So it's another one of *those* Saturday nights. It's sitting at home, watched some hockey (the Sharks, despite their most valiant effors, failed 5-3 against petty Nashville of all teams), drank some cider from Sonoma County, and now have settled down to the screen, Vodka and Aranciata in hand. I caught up on some things:

As much as I'd hate to admit it, indieshite is right. Shit, I'm even involved in the barely gasping-for-air escapades involved in their #10 choice. How much work have I done since Rocket-Fuel went back online? Answer: Almost none. Why? Because nobody makes me, and I don't give a shit. My picture is up on their staff page, but my contributions, limited to the New Releases section, have been rare and incomplete. Their lack of communication with their contributors has bred nothing but resentment and frustration. I'm sure if they gave me the credit, all the content seen here would be up on their site. Shit, I best stop, I'd sound like a Buddyhead rant (which, with all due credit, Indieshite nails).

All my logging is having the same effect that it had 2 years ago, but this time I'm not going to stop (hence my little slogan). I just can't, everything I want to see I inevitably want to share. But I'm not about to start ass kissing like a mad cow, I'd rather vent in my own small forum. I went out to a bar last night and stared down every male who appeared to be about thirty since I was certain that my geography and lifestyle would tie me in with the guy from Creepsville someday. Of course, I was certain that day would be yesterday. For all I know he made fun of my hair last night. It's strange when you don't know who you're looking at.

I remember nights like these when I typed html code for hours while Instant Messaging folks from Sacramento to Philadelphia. I'm just trying to get out of debt.

Volunteered to do some deliveries today, I needed the money and Miss Rodeo America had to go into work anyways. It's funny when you run a courier company but you rarely do deliveries. It's almost enjoyable, since the rest of the time I tell other people where to go, it's nice to take on part of the load myself.

Cruised up into the hills with some Red House Painters on, obeyed all traffic laws, took things slowly. Stared down a barking dog who was quite vocal about not wanting me standing on his porch with a big box. Nobody answered the door, but when I pulled away to leave this girl of about 13 was staring down at me from a huge picture window in the house. I guess I look scary or something. After that I cruised down to the not-so-wonderful area around 73rd Avenue and dropped off another box. Kids on those little scooters swarmed around me, staring at the newcomer to their neighborhood. The whole area smelled like fast-food. It's the sad-state of American corporations who target lower class areas with super fat heavy foodstuffs. Blech.

I think I'm going to go get some Thai food, the sun is blazing through every pore in my room today, and I don't think I can fully enjoy the beauty of today.

Had a decent time last night. Sat out in the cold cold cold waiting for our table for 8 at our favorite restaurant, and had the best blackened salmon for dinner. So good, pretty spicy, covered in this black bean sauce. Absolutely perfect. I've been getting all into this fish thing lately. The one time I got brave and ordered something somewhere else, it came with the skin and tail still attached, and that scared me off. I think I'm back on the horse.

Went out for a drink afterwards, Miss Rodeo America fastened her business card with the thousands of others on the wall. I wonder how long it will last. Things are nice, pleasant even.

I'm considering buying a pair of jeans online. It's time to measure my bravery.

I have a burning memory of the midwest that I've never been able to quite shake. It's nothing gruesome or extraordinary, and I'm not even sure many people would consider its location the midwest. I pulled in to Lubbock, Texas in the early evening in late December, people were on their way home from work, I was trying to find a place to park my car so that I could get some sleep. It must have been 15 degrees outside. I was parked on a side street, gathering change from under my seat for the payphone next to a Wendy's. As I was in the car, a crazed guy came up to me and started knocking on my window, asking if he could have some money for the phone. I was not expecting this in frozen West Texas. I gave him 35 cents and continued on to the phone.

Later, as it was starting to get dark, I was driving around the University there. I'll never forget the way the lonely brick buildings looked, surrounded by sprawl and 99 cent stores and cheap gas stations. It was beautfiful, little patches of dirty snow were piled up against the brick. The campus seemed to be deserted, but I could picture burly fratboys walking quickly on their way to football practice. I've always liked old brick buildings.

