d

i dont need much money. id be fine below minimum wage. maybe i need to go to south east asia and work in a sweatshop there.

characters

sickness looming, but thats being taken care of.

just remembered this character.

http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/98may/updike.htm

fun read. spend some time on it.

reminds me of a dream i once had where 1965 dylan walked in my open room as i was reading and said 'money's no object, kid,' and burst out laughing. walked out and shut the door behind him.

i think dylan's biggest er, most lasting gift to us, independent of recordings, so in the philosophical sense, is permission to be young and cynical. not sure we had that before him. ill gladly carry the torch.

learned something

via larry mcmurtry. a lot really, but how about this. urban scatter and urban sprawl, or the differences between them. i-85 corridor=urban scatter. charleston=urban sprawl.

twists

really interesting story on the news tonight. this man's brick house had blown up, literally, after a fire spread to his propane tanks. the house looked Sarajevo circa 94. gets fascinating with his interview, went something like 'we have to take humor from these events, i survived the marine corps, and cancer twice, and ill get through this.'

east hastings

Mogwai - Mogwai Fear Satan from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

seeing mogwai live is like driving eleven hundred miles alone on a night that never ends. its not futile. the meaning is in the event-not the direction, or the destination. and the best part of that is when you realize that the last light you saw in the west seems further away than however many of those miles you have left to drive.

thoughts

always will be the best cd of 2002 for me. what a great year that was.

just finished reading an interview between ron rash and somebody. rash said this: 'why is it that the south has produced so few philosophers, yet so many novelists?' such a clear answer. rhetorical like.

just read an article in tnr that seemed to allege that to be post-sophisticate is heroic. i find the author to be a little too wrapped up in himself. not to be ad hominem or whatever but sometimes that just happens to be accurate. got to get paid i guess.

tonight is one of those nights where i'll stay up thinking.

fringe benefits

today i spent 2 hours at the pickens county employment security office. the name is of course a significant misnomer, everybody knows it as the unemployment office. i should say that i was not there to file for unemployment, though that thought inevitably crossed my mind dozens of times as i sat there. conclusions-

1-i love the upstate, and its people, god bless them. not only are they salt of the earth, in the welty or o'connor tradition, they are profoundly interesting, in the rash way, and of course too as real people.

2-the guy, with lost eyes telling the receptionist he couldn't wait any longer, because he had to take a friend to a court date.

3-the guy with 'redemption' tattooed across his arm, who spent his time gazing at everyone sitting in the room, as if looking for something within us.

4-the receptionist, who surprisingly, to me, seemed to genuinely love his job. where was he before?

5-the woman mumbling to herself outside, who upon her name being called, the caseworkers said to each other 'she's outside again isn't she?,' with smiles on their faces with meanings i couldnt quite place.

6-the latinos, who eagerly respond 'yes' when asked every question.

7-the man who stood next to his wife and said 'im here to sign up for unemployment' with the most overwhelming and true feeling of regret and failure hanging heavy in his words.

i'll let you be in my dreams, if i can be in your's

the authoritative list of the top 10 of bob dylan's albums, in a sort-of particular order, though not a rank and file list. and i certainly won't talk about every song on every album, cause that would just be too much.

not authoritative, but spontaneous.

not 10, but 5

order isnt particular, so far as i can tell

the basement tapes-the first time i heard the heart-sunk depression and longing of dylan in 'goin' to acapulco' put in me a feeling i never knew existed before then. the overwhelming dread and loss he puts in you is terrifying. but at the same time it makes you incredibly glad for what you've got. it couldnt have been written any other place than in the big pink. 'tears of rage' the elegy that asks what are bonds?/what is family? and that certain unspoken blame for whatever it is, that we all carry. intense.

highway 61 revisited-my top album of all time. has to be. i don't need to say why, because everybody else already has. the most perfectly produced album ever made, except for maybe 'pet sounds' but i hate 'pet sounds'. so much to listen to here. the music just snarls, as if the record wasn't perfectly flat and perfectly round. fascinating.

the freewheelin' bob dylan-every english language writer that has amounted to anything since the mid 1960s, and in fact probably all western writers, owe their craft to this album. poesis 101 is taught here, not in 'the republic'.

self portrait-because nobody has a clue of what it is meant to be, and that is incredibly unique and quintessentially 'dylan'. in short, its a terrible album.

john wesley harding- a very literary album. distinct stories, images and storytellers. its not brazen or bold, it's simple and it's effective.