Fish-head Alchemy

hm. a long time away

2007-06-18T22:12:00.000-07:00

Man. It's been a long time since I posted. I ate some blackberries today. Phew. That's a load off.

Chapbook!

2007-03-04T15:06:00.000-08:00

Well. Seems like it's been a while since I put up a post it here.

news:

I have a chapbook accepted for publication with Finishing Line Press. It is called "Easy to Lose." It is somewhere around 28 pages long. It will come out in a few months. There's bunches of pre-press stuff for me to do. Will post here more frequently.

All the news that's fit to print

2006-10-13T07:13:00.000-07:00

Some research people in some country discovered a bacteria that engages in a symbiotic relationship with insects that only has 182 genes, lower than the previously estimated minimum number of genes (200) required to support life. Isn't that just magnificent?

and now a moment of silence...

2006-10-10T18:39:00.000-07:00

for MARAT. Jean-Paul Marat, the radical Jacobist during the French Revolution who died the way that he lived: in a bathtub.

an attempt to keep this updated

2006-10-04T19:04:00.000-07:00

you see! this is why I don't post too often. I've been staring at this stupid box for five minutes but there isn't that much in the terms of important news right now.

The most interesting thing that happened today was that some jackass screwed up my bumper in the mall parking lot. They didn't leave a note, no insurance information, just a whole bunch of their crappy blue paint.

You know, I don't care if I get money - my car's battered all to hell anyway, but the least they could do is leave a note of apology. I mean really - its a matter of common courtesy. Otherwise what it says to me is that they didn't feel the least bit bad that they screwed up my bumper. They were just like "oh well, tough s*** buddy."

Seriously. Just a note that says "sorry bout that." It's not like I'm going to turn the note over to the FBI for handwriting analysis so they can match it up to some master handwriting data base harvested from high school "permanent records."

This is my record frequency post. Yee haw.

New story!

2006-09-30T22:07:00.000-07:00

Yo! Check out Boatload of Fools for the bestest story ever posted therein!

T Minus 4 days

2006-09-20T21:19:00.000-07:00

Alas - tis but a short 4 days before the Livio Shuttle launches and Livio vanishes into the deserts of Arizona to be stung by scorpions, stabbed by cacti, and possibly be abducted by aliens. We should all stand for the next 4 days in a constant salute to wish him adieu.

I'd write more, but I've been writing nonstop this month and I'm just friggin beat.

Continuation of the infrequent update series

2006-09-06T21:01:00.000-07:00

Man, I'm beat. I'm spending 12 hours a week in my car now. Tim O' Brien's reading at UTC tomorrow and I really want to go, but I just don't think I have the energy. I drove to Chattanooga on Tuesday for the department meeting, to teach today, and I have to teach on Friday. Honestly, I just don't think I have it in me to make the drive four days in a row. I had monday off, but that just meant I had the drive from Nashville on Tuesday instead of Monday, that drive is a good bit longer than the driver from Knoxville to Chatt, so I didn't have Tuesday to recover like I normally would. On the other hand, teaching at UTC is pretty sweet. I really like their department and I'm getting a lot of writing done - my office totally rocks for writing. I can close my office door (when my office hours are over), and it is practically totally impossible for anything to interrupt me.

Something kind of creepy though - the fellow I've gotten to know the most in the department, one of the other lectures - okay, get this:

1) His name is Mike.
2) He wears little glasses and has a goattee.
3) He reads Barthelme, Saunders, Bender
4) He writes off-beat fiction with zany themes inspired by the above authors
5) And now Tim O'Brien is on the campus.

I believe that Michael has teleported his mental activity to UTC and inhabited the body of one of the lecturers. It is the only explanation. I'm not sure of the moral implications of this situation.

That is all for now. Must sleep.

Check back soon to see that this post is still the most recent post. Check back a little later than soon but not quite a long time to see that this post is still the most recent post. Check back when you've given up on the posting of a new post, then, my friends, then, and only then, will you find a new post. Unless I've feeling ambitious and post something new tomorrow.

My bad idea for the next controversial video game smash hit

2006-07-19T09:57:00.000-07:00

Genre: Ninja Gaiden/ Prince of Persia (new versions) style, with boss battles at stage ends. You play as Claudius, disgraced Roman soldier. You must fight your way back to glory through fifteen levels of rebels who are disgracing the Roman mythos. The first twelve bosses are the apostles, each one armed with a distinctive piece of religious iconography honed to violence. Then you fight John the Superbaptist, Mary Magdeline, and the Virgin Mary in the next four levels. The game ends with you bare handed taking on a twelve foot tall Jesus armed with a miraculous nail gun shaped like a cross. If you are victorious, the Roman people build a statue in your honor where you are depicted with the lower half of a jackal and the upper half of a platipus. And wings.

another infrequent post

2006-07-18T11:53:00.000-07:00

sometimes you just need to climb a hill. A big, red, sandy hill at 2:30 in the morning. From there, you fling large rocks and various chunks of wood towards a muddy pool at the bottom. You can see the city from the top, but you cannot see the top from the bottom if you are not a distance from the base. You will feel like a ninja, crawling up and down the slopes like someone who feels like a ninja. If you don't feel like a ninja, you probably won't feel like a ninja, but if you do, then there's something special. Real special. Fried mouse head on a stick special. Then all the children carry their mouseheads on a stick with the cellophane wrappers in one hand and baloons on a string in the other. Balloons that look just like the moon except that they are not whitish-gray, cratered, and possess to phase change cycle. Balloons are also not thousands of miles in diameter and 144,000 miles away. They are also very unlikely to rotate around the earth. If they did, those balloons: those would be some special balloons. Almost as special as special balloons.

a 'woo' and a 'hoo'

2006-07-06T11:23:00.000-07:00

Happy Fourth of July!

2006-07-03T11:52:00.000-07:00

Happy fourth of July to everyone. I hope every body is ready to blow something up.

Yo!

Attention! Important Question!

2006-05-27T00:20:00.000-07:00

So I was watching futurama a few minutes ago, and it was the episode where Dr. Zoidberg wants to attend his species' mating frenzy. Early in the episode, before the plot kicks in, the crew decides to go to the gym because Fry and Bender are getting really fat. Here's the cool thing: The gym they go to is called.... "NNY" - could this be a reference to Johnny the Homicidal Mainiac? After all, it IS in the gym that Zoidberg becomes a homicidal maniac. I just thought it was kind of neat because you don't see possible JTHM references too often in popular media.

