Author: ahniwa

Categories
humor love personal

Two cows are in a field.

Okay, so this is my new, all-time favorite joke: (which I stole from www.oxygen.ie –> Das Jokes — making fun of Germans!)

Two cows are in a field. Suddenly, from behind a bush, a rabbit leaps out and runs away. One cow looks round a bit, eats some grass and then wanders off.

If you can’t appreciate that, then damn you for having a sense of humor!

A message to: YOU!

You came into the house, probably at lunch …
I see you got your new Beastie Boys t-shirt(s) —
and so, in a mad bit of revelry,
ignoring your own cigarettes,
you smoked the ONE (1) !!! cigarette that I had,
which I was going to slowly savor
after a hard day of work.
GUILT!!! Rar.

In other news …

I want you to know that I’m not truly like that,
it’s just that a part of me has (had) been asleep for so long,
that it took a great deal of effort,
a shock blow trial and tribulation,
to wake it up. It’s still groggy,
this part of me, sleepy but restless,
like it knows it’s slept too long.
Don’t quit on me now.
I don’t want to hibernate anymore.
This winter, at least, is over.

I still search the house for you.

Categories
personal poetic

I can hardly bear the beauty of this world

Embrace beauty.
Embrace happy beauty.
Embrace sad beauty.
Embrace meaningful beauty.
Embrace inane beauty.
Embrace pedantic beauty.
Embrace shallow beauty.
Embrace wise beauty.
Embrace foolish beauty.
Embrace old beauty.
Embrace young beauty.
Embrace past beauty.
Embrace present beauty.
Embrace future beauty.
Embrace known beauty.
Embrace mysterious beauty.
Embrace frightening beauty.
Embrace comfortable beauty.
Embrace calm beauty.
Embrace tempestuous beauty.
Embrace ugly beauty.
Embrace written beauty.
Embrace spoken beauty.
Embrace physical beauty.
Embrace spiritual beauty.
Embrace inner beauty.
Embrace worldly beauty.
Embrace naive beauty.
Embrace embracing beauty.
Embrace solitary beauty.
Embrace quiet beauty.
Embrace loud beauty.
Embrace overbearing beauty.
Embrace crying beauty.
Embrace laughing beauty.
Embrace heartbroken beauty.
Embrace strong beauty.
Embrace frail beauty.
Embrace angry beauty.
Embrace wounded beauty.
Embrace incredible beauty.
Embrace commonplace beauty.
Embrace distant beauty.
Embrace the beauty at hand.

Embrace Gogol’s beauty, and that of Dostoevsky and Camus and Franz Wright and Voltaire and de Sade and Lautreamont and Gaiman and Tolkien and Kerouac and Vonnegut and Bradbury and Salinger and Mallarme and Voltaire and Jarry and Satie and Diesel and Johansson and Aurelius and Jesus and Buddha and Muhammad and elephants and monkeys and buttons for eyes and crooks for tails and thunderstorms and calms and sighs and laughter and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on …

“by the way thank You for
keeping Your face hidden, I
can hardly bear the beauty of this world.”

-Franz Wright

Categories
love personal poetic

As is my habit.

I got home from work and searched the house for you,
as is my habit.
I wasn’t surprised to not find you, but sad all the same.
I looked for a scribbled note, on the blackboard, my desk, the bed, the table, the floor and in the cat’s eyes. I thought about you, brow furrowed in concentration writing furiously, passionately your thoughts. And when you were done, looking over your words to me, frowning, sighing, burning whatever innocent paper you used as a receptacle to give your feelings to me.

I thought that, but I know you didn’t, wouldn’t. Can’t right now.

The storm rattled my weathervane, an augur of my mood. It struck out, brooded, roiled and rolled and swept across the sky like an angry inkblot smearing a perfect canopy, unstoppable. Now that too has passed, and I’m left to feel like a child angry with the sky for not holding my weight when I lept from the window and tried to fly. I just want to feel like Superman ….

My skin crinkles krik-krak from UV and dehydration, like a papyrus with years of story hidden in my pores. I crinkle and krik my way about, the only noise in this world the sound of my skin and my pants against the wood floor, swish-swish-swish-crinkle-swish-krak-swish. Cats make for good company until you desire conversation, and then it’s like talking to a mirror. Even though you know it is just a reflection of you, it seems to mock you and to be built specifically to show you what a foolish creature you are. Even though it is just a reflection of you.

