Absent-Mindfully

Appy Partment

2009-01-05T19:00:00.003-05:00

Hmm, I wonder what this could be?

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- David

The Rider

2009-01-04T18:15:00.001-05:00

"The rider is ready. Every fiber of his body is tensed. The interests at stake here are enormous. He knows the opposition is strong and varied, but he is not afraid. In his mind, all is absolute silence, tension, certainty.

Then the traffic light turns green. Two, three strokes and the rider is spurting full out; there he goes, the first to shoot across the tramline, earning him the usual hundred-thousand-guilder premium. Of all his rivals, a Volkswagen poses the greatest threat, but the rider squeezes out every last drop and succeeds in throwing himself over the front of the crosswalk first, then over the back of the crosswalk, as first past a traffic post and as first past a garbage can: four more fat prizes of one hundred thousand guilders each. Then the Volkswagen passes him.

But he's still first among two-wheelers! He passes the back and then the front bumpers of two parked cars, the two curbs of a side street and an advertising kiosk before a scooter catches up with him; by then, however, that's earned him another seven times one thousand guilders.

The rider is about to cut in and coast when he sees up ahead a woman on a bike, with a child on the back. Two hundred thousand guilders if he passes her before she gets to that pole. Two hundred thousand! Even though he's nowhere near having recovered from his sprint, the rider jumps again with all his might. No way he can ever beat this woman. But this rider has surprised the sporting world before, and this time he gives it ever milli-billimeter he's got: in a desperate attempt, he pitches forward.

The woman sticks out her hand and turns down a side street.

The rider rolls out, slowly catches his breath, cruises up to the next traffic light. He stands and eyes his opponents. The BMW motorcycle seems fairly invincible.

A million if he beats it to the crosswalk anyway!"

I think I've talked about this book before, called The Rider by Tim Krabbé. It's a thin little read, $13 at Barnes & Noble. I lent a copy to my amigo Jeff and then he moved, taking the book with him! It's cool though, cuz Kasey got me another one as part of my b-day spoiling.

The book takes place in a rider's head during a 137 kilometer bicycle road race. The excerpt above is one my favorite parts, as I think all cyclists have gone through some variation of this game with regularity. It's a fun read and easy to get caught up in; it captures a lot of the varied emotions I go through when riding hard, from hopelessness to confusion and elation to self-chastisement. Throughout the book you can tell the author (and the rider) loves cycling for it's own sake and even the torturous aspects of the race are worth it.

If you're in the market for a good, quick read that will make you feel like you've expended yourself, pick it up.

- David

New Year's Resolutions

2009-01-04T11:53:00.002-05:00

The end of the year is always a strange time for me. I think it's the combination of turning a year older and having the year begin again at roughly the same time. I'm not sure how other people are but I've always felt a sort of accumulation as the year progresses, and a slate-clearing on the first day of January. Like arriving at a resting point after a long night of driving on a road trip and starting again fresh the next morning.

In writing this I realize this year is different. My internal clock is no longer set to the cold, numbered, Gregorian calendar, but to the timing of the tiny life that grows beneath my encircling arm as sleep covers we three. The start of our new year and the clearing of our slate will be sometime in the spring.

As the years go by I'm less and less compelled to make New Year's resolutions but I always try to make a couple anyway. To a lot of people it's just another day, but I welcome an excuse to take a brief look back and see what I'd like to change going forward. So here we go.

Firstly, I'm going to write more. This is partly because I like it so much and partly because people keep telling me I need to do it. True, these people are family members and persons I'm currently sleeping with, but the encouragement is nice. I'm pretty sure I said this two or three years ago, but I'm going to start a journal or a notebook I write in every day. I probably need to practice if I'm going to do anything with my writing, which would be nice. I'd really like to do some kind of comic or graphic novel, but I have no artistic talent. Maybe I should put art classes in this list somewhere…

Concerts. I need to go to more concerts this year. I went to ONE MUTHAFLIPPIN' CONCERT last year, and that's just not acceptable. Unlike my girl Kasey, I wasn't a big concert kid in my younger days. She's been to so many concerts I wonder how she had time for anything else, and I envy her. Growing up in Idaho, and then being a poor geek in Phoenix, I didn't really get into that scene. Which is very sad to me now that I've seen a live show by a band I really love. Tom Waits, Trent Reznor, Jenny Lewis, and others better prepare themselves this year to a see a weird looking guy yelling in the front row and trying to steal an article of their clothing.

Legs. Big legs. Big motorboatin' legs. Huge, trackstar, legs. This is purely a vanity item, but I have a dream to have thighs so big people think I've had half of a liposuction procedure done and calves that would seem to indicate steroid use or implants. Of course this would also hopefully mean I'm a fast bastard on a bike, which is a daily goal of mine. To this end I plan to eat better, get enough protein (which I haven't been consistently doing), stay limber with yoga, continue to ride daily, and hit the gym. I'm not a big guy, but I hope that with blind determination and soy I'll be successful.

Another resolution I always set, new year or not, is to start meditating again. With a kid on the way I'm going to need all the mindfulness and peace I can get.

I really need to keep in touch with my family. I'm horrendous with this. Truly.

Maybe this will be the year I get my personal hygiene under control. I dunno, possibly next year. I'm going to be pretty busy.

- David

BD B-Day

2009-01-03T22:30:00.001-05:00

As I so subtly mentioned a few times this week, Tuesday was my birthsday. The man you know as BuddhaDave, aka Y.T., aka David, aka That Weird Kid Who Blogs turned a ripe twenty-six years old.

Luckily we had scheduled an ultrasound for that same day so I had a valid reason to leave work early. After putting in a five hour day on the phones I biked home and was immediately whisked away by Kasey and her mom. I dunno why, but apparently we've been going to a hospital in either North Carolina or Florida and it takes AGES to get there. Having not eaten anything all day (and biking a hard seventeen miles to boot) I passed the time eating Ritz crackers and wincing at Kasey's mom's driving. According to the ultrasound lady lil' Jonas is right on schedule in terms of weight and length and all that, and apparently is packing some major heat for a baby, if you get my meaning. *wink wink, nudge nudge*

Afterward my friends & co-workers Nancy and David S. met the lovely Kasey and I at a very local Mexican joint where food and libation soon ensued. We promptly destroyed about ten pounds of free chips and salsa before starting in on the hard stuff. Making sure I had the whole Beer Before Liquor nursery rhyme correct I had me a whiskey sour first and then a beer or two. David S. being the good friend that he is then ordered some rounds of tequila and I was instructed on the salt/shot/lemon technique and had a chance to practice it three or four times before the night was over. Kurtz showed up somewhere before the last couple of rounds but after I had donned the gold and black Birthday Sombrero.

Nancy had to be home for some ~~dumb~~ reason and started the beginning of the end of phase one. David S. was a peach and walked us home before heading out himself. Phase two began (and ended) at my place with laughable movies and bourbon shots followed by See's Candy chocolate chasers. We watched a movie called Wolf Girl or Blood Moon, depending on where you live which ended up being pretty awesome. Or maybe it was the booze. After that we started People Under the Stairs which I have seen multiple times and is always entertaining.

