I think I'm kind of a dick.

Me and Josh just got back from Barnside Diner. We ate our food and talked about nerdy bullshit, computers and whatnot. Conversations between Josh and I are kind of insanely geeky when there's no one else around. It's not something you should see.

Josh was having the biscuits with gravy and an egg and cheese sandwich (with real cheese), and I ate a country fried steak with fried okra dipped in mashed potatoes with gravy.

Mmm, good.

So does this story have a point? Maybe so...

We finish eating and this guy swaggers up to the table. He's in his early twenties I would imagine and has large baggy ripped pants on and a black shirt with a little pentagram necklace hanging out over the collar. He has thick black plastic glasses and his fingernails are painted black, I'd imagine with a sharpie. He's got a backwards hat on and his hair is pulled into a pony tail. On the way home he was described as being a guy who said "I really fucking love Everquest" as his wardrobe.

So he told us that he was really hungry and that he didn't want to eat his roommate's food so he took a cab all the way the diner, but that he didn't want to have to take a cab home cos the cab drivers around here are total assholes. They charged him fifty cents more to drive around the diner instead of dropping him off in front. So he said he would pay for our food if we would give him a ride home.

I looked at him and said "You can't kill us."

He didn't really realize that I was joking and that I'm more or less always joking and that kind of freaked him out I think. I often wonder if I come off abrasive when people first meet me.

So Josh said that we would give him a ride home cos he lives really close to us anyway, and we've all been in his situation so we know how it is.

So he sat down in our booth and immediately appologized for touching my jacket slightly. I guess accusing him of being a murderer without even shaking his hand first kinda freaked him out.

So I'm still eating and Josh is talking to him and they're talking about where he lives and where he works and he says that he works at the Hard Rock Cafe. So they're talking about how people who work there earn buttons and that there is a whole market in selling these rare buttons on eBay and whatnot. How Josh knows about stupid shit like that kind of boggles my mind. I mean, we're total nerds around other people, and ridiculously geeky around each other... I can only imagine just how much of a dork Josh is in his own time.

ha ha.

So anyway, he tells us that he gets 50% off at the Hard Rock Cafe store and that he bought this watch there today. And it came with another band on it, but he like took it off and put on this big fat leather heavy metal looking one.

Hard Rock Cafe watch. Heavy Metal watch band.

not that funny, but he keeps talking about it. He took it off and showed it to us in detail and told us the story again how he bought it and that the watch had a different band on it when he got it, but he like totally took it off and put on this kick ass one. See!

And Josh was like "yeah, dude. that one looks like it's a lot more sturdy."

And I was drinking Josh's tea. And I just lost it.

And I started cracking up.

Spitting tea.

Laughing.

And I couldn't stop.

And I was openly laughing at this dude.

And I felt kinda bad, but I just couldn't stop.

And I was immediately taken back to the time when I lived in New Orleans and me and this girl were shopping in Winn Dixie at like 3am and we saw Marilyn Manson with his hot girlfriend buying toilet paper and hot dogs and TV dinners and I was standing behind them in the checkout line looking at all the domesticated crap they were buying and I started giggling uncontrollably imagining him cooking a hot dog for her and her calling for him to bring her some toilet paper...



I don't even know why this happens to me, but it happens a lot. It happened when Ivan Brunetti was on the beach in San Diego and we were all drinking bourbon and I was listening to him talk about how he wanted to become a Buddhist and start drawing sweet wholesome comics.

It happened last week in New York when I was watching the guy on the ferry boat on acid dancing around with the tiny little glow in the dark light sticks I gave him....

It happens all the time.

So anyway, Dark Elf Wizard pays for our food, and we walk out to the car and I let him sit in the front and I sit in the back cos I've seen that scene in Goodfellas where they kill Maury with the ice pick and that has always freaked me out.

When we got in the car he said "thanks for driving me, you guys" and I said "Just don't kill us."

Still doesn't know I'm joking.

We drove him home and he turned up the death metal that Josh was listening to and started banging his head slightly to it and proceeded to talk about how the guitarist in the song had a pedal that played all the notes with an extra 5th added onto it and that's why it sounded like that.

We dropped him off and he thanked us again, and I thanked him for not killing us, and he looked at me funny and did one of those awkward "Ohhh-kayy" 's....

That guy ruled. He totally ruled. Like totally.

Hey Dirk, do you like my car?

I really wish I wasn't such a bastard sometimes. I find that I can't keep a straight face for anything these days. Like a few weeks ago at work we were interviewing potential managers (as a group for some bizarre reason), and I had to ask one of the interview questions. Everyone had to ask a question. It was very strange.

I had to ask "what have you done in previous jobs to improve efficiency?"

So I asked the question to this one guy who I knew from the second he walked in there that he wasn't going to get the job, and I almost couldn't even get it out cos I felt ridiculous asking a question I honestly didn't care to hear the answer to.

And this guy was real serious.

Like Foghorn Leghorn serious.



And I asked him the question, and he looked me in the eye and answered it squarely like a cowboy firing his guns all steady as if to say "Lookie heere mister, I aint nervous at all. I want this job, you hear me, pardner?"

