Bliss is Our Nature

Because David Lynch said so.

David Lynch has been, and will probably always be my hero. He's nuts, brilliant and just enough like Ward Cleaver smoking crack to make him seem slightly normal.

I'm not joking. This guys never fails to surprise me. The man responsible for Dennis Hopper huffing gas and screaming, "Don't you fucking look at me" is starting a meditation center aimed at peaceful living.

For some reason I think that's cool. Kind of like if Walt Disney was secretly into ninjas or something.

And I'm totally in support of peace, by the way. And I'll kick your ass if you're not.

Oh. Going on vacation next week. I won't be posting. I won't be reading email. I won't be answering phones. So next week is obviously the best time to send me 90 gigs of MP3s I just "have to hear right now".

Hang On for Moment

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

inhale

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

cough

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Thank you.

ScienceFictionTwin: A Primer

In case you're just getting caught up, or just joining us from my wife's latest post, and are thoroughly confused, are having trouble with the math, etc. I'll catch you up.

I'm not the fuckwit that is referenced in said post. Matilda is, technically, my step-daughter. Though she and I have rarely referred to it as such, nor is it even really an issue or topic. Rather, she has a "dad" and a "daddy". I am "daddy".

I signed onto the Matilda train 2.8 years into her life and never hopped off. Would I have liked to have been around earlier? Absolutely. But, you know, that would have been . . . um . . . Awkward.

In regards to my wife's impending Last Day, she says she doesn't want a party. Feel free to convince her otherwise.

Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town

“Well, it's the only art form where the consumer has to be a performer. It's like expecting everybody to sight-read music for the French horn and most people can't read that well and I mean, hell, you go into an art gallery and just look, or go to a movie or a play and just look. We are the only art form where the audience has to be a performer and it's expecting a hell of a lot of them.” --Kurt Vonnegut

Yes kids, it’s time again for me to lecture on what you should be reading/listening to/watching. But trust me, it’s worth it. You’ll be getting in on the second floor of an author you’ll come to know well in the next decade.

What Vonnegut means is that, more than any other form of art, writing requires the audience to be an active participant in the creation of the art. The author can only set up the story, provide the dialogue, setting, stage direction and the plot. You, the reader, must provide the final images. You are the director, art director, set dresser, actor, composer, cinematographer and craft services. In order to enjoy a book, you must mount a huge production within your mind and provide the drama with the proper gravitas, the humor with the proper execution and the heart with the proper warmth.

It’s not small task. A great reader has the mind of a proper Buddhist meditation master. Your mind is clear, your body is relaxed and you aim for enlightenment (of a sort) by moving through towards that final page when you finally know the ultimate truth of the self-contained world you hold within your hands.

Take notice next time you are in a hotel lobby, on the beach, on a train or on a plane. You can see the reading gurus in their books; literally within their books. The best has the ability to interact with the outside world without ever leaving their inner world of literature.

I bring all this up because with Cory Doctorow’s latest book, Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town, the author has presented his performers with his most difficult work to date. It’s also his most heart-felt, seemingly personal (don’t want to fall into that good old logical fallacy) and funniest. However, the world you will inhabit is a difficult one.

The world looks, sounds, feels, even smells like the one you inhabit now. The technology is a step ahead of us (and man, sometimes you’ll kick yourself for not thinking of the most basic application of a current technology . . . someone may get rich off Cory’s ideas . . . sounds like Clarke Syndrome). Nevertheless, there’s also a deeper, more surreal layer in which nothing is quite right with Alan, our reluctant hero, his neighbor nor his family who comes to his doorstep one day to throw his idyllic attempt at a “normal” life into a tailspin. A dead man, a mountain, an island, a washing machine and Russian nesting dolls . . . it all makes my family seem the picture of sanity.

All of these details are interesting and, of course, important. But it’s Doctorow’s heart this time out that grabbed me. He can dazzle me with his wit, his imagination and his superb writing. However, there is surprising warmth below the surface of Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town.