Somewhere in here I got up to get some cereal and had about half a dozen spoon-fulls before I started feeling a little funny. Bed time was announced when I got queasy from looking down at my dog and decided I needed to lay down. Kurtz missed the last ferry to Norfick and ended up sleeping on my couch. Six hours later when my alarm went off for work I drank some water, downed some aspirin, and decided I wasn't going to make it in. I phoned in before my shift was starting and spent the first half of the day recovering and the second half enjoying my lady's company, eating, and making sure the couch stayed warm. When I finally wobbled out of bed for real I took two steps into the living and said, "I'm sorry, just a sec, I'm gonna throw up" and promptly did. But only a little. I'd like to officially add mushrooms to the list of things that make me think I've thrown up pieces of my internal bits, if only for a second. I immediately felt better afterward.

I thoroughly enjoyed the marking of my twenty-sixth trip around El Sol and want to say thanks to my friends, my fiance´, my family, and to the forces that be for keeping me around this long. I'm grateful for everything.

- David

The Dead Flag Blues

2008-12-29T16:32:00.001-05:00

I've posted repeatedly over the last week or so on how much I like "Godspeed You! Black Emperor". Lately they're all I've been listening to; I'm completely addicted. If the human race had been born without sight, this is what our movies would be like.

I'm going to be complete dorky now and post lyrics from one of their songs, "The Dead Flag Blues". It's actually monologue that happens within the first six minutes of the song. The accent to me sounds Native American, but I could be wrong. With all of the ambient background noise it's chilling and surreal:

"The car is on fire, and there's no driver at the wheel
And the sewers are all muddied with a thousand lonely suicides
And a dark wind blows

The government is corrupt
And we're on so many drugs
With the radio on and the curtains drawn

We're trapped in the belly of this horrible machine
And the machine is bleeding to death

The sun has fallen down
And the billboards are all leering
And the flags are all dead at the top of their poles

It went like this:

The buildings tumbled in on themselves
Mothers clutching babies
Picked through the rubble
And pulled out their hair

The skyline was beautiful on fire
All twisted metal stretching upwards
Everything washed in a thin orange haze

I said, "Kiss me, you're beautiful -
These are truly the last days"

You grabbed my hand
And we fell into it
Like a daydream
Or a fever

We woke up one morning and fell a little further down
For sure it's the valley of death

I open up my wallet
And it's full of blood"

At the part he says, "It went like this" a series of violins comes in and even though they're playing simple repeating notes it adds a wonderful depth to rest of the movement. That's right, movement. This band is like a beautiful, creepy orchestra in more ways than one, and long songs with movements within them are just one of the similarities.

And the lines:

"I said, 'Kiss me, you're beautiful -
These are truly the last days'

You grabbed my hand
And we fell into it
Like a daydream
Or a fever"

are just amazing. The delivery of every word is perfect. It's hard to explain, but I hope you're intrigued enough to get at least this album and give it a few listens.

I'm going to try blasting these guys tonight on my way home. Hopefully the wind hasn’t shifted too much so I can actually hear the quieter parts.

- David

Red Means Stop!

2008-12-28T12:17:00.001-05:00

Insert Hellboy picture here. Sadly I'm at work today and cannot login to do a proper post, so use your imagination. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Yesterday I headed Downtown to do a bit of grocery shopping with Jenny (my bike), The Mansion (my big bag), and the newest member of the team, Nathan Explosion (the super loud iPod-playing bike speaker thingy). Whilst perusing the ladies deodorant section my friend Kurtz appeared, having seen my bike locked up outside. After purchasing forty-five pounds or so of groceries I accompanied him to the mall where he was headed to pay his phone bill. After answering questions about our cycling shoes ("Hey, are those soccer shoes?") and looking at graphic novels at B&N we took off, and I had a fun time blasting Dethklok from my new bike accessory and bombing the three levels of the parking garage down to street level. I don't often get to do it, but cycling with a friend is a lot of fun. Especially with a soundtrack!

Now, to the soccer moms and angry commuters of the world it may seem that I'm a careless and dangerous cyclist, but let me assure you that I'm more aware of my surroundings and careful than 95% of the drivers out there. For one, I'm on the outside of my vehicle instead of the other way around, and that's something I never forget. And two, I know just how retarded and absent-minded people get behind the wheel of a car and I'm constantly prepared to have someone try and run me over. As a (sometimes) fast moving object in an urban environment that straddles the line between pedestrian and vehicle, I have some wiggle room that I would be remiss if I didn't take advantage of. So when I'm in traffic and you see me execute any number of creative maneuvers I do as a cyclist in the city, just know that I've played it out in my mind multiple times and double-checked all parties involved as much as possible before I do anything, legal or not.

So imagine my not-quite-surprise when I have the green light and take a right-hand turn into the closest lane and suddenly a car is speeding through the intersection, against the light, luckily in the next lane over. At first I thought, "Crap, did I not have the light? No, I'm pretty sure it was green and other cars were stopped..." I made sure the car in question wasn't going to pancake me and took a quick glance back. Sure enough, his light was red. I've seen innumerable cars roll through stop signs and the like, but this was my first blatant red light runner. You may be calling me hypocritical at this point, but I was pissed. If I run a red light and get hit, that's my fault and at most the other person will have to fill out an insurance claim and a police report. If someone fails to stop and takes me out, the consequences are a lot greater on the shit end of the stick.

I started to chase down the villain to see where the fire was and possibly inform him of his mistake, but at the next intersection he pulled a quick U-turn. More and more I think how handy and pleasing it would be to have a roll of big stickers readily available that say things like "I Drive Like a Douche", "I Have No Idea What I'm Doing", and "Warning: Asshole Behind the Wheel" to punish bad driving behavior and warn other people, drivers and cyclists alike, about what they can expect. Kurtz had a good idea as well involving NAMBLA bumper stickers. I'm sure it could be construed as property damage or some other BS if we got caught, but man, it would still be worth it. Maybe we could pass it off as confrontational written-word performance art. Freedom of speech, man!

Anyone know of a good sticker-printer and delivery system? Just for uh, conversational purposes?

- David

Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven

2008-12-26T20:57:00.003-05:00

The Christmas Comedown begins, as The Birthday Countdown winds up.

I'll have a post documenting my loot later, but let me just say I made out like a drunk girl with self-esteem issues at prom. At the exact time of this writing I'm either wearing or near at least five presents. All parties concerned spoiled me in one way or another and I'm grateful. Tasteless thank-you cards are being devised now.

The hardest part of getting Xmas money is deciding what to get for myself. As you can doubtless tell from my Wishlist I have no problem finding crap I want, but when it comes down to pulling the trigger I can never pick easily. Do I get myself one of the super dorky items on my list, or some of the smaller items I've been looking at for a while? Decisions decisions. And now that The White Talon needs a new alternator, I'm thinking of being all responsible and shit and saving my Christmas cash for that. We'll see I guess, we'll see. Those rollers have been calling my name for 365+ and counting, but there's a lot of cheaper things I could definitely enjoy.

As for the giving portion of the season I'm sad to say that I didn't do too hot. Getting laid off earlier this year put us down into a hole that we're just starting to see the top edge of, and getting it lower than eye level is still somewhere in the future. I took care of bills and other adult things, then my lady, then a few friends where fate stepped in, and that meager amount saw the end of my expendable income. Every year it seems I don't have enough cash to take care of kith and kin and every year I vow to do better next time. I can't even seem to motivate myself early enough to do cards, and for that I want to apologize. I love all of my family and don't do enough to show it. If you get something in my mail from me sometime in February or July, don't be surprised.