Got my recent records arrival thing all set up. Fought basketball game parking and went down to the record store and picked up the soundtrack to O Brother Where Art Thou, probably the best collection of Americana assembled on a CD. Great stuff. Also got the GYBE! related 1-Speed Bike CD. Heard good things about it, never heard it.

Third period time now: Sharks 4, Blues 3. Back to the cold, cold living room.

I've now been on hold for 28 minutes and 33 seconds with this horrible company who have royally screwed up one of my deliveries. I'm off work in six minutes, this better not go on for much longer, it's one tough hell-ride.

Sharks v. St. Louis tonight? I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Oh, I also just ate this huge cookie full of fat and calories that is making my stomach feel like the Keebler Elves are jack-hammering my insides to death. Joey's "Very Chocolate Chunk Cookie" claims to have "luv in every bite," but it feels more like it has tepid bacteria infested water in every bite. Ouch, ouch ouch.

It's not a good feeling when you have the symptoms of pregnancy and you're male. My morning sickness has finally ceased. Oh yah, and I'm still on hold.

It's still raining. It's really bummin' everyone out, one guy went home "sick" today from work. I think it's water-depression. I like it, my shoes look better when a bit damp, almost polished and new. It's clarity derived from the rain washing away all the dust/crap from the city, and the smell of manure from the country. I like it, it finally freels like freshness for a fresh year.

Mark Eitzel is playing next week. It's something to look forward to, it's been awhile since I've seen Eitzel. We tried to go once but showed up to late and waited for an hour while a crappy jazz/funk/rock band jammed onstage, thinking Eitzel was just taking a break and would show up again later. He didn't, we left.

Speaking of leaving...

I used to work at this skateboard shop in the suburbs. Well, they sold more than skateboards, but I tried to ignore most of the other stuff. We sold lots of stickers, expensive stickers. I was always amazed when some 17 year old kid would drop 15 bucks for one of those big NO FEAR stickers to put on the windshield of his Acura. They were never alone. They always travelled in packs, and the sides of their heads always looked freshly shaven, a grisly white bumpy head peeking out from their greasy mopped hair. Their toughness was all fake, embarrasingly fake. They'd take 20 minutes to pick out their lame-ass sticker, and then leave the shop. Without fail, 75% of the time, the kid would come back later, alone, and shyly ask me to put the sticker on his car for him 'cause he wasn't sure how to do it. Sometimes I feel a slight tinge of guilt to know that I'm responsible for applying 100s of tacky stickers to suburban joy-ride machines everywhere, but I always tried to put them on a bit crooked.

Good stories from yesteday, they'll come later when I can sit down and type without worrying about boss intervention. Went and saw Unbreakable at the parkway last night. What a tremendous bore. We were able to basically carry on a converstation through the entire film and not miss a single thing. I almost looked forward to having to get up and go to the bathroom. The Parkway is getting extremely popular lately, the place last night was packed, and the two earlier showings were completely sold out. Near the end of the movie, there is a scene were the little boy busts out a carton of Tropicana Orange Juice and the camera shoots him and the orange juice for a couple of minutes, until he pours himself a big tall glass and takes a swig. Talk about product placement, we were all cracking up, joking about how thirsty we were for orange juice, but didn't know any good brands. Nobody else in the theater seemed to get it. Everyone is so de-sensitized to product placement these days. I think some county somewhere (probably in Northern California) should pass a No Advertisement law where there wouldn't be billboards and ads everywhere. I bet it would be popular.

Wow, the polytone site has a ton of good flash stuff on it. My favorite: a flash based omnichord that you can play yourself. If you're luck enough to have a fast connection, download the final Mercury album, and then print on the j-cards. A phenomenal idea.

The staying up late is finally getting to me, I got *very* tired and cranky for the last couple hours at work today. It's sad, really, since by late I mean after midnight. Ooh! It's like being 9 years old again or something. I was all prepped for a nap when I got home, but now I'm feeling rather chipper and have decided that drinking a beer is better than napping anyway. At least now it is.

