Internet Time Waste #8: Muscle Milk from Hot Sugar

Finally, a new way to waste time on the internet.

Today's internet time waster: the awaited Muscle Milk EP from Hot Sugar.

Hot Sugar is this kid Nick Koenig, a talented director whose first short film I produced in what was (I'm a bit ashamed to say) the most successful creative project I've ever pulled off.

The EP is free to download from Bandcamp with an email address. The trailer gives you a good impression of the Nick Koenig Aesthetic:

Hot Sugar - Muscle Milk EP (comes out 1-26-11) from Hot Sugar on Vimeo.

I'm writing this a bit in advance of the 1/26 release date, and I have to say the early-release tracks are tremendous.

Hot Sugar! Muscle Milk EP! Do it!

That is all.

The Sims

ribbles: I only ever made one Sim. I worked quite hard on getting her life together. After awhile, I realized I was putting a lot of work in to micromanaging the life of a fake woman who would never know I existed. I still think of her from time to time (via The Regret Index, a very handy window in to your soul.)

Information I Can Never Retain

Information I can never retain, no matter how many times I've tried to learn it.

Dance steps

The difference between whiskey, Scotch and Bourbon.

Your birthday.

The full Windsor.

Unit conversion of any kind.

Things That Make Me Angry

Inspired by this post slash years of counseling.
Fox News in general
Former McCain campaign aids in particular
People who clip their nails on the subway
The drunk guy who stands behind you at the concert and narrates the whole thing to his girlfriend
People who bring children to movies and won't leave once the kid inevitably starts crying
Family
Short films from L.A.
Eye boogers

Last updated 3/6/09

Fear of Zombie Attack

I had to stop playing Fallout 3 because my zombie dreams were getting a lot worse than normal.

Now it's a lazy Sunday afternoon and I'm thinking about playing again. Having nightmares about a game is a good sign that I should stop playing.

My question is, what is the sign that is a good idea to start playing again?

Is it just that you don't think about zombies as much? Is it when you find yourself looking around your neighborhood picking out your post-apocalyptic sniper positions? Or is it like I'm saying "what's a good sign that you should start smoking again?"

How You Can Make $200 From the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

Yesterday, President Obama signed in to law the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the full text of which you can read here.

It is very long.

Now, I want my piece of the government's money same as anyone. However, I just bought some new novels, and my docket is a bit full at the moment. Plus, 900 page resolutions are just not suitable subway reading.

Here's what I propose: first person out there to read H.R. 1, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act - the whole thing - and tell me how I, Richard, can make money off it: $200 dollar reward.

Bam! Two hundred smackers, in cash, right there in an envelope of your choice delivered to an address of your choosing. It's my little investment in our future.

Now, I am no stickler for protocol, but let me make clear on some ground rules. First, although you must read the whole bill, skimming is allowed. It's also ok if you've read H.R. 1 for some other enterprise (like you work in a senator's office) as long as it is the final version of the bill that you've read and not some previous incarnation.

However, for my $200 I am expecting some advice that is tailored to me. We'll talk it over as I verify that you've read the whole bill, but if you want a little guidance as you work your way through this thing, you should know these money making-relevant things about me:

First, I am not above starting my own business although I'm a bit lazy about running one. I would not be putting a world-changing amount of money in to this theoretical enterprise, but I do have what people refer to as "life savings."

Finally, I have only the mildest form of business training and only a few marketable skills (making movies, writing unreadably long essays about pop culture minutiae, etc.), none of which would qualify me to, say, build a new national power grid. However, you can assume that I am a clever and able-bodied American in the classic tradition.

Please leave your submissions in the comments section of this post. First to read the bill and sell me on how it can make me money is the winner!

On Becoming Older

Due to unlikely and shameful circumstances over which I will temporarily throw a veil, I found myself on an early-morning LIRR train from the Flatbush Ave. station in Brooklyn to the untamed wilds of central Long Island.

I rode in predictable silence on the sparsely populated 3:00 a.m. to Jamaica Center, where I was to connect to a Ronkonkoma-bound train coming from Penn Station in Manhattan. But when we pulled in to Jamaica, who should I find awaiting my train but hundreds - HUNDREDS - of drunken teenagers.

