"Hello?"

"David? It's K . . ."

"Hey, K . . . how's it going?"

I had seen that it was K on the caller id. I had also seen it was 11:30 at night and, well—I'm going to go ahead and admit it—that combination of facts made me a little nervous. Got the heart pumping a little bit. Because here's the thing — K is our tenant. She and her husband J moved into our place back in June. And yeah, they're the perfect tenants and we love them. And they are having a housewarming party tonight back at the old apartment. The place where we used to live. — And why am I reciting Bare Naked Ladies lyrics? — And it was cool for them to invite us. And we're looking forward to being visitors in our old place. It'll be kinda fun and weird at the same time. *Sigh* I miss our place.

But that's later tonight. Back to the subject at hand: this phone call. From K. At 11:30pm. "How's it going" is the thing I say to everybody. It's my token greeting. I say it no matter what. But what I really meant was, "What's wrong?"

"Well, I have some interesting news . . . "

Oh, crap. I'm thinking, okay, I can do this. Let's see . . . flood? . . . or fire? . . . or the crazy guy on the third floor developed another cyst on his ass, went crazy, and shot up the building? Last time K called, she and J were trapped inside the elevator and the emergency phone wasn't working. (They were later rescued by DCFD).

Whatever it was, I was ready. I could handle it. Go ahead. Give it to me.

"We found your wedding ring."

It took a moment to sink in. What? What is this? I'm not sure I . . . I mean, I've heard of this concept before but . . . good news?

"It was under the stove. I figured it was worth a late night call."

She was right. It was. Did I mention I love these guys?

And there it is. I'm not sure if the rest of you felt it, but I think a shift is happening. Did you? Did you feel it? Kinda right in the lower abdomen. That wasn't gas pain. The hellish summer of 2007, with its bad moves, its lost wedding rings and stolen money, its sweet-and-sour-ill-timed promotions, and its hot, hot drywalling experiments, is finally over.

It's time to go outside. And all I can say is, thank God. Because this fetal position I've been in has been getting really freakin' uncomfortable.

link to this | comments (3) | File:  The_Good  Ring 

I've been waiting for Gmail to enable IMAP connectivity and it's finally here. There are still some things to work out, though, like the imperfect way "labels" get handled (by placing messages in multiple folders). I'm definitely not ready to give up on using the Google web client just yet. But this article gives some excellent guidance on configuring Apple Mail for IMAP-ing to Gmail, if you're interested. Be sure to read through the comments, as there are some extra pearls of wisdom in there.

link to this | comments (2) | File:  Mac  iPhone  Google  Gmail 

The guide of this tour is eerily fashioned in the likeness of Mr. Jobs himself only slightly younger, fitter, and, let's be honest, handsomer. But his smug attitude is really annoying and sort of makes me want to punch him. You know what, though? Sigh. My copy is still in the mail, to arrive on the 26th, hopefully. Oh Apple, my love for you is tainted with angst and self-loathing. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

link to this | comments (2) | File:  Apple  Mac 

I've been reading and re-reading Hemingway lately, partly because I'm just enjoying his style, but partly because I'm hoping to learn, through osmosis, the art of writing while pleasantly pissed. Unfortunately, I haven't had much luck in this pursuit. I've tried varying the type of alcohol, speeding up or slowing down the pace of consumption . . . but the result is usually the same: crap. So I guess I'm doomed to be a sober writer. And while I suppose that's a noble thing to be, it's definitely not as fun, and makes it all the more necessary to be profoundly intoxicated while not writing.

Anyway, I'm currently involved in A Moveable Feast, Hemingway's personal account of his early years in Paris, struggling to make it as a writer. There are a number of passages where he discusses the craft of writing. This one, I think is particularly good:


I think what Hemingway is mainly referring to here is getting past that point where style begins to stand in the way of content. But I also think he's speaking to how discovering the true content can actually give way to style. Good writing—hell, good anything—involves starting with that one true thing. That spark. A feeling, an emotion: bare-skinned and honest. And when you've found that, the rest falls into place. The style, to a certain degree, is secondary. It will unfold around that initial thrust. People are good at recognizing the non-true. People are good at recognizing bullshit. It'll show.