It seems as if I've made a friend over at slatch.com for my Neil Young postering. I'm not even Neil Young fan, but the *one* song I knew got me somewhere. Sharks v. Buffalo tonight, general relaxing. Prepping myself for adventure soon. I don't know what form it will take, but I'm prepared.

It's raining, and will continue to rain tomorrow for my drive up north. I'll make sure to pick out wet-weather music for the trip.

Work has been really slow lately. I work at a pharmacy, and most of our patients are either in the hospital or dead. Having no patients to give drugs to makes things slow. I've spent the entire morning re-stocking my shelves and reading creepsville.com while pretending to work. It's hard to read websites at your computer when your job isn't computer based. I always have to pretend that I'm printing labels when my box walks by. I'm quick with the alt-tab button.

I felt sorry for this person when they publicly mistook a Neil Young song for a Built to Spill song on their website. I emailed them, perhaps they'll delete their entry. It was funny though, instead of making fun of them in my head, I quickly pointed out their mistake. I'd hate to make mistakes on my own site, although I'm sure I have before.

The polytone network is finally up and running.

Jeez, cheese on toast is one of best dinners ever invented. Tip: spend the money for good cheddar. Never buy bad cheese, it's just not worth it.

Milling about until we go see the late showing of Oh Brother Where Art Thou? downtown. It should be a fun affair. I had this idea to invite a whole slew of people who kinda knew each other, but not tell each one I had invited others, so that it would be a crowd of people just showing up and by chance, meeting all at the same movie. Alas, I got cranky from hunger and didn't follow through with my idea.

Tis the Season: Everyone made it through the new year, and now all the patients at work are quickly dropping like flies. That, and a friend of mine finally quit her job, the job she'd been whining about for such a long time. Time for change, eh? Find me an apartment.

Finally saw The Usual Suspects, last night. Pretty good, not as *amazing* as I'd heard, but rather entertaining. We also watched the beginning of Blade Runner, which I've never seen all the way through, and the beginning of Breaking Glass, this horrible movie that came out in 1980 about "new wave" music starring some really annoying girl who looks 40, but is supposed to be like 21. It was so bad we couldn't watch it. There is lots and lots of screeching and bad singing through the entire film. Blah.

The evening was nice though. We went to what has become our local pub, had a couple pints and watched the Red Wings beat the Avalance in overtime. It was a good game though, since Colorado scored to tie the game with like 11.5 seconds left on the clock. It started raining when we went to bed (on our new futon, I might add), and I fell asleep listening to the drops pound the flimsy roof over our heads. Things have been nice this week.

Drove up and did some thrifting today. Got myself a couple more state-related paraphanelia, including an Alaska ashtray and a Minnesotta metal tray thing. Shirts: SF Municipal Railway, old Detroit Tigers shirt, Oxford University, and some horse summer camp thing. I was pretty satisfied with my load, so we headed to Denny's and ate too many fried chicken strips.

So, on the way home, we decided to suck it up and buy a new futon for our bed. Our other one was flatter than carpet, so it was about time. We walked in the door (we picked the Futons and Accessoriesre over the Just Futon store, 'cause we could *clearly* see lamps and tables in the latter. This was clearly false advertising, since their sign stated that they were "Just Futon." Lying bastards.

There was an amazing band from California called Mercury who broke up some months back. Brothers Josh and Andy from that band, along with some friends, did some home recordings and called the project Hidari Mae. Andy moved to Seattle, but whenever he comes to California to visit, they record some more stuff. Recently, Josh mailed me a 15 track CD with some of their stuff on it. This is probably the best unreleased stuff I've ever heard. I swear, if I start putting out records, this will be second (my band's posthumous release would be first). The songs are really well written, and the only band whose home recordings sound anywhere near this good is Grandaddy. Check out Anonymous for a sample of their greatness. Let me know if you like it, maybe they'll let me put up some more.