In the past three days I've eaten enough and laid on the couch for a sufficient amount of time to really loathe myself, so apparently this holiday has been a success. I was able to do not one but two loads of laundry today, as well as run the dishwasher and straighten up the house a bit. The days before that though, my list of accomplishments have been as follows: Eaten enough sugar to drive a sperm whale diabetic, eaten enough in general to handicap a hearty mule, warmed various couches with my sugar-fueled body heat, and watched enough TV to not only give myself a tumor but also shrink said tumor with the same television screen radiation. Did I mention the sleeping in? Come Sunday morning I am probably so screwed. Tomorrow there is a bike ride at 9:00am and while my legs and the angel on my shoulder say, "Go, go!" the realistic devil on the other side says "You'll never get up in time." I'd like to prove him wrong, but we all know my proclivity to sleep late when I have nothing pressing to do in the morning.

Following friends and family electronically like I do, I have to say I'm jealous of everyone who's been snowed in this holiday. Back on the farm my dad has been snowed in for a day or two and a few of my Brightkite buddies have reported the same. Christmas in P-Towne saw warm weather and I bitched every moment I was outside or in a car. I remember living at home and getting snowed in, then venturing outside to build a snow cave in our front yard or walking up the drift which would form every year and reach from ground to roof in one unbroken arc. Those were the days man, those were the days. Of course, the days of waking up on Christmas morning to a flooded basement because frozen pipes had cracked weren't that much fun, but you take the good with the bad. Even though I'd have to invest in some new gear I'd love for it to snow here.

Recently I posted on music I like and had included a lil' band called Godspeed You! Black Emperor (even though I had punctuated it incorrectly) as one of the bands I really liked even though I had only heard one album. Well I've heard more now, and holy crap. They are so awesome. Definitely give them a listen. They are da bomb.

Well, Kasey and crew are putting the finishing touches on closing down this hear Starbucks so I gotta pack up and git. Take care ya'll, and be safe as new year arrives iffin' we don't talk before then.

- David

Johnny Utah!

2008-12-21T21:15:00.003-05:00

This weekend I joined best friends Kasey and Kurtz at our local movie theatre to see The Day the Earth Stood Still. None of us were expecting the movie to blow our minds. But we like movies, and making fun of movies, and I like Keanu Reeves in a way that's almost like we're related, or at least kindred spirits. We both have dark hair, we're both mildly attractive, and we're both not winning awards but should be, and we're both some how well liked. I'll see a movie just because Keanu Reeves is in it, unless it's a Disney movie or some shit like that.

I enjoyed the movie. Did it end up blowing my mind? No. Was I entertained enough to almost single-handedly finish a medium bag of expensive popcorn? Yes. Has my love of Mr. Reeves diminished? Not in the slightest.

There are certain roles that call for his handsome face and even delivery. Who else could be Neo? What other white guy could play The Buddha? Who else could pull off Johnny Utah, or Johnny Mnemonic for that matter? No one, that's fucking who. Keanu Reeves is a working man, and I bet he's rich as balls. He does a lot of work, and from the Matrix trilogy alone he probably picks up his dog's turds with twenties. And you never see him in the tabloids! No insane purchases, no scandals, no yo-yoing weight or plastic surgery. He goes to work, he kicks some ass, then he goes home and rides his motorcycle and watches some television. I'd take Keanu Reeves over half a dozen other so-called "good" actors any day.

These are the kinds of arguments I made to Kasey on our way home from the movie. While she doesn't hold him in as high regard as I do, she does find him quite fetching in Constantine. Imagine my delight when this entertaining site was singing the same tune. While other people may call him a tool, I call him the right tool for the job.

As for the movie itself, I'll probably buy it when it comes out. Not on it's release date mind you, but when I inevitably see it in stores I'll snatch it up. It had good special effects, Jennifer Connelly is purdy, and Gort was pretty bad ass. The movie could have gone a lot further in many areas but I understand the reason it pulled it's punches. They're not going to make an American film that's basically all about foreign invaders coming down and blowing the shit out of the US military for an hour and a half. While they did make some points about the military, having our hardworking men and women on the front lines getting their asses summarily handed to them in violent and exciting ways by a sweet ass robot from space and his buddy isn't something I see getting made any time soon. I would enjoy such a film, but it'd have to made in Germany or Sweden or something to come off like this movie could have.

The most annoying part of the movie? Will Smith's son. Jayden or whatever. I hated that kid. At one point I actually flipped him off and the people sitting behind me laughed. He was a ton worse actor than Keanu Reeves but you don't hear people busting his balls. Probably because he's all young and shit, and has cool hair.

- David

Vlog Entry - Jeezy Chreezy, Greasy, & Xmas

2008-12-21T16:04:00.003-05:00

- David

Moosicka

2008-12-21T13:24:00.001-05:00

I like music. I'm not up on emerging music nor am I an encyclopedia of music history, but it's a part of my daily life. Music plays many important roles for me: confidant, motivator, cathartic release. The fountainhead of the most recent and most beautiful music has been my gal, who has wonderful taste in all things. Without her I'd still be on a paltry diet of Nine Inch Nails (not to say that NIN isn't the shiznit, cuz it is.) and random crap I bumped into like a blind man at a buffet.

Multiple bloggers have put out (hurr!) their year-end Best and Worst Music lists, and while I'm too lazy and non-numerical to do that I will blab on about the junk in my iPod just the same. Just because I can't count backwards from ten doesn't mean I can't have fun too.

So here it comes, a crap-hazard list of music I like in no particular order. Keep your trendy hipster "That shit is so five years ago!" comments to yourself. I move at my own pace, even if that pace is thick & chunky. (Salsa joke!) And just for fun I'll be listening to each band as I write about them!

Arcade Fire
Arcade Fire makes beautiful music. Funeral is a gorgeous album, and Neon Bible ain't bad either. Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels), Crown of Love, and Neighborhood #4 (Kettles) are just amazing. Tunnels builds itself up so perfectly I find myself repeating the song just to experience the rising intensity again. Kettles has probably the most beautiful line I've ever heard in a song, "My eyes are covered by the hands of my unborn kids / But my heart keeps watching through the skin of my eyelids". And I thought so pre-pregnancy. Plus the band is crazy big and uses a broad assortment of instruments. Their live stuff is so fun to watch, even on TV, which is sadly the only way I've seen them. Arcade Fire has a ton of energy and the lead singer has a unique and powerful voice. I'd recommend this band to anyone from my dad to all those high school kids in tiny pants with their underwear puffing out the backs. Favorites not already listed are The Well and the Lighthouse, Neon Bible, Intervention, and (Antichrist Television Blues).

Rilo Kiley/Jenny Lewis
I like me some girl singers. While the mens can definitely do some good shit with their voices, to me ladies just have more depth and complexity going on. Singer Jenny Lewis is a redhead, and a lady, and pretty darn cute. I'd hazard to classify her as a contemporary folk-singer and all of her songs tell stories of loss and love and lust and other fun L-words. Her Rilo Kiley stuff is among my favorites and her solo albums are up there for me too. I got to see her/them in concert this year and it was mind-blowing. They played awesomely and I was right up front and center. I'd swear on a stack of Bibles or kittens that she was looking at me. A lot. They did all my favorite songs from past albums and if Kasey hadn't been there, I would have cried. It was that glorious. I listen to some form of Jenny Lewis at least every two days and suddenly she was real, in front of me, walking around and singing to my face. I could feel my brain shifting to try and wrap itself around the concept. Favorite songs include Capturing Moods, A Better Son/Daughter, Salute MY Shorts!, My Slumbering Heart, Portions for Foxes, and on the solo-side, Godpeed, The Big Guns, and Jack Killed Mom.

