been in a bit of freak-mode here at the casa.
i don't travel very well any more. i can't pin it down to a specific detail of travel, fear of flying etc., becasue i think it has more to do with the rigamarole leading up to getting on the plane. once i'm on the plane and it takes off all seems well. until then, tension. to-do lists, have i forgotten something? are the clothes clean, who will look after the plants and the cat, do i have enough money, travelers checks? the last one indicates overseas travel. i've decided to turn in some frequent flyer miles and bail to europe for a month with the pearl. outlet adaptors, guide books, sun block...
all turns out well, i've never had any problems really, even when i caught a very bad cold/flu in australia. i felt like human garbage for most of a week, but i was over there for a month and looking back from here, can barely remember the sickly part.
so the last few nights have seen un-even sleep and the hot days have had scattered errands in them.
also i had some house guests for the last few days. d.g. was in town with his sweetie for a gig. they had been travelling around australia and new zealand for the previous month and since the gig showed up, stayed over here in paradise before heading back to brooklyn. i've been very, very fortunate that friends from all over seem to turn up from time to time, spend a few days and brighten and re-focus the standard issue we got going here in the country-side of south pasadena.
i'm a real softie when it comes to folks moving on as well, always a bit sad.

so months ago, a.p. suggested the new flaming lips record. i tail-dragged for a bit but finally bought it recently - i'd just assume give them some of my money for this very good record because, as one of my profs said "one is not just buying an object, one is supporting a mode of production." i'd be glad if the flaming lip could make as many records as they'd feel like making. this is not to be taken as a jab against mp3's or burning cd's etc., i'm all for people making "tapes", and, as flying saucer attack said "home taping is reinventing music". but, if there is something i like and want, really want, the collector in me wants the whole package - the art, the liner notes etc.
on this subject see janis ian's thoughts on the subject.
speaking of supporting a mode of production, if you want more chit re: music, read this article. a good one on a local doom merchant. i think the first sample i'll try is the band boris. i head a snippet of the "slugs fucking" record over at gmacs house, a must have. the goddamn japanese do NOT fuck around - heavy ass shit with this lil cutie frontin' the band with her giant orange stack.
so, leaving on monday night - might have internet over yonder, who knows.

last minute bachelor party trip to vegas from a carload of fools. called me at 8:30 from the olympic gardens. later, a message from ak:

"10:30 - so mutherfucking hot and bright out here - dudes inside, getting worked. i'm taking a break."

we thought once, about ordering the groom-to-be an hour long lap dance, just give a girl $400 and say "go".

taildraggin? sure, but not sleepin' the days away.
last friday g and ak and i went down to san diego for the comicbook convention!
yeah, that's right, i'm a card-carrying geek from way the f back and i remember wanting to go to this con when i was a little kid, so this year i went.
it was pretty much EXACTLY how you'd imagine it would be. we only attended one not-quite-full day (left a little early to get ak to the long beach airport on time) of the four day event, but it was just enough.
we got on up early, early, after those other two fools stayed up to all hours at mr. t's bowl and rolled into s.d. about 10:30 thanks to some morning traffic on the 5 and quickly found out what "parking limited near convention center" means when it is displayed in traffic warning signs. no big whoop, you roll back away from the convention center and through town until you luck out.
fortunately there were convention shuttles, buses running various routes through the city from hotels and parking structures to the con center. even more fortunate was that these rides were for free. and to put a cherry on top, one bus stopped right by our parking spot!
we knew we had arrived when we got on the bus and through the mumble of conversation we heard "blahblahblah klingon lifespan blahblahblah..." oh shit, and we hadn't even gotten to the convention proper.

the san diego convention center seems big and spacious and spaceship like as well as generic just like every other convention building i've been in. first impression upon stepping out of the bus and into the crowd milling around the front of the center was "someone is smoking weed!" was it one of "the crow" lookin' dudes? one of the metal head lookin' dudes, one of the indie chick lookin' chicks, one of the klingons, sailor moons or random person holding a spear?
conventions require registration and nametags and whatnot and all that crap was located on the top floor of the joint along with some autograph booths for the big names attractions that were set up to deal with crowds and lines. some of the "big name" signees were: asia argento, elvira, erin gray, casey kasem (listed as: from battle of the planets), todd mcfarlane as well as a host of writers and actors from shows like babylon 5 etc. whatevs.
we bolted through the reg. lines and made our way back to the show proper, stopping along the way to get some pics of fools dressed up like the ghostbusters.
one note: the crowd was much more mixed than i would have guessed. i expected the whole place to be filled with youngish dudes of all stripes, and it was, but there were plenty of girls, chicks and womens. could have been much, much more of a sword-fight.
the main convention hall held three main areas; resellers (old comics, original art, well know comic book dealers, book dealers like bud plant - a name i hadn't heard in years and years, various posters, toys and figures and swords and videos and anything you can possibly think of that deals with comics or cartoons or illustrations etc.) - trade show booths (these are from gaming companies, companies that make video games, cartoons, playing card games, action figures), and then artist signing tables, art gallery et. al. where, at scheduled times, one could meet folks like the hernandez brothers or paul chadwick and many, many more.

