| [13 Apr 2009 | 08:09pm] |
| something new |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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yelle ... ce jeu |
] |
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| [04 Mar 2009 | 10:11pm] |
| homeowner speaking |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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matt & kim ... daylight |
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"But Master," says Counterpoint, looking up from the open torso of the fallen improvateur, "How then should I create? If a creation is to be judged by its longevity, how can I make something that will be long-lasting?"
Pseudonym laughs. "Concern yourself not with longevity. Truly, nothing matters but for the eternal." With his sleeve, he wipes the blood from his lips and smears it across his cheek. "And nothing is eternal and nothing matters! It is best to create that which will make you happy and destroy that which does not."
"I don't understand! Happiness," says Counterpoint, "is the least permanent thing of all!"
"And that is why everything must be destroyed."
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| [25 Feb 2009 | 08:07pm] |
| re: blood |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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eazy-e ... gimme dat nut |
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"If man is truly made in God's image, then our feature of greatest resemblance is undoubtedly our desire to create." Bickford smiles warmly, though it shows not beneath his paper mask. "We are the only species in His creation that expresses itself creatively, though our 'creations' pale in comparison to His. Through creativity we commune with our incomprehensible Father, and through improvisation -- with its immediacy, its purity -- we express our divinity at its least clouded by the human mind."
"If creativity is reproduction," Pseudonym responds, "then improvisation is masturbation: resulting in naught but fleeting joy and lasting emptiness. You will find nothing of ultimate value there."
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| [24 Dec 2008 | 12:12pm] |
| felt and paste |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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café tacvba ... volver a comenzar |
] |
Does anyone around here play LBP? I have been playing a rather lot of it lately. I've made some levels. I've played some levels. I need some folks to play with. So all of you, you know, go out and buy PS3s and Littlebigplanet because I think most of you don't have either of them, and that's a shame! PSN: sighwhatever
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| [23 Dec 2008 | 05:48pm] |
| i don't read the bible, i don't trust disciples |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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gogol bordello ... supertheory of supereverything |
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"One of the lights is out," Matthew remarks. "I should tap it."
On the roof, Matthew taps the burnt-out bulb, and it is burnt-out, and the tapping does not rouse it. The fat little Christmas light should be blue, but it looks black when it is out. He stands on the roof, his hands at his hips, looking at that dead bulb and letting the wind's teeth rip into him.
"I should get a replacement," he comments, standing at the edge of the roof, toes over the edge. "I'll just hop down and go get one."
"No," I say, and drag him back inside through his bedroom window. He almost had me that time, though.
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| [17 Dec 2008 | 02:12pm] |
| canyons, wax, and chips |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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gary wright ... dreamweaver |
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After the Bellagio Buffet, Alicia and Matthew part ways -- she on a hunt for family souvenirs and he to find someplace quiet. Matthew finds a small faux-marble nook outfront of Caesar's Palace with a Hindu shrine and no other people. This little courtyard is pleasant; the Donny & Marie billboard is distant enough that its looped advertisement is just a murmur beneath the accordion-synth loop that plays from tiny speakers that litter the Palace grounds. The centerpiece of the shrine is a marble Ganesh surrounded by various Hindu bric-a-brac, the authenticity of which seems moot considering it is within walking distance of a fake Eiffel Tower, a fake Statue of Liberty, and a fake Venice. There is also a fountain, which is very calming.
Matthew sits on the edge of the fountain and I am there with a comment prepared about whether or not Indians typically made many marble statues. But then, there is someone else as is typical for Las Vegas, and I am not. "Hey buddy," he says to Matthew, "Hey buddy. Hey buddy." Matthew tries not to break eye contact with Ganesh until the man steps into his line of sight. Matthew wishes Ganesh was one of the ones with more than one head.
"Hey buddy," he says. He is wearing a puffy jacket, his human features obscured by the enormous nylon lumpiness. His hood is up and Matthew can only see his nose and his scraggety black beard. "Hey buddy listen buddy I need some help buddy." The thing with Vegas is that there are no victims of circumstance. If someone is poor in Vegas it is because of one or more bad decisions they have made. Matthew does not trust their sad stories, but that is something that is not specific to Vegas. So Matthew pretends to be deaf.
"Edd I can'd wead lipth of people wif beawds," he apologizes as he cranes his neck toward Ganesh.
( bitches )
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| [11 Dec 2008 | 12:16am] |
| trundle |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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m.i.a. ... $20 |
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While sitting in his car, Matthew contracts his face muscles, tugs at the corners of his mouth, in an attempt to release the endorphins associated with smiling without actually committing to the act. Through the day Matthew bottles his anger and then purges it in traffic, but December traffic is a particular battle and Matthew must temper himself so as to not give over too fully to the rage.