I went for a jog this morning into a seventy degree sunrise, baked from the inside, heard geese laugh and passed by aged strangers who could spare me a smile. Perhaps they save them up over time, and find that they have extra as their days are running out, so spend them freely.

If you whispered my name in the night I would hear it.
My ears are sensitive to your voice and my soul is fragile to your words and I would likely weep. I remember the seperation, before. The real, distant seperation from Washington to Ohio and how I could not stop sobbing – SOBBING – for hours after watching you drive away. Was that the same then as this is now? Was that the same then as this is now? I don’t know. I don’t know.

For those who read this and care, my parking tickets (that weren’t mine) have been taken care of.

Okay then.

Categories
love personal

Stay for awhile

Don’t run away so quickly.

Stay for awhile …

stay for awhile …

stay for awhile and we’ll talk like our hearts are our mouths.

My stomach turns, rolls like it’s in my head,
I can’t stand steady.

Why did you wait for me with a bag packed, ready to go?
I knew then that nothing would stay your hand.

All the things I knew then ….

Still. The house air grass wind walls mind fingers time seems still now. Still. Still. Still. Still. Measure out my heartbeat with the word … it is too quick. Measure out my teardrops with the word. They are too plentiful. Drip – Thump – Still – Drop – Tha-thump – Still ——– and so on.

One person can make the world seem so happy.
One person can make the world feel glad.
One person, too, can make it empty.
One person as well to make me sad.

If I didn’t vent, my heart would crack.

Just know that I miss you.
Just know that I love you.
Just know that.

Categories
personal

May showers …

There were no posts made in May of 2004.  This seems a shame.

This post?  This post is cheating.  It's just filler, to make my calendar symmetrical.

OCD?  Nope, never heard of it. 

Categories
personal

April flowers …

There were no posts made in April of 2004.  This seems a shame.

This post?  This post is cheating.  It's just filler, to make my calendar symmetrical.

OCD?  Nope, never heard of it.

Categories
humor

10 Militant Groups

10 Militant Groups I’d Laugh At:

10. Militant abortionists – aka Habitat for, well, not us

9. Militant apathists – I don’t care and you don’t either!

8. Militant creationists – Deathly afraid of big bang. Prudes.

7. Militant black coffeeists – Very jittery, beware these ones.

6. Militant euro-weenies – Comment? Je comprends pas. Parlez-vous francais?

5. Militant americans – I’d laugh at them, but they’d grab one of the 57 guns they own and shoot me.

4. Militant squirrels – Crookshanx laughs at these, mostly.

3. Militant militants – see number 5

2. Militant Mac-owners – I mean … c’mon, haven’t you lost yet?

1. Militant bloggers – Sure you write everyday, and have interesting things to say, and get like 200 hits an hour … but, but … bastards.

Categories
libraries music personal school

Our kitty may be bulemic

Hey look, it’s March! Not even just March, but March 3!
How many days I have missed, living and not writing! Fah.

Well, lesse – I submitted my application to Kent online, for the MLIS offered through the local community college. Now I just have to: get three letters of recommendation, submit my career goals, a urine and sperm sample, a pint of blood, a lock of hair, and my firstborn child. And that’s just to be considered! I think I may try to pass off Crookshanx as my child, but I kind of doubt they’ll go for it. He really has the mentality of a 2nd, or even 3rd-born child. (like me!)

Emily is nearly finished paying off her credit cards. My dad offered to pay off the loan on my car. That will just leave my college loans, which may grow soon as well, but are well worth it, anyway. It’s pretty neat to think about being out of debt, even though I know it will still take a while.

The most exciting thing right now: a new guitar. I asked my dad for one for my birthday, coming up. His friend, Paul, is a guitar genius — so I think he’s gonna have Paul get one for me. Lately, I really miss playing. This time, maybe I’ll actually even work on learning how!

On a brief side note, I think our kitty may be bulemic.
I’ll leave you with that disturbing thought. Ta!

Categories
humor personal poetic

I’d rather be better than plastic

Another skipped day. My apologies.

