Hey!...It's a CareBear.

It's the Sleepy Bear, or Night Time Bear, whatever the hell its name is. And no, Kevin, the tree is not eating it.

The Jungle Is Dark, But Full of Diamonds...

I had a nice long post, but when I sent it, my browser stopped working, so this one's going to be a lot shorter.
Anyway, I looked through the story of Death of a Salesman, because Amber piqued my curiosity with a character she thought reminded her of Brueckner. So I took a good look at the characters, and I actually thought Brueckner more resembled Willy than Biff. Biff may have become a failure in life, but he is the only one in the end to realize how fucked up their entire family is, and how deluded his own father was. Willy, right up to the end, tried to think his sons would be a success, and that his own funeral would be huge even t with a massive turnout, failing to realize that he didn't have nearly as many friends as he thought he did (possible due to his attitude and his "pride" in his lowly position), and his death went relatively unnoticed.
I actually kind of admired Biff, because the whole time, he seems like he is trying to cut through the bullshit and just be honest about his lot in life. But, then I only read the plot summaries, I didn't read the entire play.

This weekend was interesting. We had me a graduation party, which would have been great except for our run in with a crazy alcoholic neighbor and her 4-year old son, which I'm gonna let Karissa explain. On Sunday, we went to Karissa's mom's to get Is and celebrate her sister's 16th birthday. Her sister likes CareBear stuff, so Karissa asked me about a month ago to do a CareBear picture as a present, so last week I finally got around to it. It was pretty non-stressful compared my other pictures, mostly because it's just a sketch with no charcoal, and it only took about 3-4 hours for me completely finish it.

Countdown to Art School: 3 days!

Quick Story of a Slacker

For those who haven't heard yet, Brueckner's revival of a career in hospitality was brief.
I trained him in just over a week ago, and had him pegged the first night as a flight risk. Sorry, Brueckner, but you wasted a week and a half of our time, so I'm gonna bitch a little (like he reads blogs, anyway).
First off, the ad stated 2 nights per week to start. He's looking for full time. He got a job at Travelodge (where he apparently didn't know I worked), and proceeded to tell me his first night that he didn't know if he wanted the job, because he REALLY wanted to do full time, and was trying to get on driving a beat truck. Okaayyyyy... At this point, I was concerned. I wasn't gonna jump the gun, though, because his woman just left him high and dry for merry ol' Oregon. This, mind you, is the woman he's pined for since high school, whom he knew he would marry (despite pining for one of our other friends and falling hard for my ex). So he was not in the best of moods (being Mr. Sensitive, I told him, "Well, it's nothing to go die over."). I thought I might as well wait on it and see how he adapts.
Well, he didn't adapt. He left almost a half hour early his second night training in, and 5 HOURS EARLY while training on the morning shift with Avis. Becky was really anxious about telling me she had made the decision to can his ass, but she was up front with me, and I assured her that no, I didn't care, and yes, I suspected this might happen. I'm glad, at least, that he didn't just stop showing up two weeks into the job. That would have pissed me off.
So there it is. I'm a little annoyed that he put us (me) through the trouble of training him just to sluff off work and get himself fired.

Groovy...

I'm not gonna go into details here. I'll give you a link. Scroll down to the calendar, and check 8/31. Hold your ears, because the next sound you'll probably hear is Kevin and Amadon screaming like little girls.
www.bruce-campbell.com
You're welcome.

Should I Be Behind a Bar?

Why do I carry on conversations with people I want to leave?!
One of the guests who works construction just staggered off to his room. About 20 minutes ago, he left his buddies (who he'd been noisely goofing around with right by the entrance), wandered into the breakfast area where I was watching a little tv, and started this wandering, mostly one-sided conversation with me that ranged from my owing his buddy $5 (which I'm pretty sure I don't), to wanting to kick someone's (also wondering if I knew anyone who wanted to kick his), to not treating black people like slaves, to black people not being as smart but faster, before slowly falling asleep at the table. It took me about 5 minutes worth of shaking to get him awake again and help him up so he could go to his room for the night.