My first thought was, "what the fuck?" My next thought was, "is this a threat to my safety?," which it wasn't (cops by the door, many kids already passed out, my generally inconspicuous appearance, etc.) Then I settled in to my seat and got down to the serious and inevitable business of passing judgement on others.

Here were the facts I had to work with: this was the last train from Manhattan to Long Island for a few hours before or after. It was the night before Thanksgiving, which, in America, is traditionally when we as a people go home to our families, become desperate for a way to avoid them, and go out to get drunk with all our other friends who also live out of town and are also desperate for a way to avoid their families.

Between these two bits of information, I could conclude these were Long Island kids out for the night, inexplicably travelling together 600 at a time. Harmless fun, right?

Thing is, these 1) kids seemed too young for college, 2) they had that sort of over-privileged, white-bred look, clothes and nature that bugged me (example: the one Latino kid seemed to know everybody, which I'm guessing was at least partly because he was the only Latino in the school.) and 3), and this is the part that really bothered me, the couple across the aisle from me each did a bump of coke about half an hour outside of Jamaica.

Now I'll talk later about why, but my initial reaction was that this just made me furious. Then I went through a bunch of possible courses of action (take their photo and post it here? Tell the cops? Confiscate it?) before settling on my standard New Yorker response of sitting quietly and not saying anything.

Then I went through a run of second-guessing - would they really do that with the cops three rows away? Could this just be some sort of nose-administered decongestant? Could I really dissaprove this strongly of a little coke and give the obviously stoned kids that filled up maybe every third seat on the rest of the train?

Finally I let myself accept the fact that I had definitely seen these kids doing some coke, I certainly disapproved of it, and I absolutely felt that I was within my rights to do so.

Here's my problem with coke versus, say, pot: it's dangerously addictive. Here's my problem with these kids: they were way too young to be fucking with this shit. What's more, this was clearly not a one-time thing for them. You don't casually do a bump on a train in more or less the middle of a nap with cops five feet away unless snorting coke has become ritualized and routine.

But we're not here to talk about over-privileged kids from Long Island. We're here to talk about me. And my thing is, there was a time - indeed, a time in recent memory, when I would have seen these kids - or maybe the non-coke-sniffing versions of these kids - as peers.

Well, almost as peers - not enough to expect casual drug use, but enough that I could see them as distant, Yankee version of my own friends.

Instead I was looking at this half-dressed high school senior and future frat boy and just trying to figure out how I could keep my future kids from ending up like that.

A Very Short History of Me and Woody Allen

So I started watching Everyone Says I Love You Thursday night in the belief that I haven't seen it before, but it turns out that I have. I think I actually saw it when it first came out, 1996, which would make me around 15.

There is really no way to explain how important Woody Allen is to Jews from New York who are not in New York except to say that if you are a Jew from New York who is not in New York, you know what I'm talking about, and if you know what I'm talking about and you're not a Jew from New York, then either Judaism, New York or both are probably in your future.

I was born in the Bronx and lived for five years in Scarsdale before moving with my family to San Antonio, Tx. at age five. Now, I am not one of those people who thinks that everything developmentally significant that can happen to you happens by age five. But I do know that for the next eight years, from five to 13, I was really pissed off that we had moved out of New York.

Thing is, I didn't actually know anything about New York. I mean - I was five when we left! And what's more, I wasn't from New York City, I was from Scarsdale - the suburbs!

However, and I've mentioned this before, New York is one of two places I'm going to say ever that you can come to some sort of understanding of just by watching T.V. and going to the movies.

Just like Mad About You can teach you about true love, Woody Allen can teach you about being a New York Jew.

I loved Woody Allen growing up. I wore glasses because Woody Allen wore glasses. I cheated on girlfriends because Woody Allen cheated on girlfriends. I even played Woody Allen in a Woody Allen play. And first thing when I got of college? Moved to Brooklyn.

Okay, here's my final proof: I am visiting our New York-branch-of-the-family cousins in London in 1998 when Deconstructing Harry comes out (I remember it was Deconstructing Harry because of the snappy music in the opening credits) . We go to a movie theater. Suddenly I realize: every ex-pat New Yorker living in London in 1998 is in this theater.

