Possible Band Name

"URETHRA FRANKLIN"

Hunter S. Thompson Dead

As if on cue one of the counterculture's icons and avatars goes and offs himself, sadly illustrating my point of the last two posts.

Anyway fear and loathing are everywhere now.

Coon Chicken

The movie "Ghost World" is one of my favorite movies. If you've ever seen that movie you may remember this picture.

In it, the protaganist, Enid uses this picture (a found art object) to trump her middle-minded rival in her school art class.

I always thought that was brilliant, turns out it's true as well. Click the title for a brief history.

Why do I do this?

Because, as it pertains to my previous post I am an anachronist -if nothing else- on a quixotic quest to connect my own abstract perceptions with the remaining shards of decency left in the world in the hopes that I might create or imagine a comfortable place to live in the absence of one actually existing.

This is the ethos of a post-modern revolutionary, simply to be able to make your own bed and sleep in it too.

There is no other motivation. I am not advocating any cause. I hurl terrible anathemas against (denounce) the status quo only becuase it is a personal irritant. The only oppressed proletariat I seek to empower is myself.

If I sound pretentious it is only because I have no one to talk to. I hurl my slings and arrows into a vacuum, shooting blindly, wildly hoping to connect.

Here I Sit Broken Hearted, I Came To Shit But I Only Farted.

One of the things that bothers me most is the instinctive apathy of those of us who care the most. I'm not trying to be like Richard Gere and speak for everyone here but I know that my circle of friends and select relatives are some of the most conscientous, thoughtful and utterly useless motherfuckers alive today.

I think we all came into awareness at the tail-end of the countercultural revolution -aka rock n' roll. Then, the highest state of being was to be stoned... immaculate, or something like that. A utopian bohemia still seemed possible while the last drops of lysergic acid mingled with our surging testosterone.

But now the pulverizing effects of globalization and the corporate meat grinder have poisoned the well; turned our serotonin into vinegar. Now the only acceptable feeling is nihilism.

Now the car we were so sure was going to take us to Shangri-la is making a funny noise. The transmission's all fucked up and we're almost out of gas.

Now we're paranoid, getting older, feeling like the karma police are finally catching up to us, and the fiery voice that once guided us to greatness is but a whimper; loud enough to be heard in rare moments of stillness but rarely understood.

We have succumbed to spiritual niggerization. And by that I mean we have done NOTHING, except lament our own marginalization from society and try to make jokes out of the nightmare life has become. What the fuck?

Same Shit Different War

U.S. ENCOURAGED BY VIETNAM VOTE
———
Officials Cite 83% Turnout Despite Vietcong Terror
———
By PETER GROSE
Special to The New York Times

WASHINGTON, Sept. 3—United States officials were surprised and heartened today at the size of turnout in South Vietnam’s presidential election despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting.

According to reports from Saigon, 83 per cent of the 5.85 million registered voters cast their ballots yesterday. Many of them risked reprisals threatened by the Vietcong. . . .

A successful election has long been seen as the keystone in President Johnson’s policy of encouraging the growth of constitutional processes in South Vietnam.

I found this here.

Bitches.

My so-called muse is a cranky whore with a scabby pussy that never calls me back. She makes her living sucking off 9-Volt kingpins. She sleeps on a dirty floor, curled up like a dog. When I try to pet her she growls and licks her own ass. Dejected, I go to the liquor cabinet. It's empty.

I take my wah-wah pedal and throw it through the window. Fucking Jap-piece-of-shit! Nevermind that the only Jap-piece-of-shit I've ever seen is a perfectly digested California roll. They're all the same.

I Steal Beck's Notebook

Basement Cheese And Popcorn Farts, Cubic Zirconium, Utica Go-Carts. (album)

I'm A Loser

There's a lot of social commentary I'd like to make and be heralded for making but it feels futile, almost as if the world is perfect without me. My thoughts have about as much impact as a graffiti genius spraypainting his Guernica in an abandoned subway tunnel.

I'm sure that guy also felt the urgency of impending doom bearing down on him like a spectral locomotive.

Still, I'm not a poet either, the world just looks like a poorly hung painting to me. I just want to fix it so it looks right and I can relax and enjoy it.

Battle Without Honor Or Humanity

Martin Luther nails his 95 theses to The Church door.

I like this image because it is symbolic of the brilliant and revolutionary work that appears on this very blog. Right now I'm immersing myself in political philosophy, existentialism and other big words. But don't worry I'm very dull and desperate... it probably won't last long.

I'd been hoping to stitch together a more legitimate vision from the shreds and tatters of last century's big ideas, hoping to establish some ideological foundation to run back to after throwing my rhetorical molotov cocktails.