And ye unto me came the weevils and the weevils were good with butter.

2006-05-19T11:11:00.000-07:00

This post marketh the celebratory occasion of my bestowment upon myself of a neweth laptop computer with wireless capability. Now I can access the internet and many new places and create new posts just as infrequently. Hallelujah.

Nuts

2006-05-03T09:33:00.000-07:00

Who ate the squirrel?
we did, we did.
Who made it twirl?
we did, we did.
Who got the acorn?
we did, we did
showed that little
bastard who got
the nuts, stuffed him
through our lips
and crunched our
teeth into his tiny
skull case. Who
ate the squirrel.
Who ate the squirrel.

Blog update

2006-04-10T14:25:00.000-07:00

Just a notice that Boatload of Fools has a new story up and that Eat Culture Baby has some neat pictures of a coffee cup.

Did you know...

2006-04-03T12:22:00.000-07:00

that aside from the spirtual aspects of nature, the transcendentalists were largely concerned with what the words of language actually signified? Or that Ralph Waldo Emerson was banned from Harvard for teaching spiritual independance reflected in "Self-Reliance" and his poem "The problem"?

Well, now I do, and in forty minutes I must take my oral comprehensive exam. Urk. Gulp.

Important News Bulletin

2006-03-28T14:41:00.000-08:00

this morning upon arriving at work, the existence of a magnificent species of animal life was brought to my attention: The Naked Mole Rat. These wonderous creatures are the only mammals that live in colonies governed by a queen like bees and ants. Their warren denizens are differentiated into several groups of job classes: workers keep the tunnels clean, etc. Most importantly, there is a "warmer" class whose sole purpose is to keep the Queen Naked Mole Rat warm.

A further curiousity of this species involves the queen: the queen is not born a queen like ant and bee queens. Instead, the queen wins the position by combat challenge. Once victorious, the new queen rapidly gains weight and muscle mass. Like a power up after a boss battle. Furthermore, the queen does not get so large that she loses mobility; she can still navigate the tunnels of her den. What I wonder is how the new Queen's body knows that it is queen and what spurs the physiological changes.

I felt the need to announce this important discovery I have made to the world. Do with this knowledge as you will.

Small fish with big teeth

2006-03-22T22:29:00.000-08:00

I was eating some pudding today and starting thinking about what would happen if pudding committed suicide. Would the flavor be affected? Would we even know? Would pudding family come and visit in the fridge unbenownst to us betwixt the hours of one and three am? Are pudding eulogies delivered in old timey English? Like: "Here be thou rested thine bowl of trembling pudding of the clouds. Let forth now thine song of mourning for beneath the row of pudding grass grows methink a tender skin?" Or would the puddings just swear a bunch and smoke a bunch of cigarettes? Maybe kick the celery in the ribs when no one else is looking?

Thesis is in

2006-03-17T13:12:00.000-08:00

well, the thesis is in and now I'm friggin exhausted. Defend in two and a half weeks. Thank God its almost done with.

T minus One Month

2006-03-05T10:59:00.000-08:00

One more month until my thesis defence, and then I gaurantee there will be at least an 20% chance of increased post frequency and an 8% chance of more interesting posts. Patience...

New Link!

2006-02-27T14:32:00.000-08:00

I have just added a link to McSweeney's page of lists.

Michael. You must submit to this.

Ryan. You must submit to this.

Also, look and see the other cool things they've got posted on other parts of the page.

Not Coming Soon: Chihuahua - The True Hollywood Story

2006-02-24T13:42:00.000-08:00

The story behind the dog. The lies, the hidden truths and buried bones. A tale of sadness and regret and kibble. Discover once and for all who really peed on the rug and unwravel the mystery of why dogs love to sniff each other in the...

Transparent Fish

2006-02-19T22:12:00.000-08:00

A wise tadpole once said, "A wise tadpole once said."

On that fine autumn morn, my head was swimming with questions. Why was that tadpole speaking in incomplete sentences? Why was what the tadpole said simply a lead in to a description of what it was saying? Or was the wise tadpole the wise tadpole referred to a completely seperate tadpole? What if this tadpole wasn't wise at all, but simply had built a false reputation of its own intellect by repeating the sayings of other wise tadpoles.

The thought struck me that maybe this situation was much like that evening in the chinese restaurant when I say surrounded by the remains of General Tso's Chicken, a plate scattered with fried rice grains, and a half-eaten bowl of hot and sour soup. I cracked open my fortune cookie and I discovered that my fortune read, "I discovered that my fortune read."

Perhaps these things are coincidence like those two pigeons from Oxnard flying into the same window in Pittsburgh three years apart, or maybe this is like the convergence of two river of sand.

Happy Valentine's Day to All!

2006-02-14T20:09:00.000-08:00

No message. Just liver.

Cough, cough, Hack

2006-02-01T11:13:00.000-08:00

Sick. Some wonky damned chest infection thats swarming UT campus. One of those irritating things that just won't go away despite the best efforts of Theraflu. Will switch to Nyquil (sp?) tonight. See if that helps, or at least makes me sleep better than this fever has been letting me. Will post when better. New story coming to Boatloadoffools when better. Hopefully this weekend. Otherwise, things good.

Oh, and happy Groundhog's Day Eve. May the rodents rule supreme on the morrow.

Fishhead Hiatus II

2006-01-23T13:50:00.000-08:00

Phew. Been too busy to post lately, trying to get in gear for the semester and recording vocals for my album - which is going totally sweet in my opinion - on both accounts. So far this semester I've taught Tim O'Briens' "The Things They Carry," Don Dellilo's "Videotape," and Donald Barthelme's "Game." Wednsday we do "Glass Mountain" and Aimee Bender's "The Rememberer," and Friday is George Saunders "My Flamboyant Grandson," and Bender's "Marzipan." Later on we've got Adam Johnson "Trauma Plate," and Michael Knight's "Killing Stonewall Jackson." Plus movies and music, it's been quite rocking. I'm teaching what I want to be reading. Woo. Hoo.

