Create

Being a writer—whether self-styled or laureled around the globe—is a strange thing.

Courtesy U of Ottawa

Everyone has an inner monologue, but a writer’s is different. It speaks in the cadence of an essay. Sipping a strong drink leads you to ponder “the injection of liquid nitrogen into your bloodstream”; a sad young girl standing at a bus stop becomes “the imploded soul smoldering behind the veneer of a Dolce & Gabbana dress her stepmother bought her for Christmas.” Your neighbor’s puppy? “A small cloud of golden fur and paws, engulfing any living thing near enough to share energy and intrigue.”

We’re just wired differently, our synapses preconditioned to firing in such a way as to illuminate the information passing through them with vigor and flourish. We need to create.

With the exception of the few weeks I spent recanting my trip to Florida for a wedding last spring, I’ve done zero creative writing over the past year—nearly two years, in fact. And without a blank Word document to regularly pour my foaming head into, the sound has become maddening at times. I need an outlet. As Chris Hardwick is fond of saying, I need to go out and create a thing. And I’m single, childless, and far from rich enough to wander self-destructively through Hollywood, so blogging it is.

As for the venue, well that’s trickier than you might think. Crooked Straight seems like an obvious choice, given the obvious reasons. But the original intent of the site was entertainment and culture; a place where you could see a scantily-clad, little-known model, download a Kanye album, or watch a funny meme take shape*. The random, probably-boring-to-everyone-other-than-me thoughts in my head? Nah.

[*If Kev, TJ, and I had any real follow-through, this place would’ve been a force in the world of online media. The talent was there, but life and peripherals got in our way. If only blogging had a 30 for 30.]

…but I still have the keys to the joint. And it’s not like the site’s being used for anything else. So, for now, I’ll post here. At least until I find some other corner of the internet to mumble to myself in. Then I’ll leave CS to the ghosts of bikini model aspirations and hood rich rap dreams.

But at least I’ll be creating.

5 Things I Think

[stealing Justin's idea from last year...]

• Watching Sarah Tiana vs. Earl Skakel in the semi-finals of the Roast Battle last weekend is the closest I'll ever come to being someone in the audience when B. Rabbit obliterates Poppa Doc in the final battle of 8 Mile.
  
  
• There are three categories of Trump supporters: (1.) The willfully ignorant. These are the cretans being led by their noses, susceptible to the the fear-mongering his campaign has hosed them down with . (2.) The white nationalists. These are the political racists, all too happy that someone on so grand a stage has given their extremist views a voice. (3.) The greedy capitalists. These are the 1%ers, who are willing to turn a blind eye to the ignorance and overt racism, because Trump being in power will mean they can enjoy more tax cuts and more absurdity of wealth without having to contribute anything back to society.
  
  
• Trump didn't invent GOP fearmongering. Let's not kid ourselves--we're witnessing the evolutionary byproduct of Karl Rove's political strategies, the blueprint that led to eight years of Dubya sitting in the oval office, repeatedly embarrassing our country.
  
  
• I miss writing. I really do. The past few days I've found myself wistfully reading through old On the Rocks posts. Though the feelings of longing that those tales bring about have as much to do with missing my youth as much as missing my keyboard.
  
  
• Parties should never have structure. Some people have a hard time with that. They want parties to have themes, and each guest to have an all-in mentality. You can't structure fun. Just let people get together, pour a drink, and relax.

Strike up the Band?

I need a whiskey stipend. I get paid well enough and all, but… What’s wrong with getting an extra $100—after taxes—each paycheck, that's devoted specifically to a good bottle of whiskey? Not a damn thing that I can see.

*blows dust off bar stool*

*pulls it out and plops down*

If anyone out there is reading this; no, you’re not seeing a ghost. I’m still around. I miss this place. TJ mentioned our old Rummy awards the other day, and my mind traced way back to 10 months ago when those were still a thing. Good times.

I think you can actually guess what happened [Well, if you’re over 30 you can; if you’re younger than that…god bless. You have no idea how things both simultaneously speed up and slow down in the years ahead. It really, really sucks a rhino’s ass.]: Life got me.

No, I’m not married. Or engaged. Or in a relationship. And no, no kids. I always thought those were the harbingers of the misery people older than me seemed to be in. But they’re just accessories to the crime. The real villain? Complacency.

I’ve grown accustomed to everything in my daily life. Wake up. Play Angry Birds. Get showered. Brush teeth. Shave (maybe). Go to work. Work. Yell at a computer screen. Work. Hate life. Come home. TV/video games. Brush teeth. Go to bed. Repeat.

Notice that writing isn’t nestled anywhere in there?

Writing is my true love. If life were a movie, writing would be the girl next door who I was cool with my whole life, messed around with in college, and then didn’t realize until my early adulthood that I truly had feelings for. We never really could find a way to put our differences aside and make it official between us. She stood by me through good times and bad; but, as time marched on and life—as it always does—got more complicated, I neglected her. And, heartbroken, she left.

I want us to be together, writing. Forever, and truly. But I’ve got to get my shit together. We both know it. And holding you back while I do that, it’s just not fair to you. So here we are, standing in the rain. Me with my 2010 Dell Insperion keyboard. You with your empty blog fields. Why can’t we just make it all right? Why can’t we make it happen?

…By the way, if you’re wondering where all of this is going, and why it’s gone where it has, then just let me say I’m in the same boat. Where are we? What day is it?

Okay, I’ll stop f’ing around with you now. The bottom line is that my drinking stories have stopped because I’m too tired/lazy/malcontent to type and publish them. The blog, as a whole, has stopped, because I can’t be bothered to squeeze time into my daily schedule to post things.

