unreasonable.org

In honor of this fine spring day, Tom Lehrer's "Poisoning Pigeons In The Park". "Spring is here, spring is here, life is skittles and life is beer."

(My mom introduced me to Tom Lehrer's work. Also to George Carlin. I do love my mom.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EYAUazLI9k

From March 23 2009: in a promotional stunt for a Belgian reality-TV program "In Search of Maria" "The Sound of Music", more than 200 dancers (with just two rehearsals!) put on this number from "The Sound of Music", in the Central Station of Antwerp. It's staged of course(!), but the passengers weren't in on it. Some discussion here.

Les Paul, one of the inventors of the solid body electric guitar, pioneer of multi-track recording, has left us. Rest in peace Les, you did good work.

Went to the open mic at Cacao Lane Wednesday, played a few songs - longest I've played since I crushed my finger, and didn't have any pain. Hooray!

Interesting episode afterwards:

the Buddha said, "do not drink alcohol"
I've never quite agreed with the Buddha on that one

and he's not
here, now
sitting at this bar
next to a young man who wants to buy us all shots
to toast the memory of his dead girlfriend

if I were the Buddha
maybe I could say something amazing about the
illusory nature of birth and death
that would help ease his pain

but I am not the Buddha

St Paddy's Day - or Irish Pride day, as I prefer to think of it... down to Leadbetters for a few in honor.

For a while I've had just a line or two from a potential song about me sainted Irish grandmother in the back of my head...

This is a song about Marion
A girl I never knew
An Irish lass from Baltimore town
With a heart so sweet and true

Now Marion could play the blues
In a dark and smoky bar
Or she could sing a hymn so sweet
T'would make your soul see stars

This is song about Marion
A girl I never knew
An Irish lass from Baltimore town
With a heart so sweet and true

Promotions at the dojo today...didn't have any students going up, but spend the day helping out. Think I wrenched a muscle in my back, so I've come down to Leadbetter's for some muscle relaxant and some tunes.

Now that the smoking ban is in effect, they have these little card you put on your drink if you go out to suck on the penis of corporate America. It says "Out smoking - Leave my drink alone". Which seems a good phrase for a writing exercise:

...interrupted by nice Nihonjin lady who wanted to practice her English. (Might have wanted more, if I read her right, but not my type.) Stayed out late, slept in, today just rested, browsed Den Den town (photos and notes toward novel potential), shipped home a box of souvenir stuff (cramming into my luggage would have been too much chance of damage - it'll take two months to get home, but I can wait). Dinner at Santana, later to Cellar for Ame-mura folk jam. Tomorrow, I think Kamakura; Saturday, should be good events to see in Kyoto.

1) I am in love again, watching the cute singer of one of the bands here at the Amemura folk jam. Can't understand a word she''s singing, but it it doesn't matter.

2) New favorite Japanese beer - Asahi Black. Porter sort of brew. Nice.

So I'm hanging out at the Cellar now, the Amemura Folk Jamboree, the only white guy in a roomful of Nihonjin. A warm welcome from the bartender and from the M of C, who remember me from my previous time here - very nice. Tonight I've set down the first few hundred words toward the potential novel that's been banging around in my head of late, a story of friendship between men and the entanglements of love and the difference between legal and right, and maybe a few other ideas too by the time it's done (if it ever is). Somehow it seems to me that the protagonists live in Den Den town (gives a nice background for cultural weirdness), so I wandered over there today, taking photos and a few notes.

Blogging from the new toy again, my Palm Centro. Kind of wild to be able to access the full internet on a pocketsize portable - Wikipedia and Google in my pocket. I can even ssh into work. (Not that I'd want to do a lot of work typing on this tiny keyboard, but for emergency access, rock on.)

Julie called this evening. the band and poets she had scheduled to play at Load of Fun had to cancel. So a couple of us Zeldaeans filled in with some poetry and music - Julie, Mike, Robin, and I had a nice little circle o' poetry.

An eventful week...Wednesday, Halloween, I played a happy hour gig at Leadbetter's. Good crowd for the holiday (Fells Point buzzes for Halloween) and I actually made decent money, almost $80 between tip and my share of the take from the bar. Not enough that I'm going to quit the day job, but $80 for four hours - $20 an hour - is respectable. I'd play more often if I could get gigs that paid like that, sure.

Hung out afterward for the night shift, crowded but generally having a good time enjoying the musical stylings of Johnny Smooth...until, during a break in his set, I made my way up front for some fresh air and looked outside, to see a pushing match, a fight brewing, in front of the Admiral's Cup a few doors down.

I told the guy on the door to call 911, and ran over to break things up. Yelling "Break it up! Break it up! Cops are on the way!", I did my best to cool things down, stepping between any pair who looked in conflict. It was impossible to figure out who was pissed with whom about what; but for that minute of two, my job was just to act as a sort of "anti-catalyst", preventing violent reactions.

At the BARC benefit at 2640 now, Mongoloidian Glow on the stage. Zelda's will be in a while, but I came down early, got some food at The Yabba Pot and then came over to give BARC a few bucks and support the AR cause a little.

Wednesday we had a planning meeting here for the Water For the Well benefit next weekend. I'm excited that Jeff, my uncle, is going to be on the bill - first time we've performed together. Afterward I caught (most of) a Halloween music and spoken-word show at the Metro Gallery.

Thursday, I played the Fell's Point Musician's Showcase at Leadbetters, got a good response to my hour. It was the first time I'd played there since I got back to the U.S.; I'll be back for the happy hour gig on Halloween.

Friday, our Samhain circle got rained out - we decided to move the date so we could still do it outside, rather than moving it indoors. So I got to go to the show at Kiss Cafe that Kelly put together. Saw Chris and Wes there, in one of those Smalltimore moments.

Yesterday, promotions at the dojo, a long day. Then went out to see Telesma play at the Metro Gallery, good show as always.

Zelda's Inferno writing exercise: write a poem from a wordlist, generated from the theme "renaissance festival":

unicycle, plague, corset, beer, joust, serf, glimmer, awkward, wench, pine, pirate, armor, rouge, constricting

sometimes I feel the constrictions
of my created self
that fiction that defines my character
that places awkwardly-drawn boundaries around
what I say and do

a plague of personalities
an armoring identity