Otherwise, I'm trying to figure out how to start posting songs to this blog so I can compete with Michael. Oh yeah. Except that mine aren't really funny songs, except maybe on accident.

That's all for know. My brain is teetering towards shutdown.

Oh, and for anyone interested there is a new story up on Boatload of Fools.

So this is what 2006 feels like...

2006-01-01T20:06:00.000-08:00

Like yogurt with a rapidly fluxuating temperature.
Like a moth in that yogurt turning into a cherry blossom.
Like a caterpillar eating the cherry blossom that the moth turned into.
Like the caterpillar turning into the moth that turned into a cherry blossom that the caterpillar just ate.
Like the caterpillar vomitting itself back up in the form of half-digested cherry blossom.
Like the yogurt suddenly enveloping it all and rapidly fluxuating in temperature.
Then a cat comes along and laps up all the yogurt.
Later, the cat's digestive system extracts the moisture from the yogurt and passes the moisture through the renal system. Though some of the moisture is filtered and incorporated into the cat's internal systems, most of it passes on to the bladder and is later excreted onto a tree.
That excretion is part of a territorial war between a band of gray tabbies and a trio of siamese who are trying to muscle in on the tabby action. Eventually, the leader of the siamese, a seal-point tough-cat named Tango loses an eye to the claws of a young and ambitious siamese named Lufta. Although Lufta is killed in the altercation, Tango is never able to match his prior abilities and is brought down in an ambush at Sardine Alley. Ultimately the gray tabbies succeed in repelling the siamese who fall into disorder without their beloved leader.

I hope this helps to clear up what 2006 feels like.

And now, a moment of silence for the memory of Tango.

An Important Bulletin

2005-12-21T23:28:00.000-08:00

It has come to my attention that recently this blog has begun to display things that resemble actual news of what is going on in my life. Entries have become curiously factual. I have yet to discover the root of this dilemma, but I promise that the responsible party will be brought forth into the light and placed under interrogation immediately. Motives will be exposed. Truth silenced. Then everyone will sit down and eat ham and cheese sandwiches that have been fried in a pan with lots of butter. And chips on the side. Gotta have chips. Maybe a beer, or maybe just a nice can of yellow soda. Perhaps a Coke. You never know. Kind of depends upon the mood I guess. Like mood rings don't. Or like cubic blocks of glass. Those fickle cubic glass blocks, always trying to pull one over on us with their transparency. That's why we need to get to the bottom of this. So we can put cubic blocks of glass over our eyes and pretend that we're looking through them at ham and cheese sandwiches. Thank you. That is all.

It is done. Finally.

2005-12-17T15:47:00.000-08:00

The final exam papers have been carried through the wastes of Mordor and flung into the fires of mount doom. All that is left is their memory in the form of elvish songs that look mysteriously like letter grades. The task is done. Once the grades are reported, I can rest. And play videogames. And sleep. Oh, there will be sooooo much sleep. Mmm...sleep...I can taste it now.

Almost over...

2005-12-15T14:23:00.000-08:00

Collected the last batch of final papers today, except those who mysteriously thought it best not to turn them in...not so sure how that seems like a good idea since the final paper is 20%, but, to quote O Brother Where Art Though (and maybe the Odyssey), "It is a fool who looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart." Now I just must grade them all and submit the final grades, and 'lo I shall rest and be merry like a fruit under a tree before the flies get to it and they lay their eggs under the skin and the fruit gets all squishy and then you step on it and say "hey that was a moldy fruit I just stepped on dagnabbit!" Just like that. Oh yeah. Moldy fruit, here I come.

Ice bullets

2005-12-10T23:07:00.000-08:00

Something kind of cool that happened today: I painted a closet this afternoon (not the cool part). When I was done, I went outside to clean the paint brush. I turned on the garden hose and no water came out, but I could hear the water pressure from the spigot. I sat there and waited a bit, and eventually this little jet trickle sprayed out the end. I figured (correctly) that the hose must have frozen since its been so friggin cold, but I started to rinse the brush with the little bit of water I was getting. Suddenly, I felt a surge in the hose, followed by another and another. It took me a second to realize what was happening, but before I knew it, I was shooting sharp icycles out of the hose across the yard, where they shattered against the fence. This went on for several minutes and was quite satisfying. Like I said, nothing amazing, but it was definately kind of cool. Oh well. That is all. Return to your lives.

Huzzah!

2005-12-05T13:37:00.000-08:00

Ten minutes ago, I completed my final lecture of the semester. I now have an official eight day break from teaching until final papers come in, and then I have a full month of doing nothing to look forward to - and by doing nothing, I of course mean writing music, playing civilization IV, chess on my cell-phone and catching up on some reading. And lots and lots of sleeping. Oh yeah, the sleep will come in a plenty. Woo hoo!

Thought of the Day

2005-11-29T14:38:00.000-08:00

Better than Gravestones

Cannibals have the right idea.
Not the flesh eating,
but making every part
of the deceased
a part of themselves.

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend!

2005-11-26T13:55:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving weekend everybody! My body is still recovering from needing to enlarge itself in order to contain the quantities of food I stuffed into it over the last two days. I must admit, however, that despite my levels of consumption, I fell short of my goal of devouring the entirety of a pie, coming in at a weak six slices on Thanksgiving. Curses. But, I hope that everyone out there had a good thanksgiving full of turkey - and if not turkey at least some quality form of poultry (or poultry substitute for the vegetarians - how about that! a parenthesis within a hyponated offset! And now hyphens within the parenthesis within the hyphens! - ) - and much good mirth and an ample quantity of quality drinking time. And now back to my standard weird postings and long delays between them. Wa ha ha ha GOBBLE CHOMP CHOMP EAT THAT TURKEY! EAT IT!!!

The Number of Lemons Mankind Will Consume

2005-11-22T12:35:00.000-08:00

And right there
we had confirmation
from the computer.
The last thing
that could be known
was known.
A couple technicians
clapped and faltered.
A coffee cup cooled
in Jeff's hand.
Melanie wiped away
a mascara smudge.
Someone in the back
faintly asked if
"someone should
maybe say a few words."
The supervisor shrugged.
Low murmurs erupted
as we turned away from
the perfected uselessness
and the number of lemons
mankind will consume
during its existence
unexpectedly increased
by one.

