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Today I got my hair trimmed and highlighted. The hairdresser and I got to talking about disabilities and she told me about some friend of hers whose daughter has a rare disease--she couldn't remember the name of it, just the initials and the symptoms: upon injury to a certain area of the body, the soft tissue in said area turns to bone. I came home and researched it and indeed, such a thing exists and is exactly what she said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33324573/ns/today-today_health/

Truth is indeed stranger than fiction...

Put in 2-week notice today.

:|

Also woke up with Abba stuck in my head.

Last friday, just before lunch, I got a phone call from my son's school, asking if my wife and I could come in to the principal's office around 3:30 to discuss a "discipline issue" that my son was having at school.

It puzzled me that they wanted to talk to my wife and I in person; about two years ago, my Son got into a fight at school that ended up with him chasing the other kid across campus and pounding on him in revenge for a punch that the other kid had thrown at my son. That time, we were able to address the issue with a mere phone call from the Vice Principal, and neither my wife nor I were "sent to the principal's office" to sort things out. So this had me thinking, "Damn, he must have done something REALLY bad this time; it must be worse than the previous fight because we didn't have to go in and talk to them that time."

After a couple more phone calls, I finally got ahold of the principal, and he still wouldn't tell me what was the matter; all he'd say was that it was a "discipline issue related to a fight that happened earlier in the week", and mentioned that my son had received an "in school suspension" this time, and that he'd spent the entire day sitting outside the principal's office as a form of punishment.

My son had already told me about the fight earlier in the week, and he hadn't been physically involved that time at all; "J" (the kid who gets beat with an automotive fan belt) had been making fun of "Z's" dead mother, and "Z" (who is as tall as my son, but much heavier) had given "J" a sound thrashing in response. Evidently, "J" had popped off to "Z" saying something like, "Your Mom is dead because she caught AIDS, and you gave it to her!" (in reality, "Z's" Mom died from breast cancer when he was 6-years-old.)

So I left work early, drove like a madman to get to the school by the appointed time, and then spent another ten minutes waiting outside the principal's office while he joked with a teacher (which didn't have a calming effect on me at all, to say the least.)

I shook hands with the principal and sat down in his office, then the principal lead my son into the office and proceeded to scold him in front of me.

It turned out that all my son had done wrong was that he had omitted a couple of facts when the principal asked him about the fight between "Z" and "J"; the principoop called this "lying by omission" and told my son, "If you did something like that in the real world, you'd be in serious trouble!"

At this point, I had to jump in there and correct the principoop, "In the first place, my son wasn't under oath, and you're not a judge or a jury, so he couldn't be accused of perjury in 'the real world' ... and in the second place, very few fist fights go to trial anyway, most end up being written off as mutual combat or self defense, so there wouldn't even be any 'real world' reason for him to be under oath in the first place."

The principoop sort of hemmed and hawed and then changed the subject, telling me that we were "lucky" that my son had just received an "in-school" suspension, and that the principoop would have been within his rights to give my son a day of "real" suspension if the principoop hadn't known that my son was basically a "good kid." I asked if it was school district policy to suspend kids for merely lying or telling half truths, and the principoop hemmed and hawed again, but I decided we were probably getting off easy this time so I dropped the matter, but I did throw in, "If this had happened to me at my son's age, the lesson that I would have learned from it all would have been, 'If you tell a lie, stick with your story.'"

Alls well that ends well, I guess. My son got off with one day "in-school" suspension, "Z" got one day of regular suspension and "J", the fan-belt-whipped, dead Mother insulting instigator of the whole episode actually got THREE days of suspension.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that through out the whole conversation with the principoop, every time I looked over at my wife, she was giving the principoop "the finger", under the table, where he couldn't see it ... that's about the only sane reaction that a normal person could have in a situation like that.

men are not attractive. On 26 September 2009, a month's worth of rain landed on Metro Manila in a single day. @ least 464 people were reported dead, and th storm caused @ least $237 million in damages (according to Wikidpedia). I shrugged and attended two benefit concerts.

After three months of my living in Brooklyn, somebody finally broke into my car. I looked up my precinct's police's number on th Internet and called them.

"Hey, yes, my car got broken into last night, and I'm not sure if there's anything anyone can do. Is it even worth reporting?"
"I'm sorry to hear that. You have to call 911."
"911, really? Hmm hmm OK. It didn't seem like enough of an emergency. I just thought you guys might want to update yr stats or whatever."
"Yeah, if you call 911, they'll send an officer out there to take a statement from you and investigate the crime scene. Just stay with your car and don't move anything."
"I already moved it so as not to get a parking ticket. Couldn't we skip th crime scene investigation and go straight to rounding up some troubled Mexicans?"