Don't believe me? Go to a sort of arty theater in London next year the weekend Whatever Works comes out. You'll see.

The One Question I'm Really Stuck On

If there's one question I could pursue for the rest of my life, it is "How do references in media work?"

What I am looking for is some explanation of how one piece of media refers to another piece of media that is as comprehensive as, say, an explanation of how molecules bond chemically to one another.

Here are some of my unresolved questions about references:

What makes a specific moment or scene in a movie or T.V. show likely to be referred to by other media?

How does being referred to often correspond with the quality of a work?

How does it correspond to the significance of that work? For example, is being referred to often what defines a piece of media as important?

Here's why I think references in media are a big deal. (Note that this is not necessarily why I think you should think this is big deal.)

In college, I had access to a big media library, and I spent a lot of time tracking down the works that I heard referred to the most often and watching them. It was how I decided what to watch. As T.V. watching strategies go, it was pretty successful. I watched a lot of good stuff and figured out what people were talking about. Call this the beta version of a true reference sorter.

Second, references are what are currently driving the internet. Google, arguably the lasting achievement of mankind for this decade, is based on an algorithm that places the things people refer to front and center in any search.

Third, it is only a matter of time before all of television is catalogued, and all references are searchable. If you want an idea of what I'm talking about, look here. The referenced by page of an imdb entry is basically a primitive first draft of what will be a comprehensive database of when anything is cited by anything else.

Searchable video may be a ways off, but Google has already made images searchable and books are next - at some point, it will move past YouTube and start cataloging all the television that's ever been shown.

Fourth, references are both central to American dialogue and our one best shot at understanding the future of the world.

Fifth, ???, Profit! If you can figure out, and I mean prove scientifically and not just "have an instinct for," what will capture the world's attention and be referenced in the future, you have a shot at building it before anyone else. Bam, the ever-elusive corporate-produced viral video. Or maybe a way to get a message of art, hope or love out. You know - whatever.

I am especially interested in the idea of creating new systems of references that cross cultures. I know a fair amount about U.S. T.V. and next to nothing about T.V. from everywhere else. If we can rank all television in importance based on how often it's referred to in other work, I can watch the ten things everyone in Argentina has already seen and be able to carry on an insider conversation with someone there without doing three years of groundwork.

Or I could try to understand what people in Nebraska are watching. Or people in 1978.

You know.

Whatever.

Three Things About Atlantic City

ONE
I like that the best bet at a Casino is to not play. It gives me a good reason to sit around my hotel room in my underwear, writing.

Know who else gets a lot of writing done in casinos? Woody Allen.

Know who else compares me to Woody Allen? My mom.

TWO
I have a habit of finding one place where I like to eat and then never eating anywhere else ever again. In Atlantic City, that place is the Asian fusion restaurant in Caesar's, which is called KWI.

The first time I was in Atlantic City, I went on a tour of casinos because I'd read in a book that doing this was cheaper than gambling.

When I went through Caesar's, this place smelled amazing. I promised myself that if I won enough money to afford it, I would come back and have a meal. That night, I got exTREMEly lucky on the river, and so the next day I had lunch at the place.

It. Was. Amazing. I ate with a bunch of Asian-New Jerseyite high rollers and one of them shared his snow pea tips with me. The - Best Korean barbeque. Some other thing that wasn't on the menu that I don't remember that was delicious. Fuck. Ing. Amazing.

Last weekend, I took my second trip to Atlantic City, and I didn't waste any time. I think I ate three meals there in three days, and the portions were so big that I pretty much just ate that and breakfast.

The food there was so good that I actually had to start eating better food once I got back to New York. I remember the first time I ate a sausage bagel breakfast sandwich after I got back from AC. I was disturbed that one of my usual New York meals seemed bland and flavorless, but I was more disturbed that maybe it had always been that way and I just had never noticed it before.

That's the problem with affected luxury - you can get used to it.

PostScript: After writing this, I realized that after a single night being bumped up to a Trump Taj Mahal luxury suite, I finally rented a new apartment.

THREE
Despite my best efforts and self-awareness that I was a living cliche, staying at an Atlantic City casino reminded me of the following bits of media:

Ocean's 11
Ocean's 13
Rounders
The Apprentice
This episode of Cowboy Bebop, particularly the scene where they're standing in the futuristic elevator and it lists all the games you can play at the casino and what floors they're on.