And I looked him in the eye the best I could. Staring him down.

And I lost it.

And I just started laughing at the guy.

And I felt really bad.

And I couldn't stop.

And Jason snickered at me cos he knew I had blown it.

And that made me laugh even more.

Uggggh.

well, erin left about two weeks ago and unfortunately i am just getting around to showing off a couple of photos. knowing me, all of them will not show up or something, but here goes...

the first night erin was here we went to sing karaoke. as you can probably guess, by the end of the night the details are a little fuzzy, but while steve hates having his picture taken, he has permitted this one... the middle of a rendiditon of cheap trick's "surrender"

once we recovered from our hangover on sunday, erin and i took off. our first stop was in osaka. we had no real plans and ended up wandering around, in a really neat part of the city, drinking tall-boys and trying to keep our underwear dry. but first we went to an aquarium, and saw, among other things, a whale shark, and these frightening deep-sea crabs.

(hi chad!)
we got onto the bullet train (shinkansen) and passed out. i knocked a beer over in my slumber which rolled down the aisle. luckily i snored throught the whole thing or i would have been humiliated. we also missed our stop and rode all the way to the end (onto, by the way, another island) and had to go back...
to hiroshima. first we took a ferry out to miyajima.

then we went to the war memorial and the Hiroshima dome.

extremely hard, especially on no sleep, but really important anyway. we found a place to stay and had a well-deserved bath and sleep before heading to kyoto the next morning. we rode the trolleys back, too, and that was fun.

this is a photo if some weird art on the edge of gion in kyoto. the first day we just went wandering, all thru gion and downtown, after finding some food and a pretty cool (and very cheap!) hotel. i actually had a panic attack because of hunger and erin had to talk me out of losing it over a lack of edible vegan food. we ended up eating expensive vegetable sushi in the train station.
gion was incredible... a maze of little streets and shops and shrines. we climbed the mountain and watched the unset over the city.

the next day was nara, my favorite part of the trip.

nara has all these deer walking around loose, and one of them, we later surmised, took erins rail pass out of her pocket when it bit her on the ass, trying to get food. we paniked because it was worth a fortune in train tickets, but decided to just relax, see what we wanted, and then backtrack.

this is in front of the Daibutsu. we are a little freaked out about the pass but once we went into the temple it was worth it. then erin got her fortune (daikichi... the best one!) and it told her "something lost will be found outside."

sure enough, just about the time she was reading it, someone found her rail pass and turned it in to a tourist center. we bought matching necklaces to celebrate and erin made her first honest offering to the Buddha. me, too.

the next day we went up into the mountains at arashiyama and hiked around with the monkeys. we were thinking that they would just be far away in the trees... then we turned a corner and there was one layed out sunning himself on the path. the guide did say NOT to stare at the monkeys... this one tried to eat erin when she did the opposite.

that evening we went back to mishima and on saturday steve, erin, and i went to tokyo. i have no photos because i hate tokyo, but we were so tired anyway, we only stayed the day.

erin spent the next week here, hanging out with my students and trying not to get lost in the ricefield maze. we went to the beach but it was so cold and windy that only throught sheer will did we stay for 5 minutes... long enough to watch the death-wish surfers and try to drink a sandy beer.

we took so many pictures that it this doesnt scratch the surface, but we had a great time and wish you could have been here to share it with us.
i miss you erin!

questions? comments? more photos? just ask!

i TOLD you a couple of them wouldnt work!!!

here is the weird art, the deer, and us at miyajima. sorry! (but you HAD to know it would happen!)

Growing up, I had to sit through a bunch of stupid, mind-numbing, white-guilt bullshit about slavery, oppression, racism, diversity, African American History Month, etc.
I got to hear how privledged I am for being white - despite the fact that I might have to walk home with holes in my shoes, and previous generations of my family could only eat five days a week.
I got to put up with kids telling me I stink because of my ethnicity. I got to be ashamed of my culture.

THAT BEING SAID

I am not impressed when I hear the people around me voice their pointless racism. I find their voice of disdain for blacks/jews/whateverwillbemostoffensive to be a lame attempt at rebellion.
I don't find Hitler offensive. I don't feel shame about the deeds of Klansmen.
I really don't find it interesting at all, let alone offensive.
I'm really tired of otherwise smart and cool people I know attempting to be impressively unique by voicing their so-called hatred.
I can understand the point of getting a reaction out of someone who actually cares. Go ahead and make an ignorant PC apologist cringe. But when I'm in the company of my friends, and we all share the mutual indifference, I don't need to hear about it, unless its witty. Tell me a racist joke. Make an off-color Bendependent comment. Make me laugh, or shut up.
You are not edgy. You are reactionary.

It seems that the onslaught of bullshit that we were raised on has had the reverse effect, leading the rebellious into the obvious ploy to offend.
They should start selling swastika patches at Hot Topic.

Who wants in?

I know we could divvy these up. Kenny and Hank and Roy and Patsy and Big John would go quickly. Those that go unclaimed we can melt. With fire.