Another guest here is staying until mid-Sept. She looks not a day older than 120 years old, does not eat fast food, had us DEEP CLEAN her room special for her, and sleeps during the day. At night, she stops by, reminds me to drop a USA Today inside her door, and goes out for a night stroll. Two weeks ago she gave me a brick of Novaculite. What the hell is it? Alright, quit asking, I'll tell you. Novaculite is a stone native apparently only to georgia, commonly used for sharpening knives (which Karissa tells me you're not actually supposed to do). It has also been found in the form of stone tools at various Georgian sites.
Last week she gave me two issues of Reader's Digest, and got mad at me for suggesting that I leave them in the office for our other night auditor to read, because this was a gift to ME.
It took me ten minutes each time to get back to work, because she had to explain all this shit to me.

People like this I could easily dismiss with a few one-word answers and a more distant attitude. But, since I am so freakin' good at my job, I strike up a rapport with our guests as a natural reflex now. And here I thougt being naturally social wouldn't come back and bite me in the ass.

Trash Diving

Now I would swear that I had sent off just about every form needed for enrollment into the academy, but looking at my personal "to do" list online told me that I had like 7 different forms not received, most of them due back in early July. Oops. Luckily, I'm dealing with people who know how to do their jobs, and my financial aid advisor was able to fax me most of the forms I needed so I could take care of them right away.
The point to this paragraph? Well, they were faxed to Travelodge, where I found them waiting for me in my folder (all employees have folders in a little file case to keep their time cards and what-not). I took them out, set them on the counter next to some newspaper ads, and by morning accidentally scooped them up with the old ads and tossed them in the trash.
I didn't work Saturday, so tonight I shoveled through a dumpster full of three days worth of garbage. It would have taken another day or two to get copies re-faxed, so I did the old CSI thing, slapped on a pair of rubber gloves, and rooted through garbage, trying to recognize the very trash bag holding the documents that would help me pay for school.
11 bags later, I found them!
And don't worry, I re-sanitized my hands before returning to work.

Damned Solicitors!

I've been noticing quite a few "comments" lately of people with links that turn out to suspiciously resemble business sites. This is really pissing me off. I can handle some kid on the web berating me and my friends, because he's entertaining and uses his own blog to do most his most creative work.
What really chaps my ass, though, is that some fucking genius decided that comments on blogs are good ways to advertise.
First off, it's a comment, not a mailbox. Don't come on to my blog to tell me about your health & fitness website or classic car online store.
Second, DON'T PRETEND YOU'RE A GODDAMNED BLOGGER! I've seen tons of comments that say, "Hey! Great blog. I liked it so much I put it in my favorites! You should check out my site. It's (website having nothing to do with blogger). Seeya!"
Are we that bad off with the internet that we have to get SPAM in our comments?
How long until it is mentally transmitted into our daily thoughts?

DUSK "All-Star Reunion Special"

5 years ago, we practiced for the last time in Amadon's shed, back when he lived in Southview Estates. Derek had pretty much left the band by then, and we were trying out a new guy. I don't remember who exactly it was, but the whole thing was a major disappointment. He walked in carrying a bottle of Vodka, alreay half gone. He started out okay, knew some of the songs we played, but kept taking hits off the bottle, and by the third song we tried, he was totally smashed and could barely play. I didn't much like the kid anyway. His mullet screamed trashy classic rock lover, his bringing liquor to practice with a bunch of guys he didn't even know was tactless and made me think we was a rockstar wannabe, and finally, the only songs he liked to play were GreenDay. I have nothing against GreenDay, and even like some of their songs. But if that's all you know, and you're not playing with GreenDay, that's pathetic. After that, we all seemed to go our separate ways.
We've all tried to keep up our chops at times, but unfortunately, we've had to blow the dust off the guitars more than we'd like to admit. Playing on our own, we might not have been too bad.
We've been talking about getting together again and playing for at least 2 years, now. Finally, with the acquisition of Amadon's new store, we have a place to practice, which had been our major hindrance. The other problem is that we are still without a bassist.
We did finally get together last Saturday, and kinda sucked. The good news is that we all thought we'd be worse. Apart from forgetting the lyrics (my fault, spent too much time looking at tablature) and forgetting how parts of songs went, we did pretty well. I brought my video camera with me to DL, but we left it in the bedroom, and by the time we remembered it, she was asleep, and I had already acceidentally woke her up to unplug the phone in that room. Not to worry! There WILL BE another practice, and hopefully I will remember the camcorder, and HOPEFULLY I will by that time remember to buy the attachment I need to upload videos onto the computer, so eventually everyone will be able to see and hear us sex the place up.
I think the song everyone liked best was 3 Little Pigs. It's the most fun to do, but it fucked up my voice for the rest of the night, and I had a sore throat inthe morning. I liked Die Die My Darling, but we had to take a couple of running jumps to get it.
We didn't really do anything as far as original songs, except for 666, which has evolved into about 3 different incarnations of a work in progress. My mentality for approaching a song has evolved in the last few years, and I habitually write songs or music as if it were going to be sung by trainyard laborers or prison convicts. It's not bad, but chain gang singing is hard to convert back to hard rock or metal.

