrific turn of events.

The next day I was doing outside work. The best sort of work. First I built a flower box for my window, and then made some flowers be outside of my neighbors window. Next I was doing some sweeping when the metal broom handle buckled, snapped and bit my finger. The blood flow was instant and heavy. A major chunk of my middle finger was split off from the rest and hanging, the space between a stream of red. I got my finger beneath the hose and watched my yard turn into some tiny approximation of Saipan. I'm no dummy, I asked for help and between my nurse friend, myself and three hours of constant and numbing pressure, we got the wound to close enough to get a bandaid around the whole mess. It was barely an eight of a inch of tissue that kept me from losing a half inch off the pad of my finger. And yeah, because a broom bit me.

Sunday wasn't a close call as much a crushing disapointment. I'd gone into Peet's, as I usually do. Got an iced coffee, nothing new here. Decided I'd had a rough weekend, what with the bleeding and the hangover after the party the night before where we split two fifths of whiskey and enough beer for a 30 man tailgate in a blizzard. As a consequence of this decision I bought a slice of delicious pumpkin bread, surely my favorite dessert bread. There were all kinds of people jostling in the line so I took my coffee and stepped aside and was distracted by a Chemex coffee pot that I've long cherished. Next I made my iced coffee into a poor man's iced mocha, stole the sports page from the newspaper rack and left the store, forgetting my pumpkin bread on the top of the pastry cabinent. Soon enough I got home, realized my mistake and broke into angry sobs. Or maybe I rolled over and took a nap.

12 left and someone might have some NLDS tickets on the way.

clanging chords

2010-09-17T17:22:00.001-07:00

the fog aside, the fog that encased my house this morning, the fog that made the de young invisible from the alive roof, the fog that i can see settled behind sutro towers, this fog...well, it's indian summer time and the sun will break through. i believe the sun is coming. it's birthday season, i know a bunch of virgos. so happy birthday to all the virgos i know. the best party is going to be tomorrow, with lawn games, in the sun. yes, i dare the sun to return. and then all the weekends stack up, as indian summer weekends tend to do. bridge school, and hardly strictly bluegrass and treasure island for music, the giants for baseball and the blue angels for america. it's street festival season, pennant race season, a warm entry into the eventual cold rain. weirdly enough, besides watching the giants, what i've wanted to do most is read more and more of freedom, that jon franzen has written an epic, accessible, beautiful and hilarious ode to the unique and paralyzing modern american condition. ah, so at the least, that will be part of my weekend, fog be fucked and damned.

this is my 1,000th post

2010-09-15T16:51:00.000-07:00

There is a party at Ike's in the Castro. Tonight at 7:30. Come straight over after work.

Giants! Torture! Giants! Torture!

It feels a bit like some part of Git-mo has been lopped off and placed into my heart. Burn the holy book, desecrate my sacred places, leak oil, dump sewage into my bed, give me a bad hair cut, cancel Modern Family, kick a puppy, kick a puppy at a kitten, shove a hot pepper into my nose, take away Freedom, force me to read all the shitty feminist poetry at scripps, make my pecker point sideways, blind me to the good in the world, just please, please, score some fucking runs.

that was hard

2010-09-14T16:08:00.000-07:00

Last week I watched a documentary call The King of Kong, A Fistful of Quarters. It was basically about one creepy guy that was terrific at old school video games and self promotion and another guy, a bit of an enigma, that managed to beat the first guys world record Donkey Kong score. The record was considered the Holy Grail on classic scores and had stood for over 25 years. I was a bit young for the classic video games, I do recall my dad perhaps enjoying a little Pac Man during his breaks at work, but this could be constructed memory. To me Donkey Kong was the all together simple game that we walked by at Pistol Pete's to go and play skee ball. Watching the two main characters (and they did inhabit a world filled with numerous odd balls) play Donkey Kong was a revelation. Either they were great at an easy game or I'd completely missed something over the years. A few nights after watching the film, which as an aside I really recommend, I was waiting for someone at Li Po in Chinatown. There was a cocktail video game cabinet, one of those we used to find at Little Caesars. It was loaded with 16 classic games and five credits. Curiosity compelled me to see how hard Donkey Kong really was and I blew through the five credits, three lives a turn, in a matter of minutes. I couldn't even get half way up the scaffold towards the princess on even the first level. My score topped out at 400, the world record is somewhere about a million. That was the low light of my friday night, getting beaten around by a game that debuted when I was still sucking my thumb. So cheers to Steve Wiebe and the hardest video game I've ever played.

