I don't recommend

I don't recommend going to Firestone to get your car fixed.  It costs a bundle and they'll probably do a shitty job and take cover it by offering you free oil  change next time instead of the gas that you actually need due to their mistake.  Man.  Shitty.

Top Six Movies 2012 (thus far)

My top six movies this year in no particular order are:

The Avengers
Wrath of the Titans
Moonrise Kingdom
Safety Not Guaranteed
Lawless
Seven Psychopaths

See any and all of these.  The avengers made 2 and 1/2 hours seem like fifteen minutes.  And any frame that The Hulk was in was worth the watch.

Wrath of the Titans is in the same boat as The Avengers;  Fast paced, lots of action, amazing special effects.  A grand old time.

Moonrise Kingdom was simply magical.  And you could expect nothing less from Wes Anderson.  Quirky to a fault, funny, rich with the power of pathos.

Safety Not Guaranteed:  A sweet romantic comedy with a time machine.  Worth it.

Lawless--Falls into the same category as Bonnie and Clyde with a clever if not out right cute ending.  Awesome for appreciators of actions with some blood.

Seven Psychopaths:  Not just entertaining, but funny.  Chistopher Walken takes the cake.  From the director of In Bruges, anothier awesome movie but from years ago.

Getting Back At Big Companies

Verizon Wireless


You know who sucks?  Cell phone companies suck.  They've spied on their customers, they have outrageous fees for cancellation, the plans suck (that is, you either spend more money for minutes you don't use, or you get a plan where you end up going over every month).  The list goes on.

One thing i've realized is that if you elect to rate the customer service you've received on a call you've made to get some help from their cell phone company, you can use the opportunity to get back at the whole company.  To do this, first give very low marks for the customer service.  They may have answered all of your questions, but that doesn't you like the company's policy.  Later, someone from the company will call you back and ask you what the problem was.   This is your chance to vent about all the miserable fees, the shitty plans, and the spying.  Furthermore, once enough people do this, the company will no longer be able to boast, 'best in customer service.  The only reason they qualify in the first place is because the agent isn't responsible for the bad plans, etc.  But fuck them.  And fuck the whole company.  They're experts at ripping us off and cheating our privacy.  If you gotta use some cog to get the point across, do it.  

Netflix

Netflix is a company that will ask you when you sent back your last dvd.  If you answer the earliest possible date listed, instead of the date you actually sent it, you may end up with an extra dvd a week they will send to placate you for the 'late' service.

There's your homework.  Thanks for reading.

Albert Goldbarth Quote

"Is it going to be important to poetry in the future?  It will be important to everything in the future.  Your grandchildren will wake up in the morning to the sound of the computer screen, the computer screen will lead them into their breakfast, will lead them into and become the entirety of their jobs where they will sit facing that screen that has the approval of the government and of the advertising industry behind it.  They will be there for their 8-hour day--their personal lives, their sex lives, their parental lives will all occur on and through that screen.  They will come home, they will watch that screen for government and advertising-world-approved entertainment, they will fall asleep again.  Will that computer be important to poetry and art in general? Oh yes--But it won't be my poetry.  It won't be anything that i care about and i imagine i won't be here to see the full fruition of that vision." --Albert Goldbarth

Untitled I

"This world...  Goddamn this world," he thought, his hands locked, thumbs pressing against his eyes.  "If i was on the other side, i might not think this."

Bored, he lit up the runt of a smoke he'd just moments ago stamped into extinguish.  It wouldn't do him any good.  But he was trying to thwart something--change, probably, he thought.  "The devil is laughing at me."

It was a week ago, but the notion still burned.  Some professional linguist, Steve's tart, had stated flatly that poetry was, "Just words".  He thought of his life, his efforts.  Surely, she was full of shit.  Surely words had a terrific power; some shattered lives could suture, some steady could come unhinged.

Or more! he surmised.  Think, think, think, think, think.... He said to himself as he rapped his forehead with his knuckles.  The room began to spin.  He could feel the thick darkness gyrating around him.  He was sinking.  He needed something; help, another smoke, some sleep.  He tried but he could not think.

Diet of the Rich

Sometimes i think the rich will survive beyond most of us.  In 30 years, it's very possible news will come concerning how awful our tap water was.  It will take the place of hormone-fed, preservative-ridden red meat.  Folks'll die and at the funeral they'll say, "Well, he drank tap water for 40 years."

Also, the rich can not only afford nutrient-rich diets, but can also afford to eat meat as a staple.  So not only are they healthier, they're also spoiled.  No one should ever say a vegan diet is expensive.  But it is, in its own way, a sacrifice rather than an indulgence.

those are my thoughts today.