More proof that bathrooms are the key to creativity

2005-11-22T11:30:00.000-08:00

I feel that I must add the disclaimer that I was not actually using the bathroom stall when this picture was taken. I was simply recording a strange optical effect I noticed (the tile is all white, the green is the product of light) on previous occasions.

Damn it, another picture

2005-11-10T14:22:00.000-08:00

I know I've got a bit of a photo theme right now, but I've been churning through the Romantic period of poetry for my reading list and cranking out poems for my thesis, so the random writing gnomes are sleeping in my head. If you don't like it, you may file a formal complaint on my comment section. Then you can burn in hell. If you don't want to burn in hell, than that's your problem you selfish bastard.

2005-11-08T13:03:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of my glasses having a picnic in the park with a chihuahua. I'm not sure what glasses eat, but I'm sure it was a good meal. Probably bits of sand for the glasses and bits of bug for the dog. One never really knows how these things work, but I guess that means that "one" is just really short sighted about the way the world functions. Stupid One. One needs to get its act together.

2005-11-07T13:33:00.000-08:00

Here is a picture I took of a Chihuahua looking out a window at a cat. If you don't like it, fine. Be that way. You stubborn pile of welded together junk at the end of a pier.

They're coming

2005-10-17T10:51:00.000-07:00

I remember a time, perhaps in the eighties or something when your average everyday Joe could walk out of an eating establishment and find the peaceful chirpings of birds ringing across the parking lot, parking spaces empty as far as the eye can see.

So naturally, I was up for quite a shock when I was exited Cracker Barrel to discover that the men in the red trucks had come. Clearly, no one is safe anymore. I have yet to ascertain their purpose in arriving, but a...murder of red trucks with strange yellow ladders. Most frightening was that the drivers and crews were no where to be seen. What were they up to? What plans where they hatching? I took several surveilance shots, but to little avail. The only thing I was able to confirm was that I was looking at a whole sleiu of mysteries red trucks.

More on this to be sure, but I leave you all with the following questions: When will they execute their plan? Is their's a mission of benevolance, destruction, or subterfuge? Is their base of operations sub-terraneun, sub-aquatic, or based somewhere beyond the gray-silver clouds in the sky? What wisdom do they have to offer or what knowledge can we steal from them? Are they simply a mass of construction trucks? Perhaps we will never know, but my money says one day their plot will be hatched and little yellow chickens of destruction, the same yellow as the ladders, will spring forth and devour the snakes of goodstanding and blind the watchfullness of the ever unblinking eye of our great sun. Praise Amon Ra, glory to the sun-God.

Another Chapter Down

2005-09-25T21:47:00.000-07:00

On a note of some interest, I have completed Chapter 6 of my book and am plowing rapidly into Chapter 7. Chapter 6 is entitled "Why We Regurgitate" and the following excerpt comes from the first sub-section of that chapter which is sub-titled "One Leg at a Time."

"Bradley woke up on the floor of the dining area, the brotherly hugs and the sentiment behind them lost in Bradley’s heart as what had been a great Texas drunk melted into a kicker of a Texas hangover. Broken glass jangled as he stirred his leg. His elbow was on a lime peel and his lips were smeared with salt and tequila residue. A damp paper towel, clumped and pulpy, acted as his pillow. One of his shoes was half off, the other resting under his hand, and a vague memory of trying to take his shoes off lingered.
"Another vague memory of eating a tequila worm off the floor from amid the shards of a broken bottle also butted its way into Bradley’s head. When Bradley sat up among the fresh wreck of Garrison’s living area, the first thing his eyes registered was that there were ripped photographs of naked women everywhere. It had been during the second bottle when Garrison rambled about some bizarre fantasy of being mayor that culminated in the declaration that his need for pornography had come to an end.

"It was during a flurry of ripping and tearing, of shredding and crumpling, of thrusting magazine pages back and forth that a stray elbow had knocked the tequila bottle to the floor. Garrison and Bradley both wept at the sight, hugging and apologizing like they were at the funeral of each other’s fathers. From God came man, and from tequila came the Texan."

Chapter 7 is tentatively titled, "The Trash Arrives at the Dump" and will be full of dead fish, birds, and cats. I believe my sentiment at completing Chapter 6 and arriving at page 160 of coninuous completed text is appropriately stated in the following phrase:

"Yeehaw."

The Origins of Things

2005-09-15T16:54:00.000-07:00

As an interesting an addendum to the story I posted on Boatload of Fools entitled "How Chaz became a Stupid Dumb*ss Mother****er," I may have come across the first literary use of the term Mother****er in a derogatory sense.

Although the concept of being a mother****er draws all the way back to the Oedipus myth and before, Oedipus is not generally treated as a mother****er in the modern sense of the term. However, during the sixth century BCE, the Greek lyric poet Hipponax writes, "the mother-****er Bupalus with Arete" in fragment number 12.

Though the usage of the speficic phrase "mother****er" can be attributed to the translator M.L. West, it is nonetheless present in the original Greek that Hipponax insults Bupalus by claiming that he engages in incestual intercourse with his mother.

If this usage is not the first extant occurance of this insult in literature, it is still likely to be the first extant usage in verse.

History can be fun people. Get on the bandwagon and shout "Hi ho."

Interesting people and places

2005-09-12T10:51:00.000-07:00

The news just keeps coming; I've got to be careful, otherwise this blog is going to turn into something I didn't intend it to. But, Chris got to meet President Bush yesterday and again he was seen on the news on a story about Bush's visit. Also, I just purchased Nine Inch Nails tickets for their Nashville show on Halloween. Yeehaw. Oh yeah, also, new updates on Eat Culture Baby.

Delving Deep

2005-09-11T14:55:00.000-07:00

After the authenticated Knoxville, TN sighting of Weinerus Mobilus, I decided that such a promising portent marked the time to step up my investigation into the retrieval portal. On the bottom right, you see a picture of the bagel probe I sent to the depths of the conveyer belt toaster while I watched tongs in hand in hopes of perhaps uncovering another piece of the retrieval portal mystery in the heart of heat and flame and burnt bread crumbs. I hypothesized that if I could unlock the connection between that toaster, bagels, cream cheese and goodness that perhaps I could begin t0 establish a larger goodness theorum that could encompass not only the bagels and the chai I extracted from the retrieval portal, but perhaps the greater mysteries of love, happiness, and things with fruits baked into them. The brave bagels returned through the other end of the toaster bearing battle scars and enough heat to soften cold cream cheese into creamy goodness, but ultimately I was unable to debrief them to the fullest possible extent because of frequent customer interruptions. The mystery continues and the hypothesis remains unproved.