Casino Vay Kay

Okay let's play roll the dice /
At the casino they treat you nice
-Freezepop / Vacation

I like Atlantic City because there is always someone around to help you out. Where's the bathroom? Where's the poker table? Could you get me a drink? How do I get to the Marina? Is there anywhere to get something to eat this late? They would love to let you know.

You don't even really have to pay attention to who you're asking - a uniform is a uniform. I once accidentally asked a New Jersey State Gaming Commission officer where I could check if I'd earned any comps. He didn't know specifically, but he certainly made an effort to answer.

I should note that I am not a relentlessly over-privileged capitalist in the grand American tradition. I do not send food back in a restaurant. Whenever someone pours me a glass of water, I look at him and say Thank You. I am uncomfortable being too attended to as I tend to equivalate this to making a scene. I surprise cashiers by speaking Spanish. I am an unceasingly polite customer.

In the casinos, however, the math changes. I am essentially making everyone money simply by being there. In these circumstances, it is in everybody's interest to listen, smile politely, and explain calmly how I may be able to add my name to the poker tournament starting in half an hour.

I don't mind enjoying this consumer haven for a couple of nights. After all, I'm paying the rake same as everyone else.

How I Spent My Last Presidential Election Night

Four years ago Tuesday night, I was hanging out with My Friend The Kiwi at my place. The Kiwi and I had been hanging out a lot at my place even though she lived uptown because I had a TiVo and we were watching a lot of 24, and because I guess we didn't know a lot of people in the city at that point.

I was not following the EV and other important factors as closely then as I do now.

Also, we were drinking.

As a result, we started out very, very excited, and I remember as the night went on we just got more and more sober and depressed. Around the time Edwards came out and said "I'll guess we'll just have to wait until tomorrow, kthxbai," we just went to sleep.

Our feeling the next morning is represented in artistic form here, in the saddest cartoon of all time.


Post Script - Tuesday night's plans are here.

Tonight's Entertainment

Tonight I watched Rocknrolla and considered a career as a criminal.

Now I am reading The New Kings of Non-Fiction and considering a career as a reporter.

The key, of course, is to write movies about criminals and reporters, thereby justifying all my errant daydreaming.

More Fun With Google

Yesterday, Google created (or re-released?) a time machine!

Life was so much simpler then .

Thank God no one archived the program for my 1992 tap recital, "Tuxedo Junction." Or did I just put that back on my permanent record?

Stupid internet.

ribble's Guide to the Holidays

January 1
New Year's Day
Break as many of last night's resolutions as possible. Sober up. If already sober, wait out hangover. Shower. Take it easy.

January 27
My Birthday
Perfectly placed just long enough after Christmas that people are no longer burnt out on gift-giving, my birthday is one of my favorite days of the year. I look back on the past year, see how far I've gone, and then take all my friends out for dinner so they can meet each other, get wasted and tell me what they really think of me.

Having all these people who like me together in one place is also a very important opportunity to impress girls.

Also in January
Superbowl Sunday
The one day of the year where I can pretend I care about not only football but also commercials. Also one of the few times where everyone in America admits the importance of both snacks and beer simultaneously.

February 14
Valentine's Day
Is there any other holiday with such a rich contrast between two arbitrarily distinct groups of people? Valentine's Day is either all romance and flowers or all sucking and suck worthiness. Either I have a girlfriend on this one day of the year or I don't. I don't see why we've all got to get so worked up about it.

March 17
St. Patrick's Day
Okay - best St. Patrick's Day ever: My gigantic Irish friend Ben, an errant Canadian and I stagger across the fields of South Wales with a half bottle of Bailey's (having drunk the other half). In New York City, though, this is basically a bar holiday. I am a man who simply does not go to a lot of bars.

Mid April
Fiesta
Fiesta is a week-long San Antonio party that comes just before it gets too hot to do anything in San Antonio.

Fiesta used to be great when I was a kid because all our friends across the city would come down to my neighborhood for the King William Fair.

I went back recently and got to see Fiesta as the adults saw it - crowded and exhausting (although the parade was still awesome). Oh, well. You need to eat at least one funnel cake a year, may as well be here.