He jerks the wheel to the left to keep from skidding into the rear of a fellow driver who came to an abrupt stop at a yellow light.
"Christing fuck! What the shit!" Matthew thunders from behind closed, tinted windows, "Why do you always stop for yellows? Is that how you want to live your life?"
On the passenger side, I'm contracting face muscles as well, trying to stifle a smile.
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| [08 Dec 2008 | 07:21pm] |
| public urination was the case that they gave me |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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battles ... atlas |
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Walnut Street with its tall cliffs of row-homes comes to an abrupt end at the soccer field on 63rd Street, forcing the cautious motorist to make a left or right turn to avoid driving onto it. No soccer game has ever been officially conducted on this field, though the high-intensity lights are on every night -- vigilantly defending the field from those rogue soccer-players who would start up an unofficial game under the cover of darkness.
There is a squat cement building next to the field, and a set of squat cement steps that run down to it from the sidewalks. Between the cement building and the cement steps is a dark cement crevice, hidden from the headlights of cautious motorists, the high-intensity lights of the soccer field, and the fleeting glances of rogue soccer players. It is not hidden from the cold winter air, though, a gust of which howls down the narrow corridor and across (what the good people at Extenze would refer to as) that special part of Matthew's anatomy. The effect is instantly sobering.
So now I'm there also, on the steps. "Maybe you have alcoholism," I say. I admit to being a little bitter about the situation.
"I don't have alcoholism, I have mid-twenties fun times," slurs Matthew. "Also shut up because I can't go when someone is talking to me."
I hum These Are A Few of My Favorite Things by way of extending an olive branch. I stare out across the field, watch the trees swaying in the distance. This isn't a bad place. This could be worse. The soccer players chatter from the shadows -- rather, from the other shadows -- waiting for their chance to play.
( mspm )
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| [23 Oct 2008 | 09:04pm] |
| inflamation |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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talking heads ... psycho killer |
] |
Monday through Friday, Matthew suckles at the teat of human suffering, and has become bloated with that sweet, sweet milk. The people who call him have miscarried, are addicted to painkillers, have had their cancer termed a pre-existing condition. They are scared, confused, and desperate. These people, at their worst, come to him for counsel and comfort. It is energizing, transformative.
On the other hand, Joanne is calling because she must know if her surgeon is a devout Christian and specifically if he prays before surgeries. This is not fulfilling. Furthermore, this information is outside of the scope of Matthew's database. Joanne is not happy about this. Joanne demands to know whether or not her doctor "is aware that God's hand is guiding him through the surgery."
Matthew covers the microphone of his headset.
"I don't know what to tell this lady," he whispers. "How do you answer someone like that?"
"Tell her that he sacrifices a goat on the operating table before every procedure," says Counterpoint.
Joanne sermonizes. Matthew cannot break in to provide counsel. Instead, he occupies his mind by imagining her surgeon dressing the walls of the operating room with goat entrails. Matthew imagines the dance the doctor does as he casts salt to purify the space. A set of chimes are rung whenever he requests a scalpel or such. Matthew thanks Joanne for her call, and instructs her to call again if she has any other questions.
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| [22 Oct 2008 | 12:41pm] |
| coagulate |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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beirut .. scenic world |
] |
They won't turn the heat on in the office. Frost forms on the steel surface of Matthew's leg iron. The glue holding up his printed-out MS Paint drawings cracks and crumbles, exposing the dingy felt wall of his cubicle. His breath fogs the computer screen. Matthew is faced with a dilemma: drink his coffee or huddle against it for warmth?
"Huddle it with your insides," says Counterpoint. A valid suggestion.
In spite of the sudden cold, Matthew enjoys the onset of Autumn. He spends the day watching the tree outside his window ease into a peaceful sleep.
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| [13 Oct 2008 | 09:51pm] |
| come with your sharpened knives |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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man man .. black mission goggles |
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Matthew is in his burgl'd car, surveying the damage. He is extrapolating the losses from the pennies that remain. For every penny that remains, there is approximately one nickel, one dime, and one quarter missing. There are forty pennies remaining. Counterpoint is in the passenger seat, calculating.
"Five hundred dollars!!!" he concludes.
"Revenge!!!" Matthew swears.
But first, he must rearrange the empty plastic hot-dog coffins in his back seat (the burglar had rifled through them) and make a proper revenge mix CD because honestly who can commit revenge without the appropriate soundtrack?
