pandagon has outlined the correct way to blog. that is, if you like that kind of thing. good luck.

Maybe it’s just me, but following a night of drinking with a morning of mountain biking seems just plain stupid. So of course I jumped at the chance. I went mountain biking this morning in Austin and paid the price. Is it possible to cough up a lung AND a liver? I think I did. Hikers, joggers, and bikers of the Barton Creek Greenbelt might notice them halfway up the hill at the end of the trail.

Things started getting rowdy. The two people you’re looking at hopped onto the table started shaking their tuchuses. Then everyone else started hooting and throwing dollar bills at them.

Or not. Anyway, the rest of the pictures are here.

This whole ‘voluntary unemployment before law school’ thing is rocking. I spend my days reading, vegging at the pool, riding my bike, catching up on various bloggage, playing guitar, and generally loafing around the apartment. It’s fantastic. I’ve got a nice little book list off to the right that I want to work through by August 16th, my first day of law school, a day that will likely mark the end of my leisure reading habit for a good long while. And since it’s summer, well, I figured I ought to give Michael Chabon’s Summerland a shot, especially since I liked his last book, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. It’s definitely one of my top 10.

I’m about half-way through and I wanted to see what anyone else out there that might have read it thinks.

So, has anyone else out there in Internet-land read it?

Summerland feels quite different than Kavalier and Clay. It feels, for lack of a better term, like a children’s book. It’s kind of like The Hobbit, Harry Potter, and something else I haven’t read rolled into one. The premise [so far] finds a couple 11-year-old kids trying to save the world but, first, one of the dads, who has been taken hostage by the Bad Guy, needs to be rescued. Yes, it’s a story of Good vs. Evil set in a fairy tale land. With Kavalier and Clay in mind, I didn’t expect this kind of thing from Chabon.

What also hints towards the kids’ book theory is the size of the text and the amount of text on each page. Getting through 10 pages of Kavalier and Clay took much longer than 10 pages of Summerland. It seems well suited to pre-teens. Then again, it’s 500 pages. When I was 12, there was no way you could have gotten me to read a 500-page book.

I don’t imagine the book will change much in the remaining 180 pages, so I’ll just sum up my thoughts now and refer to them when I finish: the suspense of finding out what other kind of shenanigans the kids will have to work through to save Dad and the world is strong enough to make me want to finish it, but, the book is still pretty damn corny.

I should also mention that there is a chance some of the basic elements of the book could be allegorical or metaphorical to something very real and pressing in the world, but who knows. Right now, it’s just corny.

I spent the afternoon with Sophia in Austin. We took a couple last shots of us hanging out on the balcony that was the greatest balcony of anyone any of us has ever known. It was the balcony to end all balconies. Seriously. Here’s a picture of us and a picture of her lookin’ hot. We hit Z-Tejas for dinner and gorged on a spiced chocolate cake for desert. Mmmm, Z-Tejas.

Then, on the way home, I was greeted with a late night traffic jam on I-35. You know, I love it when a three-lane highway gets taken down to one measly lane. Especially when I’m surrounded by 18-WHEELERS. Everywhere. Look, there’s two in this picture.

They were multiplying exponentially, sprouting from each other’s heads, crowding my Honda and every other normal 4-wheeled vehicle onto the shoulder.

Then we got the lanes back and I smoked all of them. Me and all four of my Honda’s cylinders. Word.

oh, the humanity.

Just got through watching Drugstore Cowboy. I’ve documented a few Lessons Learned:

1. William S. Burroughs cannot act. But he has a fantastic voice and speaking style.
2. Never place a hat on a bed.
3. If you ever plan on committing a crime that requires a car, do not bring a dog with you.
4. Do not hide drugs in the walls, kitchen, bedroom, furniture, cereal, golf bag, or floor.
5. Do not use drugs.

If you're looking for another good drug-centric movie, check out Requiem for a Dream. You won't sleep for weeks.

David Garza’s got a bunch of new tourdates up. For my Portland homies, he will be in your area on July 26th. For the LA crew, he’s booked for the 24th. He’ll be in Austin on the 14th, San Antonio on the 15th, Houston the 16th, and Dallas on the 17th. Do try to check him out. He puts on a good show, charges low cover, and is usually happy to hang out and chat afterwards.