The Decemberists
Even though drama dorks all over the world cream their little Pirates of Penzance panties when you mention The Decemberists, I still love them to no end. I can't help it. No one could, and anyone who says they can is a liar. Picaresque is one of those albums that you can play till you die and then bring a copy to listen to in Heaven. Their other stuff is good but after two years I'm still just so smitten with Picaresque (and Picaresqueties) that I only lightly touch on the other stuff. I even have it on vinyl! You want to talk about songs that tell stories? You could easily make full-length movies from any one of their songs. "The Marine's Revenge Song" is the perfect example of The Decemberists: An eight minute, thirty-one second song telling the tale of a young boy who becomes orphaned due to a rogue-ish captain and getting revenge sixteen years later. That's horribly succinct but you just have to hear it. It's amazing. I get goose bumps at the end and feel like dancing a jig and punching someone in the face at the same time. Favorites! The Marine's Revenge Song, The Bagman's Gambit, Bandit Queen, Constantinople, and A Cautionary Song, just to name a few.

Tom Waits
You bet your ass Tom Waits is on this list. We love this guy so hard that both Kasey and I were in complete agreement on naming our first child Dylan Waits, should it be a girl. No foolin'. Where do I even start? No one sounds like Tom Waits sounds. He uses instruments that people have forgotten the names of. He uses instruments that aren't even instruments. He's funny. He's charming. He writes surreal songs about heartbreak and god knows what else. You know Tom Waits when you hear him. Tom Waits helped me out in a time when no one else was there for me, and that's the truth. His early jazz-type era has some okay stuff, but once started doing his own thing, that's when it gets good. Start with the Rain Dogs album and stick with it. Maybe go on to Real Gone from there, or Bone Machine. My first listen was the song Little Drop of Poison, and I was hooked from then on. While many other songs have come to symbolize Tom Waits for me, that one is still the best in my opinion. Ready for a long favorite list? Little Drop of Poison, Tango Till They're Sore, Gun Street Girl, Anywhere I Lay My Head, Shake It, Green Grass, Jesus Gonne Be Here, Little Rain for Clyde, Chocolate Jesus, and Bronx Lullaby/Smugglers Waltz. That last is nearly my favorite, but impossible to find. It's on YouTube though.

Nine Inch Nails
The reigning champ since I actually started listening to music. Say whatever you want, but Trent is my boy. Everyone says that he peaked with The Downward Spiral or Broken, but I say "shut up". That's such a cliché BS answer. What, you got sick of waiting ten years for The Fragile and your receding hairline made you feel awkward when purchasing music that wasn't shit-ass Metallica or something you heard on K-DOOSH Easy Listening FM? But I'm getting off the subject and onto a soapbox. Trent Reznor is a cool guy. He's like the Edgar Allen Poe of our generation, but with drum machines and guitars. Some of my favorite stuff is from Downward Spiral and Broken, but it's his later stuff that keeps me coming back. It's called evolution people. I think The Fragile showcases what I like most about NIN music: It's angry, it's broody, it's got catchy songs and computer noises. It makes me a little angry, and also a little sad. His music hints at all kinds of beautiful, lonely landscapes just beyond the horizon. His music makes me want to get it on. New albums like The Fragile, Year Zero, Ghosts I-IV, and The Slip definitely lay on what I like, but his older stuff still pumps me up like nothing else. Now that he's an unsigned artist he's doing whatever the balls he wants with his music, like offering full albums for free on his website. And have you seen his live shit?! I get so jacked up just watching the recordings of his live shows I backflip-kick my mom in the face. Favorite NIN Songs to Get It On To include: Wish, Suck, Physical (You're So), Gave Up, Closer, The Becoming, Reptile, Mr. Self Destruct, The Wretched, The Big Come Down, And All That Could Have Been, Only, The Hand That Feeds, Survivalism, Capital G, 10 Miles High, and The Perfect Drug.

Godspeed! You Black Emperor
I have only listened to one album by these guys (F# A# (Infinity Sign) or something like that) but I totally dig them. Any "song" I can listen to for sixteen to thirty minutes is a winner. Remember that scene in 28 Days Later when hot-ass Cillian Murphy goes nuts and kills a bunch of those army dudes? And he beats that guy against a wall and then buries his thumbs in his eyes? That whole scene has Godspeed playing the background, as well as when he's walking around London's deserted streets. These guys are amazing at intense ambience, which is a term I just created. I just got a few more of their albums, and I'm excited to give them a listen.

Wolf Parade
Wolf Parade gets a spot in my heart for making one of two or three Known Perfect Songs. "I'll Believe In Anything" is my personal theme music, as well as the closest thing Kasey and I have to "a song". The first time I heard this song I was like, "What the hell is this?! Why haven't we listened to it before?!" The next day I borrowed the CD and have listened to Wolf Parade enough for the laser to burn a rut in the disk. Besides the aforementioned track, the rest of the album "Apologies to the Queen" has a lot of good songs including Same Ghost Every Night, Dear Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts, and Modern World.

Bloc Party
This band gets it's own spot in the fist wrapped in blood that is my heart for another Known Perfect Song, "This Modern Love". Fire up iTunes or eMusic or however you procure music and get this song. Listen to it with headphones or in a place where you won't be distracted and can pay it's many levels the attention they deserve. Just like the Arcade Fire track mentioned above, this song starts out small and constructs itself perfectly and subtly into probably the best song I have ever heard. And that's not over-exaggeration. I'm not even going to try and describe it. I like bands that sound like where they are from, and Bloc Party definitely sings British. Call me a reverse racist here, but when I discovered the lead singer was British and black, I liked them even more! I love black Britons. I started to list my favorite songs, but I like pretty much every song on the Silent Alarm album a lot.

I was going to try and round this list off with ten entries, but it feels like that'd be forcing it. And I write crappy enough as it is without faking it. So instead here's a rundown of the other bands I like, rapid fire: Gorillaz, Be Your Own Pet, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Polysics, Wednesday 13, Bright Eyes, Cake, Bishop Allen, Cursive, Death From Above 199, Dethklok, Joanna Newsom, Mindless Self Indulgence, and Refused.

Rock on hermanos y hermanas, rock on.

- David

Good Quote

2008-12-17T19:35:00.001-05:00

From Dustin Klein of Cadence, who makes some pretty cool cycle-centric clothing and junk:

"Since 1999 I have made the conscious decision
to live car-free and relish the political and
individual effects of this. Once the motor
vehicle is out of the equation, you start to
base your life around the bicycle. To me this is
beautiful and I love how it affects everything
from where you choose to live, to the types of
food you eat. To me, bicycles are a physical
representation of freedom, and I live my life
by it."

It's quite true; once a bike becomes your only mode of transportation your whole life starts to change around it. I eat both worse and better because I ride 98% of the time. Better because things like pop are crap to have in your belly while you ride, worse because I figure I bike a ton and I can eat whatever the fug I want.

Also, I've actually started doing yoga instead of just talking about it. Granted it's just cuz my legs get tight enough to make harp strings jealous and I gotta loosen them up somehow, but still. It's something. My household has also slowly moved towards the European style of grocery shopping, which I guess means numerous small trips to a local store instead of one huge trip to stock up for a month. Which was always annoying to me but the short trips are actually enjoyable.