Jabberwocky

Karissa mentioned once that a lot of people thought Lewis Carroll had experimented with drugs while writing Alice in Wonderland. After reading the book, I kind of saw how people could come to that conclusion. I looked around on the internet to see if anything had been written pertaining to that aspect of Carroll’s writing, and I actually found a pretty big argument still going strong on both sides about whether or not Carroll’s imagery was drug-induced.
http://www.lewiscarroll.org/pop.html#drug
The above website is one of the most vehement supporters of Carroll’s natural imagination over recreational drug use. It’s also stated that “…He used his imagination. If you have one, it’s better than drugs. If you don’t, the drugs won’t help you…”
That statement alone made me actually think, not just about Carroll’s creative faculties, but about the whole concept of creativity, and how it’s viewed as an acquired trait among select individuals. I don’t think that’s really true. Unless a neurobiologist (I might have made that term up) can show me a diagram of a brain with the “creative” gene vs. a brain without one, I’m going to go ahead and think that everyone is born with the same potential for “Carrollian” creativity. This isn’t to say that everyone will exercise that potential, or even make themselves aware of it. Self-confidence is usually the first wrecking ball to take down that building. This doesn’t reflect my overall opinion on recreational use of psychotropic drugs, especially for reasons like enhancement of creativity. I don’t think it enhances creativity at all. I think it may make you aware of he creativity you already possess, but that’s a risky way of finding it. The only thing enhanced is your perception of your own imagination.
Take the example of native American religion. More specifically, peyote, which was fairly widely used across the continent. Most commonly used within the borders of religious ritual, many tribes believed this plant was their gateway to an intimate relationship with the spirit world. It didn’t give them a spirituality where there was none, but rather showed them how to find spirituality that was already there, but hidden.
I’ll throw in a couple of fun facts before jumping back to Carroll.
1. The term peyote is believed to have been derived from the Nahuatl (Aztec) word peyutl, meaning “silk cocoon”.
2. There are over 55 alkaloids present in peyote. One alkaloid, Mescaline (a phenylethylamine compound), is psychoactive and produces various effects from euphoria to vomiting. The first place I ever learned about mescaline, interestingly enough, was reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
So there you go. All of that can be found in the following link:
http://ethnobotany.yage.net/article2.html

I myself would have to argue against Carroll’s use of drugs. I wouldn’t rule out the possibility, though. He was knownto have used laudanum—but then, who in 19th century England didn’t? It was like Tylenol PM, only stronger. And London was known infamously for its Opium dens.
But in reading Alice in Wonderland and Alice’s Adventures Through the Looking Glass, there’s too much contextual evidence that corroborates a memory of simple dream states. It is even made known in the end that Alice is just dreaming these other worlds. Simple aspects of the dream state are familiar to me as I read—looking at an object, looking away, then looking back to find something different in its place; trying to focus on an object only to have it disappear (this works when awake and in different levels of natural light—try focusing on a star); well-known verses become perverted and different; and absurd ideas are present and oftentimes seem to make perfect sense. In my opinion (as someone who is pretty far from being an English major), Carroll more than likely was just writing a story with his own creative ingenuity and used typical dream behaviors as the engine to drive a 7 ½ year-old’s fantasy life through it.
If anyone wants to research a little on the common use of the hookah (oriental water pipe), be my guest. The caterpillar in Wonderland was smoking one—it could be a drug reference, or just a tobacco reference.
By the way, if anyone hasn't seen the illustrations by Sir John Tenniel, you should check them out. They're kind of far out and strange.