But writing something true—something that rings true—does not necessarily mean writing the truth. One of Hemingway's biographers (and friends) A.E. Hotchner writes in the 1999 preface to Papa Hemingway, "Part of the mystique about Ernest stems from the manner in which he blurred the demarcation between fiction and fact." He adds that Hemingway once remarked that "Fiction is a magnification of reality." And this is particularly interesting in the context of A Moveable Feast since it is something of a memoir.

So I've been thinking lately about these ideas of truth and fiction and how they relate to blogs. To my blog, in particular of course (because it is, after all, all about me, isn't it?) But also to all "personal blogs." Because people kind of have a different standard for these, don't they? They expect them to be . . . the truth. And people tend to get very upset when this does not turn out to be the case. I sat in on a panel at SXSW last March about fictional blogs. The subject was interesting, though the panel itself was way too short. There was one panelist who had maintained a fictional blog for several years and there was a good discussion revolving around how readers of that blog had felt "duped" when they found out the blog was "not real." Because these readers had related to the narrator and had come to see her as a real person. But my take is this: these people were "duped" because they allowed themselves to be duped. It doesn't change the fact that when these people read the blog it spoke to them on some level. And I think it was that "speaking-to," that conversation, that is what was true. Without it, the blog wouldn't have held their attention. And if they had known that the blog was fiction to begin with, would it have struck them in the same way?

Despite the fact that this blog—my blog—is named after a fictional character, I am not a "fictional blogger." That said, I'll be the first to admit that there are elements of fiction in almost everything I write here. I don't see any other way of doing it really. What I'm always trying to arrive at, though, is something honest and unaffected, and hopefully those are things that come across independent of "fact" or "fiction." Either way, you must get to the one true sentence. And that usually involves baring yourself in ways you don't always feel comfortable doing (regardless of the fact that you might be an exhibitionist at heart.) Because sometimes the fear sets in. A fear of offending, maybe. Or a fear of people not understanding or misinterpreting. And the fear tends to be stifling when you allow it free reign. Of course, this isn't necessarily a problem unique to somebody who blogs. It's a problem with any form of public self-expression or art. And, holy crap, I worry constantly that I don't have the courage necessary to be a writer.

I have toyed with the idea of writing out-right fiction on this blog. Because in some ways, fiction would open up some new possibilities. But it has just always seemed out of place here. And so I've been tossing around some ideas for a different blog, something more fictional that I can do alongside this one, and hopefully one of these days it will become a reality. (Oops. No pun intended.) But if it does come about one of these days, I don't want it to necessarily be defined by the fact that it's fiction. Because even if it is fiction, it's going to be based in some sort of truth. Because, to be honest, I'm just not that imaginative . . .

I read a lot of personal blogs. Some of them are written by people who give their "real" faces and names to the Internets. Some are people who prefer to remain anonymous. Some of them are people I know "in real life" others are people I've never met. Some of them are probably entirely "factual" accounts of "real" life. Others probably contain a good deal of fiction. Either way, it doesn't really matter to me. The way I see it, every "true story" has elements of fiction. And any good fiction is filled with elements of truth. The "true thing" —the one true sentence—is what speaks to people. That's what matters. Without it, there's nothing.

link to this | comments (9) | File:  Writing  Chewing  Blog 

The French do just about everything with style, including staging a protest, apparently. The current strike by the union of utilities and the union of transport, which has most of Paris shut down is being referred to as "Black Thursday," but in this piece, NPR correspondent Eleanor Beardsley describes it as more of a "festival" or "country fair," complete with hot-air balloons, grilled sausage, and hanging out on the grass. Vive la France!