Shattered safety glass looks like potted plant pebbles. I drove my wife to work w/ no passenger-side window, but it didn't matter due to global climate change. People are wearing short sleeves in November. Are you worried about th kind of Earth you're leaving yr children? Do you have faith in their intelligence and problem-solving abilities? Is suffering inevitable, anyhow, so who cares? Are you planning on having children? I called up Two Guys Auto Glass, and they said $195, and it would be ready tomorrow. And den I called up Joe's Auto Glass in Park Slope, and they said $120, and it would be ready today. Joe's son showed me how to break into a car w/o making a sound, using a screwdriver. Thanks, Joe!

When I think about Megatron's shiny new window, I hear "I Shall Be Released"'s first few lines --

They say ev'rything can be replaced,
Yet ev'ry distance is not near.
So I remember ev'ry face
Of ev'ry man who put me here.

-- and recall when my BFF Diego Muhlach's brother drowned. Diego was playing a mixtape I'd made for him that had "I Shall Be Released" on it, and when Diego's dad heard th song, he cried for his dead son and for everything that was left behind. Diego's dad gathered his remaining sons around him and took their faces in his hands and said, "Don't you dare die before me."

When I talk up my and Sascha's book, it makes our publisher happy, which in turn makes me happy because he's a cool guy, even though promoting my and Sascha's book does not in and of itself make me happy. I made a Facebook fan page for our book

44 Presidents | Order from Amazon.com

so that people would have somewhere to go to jizz all over it, and so when people saw that other people were jizzing all over our book, it would make them want to get out their jizz for our book, too. There is now a place for that.

Women are attractive, though. All men have to help them are jokes and guitars. Acrassicauda, Iraq's most famous metal band, fled to Syria, den Turkey, den New Jersey, den New York, to escape violence in Baghdad. Allegedly, their headbanging was mistaken for how Jews pray. On Monday, my roommate and BFF Rome hired me to work on th film crew for Acrassicauda's first music video -- 12 hours in a dark warehouse w/ nothing but men.


No metal band would write lyrics about how much they love to flee violence, yet here are Acrassicauda, face-to-face w/ their own inescapably newsworthy story. Th world is so doomed, we might as well try to squeeze every last bit of metal out of every day.


Th important part is, use yr whole heart, but never, ever be desperate. Don't be desperate for people to love you or give you money. Never be desperate to be understood. How can we act w/ our whole hearts and not be desperate? Especially when th heart -- it wants what it wants. I can't stand th word girlfriend. I told my wife,


"What if we got married just because I don't like how girlfriend sounds, but I love how wife sounds?"

People get married because they love each other more than any other two people in history have ever loved each other. Two, five, seven, or twelve years later, they get divorced because they hate each other more than any other two people in history have ever hated each other. I know what marriage is. It means one day, one person is going to have to bury th other. That's metal. If you're not metal enough, don't get married.


She said, "What if we get married for a normal reason such as we are the best people for each other, but you can call me your wife starting immediately if you want?"

Deal.

+ + +

TH COUNTDOWN:

( 33-24 )
23.  PHYLLIS DILLON "Don't Stay Away" (3.7 MB) -- Ms Dillon creates a delusional narrator whom U can't feel sorry 4 because her voice is 2 strong, 2 sweet 2B defeated.

It's not even 8 yet and it feels like midnight, and not getting out of bed until 4:30 didn't help. I'm pretty sickly and out-of-it today. Yesterday was fun though, sad but fun. A bunch of us met up here in the early afternoon and drove out to Sacramento for the memorial of Keith Campos, a Pyrate Punk out there that was murdered a couple weekends ago. I only briefly met the guy a few times but he sounded like a good guy from what everyone was saying. It was a nice little gathering in a house with bands playing in the basement. The last band ended up turning into a series of talks by close friends of the deceased and there was so much crying going on it was almost contagious. I think the worst part was when the guy's girlfriend described their conversations during their last night together. Ooh boy.

Amongst all the sobbing, floor and wall punching, and hugging going on, there was a common theme among the speakers towards the end there of cherishing the people around you, and I think we all walked away with that heavy on our minds. I know I did. Big Steve also mentioned it was nice that we were getting out and doing stuff besides the same old shows. I know I greatly enjoyed going somewhere I don't usually go and meeting a handful of good people on top of having a nice outing with my family from home, though it would've been better if it was under less sad circumstances. And then a bunch of us ate at a Chinese restaurant before heading and it was fun (and I had to sober up a little before driving home anyway).

And I just got invited to Merchants while typing this. I reckon I'ma head over there in a few.

Decided I hate people too much to keep dealing with them..
So I put my remaining two guitars on consignment at 12th fret..