Songlist Ideas For Saturday...

This is a song list for Kevin & Amadon to look over. I figured we could start out some stuff we already know to warm up.

-Misfits-Die, Die My Darling
-Metallica-For Whom the Bell Tolls
-Misfits-London Dungeon
-Greenday-Brainstew
-Green Jelly-3 Little Pigs

This is stuff we all may or may not know, but might be a little more difficult to get. That's not to say we'd make it past the first few riffs, but I thought it'd be fun.

-Animals-House of the Rising Sun
-Drowning Pool-Tearing Away
-Soil-Halo
-System of a Down-Aerials
-Pantera-Fucking Hostile
-Danzig-Thirteen
-Danzig-Twist of Cain
-Misfits-Scarecrow Man

Of course, we'd have to try to make time for our original stuff, like Dead Forest, Heart of Thorns, and 666, which I think needs to be worked on (Sorry Amadon, I just like the way my version sounds more).
The only problem with half of these songs is that we need a bassist, otherwise they'll sound a lot shittier.
This list can be added to or taken from, nothing's really written in stone. It's just that if changes are made, you guys might want to let me know so I can check out the tabs and get the lyrics.
Oh, and Amadon, were you able to work out your schedule with Case? Let us know.

Ok, I'll tell...

Ok, so I didn't really have a shitty night at work so much as just exhausting. The previous post was mostly just to screw with you, and also because I was tired and realized I didn't feel like doing anything but go to bed.
I had to have to laundry done by the time the night person got there, because she had some other projects to do for the night. I figured I'd be busy, but that I'd be able to get it all done anyway.
During the course of 8 hours, I checked at least 35 people in, most of them walk-ins that take a little more time, and answered roughly 160 phone calls (an average of 5 per every 15 minutes). Aside from that, I exchanged pool towls, moved rollaways, and negotiated rates with virtually every Canadian there (not a generalization, I saw it on the registration card). The most frequently asked question: Are you sure that all you have are suites?
No. I'm just guessing. I was guessing when I told the person in front of you, as well as the person in front of them. Let me give you our special regular non-smoking room that I only keep aside for those that ask that question three times in a row. In defense of Canadians, that question was not restricted to those of the Northern pursuasion.
I didn't get out of the motel until 12:40, and I was almost falling asleep counting the money at the end. Then I got a call from the manager this morning regarding three guests staying together in 3 suites that got three rollaways but only paid for one. Long story short, they argued and haggled over the suite rate, and didn't think they should have to pay for the rollaways because their kids were sleeping on them (what the fuck!?). People were waiting to check in behind them, and the phone was, as usual, ringing off the hook. So, being the nice guy that I am, I gave them a break. I got in trouble for it, I know it wasn't exactly right, but I stand by that decision.
So that was my night. Tonight will be better.

What a Shitty Day at Work Today!

You know what? I'm not even gonna tell you guys about it. So there!

To Practice, or Not To Practice?

Sounds like there may be some complications to playing in the basement on the 13th or 14th. We won't be up the 12th, so just get that date out of your heads. It might be hard, too if Amadon has Case, we're trying to figure out the situation with Isabella. She doesn't mind noise, but that much noise and the fact that it's metal and not just a bunch of bass or baritone noise might irritate her more. As far as space permits, I really don't care who else comes. I don't think it should be really exclusive if we're jamming or seeing what we all still know. I do feel a little better about the space having it explained more. I have no problem playing in the unfinished part, as long as it's somewhat level (meaning no excessive dirt hills). The cords might be a better idea, though, because I think I have some 3-prong plugs, and half the time you can't count on an unfinished basement to have outlets for them.
As far as 1/4 inch plugs, I'll see what I got. I may have to purchase a new one myself, unless I want to keep playing on a 6 foot cord.
If we can't play that weekend, we can't. We'll find another weekend. We've all got crazy schedules to keep track of now, so I know how hard it can be to find time that works with everybody's schedules. Location still sounds pretty good, then, just time is the problem. Let me know if anyone has any other ideas.