But so far I feel like a pathetic little fallacy trying to imitate these egotists. I'm torn between developing "The Big Idea" and riffing on these sparks of originality. It seems unnatural to ignore the flow of flashy phrases that seem to pop into my head like coins dropping in a slot machine, yet they rarely lead to anything coherent.

Thinking about the "The Big Idea" makes me feel like a pompous, fake intellectual trying to stretch what little education I have too far. Meanwhile, I end up sounding like some hapless Unabomber.

Einstein said, "Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources." I guess that's the right ethic. As long as it works who cares if it's a little bit of a smoke-and-mirrors illusion. It's always the academics who pick these things apart years later and throw the up-and-comers off course.

Secretly of course, I'll continue rooting for utter catastrophe and chaos because only in the profound chasm of suffering can truth or beauty be found anymore. Only in the stark juxtaposition of "normal" life and it's destruction can I find anything worth living, dying, or fighting for.

My Funny Valentine

"He's doing a fabulous job!"

This is a funny website exposing Bush's raging latent homosexuality. Click here.

This is a jaw-droppingly explicit blog exposing White House "reporter" Jeff Gannon to be a gay hooker who posted his hourly rates and hosted other "stud" sites. I'm not making this up. It's hilarious. Click here.

Nevermind The Buttocks...

Something about the Oakland A's former "Bash Brothers" bending each other over in the locker room and injecting steroids into their asses makes me nostalgic for my own dog days of summer.

Can't you just picture these huge Goliaths strutting around the locker room in nothing but their jock straps suggestively swinging their bats before pairing off in bathroom stalls to give each other an "injection"?

So shooting up illegal drugs in the locker room is somehow OK now, but pretending to moon somebody is a high crime?

In my opinion these guys are not cheaters, they're traitors. They sold out America's Pastime. I'm glad this piece of shit is on the Yankees.

Abu Mazen and Dick Van Dyke

Seperated at birth?

An Abreached Revelation.

I give birth to the truth like a dyslexic whore talks to her baby.

(I wrote this awhile ago and just re-discovered it today. I swear it made sense at the time. It was going to be the beginning of another essay but I guess it was "aborted." Ha-ha.)

Happy Birthday Bob

You are my jesus. I'm gonna pack a Hav-A-Tampa with ganja in your honor. See other noteworthy Bobs here.

Hav-A-Tampa

I lace up my boots and march out the door -forgetting to lock it behind me. Sloshing through the soggy, trash strewn gutter I make it -just in time- before the liquor store closes.

The local hindu tries to swindle me (as usual). I'm thankful for the company. I snag a few loose Hav-A-Tampas on the way out.

"Bumbaclot!" I scream at the dump truck in front of me.

I come home and hurl terrible anathemas at the TV. Catching my reflection in the window I look tired and sad. I fetch a tumbler out of the cupboard and drop a few clear, clunky ice cubes in. The ice crackles as the glass fills up with warm, amber coloured bourbon. Spontaneously a phrase pops into my head and I'm off and running.

Typing with a cigar in my mouth I feel like Hemingway with half the sperm count. (It's a Hav-A-Tampa afterall).

"Downpressor man where you gonna run to?" wails Peter Tosh. Lately I can sing this with all my heart and not feel guilty. Not that I ever felt the usual guilt -paternalistic pangs of sympathy for the help as they brush the crumbs off my blue blazer. No, I've never turned to my chums and said, "You know, we really should do more," as we waited for our drinks to get freshened up.

My kind of guilt is born out respect and sensitivity. "As the bee takes away the nectar, and departs from the flower without harming its color or fragrance, so let a sage move about in the village."

This has always been my philosophy. And in this spirit I've never wanted to feel that I was in anyway appropriating a stance of black militancy simply to enhance my own potency or credibility. I always hated those motherfuckers. Probably why I didn't go to my high school reunion. Oh wait did that happen already?

I never got the email.

I know where I'm most at home. The blowing tumbleweeds of Dylan's "Desire"; the breathy yelps of Neil Young's harmonica on "Harvest"; The long, expansive ride through emptiness is my morning dew. My further shore is the border of Old Mexico.

My heart pounding, the bailiff grabs my collar.

"Step in" he orders.

My knees tremble.

"Damn." I think. "If I'da just resisted the urge for one second..." I'd still be free.

"Maybe I could still go back and pay?" No. It's too late. No clemency for me. There's no pardons for two-bit cigar thieves.

What on earth was I thinking? Hav-A-Tampas?

Not worth a dollar much less a year.

"I've got an answer." the majestic harmonies of CSN promise. I cling to that hope.

The Law

The holding pen is cold as hell. The handcuffs dig into my bloodless white skin. We stand, as ordered, without dignity, while the motherfucker chains us all together. We stagger out of the precinct, like a bunch of captive animals. About 20 niggers, 8 mexicans and two white guys. I'm one of 'em.