Supercat

2005-09-08T14:48:00.000-07:00

The cat is alive after ten days of isolation in the chaos of New Orleans, suffering only from a rather unpleaseant smell eminating from its fur. Although the cat declined to offer comment to reporters, rumor has it that Taz will soon be the author of an autobiographical novel about his ordeal within the apartment to be followed by the national release of a Worst Case Scenario Survival Guide for Cats. That is all. Return to your lives. I said RETURN!!!

Quick news

2005-09-07T11:09:00.000-07:00

And now for one of my rare news posts, literally in this case: My brother was on NBC national news at prime time last night for the work he's been doing down in New Orleans. NBC aired just a clip of the interview, but I think MSNBC aired a longer segment. The camera crew spent most of the day with him covering some of the rescue work, and the interview mainly spanned Chris's predictions of the short and long term health impacts of the conditions in the city. Also, once he finished the priliminary evacuation work in NO, he was sent to Slidell to help set up and run a MASH unit to treat the injured there, and now he's back in the difficulties of the Big Easy again. On another bright note, Chris' house actually avoided the flooding, apparently being in the twenty percent of the city that didn't submerge. Sadly, there is no news of the cat as of yet because Chris has still been unable to enter his home.

Nature Photography

2005-09-06T13:10:00.000-07:00

I promised wonders when I spoke of the retreival portal, and behold, for here is one. On the right, as you can see is a rare sighting of the majestic Weinerus Mobilus in it's natural habitat. Notice the how the bright orange and red plummage leaps out against its gray urban habitat. Experts in the Oscar Meyer branch of zoology have speculated that the poor camoflage of weinerus mobilus is largely responsible for its rarity as a species, compounded by the rampant poaching of its offspring in grocery store meat aisles. The days might still return where one only need look out their window and spot the beauty and the symbolic symoblism or the weinerus mobilus in every street and driveway, were its pups are no longer boiled as hot dogs by the dozen at barbeques and picnics, and where once and for all it is determined from which species(es) of animal its lushious meat has evolved from.

A World Without New Orleans

2005-08-31T15:19:00.000-07:00

Great tragedies befall every generation. The devestation of Hurricane Katrina along the Gulf Coast is one of personal impact on me because my brother (until very recently) lived in New Orleans with his cat Tazmanian Devil, or Taz for short. My brother was forced to leave behind Taz, a black cat, half something, half Bobcat on the second floor of his apartment home. Sadly, I doubt his chances at this point. Though I still hold out hope that he escaped somehow before the flooding reaching my brothers house, it is a grim situation. It is with Taz in mind that I post the following memorial poem. He was a good cat. He deserves it.

Tazmanian Devil stands up to Hurricane Katrina

I’d like to think that at least
you died in your element,
the fury of Katrina’s whirling turbine,
fangs bared, fur raised at the maelstrom
wrenched shingles, fractured beams,
Spanish moss and Mardi gras beads.
Threw vehement hisses into shrieking gusts,
swiped claws at the visibly invisible.

I doubt that this was the case.
Had you stood up to the monster,
you would have been swept helpless
through a shattered window,
lacerated by swirling shards,
spinning towards an oblivion
that you are programmed
to frenzy against with every fiber.

I too am helpless. When the worst past
you probably crawled out from under the bed,
lapped the pooled water from the slats
and listened as the rains abated
while you waited for my brother to come home.
Had the news come, pumps failed, levee gave,
you wouldn’t understand that the water
wouldn’t stop rising. I really don’t either.

*** Please note - although the contrary can be read into the poem, my brother is in fact alive and well and participating in the evacuation of the superdome (he is an emergancy room physician with a minor specialty in helicopter rescue).

And it could happen to you...

2005-08-25T12:27:00.000-07:00

There are some things in life that we spend our whole lives looking for, except we never know that we are looking for it until we find it. Today, I have made one of those miraculous discoveries: BEHOLD! The picture on the right is a picture of an authentic retrieval portal. I say again, I have found the retrieval portal in a small coffee shop in Knoxville, TN. Thousands, I'm sure, throughout history have died in search of just such a retrieval portal. So far I have managed to unlock the secret of retrieving concentrated chai tea from this particular retrieval portal, but I know that it is only a matter of time before I uncover the greater secrets in the darkness of the carton's cardboard belly. Will I find the answers to the great mysteries of the universe; God, life, a unified field theory? Will a voice within whisper to me undiscovered excerpts of the Canterbury Tales or perhaps a sequel to Beowulf? Does this portal lead to the body of Jimmy Hoffa and does Jimmy Hoffa's body contain the cure for cancer when it is found through The Portal of Chai? Perhaps I will find tea leaves or perhaps the doorway into some sort of tea based dimension where physics are based on the caffeine principle, people read wine dregs to tell the future, and the rivers flow with warm honey. The possibilities are limitless, the universe beyond infinite. More on this in years to come as we all ascend to greatness.

Technical difficulties

2005-08-21T21:40:00.000-07:00

It would seem that a cat is attempting to adopt me as its owner. It showed up on the deck last monday, and has not since departed despite numerous attempts to shoo, scoot, scare, chase, or otherwise dislodge said cat from the deck planks.

So, if any of said cat's friends or relatives are viewing this page, it would be much appreciated if the said cat in question could be removed. I realized the unlikelyhood of this page being viewed by any of the majestic feline species, and if so viewed, it is furter unlikely that it would be understood, and if understood, the odds are absolutely remote that they would be acted on, acted on successfully, or if acted on successfully, leading to optimal results.

That being said, I feel there is little else that lies within my power to remove said cat from my property outside of violence or meanness, violence and meanness being two things with which I am incapable of treating a cat - unless the cat in question be proven to be an evil cat, such as Zervok the Furricane of Death, the cat who led the other cats in the Great Rat Extermination of 1903.