Emily got back from Vegas. All is once again right and good in the world. Well, in Oberlin, anyway. Ideas escape me tonight. I’ll post something cute I wrote a couple weeks ago. A month ago? Time escapes me.

From the Kas journal: a rhyming thingie –

Curse Neitzsche for being so witty,
Liberace for being so gay.
Curse Mozart for writing a ditty,
and Shakespeare for penning a play.

Curse Flaubert for his eloquent diction,
and Germans, I curse all of them!
I doubt I could write science fiction
much better than Stanislaw Lem.

Curse Chopin for every sonata,
Rachmaninoff for each cantata,
for goodness curse Saint Liberata,
be better at something, I gotta!

At writing I’m just mediocre,
when singing I sound like a toad.
When painting I like to use ochre,
I curse all who’re talent “Van Gogh’ed”.

My rhymes are always an earsore,
my meter is half a beat late.
Originality, I need a size more,
my normalcy’s all that is great.

Yes, my mundanity’s simply fantastic,
and though it may make me seem spastic,
I’d rather be better than plastic
at being more normal than you.

Okay, so there’s that. Yeah….
Where in the world are you, Kas?

Categories
cinema personal poetic

Prolificity

No frost today, but a wet layer of snow – sticky, cold, more like a mixture of ice and water than actual snow. We are now less than a week away from March, and then only a month away from April, and then only a year away from me, 25 and counting. The nearby community college has begun to offer the MLS (Masters in Library Science). At two nights a week, they say you can get your MLS in two years. Not bad … something to consider.

Emily is still abroad in a foreign land they call “Nevada”. My dad’s mom lives in “Nevada”. I might say my grandmother, but considering the fact that I haven’t communicated with her in about four years, I think she may have disowned me. Which may all be for the best. I’m not sure, really.

Last night was a fest of new, bad movies. Charlies Angels: Full Throttle and Radio. When I say bad movies, what I really mean to say is completely mediocre. I can deal with a bad movie, it’s mediocrity that’s painful. It really makes me want to make a movie, and god knows I have the ideas in my brain … I simply have to conquer my hatred of egoism. This blog may be a good start towards that. I haven’t decided yet, especially since, having put a hits counter at the bottom the other night, I can now see that no one actually reads this. Oh well, I’ll just tell myself it’s the best things that no-one has ever read.

Now, a vocab quiz.

Prolificity: a word meant to enrage artists who believe in quality over quantity.
Usage: “Prolificity? Fuck off.”
See also Prolifi-city: a populated area near L.A. known for producing 99 brain-numbing lumps of slag metal for every brick of gold.

Categories
personal

The hesitancy of hoarfrost

It is morning now. By the time I awoke, the hesitancy of hoarfrost had vanished. I slept, not well, but long enough and well enough that today may not be an unendurable ordeal.

The drapes in our upstairs bedroom were raised, for them to install the door to our bedroom closet, I assume. Rather than close them, today or last night, I snuck about furtively, naked, in my own bedroom, using whatever garment was nearest to divert the worst of my debauchery from the innocent morning commuters. We’re at most two blocks from the high school.

From the France journal –

Today there is rain and wind in Paris. I have lyrics to songs I have never heard demanding to be written, and no time for a creative thought. It’s 1:10 in the afternoon at a cheap cafe in the sex district. I did a sketch of Meighan, a decent work for a feeble-sighted hand. Tomorrow we will be on another train. The last time I rode one was yesterday, 3 years ago. Time does not exist. We are traveling here, throughout Paris and then to Lyon. A million miles away for all we really know of it. A million days away for the way times runs here. Everyone is a foreigner here, and we all feel at home. Children run through sex museums with their parents like it was Disneyland. Foreign men on metros who can only say two phrases in English. Fuck you. I love you. On drugs, condemned to odd behavior, with foreign rap playing through small ear phones. For me, a “fuck you”. For the girls, a passionate, brutal “I love you.”