March 20-ish
First Day of Spring
In New York City on the first day of Spring, everything is beautiful and perfect in the world. Here's not one but three excellent songs about this particular season in this particular city: Jonathan Richman's "Springtime in New York", Jonathan Coulton's First of May, and, of course, the classic How About You? Woo, Spring.

Memorial Day / Labor Day
Because it was always hot in Texas regardless of "season," I am just now becoming acquainted with the value of the beach-going Holidays. As a result, I always get these two bookends mixed up.

July 4
4th (July)
The success of this holiday depends entirely on one's ability to get a good angle to see fireworks. Sometimes it helps to bring your own.

October 31
Halloween
Last year, I crashed a Columbia party with Marmo while I was dressed as the Chinese Zodiac.

I pinned a bunch of tiny stuffed animals to myself for each of the 12 animals in the Chinese Zodiac calendar. Then I decided my costume was too cryptic, so I took some masking tape and a sharpie on the train with me on my way to a party and I labelled myself - "Year of the Dog," "Year of the Rat," etc., and then three lines of tape saying "I am the Chinese Zodiac" on the front.

I couldn't find a stuffed rabbit, so I just drew one on a white T-shirt and put a label on the front of my coat saying "Ask to see my bunny."

Some Thursday in November
Thanksgiving
Traditionally the time when I go home and let my Dad cook for me while I play with my baby brother and half-watch American football on TV. I have tried to explain how good my Dad's cooking is to other people, but I rarely succeed.

Recently, a friend of mine told me a close friend of hers that had been living in France for years was going to finally be back in town in a few weeks. I listened, and then I said that during our coming visit to my parents' place, we were going to eat my Dad's ribs. It was only right afterwards that I realized that I had felt like my news about the ribs was just as important as my friend's news about being reunited with someone she hadn't seen in years. That's how good my Dad's cooking is.

December 25-ish
Christmas
I watch Die Hard every Christmas.

December 31
New Year's Eve
Tied with my Birthday for my absolute favorite holiday. I like to think back on the past year, think ahead to what I can expect to come, make a lot of promises and just get absolutely toasted so as to watch things blow up high above the city, fully prepared for a new year full of the brand new holidays to come.

Things to Carry

This is what Dorothy Gambrell carried around the world, or at least what she was carrying when she made it back to Brooklyn from her trip around the world on boats and trains.

Reading about Dorothy's supplies reminded me of something I've thought about every week since I read the last few paragraphs of this interview in Wired Magazine in April of 1996.

In that interview "cybertheoretician" (there's a Wired Magazine neologism if I've ever heard one) Marcos B. Viermenhouk, by way of explaining humans as both increasingly specialized and increasingly interdependent, said "Pull Bill Gates out of his office and put him in the veldt - in four days he's a bloated corpse in the sun."

As a fifteen year old born on the The Day of Precocity, I found this idea appealing on a number of levels. The one that's stuck with me, though, is that I could be picked up from anywhere at any time and dropped off on the Veldt or anywhere else without the slightest bit of warning. Where would I be then? Would I outlast 1996 Bill Gates?

As a result of thinking of this idea for the last 12-odd years, I've become very conscientious of the things that I carry with me when I leave the house (I've always assumed that Viermenhouk would be good enough to let me keep my immediate personal effects.)

It isn't really a question of survival skills, after all, since if we're assuming the Veldt could hit you at any moment, absolutely anywhere else is possible as well. It may be useful to be able to set traps in the Australian outback, but drop me in downtown São Paolo and I'd much prefer a cell phone and a short stack of US currency. Flexibility is the key.

First, I always carry my black Swiss army shoulder bag with me wherever I go. Like an alligator with a shotgun, this thing always takes people by surprise. It can carry any amount of anything. In my pockets, I have my wallet, cell phone and keys. Always headphones.

In the bag, I always carry boxcutters (a habit from my gripping days), leatherman or multitool, an umbrella, matches, a small (eyeglasses screw-size) screwdriver, a cheap corkscrew, a small (2" long) philips' head screwdriver, a couple of pens, a pencil for crossword puzzles, my checkbook, two buttons (for clothes), one button for Nerdcore Rising, sunglasses, reading materials, the keys to my old employers' office, and various medicinal crap: antibiotic ointment, two very old pieces of nicotine gum, a powerful French lip balm which I never use except in winter, and a single sudafed PE which I have fantasies about grinding up and putting in someone's coffee should I ever be kidnapped.