Anywho, ride a bike.

It's my Friday, I'm going home now.

- David

Paul McCartney, Vegetarians Hate You

2008-12-16T15:24:00.001-05:00

I Twittered about this earlier, but I feel more attention (and annoyance) is due.

In a news article I read today (http://tinyurl.com/6agvs4) Paul McCartney "lashed out" at the Dalai Lama for not being strictly vegetarian. I remember reading somewhere that Paul and his whole brood suddenly went insanely vegetarian after watching one of their kids play with the family lamb in the back yard. "Holy crap!" Paul said, "We eat stuff like that cute lil' lamb our daughter is frolicking with!" and poof! Annoying vegetarians were born. I also remember reading that His Holiness (or H.H. as we call him around the poker table) eats meat half of the year due to health problems, as prescribed by medical professionals.

For the record, I'm a staunch vegetarian. I get upset when people who eat fish and seafood call themselves vegetarians. Grab a dictionary, assholes:

–noun
1. a person who does not eat or does not believe in eating meat, fish, fowl, or, in some cases, any food derived from animals, as eggs or cheese, but subsists on vegetables, fruits, nuts, grain, etc.

I've been vegetarian for about four or five years now. It's pretty cool, it works out for me. Is it for everyone? Probably not. Do I go around slapping wieners and beef out of people's hands and mouths? No. Do I have a megaphone with a big MEAT IS MURDER sticker on it constantly blaring my high-pitched tirades against all you heartless meat munchers? No. It's not my place. It's not anyone's place to tell anyone else how to live, unless you happen upon an obviously pregnant woman about to do some crack. I take great care to make sure I don't become one of Those Vegetarians who feel the need to preach their dietary choices to anyone who crosses their path. I give Kasey shit every once in a while, but it's all in good fun. I learned years ago not to go around preaching my personal crap to people.

So it really bugs me that this senile prick of an old man who just happened to be popular FORTY YEARS AGO for dicking around on a guitar is on the Dalai Lama's balls to go meatless. Hey buddy, he gets it okay? You don't roll up to a fireman and go, "HEY MAN, BETTER BE CAREFUL WITH MATCHES AND GASOLINE HURR HURR" He fucking knows already. Kinda like how the spiritual leader of Tibet knows that eating meat isn't in line with Buddhist philosophy. Ever since he was two years old he's known it. H.H. doesn't need your melted face up in his grill telling him his business.

"[The Dalai Lama] replied saying that his doctors had told him he needed it, so I (Paul McCartney) wrote back saying they were wrong." Yeah, cuz you're a doctor. And not even just A doctor, HIS doctor. You have done his examinations and are intimate with the details of his health and physiology. Memorizing the health benefits of a vegetarian diet (of which there are plenty) does not qualify you to make medical decisions about other people, especially in such a dickish way.

So I'd like to say on behalf of the Vegetarians against Assholes Group (or VAG for short), that you suck Paul McCartney, and stop giving us a bad name. Go join Ringo and beat up some cancer kid who wants your autograph or something.

- David

Bicycling Buffet Burglar Busted!

2008-12-16T11:59:00.001-05:00

A month or so ago I posted about a Chinese food place in my area that had been robbed repeatedly by a guy who made his escapes via bicycle. Apparently he (or a copy cat at least) has been caught!

"Police have charged a 19-year-old in connection with a robbery at Empire Buffet at 1106 London Blvd.

Patrick Louther, of the 1100 block f Blair St., has been charged with the Dec. 1 robbery and using a gun during a felony, according to a police news release. An investigation is continuing, police said.

Investigators said earlier this month that the restaurant had been robbed several times since Aug. 26.

No injuries were reported during the robberies."

What happens to his bike though? Maybe the bike made him do it, like that Stephen King story about the possessed car. It drove him to steal, but it's powers were only strong enough on roads with bike lanes. Oo, oo! And then the police give the bike to the owners of the buffet as part of their compensation and it drives their young son to a life of crime and it starts all over again! If I added a retard to this story Stephen King would be showing up at my door with a big bag with a dollar sign on it fer sure.

- David

Moje Teta je Úchvatný

2008-12-14T12:42:00.001-05:00

Apologies in advance if the title of this post offends any Czech readers who may stumble upon it. Google told me to do it, and hopefully it's not playing a joke on me like I'm the German guy in Can't Hardly Wait. I'm a weekend late in posting this, and I apologize for that as well. I don’t know if it was the schedule change or the back-to-back calls every day at work but last week just flew by.

Anywho, my lovely & awesome aunt came down to visit Kasey and I on her way out West. She's been living in New York for a spell and going to the Culinary Institute in Hyde Park with her massive dog Romey. Now that she's all graduated and unencumbered by school she's striking out with 95 lbs of dog and an SUV full of possessions to move to the nor' west part of the country somewhere. On the way she's visiting friends and family and I was lucky enough to have her around for a few days.

Being the first of my family to actually visit the new home I've come to love so much, I wanted to make sure everything left a good impression. It may sound dumb, but I regularly day dream about little visits my family could make and all the fun crap we'd do. That's how much I like it here.

You only get one chance to make a first impression, but you can shampoo the carpet till the cows come home. And shampoo I did. In fact, I don't think the apartment (well, the non-bedroom parts) has ever been that tidy and inviting. We vacuumed, cleaned the carpet in varying stages and angles of approach, mopped the floor, cleaned the counters, did the dishes, straightened up all the knick-knacks, combed the dog; all the crap regular people do on a regular basis but we do only if a VIP is making a visit. With the Christmas tree and ring of festively wrapped, unmarked presents underneath the place looked very cozy indeed. I think it also helped my chances of leaving a positive impression that the house was already sprinkled with past presents from the honored guest as well.

She made the drive late at night and come over around Noon where Maudie mauled her and was in turn showered with attention. After taking a brief look around the apartment we headed out for lunch in Ghent at Azar's which seemed the perfect place to officially start her visit. I couldn't very well take my chef of an aunt out to McDonalds or something, now could I? Azar's also has a lot of vegan and vegetarian dishes and a cute little market I knew she'd enjoy. Ghent itself is also right up her alley. We talked and ate slowly and spent time catching up on everything from stories of the past to new happenings back home. Kasey and my aunt Brandon get along well, which is a pre-requisite for successfully dating Y.T. Baby or no, not liking any one of a few key family members could be grounds for separation and/or hefty fines. It says so right on the end-user agreement form I hand out when meeting possible daters.

Afterwards we picked up Romey from the hotel (he was being grumpy and didn't want to get in the car earlier, and it's not like you can pick up a ninety-five pound dog and put him on the seat) and thankfully after subtly moving him closer and closer to the car we were able to get him in and get all four of us back to Olde Towne. I leashed up Maudie and together we showed my aunt the neighborhood I've come to consider my own in a way I haven't with any other. We let Maudie and Romey off the leash in a small park not far from my house so they could do whatever. Romey wanted to play and as Maudie ran by she got rolled over a couple times like a furry hotdog on a plate by the huge bulldog. I think the size difference between the two left them at a loss on how to interact with each other. No harm, no foul; Maudie simply scampered away with a look on her bug-eyed face like, "What was that!" I've become quite adept at reading a pug's mood and she was fine. The trick is looking at the tail and not the face when determining a pug's emotional state. The curl, speed, and direction of the tail gives a lot more information than the perpetually horrified/depressed look all pugs seem to have.