Look, I don’t want this site to die. Maybe it’s just my penchant for holding onto the past (don’t know if you’ve picked up on that from my having a blog specifically dedicated to my drinking stories…), but this site has been a big part of my life for eight plus years. When it first started in 2007, I thought that by 2016 we’d be the next BuzzFeed. We were SO close. I blame TJ, really.

TJ. He made an offhand remark months ago about me dragging out this site’s life for longer than I should have. Well, contrary to his understanding of the world, I don’t have to conform to his personal qualms with the world around him. The fact that his social and economic dynamics don’t allow him to allow himself expression through written word, and through sharing stories about his past/present, is a sad one. But it has no bearing on whether my social and economic dynamics do the same to me. So, as much as I love the man like a Jewish brother neither of my parents can comfortably explain, his opinion on this particular matter means jack shit to me.

And let no one think that it caused my withdrawal from Crooked Straight. I read it, brushed it off, and kept moving. But life… Life got me.

Maybe I’ll find my way back. Over a year ago, The Hero basically bequeathed the site to me. So it’s future, if there is one, is in my hands. And all I can tell you at this moment is: I don’t know. The first step would have to involve quitting my job. At a minimum, a change in the management structure at said job would have to happen. The second step might have to involve a winning PowerBall ticket. Of course, then I’d probably be too busy cruising the Mediterranean with my wife, Hiromi Oshima, on our mega yacht…

I’d probably hire TJ to type up blog posts for me, though.

Whatevs

It’s been too long since I’ve let my brain loose. I’ve spent weeks, months caging it in spreadsheets, business plans, and emails. In Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat—even Google+. Cruelty, thy name is a computer screen.

Ironic, then, that I’m curing that with…another computer screen. Whatever. This is free-form writing. It doesn’t have to make sense.

Of course, free-form writing has now been co-opted by blogging. I blog, but typically do so with a set purpose. A subject, some opinions about said subject, maybe a funny video or a scintillating picture to support said opinions about said subject… I’ve lived in that wheelhouse for years now. Sure, it gets lonely on weekends and the landlord hasn’t fixed the leaky roof, but… Whatever. It doesn’t have to make sense.

Boredom is to blame for this rare, random break from the mundane normality of—and, as some might point out, scarce population of—this blog. I’m bored on a Thursday night. Of course, you could replace “Thursday” in that sentence with any of the other six days, and you’d probably still be right. Welcome to your late thirties. Life starts to feel like a warning message to the 20somethings around you.

“The end is nigh! Enjoy the late night booty calls, lack of worry about…anything, and feeling like the envy of the rest of the world!”

Sounds like fun, right? Ah, what am I talking about. No 20somethings are sitting at a computer screen reading this right now. You’re all out tweeting your twerkers and Tindering your Instagrams. Damn kids.

Me, I’m sipping a glass of bourbon and sitting here. Wondering what’s next. Maybe I’ll just go watch the news. Whatever. It doesn’t have to make sense.

Shit Just Got Real

Spotted this on the news while I was in the barber's chair tonight and cracked the fuck up.



I mean...it is called a Porta-Potty. Seems pretty mobile to me.

Dearly Departed

This is just one of the many reasons why I love my friends. The following is a random conversation that started between four of us on Twitter earlier today (with some slight editing done for grammar and format). This is what happens when you open the floor for discussion between W&J grads. It doesn't matter if it's just the guys shooting the shit, or if our female cohorts (Alex, for instance) are involved. Shit. Gets. Real.

Joe: "My greatest fear is that, somewhere, someone is pointing at a picture of my girlfriend, as karma rears its ugly head. I fear that 30 years from now, I will be attending a reunion somewhere and will be the subject of snickers and points."

Me: "I've always said that about 'Heart Break'. I mean...some poor guy MARRIED her. lol. He has no clue."

Joe: "Same here. I see some poor guys who have married some fellow alumni and I... *bites lip to keep from laughing*"

Alex: "I feel fairly certain that will happen to me regardless."

Me: "I think you'll be okay. Def not in same class of gals as I'm talking about (and I use the term 'class' loosely)."

Alex: "Their class isn't the only thing that's loose..."

Armo: "I live in Heart Break's old house, and sometimes I feel a chill of cold air go by, and a phantom itch."

Me: "...and hear the somber groan of a deceased vagina."

Joe: "Deceased? It lived more in four years than I will in a thousand lifetimes. If we were 10 years younger, it would've trended on Twitter."

Alex: "I seriously have tears rolling down my cheeks from laughing."

Joe: "It probably deserves a Facebook memorial page, too."

Alex: "I'm thinking blog...Diaries of a Deceased Vagina."

Armo: "The Vagina Eulogies? #OffBroadway"

Joe: "Think of all the young men it touched. Made so many people happy. Like the Jerry Lewis of vaginas."

FLOTUS Like a Butterfly, Sting Like a Bee

Here's an excerpt from my phone conversation with my old man today.

Dad: "So long as [President Obama] doesn't do anything stupid before election day, like beat on Michelle, he should be okay."

Me: "Well, yeah, he'd have other things to worry about..."

Dad: "He'd have to deal with me. I'd have to go up to Washington and teach him some manners."

Me: "I don't even think you'd have to—Michelle can handle herself. If he slapped her around, he'd be on a cart being pulled up Pennsylvania Ave LONG before the election."

Dad: "A woman that we walk with at the track told me, 'Michelle Obama isn't attractive.' I said, 'Hater.'"


(For the record, that's a 75-year-old man calling someone a "hater." Don't ever wonder where I get it from.)