link to this | comments (2) | File:  France  News 

A man and a woman are in the lingerie section at Macy's. It seems like they've been shopping for a while. It seems this way by the number of bags they are carrying. White House | Black Market, Nordstrom, Gap. And maybe this is their last stop, and also something of an afterthought. But I wouldn't know this. I couldn't know this. It also seems, by the looks of things, they don't go shopping all that often. It's possible they have a real impatience when it comes to this sort of thing. It's possible the only reason they are doing it now, in fact, is because it has become absolutely necessary. Jeans that no longer fit—the current pair barely held up by a thick brown belt. A black blazer that has been lost, perhaps while traveling in areas north of here. Maybe it's undershirts that bring them to this particular location in the mall. Or bras.

Who knows, though? I'm just making this stuff up.

By the looks of things, it also seems there might be a TiVo recording a football game somewhere in these people's lives. It might be that the football game has been billed as the "Battle of the Unbeatens," and the knowledge of this game being played right now while their eyes itch from the dry air of the department store, and their feet swell, and their minds hum—well, it seems to be distracting them. It's possible they're both fans of the football. They look a little tired. A little antsy, maybe. There could be a cold IPA in this man's imminent future.

All of this, of course, is conjecture.

"Do you like this?" says the woman, motioning to a slight mannequin wearing a bra-and-panties ensemble. The panties have a gold and black pattern. They are lacy around the edges and they are square-cut. The bra is patterned similarly. Gold and black and lace.

"Mmm-hmm," says the man, affirmatively. "Yes, I do." He seems like the kind of guy that really goes for those square-cut-panty numbers. You can spot the type from a mile away.

The woman fingers a strap on the bra. "They always make these cute sets for small-breasted women," she says.

The man takes a step closer and assesses the mannequin. He extends his hand and cups it over the right breast. The breast disappears under his hand, fitting neatly in his palm. "You're right," he says, turning to the woman. "Small." He smiles proudly. It might be he thinks he made a pretty funny joke. Though it's hard to say for sure.

There is some head-shaking from the woman now. Maybe a sigh could be heard. Some exasperation, perhaps. "I really didn't need the illustration," she says, looking around them to see if any of the other respectable women shopping for lingerie had noticed the lowbred oaf standing next to her feeling up the mannequin. She turns, muttering something about embarrassment.

Moments like these, it's easier to write about myself in the third person.

link to this | comments (3) | File:  Ho_Hum  Football  Cath 

We learn some really strange songs in elementary school. Case in point: Miss Mary Mac. You know—the chick with all the black and the buttons and the elephants and fences and weird, weird shit. Remember this one? I do. And unfortunately, this little diddy has been rolling around in my brain for the past week or two. It's mainly due to the fact that our real estate agent in New Jersey has a name that can be shortened to "Mary Mac." And she has done just that with her email address. So when I send her an email, or receive one from her, the song lyrics to Miss Mary Mac immediately pop into my head. And so now it doesn't even take an email. The lyrics just remain there. For hours. Even in sleep, through elephant-filled dreams. And when I wake, wake, wake. They're still there, there, there. Damn you, Mary Mac! What cruel joke is this? I mean, I could easily make my email davycrockett at goaheadandtrytogetthatfreakinsongoutofyourhead.com. (He is, after all, king of the wild frontier.) But I've got some semblance of common courtesy, you know? Manners. And I wouldn't do that to my friends. Or my enemies.

Okay, so the deed is done. The song is here, firmly planted. So what of it, anyway? What of Mary Mac? And why? And whereto? And damn it all, what the hell? And so on and so forth. I mean, the significance, brother. What is it? Maybe a close-reading is in order.


I think Mary Mac was a Goth. Which is fine. Girls dressed in black turned out to be something I was quite fond of in high school and college. Maybe this song planted that seed. But I didn't know what Goth was in 1st grade. I did know black was dangerous. And that sometimes bad could be very, very good. And thank holy goodness for that. Because age 19 would have been much more boring without that knowledge.