The next night Aunt Brandon came over with bags of groceries and made macaroni and cheese from scratch. She pulled tiny leaves off things, grated cheeses of origin and type I'd never heard of before, and made a nummy salad dressing to pour over leaves of green and purple. We pre-feasted on salad and crunched on slices of bread while we waited for the pasta and I introduced my aunt to The Labyrinth, which I honestly could not believe she'd never seen before. Even though I was plenty full I kept going back for more. She's always been a good cook and I'm glad she's going to do that for a living now.

All the food was fantastic and having her there was wonderful. We laughed a lot and just talking to her is a joy. I get nervous around most people, family members definitely not excluded, but I've always been more comfortable around my aunt. I was sad as I closed the door and made sure she made it to the elevator through the peep-hole (sometimes people get confused) when she left. I've been waiting a long time to have someone from my family come see me, and I'm glad it was her.

I definitely need to make more of an effort to keep in touch with my family, even though they should still get their asses out here once in a while!

- David

Conversations Concerning Cycle Commuting - Volume 1

2008-12-10T10:46:00.000-05:00

People give funny reactions sometimes when they find out a person rides to work every day. I'm sure in places that have harsher climates like Alaska and such it's even worse, but even for lil' ol' me in the relatively moderate climes of Virginia people are sometimes shocked that I hazard to ride in such things as the rain, the cold, and Hampton Blvd traffic.

Today my friend Nancy was at my desk, messing with the World's Largest Styrofoam Ball tourist attraction that is my helmet when a lady from QA walked by and asked what she had a helmet for. Nancy replied that it was my helmet and that I rode into work every day. What follows is a loose approximation (just like yer mom) of their conversation:

QA Lady - It's raining outside!
Nancy - He loves riding in the rain, he says it's a lot of fun.
QA Lady - Does he know Virginia drivers have no respect for human life? They go, "Oo! Shiny bicycle!" *mimes turning steering wheel into path of bicycle*

They then went on to talk about how dangerous it is for motorcycles too, but how it was even worse for cyclists because I'm little and my bike is little and together we are a fragile little thing blowing in the turbulence of the big scary cars.

Also, it was more sprinkling than raining today and with the 65 degree weather it was quite nice. Toweling myself off in the bathroom with paper towels wasn't as good, but you gotta take a little crap for what you love.

Common commute conversations include asking how many tires I go through, how long it takes me to get into work, where I ride from, why I wear "short pants", and stories about how awesome the bike they had fifteen years ago was. Nobody asks the fun questions like if I've ever been run over or what's the best thing a driver has ever yelled at me. Those are the kinds of things I would immediately think to ask.

Today is my Friday, and it wouldn't have come sooner. Gonna try to hang out tonight with my amigo and then it's three days of Me Time.

Piece out home slices.

- David

No, Like "The Giver"

2008-12-09T11:38:00.001-05:00

Last night I broke down. Kasey confessed to me that within the last day or two she finally got excited about the baby and had been refereeing to it by name instead of "it" or The Gaffer, which is the nickname I steered her towards when she was still calling it The Gross-Ass Fetus. I think the baby can hear now and I don't want it growing a complex along with all of it's other organs.

So on the way home from the grocery store, and after numerous iterations of "I'm sure, I'm sure!" Kasey let me in on the gender of the lil' one. Which his pretty much how I wanted it to happen. I figured I could probably hold out until the doctor told me, but I was fairly certain someone would let it slip or I'd figure it out some how. Riding in the car, just the two of us, laughing and enjoying being near each other seems like the perfect place to hear this kind of news.

Ladies and gents (excepting all those who already know), we're having a boy. Sometime in the spring lil' Jonas Charles will be borne into the world and become the next Emilio Airhart, Lex Luthor, Charles Darwin, Salvador Dali, or Trent Reznor. I was about 49/51 on whether I wanted a boy or a girl but it was very exciting to think of having a little Davey to teach stuff that a girl may not be interested in. Like the proper application and technique of The Shocker.

So for all y'all that knew but knew I didn't want to know, know now that I know. Coo?

Now if we can only work out this last name thing…

- David

P.S. And each person who asks, "Jonas, like the Jonas Brothers?" is going to get a kick to their soft nether-parts and spit in their face.

Big (5", 5 oz) News!

2008-12-03T20:13:00.006-05:00

Soooo, apparently I'm not shootin' blanks like I thought all these years:

I've been holding out on this post for awhile just because I hadn't broken the news to my family, but my dad knows now and my aunt will be here soon so (hopefully, cuz she does read this blog) I may be able to tell one of my family members face to face.

To the rest of my loved ones, this may seem like a shitty way for me to bust out baby pics but I'm still weird with this kinda thing. I mean, I'm excited fer sure. We have names picked out (Jonas Charles for a boy, Dylan Waits for a girl) and I'm already plotting schemes to raise a vegetarian child (tiny pet piggies and perhaps a miniature cow that I'll have to invent) but being like, "Hey, um, I got a kid coming!" is still really hard. I'm not ashamed, it's just so foreign.

Kasey is fifteen weeks along, and the kid is about 5" and 5 ounces big at this point. The ultrasound was surreal. Based off television, I thought ultrasounds were kind of boring, 2-dimensional sorta deals. But no, oh no. We could see it moving around! It's little arms were all over the place! The ultrasoundologist had to jiggle Kasey's tummy to get The Gaffer's legs to uncross so the sex could be determined cuz apparently David/Kasey Jr. is a modest soul (unlike it's pappy) and needed some prompting to show the goods (very unlike it's pappy). But she was able to determine if it's gonna wear a poodle skirt or a leather jacket eventually.

And this an important paragraph right here. Ready? I don't want to know what it is. I'm an old fashioned kinda guy and with the help of the understanding peeps at the doctor's office they were able to impart the chromosome situation to Kasey but keep me in the dark. Everyone we've encountered since the visit knows, but I don't. And I'd like to keep it that way until the doctor spanks it's booty and busts out the cigars. So please, no blabbin'.

Other than being at a loss at how to break the news (with my friend Kurtz, I let him know by telling him Kasey couldn't accept his offer of booze while rubbing her tummy with a comical look on my face) I'm looking forward to the whole deal. I'm sure the sleep deprivation and unimaginable messes won't be a blast, but man, this is going to be interesting.

- David

News

2008-12-03T12:50:00.001-05:00

From my current hometown of Portsmouth, VA:

"Robbery suspect escapes on bicycle

PORTSMOUTH, Va. - The Empire Buffet restaurant in Portsmouth has been robbed four times in the past three months and police believe the same suspect is behind them all.

The latest robbery happened on December 1, 2008 at 9:10 p.m..

Police say the suspect, described as a young black man, walked into the restaurant on London Boulevard and demanded money while pointing a handgun at the employees.

He made the employees lie on the floor, then went behind the counter and removed the money from the cash register drawer.

Witnesses say they saw the suspect leave on a bicycle.

This is the fourth armed robbery at the business since August 26, 2008. During that robbery, the suspect had two handguns, one in each hand. The other robberies were on November 13 and November 22.

Detectives believe the same suspect participated in all four robberies and he tried to conceal his identity each time. Police say a second suspect was involved in two of the crimes.

Anyone with information that could help lead police to the suspects is asked to call the Crime Line at 1-888-LOCK-U-UP."

Man, I feel bad for the people who are getting held up so much but the image of a rober escaping by bicycle is hilarious. It's probably one of those ridiculous beach cruiser type bikes too, with the handlbears pointing straight up in the air and the seat set way too low. I'd pay to see that getaway.