( WARRRRRR. )
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| [03 Sep 2008 | 08:49pm] |
| all the time in the world |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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the aquabats ... sequence erase |
] |
Counterpoint punches me in the arm and I'm back on the air, somewhere, stuck in traffic, slumped low in my bucket seat, and there's static on the radio. A signal is trying to get through, but all I get is partial syllables of someone speaking.
Counterpoint punches me again. "Do it right," he says.
"Fine, okay," Matthew says. "Stop hitting."
Matthew's awake, groggily aware of his surroundings. His eyes are crusty with weeks' worth of buildup. He checks his body for remoras. What is he thinking? What has he been thinking?
"What dreams did you have today?" asks Counterpoint.
Matthew had the following dreams: 1. He is sitting in a park and autumn happens suddenly around him. Leaves change color and fall en masse. 2. He is playing paintball with his friends, but their guns have accidentally been loaded with real bullets. Matthew is the only one who realizes. Everyone is in camouflage except Matthew, who wears red. 3. He is reading the newspaper but the ink gets on his hands. It burns like acid and eats away his hands and arms up to the elbow.
Traffic inches forward, and Matthew’s car drags its antenna through wispy signal streams. The radio garbles and burps out vowels.
"Why do you ask?"
Since he has been turning his brain off to better integrate with society, Matthew has been in tune with the global consciousness. "I've been monitoring your dreams for keywords and mapping them against results from the Web Bot Project, looking for patterns in linguistic shift." Counterpoint makes notes. Autumn, change, guns, accident, newspaper. "I think I can use you to tap into time-reverse experience. If I can interpret these results, maybe we can predict the future."
"So, what do my dreams tell you?"
"This election's going to be a big fuckin’ mess," says Counterpoint.
"Hm," says Matthew. "I guess I ought start looking forward to 2012, then."
Counterpoint twists the radio’s knob and the static fades away. "You don’t want to know what the global consciousness has to say about 2012."
( while we still have time. )
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| [18 Jun 2008 | 09:44pm] |
| the adventures of basil ganglia |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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nancy sinatra ... these boots are made for walkin' |
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Time is skittish; it darts by when you're distracted but decelerates to an uneasy, lurching pace when you pay it attention. Matthew is in Vrksasana (tree pose) facing his wall clock (moved to eye level for this exercise). He breathes deeply and focuses on the movement of the red hand. Time nervously slows and Matthew sees each jerky step of the machinery. He closes his eyes and can fully sense the wavering second hand and the steady grind of the gears. His awareness expands and the hand struggles to move through the mire of time that quails around it.
Then, time stops. It huddles, frozen in place around Matthew. Fearful, it bolts backward, recoiling but pulling Matthew with it. Matthew is hit by a forceful blow - like being shoved on the entirety of his surface area - as he has his past self momentarily occupy the same point. It is only momentary as the shock jostles Matthew's mind and time seizes the opportunity to cascade past him.
"What--!" Matthew says and promptly dies of natural causes at the age of seventy-six, having spent his last relative second looking very surprised from a hospital bed for fifty-two years.
( science! )
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| [11 Jun 2008 | 09:35pm] |
| honk |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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the 5678s ... hanky panky |
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Hot office gossip for Wednesday June 11, 2008
Honk honk! Summer is in the air and so is the noise of dozens of tiny baby geese! At least, that was the case last week, before the property manager allegedly had the gaggle of goslings murdered! An anonymous source reports that they saw "a man in a uniform with this like aluminum pole" collecting corpses in a trash bag over the weekend, though it is unclear whether or not these activities were sanctioned by property management. Skeptics who cited the migratory nature of geese as a possible reason for their disappearance we countered by goose migration expert Steve from IT, who commented that, "those geese usually hang around until the end of June." Currently, there is no evidence of fowl play, but please alert a coworker if you get a gander at any goose bodies!
Honk honk! Summer is in the air and that means it's time to hit the pool -- but not the kind with water and chlorine and a child's urine! Gas prices are rising alongside the temperature and that means it's carpool season! All-American office roustabout Matthew has "taken the plunge," so to speak, and had been carpooling with his coworker Kate for the past week. Has it been a relaxing reprieve from the stifling summer gas prices or has it left him feeling "all wet"? "Well, I've been trying to find a way to talk about dead geese and the weather for two extra hours every day, so I guess carpooling is a blessing in disguise," says Matthew. Hey Matt, why don't you run that through the Sarcas-O-Matic a couple more times and tell us what you really think?
And that's all the gossip that's fit to blog! Tune in next week for a startling revelation on who used the last of the creamer! And what young man just purchased a swanky new suit for a job interview? Is it also Matthew? My lips are sealed, at least for this week!