My Time with Joe

My Time with Joe

I will tell you a story, one from ages ago.  It’s nothing heavy; there are no serious nor boundary-breaking themes.  It is simply something that happened to me ages ago when I was embarking on my final year of grade school in Omaha, NE.

Of the exact date, I am not sure—early 90’s probably, in the summer.  My parents had divorced the year before.  My mother felt helplessly sick—not in the medical sense, but in the psychological sense.  She says about the time that she finally understood what an abusive parent she’d been.  And to this day, she begs forgiveness through a stream of tears every time she thinks of the period just before her trip.  That is where I shall begin.

As I said, I was in the last year of my grade school education.  We had visited my mom in the institution in Tuscon, Arizona.  And before that we stayed at granny’s house in Manhattan, KS.  But neither of those tales will we resurrect here.  Instead, we head for the last stop on the trip, the P_____’s house back in Omaha, NE.

The P____’s were family friends.  In earlier days, we’d even play together with their kids.  We lived fairly close to each other which was reason enough to hang out.  There was one my brother’s age, and one a year older—a sister and a brother, respectively.  And there were twins—twin girls that were my sister’s age (3^rd grade, approx.).  The only of their kin anywhere close to my age was Joe—2 years my junior.  Inevitably, it was in his room I was to bunk.  We, my sister and I, had at least a week before my mother returned, and probably more like two.

This has little to do with this story, but for some reason my older brother went to stay with some other family with whom he was more familiar.  That left my sister and I alone at the P_____’s and at their mercy.

From day one I felt uneasy.  Apparently, Joe’s sexuality was just blossoming.  I’d been familiar with masturbation for about three years and knew how to keep it quiet.  I wasn’t interested in experimentation cuz that shit gets out and can ruin a kid’s rep.  Besides, we were all students at an all-white, sexually repressed Catholic school.  One time, a young fellow a year older than me admitted to everyone he masturbated the day before he moved with his family to another town.  The news rippled across 3 grade levels of students who were stupefied that someone touched himself like that and was okay with it.  I could only react shyly about the news.  Mostly speechless with secret shame, I could only utter aloud in wonder about what would make a kid admit such a risqué thing.  No one questioned my reaction cuz everyone felt guilty about the truth.

As I said, Joe’s sexuality was blossoming.  In other words, nothing so controlled his actions as the desire for sexual satisfaction—NOTHING.  As days went by, I noticed an increase in daring regarding Joe’s libido.  Let’s start with the horses behind their house.

I loved the horses.  I thought, “How cool to have your own stable—at the edge of the city of all places.”  I felt honored to be able to pet and brush the regal beasts, but Joe saw them for more—a lesson in anatomy.

It started in the stables, just two young kids observing, the one showing the other how they fed, where the water came from, etc.  It ended, however, in the middle of the pasture where Joe picked his favorite horse.  He had me take special notice of the horse’s cock, pointing first with a stick, then tapping it, then touching it with his bare hand.   A horse’s cock was a mystery to behold for young Joe P______.  For me it was awkward and left an anxious lump in my throat that kept me leery but speechless.

Later on, I was upstairs in Joe’s room.  I already felt uneasy, as I’ve said.  The P______’s house was pretty huge as you can imagine having a stable and pasture in the backyard.  Every room had gigantic walk in closets.  That was where I would change my clothes, having always been modest or at the least, repressed.  Joe promised—I made him—that he wouldn’t burst in while I was changing clothes.  Well, he didn’t, at least not until I was stark naked.  The iron being hot, Joe struck.  I covered myself and pleaded with him to go away.  Joe, like most kids his age, was a pervert you couldn’t trust.

Finally, a day away from the return to school, I was casually covering my class books with cut out paper bag material as was required from everyone who would be attending classes for the upcoming year.  Suddenly, from the corner closet came a raging, nude Joe P______ waving his half-erect penis in my face, giggling between howls—“Hey Tom!  Look!  I got a boner!”  I was so flustered I couldn’t respond.  All I could do was wait for this tween to finish up with his cock-wagging dance and get out of my way.  He did and that was that.  I finished my book-covering in relative peace and imagined all the kids I’d rat out Joe to once we returned to school.

Of course I was eager for my mom to return.  I wanted so badly for our family to return to its casual dysfunction so I wouldn’t have to live in fairly unfamiliar houses with horny twelve year olds flashing their stuff at me. I wanted to return to my repressed wholesomeness and not feel beleaguered by penis fixation (my own excluded).   I guess I got my wish.  In another couple of years, my mom would move to St. Louis with my little sister leaving me at the mercy of my older brother and my impotent father—something heavier perhaps for another time.