With this full kit, I usually feel prepared for anything. It's not the perfect set of tools for a round-the-world trip, but for the challenges I run in to in day-to-day life, I do pretty well. I also for some reason enjoy the idea that I could take apart almost any sort of small electronic device, although I rarely know what to do with them afterwards.

With the issue of Veldt preparedness out of the way, then, my mind often begins to wander to the logical next question: who would I bring with me in to this excursion in to the random? Who possesses the crucial combination of useful skills and an agreeable personality for any possible situation?

For some reason, I always imagine myself with this person in one of the crucial scenes of Cerebus the Aardvark Volume 4: Church and State #2. I'm thinking specifically of when Cerebus is trapped inside a giant tower made of stone skulls while he's bringing a perfect sphere of gold to the moon.

As we all know, Cerebus was accompanied then by the Flaming Carrot in the famous Flaming Carrot Crossover.

The Flaming Carrot was a valuable travel companion as he not only possessed the wherewithal to cope with such a strange situation (in fact, one is left with the impression that he often caused exactly that kind of situation himself), but he also allowed Cerebus to move much more easily up the tower in the darkness of space as his carrot top is constantly on fire but does not consume itself. Handy in a pinch.

Interesting Things I Have Done

One reason I'm decent at making up stories is that I never feel like I have all that many non-fiction stories of my own. I just tend to tell the same ones over and over. Here, then, is the definitive list of interesting things I have done, in no particular order.

Gone skinny dipping
Travelled across Europe.
Hitchhiked from Wales to London on a Sunday (this is hard!)
Taken a hot air balloon ride in Africa.
Gone to Summer camp.
Accidentally hit on a girl who was ten years younger than me.
Consistently dated way out of my league.
Started dating at 15.
Grown up with someone who is disabled.
Worked on film sets with movie stars.
Directed short films.
Produced short films.
Driven a cube truck in New York City.
Made out on top a 15th-century watch tower.
Watched a lot of movies.
Learned a lot about T.V.
Managed the Pioneer Theater on Manhattan's Lower East Side.
Travelled across this great land.
Never been to Mexico.
Lived in Ecuador.
Gone to an international school.
Fallen in love.
Learned to speak Spanish, mostly.
Bought a piece of art.
Eaten some really good ribs.
Made really good friends with my cousin.
Gotten a baby brother.
Written for a newspaper.
Written a movie script.
That's it.

updated 3/5/08

Back to Zero

It's Sunday night. I've done the three weeks of dishes, bagged three months of recycling and four months of newspapers, taken out the trash, read the usual array of comics, found my watched, fixed two lamps, cleaned the bathroom, cleaned the living room, cleaned out the closet, scrubbed the counter, fed the cat, gotten eight hours of sleep, eaten breakfast and lunch, ordered dinner, wrote some cheques, watched anything pressing on the T.V., seen a friend, talked to my mom, talked to my dad, found my missing Netflix, been to the grocery store, looked for a location for a movie, watched Star Wars, vacuumed the carpets, scrubbed the sink, scrubbed the shower, scrubbed the toilet, checked my home email, checked my work email, straightened up, pet the cat, fed the cat, changed the kitty litter, moved some furniture, moved the coat, broke my blender, cleaned up the broken blender, bought more coffee, sat on the couch, changed all the light bulbs, drank a pot of coffee, drank six glasses of water, found some other stuff that had been missing, taken a shower, gotten dressed, and sat around. Not necessarily in that order.

Now what?

There's a strange universal feeling that one only experiences on a long Sunday afternoon. Douglas Adams wrote about it - that time when you've taken as many baths as you can usefully take in a day and you realize that you're probably not going to use the revolutionary method of pruning you're reading about in the Sunday paper.

Woody Allen wrote about how we tend to make small problems for ourselves because we don't know how to deal with the big problems.