Great Science Fiction is not about science. Science is merely a trapping, a vehicle to tell a human story about human interests, human limitations, human loneliness, human grandeur, and human folly. At its heart, Sci Fi is an allegorical medium that tells you more about the inner working of the human soul than it reveals about technology.

From the outset, it is clear that, pushing aside the surreal, mysterious nature of how the story unfolds, that Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is a story of personal importances. It is a story about love and respect of those things, or people, that others have forgotten. Whether it is a children’s book with a deteriorating spine that oozes with the promise of a past life, or the beauty that hides beneath layers of neglect on an old hardwood floor, a wingback chair . . . or a girl with regenerative wings, everything has worth to someone.

There is no trash nor no waste here.

Hey Babe . . .

I have seen the best minds of my generation destroyed by Barney, Teletubbies, Boohbah and strange meetings between the Velvet Underground and the Wiggles.

Yesterday the wonderful covers website Copy, Right? posted a file that I felt compelled to share with others. Other parents who think that Lou Reed was, at one time, a pretty cool guy. Parents who have actually turned down Coltrane’s “Naima” and thought, “You know, ‘Fruit Salad’ really isn’t a bad song. Don Kirshner certainly did worse and he was aiming much higher in the age bracket.” These same parents suddenly know that Greg Wiggle has an Elvis fetish and secretly wonder if Anthony has left a trail of broken-hearted MILFs across the country.

Thing is, I actually enjoy watching the Wiggles with my daughter. I have seen them live, and enjoyed myself. I even got involved in the whole “Jeff is Dead: Not Just Sleeping” conspiracy and analyzed the cover of “Wiggly Gremlins” to discover if it were true that he was replaced by a keyboard playing cyborg.

But this file that was posted yesterday brought together two worlds that many of us thought would never come together. Ostensibly, it’s a radio appearance by the Wiggles on some Aussie program where the DJ liked to have bands play unexpected cover songs.

Boy did they. And this file is so much more. So much more.

After the mind-blowing aspect of your two worlds colliding dribbles out of your nose in cerebro-spinal fluid ooze, you actually think to yourself: “All things considered, these guys ain’t bad.” Hell. Tim Finn sang a version of “Six Months in a Leaky Boat” with them. Or was it Neil Finn? One of them. I don’t know. However, it was a damn good version of the song and will serve as my daughter’s entrance into Crowded House/Split Enz/Finn Brothers in the future.

Before you even click on the link below, I feel the need to quote one of the minds destroyed by this file:

“I think I've just realized how deeply embedded Greg Wiggle's voice is within my subconscious. My fear is that I'll be turning 108, teetering on the brink of a vegetative state, and I'll still be able to sing ‘Toot Toot Chugga Chugga Big Red Car’ note-for-note. Furthermore, if I once held the fear that I would someday forget most of the lyrics to Walk on the Wild Side, that day was today.”

Without further ado, since you no hope of buying the Like a Version disc on which this appears outside of Oz, I present:

The Wiggles – Take a Walk on the Wild Side (Wiggly Version)

Sweet Mother of . . .

Gertrude needs a set of these more than we need anything else right now. They're perfect. I can just picture the epic battles of good versus evil that will be set up on her big girl bed with these puppies.

I especially like the consultant ninja complete with arm nub. Heh.

What? It's wholesome entertainment for kids. I swear. Besides, blame Daddy Types for bringing it up in the first place.

I Rule

Mom was sleeping off a night of caring for Exorcist child. Child was sleeping off a night of pea-soup spewing dementia. Sister was playing Polly Pocket. Dad, the dedicated worker bee, was working on manuscript on the coffee table in the living room.

Father hears a faint moan from child. He gets up, goes to her room. She stares at him, bewildered, angry.

"Are you feeling sick," he asks, considering the fact that it's been 12 hours since Belezebub reared his ugly head.

She looks at him with baby Harp Seal eyes. And coughs the cough of someone who is about to let loose a torrent of horror from her gut.

