WHAT WAS HIS NAME????

anybody remember the cartoons from saturday mornings with the sheepdog and the coyote...i think they were warner brothers...they always used the same sheepdog...and actually they just used wile e. coyote for the coyote...
anyway...in the cartoon i'm thinking of the coyote and the sheepdog both arrive at the field where the sheep are pasturing and they both are carrying lunch pails and as they arrive they greet each other..."mornin' ralph" "morning sam"...except i don't think the other guy was called sam...and i' can't remember which one was ralph...and then they clock in at some old fashioned clock punch thingy and do their thing (ie. the sheepdog guards and the coyote tries to steal the sheep...)...hilarity and hijinks and mayhem ensue...and then they punch out "evenin' ralph" "evening sam"...
well that's what i think of when i get on and off the subway at don mills station (yes the whole other end of the sheppard line...)...i imagine myself greeting my fellow travellers the exact same way..."morning ralph" "morning paul"..."see ya ralph" "evening paul"...it's not like i know them or anything...just fellow travellers...ya know...? how do you get to know those people?
probably i'm under a lot of stress...underslept...too much time to think on ttc...
"morning ralph" ... "evening paul"...

in other news..."fortress of solitude"

i'm reading "fortress of solitude" by jonathan lethem...about a white kid growing up in black brooklyn in the 70's...really good...also not too much with the plot...but really good...background politics and race relations and pop culture are very cool too...
my favourite part so far...page 109...[and for michelle - the best friend is biracial...]
"It was entirely possible that one song could destroy your life. Yes, musical doom could fall on a lone human form and crush it like a bug. The song, that song, was sent from somewhere else to find you, to pick the scab of your whole existence. The song was you personal shitty fate, manisfest as a throb fo pop floating out of radios everywhere.
At the very least the song was the soundtrack to your destruction, the theme. Your days reduced to a montage cut to its cowbell beat, inexorable doubled bass line and raunch vocal, a sort of chanted sneer, surrounded by groans of pleasure. The stutter and blurt of what -- a tuba? french horn? Rhythm guitar and trumpet, pitched to mockery. The singer might as well have held a gun to your head. How could it have been allowed to happen, how could it have been allowed on the radio? That song ought to be illegal. It wasn't racist -- you'll never sort that one out, don't even start -- so much as anti-you.
Yes they were dancing, and singing, and movin' to the groovin, and just when it hit me, somebody turned around and shouted -
Every time your sneakers hit the street, teh end of that summer, somebody was hurling it at your head, that song...
...September 7, 1976, the week Dylan Ebdus began seventh grade in the main building on Court Street and Butler, Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music" was the top song on the rhythm and blues charts. Fourteen days later it topped Billboard's pop charts. Your misery's anthem, number one song in the nation.
Sing it through gritted teeth: WHITE BOY!
Lay down the boogie and play that funky music 'til you die."

from "the fortress of solitude" by jonathan lethem.



...i read about this book while reading "polysyllabic spree" by nick hornby...

...and then a chihuahua tried to eat my new boots right off my feet!

where did it all go wrong?
see today...again...i was really stressing out...really working everything i had...to make our sales goal...in the retail establishment that i am now (for the past month or so) basically assistant manager of (different title. same job)...like i was helping my staff to help themselves help more customers...like i got some kinda belief...where am i?...who am i?...how did i get here?...
...this is the kinda thinking that comes from too much time on transit coming home from Willowdale(!?)...and too long waiting for the king car...mofo...and the thinking...(!?)...SIGH(!!)...
...and it's winter...and some stupid chihuahua who lives on the laneway came out to try to defend his territory from me (!?)...barking and growling...and trying to bite my feet inside my new boots (and these boots really are my feet away from feet i tell you what...) all the way down the laneway!!! da fock?!...
i used to be in a band! (admittedly we weren't very good...and things got dicey when we went all fleetwood mac [by "we" i mean jen and murray...]...and then when jen left the band we weren't very pretty either...)...i used to have street cred! (at least i'm pretty sure i did...)...i wore doc martens and had jeans with holes in them and long hair and then short hair!...i don't care if i'm making any sense!...maybe now you feel guilty about not calling me up to take me out for beers...so there...
besides my girlfriend is making nachos and she brought me a big beer from our fridge! watchugot?