Categories
love music personal

A strength in weakness

There is a strength in weakness. Fortitude, in allowing yourself vulnerability. We are weak when we lean, but in this fashion a peak is made – two sides leaning, weak, and make something strong. That’s why relationships can be hard, people don’t like to make themselves vulnerable – and then if one side disappears, you’re left with a leaning line, who may have forgotten how to stand up straight. For some reason, illness makes me feel strong. I feel a surge of vigor when I experience my own frail humanity. This structure I live in may topple and fall – though no time soon, I think – there is something inside that is not collapsible, that will not break. It’s as if when the outside material wears thin, I can see through it, ponder the gears and pulleys, the drive-shafts of my mind and the hamster-wheel of my soul.

Can someone explain to me inertia? Can someone tell me the differences between vigilance and paranoia, decadence and excess? What about language and expression? Sometimes, I think I could draw something interesting, if I only had a bigger piece of paper. I could be an artist, if somehow all the right materials were placed in front of me. The days of feeling like a child genius have passed. Left behind is a fragile body, housing a mind still guilty over past megalomanias and a spirit that alternates its weekends between pure selfishness and pure charity. After everything, I’m still not sure if I believe in an unselfish act. Not even that!

Rimbaud channeled devils, demons, angels – innocence and madness! I would be content to channel Rimbaud. But no, I would not want his life, nor his agony. Self-crucifiction is the pinnacle of vanity.

On the loud-speaker: Clem Snide, Iron & Wine, and Death Cab for Cutie. Emily today called it “music to slit your wrists by”. Somehow, I don’t know what could be more uplifting. I’d rather live in Sartre’s plays then Chernyschevsky’s utopias. Strange fact: I’ve never attended a funeral.

I don’t remember now why I started this. Emily is gone for days (though so far, only hours) and there’s an emptiness already. Looking at it, I actually only feel happy – I’m lucky, because this emptiness is temporary, a ghost. There is a fullness that takes its place. Not completion – I am not incomplete alone. A sense that the world is so much more beautiful when it can be shared. Camus talks about art, and the multiplication of experience. It’s the banal part of his essay, where he sells out absurdity. Not that I don’t agree with him. But I can’t think of a better way of multiplying experience than by sharing: the world, ideas, perspectives –

– a mirror, a blanket, affirmation and warmth and the voice of reason in madness and the voice of passion against reason.

Thank you so much for all these things.

Categories
libraries news personal

Today, someone died…

The snow is melted, huzzah!

Today, a shot was fired within a block of the library. We locked our doors, called the police, gabbed about the possibilities. “Was it a gunshot?” “Yes!” “Where? Who? What?” I continued to unlock the door any time a patron wanted in or out … I was told to, but really, I was unconcerned. Grafton is hardly the type of town to host the next Dog Day Afternoon. When the police arrived and told us it was just a car trying to start with no manifold cover (something about spraying ether), and backfiring, I wasn’t surprised. Still, that’s what passes for excitement when you work in a small-town library, I guess.

Today, someone died in Grafton. No, they weren’t shot by the car backfiring. Someone died at the bowling alley, and that’s all I know. Not how, nor why … they waited, and the ambulance never came. They called for one twice. Somewhere nearby, there is grief. Nearby, there is anger. I know no details, only third-hand information (if not fourth).

If I had a spiritual guru, it would be Rob Brezsny.

Aries (March 21 – April 19)

On February 1, six big-name entertainers took control of the Super Bowl halftime show. The result was a histrionically boring spectacle of robotic sexuality and fake emotion. If there was any saving grace amidst the monumental emptiness, it was Janet Jackson’s climactic unveiling. In a New York Times article, Alessandra Stanley wrote, “The one moment of honesty in that coldly choreographed tableau was when the cup came off and out tumbled a normal middle-aged woman’s breast instead of an idealized Playboy bunny implant.” Your assignment in the coming week, Aries, is to be inspired by that moment of honesty. Strip away pretension and phoniness everywhere you find them, thereby exposing the raw humanity that lies beneath. One caveat: Do this ethically, and without breaking the law.

I’m not one for pretension or phoniness as it is. For some reason, though, I really, really appreciated this perspective on something that the rest of the nation has been playing up as shocking, horrifying, or – and perhaps this shocks me more than the others – even newsworthy. Today in Grafton, someone died because the ambulance never came. It will affect the news no more than a passing breeze, but Janet’s breast will never be forgotten.

I die of shame.