In other news, I like this new exploding dog drawing. It’s very appropriate considering…

I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 yesterday. It made me ill. I really wanted to throw up. But only after I cried for that mother who lost her son. I knew things were bad but I didn’t know they were that bad. Man, they suck. Dubya has really got to go. I never expect politicians to be honest people – they always turn out to be corrupt in one way or another. Dubya, however, takes this whole sleaze thing to a new level.

All I can do now is crawl the web for any valid rebuttals to Moore’s evidence. So far, all I’ve read is this Slate article.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I went to a friend’s place for dinner last night. Along with dinner came ridiculous amounts of beer and port consumption. Before engaging in said activities, I neglected to consider an 8 am meeting scheduled the next morning with my entire team. It was one of those working / brainstorming sessions in which the bossman briefed us on the recent organizational changes and then went around the table asking each person to discuss their particular area of responsibility. Thankfully, I managed to avoid having to discuss anything since I’m, um, bailing. Abandoning ship. Later! In two weeks. My responsibilities are getting transitioned to other people.

so I got to sit there dehydrated, foggy, and loopy for the entire meeting. It was torture. And the best part?

IT WAS A THREE-HOUR MEETING. CHRIST.

Logically, the only thing to do tonight is a repeat of last night. Dehydration be damned. There's a girl in a pink skirt somewhere that i can embarass myself in front of.

Lamar Street Pale Ale. Totally organic, very tasty, and not so loaded that four will knock you on your arse. I’m not sure which stores carry it, but if you’re local grocer doesn’t, here’s the brewer info: “Brewed and bottled by the Goose Island Beer Company. Chicago, IL.” For some reason, I don’t see this beer on their site. Odd. It’s at Whole Foods in Austin if that’s of any help...

Reading a W bio on rotten.com:

In 1973 he enrolled in Harvard Business School and spent the next two years earning his MBA. He spoke fondly of the institution in his 1999 autobiography, declaring: "Harvard gave me the tools and the vocabulary of the business world."

In 1974, George spent Superbowl Sunday at a party hosted by Hunter S. Thompson. When asked decades later if he remembered whether Bush had used any drugs at his party, Thompson replied:

"I can't be expected to remember what every drug-addled yuppie hanger-oner who wanted to get close to me during a football game twenty-five years ago digested. There were so many dope fiends milling about, I don't remember what some Yalie named Bush, whose father was a factotum in the Nixon Administration, was doing. But he strikes me as the sort of person I would have thrown out of the room. A rich, beer-drunk yahoo with a big allowance who passes out in your bathtub...

I’ve got my next book idea. While sitting on Mandi’s balcony this beautiful July 4th afternoon, Aaron brought up Stephen Hawking’s The Universe in a Nutshell and I was reminded of my struggles with A Brief History of Time. ABHOT is fascinating and complex and tough as hell to understand despite the fact that it’s supposedly written for commoners like myself. Alas, I’m still too much of a dimwit to understand a hefty portion of that book.

TUIAN is supposedly written at an even lower level [it has pictures! lots of color drawings! yay!] so hopefully it will be easier to digest. I tend to think that the only people that really understand this stuff in its entirety are: a) scientific geniuses or b) pot heads. I am neither, so I basically need a picture book.

Yep, it’s that time of year again. The Tour de France is in full force. Cross your fingers that the Austinite will spank everyone else once again (with the help of his highly talented team, of course). Some good stuff to keep you updated:

Tour Diary: Scott Sunderland
TDF Blog
OLN

Moore apparently wanted to use “Won’t Get Fooled Again” for F 9/11 but used “Rockin’ In The Free World” instead. Townshend says:

I suggested in the email that they might use something by Neil Young, who I knew had written several songs of a more precise political nature, and is as accessible as I am. Moore himself takes credit for this idea, and I have no idea whether my suggestion reached him, but it was the right thing to do.

In response to a short article about a website listing famous guitarists and their guitar/amp rigs, the following exchange ensued:

Person 1: Juliana Hatfield isn't listed, so the site is worthless.
Person 2: It is well known that Juliana plays Evan Dando, or at least used to.
Person 3: 1994 called. They want your lameness back. Juliana Hatfield, Person 1?