I wrote about liminal feeling not too long ago, as well. I think the difference between now and then is that now I have a job - where as before I was killing time between nothin' and nothin', now I am stuck waiting for tomorrow, and I have a pretty good idea of exactly what tomorrow will consist of.

I work pretty hard, not enough to do any long-term damage the way working 14-hour days as a grip could do long-term damage, but hard enough to wear down my batteries. Then I spend a weekend resting up, I set everything in the apartment up to be used again, and I'm back to zero.

Which leaves me, where exactly? My life is not fundamentally different than it was Friday night, and it's not going to fundamentally change between now and Monday morning.

The thing about the big problems or the big questions is that I don't deal with them in a moment, I deal with them over a long period of time. From week to week, it's easy to feel like things just stay the same.

Oop. Dinner's here. Maybe I can put off the big problems for a bit longer...

Monkey Monkey

I am waiting until midnight to update the First Sundays website. There's some technical reason why I need to do this, but I don't think I understand it well enough to explain it.

I am going to be asleep soon-ish, much earlier than my usual. It's funny, but with all the time I kill in a normal day, I wouldn't say I spend all that much time waiting for things, outside of a subway platform at least. Not working may be part of this - there is just not enough going on that I could legitimately wait for anything.

Waiting is a funny thing. It reminds me of a habit I've developed in my notebooks, the written precursor to this blog and the preferred depository of my thought when I am offline or they are too trivial to be presented publically.

When I can't quite remember what it was I was thinking that I wanted to write down, I have take to writing the word "monkey," then either looking at the word on the page or writing "monkey" again until my last thought comes to me.

I remember when I learned the word "liminal," meaning in transition or on a threshold. It was in high school, the most liminal place someone could ever be.

I guess I don't really mind waiting. I remember when I was putting together a movie with Nadine back in December, there was a time when I had no more producing work to do until Nadine and the cinematographer put together a shot list.

It was the strangest moment, because I knew I'd been productive and I'd accomplished something and I could generally could feel good about thing, but I had to wait a couple of days before I'd be able to advance at all. It was not the same as feeling stuck, feeling that I couldn't move myself forward.

In short, it was a vacation from my own expectations, and it was wonderful. I wrote first drafts of at least two short films over those two days. It was like the perfect example of the conspiracy of circumstance that I tend to think I need in order to be productive for myself.

It's 12:05, and I'm starting to think free association is a good idea for a new feature. Jeez, I must be pretty tired.

ribble's Spanish

Here is something I never considered: a graduate degree.

When I finished college, I had been in continual education for 18 years. I was of the opinion that this was quite enough.

A few weeks ago, I started to think about what it was I'd learned over all those years.

So I wrote out a list, by category, of all the things I studied in school, and ran through each subject trying to see what, if anything, had stuck in my mind. Here's my first:

Spanish
As a South Texas resident who was never snoby enough to learn French, I studied Spanish through secondary school and college for a total of six years of instruction.

Spanish was consistently my worst subject, but then I am convinced that it was also consistently the worst-taught. However, to everyone's surprise including my own, somewhere along the line I did end up learning to speak it.

I still limit myself to two of the eight (I'm guessing) tenses - present and past participle - and I can't understand any conversation that isn't directed at me (which means I can never eversdrop effectively). Nevertheless, I can generally make myself understood by someone who speaks Spanish and, almost as often, understand what they are saying to me.

What's more, these people come away with the impression that I speak Spanish, and there are now too many of them for me to believe that they are all humoring me.

Part of why I retained this skill is that Spanish is a very handy language to know in New York. I've used it at work, on film sets, in a cab, buying gum, getting something to eat - everywhere, really. Nothing makes one comfortable in a skill like continual use.

I think that it also has to do with Mexico being Texas' second culture, much like the Brits have a sort of intuitive sense of India.

In San Antonio, where I grew up, the place I was most comfortable in the world was the Mexican restaurant down the street, El Mirador.

In New York, the places I am most comfortable are Elite Cafe on Amsterdam, my laundry spot on 4th Avenue and the Mexican restaurant up the Slope, La Taquaria. Spanish is language one among the staff at all these places.

Maybe that's why it feels like I learned Spanish without trying - it was almost too much effort to not know it. Before I learned Spanish, I was like a stranger in my own land.