Author: Matthew Groff

  • Flashback

    I was checking a shared work folder in my DropBox, when I saw a folder of documents that I haven’t looked at for over a year. It was a protection folder that I had from my last job in New York, which contained email and documents that I could use as evidence of the unprofessional behavior and harassment that I was receiving from people in the theatre department. Funny thing was that I thought that the “company” would want this information when I filed a complaint, but at the end of my time there, it became clear that the Exec’s decided that I was the expendable one. Not that I was fired, but no one wept for me when I left for California.

    And when I looked at these documents again, I had a pure flashback of the anxiety and stress of that time in my life. The whole situation tested my moral center as this was a situation where people were clearly doing unethical things, bordering on illegal, but nothing happened to them. I had believed, and still do, that if you behave badly, it will come around. Somehow, it still hasn’t happened. And it might never happen to those two guys.

    The other awful part was that people aw what was happening to me, and no one said anything. People looked the other way and didn’t want to get involved. That’s how bullying works; it the fear that bully will turn on you.

    And I thought about deleting all of it. Just clearing it out of my life.

    But, I think I need the reminder. I don’t think it’s healthy to never remember that situation.

  • Gobbley Thoughts

    This hasn’t been as creative of a day as would have liked. I got caught up with work, and the news seems to be dominating my few other thoughts.

    But it is cool out on Norther California, and after have a week of 100 degrees what seems like last week, and it was, Fall seems to be coming around.

    Halloween will soon be discussed at home as to what we will all dress up as, and then we will start to think about Thanksgiving and Christmas.

    Having lived in the northeast for so long, October has felt like the start of the end of the year.

    When I was living in Texas, October was still hot. Maybe not 100 or even 90 degrees, but 85 can feel hot out, especially when you very much want to put on a sweater.

    These are the thought bopping around my head today, and that is what I want to share.

    Why do you do this blog, I ask myself when I look at it, and I say back to myself that creativity comes in many different forms. Also, you don’t have to have a point to create, just create. And how long have you been talking to yourself? Which I have to admit that I have always done

    See, even when I am writing, I will jump up from my desk, and continue the thought that I am trying to express in words, by saying it out loud as I walk down the hall. The wife has learned to live with this.

  • Frank Zappa

    I have nothing against him. I could pick him out of a lineup, but I couldn’t name one of his songs. There were a group of guys I used to hang out with in high school, and try to write comedy with who just loved the hell out of him. I couldn’t get into his music, but I could respect and admire his output and commitment to music, and to satirizing everything. Zappa embodies the definition of a true artist; A true artist does just create great work, a true artist is always creating work regardless of its value.

    I don’t have a deeper reason of bring that up other than it just popped into my head as I sat down to write just now.

    First thought, best thought.

    There is creation, and there is production, and that also means that there has to be consumption. Creation is the act of bringing an object or form into existence. Production is the manufacturing the same object repeatedly for consumption. Which leads to consumption which is using up of an object or form.

    There might be some bigger theory about art, but I’m not sure I can put those pieces together today. What I would like to say is that I think most people put themselves in one of those three categories, though I believe that you can be all three. Some people would like to be creators, but they are producers. The worst are consumers who think they are creators.

    Just some random thoughts.

  • Never Mind Trump, Here’s Abbey Road

    Today, I needed a change of pace, though I have not forgotten what is happening in the world.

    When I looked at my Spotify account this morning, FINALLY!!! The 50th Anniversary Super Deluxe Edition of Abbey Road was released! (I am listening to it as I write… and as you read?) This isn’t a review, but I sure can tell you that even with my shitty computer headphones, the sound quality is sharp, and the instruments have been separated on their own tracks, giving a fuller sound that avoids becoming artificial, and too “studio.” I have always liked the fact that the Abbey Road studio was an instrument in The Beatles’ recordings. They used the space to capture echoes, and live mixed in the studio as they recorded, like a band would do “live.”

    Either way, this album was what I needed today. I have written about The Beatles, and all their albums often, and I have read books, and dissected all their songs.

    But Abbey Road… man, it is still an album that’s exciting, and fun to listen too, but more importantly, just makes me feel better if I’m having a shitty day. And I have been listening to this album since I was 16. Logically, I know that this album has nothing to do with me, recorded before I was born, but it is completely personal. Such a part of my life.

    Here comes the sun, everyone!

  • It’s Not the Crime

    Okay, so I have read a great deal today about the new Trump scandal. These are my thoughts;

    1. It’s never the crime, it’s the cover up. As far as I can tell, Trump broke this rule, bigly. The way Trump handled the Russian prob was to claim that he had no idea that what he was doing with Russia was illegal. That seemed to be the point Muller made, that he could prove intent. If Trump intended to commit a crime. This time around, if Trump’s lawyers and the Justice Department did try to hide these phone calls, and the whistleblower complaint, then that would show intent. They all knew it was illegal and had to stop it from getting out. To me, that takes away the argument that the call was innocent. The withholding of Ukraine’s defense money might also show intent.
    2. Attorney General Barr is all up in this. I know the NYTimes ran this idea first, but now that Trump is saying to foreign leaders that Barr will contact them, then Barr needs to answer why the President would think that. What conversations has Barr had with Trump about Biden? I know full well Barr will claim that he cannot talk about his conversations with the President, but is there anything at the Justice Department happening about Ukraine, and Biden? When did that get started? Who started it, and when?
    3. This is a stretch, but Rudy is going through a nasty divorce. I don’t think he has his head on straight, and can’t keep all of the truth, lines, and smoke from blending together. Investigators should lean on him, as I think he would be the first to crack.

    None of this is good…