fortress of solitude...that's what i'm reading...playing with metaphor...maybe metafive

tonight we're gonna put some pillows and blankets down on the floor in the living room, and watch movies...popcorn fresh from the stove top and still warm...beers...and snacks...
flickering blue lights...
like a dream of home, safety...like it already is even if the world is not exactly as we would have it be...hmmm...the idea is there...and i love sarah.

road trip...ptbo...haiku...tired...mmm, irish cream...just a blog postcard really

hey yeah so i went to peterboro last night to see gord and pete for his birthday...it was a really really nice time. those guys are great. wish i could see more of them.
i spent the drive up to ptbo composing haikus. i actually came up with this one really good one too...only all the drinking and stuff ate away that part of my brain...the first line was something like "country road, country sky"...only better and more poetic... and there was something about the possibilities between headlights...only with less syllables...6-7-6 right?...the poem evoked a sense of satisfaction and adventure in the every day, and possibilities and hopes and dreams maybe... i was working on another one on the way back into town about winter sunlight through glass being something special...i know...less ambitious but i was tired and warm...made me think of "cryptonomicon" - one of the main characters is a marine in ww2 who likes to compose haikus...and he comes up with a really good one in the first page i think...ask michelle - and adam read it last...
nice to be home now.

oh yeah i forgot to make you all jealous...except dan i guess...

so last night sarah and i went on a date to hugh's room to see the silver hearts. it was pretty awesome. many transplanted peterborions. even our waiter. it was pretty special. the room is pretty good for old folks like us who mostly want to sit down but still be able to see the show. also the show ended just before midnight - another plus for old people out on a weeknight. they were really good. played many of our favourite songs. also they had many special guests. serena ryder played and i guess i'm gonna have to rethink what i think about her music...cuz she's gotten better and written some new songs. one of her songs was this power ballad called "weak in the knees" that would make both pat benatar and aerosmith jealous. really made me wish i had a lighter i tell you. plus at the end of it just as it faded out sarah said pretty loudly "i was just thinking how you've finally found a serena ryder song you liked..." (or words to that effect...)...just as the song was fading...she said the loud part during the quiet part...oh that sarah...i love her.
but also they had a real surprise special guest. it was kinda funny to see ron sexsmith up there with a huge band behind him, but also pretty cool. he shoulda tossed more solos to the band and stuff but it was still pretty special. and dan's right - he does have wierdly large hands - what do you call him dan?
anyway that's it for tonight. stay tuned for the trials and tribulations of a man who has become retail management...brought into the store for his problem-solving abilities...hmmm...there's a clue there methinks...

sitting here with some irish cream...many thoughts signifying nothing...or maybe everything...something in the middle