This is why, despite the unlikelihood of cat action in response to this message, I offer a reward of ten cans of unpoisoned tuna to any cat who aids in the removal of the current cat fixture off my rear porch. I feel bad for that cat because I'm not even sure what it's eating and it's been raining a lot, but I simply can't A) afford a cat or B) deal with cat allergies, or C) cast a voodoo spell that will simply cause the obstacular cat to be sucked into some sort of magical vortex.

So I say unto ye, sweet cats, oh great felines of the world wide web, Call to your stubborn brother, make him see the light reflecting from the eyes of mice on the other side of my fence. Let him chase the mockingbirds into the trees of neighboring yards, and let him bury his feces by someone else's trashcans.

Fly well and deliver him.

Voosh.

2005-08-10T21:51:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture I took of a plate of eggshells on the stove top. It is important to bear in mind that this photo was not arranged. The plate of eggshells just happened to be sitting on the stove (it is usually in the microwave - long story), and I thought the effect of the stove top light would look really neat in black and white. If you don't like it, then go to hell.

A Fire Hydrant named Bill

2005-08-07T22:13:00.000-07:00

Bill was a fire hydrant, a red fire hydrant, the reddest fire hydrant in the universe, so he believed. Whenever there was a fire on his block, the red fire trucks would screech to a stop in front of him on the gray asphalt, black tires leaving smoldering black streaks. The firemen in the yellow boots and hats would leap from the sides of the truck, shouting to one another as they uncoiled their hoses, and one would always take the giant red wrench and undo one of Bill's pentagonal nuts to plug the hose to his raging water supply.

Bill loved to feel the water surging through him into the rubber house, loved knowing that somewhere the power that rushed through him jetted forth to extinguish the hottest of flames. It made Bill feel important, purposeful.

When Bill wasn't attached to the hose, when there wasn't a building engulfed in flames, restlessness twisted through his metal housing, a geyser supressed, and he found himself frustrated with his inability to wrench himself free from the concrete and venture boldly towards a place where he would be needed immediately. Sometimes he wondered what it would feel like just to open himself up and pour into the street to watch his precious poor vanish into the storm drains.

On quite sunny days, he tried to will his pentagonal valve nut to unscrew, if just for a moment to release the pressure that sometimes seemed to threaten to launch him into the sky from below, to erupt in a glistening torrent. Whenever a woman carrying a little leather hand bag and a pooper scooper stopped her dog at the end of its leash, Bill found himself envying the dog's ability to release the fluids welling inside with a simple lift of the leg. The envy grew so great that he no longer disdained being urinated on by canines and wished that he was a canine himself.

One fall morning, as the golden leaves tumbled from the branches of the sparse trees that decorated the street, as the amber light of the late afternoon sun refracted off the broken glass in the gutter by the curb, two teenage boys walked up to Bill in tattered jeans and frayed sneakers. One carried a monkey wrench, the other the hammer, and they proceeded to bang and twist on Bill's pentagonal valve nut.

A strange feeling came over Bill as the threads gave first just a touch and then in swift twists as the teeth of the monkey wrench found their purchase on the ill-fitted angles. The feeling was that Bill didn't want to let loose his flow of water into the streets. There was no fire, not even anything to cool because the summer heats had passed. Helplessness coursed through Bill's metal as the pressure grew more urgent as if sensing its imminent release.

Metal cried Bill's despair as the nut wrenched further down its threads until suddenly bursting off in an eruption of water and sadness. It was a violation, a forced opening without purpose. It wasn't that Bill hadn't sometimes wished the pressure would just release, but that it was the fulfillment of a fantasy he'd never expected to come true. He never imagined he could be left so vulnerable by his dreaming, that their fulfillment could be so empty.

The boys didn't even have the decency to play in the water they set free, but instead they lit cigarettes above the very force meant to extinguish all flames. The boy with the hammer whacked Bill across the top with the blunt end. Bill's tears trickled unobservable into the greater stream, and a great regret filled the hollow where the pressure had been. So much potential given over to so little reason.

It was that night, after the firemen in their yellow boots and hats had wrestled the valve shut again, that Bill first noticed spots of rust on his red paint, but when he cried over it, the tears stayed in the tumolt of swirling force just inside the valve just as invisible as before, just as useless.

The birds sung from the trees. A gentle rain began to fall. A slight gap where the pentagonal valve had not been screwed as tightly as possible because the firemen where irritated to inattention by having their time wasted allowed just a little bit of water in. The threads began to rust, and Bill knew that it was only a matter of time that he would either rust shut forever or become so brittle that he broke open. Either way, his pressure would either be forever or nothing.

That night Bill didn't cry anymore. He didn't cry again. Sadness and tears are irrelevant in a world where the fulfillment of dreams and the empowerment of the self amount to little more than futile expression that is lost because it is delivered too far from where it is needed.

The News in Briefs I

2005-08-06T06:55:00.000-07:00

1. New Blog site up open for Croatian pictures at Eatculturebaby.blogspot.com. It will be mildly amusing, to be sure.
2. Michael Allen and his wife Maggie are town. For more information on Michael and Maggie as well as a plethora of musical fun, visit Texas Embrace.
3. My house is nearly painted. Finally. The Kiltz patches no longer reign supreme.
4. The garden beds will lose the battle on Monday. They have fought well and fought hard, but soon they will be put to rest.
5. I have done nothing on my book since I got back from Croatia. I have been severely jet lagged and sleeping twelve hours a day when I 'm not fixing my house or lying next to the pool. For more information about sleep, go to bed, turn out the lights, and close your eyes. For more information on pools, well, if you don't know what a pool is, you're either a fish or just plain helpless.
6. I start teaching my own classes in just over two weeks. Creepy. I will mold people's minds. Mold. Heh. For more information on my classes, well, I guess check back here or take them. I dunno what to tell you on this one.
7. My chainsaw broke. It was a sad thing. The rip cord tore straight out of the housing. Damn piece of junk. Oh well. Damnit. Piece of junk. Damn junk. For more information on this chainsaw and other chainsaws see thingsthatiknow.blogspot.com, concerning: Chainsaws.

The journey is now complete.

