littleghettoblaster

Bored? Join the Scraper Bike movement, y’heard?

After you read that, watch this:

How did I now know about this? Eh, better late than never (thanks (again) Dad!).

I’m one of those people who still writes on their hand. Or wrist. Or wherever I have room. I’ve joked for a few years that I might get a blank calendar tattooed on the inside of my left forearm and I’d start carrying a pen with me everywhere, so that I could keep track of my life better. I figured a one-week rectangle sounded good — having a whole month on my small forearm would leave each day too small to write in. Sometimes I laughed at my idea, other days I thought it could be great. And so functional! But I’ve never gone through with it. Well, someone had a similar thought: To Do (fake) Tattoo (via Outblush).

Love it! So, this got me thinking again. Maybe a functional calendar tattoo isn’t a bad idea after all, although I’d be a little worried about the long-term effects of pen ink osmosis into my skin. Not really trying to turn blue.

I’m not going to take down everything I possibly can. There’s no way to fully remove myself from the internet, anyway. And I don’t really want to. But that means I need to come to terms with the fact (again, or still) that this is not an entirely anonymous existence I’m living.

I haven’t linked to my blog from most of my network profiles (Twitter’s got it now though). If you ask me why, I’ll tell you it’s because I don’t want people to read this site. I just like having this place to write things and geek out a bit and get the thrill of seeing my stuff out there in the world. But I do want some people to read it (and those who get pestered know it). Bit of a disconnect there, huh?

Someone I met recently said that any artist, writer, creator who says that they only do their work for themselves, they’re full of shit. I disagreed, since that’s been my claim, we had a good chat about it. I left him with the impression that I was unchanged in my stance.

He actually planted a seed. That seed was watered by more thought provoking drops: I was reminded, in a way, by another blog author that most writers’ hope people get something meaningful from their work; I realized that I haven’t told a whole lot of meaningful stories because I was censoring for other people. But those untold stories are exactly the ones that might help someone else out there, Googling for an answer to life in its roughest moments, bouncing from site to site hoping to find something that looked or sounded or felt a little bit like them.

I guess this is my resolve to give up the ghost and stop pretending about some things. Like the anonymity of this blog, for starters. If I really don’t want people to read it, I’ll take it down. I’ll try to stop pretending about some deeper shit, too, but that won’t come as quickly.

Tags: indulge me - i do

Ok, seriously folks. THIS will be the last time I post about it anytime soon. We all know that there are pervs, but I just really felt the need to let the world know that there are super sneaky pervs out there to keep an eye on. The PI picked up the story, prolly from Schmader.

The great David Schmader quoted from a certain skinny white girl’s very angry and upset post on CL about gettin’ upskirted (now gone): Last Days, scroll to Friday, August 15th. I will say nothing more about it for a long time.

Other than this: That skinny white girl was extraordinarily upset when she wrote the post Schmader quoted. And a couple more things: It’s not that well written, for one. Two, it might not be the most accurate depiction of the events. Just wanna say that now.

Tags: indulge me - i do, linkd, weird

This was just one part of my weird day yesterday: read my craigslist rant. Deleted.

Headed to SLC in a few hours. Main objective: enjoy family. Secondary objectives: hike Ensign Peak and visit Antelope Island. Or, visit the lake in any capacity and see Park City. Or, relax a lot. By a pool.

(When I get back I will post photos on flickr, from this and other excursions.)

Tags: travel

I posted this on that EX blog on day 37 of quitting smoking. That would be yesterday.

There are now huge chunks of time (read: almost 24 hours) where I don’t think about smoking a single puff. It’s nice, although what I really want is to not think about cigarettes at all. One of the reasons I quit was because I was tired of how much they ruled my day. It still feels like that sometimes. Like I can almost see the ghost of a Cigarette King in the corner of my mind, still wearing his jeweled crown, still sitting on his high throne, waving his matchstick scepter whenever I feel like I might be finally, really, actually over it. I want to break that matchstick.

Tags: smoking

That’s how many days it’s been since I quit. It’s saved me something like $200 and about 5 days of living, supposedly^*. Most impressive stat, though? I’ve NOT smoked over 700 cigarettes in that time. Snap.

^{*According to this thing}

Tags: smoking

Remember the Smurfs? And how they would always say “smurf” things? I use the words “monster,” “pants,” “face,” and “head” kinda like that. Been doing it for a few years now. They can replace a lot, but context is everything. That’s how we knew what smurf meant: “Smurf your whole day long” versus “Smurftastic” versus “Hi, Papa Smurf!” And, as with everything, tone says a lot. Body language even more.

“Hey, while you’re in the fridge, grab that avocado for me?” Luc might ask me.

“You’re an avocado FACE,” I might reply with a big smile and the avo offered up — as if to say, “Here’s your avocado, Luc.” Or I might ask, “Are you going to be an avocado monster?” — that would be more like “So, are you gonna eat all that avocado? Also, are you sharing?”

These replacement words aren’t new for me. They follow one of my original verbal quirks: “meow.” Really more like “shmeow.” And that’s just the best approximation I can make with the written word. I went through a phase — a phase that lasted years — where I would make cat noises to express myself from time to time. And by “from time to time” I mean “every damn day.” Most people seemed ok with it — my loved ones are and have been accustomed to certain weirdness over here. Some even adopted it — I would have mini cat conversations with some of my closest friends. All you can really infer is from intonation, and even that’s usually just play. But whatever, it was fun. I would hiss, too. Still do. That’s actually a great way to show disapproval, especially when the situation you don’t like is out of earshot and you’re really just letting your old man know you didn’t like what just happened. Literally catty.

Anyway, now I have these other variations. If someone dishes out a witty dis and I blank on a real comeback, I default to childlike humor. “Well, YOU’RE an overly liberal FACE who doesn’t think enough about long-term MOSNTERS!” is something that might come out of my mouth.

They work for short, angry outbursts, too. Especially when directed at inanimate objects: computers, phones, traffic (not inanimate, but uncontrollable by you), etc. Just pick a swear word and add one of those replacement words: “Gotdamn faces!” “Fuck monsters!” Then change it up and replace the cuss word: “Stupid PANTS!” “Moronic HEAD!” It makes getting worked up more entertaining at least.

When something good happens: “Awesomepants!” When something bad happens: “Shittymonsters.” Your friend gets a promotion? “Congratulationspants, Miss New Job Face!” Maybe you’re relaying dramatic gossip: “She was a total freakout head!” There are SO MANY POSSIBILITIES.

I’ve noticed that some of these words have started to catch on in certain ways. Just wait, in a couple more years they’ll be the new rage. People will have hoodies that say “monster” and messenger bags that say “face.”^*

^{*Also, after my college friend Joe posted a video I like, someone in his comments said they wanted a shirt that says “pants” — see? Already. Starting.}