This morning while dropping my kids off at school, it occurred to me that California is now my home. I’ve lived here longer than I’ve lived anywhere else.
I spent seventeen years on the east coast, interrupted by five years as a kid in Holland. Meanwhile, my California experience will hit nineteen years this coming July.
Oh, I’ve been keeping one eye out for the “when will I have spent half my life out here?” milestone — it’s waving at me from about 3 years down the road. But this subtler calendar-flip slipped past me in the night.
If I was super-dooper rich, I think I would hire someone to scan my personal numerology, looking for just this sort of Highly Significant Moment.
“Mr. Vortex, did you know that your heart has now beaten more times than a bumblebee’s wings will flap, using standard bumblebee life expectancy charts and such?”
“Thank you, Harold.”
“Also, if all the work emails you’ve sent were compiled into one document, it would be eight times longer than Finnegan’s Wake.”
“That’s fascinating, Harold. Here’s a gold doubloon with my face on it.”
Blog
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Harold, asleep at the wheel
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it’s me
I saw you watching when I got up
and I want to reassure you,
it’s not you, it’s me. It’s not the way
you were snapping your fingers. Or how
loudly you were breathing. Sure,
I don’t like your shirt. But
there are lots of shirts
here I don’t like.
Look at that guy, for example.
No, this is about me.
And the choices I’ve made.
The potatoes I had last night, for example. -
Eskimo (not Inuit) Rock n Roll Recall
Back in the 90s, there was an SF band I loved called “Eskimo.” They had one song in particular I was so sure was gonna be an alt-rock super-smash. We’d go to the shows and this tune (“Dado Peru”) would kick in and the crowd would start to sway….
Well, Dado never broke out the way I expected it to. And I kinda sorta forgot about it until this past weekend, when it showed up on my ipod. I played it for my 10-year-old daughter, who agreed that it was the most-est. And we drove down Franklin in Oakland, raising our arms in the air, swaying like we just didn’t care….
When I got home I started thinking, golly, I know it’s against the law, but wouldn’t it be great if I could rip that tune and put it up on Cecil to share with the world, without going to jail?
Lo and also behold — the world wide web has saved me from a life of crime. Turns out the band was kind of enough to post the tune right here. May I recommend that you crank the speakers?
For Bay Area folks who share fond Eskimo memories, that very same site contains eight (8!) Eskimo tunes I’ve never before heard. I just downloaded them and will, yes, get to swaying momentarily.
Yiba ho! -
Monkey Vortex (Flash)back Theater
From 2004 to 2006 I was part of a loose cabal of audio-oriented miscreants known as Monkey Vortex Radio Theater. Between us, we produced around 35 or so short bits of MP3 whackiness. Yes, and it’s hard to imagine a time when we had the brainwidth to produce 35 or so short bits of MP3 whackiness. But there was such a time.
Anyways, somewhere along the line a very nice fellow named Hank offered to make a Flash animation out of our theme sound-bit and one of our cartoon mascots. But — the shame! — I never got around to putting it up on the site or even plugging it here on ye olde Cecil.
Well that smudge on my conscience gets watered down today with this very link. Enjoy! And thanks “so-called Hank,” wherever you are. -
Obama and the Inuit
Lots of noise this week about Obama and the former minister at his church. I’m pro-Obama, so I’m gonna see things through that filter, but I don’t think there’s substance to the issue. If O. hadn’t repeatedly rejected what Wright has said, that’d be different. But he has.
I think most of us like and associate with folks whose political views would look, um, unhelpful repeated over and over on TV. This hits particularly close for me, as many of you know. Heavy sigh.
I have this pal (let’s call him “Bill”). Bill believes that for several years now — since shortly before 9/11 in fact — Eskimos have been taking the marmalade out of these homemade marmalade jars he makes and replacing them with store-bought marmalade. Now, I didn’t choose “Bill” as my friend because of his ignorant theories about the Inuit. In fact, I’ve repeatedly rejected and denounced his statements.
But he’s still my friend. -
The popular vote canard
There’s a slow-motion scam being perpetuated by the Clinton campaign and I must speak out.
The short version: Barring a complete Obama meltdown, you know, I know, and the American people know they can’t win on elected delegates. So you’re increasingly hearing them talk about the popular vote. If Hillary wins the popular vote, they argue, she should be our candidate. And that sounds like a pretty reasonable position. We all went through Florida in 2000. Electoral College? What a crock! Democracy is about one person one vote. If she wins the popular vote, little d democrats should insist she be the nominee, right?
The problem with that canard is that while you can argue “one person, one vote, electoral college, grrr” in the general, the nomination process is different. As we all know way too well, some states caucus, some states run primaries. As we also know, caucusing, like ’em or not, take a much bigger time commitment than pulling the lever in a primary, so the turnout numbers are dramatically depressed.
If the caucus states all have substantially lower vote turnout percentages than their primary bretheren, selecting a nominee by counting the total votes makes votes in a primary state worth a lot more than votes in a caucus state. How do fix that problem with the math? We find a neutral measure that assigns a total # of votes to each state based on their relative size. And yeah, we call those neutral measures “delegates.” That’s why, in the nomination process, delegates are a much truer measure of “popularity” than the popular vote.
I know the popular vote is popular. We should invite it to parties. We should buy it drinks. We should ask it to sign our yearbooks. We just shouldn’t use it to choose our nominee. -
waiting on line
waiting on line
in my mind. everybody
cutting and they
don’t even know it and hey
I was here. getting coffee
and a scone but
also waiting. -
Garfield Minus Garfield
Lovely. (Link via ye olde zefrank.com.
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The Lavender Lemonade Is Back
This poem was originally about the joy of lemonade and coffee shops. Over time it became about other things that go away and comes back — like creativity. But these last few weeks, it’s become about missing lemonade and coffee shops again.
From The Lavender Lemonade Is Back: Poems and Stories, now available in print/kindle on Amazon.
The Lavender Lemonade Is Back
The lavender lemonade is back
at my local coffee shop.
I’d given up on her.
All the lemon factories, moved off-planet.
“We Thank You For Your Business.”Empty cups, traced with
mint and cane.I’ve been lost
behind the
lost
behind the
dark berry side of this Lavender Moon.
Here comes the lemonade. -
Las Vegas-style entertainment
So I’ve always heard that Las Vegas was known for having something for everybody. Harley Davidson-brand pedicures? Check. A shadow-puppet show featuring the songs of Hugo Chavez? Check. Guys who wear blue face paint and speak in pig latin? I’m telling you, it’s all here.
One example, though, I found kinda gross. Frankly.
I get off the plane yesterday, and there’s this poster with a bunch of half-naked guys on it — “The Thunder from Down Under.” It’s a troupe of — and I’m not making this up — lactose-intolerant Australian male strippers.
I don’t like to judge but that’s just weird.