2005-08-05T07:46:00.000-07:00

Behold! This picture is an authentic picture of a Croatian slug. This particular Croatian slug was photographed on the stone steps leading up to a cathedral that I discovered while walking with my mother in downtown Zagreb. Although I cannot confirm any personal information about the slug, I believe that this slug may have been some sort of slug priest either travelling to or from its congregation given the fact that I observed this slug on a Sunday night. Also, be sure to not the divine 'v' of it antennae.

I travelled 4,000 miles bring back this (and other) information.

A little about the trip itinerary- we departed from Knoxville to Detroit Sunday the 18th, then Detroit to Amsterdam. International flight technology has grown more than I imagined, and I was able to pick the movies I watched and play games such as solitaire, reversi, and taipai on a little screen in the back of the chair in front of me. I would have taken a picture but cell phones were not allowed on the plane. Alas.

Though our 4 hour layover in Amsterdam was insufficient for us to venture forth from the airport and sample of the fruits of Amsterdam social life, we enjoyed our stay in the airport immensely through the consumption of much beer and the smoking of some excellent cigarettes. As a curious note, I discovered that not only did they still have cigarette vending machines in Amsterdam, but that smoking is allowed for the ages of 16+ as you can see on this picture.

The final leg of the flight was from Amsterdam to Zagreb. It was amazing. The armrests still had ashtrays built into them. They didn't have ice for the Cokes. The pilot spoke in another language BEFORE he spoke in English I knew I had arrived in a foriegn land. When we passed through Croatian customs, our journey through the beauty of Croatia (note - no sarcasm here) had finally begun.

So- over the next few weeks I will be putting up photo posts talking about my trip to Croatia. However all further posts will appear on a new blog page that I will start shortly. The link will be up when the page is. This page will be dedicated to the trip, and when stuff about the trip is done with, it will be dedicated to something else. I am taking this course of action in order to prevent substantial disruption in the usual idiocy, blathering, and tom foolery usually illustrated by this page.

I will close today's entry with a photo of a praying mantis I met on the Isle of Ist. Though I did not have any actual conversation with this mantis, I like to call her Father Head Eater. I know that there are no female priests in the Catholic church and that she would techinically be "Mother Head Eater", I figure that things might work a little different for praying mantises since the male's inevitably get their head eaten. Furthermore, I have no proof of the Catholic inclinations of this mantis, the number of Catholic shrines on Ist island suggests a predominantly Catholic insect congragation. This is a tribute to you, Father Head Eater, keep your congregation straight and true, and eat the heads off those who stray so that they may no longer see the way and thus be more easily be led back to Mantis righteousness.

Fishhead Hiatus

2005-07-17T14:52:00.000-07:00

La di dah, I'm leaving for Europe tomorrow morning. Tune in again Alchemists in two weeks for a possible series of pictures, and certainly some account of my adventures in addition to the usual blathering, tomfoolery, inanity, and yabbering. Perhaps there will be several pages dedicated to ducks. Maybe I'll post a sonnet in the form of a cardboard box that I keep in my closet. The box is full of CD cases, I think. Tell you the truth, I'm not really that sure. I'm starting to accumulate boxes full of stuff like snow fall in New Hampshire. MMM...Stuff drifts...

Woo. Hoo. Toodaloo.

And now a word from our sponsor - pants.

Boom Boom, Bam, Chomp Chomp Chomp

2005-07-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

Kablam! I have finished the first five chapters of my book! I'm up to a total number of 150 pages (bear in mind the 1st 5 chapters can also be the first 20 chapters depending on how you look at it).

Here is an excerpt from Chapter 4:

"Naturally, when Garrison woke up bleeding and ejaculating that morning, he had been dreaming about picking his nose while fucking the only woman he’d ever told about it. In the background of the dream, a small, black and white TV set was playing the DVD of The Ten Commandments. Nolan Ryan was in the dream too, wearing his old Astros uniform and giving tips about sexual performance, talking about changing teams from Houston to Arlington, and suggesting a split-fingered technique for nose-picking."

Skootch Skootch Skootch! The book's flying along now! I'm also almost finished with Chapters 6 and 7 because I wrote parts of them while I got stuck on Chapter 5! Not that this means anything to anyone, but damn I'm excited!

WA!

2005-07-11T20:12:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of a daddy long legs spider dragging a firefly up a light switch. I hope your satisfied. Son of a bitch.

Eye

2005-07-11T12:37:00.000-07:00

Today is a gray and rainy day,
the first in a succession
of gray and rainy days
so says the weatherman.
When the droplets fall fine and fast,
the world is static snow
and the streets glisten
while the clouds filter
and shift the light.
Just as the cars in traffic
transform into identical streaks
when played back in time-lapse,
the excess of motion
outside becomes a stillness
like the moment of realizing
that one is in love
or one is not in love.
There is always water in any given spot
even though it is not the same water
from moment to moment.

For those of you who tuned in last time:

2005-07-05T14:21:00.000-07:00

I am still not a lava monster. Sorry, there is still no progress in the waiting list for lava related party performances or village destructions.

In other news, Ben's fourth of July party was quite exquisite. There were burgers. There were hot dogs. The ice cream melted in the cooler, but it was there too, man. There was even tons of beer and this crazy tofu curry with day lilies in it. Eating flowers under the twilight sky is almost as fun as blowing things up. There was plenty of that too. Ben and Amir bought two mortars, so we had some real professional quality fireworks. I brought some stuff too, as did Seth of the Seth and Stephanie connection. Many a roman candle shooting contest was held. James and I practiced some archery in the dark. A fire was built. A lady brought a dog who wasn't afraid of nothing, least of all the endless explosions going off all around it. No one walked through plate glass. It was a good night.

The Narrowing Road of Passing Years

2005-07-04T14:59:00.000-07:00

It's a sad thing to realize that you might not be able to achieve one of your life goals. Some people want to be president when there might only be twenty people in a life time who serve as president (those who want to be president can improve their odds by not limiting themselves to the presidency of a specific country). Some people want to fly beyond our orbit, but might find themselves frustrated about the stagnation of space exploration. I myself dreamed, hoped, prayed, and wished that I would become a lava monster, and over the last few years I have had to reconcile myself with the fact that I become older and older it is less and less likely that I will either turn out to have been made of lava all along or to transform into a lava creature during some sort of geological-igneo puberty. Furthermore, it doesn't matter how much support I might get from friends and family about any effort I make to become a lava monster, and it is even irrelevant whether or not I'd be the best lava monster that ever was. I can't take courses on how to withstand temperatures in excess of three thousand degrees farenheit. I can't I order an Idiot's Guide to Becoming a Lava Monster. I don't even know the first thing about erupting. I simply don't have what it takes to become a lava monster, and that is a body made of lava.