( paparazzi )
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| [03 Jun 2008 | 06:03pm] |
| gas prices |
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okay |
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music |
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beirut ... mount wroclai |
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Matthew likes his coworkers. At worst they are entertaining, at best they are pleasant company. They have stories. They make jokes. He and they stand at the window and make up insulting nicknames for the Davita Dialysis employees that pass by (what a bunch of wads). They make interesting movie and music recommendations. Today they made waffles. Straight brought in a waffle iron and made waffles. How about that.
That said, Matthew is not comfortable with carpooling.
It's not because the hour drive to work and back is integral alone time in Matthew's life (it is), and it's not because Matthew doesn't feel he can keep up two hours' worth of conversation daily (he cannot), and it's not even that Kate will insist on listening to and singing along with country music (she will). Matthew just does not repeat DOES NOT like to trust people. Yes this makes it very difficult to live in a society but we're all not Thoreau you know
( cell phone style )
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| [29 May 2008 | 07:10pm] |
| murdersquash |
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mood |
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okay |
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10cc ... rubber bullets |
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Stinkbugs are fat little arthropods. They live in drop ceilings. At any given moment, Matthew can see exactly three of them in his office (they patrol the room in shifts). Currently: 1) flying clumsily into the fluorescent light bulb, audibly tap-tap-tapping on the glass. 2) perched on a pushpin in the cubicle wall. 3) resting its belly on the warm window-glass.
Matthew is the only male and as such his actions determine office policy for insect management. Typically he is called upon to squash but stinkbugs are a different story entirely. Matthew is sick of escorting them outside, so the office is now attempting cohabitation. This decision has been met with some protest.
It is relaxing. The bugs give the office a more natural, zen feel. Matthew removes the napkin he's had covering his coffee cup and takes a sip. The bug is gone from the window-glass but another has appeared on the corner of his monitor. Matthew flicks it into his neighbor's cube and goes to take his lunch break.
( also in bug news )
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| [28 May 2008 | 06:13pm] |
| gaffer |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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greenskeepers ... vagabond |
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Okay. First, Matthew needs to burn off the hair on his head. No, first he needs to swear some into the palm of his hand and then second he needs to burn off his hair and third he needs to find a plastic bag and some rubber gloves and something to scoop with. A spoon. Bigger than a spoon. A ladle. No, not something that has to do with food. A spade. Too large and clunky for this time of night. He cannot wake anyone up. He needs a scooping mechanism that is smaller than a spade and larger than a ladle. Matthew is not in the mood for brain puzzles.
****BEGIN**FLASHBACK***
Matthew went up to the attic to put away his suitcase. When he opened the door, a dead mouse fell on his head.
*****END**FLASHBACK*****
It is on the floor on its back with its paws up and curled, looking flat and deflated and a little decomposed. Eyes open and mouth open. Tail. Its tail is present. Matthew's mind hums, trying to recall mouse removal procedure. Any point in his life where anyone told him what to do with a dead mouse. Nothing useful. Throw it out the window? Wayside School protocol, but that's for rats. He pulls his t-shirt up over his nose. He nudges the little corpse into a opaque plastic bag with an unbent wire hangar and throws the bag, the hangar, the rubber gloves, and - for good measure - the t-shirt out in his neighbor's trash can.
( pamcakes )
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| [27 May 2008 | 06:15pm] |
| server lag |
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mood |
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okay |
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music |
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calle 13 ... atrevete-te-te |
] |
Today, Matthew is briefly awake. He has to check what day it is. What month. What year. 2008 still looks funny, even though it's nearly June. This is the way he does it now. It's like highway hypnosis, but for life. Matthew is not a failure. In fact, he believes the opposite. He fancies himself a time traveler.
He spends his waking time doing quiet things. He gets up from his desk to get a drink of water. He takes a walk out to the artificial lake to have a peanut butter sandwich and re-read a book in the sun. He doodles and thinks.
Soon the lifesuck surges, that twisting in his stomach returns, and it is time to go back under. Matthew makes some preparations, hopes things are set correctly to run on their own. It is so difficult to tell.
( elsewhere )
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| [01 Feb 2008 | 10:34am] |
| wires |
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mood |
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o |
] |
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music |
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vampire weekend ... a-punk |
] |
In November, a slipneck flew headfirst into the window by Matthew's desk and left a large red splatter on the glass and a corpse in the grass. Matthew considered going outside and burying the bird, but he didn't. Instead, he says hello to the bird every morning. A kind formality, similar to the way he greets his coworkers. Today, a stranger cleans the blood off the window with a squeegee and steps on the corpse. Matthew apologizes to the remains of the bird, through the glass.
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