PS: I actually kinda like Juliana Hatfield, but anyway…

PPS: the post category formerly known as "contact" no longer exists. my condolences. it never did much anyway. it has been replaced with a new category, law school. since that is where i'll be in about a month's time, i figured a post category was in order. also note its strategic placement - between "beer" and "about." excellent. [actually, that's just where contact used to be.]

in honor of contact’s demise, my friend aaron donated his spiffy email form, which I have placed in the official “about” post.

I posted two new tracks under the “currently” section. They’re both by David Garza – one is a rockin’ rock n roll song recorded live and the other is a reverb-doused acoustic tune.

I’m working on a slighty-more-than-usual complex post that requires some research. Can you believe it? Me, research. Crikey.

Using mozilla or thunderbird on windows? Read this. The red dinosaur is not invincible.

So I’m really thinking of spending the weekend in Portland with some friends who have a Web conference to attend [hey Portland homies – check yer mail (except Cherz, who doesn’t post an email address, you chump)]. I won’t be going to the conference, but my last day on the job is Thursday and I have little else to do. All in favor, say Aye. All in not in favor, tell me what else the hell I have to do to prevent me from going. I have a free flight on Southwest and I’m not afraid to use it.

MISSING: TWO KRISPY KREME DONUTS HAVE DISAPPEARED FROM THAT BIG CONFERENCE ROOM DOWNSTAIRS. TIME OF VIOLATION IS ESTIMATED TO HAVE BEEN RIGHT BEFORE THE NINE O’CLOCK MEETING. PERPETRATORS ARE BELIEVED TO HAVE BEEN IN THEIR MID-TWENTIES AND LIKELY HUNGOVER. DO NOT APPROACH SUSPECTS. IF SUSPECTS ARE ENCOUNTERED, NOTIFY AUTHORITIES IMMEDIATELY. SUSPECTS MAY HAVE HISTORY OF REPEATED AND CALCULATED FOOD REMOVAL OPERATIONS. THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION. END TRANSMISSION.

I’m back from Portland. It’s 1 am and I’m ready for sleep. But before that, some Thank Yous are in order.

I’m happy to say that I have a lot of new friends, friends that were once ‘virtual’ but are now very real. Thank you Semaphoria, Ivar, Nerdygirl, and Cherz for a kick-ass weekend. It was great to finally meet you and hang out. If you’re ever in Texas, you know who to call.

Thanks also to Skorloff, Ashley, and Julee for inviting me (and convincing me to actually go). I’ll have to spend a little more time summarizing the trip’s activities, but for now, I think Nerdygirl put it well with:

They blazed through Portland in a bright orange Mustang, leaving a trail of empty beer glasses and the faint echo of the word "y'all" in their wake.

Second installment of the “things that happen to you while” series; alternate title: “too many p’s: p-man in p-town”; written after a five-day excursion visiting four bloggers I had never met [in person] with three friends I met at my [now previous] employer.

Note: The links don't actually send you anywhere, they just pop up witty witticisms.

- - - - - -

On the way to Portland, you sit next to a woman speaking a language strangely familiar to you. It’s Russian. You talk with her for the duration of the flight about living in Russia, traveling in Europe, how your Jewish parents are basically the same, how writing code gets old, how lucky her kids are that they get to travel the world by age 10. You exchange information. You have now made a friend in Oakland, California.

After several bumbling mishaps, your friends meet you at the airport and whisk you away to a five-day vacation. Your friends say they’re in an orange car. When you see an orange car carrying your arms-flailing-hands-waving friends, your mind flips when you realize the orange car is a bright orange Mustang convertible. Your friends have rented a speeding ticket waiting to happen.

You and your friends drive like maniacs [safe maniacs]. No tickets happen.

You proceed directly to an establishment called the Kennedy School and wonder how long it’s been since you went anywhere with a name ending in “school.” You are oddly excited because this place apparently serves beer. What a great combination. You meet your blogger friends there and you discover their blogs are accurate representations of who they really are: interesting, cool, witty, fun, and just a little bit saucy. Or is it snarky? Both.