The Loneliest Surface to Air Missile in the World

2005-06-25T16:36:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you about Sam. Sam was a missile, the loneliest surface to air missile in all the world. Sam sat forever at the bottom of the silo. He waited day in and day out for his turn to launch. Tears ran down his fins from his nose casing as he watching buddy after buddy zip out from the earth on a bed of flames to a firy destruction in the skies above.

So glorious, Sam thought, to launch from the earth on a bed of fire and collide with another object to detonate in the sky in an even bigger and more destructive fireball than the one that launched me.

Sam thinks about launching every day, about the blue sky, about the trees growing smaller before he blew up. Sam cries everynight as one by one his friends fly away to their beautiful, firey deaths.

"What's the point of being a missile if not to be launched? Can there be a God if there is nothing for me to blow up?"

These are the questions Sam asks day in day out. The other missiles that hadn't been launched long grew tired of hearing Sam's whining and made themselves go dud. As night set on the silo shortly before the end of the summer and the last rays from the sun backed out of the hole like a dying flame, Sam wondered if he could just launch himself.

Could he fire without purpose to detonate in the sky? Would his explosion be just as glorious?

Sam didn't have the answer. He just waited and waited until one day one of his red guiding fins fell away from the side of his propulsion housing. One of his internal sensors shut down and another indicated that his fuel had been contaminated. The months past, and then the years, and so did war after war, and Sam's housing began to corrode and his nose lost its shine.

One day, some technicians opened a door at the base of Sam's silo dressed in white coats smudged with grease and carrying clipboards.

"Looks like this one's got to be junked too," the first technician said.

"Yeah, too bad they didn't launch this one when the war was still hot," the second technician said. "I bet this was one damn fine missile.

"You got that right," the first technician said. "He would have blow'd up good. They don't make them like this no more."

"They don't fight wars like this anymore," the second technician said, shaking his head.

Neither technician knew it, but tears rolling down Sam's side through the rust and the corrosion. Neither of them knew it, but they'd broken Sam's internal guidance chip with grief, and he had become a dud despite his determination to stay volatile. When Sam was disassembled and deposited in a weapons disposal facility, he was too sad to notice. He just didn't know which was more meaningless, to be laid to waste or to detonate in the sky atop a pillar of smoke and flame without a target.

The End

I care about octopus care.

2005-06-09T14:44:00.000-07:00

Like most Americans, I get really worried when my pet octopus is sick, and I find the inavailability of health care for octopi to be one of the more troubling facets of our society. What are we supposed to do if we wake up drenched in our beloved pet's ink to the sound of it's beak champing in fear? What do we do when the nearest veterinarian certified in octopi care AND who runs a 24 hour emergency clinic is more than three hours away by car? They have helicopters for people, so they need helicopters for octopi damnit. I remember the days when any Nurse or EMT could start an octopoidal IV, but now they need to bring in a specialist. Those precious lost hours could mean the difference between the need to amputate a tentacle. Biology journals may claim that we've made great strides in marine medicine, but I'm still waiting for the day when every household in this country has an octopi medicine kit safely tucked away under their sinks. Maybe then we could sleep easy at night.

Felt too specific for Totally Vague Reviews

2005-06-04T23:47:00.000-07:00

I know I'm behind the times with this, but I resisted reality TV as long as I could. Now, I've been watching a lot of reality TV for the last few months out of some strange masochistic/ experimental impulse, anything from reality games shows like Fear Factor, the Real Gilligan's Island, American Idle, and the Bachelor to those shows where they redesign people homes, plan their weddings, fix up their cars, make them compete for jobs, and who really knows what else. Although I must concede that I often am mildly entertained by the shows and spend the rest of my time watching them in a sort of vacuous stupor that passes time without really noticing it (except when Fear Factor makes me want to laugh and vomit and vomit laughter at the same time), I must insist that I think reality TV sucks away my will to be creative. It reminds me that real life just isn't as interesting as I sometimes let myself think it is and certainly not as interesting as it is when I write about it. If writing and movies etc. is reality with all the boring stuff cut out, than reality TV is movies and books with all the good stuff cut out. Just once I'd like to see the judges from American Idle stand up, pull out shotguns and just start removing all the candidates from the gene pool instead of simply kicking them off the stage. I think waiting for this is what ultimately keeps me watching.

Chihuahuas the size of Buicks

2005-06-01T17:30:00.000-07:00

So it would seem I've spent most of today alternating between putting batches of chocolate chip cookies in the oven and shooting terrorists. All these years I thought I was American, it turns out that I was mistaken until now. Now that I have enjoyed tasty, oven-fresh toll-house cookies while shooting terrorists; now I am an American, full-blooded. I even bought beer today. I'm kind of proud of myself. I've come so far since I was a little pup. Now I'm a big dog eating raw meat from a little bowl by the water dish. No wait. That's my dog, except my dog isn't big. Really it's pretty damn small. Smaller than a cat. Bigger than a rat, but we're trying to get it fat its just that it isn't all that easy to make a little dog big. That's what today's science needs to explore; how to make little dogs into big dogs. Chihuahuas the size of Buicks. That's the future. We'll ride them to work and throw them the bones from the table. Hell yeah.

Umm...

2005-05-31T21:59:00.000-07:00

Well, geez. Now I feel kind of on the spot. Hm. (scratch). Got to think about this. Ninja? Was anyone else disappointed that Deep throat wasn't a ninja? Or at least related to Ninjas, a ninja clan, or some sort of Eastern dynasty? Maybe I'm just not old enough to fully appreciate the number two guy in the FBI's place in the scheme of things, but I kind of hoped I'd be kicked in the stomach with some Kaiser Soze style twist or something. I know this is not much of a post, but I started this blog on the spur of the moment.