minimal

after laughter comes tears

Hey! I'm here. Starting in to Week 2 on the NJ (new job). TGIM am I right? Here are some quick impressions after Week 1:

- the break room has six garbage cans.

- there's a field full of sheep nearby.

- I was reaching in the fridge for my lunch and accidentally knocked over a huge tupperware thing full of lima beans. My goodness there were beans everywhere! I picked them up one by one even though they were gross and slimy. I felt really bad though because if someone had destroyed my snack, even as weird a snack as that, I'd be pretty cranked. So I left a note and a dollar on the now empty tupperware thing in the fridge. Later that day I was back in the breakroom trying to decide which garbage can to throw my empty sugar packets in when a few people had a laugh at my note, not knowing it was me. I guess they find decency funny.

Friday night I decided to celebrate the new job proper by hitting the town. Went to the gallery stroll. It was uh... well the weather was nice. Apparently some people really don't care for it though.

Then we went to the Bayou (a private club for members) where I accidentally ordered a drink in a fancy glass with a straw. That happens to me a lot and I hate it. From now on the only cocktail I'm ever going to order is a lemon juice and lighter fluid.

Whoa by the way I can't say enough good things about the ahi taco at the Bayou. I want some right now.

I got a little buzzy but I tried really hard to keep it professional so as not to appear foolish.

Big Lebowski, for probably the 78th time. Still holds up.

I slept on a couch and left for home at 6am. Almost every street was blocked by a battalion of cop cars. I didn't know what was going on and assumed the worst but it turns out they were just blocking the route for the Salt Lake Marathon. That little fun run nearly ruined Record Store Day.


(illustration courtesy of http://thisismattsart.blogspot.com/)


Record Store Day! My new favorite holiday, right up there with Thanksgiving and Comic-Con. It's a nationwide event to promote indie record stores. Lots of limited edition vinyl was released just for RSD. It was amazing. I got to Graywhale as it opened and they sold out of everything within a few minutes. There was this Beard Guy there being a real beardguy and I had to be impolite in order to grab New Order's "Temptation" before they ran out. I went to another store later and the same Beard Guy was being all loud and stupid. Anyway here's what I got.

Is it dorky that I laid everything out and took a picture of it? Remember Green Day's "Dookie"? Did you like it when you were 14? Well it turns out it's actually even better than you remember. Listen to it again, front to back. Do it! That Misfits album was probably the CD I played the most back in 2001. The CD is too scratched to even play now.

I think my favorite thing is a 45 I bought not even knowing what it was. Lykke Li - After Laughter.

Sunday I went to a church for a baptism. It was a great looking church. Nice modern, refreshing design.

And the pastor looked just like the Transporter.

Angry Woman overheard at Target: "They are making WAY too big of a deal about Wolverine!"

Different Angry Woman: "Star Wars! There's a whole aisle just for Star Wars! Argh!"

The good news is, they finally made an action figure of the singer from Nickelback.

the lord's chips

Wow what a weekend! I wore a tie and then got a job so I went to the Pioneer Museum and got an iPhone and for the first time ever ate tacos from a cart on the street and then baseball home opener and Nacho Libre and soft little goats and Emily A. got peed on by a rabbit and later I wore a wig and the next morning ate so much breakfast and then Gordon spent four hours talking about potatoes.

Whew! Let's slow it down a bit. Big job interview Friday morning. Later that afternoon I found out I got it so I did what any young man in a celebrating sort of mood would do.

I went to look at portraits of grim, scowling people at the Pioneer Memorial Museum.

This place is great and you should go there if you haven't ever been, or if you haven't been back since that once field trip in Elementary School.

They have all sorts of cool stuff in addition to portraits. Like a creepy flag.


And proof that the 1880s were truly the Golden Age of party invitation and souvenir program design.



The museum also has rocks a plenty, bones (animal bones and baby skull), old tools, guns and swords, a big stained glass window, a room full of creepy dolls, ladies pioneer clothing (hott!), Indian stuff, and a coke machine.

I had my first taco cart taco. From now on that will be all I eat.

Just like last year, coooold opening day for your Salt Lake Bees. Great game.

The flag was at half-mast for Nick Adenhart, who spent most of last season wearing the Bees' black and gold. I'd be lying if I said I remembered seeing him play, but I may have at some point. This story had me in tears.