We pile into the paddy wagon for the long dreadful ride down to central booking. It's about 4am. Someone lights a cigarette. The niggers go crazy. "Yo who da' magician?" one says. I've got to agree. How the hell could a guy manage to light a cigarette handcuffed, chain-ganged, piled into a paddy wagon like sardines, after being searched for contraband about eight times throughout the night?

It's the other white guy.

"Yes!" I think in a Marv Albert voice.

After awhile it becomes apparent that we are no longer moving.

"What the fuck?" one of the niggers protests.

Again I agree. Someone announces that the cops have stopped at Dunkin Donuts on the way to transporting us to jail. I don't believe it. When they get back in I can smell the coffee and crawlers. I wish I could've lit up a Hav-A-Tampa right there. I bet the niggers would've been impressed.

Finally they let us out.

"My ass hurts already," I say to the other white guy after the long ride.

My humor is appreciated, but the nervous uncertainty of what lays ahead gnaws at us both.

I learn the rules quickly. If you're white shut the fuck up. There was one guy who tried to be friendly, he wanted to be down. The niggers all thought he was a snitch, sent to spy on them and gain intelligence. I found this amusing yet oddly convincing. From the inside, rumors make more sense than the system.

Blacks only feel totally at ease in two places, the barbershop and the county jail. Go ahead, call me a racist. Have you ever been there? Then shut the fuck up. These are the only two places their dominance is unchallenged. Even in the locker room there's always a coach or a reporter making them toe the line, forcing them to conform, so they keep their guard up.

Outside, you'd probably cross the street a block away if you saw one of these young bucks approaching. But inside, in the bullpen at least, they drop all that. They're able to call on some conditioned response that enables them to relax in the most anxious of circumstances.

Some survival instinct learned in the awful galleys of slave ships, sailing through the middle passage. Re-kindled in the face of Birmingham firehoses and Chicago police dogs.

It's hard not to want to be a part of it. It's so free. But we're not welcome. Inside the rules are opposite. Outside, the law we all broke is written, codified. Inside it's wild and unspoken and could change without notification.

I learned this the hard way. I tried to join the discussion on celebrity justice.

"O.J. was so guilty," I announce.

Everything stopped, two dozen pairs of savage eyes glared at me. Whoops.

Luckily one of the biggest guys saved me. "He was mad guilty yo..." I guess he didn't quite know the score (thank god).

They proceeded to discuss the merits of the most radically implausible conspiracy theories regarding O.J.'s case and forgot about my transgression. Like I said, from the inside rumors make more sense than the system.

Never get out of the boat. "Absolutely goddamn right," I thought to myself. I had just stepped out to put my toes in the water and nearly stirred up a hornets' nest. I decided to just shut up and listen.

I listened to their stories about old busts, shooting people, how they got caught this time etc...

"I got that ole' country aim," one of the older cats says.

It's all bullshit and everybody knows it, but it helps pass the time.

"I remember back in the 80's, I was on tour with Run DMC, " the old cat went on. "And I hear this voice, 'Hey Red, come get your dick sucked!' They got these white bitches lined up... MAN!" he shook his head as the room dissolved into laughter.

One of the young bucks asked admiringly, "Did you bust a nut in like two minutes?" The old cat cut him off. "Shit, two minutes? I mean it was like fif-teen seconds."

Everyone howled. I'd never seen a room full of black males engage in self-deprecating humor before. I guess it's safer to just make fun of yourself when you're locked in a cell and not getting out for a good long while. You don't want to step on anyone's toes. Besides, everyone there had done something stupid and got caught or they wouldn't be there. Still, it was cool to see them drop the hyper-machismo for once.

One of the young bucks talked about how a girl from the neighborhood had tipped him off at the last second and he was able to ditch his stash. He claimed he had absolutely nothing on him when he was searched and this was just a little matter of routine harassment from TNT. The price of doing business I guess.

"I know you gon' bless honey when you get home," the old cat admonished with a smile.

"Oh man, I'ma hit her off with like five bags. She saved me yo, she saved me," he assured the old cat.

A cop walked by. Counting heads I guess, just reminding us where we were.

They don't have C.O.'s (correction officers) at this early stage in the game, but everyone called him "C.O." anyway -except me.

The youngest kid in the whole bunch stood up and started talking shit to the cop.

"I'm the smartest hustler out there," he said matter of factly, directly to the cop's face.

He then launched into a long discourse on the various methods of concealing drugs in different items of clothing and different parts of your body.

"Ya'll got me this time but I'll be back out there tomorrow, same place, and y'all ain't never gon' get me," he said directly to The Law with proud defiance.

