Month: May 2022

  • It’s Time to Cut Stuff Out

    So, ah, I have been going to the gyp for four months now. Not a whole lot has changed. I have dropped 8 pounds, and my legs look toned and muscular. Outside of that, nothing has changed.

    In fact, I went out shopping this weekend to buy some new shorts, and I had to move up to the 32″ waist. Yup, in four months, my stomach got bigger.

    So, something is outta wack.

    My belly, is a beer belly. Or, if you are trying to be cute, one might call it a Dad Bod, but that sounds gross and icky and trying too hard to be trendy. I have a beer and ice cream belly. To be specific, it is a bourbon and ginger ale, and late night ice cream beer belly. I have to admit that I have two habits that are working against me.

    It’s June, which is a month that I normally take off from drinking, so that will be an easy adjustment. But, I need to start to look at my relationship with drinking. Ask the hard questions as to why I do it, what am I getting out of it, and is it masking something that I don’t want to deal with. Those are tough, and serious questions.

    The ice cream, on the other hand is an easy one. I am a late night snacker. I like to raid the fridge before I go to bed, and being that we are about to start summer, I have been buying a lot of ice cream. Most of it is ending up in my stomach, which then attaches to my stomach. I mean, I do have some other bad eating habits if I am being honest, but the ice cream really is the crown jewel of my gluttony. Sure, the roots of my drinking might be deep and dark, and deserve real introspection, but the reason for ice cream is easy; it tastes good and makes me feel really good. Sure, my family sees me drinking, but the ice cream is a secret that only happens when I am alone late at night watching old movies or MST3k.

    The point here people, if I want to see more results, and actually get to feeling better, which is still alluding me, then I need to make some additional changes to my health, and admit that I need to cut some things out.

    (Say, don’t forget to like this post, or share it, or leave a comment. I got bills to pay, you know.)

  • Memorial Day

    Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

    Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

    But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

    Abraham Lincoln
    November 19, 1863

  • ODDS and ENDS: Kids are Back, Doomsday DJ, and Protect Kids and Not Guns

    (Is that a flying pig in the sky?)

    I have started watching The Kids in the Hall’s new season in Amazon. As with all of these nostalgia reboots of stuff from the 80’s and 90’s, some fall rather flat, and leave you wondering why it needed to be rebooted in the first place. (Looking at you Fresh Prince.) First of all, I don’t think The Kids in the Hall are a reboot, as it feels like a solid continuation of the original show. Second, The Kids are just as biting and internal as they have ever been. Yes, they are older, but that alt/punk subversive vibe is still there. Their humor was never topical, and their best stuff always had to do with the relationship between characters.

    Which brings me to “Doomsday DJ” a darkly humorous bleak sketch with just Dave Foley and Melanie’s 1971 hit “Brand New Key.” Though the sketch, which is in three parts and the clip is only the first, takes place in a world where DNA bombs have fallen and destroyed just about everybody on the planet, it has an eerie present feeling to it. Was the sketch’s creation influenced by the Trump years and Covid isolation? Clearly, yes. But man, Foley’s expression of desperation and loss with his eyes becoming unfocused, only to snap back to reality to do his “job” on the radio. I think everyone can relate to a similar feeling during the lockdown, watching tv on the couch, and wondering, “Is this really how it will all end?” The Kids tapped into a zeitgeist in the culture that I don’t think anyone has been able to express correctly. I know I said above that they don’t do topical jokes, and I hold to that, because the joke here is the internal struggle of the character to continue in the face of ultimate doom. Amazingly, we all know what that feels like, and now we see you can make fun of it.

    Protect Kids and Not Guns.

    Protect Kids and Not Guns.

    Protect Kids and Not Guns.

    (Say, don’t forget to like this post, or share it, or leave a comment. I got bills to pay, you know.)