...
Friday night I was forced to watch Nacho Libre against my will. I was all ready to hate it but then I accidentally really loved it. Hahahaha. Oh Nacho.


Hey, look at this cute little guy, dressed all nice for the day's work.


Waitaminute what's in his briefcase? No...

Saturday: eight people, two cars, heading north. A brief stop in Ogden, the most photogenic city in America.*



* -if you like photos of neon signs, old diners bars and motels, old churches, abandoned factories, and train tracks. Which I do.

Why this trip? To see the lost spirit of America's farmland. To find the holy in the rust and dirt. To stand among the lightning and let it take it's best shot.



No, we went to play with baby animals!

This goat's fur was as soft as a kitten.


I found a bunny. I named him Ghost. He's a direbunny.

Whoa look at the size of that gut behind me! I just noticed that.

Emily A: "This bunny is peeing on me! It's peeing on me right now!"



She certainly didn't deserve it, but I'm awfully glad it happened.

Everyone seemed to have a favorite animal. Becky liked the goats.


Oh great. One of those old time bicycles that make me so uncomfortable. Time to go.


Goodbye, critters.


Another account of baby animal day here.


Later that night circumstances found me at a tea and wig party. (tea and wig parties are the next twitter. you heard it here first).

This bunny hat made Elin look even more adorable than usual.


And it made Terrence look bad-ass. What a wonderful hat.


Sunday morning I breakfast buffet'd. That was a good decision. That night the family sat down for easter dinner. Since Sean is out of town Neko had to fill in for him.


This is worth repeating:


Monday. First day of work. Bringing it back around with another trip to the taco stand.



And time for this year's official "I Love Springtime in SLC" pic.

those were the days

There's a whole lot to talk about from this weekend and I want to get to it as soon as I can but I have to go to bed because tomorrow morning I will be waking up earlier than I have since high school.

In the meantime, check out these old pictures I found from back before I started shaving my head every week.

goofing off

I have two very important pieces of news.

1) I got a job. It's with a company and my job title is King of the Office or something. It's a grown-up job so this will probably be the last I'll mention of it 'cause I reckon I should probably be professional.

I'm still working on my novel though, so don't worry about that.

2) I made an Easter Egg that looks like Spiderman.



The egg-dying occurred at my new friend Morgan's house.

He belongs to Christopher and Tasha. Last week I went adventuring in small-town Utah with Tasha as the guide. The destination was Tasha's homebase, Morgan. What are the chances that she'd be from Morgan and then end up having a kid named Morgan?

I took this as a good sign:


We went to a restaurant called, um... well I can't remember. But it was really good. I had a burger that used pita bread instead of a bun! Only in Morgan, as they say.

I also attacked this insanely large pink cookie.


There's a neat industrial/ghost-towny area called Croydon. Lots of iron and rust. I think I'll go back and try to get some more pictures. This road leads to a cement plant and some cows.

Bridge.


The city of Morgan is pastoral and rainy. It also has a haunted (presumably) church that has burned down three times. The latest time it was the hippies' fault.


This is called the Devil's Slide. This picture was actually taken in 2003 but it hasn't changed much since then.


end of post.

the ghosts of me and you (addendum)

per Eped's request:

please elaborate on the following:
your conversation with The Dude.
that time w/ the supermarket nazis.

The Dude at the Belge. There's a fishtank up by the front and I was waiting to pay and a guy came up and was really interested in the fishtank. He had long dirty wavey hair and a goatee, looked to be in his early forties, and was wearing a silky bowling-style shirt. He looked exactly like the Dude.



He was tapping on the glass and said to me "I just got one of these today." I thought he was talking about one of the fish so I said "Oh, what is it?" and he said "a big piece of coral."

Seems The Dude's friend (maybe Walter?) had gotten him a big piece of coral for his birthday, which was that day. Then he continued tapping on the tank as though he was looking at newborns in a nursery. Also he smelled good.


Nazis! The year was 1997. It was a Saturday night and I was with two of my friends. I don't remember exactly what we were doing but we were probably on our way to some party with lots of hot girls. I was wearing my Ska jacket because I wasn't to content to just wear it to shows, I wore it about town. It was a good conversation starter. Anyway, we go to Albertson's and there's these two skinheads hanging out by the entrance.