I couldn't believe the balls on this kid. Not in a million years would a white guy like me ever, ever do something like that. I envied him. I hope he's still out there.

Talk Of The Town

I write this, comfortably ensconced in my snow bound jersey crack shack, nestled snugly in the seedy underbelly of the night.

The Little Eichmanns have all got vertigo, they've no idea which way to point their mass produced urine antennae.

A suggestion: Paula Zahn.

There, there, now put your mind at ease. She'll show you just how to react. You don't have to think at all.

BY THE WAY, it is fun to shoot some people. You can only hurl terrible anathemas at the TV for so long.

What The Hell Happened To Manny?

My old drug dealer. I think I annoyed him to death.

Possible Band Names

1. Mad Cows.

2. The Gout.

Laundromat Blues

"Can colors and whites go together?" I almost ask the older black woman in the laundromat.

I catch myself at the last second; scared I'll accidentally say "coloreds and whites." I think of another way of phrasing the question.

“Can lites and darks go together?"

Forget it. I'll just wash them seperately. The language is too fraught with landmines.

I sit back and watch as my clothes swirl and tumble, first clockwise, then counterclockwise. To a moron, it's kind of mesmerizing.

I dream of Europe. Repatriation. Back to white man's Africa. A place where the sins of someone else's father aren't held against me.

I dream of mashing the red clay soil through my fingers like a barrel full of crushed grapes and blending back into a culture where hot tempered arrogance courses through the family tree; where passion is as strong as murder and vendettas are eternal.

She drops her soda. I look up.

Two spanish women walk in. These women are pros. Spanish people, for some reason, tend not to have washing machines.

”You dropped a dolla” the black woman says as she cleans up the spill.

“Oh, thank you.” I pick the dollar up.

“I found a bag of money once,” the old black woman says.

“Really?” I respond with earnest curiousity.

“Yeah, in the thuh WalMart down there.” She says.

“Wow.” I say, and go back to my book.

Mexicans are the new blacks I think to myself. The new uppity malcontents.

I chuckle to myself.

Fuck it. Maybe the only weapon a smirking know-it-all like me has in this world is that he's a smirking know-it-all.

Blah, Blah, Blah, I'm So Deep.

I appraised this guy's house today. Check out the poster in the back. You can click the picture to see it better.

Drank 3/4 of a bottle of Jack D. last night. As Spinal Tap said, "there's a fine line between clever and stupid."

Life Is Hell

...I live. I travel back and forth across the Goethal's Bridge, the Jersey Turnpike . It's a dirty gulag. I hate this country, what it does to it's people, how it lies like a dirty whore, and I yet I wake up, day after day, and slog through; emerging brutal and hairier.

I come home and hate myself.

My life is a series of daydreams. I'm constantly tripping over my own two feet. I've written 27 different first chapters of the same book. They all end the same way. To be continued...

And yet they never are. Why? Because today when I was buying a new lid for the garbage can I could feel the death rays emanating from the cinder blocks of Wal Mart. I didn't even know I was standing next to a WalMart. This ominous sense of our dark future just sort of came over me. Then I realized where I was and it made complete sense.

I thought to myself if I ever ran for president this is where I would come. Forget the rallies and the speeches. I would just stand in front of WalMart. So many people go there; it's a perfect cross section of America.

And then I just can't go back and pick up where I left off. I have to write a new chapter. I have to somehow redeem myself and iron out the spastic karma in my mind.

So I go to the convenience store and stand in line. I watch as the snaggletoothed hags of Milltown queue up to buy lottery tickets and get into a give-and-take with the plumber-pantsed Joes.

"So when a ya' goin ta A.C.?" they crow.

A shudder passes through me as the nightmare takes form in my mind. The Corporation sets the parameters and dictates the terms. The mass of humanity is then poured into the mold and we have to live our lives accordingly, even though it's against our nature. We live in cookie-cutter subdivisions, we go to work in office parks, we eat lunch in bourgeoisie vomitoriums (all-you-can-eat Chinese mega-buffets), we take leisure in strip malls, and we watch The Plastic Surgery Channel while we jog. This is the greatest country in the world.

I struggle all week just to get to the moment when I can sit down, break the seal on a 1/5th of bourbon, and watch- as a faint wisp of vapor escapes from the bottle- then vanishes like a spirit.

Otherwise, my jaw is clenched tight as a fist as I travel back and forth, up and down the mudvain of the east coast.

Exit 11, and I've got a boner. Goddamn I'm sick of all music. I pull my shades down snug on the bridge of my nose to shield my eyes from the blinding, glacial death star afternoon sun. My mind wanders back to that little igloo of peace I had built yesterday afternoon at the coin-op laundromat.