Categories
personal

The opposite of conceal

Though yesterday was warm, this morning blew in a light snowfall. It’s a too-thin blanket, like a bride’s veil – the type of covering that does the opposite of conceal.

Today is another work day. Today is another work day. Today is another work day. I get tomorrow off, and all I want right now is 2 more hours of sleep.

From the France journal –

When I get home, I won’t believe me when I say that I went to France. I’ll laugh. It must have all been a dream. Flowers on every table and rough sketches at 1:10 in the afternoon…

Categories
cinema game personal

Buridan’s Ass

No apologies for my absence. I have no excuses. Health feels fragile today, like a toy top spinning — we all fall down.

I watched Dummy today. Adrian Brody before “The Pianist”, and well worth the watch. One of the better movies I’ve seen – lately, ever – good movie, anyway. Emily leaves for Vegas on Sunday for a few days. The sister’s (2nd) wedding. I wonder what a wedding is like, what a 2nd wedding is like. How much can the bride be blushing when it’s all been done before? But no, maybe that’s mean and insensitive, and illogical. That’s like saying how much fun can a relationship be if it’s your second one, no matter that it’s to someone different.

A return to Everquest, but a casual return. In the last week, I’ve played twice. I feel strangely ambivelent to EQ itself. I enjoy spending that time with Emily, sharing an activity — as I enjoy any activity we spend together / share. Still, EQ IS fun. So is Prince of Persia, so is Hoyle Majestic Chess, and so is reading and writing.

I am Buridan’s ass. Status quo, miasma, feet locked in an iron cast — not struggling. I’m Rimbaud’s companion “down below”. I have not taken the road less traveled. Somehow, I think I am a villain. I have no evil laugh, nor curled mustache, nor black sedan with tinted windows. I haven’t got evil intentions. If I had, I would not be a villain. No, my villany comes from a fullness of goodness, unacted upon. My coffers full of charity, I stand by and watched the world starve, consuming depravity like a chimera’s feast. Worse, I criticize, mock, or stand off to the side with an air of careful detachment. That last may be the worst.

Buridan’s ass starves to death. Perfectly good food within sight, within reach, no bars between, nor chasm. No device keeps the ass from its feast except rational thought, the bane of all good dreamers.

No, I am not Buridan’s ass.
But sometimes I catch a glimpse of the beast’s death.
Sometimes I understand it.

Categories
book personal poetic

We must submit to baptism…

I feel smote down by the duldrums of $8.50 an hour and having to work on a Sunday. My revenge is to sit here and blog about it, which is some small recompense.

Emily and I have a new boarder in our home, whose heart thrums like an engine when she’s happy, and who only speaks at night. She’s very shy, but she hasn’t gotten used to us yet.

As for the perfection of language, I think that language is perfect. It is those who try and use it that are flawed. Our expression, as well as our understanding of language are both intrinsically flawed, because we don’t think and we don’t see in words. In any case, I like language for its ambiguity. I like that two people can read a book and get different things out of it, because so much depends on our perception of language, as well as how it is used.

Entire novels are written simply to express one idea. That’s 500 pages devoted to trying to express one thing, in the end, and even then they aren’t always understood. As for my writing, even I don’t understand it sometimes.

Today my brain is tired, and my heart feels like lead.
My fingers are typing independently, willfully … I can’t keep track of them. My eyes simply gaze, straight ahead, listless. I blame it all on the duldrums of $8.50 an hour and having to work on a Sunday. I blame it on the extraordinary distance between two points, and the law of half-lives. I’m walking towards my future, closing half the distance each step, knowing that at this rate, I’ll never reach it.

The white man is coming! The cannon!
We must put on clothes, submit to baptism, work…

With my apologies to Rimbaud for what is probably a mild mis-quote.

Categories
humor personal

In Soviet Russia …

In Soviet Russia, the dishes do you. *evil russian-accented cackle*

Okay, so I stole that from Emily, who posted it on our chalkboard (which is on the fridge in the kitchen) this morning as a subtle hint that some accidental harm (involving sharp utensils, I imagine) might befall me if the dishes were not sparklingly cleaned. Needless to say, the dishes are done … so that I might live on a little longer.