You, a couple of the bloggers, and a roommate continue the drinking at another bar. Upstairs, Sonic Youth is making a racket – a beautiful racket you would love to hear in a venue you would love to see. One of the bloggers happens to be a well-known bartender and musician in the Portland area and gets you and your friends in for free. Sonic Youth slowly gets louder as you climb the staircase and walk into a historical gem of a music venue. It’s a ballroom complete with chandelier, frescoes on the wall, and a spring-loaded wood floor. One of your friends says “Welcome to Portland!” as Kim and Co. do their thing onstage. You wonder why the hell you aren’t already living there.

An afternoon spent wandering the many trails of Washington Park reminds you why you like being outside and how much cube life sucks. You find a bench under a redwood and sit. For a long time.

Sushi Happy hour results in many beers and several rolls of rice, seafood, and vegetables. One of your blogger friends ingests an ungodly amount of wasabi. You laugh. He cries. You laugh more.

You spend the evening at one of Portland’s many brewpubs, Bridgeport. You take pictures of your friend’s simultaneously hideous and glorious parallel parking job. Imagine: right next to the pub’s patio sits a bright orange Mustang convertible with half of its nose sticking out into the street. The patrons gawk in amazement: “who the hell are these people?” You enjoy yet more delicious new beers.

Two of your friends leave the next morning, and with them, the ‘stang. You and the remaining member of the Texan crew rent a Taurus to explore the Gorge. Within thirty minutes of leaving Portland driving on a picturesque highway [only a little more picturesque than I-10 in San Antonio] you arrive at mountains and waterfalls. You ogle the waterfalls, want them to be thirty minutes from your door, wonder if you’d ever get used to them and stop visiting them if you lived in Portland. You pinch yourself and think, “stop daydreaming, asshole. there are waterfalls here that need your attention.” Your friend’s new motto for the trip is “that doesn’t suck.” You agree.

Over the next two days, you continue to consume refreshing beers and visit places like the Pittock Mansion, The Japanese Gardens, and The Chinese Gardens. During those two days, you end up at the Kennedy School once again and wander off the beaten tourist path to a pub called Bonfire.

You spend Monday morning wandering the many stacks of Powell’s Bookstore. At 1, your friend leaves for her flight back to Crap Antonio. You hug and realize this trip basically changed your lives. Now you’re on your own with one more night and no hotel room, you wander the streets of downtown in search for lunch and a good time. You invariably end up back at the bookstore.

Your friend's husband calls you and invites you to the park to see if there is any kickball to be played. Looking down at your feet clad in sandals, you wonder if that’s such a good idea. You say, “Fuck it, worse comes to worse, I can play barefoot.” You meet a lot of cool people and head over to the Portland version of a dive bar called the Triple Nickel for beers and music geek talk.

A show at Dante’s featuring the Short Bus Dub All Stars is waiting, so you head back to the house to change and pick up your friend’s wonderful wife, the one that let you crash on their couch. While the husband plays pool, you and the wife skank to the opening ska band and wait for Short Bus to come on. While the bands are loading/unloading from the stage, a high school-esque drum line entertains the audience with cool beats and crashing cymbals. The crowd starts to pogo; you pogo; everyone is getting into it. For a split second, you wish you were in marching band in high school. Then the next second arrives and you’re glad you weren’t. Jazz band was way cooler.

You end the night at a strip club down the street from your friends’ house that oddly has one dancer that isn’t stripping. It’s late on a Monday night and she’s hanging out and talking to the few patrons left. You aren’t the biggest fan of strip clubs but you like this one. You talk with your friend, the dancer, the bartender, and the patrons till late.

The next morning, you and your friend eat cheese and crackers and watch the best cartoons since Transformers. Imagine the old Hanna Barberra cartoons on crack. And a couple 40s. After a short drive to the airport, you pull up at the departure entrance and tell your friend he and everyone else are always welcome in Texas and to drop you a line if they ever go, but as soon as you say this you realize chances are better that you will end up in Portland before he or his Portland crew will end up in Texas. Lo and behold, he says just that. You agree. You say thanks again, shake hands, and hop out of the car.