Hey Killoggers, French Quarter Fest is this weekend. I am watching them build the sound stages at Woldenburg Park out of my office window right now. Come Saturday, there will be many beers that need to be hugged in the park. Who is with me? Well, I suspect nobody, but, Cricket is coming into town so all you bastardos who want to hang out with her can. So who is with Cricket? Better, thats what I thought. E-mails me if you want to get down with the clown(s).

Disclaimer: Josh is invited, but he attends at his own risk: the risk of being repeatedly stabbed.

P.S. Forgive me for what is a mundane post about an upcoming event, void of personal flair, literary content and without graphics of any type. Thank You.

OK. So I wasn't going to post this, but I just can't help it. I just got an email from a girl I dated when I was 16 apologizing for the way she treated me when we broke up ten years ago.

In high school.

HI. i don't know if you remember me, but I went out with you a long time ago. My name is being held to keep my privacy. You are probably wondering how I got your email address. I used to go to Shim Sham for 80's glam night every thursday and I would always see a friend of yours there. I can't even remember the guy's name. Anyway about a year and a half ago I asked him how you were doing and he said you were very happy and gave me your email address. I had been wanting to contact you to apologize for years, but I wasn't sure if I should or how I should contact you. I don't know if this would even matter to you or not. I just wanted to say how sorry I was for being so horrible to you. You were such a nice guy and I really mistreated you. I am really sorry that I hurt you. I am sure I could try to justify it with some excuse, but the bottom line is that I was a total asshole. Anyway, I hope you are happy now and being treated the way you deserve. Take care.

I believe she was 14 or 15 when we went out. I probably only saw her in person a total of 5 or 6 times, and pretty much just talked to her on the phone every night til the sun came up... For an entire summer. I remember that summer pretty well. I would talk to her until I would fall asleep, sometimes with the phone still dangling from my neck. The most exciting part of my day was waiting for the mail to come so I could see if the records and zines and catalogs I had ordered had gotten there. I think she was the first girl I was totally infatuated with. I used to cut her name out everytime I would see it in print and kept a collection of them in my wallet. She was a wreck. She chain smoked and had an unbeatably wonderful bad attitude, but still managed to be completely adorable somehow.

Dude, she was pretty hot for a 14 year old.

We only hung out a few times, but I'm completely and totally cursed / blessed with good memory so I remember a lot of weird little details about our relationship. I also still have all of the letters and odd things we had made for each other that summer in a shoe box at home (so really I could probably recreate that entire time period and mindframe if I wanted to). She gave me back all of the letters I sent her when we broke up.

Actually, I still have just about everything I've ever owned that had some significance to me at some point. It's weird. I know Josh and Loren are the same way. We have kept absolutely everything. Things we just really had no reason whatsoever to keep. Which I guess is really why killoggs and underachievers exist when I think about it. I have a diary that I kept in 5th grade that I've been meaning to post all of the pages to. That thing is hilarious.

Hanging out with my young punk rock love was so fun. We would do bad things. I remember breaking into this house down her block once and eating all of their food and rearranging all their furniture. I remember the Asian kid who drove us around all night who said that I was real tall and that "he wished that I was weed" cos then he could roll me up in a bed sheet and smoke me (?). I remember when she overdosed on air conditioner freon. I remember sitting in Burger King with her once and watching her chain smoke with this entire family sitting in the booth behind her coughing their asses off trying to drop her a hint to stop smoking so close to them. She turned around and blew smoke into their faces and told them to fuck off.

She was so punk rock.

We both liked mentos. I believe I still have the picture of her mom sitting on the toilet somewhere.

Yeah...

I just don't know how to respond to this. Scott says I should ask her to marry me. I'm thinking it would be fun to dig up all those letters and whatnot and continue where we left off, bringing up details I just shouldn't know any more and writing in the same style I did when I was 16 (which is probably not that different from the way I write now... really not much is that different at all 10 years later).

I wonder if she'll read this. Maybe I should just send her this as my response. Maybe I should test the waters and see if she's nutso first.

Why would she send me this?

Here are all of the reasons I can come up with:

1) She really does still feel bad about how our relationship ended 10 years ago - perhaps she just saw that Eternal Sunshine movie and made a vow to do this with all of her ill ended relationships

2) Her therapist told her to do this.

3) She's completely and totally out of her mind.

yeah, this kicks ass. I don't care which one it is. This has been my favorite part of today.

Thanks, dude. Let's like be friends again and stuff.

1. Spend every weekend night for 2 years painting your name on trains.
2. Spend the rest of the week watching trains under a bridge downtown.
3. Turn down every oppurtunity to hang out with girlfriend with some or all of these excuses: "I'm too tired" , "Those people are weird" , "I hate big crowds" , "That band sucks" , "That movie is going to suck" , "I have plans to sit around and drink beer" , "I have plans to sit around, drink beer, and watch football or basketball"
4. Put a Rebel flag on your pickup truck.
5. Listen to Bluegrass, Classic Rock, or Country Music exclusively.
6. Don't do the dishes, ever.
7. Promise to change, and don't.

Trust me, this method is foolproof.