  • Nothing Changes, Except the Names

    I have been pretty pissed off for the past two days. And now, as well. The shooting in Uvalde, Texas has been on my mind, as I know it has been for just about all of us. I grew up in Texas. I spent one Summer in San Antonio, and so I knew where Uvalde was. I knew it was a small west Texas town, in all the good ways that a town could be small, and in west Texas. When I heard where the shooting had taken place, I knew, heartbreakingly knew, that everyone in that town knew everyone who had been killed.

    And as a parent, with a child about the age of the kids who were murdered, my soul is just wounded for the parent in Uvalde. I drop my kid off every morning. I hold her hand as we cross the street, and kiss the top of her head as she walks away from me to get in line for class. And I stand there watching her walk into school. And yes, the dark, evil, depressing thought does cross my mind that this might be the last time I see her.

    I don’t have that thought because of Uvalde. I have had that thought since I first started dropping her off at school, over a year ago, because I live in America.

    I could use logic to point out the odds of a school shooting, or the likelihood that my daughter would even be involved in one. I could use logic and be rational, and come up with a well-reasoned argument for or against gun control.

    But I’m tired of that.

    I’m tired of all of it.

    I’m tired of nothing changing.

    I wish I was a better writer, because a really good one summed up how I am feeling. Roxane Gay touched on how after these tragedies, there is a call for civility, but she is right; who is served by the people being civil in an uncivil situation?

    This is what I think we should do; read their names. When you get in an argument over guns, take out your phone, find them, and then read their names. Don’t make this an abstract discussion, make it personal. Read the kid’s names and their ages.

    No screaming, or yelling, but forcefully; read the kid’s names. Interrupt them if you have to, but keep reading the names.

    Read the names.

  • Short Story Review: “Invisible Bird” by Claire-Louise Bennett

    (The short story “Invisible Bird” by Claire-Louise Bennett appeared in the May 30th, 2022 issue of The New Yorker.)

    (Odds are there are SPOILERS!)

    Well… I’m not sure what to make of “Invisible Bird” by Claire-Louise Bennett. I have had this happen to me several times of late, when reading a short story from a magazine; I finish reading it, I don’t dislike it, but my gut tells me that I am missing something. Like, if I wouldn’t have missed that one day in my senior English class, then I would totally understand this story. Or, being that I didn’t get an MFA in creative writing, that’s why this story doesn’t work for me. That might be true, but I hope it isn’t. In these reviews, I try to read each story as is, and don’t read up on the author, or research anything the author has to said about the story. This way I enter the story with a clean slate, tabula rasa so to speak, and go with what my gut tells me.

    My gut tells me I’m missing something.

    The story is about a girl who recently finishes her degree in London, but being that she is behind on her rent, is politely booted from her flat, and is forced to move back home. Then, her and her boyfriend, after he sells his car, go to Dublin, only to find themselves homeless and scrounging to survive. They live on the streets for a time, make some unsavory friends, beg, work jobs that steal from them, but still earn enough money to rent an apartment. They build a home in the apartment, and the girl starts to write, the boy moves back to England, while she stays in Dublin. The End…

    The story is pretty straight forward, like the description I gave, and I was entertained by it. But what I didn’t get was how to feel toward the girl. Essentially, her and her boyfriend are, for lack of a better term, are “slumming it.” They are tourists. They are college educated young people, who choose to be homeless. The girls describes their experiences in a light, almost, fun way. I kept rereading to see if there was a hint of irony, or sarcasm, or even satire, but I couldn’t find it. The story felt like it was presenting the girl, and all of these events as straight. And if that is true, then why did this girl want to be homeless? (I have worked in a shelter, and being homeless is scary and tough as shit. I have never met anyone who wanted that life.)  So, what am I not getting here?

    It felt too easy for the girl, and too succinct. It made me wonder if this was an excerpt from a novel, or a much longer story that was pared down. It’s not bad. Just, it felt like something was off.

    (Say, don’t forget to like this post, or share it, or leave a comment. I got bills to pay, you know.)