i wanted to post something long and insightful this evening, but my brother is trying to get asleep, and i don’t know how well it’s going to work out with me hammering away at the keyboard, because that tap-tap-tapping can get mighty annoying.

do you ever feel like you lost your keys, and have been looking for them forever? you check everywhere - the first place you look is in the couch cushions, because that’s where they always are. next, you check your pants pockets and jacket pockets, the tables and counters, and you still can’t find them. you worry about getting new keys for everything, changing locks (if you’re not lazy), and generally going to a lot of hassle that you normally wouldn’t have to, if you just found your damn keys.

well, i feel like i found them.

and with these hypothetical keys, i took a real trip to bellingham last night, and saw a sandcastle still (as pictured), and lands farther east (as well as spare change and the anarchist’s fakebook) last night, then proceeded to go to shari’s and drip strawberry blintzes all over my pants.

my brother just gave me an evil look. time for bed.

the worst thing is, my friends think it’s funny to promulgate one of the worst pictures of me on the internet. i suppose i’m helping their hilarious cause by linking to the same picture, but what the hell. i am wearing a dismemberment plan t-shirt. how’s that for indie cred?

every time i get on the damn internet (which is all too often), i say to myself - don’t forget to get tickets for jets to brazil and the weakerthans/dashboard confessional, and every time, i forget. not today, my friend. i just got tickets to those two shows as well as the upcoming of montreal show.

i forgot to mention that last weekend, which was the real easter, i went on an easter egg hunt. the strangest thing about the easter egg hunt had nothing at all to do with the eggs, or that i haven’t been on an easter egg hunt in 12 years (i kind of miss doing things like that; on my list of things i used to do all the time but never do anymore: play with legos and draw), no, the strangest thing was the kids in the park, playing swords and falconry, talking in ye olde english, and (damn the little bastards) throwing our hidden eggs on the ground. other than that though, i had an enjoyable easter.

the weather ’round these parts has been incredible as of late. the other day, ali and i sat in the park and i tricked her into reading rilke with me, so that i could get ideas on my paper. the paper still isn’t done, but it’s sitting in the back of my mind waiting to be written; i can be effusive when it comes to rilke. the guy’s so damn great, who wouldn’t? it’s one of those convictions that you have where if someone differs, it’s not their opinion, it’s just that they are just wrong. i feel the same way about neutral milk hotel.

oh, and one last thing - apologies go out to those that have been trying to read the site (that means you!) and haven’t been able to connect, the ip address has changed, so it’s going to take a couple of days to propagate.

since my alarm went off at exactly 9 o’clock again this morning, and at exactly 9 o’clock the lucksmiths came on again, i’m going to relate another lucksmiths story (which has very little to do with the lucksmiths themselves) from the dusty confines of my brain:

sometime around november or december of 1999, my little brother is graciously invited to play at the magic marker house opening for the lucksmiths, kissing book, and dear nora.

nervous as i was, we played to a “small pond of bobbing heads” and the microphone kept shocking my lips. it wasn’t pleasant, and i’m sure people wondered why i had such a sour look on my face. i stopped the song, and we ended up putting a pink sock over the microphone. i have this nasty habit of getting real close to the mic, and touching my mouth to it (disgusting!), but i felt like a science experiment, learning not to touch my mouth to the mic lest i be shocked. oh, and the sock was clean, thank you.

i also recall rich (see also, rich) standing right in front of me whilst i tried to explain the “dog show” skits from saturday night live, because one of the songs ended with that beat they play (dun-dun-dun-dun-dun–dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun–DOGSHOW!).

the best part of any lucksmiths/kissing book show is when they play sad city, and it lasts for 5-10 minutes, and everyone is singing and dancing and everything else is set aside. completely.

the only thing that could get me out of bed this morning was the lucksmiths. luckily, some kind soul requested them on kexp this morning, and i finally got out of bed.

i remember the first time i saw them, down in portland at the 17 nautical miles, a small, small hole of a place. it was better that way, because it was like they were just playing a show for me and my friends. actually, that wasn’t far from the truth, because no one had heard about them at that time, so brandon and i drove down there (brandon from bellingham, me from seattle). after the show, we all went back to the house and just hung around. because brandon and i were so lame, we decided to drive back that evening. as we were leaving, marky (who plays some beautiful bass) tried to stop us:

“you guys are leaving already?” (add thick australian accent)

“yeah, we gotta get back up north.” (add lame nerd accent)

“well, at least take some for the road.” marky says, offering us a couple of beers. brandon and i smile and kind of laugh, when mike breaks in -

“oh mark - you can’t do that here man. it’s the states.”

go pick up the new lucksmiths album if you haven’t yet. if you haven’t picked up any, then shame on you.

a while ago, alexi and i went out to the store, and before we left, we asked my brother if he needed anything. he said, “yeah, i need some staples.” no problem, i think. staples.

we get to the store, and look around, get the stuff we needed, and eventually come into the staple aisle (not that there’s an aisle specifically for staples, and staples alone, but it was the school supplies aisle). thinking it’d be a funny thing to do, and thinking that the staples were decorative, i bought a pack of staples for my brother that were bright purple, knowing full well that he’d hate the purple staples, but have to use them anyway when he handed in his paper.

never did i think this would backfire on me. i stapled together one of my papers a couple minutes ago, purple staple and five pages. a glimpse of a paper that i haven’t proofread, nor do i care to, here.

update to my last post, courtesy of jason, (and coming in second place, scott, who informs me gene simmons [of kiss fame] is the bad guy! that’s almost as cool as alice cooper being the evil bum in prince of darkness).