zoiks

2010-09-10T16:03:00.000-07:00

Like many last night I was watching the Saints and enjoying the warm weather and at half time the news men burst through and onto the screen because there was a massive fireball following an explosion and a whole neighborhood in San Bruno was torched. In the first minutes speculation ran rampant about the causes of what clearly appeared to be a natural gas pipeline fire. Sucker looked like a flamethrower grafted onto a lawn sprinkler, spewing fire into the sky. But the speculation, that was more fun, it might have been a plane crash, maybe a big plane crash and the anchor man's were even disappointed when the FAA clarified, again and again, that they didn't have any planes missing and oh by the way, the tower at SFO was barely two miles from the conflagration and they might have noticed a 757 falling from the sky. As stories go, it was the rare local sensation that merited pushing network programming back into the shed for round the clock all angles coverage. The search for angles, new angles, was fascinating. Eventually they found more and more locals to recount their stories, live and unedited, always a dangerous format for TV news. Everyone was going strong when I finally dozed off, close to midnight, even Sal Casteneda was breaking big meaty scoops via his twitter feed. The whole thing reminded me, as fires and explosions inevitably do, of the Pepcon disaster. I've probably blogger about that one before, the time when the rocket fuel planet exploded and I was more scared then I ever was before. This explosion here:

made all the windows in our apartment shatter and knocked our house plants off of our shelves. I was in kindergarten and was scared of sirens for many years after. And I'll always remember that day, as vivid a memory I have of those years of my life, whenever something like San Bruno happens.

las vegas on the rocks

2010-09-07T16:28:00.000-07:00

I've said this before...Las Vegas isn't what I remember. The Strip looks likes a bloated and surreal version of what I remember. I haven't been home much the past several years. Each time something feels terribly different. This time it might have been seeing the home not so far from mine that was sold for 39k. Or perhaps it was all the condo towers springing up from pieces of property, that to me, will always be somewhere else. It was an unending cycle, what's that they put up where the El Rancho used to be? Condos, condos, condos! Excess breeds excess despite a distinctive lack of success in selling the foreclosed stock of homes and yes, condos, that dot the valley like little pieces of despair on a map of runaway capitalism, shitty investments and American greed. The gaming that the valley was built on still hums along, the coffers might not be as deep as they were, but yet, people still play. The wheels spin and sportsbooks set odds. There was a line of folks cashing their paycheck Friday morning, all the graveyarders, back in a casino, getting payroll cashed from another casino, in cash, from the cage and then for every one's benefit, playing a little video poker on the way home. In 1989 Steve Wynn opened the Mirage. Everything that happened afterwards, the nearly 20 year boom, more and more, it's looking like a mirage, a sham, a joke, but even as they realize the game is up, the game will still be played, Las Vegas is too big now, it can't fail, it can only lumber through the darkness, too big, too much, too far gone.

maybe this wouldn't matter to you

2010-09-02T16:11:00.000-07:00

Long weekend here. Going gambling. Going collecting. Despising hipsterati. Probably not dancing. Probably eating mexican food. And I might even do some fixing of broken things. I'll be smiling about Darren Ford and how amazing it is that last night was his first ever visit to a MLB stadium. He's got 32,000 people who'd love to buy him a drink. And most of all, entering this long weekend, I know my slacks are put away for 96 hours, no work email and most beloved of all, I don't have to shave. Nothing means not working like a scraggly beard and the little pointy hairs at the side of my mouth.

Until next time, God bless America second and the Giants first.

Oh yes, I also got my copy of Freedom in the mail. It's going to be a good weekend.