Some other fun “In Soviet Russia” phrases:

In Soviet Russia, the books read you.
In Soviet Russia, the movies watch you.
In Soviet Russia, the blogs write you.

In Soviet Russia, — yes, yes, okay … so it’s silly. That reminds me.

In Soviet Russia, the jokes tell you! HAhahahahaa….

Okay, someone please set my “dumb” switch to “off” please. Thanks. And off to work I go, wheeeeeeee.

Categories
personal

A beautiful melancholy

I would not want to run a mile with a thousand spectators watching me intently, and I don’t know why. I think I could probably make it a mile without collapsing, if I jogged it, at least. It’s not a soul-bearing act, but I’d prefer to have a thousand people watch me write, or read, or just sit and stare at a wall. I’d rather give a speech in french in front of a thousand french people, I think. Scary ….

Today has been a bit melancholy, a day where I just want to relax, and feel like the world is judging me for my inaction. I revere stillness as much as action, silence as much as speech, meditation as much as thought. It’s often in my silence that the world makes me feel alone.

It’s a beautiful melancholy. Don’t begrudge me it.

Categories
humor

The cure for mad cows

News Flash: Spanish scientists believe they may have found the solution to mad cow disease, an infection caused by a rogue protein produced only by cannibalism. Though as yet unproven, geneticists believe that mixing the genes of those infected with mad cow disease with the genes of those infected with placid bull syndrome would cause both infections to cease, effectively killing two birds with one stone.

Placid bull syndrome is a long-standing, formerly rare ailment in Spain. The first recorded “placid bull” was none other than the lovable Ferdinand, who most people know from stories for his love of flowers and refusal to fight when thrown into the arena. For a time since, Ferdinand was put to stud, until the Spanish realized that “placid bull” was a dominant genetic characteristic, and was passed down to each and every one of Ferdinand’s offspring. Now, placid bull syndrome has become a major threat to the Spanish way of life. After all, what would Madonna do for a music video if she couldn’t have a matador in it? Where would Spain be without decadent bovine bloodshed? Needless to say, Spain is as concerned, if not moreso, with finding a cure to placid bull syndrome as they are to mad cow disease.

Skipping animal testing, scientists have jumped straight to testing on humans. Though results so far have produced only “bi-polar minotaurs”, scientists are sure that the cure is within their grasp, and that it is only a matter of time before humans are once again meek and docile, and bulls ferocious and mean.

On another front, PETA says the solution to mad cow disease is simple. In the words of PETA spokesperson, “Of course the cows are mad. They work hard for little or no wages, live in squalor, and have to put up with the occassional “tipping”. The cure for mad cow disease? A union!”

Categories
humor personal

The rolled spring bounty of General Tsao

Regarding the title of this blog, i.e. “Where is my muse?” (editor’s note: this was the subtitle of the old blog I had at www.blogstudio.com), I can now, officially report having found it. It was not, as I had perhaps expected it to be, located in a park, museum, work of art, literature, or in the depths of someone’s eyes. Rather, I found it in a chinese restaurant.

Yes, it was there, amidst the wonton, eggdrop, rolled spring bounty of general tsao, that my muse awaited me. And you might imagine, much to my amazement! Even so, it was no bolt of lightning, nor thunderclap, nor sudden clarity of thought. Rather, and rather abruptly, I was confronted by my muse when that most-delicate of chinese post-feast cuisine, my fortune cookie was presented to me, along of course with my check and an after-dinner mint. Expecting portents of doom, cute kitchen wisdom, or some chenglish garble, I was, and I admit it, a bit dismayed when my fortune read, simply, “I am your muse.”

I sat, stunned, for several minutes, contemplating the ramifications of this revelation. Should I move to China? Should I have gone to a thai restaurant instead? Who was General Tsao, anyway? Finally, and a bit furtively, I took both what was left of the cookie, and its fortune, and quickly devoured it. I got up, payed my check, ate my mint, and left the building, occassionally glancing over my shoulder for bad signs that I might soon be struck dead, or maimed by ducks.

Half an hour later, I had horrible indigestion. Perhaps ironically, it wasn’t even inspiring indigestion. I guess that may be for the best. So, at least for awhile longer, the title stands, and I’ll try to forget this whole fortune cookie thing ever happened. It’s better that way.