Hey tim, that Tom Selleck movie is called Runaway in the US. You can actually catch it on the sci-fi channel every once in a while.

oddly enough, the film was written and directed by michael crichton. with hits like jurassic park, jurassic park 2, and jurassic park 3, how could he churn out something as low brow as runaway, especially with the star power of mr. selleck. leonard nimoy definitely used him well in my favorite role of his.

i’ve successfully put off my two 5 page papers due tomorrow for approximately 3 hours now. if you have a burning desire to talk about rainer maria rilke’s duino elegies or pasolini’s mamma roma and ashes of gramsci, lemme know.

today has been sunny and rainy all day long. everytime i get outside, it starts pouring and the sun shines down. i look up at the sky, trying to find a rainbow, but there’s none in sight. regardless, i love it.

because i tend to get regularly long emails from brandon, i think they’re funny as hell, and i don’t have any time for real content right now (as if an email from brandon is not real content), here’s a guest post, from brandon (who actually should still have access to posting here, but doesn’t seem to take advantage of it)(in an effort to save time and confusion, i’ve made some footnotes [as indicated in yellow] for those that maybe confused):

so, i went to Germany last week (my spring break), in an impetuous move to visit brian without him knowing, even though he could’ve known had he checked the ten emails i went him before i left.

Giessen is extraordinary in its collection of local monsters, which i will leave to Brian to explain (i.e. the leprechaun and the nearly-extinct species of one-legged grey mullets), as well as rampant with ten-ear old label-whores who wear skateboard outfits and/or G-Thang outfits and would flee at the slightest hint of a real LA gangster (for example, i might tell them that i’ve been to LA, and they’d flee in terror).

thank you, brandon

your hair is everywhere, screaming infidelities and taking its wear:

sitting in flowers, i waded, hip deep in my own embarrassing clumsiness and stupidity. the way things were going, i’d drown before the night was over. the waitress came, and started to take our order; panicking, i said i was ready to order, when in fact i had looked at the menu for a few minutes, but the words made little sense to me. confused and distraught, she turned to me after 3 of my compatriots had ordered. i looked up from the menu and towards the waitress.

“do you have soup?” i asked.

“no.” she replied, looking at me and turning her head, as if to say that i were being much to quiet.

“oh. um…can i get….”, i paused, and gathered my thoughts, and looked around at the table, glancing quickly. the present company included someone i always try to impress for some reason - to absolutely no avail; i stumble over my words and hands and head. “…a whiskey sour?” everyone laughed. i couldn’t get soup, so i ordered a whiskey sour.

“can i see your i.d.?”

“no. nothing to eat, thanks.”

she stared blankly at me. rick and candice (whom were sitting much closer to her, in my defense), told me that she wanted to see my i.d. i got quiet and smiled to myself to hide my embarassment. i pulled out my i.d. while the waitress superciliously made fun of me.

i stared at candles, played with the straws in my drink, smiled a lot, and laughed at other people’s jokes. i locked up and shunned brief gazes, talked to no one in particular when i did talk, unless i was speaking specifically to rick, in which case i would talk in a low and whispery manner. i kept remembering that i didn’t really have anything to say, and anything i did say would have been superfluous. conversation became alien to me, and being non-chalant was not an option. i was nervous. nervous. jittery and stressed - ridiculously so.

i’m not sure if anyone caught it, and i’m hoping that no one did. seconds at a time, a frown would stretch across my face, and i’d end up staring outside. i’d realize what was happening, and i’d shake my face back into a smile. i teetered back and forth; sometimes thinking that the smile was artificial, and the rest of the time, feeling like the frown was.

i went and saw low tonight. it was an interesting show, and i found myself experimenting with my blood circulation and numbing of my legs, feet, and ass. that’s what you get for sitting cross legged on the floor at shows. low shows are weird like that, and matt kept telling me about low elitists and the like. i still have my cough, and was afraid of getting frowned upon heavily if i let one loose just as they were reaching some sort of crescendo. things getting tense.

the paradox seems to be making a name for themselves (despite the snide and unfriendly workers there), because there’s a lot of good bands going to play there soon. one show in particular.

mon. apr. 30 *7pm*($8)
q and not u (dischord)
ted leo and the pharmacists
blenderhead
lands farther east

other shows of note include john vanderslice and the prom on june 2nd, and fcs north on april 28th.

today, i also picked up dashboard confessional’s the places you come to fear the most, dolour’s waiting for a world war (which amazes me, because it’s so good. shane is a young ‘un, and i wish i had that kind of head start he did. argh.), and i finally picked up revolver as well (and the shins 7″ that i haven’t listened to yet).

today i got to practice with the makeshift band we put together for my one of my classes. i snaked my way out of playing drums, and got my hands on a guitar instead, although i’m afraid of the outcome for the class. strange thing was, one of the kids just happened to be in my philosophy class last quarter, and he’s a music major, in a band, etc.; and another guy is in a band called kentucky pistol and is best friends with another guy i talked to on smoke breaks at amazon.

anyhow, matt needs to get here soon, so we can go to stella’s.

i was sitting at the bus stop this morning when a police car started wailing down the street. i looked at it, and as it got closer, it started to move really slowly, and creep near the ravenna park & ride, lights and siren off now.

another car then tore ass out of the parking lot and into the oncoming lane of traffic. it ran the red light, and smoothly negotiated it’s way onto ravenna driving east. the fuzz turned on it’s lights and followed quickly. i imagined that the car was stolen, and the thief drove onto the onramp to get on i-5. i wasn’t able to see it. if it was o.j., i could have gone home and watched the high-speed chase on tv.

i looked around, and this girl in a jetta (the same color as mine, oddly enough) looked at me and made a funny face, the kind that conveys that “we both saw it happen and it was kind of exciting” look. we both smiled and laughed.

i always thought it odd; those tiny occurences that link your life with someone elses. i think they made a movie like that. what was it called? oh yeah.