duck xing has gone crazy

I've just been included on the Duck Xing list for Mars 2008. Either my drinking or my dodgeball skills have reached a certain level of abject ridiculousness.

Or both.

Who knows for sure?!

coffee and volume 14

Before I forget, I would like to thank coffee and volume 14 for keeping me awake on late night drives. You, my wonderful and faithful readers (all two of you!), should probably thank them too, as they are your unassuming saviors from a 2 am phone call. Time zones and delayed, homeward bound flights will really mess with your sleeping schedule.

A. Coffee-drinking (The Midnight Oil)

Some might find the vice diabolical. But it's certainly not so diabolical as circus peanuts, especially when coffee's trusty sidekicks are 3 packets of Sugar in the Raw and delightful doses of cream.

B. Volume 14 (Eardrums? There You Are!)

Even Captain & Tennille sound better at this setting:

1. When Bon Jovi tells you to hold on to what you've got, you HOLD ON.
2. When Kanye tells you to dig for gold, you DIG (or find it in an abandoned mine shaft in the Californian desert).
3. When Colby asks you to count her in, you COUNT HER IN.
4. When Gwen goes bananas, you spell it B-A-N-A-N-A-S.
5. When Jukebox the Ghost wants you to hold it in, you HOLD IT IN.

(etc etc)

And so, I find myself back from J Tree safe and sound, thanks to these things.

Days were spent frolicking in the desert -- meeting trees named Joshua, rabbits named Jack, and cacti shaped liked teddy bears. Nights were welcomed with homeade dinners and conversations with old friends -- ones that know me better than most, and who still seem to like me in spite of it.

Comfortable nostalgia and new memories.
The best of times were had.

For those that care to ask, I will storytell until you're part of the 'in' crowd, but the happenings were numerous, and I fear I may not do them justice. I won't b(l)og you down with my verbosity now, but perhaps a handful of things that happened at JTNP will pop up from time to time in later posts.

To the person who left me the amusing voice mail about one-way streets, I respond with this Shelley-ism, in two-part list form:

1. I don't know what you're talking about.

And....

2. If I did, it's the only way to fittingly celebrate St. Patrick's Day Eve, a celebratory night that's often overlooked for the day of.

Away now, caffeine!

Off to count sheep (bah bah bah)....

The OMF

homegrown homebrew and high school

Tonight I'll be having dinner with Blair Bear, and I can't wait to see her, and mom Daphne, and chat up a springtime storm.

I'm reminded of the many high school memories we shared together. Here's one of them:

Ray often made home-brews, and in true adolescent fashion, we found ways to have a taste (or two).

The homebrews were delicious, and strong, and tasted -- true of any good, homegrown, Irishman-made / Englishman-made beer (my confusion over the Lamb family name is a harrowing dilemma on many levels) -- like a thick veggie stew. If drinking 'em didn't put hair on my chest, nothing ever would.

I'm sure this evening will be filled with grade school memories, conversations about the greatness that is The Animal Collective, and stories about the trials and tribulations of Penn Nursing School.

For now, this* will have to do.

*High School / Jeremy Fisher

ingesting large amounts of psychoactive stimulant...and trees named joshua

Goodness.

I feel like a 5-year old, waiting to go to Disney World. But instead of Disney and Mickey & Friends, I'll be going to see a tree named Joshua with some of my favorite people in the whole wide world.

Along with the anticipation is a certain amount of jittery-ness. But the fact that I've ingested large amounts of Juan Valdez might have something to do with it -- he's just so dreamy on mornings like this.

Anyway, I simply...can't...wait.

glass half full and weekend itinerary

The best part of my week has always been guitar lesson. And this week was no different. Chris' enthusiasm and patience is endless. Believe me, the latter, he needs a lot of! I've finally managed, clearly strummed bar chords. This isn't so easy for my small hands on the acoustic, but I can now play 1st position bar chords.

In the spirit of glass half fullness, here are some other noteworthy events from the week:

1) Searching for ATM's in the H-burg and perusing all that the Beer King has to offer. Cold, crisp deliciousness. The guy manning the counter was not, to a nominal amount of disappointment, dressed in kingship attire.

He was also not very impressed.

2) Catching Tim stretch in front of the vending machine, in preparation for his newly purchased Combos. Hilarious! He was as giddy as a schoolgirl about those Combos:

Pretzel on the outside. Cheese on the inside. It's a snack to be consumed with childish delight.

3) Bringing a cold, Rocky Mountain suitcase into Thai Palace and leaving with it mostly empty.

4) Slideshow making. It brings me great joy.

5) Playing guitar in the middle of the night in my tshirt and undies. Also brings me great joy.

6) Alex the iBanker's blog post (as well as postings by other members of the Asian Blog Mafia). Yes, Alex. I AM a self-professed Twinkie.

The Weekend Itinerary

FRIDAY
Take-out Chinese / Consumption of wine(s)
Catch up on music
Work on slideshow
Go to bed early

SATURDAY
Drive to the H-wood
Bargain shopping with Mamma Su
Courier Pappa Su's order of 2 dozen oatmeal cookies from pseudo-Amish country
3- possibly 4-chord jam session with Mike
Drive home
Evening shenanigans

SUNDAY
Clean clean clean
Music music music
Project project project
Other goings ons TBD

tencent mix #1: greyskyblue

This is an exercise in nostalgia and self-reflection.

Just the other day, I was at your regular bookstore, wearing my mom's homemade scarf, sippin' Seattle's Best coffee, and playing the role of bookstore browser. I was drawn to a graphically-pleasing book, covered mostly in mono-spaced, typewriter font, entitled 'Four Letter Word: Invented Correspondence from the Edge of Modern Romance.' As I was flipping through each new page (I love the feeling of new pages between the fingers), I was reminded of a handful of letters I'd written and an excellent cyber-conversation I had with Alex the iBanker on the topic of nostalgia -- where I espoused, like the cheesiest of cheeseballs, the following:

I think the thing about [it] is that feeling of closure -- or I guess, the feeling of something old ending and something new beginning -- but really, or at least it seems to me -- that there's no real beginning and no real end to anything. There's just stuff. We always end up digging things up from our past and wishing the good times could have been an everyday occurrence for the future. Anyway, that's my spiel on nostalgia.
[END QUOTE]

Memories throw off our tendencies to think linearly. It's not regret, per se, but an illustration that life , or our way of thinking of it, can sometimes be circuitous. But it's healthy to think of the past in order to appreciate the things you have in the present. This is a mix that sums up a group of letters I wrote about a short time in my life I value. In many ways, the exercise was cathartic. Yes, catharsis -- only without the Oedipal complex and gouging of the eyes. I happen to like my eyesight, despite my myopia -- it allows me to make analogies about a bunny and a carrot, joke about all of my keen senses, and wear cute glasses.

I apologize to the adoring fan(s). This is not a 12-song mix for The People, but there will be more of those to come. Stay tuned. In the meantime, I hope that you can find something you like amongst the riffraff of tune-age.