If there is a gun in act one, it will certainly be used in act three. And if there are buttons in verse two, they will certainly come undone by verse ten. Okay, maybe not. But they would if my 6-year-old brain had anything to do with it. I blame school for my lascivious imagination. Because I've got to blame somebody. And my dad gets blamed for far too much.


It takes a lot more than fifty cents for me to see elephants jump over a fence now. But in elementary school, this seemed perfectly plausible. In fact, just saying the words made it so. Elephants jumping fences: it was that easy. The mere suggestion, and an entire world in which young boys and girls paid money to go see such things opened up before me. The grass was green. The sky was blue. And the weather was always 72 degrees and fair with no bugs. It was a world I could understand. And on some level, thankfully, I still do.


The moral here is, even if you're going to be subversive and weird, it's important to be patriotic. These elephants knew it. Mary Mac knew it. And, by God, I know it.

I never did the hand-clap thing that the girls did while singing this tune. Mainly because that was a "girl" thing. And if nothing else, I was always the spittin' image of macho, even through the years I maintained a rat-tail. I never once envied these girls for their hand-clapping adroitness. Or sat idly by wishing I too could clap like that. Not once. But they could sit there and make up verses to this thing and clap and keep it going forever. And by "forever" I mean the full five minutes or so when we'd line up between classes.

So, in that spirit, does anybody have their own lyrics they'd like to add? Try and keep it clean. You know, like the original.

link to this | comments (3) | File:  Childhood 

For a variety of reasons, I wound up missing the game last night and I feel like an idiot. I can't believe it. I'm sweating just reading the re-cap.

link to this | comments (0) | File:  Football  Cowboys 

Right now, I guess I'm glad to live (temporarily) in an AFC town who's TV schedule prevents me from seeing the Broncos get stomped on this badly. And I had such high hopes for this season. Mile high hopes.

link to this | comments (0) | File:  Broncos  Football 

Northwest Highway in Dallas is not really a highway, nor does it really meander in a north-western direction. It's a six-lane road, three lanes in each direction, and there are many and frequent stoplights scattered throughout it's twisty-turny path. It's ultimately part of a larger loop—Loop 12. But the stretch of it I took each day back and forth to work was strictly an east/west kind of thing. Well maybe not "strictly." Maybe it was "more or less." Yes, that's it. It was "more or less" an east/west kind of thing. Because, as you probably got from "twisty-turny," the road had many twists. And many turns. For four years, I traveled the stretch between I-75 and 114. I had that road down to a science. I knew that if I caught stoplight X, that I'd also catch stoplight Y and Z. I knew when to take the left lane and when to take the right lane. Never ever the middle lane. The middle lane was for grannies and people who drove Saturns.

Needless to say, I spent a lot of time on Northwest Highway, and it was on this road that I witnessed—and unwillingly took part in—my first cat suicide. (Kim, you may want to stop reading here.)

We were on our way back from a Dave Matthews concert at Texas Stadium. C was in the car. So was my brother and his friend. It was late, but I was alert. We were all working on the adrenaline high from the show. I saw the cat from pretty far away. It was darting across a parking lot to our left. Fast. A black blur. I knew as soon as I saw it that if it maintained its speed, and I kept mine, our trajectories would intersect and it wouldn't turn out well for the cat. But not to worry. No way would this cat get all the way to the road. Surely it would stop or turn or something. But even on the small chance that it did continue hell-bent across three lanes and a median to my car, this road was my domain. And there was plenty of time to react. I started to slow down. The cat slowed down too. So I sped up. It sped up. Every move I made was countered. In the end, I would have completely run it over, but at the last minute I swerved right. Tires screeched. Smoke rose up. And through all the racket, we heard something else. A sickening, small thud.