This is where dad suddenly excels. He goes into super slow mode. No trash can in sight. No towels. Nothing to protect the child's bed from the sudden flood about to hit the loving print of Care Bears staring up at him. Funshine Bear needed protection from tummy juice.

Still in super slomo, Dad schoops up child and darts out of the room, across the hall and plants her in front of the toilet, ready for the show to begin. Just as child is about to relieve her pains, dad notices that his vigilant effort to always put the toilet seat an lid down (he is the lone male in the house) is about to bite him in the ass.

As the first retch begins, he engages super speed and whips open the lid. Child vomits successfully.

As gross as this post is, it does have a point. She was the cutest girl whose hair I've ever held while she puked.

That, and I don't do well in these situations. I get nauseated just thinking about it. The only reason I'm writing this right now is because I know that as soon as I go back up there, I'll be surrounded by the very germs that ruined my baby's day.

And they're gunning for me.

Designing the Story

Hey, subscribe to my friend Eric's podcast "Designing the Story" (enter the URL into your podcasting software, iTunes or iPodderX). Think This American Life crossed with a high-tech audio touch and a little snarkier (if that's possible). Snarky is good.

Good schtuff. And it will only take five minutes out of your day. Then, after you listen to it, you can steal his jokes around the water cooler. I won't tell him. In fact, it would probably make him happy.

Meat Trees?

From John Varley's head straight to your grill.

As gross as this is, for a guy who hasn't eaten beef in ten years for a variety of reasons, I'd kill for a meat tree double with cheese.

I Tried and I Tried

I tried to resist the Sufjan train. I tried to avoid getting sucked into his ever-growing presence in the indie rock world. Sure, I enjoyed "The Dress Looks Nice on You" and his xylophone player's is rather cute (she's the angel on the right). But that's just not enough to base a musical relationship upon. I need more. A sense of commitment, not just lofty promises and cuteness.

Then a friend started talking Sufjan up. "He's really talented," he said. "Don't base all your thoughts on Seven Swans," he told me. "I bought a t-shirt from the xylophone player in San Diego," he claimed.

I read the reviews of Illinois yesterday. Very strong. Even Pitchfork had to clean up the mess they made after they reviewed the disc. Several reviews had a palpable sense that the writer was getting moist thinking about the disc.

Curious, I thought. But I'm not convinced.

Then Stereogum posted the Toolshed MP3 for "The Man of Metropolis Steals Our Hearts".

Now I'm trying to scrape together money for the disc. Damn it. I mean, comic book references, lush orchestrations (baroque pop?) and a hot xylophone player? That's enough, I think.

Perhaps it won't last. In fact, I think I hate the music already. Must keep up my resistance.

I Don't Know Why . . .

But I'm addicted to Tour de France coverage, for the second summer in a row. I've watched every moment so far, some of it twice.

Can't say what it is about it. I enjoy my own bike, sure. But suddenly, competitive cycling is something I can watch for three to six hours. It's addictive.

And when David Zabriskie fell today, I felt for the guy. I wanted him to hold onto the yellow for another day. Poor kid. That looked painful.

Oh well. Can't explain it.

Go back to your business.

Maybe in the Next Batch

The title of this post refers to something the wacky little Gert said this weekend. But that story will have to wait.

Schedule sucks this week. And next week. And the week after that. And the week after that.

So I'll leave you with an abbreviated version of the lullaby CD I made for the girls. It's freshly loaded into the Radio SFT playlist off to your left. Listen and enjoy. Please note, song number 3 is the aforementioned "Gracie". And, for some odd reason, Gert loves that Eels song. My sweet little hipster chick.

Oddly enough, Martin Newell pops up in this playlist. He's been a topic of conversation recently.

Anyway, if you want a copy for your kids, let me know and I'll replicate. The disc, not myself. Who needs more than one of me?

And hey, my job's driving me nuts lately. Anyone know how you become the guy who selects music for movies? I think I want to do that. As long as I don't have to leave my basement and I get business cards I can put in the fishbowl for free lunches, I'm in.