so the first order of biz was to get some food. is that HUGE line for the food!? nope, its for the he-man action figure that is first-day of issue here at the con, to celebrate an upcoming he-man cartoon. the line for the food is made up of those five fools there, including a klingon with a pizza.
after eating we made plans to meet up in a few and then split up.
adrian tomine was just sitting down to sign books at the drawn and quarterly booth so i fell in line. i was five or six folks back and soon noticed that he seemed to be taking his time with the visitors - actually he was sketching. being a rookie, i had no idea that one could simply ask if artists would draw something for you. in his case it was for free.
he did have a bunch of original art, and some pages from his books for sale. though they were what i could consider reasonably priced, i couldn't spring $200+ for 'em. but i did get a finished drawing of a girl, from a horoscope series, for next to nothing. for the on hand sketches i noticed that veterens had come prepared with black bound sketch books for the artists to draw in. i've carried one of these around with me for a while now, it has my "checkbook", notes, directions, stamps, reciepts and anything else shoved in it - so i quickly cleared all this kind of shit out and was fully prepared if not looking a bit worn around the edges, to present it for sketching. at least a bunch of stamps didn't fall onto tomine's lap. (it is the heaviest thing in my bag and was --> this close <-- to leaving it in g's car.
so throughout the day i managed to get that stuff from tomine, a sketch and an autograph from jason lutes who makes the book, 'berlin', and is very easy to chat with, a sketch from paul chadwick of the character 'concrete' as well as meeting bob burden.
when i was an undergrad, there was a time when my two favorite cultural elements were the butthole surfers and the flaming carrot. they were the most beautiful things since sliced bread and the more i think about it, probably birds of a feather, so meeting bob, the creator of the carrot was up there on my list of shit to do at the con. he wasn't at the table in the "signing area" but when i was wandering through the resellers booth, i saw a stack of flaming carrot statues and had found him.
nice enough guy, he had two drawings for sale (bought one) and he signed my copies of issue 1 & 2 that i just happened to have with me. he was all "say, this is in very good shape, might be worth a little bit." and i couldn't help but think that, at that point in time (and still now), i couldn't even imagine selling these books.
so i came home with a small but respectable selection of drawings and sketches. (i could mention that los bros. hernandez made a stop in a comic book shop in louisville in the early 90's to sign books - got my issue #4 signed and jaime made a sketch of hopey for me.)
the rest of my time was spent wandering and wandering and avoiding storm troopers and boba fetts and the dude who was the dude who wore the chewbacca suit in the o.g. star wars films and taking pictures of things that people were taking pictures of, like the human-sized blister pack at the star wars booth - where you could walk behind the thing and stand in a big plastic bubble so it would appear that YOU were the action figure.
there were lightsabre booths, japanese anime out the yang, anime porn with porn actresses hosting, piles and piles of beautiful orig. art; jack kirby stuff all over the place, warhammer figurines, a giant robot booth and then, when i wasn't looking - a dazza booth, mit dazz of course, appeared. it was all there.
the other items i spent time looking for were some back issues of kirby's 'new gods' series. these have become very popular so the early issues, in nice shape, cost $40, $30 etc., so i stuck with some later issues in slightly worn shape. beautiful stuff - i probably bought a total of six actual comics at the convention.
we had plans to leave at five pm, as ak needed to be at the long beach airport by 8 and we had to factor in traffic and shuttle time and taildragging, so the last item on my agenda was one of the "events". there was a whole schedule of events going on all weekend including gaming rooms, speakers, films and q & a panels; another reason to spend two leisurely days at this kind of con. at 4:30 i briefly attended the "afternoon with tony millionaire, hosted by the society for the preservation of strawberries and plums" which turned into a stand-up kind of act as they waited for the video projector to arrive. iced tea and mint sprigs for everyone.
then it was time to bail back down the stairs, the same stairs where i saw gene simmons on my way up the stairs, to meet an equally blown-out ak and g so we could begin our journey home. actually, if you ask them, i probably looked more blown-out, but whatevs.
you should go to this thing next year.

this last sunday, the neighbor announced that he was heading for amoeba records, and would i like to go as well.
self-control evaporates in the countryside summer sun. take:
bobbie gentry's "ode to billy joe" used lp
flying burrito brothers - guilded palace of sin & burrito deluxe - used 2fer cd
beach boys - party & stack o' tracks - used 2fer cd
the new flaming lips cd - new

so there is a new song for you. it is from the stack o' tracks part of the beach boys record. this album was a kind of gimmick record that capitol issued when sales were slippin' and the execs were scared of pet sounds and smile et. al. it is a karaoke record, a bunch of their songs minus the vocals. the original record came with "...booklet with printed lyrics. Chord symbols. Lead line and bass line". pretty fuckin' cool i think - and something that shows that even if the pop market wasn't ready for some of the work that brian had made, his song crafting and arranging was respected enough to be put out on its own.
"in my room" is up for ye to d/l.

a few bloggers have mentioned this story at the nytimes, so you may have already seen it. i've been a bit lazy about posting, but read it a few days ago and find myself wondering how it will all turn out. it is an article about the creating of a pop singer - olando style - a dark haired girl who will basically sing any song, look any look, as long as her managers and the label think it'll make her a star. a fun read in that clearchannel kind of way. one bright bit of hope that i got from the piece was this:

Lately, Spears's star has fallen; her last record sold disappointingly, and her HBO special revealed that she can't sing live. With 'N Sync and the Backstreet Boys dismantling and Christina Aguilera still recording the follow-up to her 1999 debut, the teen-pop phenomenon seems to have fizzled.

and thats just the first paragraph. apparently when this was being written, PINK was taking over as the star du jour.

here is some oddball from back in the mothercountry:

BRANDENBURG, Ky. -- A case of mistaken identity almost caused a Meade County family to cremate the remains of their teen-age son's friend -- while their son, whom they believed to be dead, lay in critical condition in a Louisville hospital.

sheesh.

one of my favorite movies of all time is "the decline and fall of western civilization, part 2: the metal years". i've had a vhs copy of this landmark for quite some time now and have also managed to find or be given albums by seduce, odin as well as the s/t. so today, via mefi, we have rikki rockets toilet seat art. bust.