I stole an hour several weeks past to peruse a local book shop, where I picked three one dollar teases from the curbside lure. One of those was a book of music criticism by one Paul Williams, whom I thought was a midget conductor of TV symphonies, but who is also a titular twin and cultural commentator stretching back to the inescapable 60's. This ain't a review of said book, but a reminder from Williams' reminder to listen more deeply and less broadly. Buy fewer records and listen more closely to them. Read fewer books and spend more time with them. Nothing revelatory, but a reminder I seem to need again and again. Stop salving curiosity with cursory looks and start getting past knee jerk impressions. Stop listening to records while watching sports on TV with a book in your lap. Focus more intently on one thing for longer periods of time and maybe some understanding and some revelation will penetrate the dodgeball synapse orgy in the forebrain.

If a cyber book club can't work, how about a record? Someone nominate and I promise to listen closely. Really.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Did I Kill The Blog?

It's a Shame About Cal
Holy Mother of the Clouds I am out from under the darkness and into the bright penetrating beauty of health and oh boy it's a wonderful world out there filled with tailgators and mouthbreathers and stroller aggressors but hey, I am king of the rest of my life, lovin' it baby. Just d-loaded some Lemonheads It's a Shame About Ray, digging the back tunes but always looking to the future, prince albert. Saw a couple of fine fine films in my convalescence, most notably United 93 , a thriller tauter than teen taint, and let's not forget Little Miss Sunshine, which, and I'm telling ya sugar, includes the funniest scene of the year. These are goodies. Get get.

Do not, and I begs yas, forget to get on The Equals (try Among Us), a peppier buncha pop-makers you would not find in the isle of Englande during the mid-1960's. Maybe it's R&B, maybe it's pre-ska, maybe we just best leave the categories to the categorizers and get on with the kitchen dancing. Need some lysergic acid? Dead Moon's Echoes From the Past is Bon Scott fronting Greg Cartwright's band while he was just learning the geetar. I don't know why it sounds so real but let your shivers be your guide. Hell I put on the Flat Duo Jets Lucky Eye, the one everybody poopooed and it sounded like gold to this Pony Boy. Dexter in 2008!

Can I get below 170? Who wants to bet? I have two days of meetings and then family. I'm so lucid- I might say anything. Never underestimate the haze of the hangover for keeping social relations at that pleasantly necessary distance. Clarity of consciousness is a rugged beast. Get out the metaphysical whip and chair.

Oh, and happy Sunday.

Out come the wolves...

One of your old running crue, NY Tunafish?

NBA champ. Outstanding...

Things I've Learned After Seven (and Climbing) Days of Illness
The American System of Health Care is Broken- unless you're fuckin' rich.

I've discovered a new color of phlegm, which, given my history, is kinda like astronomers finding a link to new universes. Oh, it's a light black, by the way.

Dead Moon's Echoes of the Past 2-Cd Best Of is a strong contender for sweating-it-on-out-on-the-couch, writhing in acute face pain, hallucinating dark futures behind your eyelids record of the decade. Just misses the glory of Spiritualized's Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space in 98', but really a different vibe.

James Crumley is the only man I can read while I'm ill who makes any sense.

Grading papers with a low-grade fever and a waterfall of discolored, diseased snot lava is a product of middle-class guilt and an example of poor decision-making.

After about five days of the big nasty sinus infection, your face begins to taste and smell like old cigarette butts drowning in a sea of burning pus.

Tuna, that last one was for you.

Goddamn Cal Bears. Goddamn it.

Breaking News
In a stunning development, middle-aged dad and big-time asshole Ken Der has made a deal with Iranian terrorists to test nuclear weapons inside his face to eradicate Der's nasal cavities. Sources say Der's constant whining led his wife to seek help from local Iranian cells, as she was "unable to take his fucking self-pity anymore." According to unnamed sources, Der will emerge from a hidden North Oakland bunker on Friday with irradiated sinuses just in time to get "really fucking shitfaced" for something known as the BudgetRock Fest. Sources were unable to confirm the nature of said Fest, but two local drunks stumbling out of The Hut called it a "pagan bacchanal in which poorly dressed and unemployed sinners dance to the death of Jesus's memory and lick sausage skin from the labias of their Jewish sisters'". Der was unavailable for comment, but sources close to the demon suggest he is an arrogant and obnoxious bastard who uses cyberspace to justify his annoyingly sanctimonious worldview. Rumors that Der was drunk at the time of this posting are unsubstantiated but mostly true.

I was down at the Hudson Bay Cafe last Thursday, trying to catch up on stacks of papers and waiting for the library to open. I generally avoid cafes because they're filled with melodramatic conversations about people's problems, and theirs soon become mine. About two bad essays, an almond muffin and a latte later, two dudes sit down at the window table next to me and begin talking poetry. The black dude basically listens while the horned rimmed glasses dude spouts. Baraka this and structure that and positivism hoodydoody do. Once again unable to concentrate, I packed up and left.

Well, I guess one man's pretension is another's poetic gold.

Italian Americans rule, I spent $35 on a Flaubert biography, and who needs the Senate? Pelosi forever!

Things I Learned Alone With The Kids This Weekend

People eat buttloads of ice cream. I took Lucas and Lars to the post-soccer celebration at Fenton's and there were 50 people waiting in line on Sunday afternoon. Skinny Asian chicks were powering down bongo sundaes with gusto. This was not on my radar. Sunday afternoon ice cream blowouts? Who knew.

Attitude is arguably the most important influence on mood. OK, I didn't exactly learn this today, but I further confirmed it. Commit to what is and what cannot be, and you will have more pleasant moments.

Walking is good for what some people like to call the soul.

Lack of control is the most aggressive cause of rage.

The new NHL can work if two skilled teams face off.

Soft fat accumulates quickly when the body does not move.

Your parents can surprise you in wonderful ways in the right circumstances.

6-under soccer rules.

Spider bites wreak havoc on the extremities.

If the leaves don't get raked, the leaves don't get raked.

Taco casserole is a fine breakfast food.

Bruce Springsteen used to make purty decent records.

Tim Russert is a shitbird.

Your family has many more secrets than they've told you. Yet.

Lou Reed solo records have their moments, in case you've forgotten.

Sir Bradley can get nasty when he needs to.

Even Nellie can't save this Warrior gang.

You can't lecture on what you haven't read.

RIP William Styron
I really liked the three books I read, including his thin memoir on depression, Darkness Visible. I saw him speak a number of times and he always struck me as having come from a different era, from a time when folks took literature and ideas seriously and were ready to do hard battle over both. He also knew how to live, as the following blurb from the Chron's obit attests-

After the Styrons settled in a Connecticut farmhouse and began raising a family, he developed a routine he stuck to: sleep until noon; read and think in bed for another hour or so; lunch with Rose around 1:30; run errands, deal with the mail, listen to music, daydream and generally ease into work until 4. Then up to the workroom to write for four hours, perfecting each paragraph until 200 or 300 words are completed; have cocktails and dinner with the family and friends at 8 or 9; and stay up until 2 or 3 in the morning, drinking and reading and smoking and listening to music.