With Confetti in My Hair

4.12.10

Working on too many projects, per usual. Here’s where I’m at for the moment. As always, click on the pictures for more info.

Listening to:

Watching:

Reading:

Obsessions:

Also, you can watch Bergman’s Persona in its entirety on youtube. Here’s the first part:

Hope you have been well.

Movie Roll, Other Rol[e(l)]s

Things I’ve been watching:

Things I’ve been reading:

Still continuing on the Murakami kick (his best yet):

And working on:

Things I’ve been listening to:

A snapshot of February. It’s been an odd one. You’ll have to tell me about yours soon.

Hope you have been well.

From the underground.

Been a while. Don’t know where I’ve been. Reading bad new poets and too much/not enough Murakami. Saw A Single Man last night – was a fantastic piece of film.

Preparing for many things.

Hope to stop speaking so vaguely in the future.

Anyways, watch the Toy Story 3 trailer.

Hope you are well.

November 17th

Where my mind has been lately:

-Brian Molko of Placebo singing Bowie’s “Five Years”

-Acoustic version of “Living Dead”

I heard someone call Brett’s voice “apocalyptic yodeling”

-The Limits of Control

-Morrissey

-Robert Altman

-mewithoutYou (hadn’t seen this video – it’s very nice)

WARNING: ANOTHER BONNIE “PRINCE” BILLY COVER COMING AT YOU IN 2 VIDEOS!!!

HERE IT IS!!!!

Also, I forgot to put the original Bill Withers “The Same Love That Made Me Laugh” when I put the BPB cover a little while ago, so here they both are, side by side.

(You have to wait for the annoying added intro to end)

I think Bonnie harnessed something in the original and made it painful to the soul. Wonder what Mr. Withers thinks. Bill, if you’re out there, holla at cha boi!

Going to Brooklyn this weekend to visit a wonderful friend of mine, Levi Ward. So, inevitably -

I hope you are well. See you soon, Levi. Bringing my dancing shoes.

Wednesday, November 11th

For Veteran’s Day-

 

Reading Arda Collins’ first book of poetry It is Daylight. Louise Gluck wrote the forward. Amazing, amazing stuff. I met Arda this past August and had no idea she wrote like this. Probably for the best. Please check out one of her poems, “Spring“.

Laura Gibson plays “Take This Waltz” -

 

I hope you are well. Last night was both cool and warm in a way that way inextricably fall. We need more nights like that.

The Burden of Some Other

Odd, odd feelings curling and haunting.

I hope you are well and wish, for once, that you have no idea what I speak of.

Cheers.

There’s Rain Outside

A rainy Thursday. Watched a couple movies last night: Not Quite Hollywood (an excellent, excellent film about Australian exploitation films – mega fun), the Guatemalan Handshake (beautiful visuals, ending that saves the rest of the movie, the amazing Will Oldham, a.k.a. Bonnie “Prince” Billy), and Local Color (with Armin Mueller-Stahl, the hilarious “Helmut” from the NEW YORK vignette in Jarmusch’s Night On Earth -another great film). Local Color was amazingly sappy but a nice watch if you’re in a not-think-too-much/eating-cookie-dough mood. Going to see Where the Wild Things Are tonight in IMAX. Never seen anything in IMAX. Been checking the Where the Wild Things Are blog We Love You So (which is fantastic, fantastic, fantastic) daily (until recently) since about February.

Got a couple letters from some old friends I haven’t talk to in a long, long time.

I hope you are well.

Bonnie “Prince” Billy covering a Bill Whithers song:

Cheers.

To Travels, To Loss

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Not the exact course taken but you get the drift. It’s been a week now and I’ll be back soon. Haven’t been in touch with many people and don’t expect much mail when I get back. Haven’t used the internet for a bit and haven’t missed anything. I’ll update this blog every once and a while and check my e-mail every other week or so but other than that…what am I missing?

With the internet we have an unimaginable amount of information at our fingertips – but how much information do we actually retain? I can look up a word online and have the definition in about 8 seconds; it would take me a few minutes to dig out a dictionary, find the word, check it against another dictionary – but I am much more likely to remember the word I had to take the time to look up compared to word definition I found online. And, for me, retention is the #1 priority in education. Grades, awards - none of that shit matters when a month later you remember nothing. The internet is, for me, a thing of worthless instant gratification. At all levels.

E-mail is the tricky thing. For jobs and various other institutional relationships (impersonal and/or insincere) it is, unfortunately, a necessity. For any other contact paper mail will suffice. If you lose relationships because you are no longer available online those relationships were meaningless. And a Facebook message of any sort is the most insincere gesture I can think of at the moment. A comment on your wall for your birthday vs. a handwritten letter? Please.

I do not mean for this to sound like a soapbox against technology. Nor am I trying to say that I am more virtuous or better in any way than anyone because I am reducing my internet use. This is just what I have to do to focus on what I want to do with my life. I need to start cutting away.

I need to start cutting away.

If you want to contact me, please attach your email address or mailing address or phone number and I’ll get in contact. I promise. Meaningful contact with those who are willing to do so in return is all we have. Or, at least, all I have.

I hope you are well and that I hear from you soon.