so i'm home from work. listened to tom waits all the way home - "mule variations"...maybe my favourite tom waits album...maybe...hard to say really...anyway, stepped off the streetcar onto deserted marion street...bare tree branches silhouetted against light reflected off clouds arching over the street from both sides, and yellow streetlights glowing into falling snow. here's me feeling meditative.
actually the song "come on up to the house" was playing as i walked along marion. i had the volume up pretty high cuz it's such a gorgeous album - the recording is just awesome...the most beautiful sounds captured and with headphones you can even hear the room in such a sweet way...
...here's me feeling more meditative. that song is somehow really important to me. "well the moon is broken and the sky is cracked, you gotta come on up to the house/the only thing that you can see is all that you lack you gotta come on up to the house..." "...there's nothing in the world that you can do, you gotta come on up to the house/you been whipped by the forces that are inside you, you gotta come on up to the house". it's that little oasis kinda place, something i've always looked for/hoped for...adam's family has played this role at different times in my life, showing me that families can work...be good things...be good homes...and lotsa friends have shown me all kinds of gentle generosities with their couches and tables and living rooms and sometimes other rooms too...but i've always imagined that when i grow up i'd make my home into that place too...as much as i could. my friends should always have a place to come to or go to in my house. family too i guess although that's got some hard sharp edges. i've always wanted that, and it's always been very important to me to be able to offer that. i've even imagined a future where our children's friends know that our house is safe. sarah says her house was like that growing up. not so much my house. wasn't even so safe for us really. maybe that goes toward why i feel so much about having/offering that. maybe it says something too about seeing clearly to a place or time when that can be real...something about how i'm in a good place with sarah. (she wants to have a basement so our strays plus me and the kids don't overrun the place...smart woman...) i guess it's my best idea about how to make a difference in the world...make the world a better place - realistically speaking making the world better usually happens in small ways...sometimes our responses are all we have...our local variety store got robbed last year, and all i could think to do was to introduce myself and find out the names of the guys who worked in the store...a response...one of the only times i was really proud of my dad was when i was in my early teens and the neighbours - the desmarais's - were having it out bigtime. steve desmarais's dad was really laying into him - we could hear every word...it was city housing, a duplex with us on one side and them on the other. he was saying really awful things to steve, who was also one of my friends, and making threats...well when steve came outside, scared and crying my dad brought him into our house. made me proud. never mind the hypocrisy of all the times the desmarais's heard my dad yelling the same kinds of things at me...anyway...life is complicated huh? someday, that's what my house is gonna be. and our kids will know too that if their friends are in something bad that our house is a good place. their friends will know it too i hope...all my people gotta know about our house.
wow maybe i should be drunker...

the other day i was riding the subway home and i saw this dad and little son sitting together reading the wish book, which is sears christmas catalogue...well i'd forgotten about the wish book. it was a big deal when i was a kid. the day it arrived...we'd all sit down with it, me and my siblings, and that was when we really made our christmas lists. it had a whole section of "gifts under x dollars"(different amounts on each spread) starting at ten dollars, and we'd look a little harder for the cheap gifts cuz even as kids we had some ideas about how money and christmas went together, but we'd look at everything in that catalogue. basically it was a book of dreams...and hopefully some would come true...dreaming was so nice we'd even come back to the wish book every couple of days, hoping to find something we'd missed. i don't know if those folks on the subway used the wish book the same way as the wehrle kids did, or if it meant any of the same things...i'd just forgotten about the wish book for a long time...christmas is complicated...

picture this...i'm standing on the west bound platform of the yonge subway line at yonge and bloor station...late rush hour, so not super busy but still lotsa people...tears slipping silently down my cheeks, actually dropping onto my jacket cuz i'm finishing one of the better books i've read in a while...some sadness, some courage...i was finishing "shadow of the wind" by jose ruiz zafon. stephen king has a quote on the cover describing it as "one gorgeous read". good description really. also had great quotes - "love is like pork..."something about a nice tenderloin and bologna being part of it...genius. it's set in barcelona between the 1920's and 50's. really interesting historical period too. world war, government overthrow, fascism... throw in a mysterious book and a love story and some tragedies...some of you might be getting a copy of this book as a christmas present....

also before that i was reading "a fine balance" by rohinton mistry. probably one of the best books i've ever read. it was the first time i was actually afraid to finish a book cuz i knew it was gonna break my heart. but i did. and it did.

now i'm reading "the wisdom of crowds". it's really interesting actually. about the idea that a diverse group of people will come up with a better solution than any single expert, even if the group is not made of experts or even particularly knowledgeable people....the author, james surowiecki, uses some pretty amazing examples - like the 800 folks who guessed the weight of a prize bull after butchering and the average of their guesses was only off by one pound - none of the guesses were closer....or the stock market after the challenger shuttle disaster - immediately after the challenger exploded, the stock market responded by selling off stocks of the four companies involved in the shuttle...what's surprising is that the company stocks that suffered the worst (by far) was for the company that would be found culpable 6 months later. no explanation could be found for this phenomenon, and many were investigated. kinda spooky really.

so we got our computer back. and tonight i was in the mood to talk. so here's my blog updated after so long that michelle resorted to typing echoes at me...hmm...kinda funny that one. but now i've run out of steam...and irish cream. i'm gonna go sleep. glad to be back.