Let me pause here and say I've always loved cats. I had three cats growing up—Midnight, Sunshine, and Snuggles. Snuggles and Sunshine died when I was young. But Midnight lived a long and happy kitty existence to the ripe old kitty age of twenty. I haven't had cats in my adult years because C is allergic to them. But I still consider myself something of a cat person. And when I heard that thud, I immediately felt horrible, not just for the normal reasons that one might feel horrible for something like this, but because I really liked cats. My brother, from the back seat, turned and saw the cat in the road. He said something like, "Aw man. That . . . sucks." My brother is really good at understatement. I didn't stop the car. We just continued, in a kind of stupor. I was sweating. We talked about the strangeness of the whole thing. How I had done everything I could to avoid that little kamikaze, and still wound up hitting it. I kept looking in my rear-view mirror. Like maybe I'd see the cat in the road or something, chasing me. A deep and hungry guilt set in. And it devoured my ability to think about anything else. It had been a black cat, too. Forget the "crossing your path" thing, what happened when you killed one? I figured my fate probably involved a slow painful death, demons flying around my head and shrieking, and my face melting away like in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

After dropping off my brother and his friend, C and I sat in the parking lot of our apartment complex for five minutes discussing whether or not the cat might still be alive and suffering. We finally decided we should go back and check, for our own peace of mind. So, at 2 am, we headed back west-bound on Northwest Highway. I approached the scene with fear and dread. The cat was still there, a dark spot in the road. And it wasn't moving. We pulled over. There were hardly any other cars on the road. It was humid. C got out and took a closer look. I stayed in the car because I was afraid the cat might suddenly take zombie form, leap upwards and take hold of my jugular in it's cold, zombie jaws. Luckily no such thing happened to C. Though if it had, I would have felt doubly horrible as I peeled out in a cloud of smoke. C confirmed that, yep, the cat was most assuredly dead. I think she used an old towel or blanket in our trunk to move it off to the median. My memory is kind of hazy here. If she did do that, I'm pretty damn impressed, in retrospect. Nice job, baby. Way to take charge. I do remember that somehow the cat got to the median because every day for the next week or so, I would have to drive by it on my way to and from work. When rigor mortis set in, it caused one leg to jut out stiffly from underneath the cover. Waving at me. Compounding my guilt.

There hadn't been any crushed part of the cat. No blood. C and I decided based on that, and on the way it had sounded at the moment of impact, that the cat had actually ran head-first into my left rear wheel, fatally knocking itself out.

I hadn't thought about that night in a while. Then on Tuesday, my neighbor—who I'm almost 100% sure is not a werewolf—started up his car and unwittingly ran over a cat that had fallen asleep by the rear wheel of his car. This happened right in front of our house. Literally. I hadn't seen it, though, until my neighbor's wife came over to ask me what I thought "we" should do about it. The "we" was strongly implied. "About what?" I asked. She motioned to the cat and explained what had happened. She had already called the city, but she wondered if maybe it should be moved or covered or something. I think my response was something like, "Echh." Then I told her I most definitely didn't think "we" should move it, and probably she shouldn't move it either. Just let the city come get it. Surprisingly, the city came and got the cat pretty quickly. Which I'm glad about. Because dead cats in front of your doorstep tend to be bad for showings, and we were scheduled to have one of those that evening.

What I'm now wondering is this: had the cat really been sleeping? A car starting up is a pretty loud thing. And cats are skittish creatures. Wouldn't it have moved? I think there's a silent epidemic out there. Unhappy cats who just can't bear to go on. And since they don't have opposable thumbs, and can't work triggers, they're offing themselves the only way they can—with our vehicles. Or maybe this cat was just on life number ten.

link to this | comments (4) | File: 

My first Tom Waits experience was in college. My friend loved him. I thought his music was . . . interesting, the same way a swamp is interesting. There's some beautiful things in a swamp, but it takes a special type of person to venture into the dank and mud. Bottom line, I just wasn't ready for it then. But I am now. In a really big way. And I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but man, I love Tom Waits. And I love this album. I can't stop listening to Brawlers and Bawlers. Over and over. Holy crap, it's a drunken bar fight of an album. And I've never been this happy to be this sad.


link to this | comments (3) | File:  Music