On the flight home, you sit next to an elderly nun. There is an empty seat between you and her. You spend the entire flight engrossed in one of the many books you bought at Powell’s and gaze out the window at the black sky, a little fidgety in anticipation of getting home. The nun spends the whole flight motionless – she stares at the seat in front of her blinking for the duration of the flight. Doesn’t move. No book to read, no magazine, no music, no journal to write in. Just sits. You wonder what kind of thoughts she has that keep her entertained or if she needs anything at all to be entertained, or if, more simply, she needs to feel entertained at all. She just is. You wonder why the hell you can’t do that. You look at her and notice you’re staring. She turns her head and smiles. You smile back. You look at your hands and try to think of nothing.

And then all the badass people you met and all the badass things you did in Portland flood your brain. Hey, doesn’t Portland have a law school?

Once upon a time, I was in good shape. I don’t really see much of a reason for staying in good shape except for that it tends to keep this awkward, gangly hunk of junk called my body in proper working order. And once upon a time, I consumed beer on an irregular basis in small quantities. The small quantities of beer did nothing to adversely affect my fitness.

However, while climbing up and down the stairs this morning helping my roommate move his couch and other random things out of the apartment, I noticed I was sweating like a mofo and gasping for air. Then it occurred to me that I have been drinking and getting quite smashed every night since last Monday and have all but ceased my regular physical activity. Voluntary unemployment will do that to you. So I’ve decided to take drastic measures.

I’m going dry. No drinking. For two whole nights. And maybe a couple more thereafter. I might also start waking up early to ride my bike before the sun torches everything south of Dallas. With Lance as my inspiration, I hope to complete at least a few pedal rotations before passing out.

He just won the time trial [34 miles] by 61 seconds, a lead he didn’t even need to secure his already clear victory in the Tour. All that’s left is tomorrow’s victory lap through Paris. The Chronicle featured an article today about how Lance has yet to rule out a seventh straight shot at the tour with the US Team’s new sponsor, The Discovery Channel. An excerpt:

If they give me the green light to do something different, I might skip the Tour. If they say, “Lance, we want you on the tour," I would understand that, too.

News junky links:
TDF Blog: Armstrong leaves doors open to ride, not ride 2005 Tour
LeTour.com: current standings

and she’s only getting cuter.

“I like cheese. Do you like cheese? Cheese is good.”

Chillin’ with Daddy and Umbie. Life is swell.

“It’s naked time!”

And in case you didn’t know: it’s done

I’m still gathering all the pictures from the Portland trip so I can’t send a link to them yet, but I can post links to the short movies I took with my digicam. They’re all .avi. Sizes listed below.

Multnomah Falls - sideways (1436 KB)
Driving across Bridge of the Gods (4119 KB)
Japanese Gardens - Pond and Surroundings (2542 KB)
Japanese Gardens - Rock Garden (4595 KB)
Driving across Morrison Bridge (1755 KB)
Circular panorama of trees at Washington Park (3016 KB)
Bigass redwood (1748 KB)

You can read about the Portland trip here.
--------------

Finished Prague by Arthur Phillips last night. I burned through the first half, slogged through the third quarter, and regained some interest at the ending.

The book lost steam after the halfway point because characters started abruptly disappearing [desertion, marriage, whatever] which, combined with a series of conflicts and goals apparently coming to resolution, made for a vacant second half of the story. The characters themselves were interesting enough to hold my attention, though. There were a few surprises but also a few gimmies.

One thing that bugged me was Phillips’ repeated use of the same observation. He mentions how a character, deep in thought at a cafe, swirls his beverage and stares at the film of liquid left on the mugs’ interior. While this is kind of a cool observation to mention, it’s only cool once.

Oh yeah, and don’t let the book’s title fool you. The story is set in Budapest. The characters only have this nagging feeling that life in Prague is better.

Overall, my favorite part of the book was the writing. The narrator and several of the characters have that wry and biting sense of humor that always puts a smile on my face.

Other reader reviews here and here.

Hooters has an airline [via crooked timber]. What the hell? I’ve obviously been living under a rock, in a cave, in Tajikistan.

Maybe instead of peanuts and a soda, they give you a plate of wings and a pitcher of beer. I could live with that. Oh yeah.