- David

Bitchin'

2008-12-02T10:41:00.001-05:00

I'm slightly grumpy this morning.

Last night one of my new neighbors, who appears to either be young and dumb and just out of college or young and dumb and in the Navy, decided the washer and dryer were his personal domain and left clothes in both all night long. In fact when I left this morning they were still in there. So after waiting later than I should have, I decided to use the facilities on a nearby floor. I was out of work clothes, my bike clothes were a tad musty from the rain, and I wanted to look nice for the doctor appointment today, so I basically had to do laundry.

It wasn't a big load, just a pair of pants, socks and undies, a few shirts, my sweatshirt and my cycling shoes. Not even enough to fill the washer halfway up. Apparently that meager amount of clothes was too much for the dryer though, as after forty-five minutes of burnin' and turnin' my crap was still damp. By this time it was nearly Eleven at night and I didn't have time to put them in again. So whatever, they weren't wet or anything and the stuff I needed in the morning would probably dry out by then.

Then I couldn't sleep. As a bit of advice from me to you: Don't watch an awesome, exciting, addicting show like House when you're trying to go to sleep. Eventually I did slip off to dreamy land, but not anywhere near enough to get my butt out of bed to make the bus by 5:30. So I had to drive, which is a bit annoying in itself even on good days. Which I suppose is fine since I'm only working a half-day and heading the doctor's right after.

But there was a "disabled" vehicle in the tunnel, so I was about twenty minutes late today. A disabled vehicle in the tunnel is a nice way of saying that some dickhead ran out of gas or tried to change lanes and wrecked or was somehow incapable of driving in a straight line for less than half a mile, and then some government employee has to roll out a tow truck and clear the blockage. For the amount of traffic that drives through the tunnel it doesn't happen that often, but often enough.

And now, apparently, I'm in the Marine queues. I don't yet have my administrative account on the Marine Corps side of the network so I have to get someone to lean me their account on a lot of the fixes I need to do. This is annoying and takes time. But Marines are usually nicer and easier for me to talk to than Navy folk, so it's not all bad.

But on the Good Stuff side of the spectrum, I only have two hours left. I got my arm and leg warmers from Solocc.com last night, and they are awesome. I get to spend the rest of the day with my honeyface. I have pastries. Guess it ain't all bad, as long as I can get my sugar I'll make it through.

- David

Attempting to Define A Life - Past

2008-11-30T14:00:00.001-05:00

Writing a biography, auto- or otherwise, seems like an impossible task. How much of our lives are made up of intensely personal, internal thoughts and feelings that can't be defined or described to others, beyond tax brackets and age groups and culture and history? Walking down the same street, side by side, our minds are vastly different universes, each at least as complex as the physical one we live in.

But I've been thinking about my life lately, and how to express it to my loved ones. How to explain it, I guess would be more accurate. Even while another voice says I don't have to explain anything, I haven't done anything wrong; I don't have anything to say for myself.

Still, I have this feeling that my family may look at my life as something less than acceptable, and that perhaps I have done something wrong. And am continuing to do so. It's probably vanity, but I have always been happy that my life hasn't followed what seems to be the Standard Plan for Young Americans. I go where the wind takes me, and sometimes that matches the Plan and sometimes it does not.

So here we go.

I am twenty-five years old. On December 30^th I will be twenty-six. My last name means "cake" in Czechoslovakian. I'm adopted by my father, to whom I owe everything. Some people may contend that, but I've never felt any differently. I grew up in south-east Idaho on a potato and wheat farm owned and operated by my family, where I lived until I was eighteen. The town I lived in had a population barely overly a thousand.

I was an average student, horrendous at math but good in English. The latter is due to my dad. I didn't play any high school sports and was only in Drama once. I did lighting. I took Choir throughout nearly all of middle and high school. I got Biggest Flirt in the yearbook. I helped teach an HTML class. I hung out with the "stoner" kids but wasn't one. I decided I was an atheist around the 7^th grade. I didn't have any real cliques and was liked by pretty much everyone. I worried a lot. I liked girls.

Until a recruiter from the High Tech Institute of Phoenix came to my high school somewhere near the middle of my senior year I had no plans for college. I hated the pressure from my teachers and the assumption that I had to make plans for the future. Even then I didn't like making plans, especially far-reaching plans like college. I knew I wanted to get a higher education, and I knew I would go into computers, but out of some passive-aggressive spite I refused to research schools and write application letters. If the recruiter hadn't come I don't know where I would have went. The school was comparatively inexpensive, had a good program and an accelerated schedule, and Phoenix also happened to be where my high school sweetheart would be moving once she graduated, so it seemed like the best choice. It was the only place to which I applied.

I graduated with an acceptable GPA (which I can't recall now) and began working at Best Buy. While in college I did a bunch of short-term contracting jobs for companies around Phoenix. Best Buy wasn't spectacular, but it paid the bills and the discount was nice. The worst part was being forced to push warranties on the customer covering everything from USB cables to Mountain Dew. That and I hate being a salesman. The powers that be wouldn't let me off for Christmas vacation so that I could enjoy a cruise with my family and see my dad get re-married, so I quit.

After that it was GoDaddy Software which I worked at for about four years, moving from the call center floor to the network operations center, to the security operations center where I was a sub-department in charge of all user accounts for the company. I was making good money in a department made up entirely of me, which I had created as the company grew and they needed a person to take care of accounts full time. I enjoyed working there a lot, and if Phoenix hadn't stopped feeling like home to me I'd still be there now. I made some good friends there that I miss terribly.

As long as I can remember I've always picked friends (and girlfriends) who are smarter than me. In high school it was Tony Bixby. In college and throughout my time at GoDaddy is was Jeff Rodriguez, Chris Beverly, and Scott Gerlach. Jeff helped get me both of my jobs after college and even though we don't talk much I still bug him for computer crap every once in a while. A guy named Chris Hawkins and I spent a lot of time together, getting drunk and eating steak at Applebees or playing Final Fantasy and watching movies. When we were on the call center floor together we ate at Panda Express every night for at least six months straight.

Chris and Scott are the funniest and most fun mofos I've ever met. I cannot count the number times my face and sides have hurt from laughing so hard. Chris and I used to make even the hardiest of people uncomfortable with our ability to deliver the most homo-erotic banter with completely straight faces and natural, conversational tones in our voices. It's a special friendship that can engage in that kind of foolin' around, and I do miss him so. Scott is the best story teller around, and his impressions of people (his lovely wife included) during these stories are hilarious. He pulls faces that make Kasey and I laugh to this day, and I've been gone from there for almost two years. I was proud and thankful to be at his wedding in Hawaii and wish I could still pug-sit for him and Jori.

I married my high school sweetheart Heidi in Las Vegas with only our immediate families present due to a fued between her parents and my grandparents. Think Romeo and Juliet meets The Hatfields & The McCoys, but with potatoes and north-western accents instead of iambic pentameter and moonshine. Thing were good for nearly the entire eight years we were together. Growing up with each other like we did afforded us a total sense of ease around one another. Fights were rare and ended quickly, we thought the same, we helped each other out. We were best friends. We could be ourselves in a way people rarely are unless they're alone, and for a time it was good.