(12th fret is a world reknown vintage guitar shop that lists
its stock online.. which will open up my customer base to a
way larger, way more lucrative market.. also they appraised my
Les Paul at $1900.. )

Then its time to get my Marshall re-tubed (one broken tube) and
start listing my Amps.. then its pedal time..

If I get what 12th is selling my two guitars for, ill be up $3700 towards
the Rolex.. which is about what I want to spend.. but I may need to
get a few more bucks out if it goes up over $4000..

Man, if there's any one type of material possision that I really dig, it's guitars; they're like pieces of art that you can use to make music. Each one has it's own personality, strengths and weaknesses (especially if you mostly buy cheap guitars like I do), they've all got they're own sound and purpose.

I've still got the first guitar that my parents bought me in 1968.

I know, I know ... "pictures of vegetables; how fascinating!!".

But here goes anyway.



( Read more )

Just drove the Spaniard band Trust Nothing to the airport. They barely fit in my van with their stuff, and the car itself felt weighed down and I was a little nervous during the drive out there. Everything and everyone made it okay and I made less wrong turns than when I made my last trip out to the airport.

Old-ass friends Jess and Tross showed up out of the blue Tuesday and we had a fun couple days hanging out. Got too wasted.

May be picking up some here-and-there construction work soon but I'll believe it when it actually happens.

Am I getting Athlete's Foot again? Not enjoying.

Got myself a nice Le Creuset Tagine at the WA sale.. (William Ashley is a upper crust dinnerware/china/cutlery/crystal/kitchen gadget store that holds a 90% off Xmas sale each year at a warehouse.. needless to say I was competing for deals with a bunch of middle ages woman)



Also grabbed a couple of All-Clad kitchen tools, a Le Creuset Pie dish, some Stainless steel chop sticks.. and 4 sets of Dansk Flatware (at over 50% off).. as seen below..



Might have to go back for Xmas shopping this weekend and I know the GF wants more Le Creuset shit..

Mystery Number: "O julio!"

Me: "Whos this?"

Mystery Number: "Penelipi! Don't u remember?"

Me: "???"

Mystery Number: "Your sleeping bag silly!"

Me: "Huh?"

Mystery Number: "I love u julio and i had your son, his name is max. He has your wonderful eyes. U should meet him.

Me: "Sounds good."

Mystery Number: "U do not have to worry about paying alomony, just wanted u to be in maxs life if u want to. I can fly u out here & back. I am very well off now."

Me: "And where are you nowadays..."

Mystery Number: "Out east in maine now."

Me: "And how old is max now?"

Mystery Number: "Almost 29 months he was concieved @ libertatia."

Me: "Libertatia 06? Funny, I woulda thought I was too wasted to fuck at that one."

Mystery Number: "O u got that driller working!"

Me: "Amazing"

Mystery Number: "Can u bring blackdawg w/u to maine? He is so handsome."

Me: "Hi marcus"

Mystery Number: "Lol, gotcha!"

:D

Just noticed that on Ebay 1974-1976 Gibson Les Paul Deluxes are going for $3500-$5000..
I guess the $1500 im asking is a bit too low.. Im gonna pull my ads and put my last two guitars
up on consignment at the local Vintage shop.. fuck these low bid assholes on CL.


Martin

We lost the campaign. Maine voted (by a slim margin, the slimmest ever) to repeal the law granting gay and lesbian couples the right to marry.

I'm not feeling as upset about it as I feel I "ought" to be--I feel like, had we won, I'd be feeling more emotional right now. I sort of feel like we didn't really lose much, even though we did lose the campaign--the law was never officially in effect because of the pending people's veto, so same-sex couples weren't able to get marriage licenses or anything. It's a bit less shocking than the passing of Prop 8 last year, for me; I remember getting a little misty-eyed looking at wedding photos, and then to think of the loving, committed couples having that sweet victory taken away... man.

We were having a gathering at a couple different bars in the nearby town of Hallowell; most of the local team that Matt and I had been working with for months were there. We got a few rounds of free drinks and finally one of the organizers with the Gay and Lesbian Task Force came in, fresh off the phone with the Portland headquarters, and announced to all of us that we'd lost by a couple points. Later one of our most dedicated local teammates came in all teary-eyed. We both gave him a hug. I'm sure he and his partner are both pretty devastated right now--they were pouring their whole lives into this thing.

Bah, I just don't even know what to say. I feel such a mix of things right now and yet not very much at all. It's so anticlimactic.

I do feel confident that the entire No on 1 team did incredible work. Maine also made history by passing a same-sex marriage bill through the legislature, and then having the governor sign it--no other state has done THAT before. I'm proud of what we did as a team and proud of myself individually, and I feel certain that in twenty years this won't even be an issue anymore.