I can't tell if they're the racist kind of skinhead or not so I kind of look at them and they say something to me, but I'm not sure what.

For the uninitiated, I should point out that a lot of the bands represented on my jacket were known for their anti-racist activism.

So I stop and one of them says "White Power" and I'm like "Wha? No..."

My two friends disappear inside of the store. One of the guys pulls up his sleave to show off his third reich eagle and swastika tattoo while the other guy just keeps saying "White power!" Tattoo guy doesn't say anything ever but sig-heils to punctuate the other guy's sentences.

I don't even remember what I say back to them, but then the big guy threatens to squash me and everyone like me "We'll squash you! White Power!"

Later I realized that I should have said "Just like you squashed Jesse Owens in '36?" but you know how you always think of those witty rejoinders when it's too late.

Their words get much more threatening so I do what any man would have done: I walk into the store.

I hung out in there for a long time until I was sure they were gone. I spent the rest of the weekend looking over my shoulder.

the ghosts of me and you

It all started here, during Leland's countdown of his ten favorite albums of the year. Surprise of surprises, Less Than Jake checked in at number 7. Less Than Jake. A name I've not thought of in a long, long time.

Really though, it started here. Ages ago, in 1996. I was working at the Holladay Library, and with my very first paycheck I went to the Sam Goody at the Cottonwood Mall and bought Less Than Jake's seminal album, Losing Streak.

That same day I bought the nylon flight jacket that I would bedeck with buttons and patches bearing the logos of ska bands young and old. The same jacket I was wearing when I ran afoul of some nazis in front of the Albertson's (a story for another time).

Intrigued by Lee's very well written review, I got Less Than Jake's latest, GNV FLA. It's great. It might be their best record yet. LTJ quickly became the official soundtrack of Adventure Days and when I saw that they were coming to play in my town I got awfully excited. What follows is a chronicle of one of my funnest nights in recent memory.

I decided my flight jacket should probably remain in the back of the closet where it can't hurt anybody. I wanted to show off my old-school credentials somehow though so I transfered the back-patch to my favorite hoodie.

It's held on there with safety pins, which is totally punk.

I'd never been to the MURRAY SUPERTHEATER before but I have admired their sign from afar.


Great place. I hope it survives and starts taking away shows from In the Venue, the worst music venue in the history of music.

This was the Expendables, a very confusing band.


First of all, those aren't even green lights, just regular lights made green by all the ganja smoke in the air. This band was so confusing! Kind of this Sublimey rocksteady sound punctuated with Luca Turilli-esque guitar solos, made by guys that look like a second-tier nu-metal band. And every song is about smoking bowls.

I'm not trying to be mean, just painting a picture. I actually really liked them. I was just confused.

Waiting for Less Than Jake, Lee and I could barely contain our excitement. Well not really. A couple of old punks like us don't give a shit about anything or anyone.

They came out to the Star Wars theme, then played along with it. So, that's great. Hard to get pictures early on because of all the slam moshing.

Luckily the whole crowd seemed to run out of breath at the same time (which is to say, about fifteen minutes after I was completely spent), and things settled down.

Roger said it was the biggest circle pit the theater had ever seen. And I didn't think it would ever be possible to top the one at the Mason Jennings show.

Lots of banter between songs.

Although...

Dear Touring Bands,

We've heard all the jokes. 3.2 beer, polygamy, etc.

Sincerely,

Utah Audiences.

The show ended strong with "Does the Lion City Still Roar," and "Look What Happened," (all these links I'm posting are optional, by the way).

Encore started with a sort of solo version of "The Rest of My Life."

JR came out to provide some solid backing vocals.


Then Buddy Goldfinger filled in a kick-ass trombone solo. (that's right. I said "kick-ass trombone solo.")

Finished up with the two opening tracks from the latest album and "All My Best Friends are Metalheads."

Since this whole thing was kind of a high school throwback, we ended up at a place I haven't been to since high school, The Belge.

They have a surprisingly good burger. And the waitress seemed genuinely concerned that we drive safe.

I also had a nice conversation about fish tanks with The Dude, which is amazing because he's a fictional character.

Anyway, Less Than Jake rules.