But I started to feel neglected and she wasn't good at handling the stress of college, of her job, of anything, and would take it out on me. I tried my best to help or let it go, but after a while I began to wear. I'm positive I wasn't always a bundle of joy and I wanted a lot from her. We hit a major bump in the road that striped away a lot of trust and innocence, and a year later after things had not improved and I saw the beginnings of bitterness and loathing in me towards my spouse, I decided to end it. I won't lie; it helped that I had someone wonderful to go to. I've never had any delusions about being good at being alone.

Somewhere in here my youngest brother Seth died in a car crash shortly before his eighteenth birthday. It was the first death of an immediate family member that I had ever experienced. I hadn't seen him for a long time, and I don't know if I'll ever be okay with that. I felt the worst for my father and my brother, who were closest to him. People have told me I changed after that, and attributed my decision to end my marriage and move away to this change, but I don't recall feeling anything different about myself. However, I do know now that nothing is all that serious, where before it was only a belief.

Despite having a job and friends I always felt were too good to be true, I had to leave Arizona. The relationship between my long-time girlfriend and short-time wife was making us both unhappy. I was becoming increasingly bitter towards the person I valued the most and I didn't want to hate her. My apartment felt like a cardboard box instead of a home, and I couldn't stand driving/living/existing in a life that had collapsed. The bulk of our friends stopped talking to me the day Heidi moved out, those mentioned above excluded. Maybe I was thinking the grass was greener on the other side of the country, but when you live in the desert that's not a hard thing to imagine.

So I moved to Virginia. After a handful of visits to the east coast I was in love, both with the area and with Kasey. She flew to Arizona and stayed with me for a few months while I tried (and failed) to talk my job into letting me work remotely and packing up all the stuff I owned to drive cross-country. I had an apartment, but no job. I knew one would come, it was just a matter of time. Of course it took longer than everyone would have liked, with my family picking up a lot of my tabs until I got on my feet (which still happens, here and there), but it gave me time to get settled and explore my new, wonderful surroundings.

Two days of driving and twenty-four hundred miles later, I was home. At the time of this writing, that was a year and a half ago.

- David

Part Two Soon!

Traffica Electronica

2008-11-30T08:57:00.006-05:00

So there's this thing called Google Analytics that can show you a bunch of information about your website traffic in purdy charts and graphs. I got invited to a beta account by a friend a while back (thanks Melly!) and check in on it once in a while, just to see what's up.

Now, these maps are going to be ugly because A) I can't figure out how to export them from Google Analytics so that I can embed them in my blog and B) I'm at work and only have the Print Screen button and Paint to work with. But if you click them you'll get a better version.

I wanted to post proof cuz I don't believe it myself, but apparently I've gotten 351 visits just this month from ten countries, including such far away places as New Zealand, Brazil, and Nebraska. And over a year period, more than five thousand people from fifty-one countries have stumbled onto my site, probably looking for some kind of weird porn or something. Compared to the sites I visit that isn't a lot, but in my mind 350 hits a month for my lil' ol' Interweb page is pretty awesome.

Google reports that besides direct traffic, a couple of people are responsible for this "success" of mine. In order from top to bottom, my amigo Aero's website LevelUpNinjas.com is responsible for 40 hits this month alone and 10% of my new traffic. Next up (after Blogger, some Yahoo mail server, and another blog service) are my kindred spirits over at A Year of Bike Commuting, who have sent 10 hits this month but are responsible for a whopping 50% of the new visitors. After that it's a couple of sites dedicated to fixed-gear cycling, then Twitter, then my own website. So apparently I'm giving myself the reach around as well, but I just barely made the top 10 list of those doing so.

Another fun feature is the Keywords list, to see the top ten things people are searching for when they hit my site. This month the top three (besides the name of my website) are "retarded pug", "story of O" webcomic, and "tom waits is my religion". So people coming to my site are looking for mentally handicapped dogs, webcomics of a naughty book, and a Tom Waits-based religion. It's interesting to me that not one of the top ten keywords has anything to do with cycling.

I have half a mind to start posting nudey photos about every third post or so even if they have nothing to do with the subject material and see if my stats change noticeably. "Hey, have you been to AbsentMindfully.com yet? Aw bro you gotta check it out, this weirdo will be talking about almost getting ran over or some shit but will have a hot naked chick right in the middle of all this writing crap. It's awesome!"

Yeah, I can see it now.

- David

Random Sharing

2008-11-29T14:15:00.003-05:00

This video is great, apparently there's a commercial based off it/it's based off too.

I want to print this out and frame it somewhere:

I just finished up Phase 1 of some Christmas shopping for the lady. Yesterday we went into Target for about ten minutes and it was nuts. People had their heads down, eyes set, and looked very stern on wheeling them carts to the best deals. I even saw a cart-wreck! Some kid was pushing a cart and t-boned a lady who wasn't watching out. I just needed some carpet cleaner, but I could feel the tense vibe. People were a pain.

I seriously gained seven to ten pounds this week. The Lovely Lady and I went first to her mom's house for Thanksgiving lunch where I ate a ton, then a ton more, then napped on accident, then ate some more. After that we went to her pa's house for dinner and did it all again, except the nap part. The next day we took it easy in the morning then went back to her mom's to take another crack at all the food she made. Napped again, and then went home. I ate so much it feels like I just completed the Tour de France of eating and held the yellow jersey the whole time.

Presently I'm parked outside of Starbucks in Downtown Norfolk bloggin' and talking to my amigo Jeff, sharing links for crap we wanna get for our bikes. The current quest is new shoes. Mine are worn out, and the topmost velcro strap on one side isn't staying velcroed, which messes with my stroke (hurr hurr) and I think has caused some of the weirdness concerning my calf on that side being a full inch bigger around than the other side.

Welp, time for me to head home, to the land of Still No Internet. Have a good weekend, y'all.

- David

More Vidi-hos

2008-11-26T20:12:00.002-05:00

When I used to ride to my friend Jeff's house late at night, this would happen to me all the time. But it was just deer faces. And I was sprinting out of fear:

Also, tomorrow, if I can swing it, and if I get enough commas into his sentence, I'm going to start doing my own morning ride on days off, cuz, you know, I want to have disproportionately large legs, and all.

- David

Christmas Town?

2008-11-23T13:28:00.002-05:00

December fasteth approacheth, and it doth bring Christmas Tyme and Me Olde Birthday. In that materialistic, kid in a candy store, gimme gimme gimme vein, I've updated my Wishlist, linked here and in the Stalk Me section on the right. If you're curious about what non-fleshy things I lust for, check 'er out.

It's a specific list but in no means all-inclusive or final. I just have a hard time with the "So what do you want for Christmas/your birthday?" question when it's face to face. It's easier for me to make a list cuz I'll forget when I'm under pressure. Also, I prefer that my character flaws be apparent only on the Internet.

Although in truth, a lump of coal might be asking for too much this year.

- David

Absent-Mindfully

Appy Partment

The Rider

New Year's Resolutions

BD B-Day

The Dead Flag Blues

Red Means Stop!

Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven

Johnny Utah!

Vlog Entry - Jeezy Chreezy, Greasy, & Xmas

Moosicka

Good Quote

Paul McCartney, Vegetarians Hate You

Bicycling Buffet Burglar Busted!

Moje Teta je Úchvatný

Conversations Concerning Cycle Commuting - Volume 1

No, Like "The Giver"

Big (5", 5 oz) News!

News

Bitchin'

Attempting to Define A Life - Past

Traffica Electronica

Random Sharing

More Vidi-hos

More Tiny Videos!

Christmas Town?