Failed Minimalist’s

Possibly the most reassuring statement ever (see above).

Made a new goals list. 

#1 - Make it to my 25th birthday

Easy enough, right? 

It’s my quarter-life birthday tomorrow, assuming I make it to 100.  Going back to Asheville for the night.  Last year I blacked out and woke up with a bruisedfist and a broken bathroom.  Really, I’m just looking forward to the car drive so I can catch up on some On The Page and This American Life podcasts.  I think I might get a tattoo tonight, too.

Dreams.  Do they reveal what we really think?  I watched a windstorm tear apart and eventually topple a gigantic cylindrical building I had been sleeping in the basement of.  I had been making phone calls to an old lover.  Somehow when I dialed the number, it connec me with the person in the past.  A little like that movie “Frequency.”  But it only worked in the basement of this doomed housing unit.  As the building fell to the right, it unwrapped itself from a tree which had been its foundation.  I was just pissed I couldn’t place any more phone calls that disregarded the laws of time and healthy nostalgia.

John Mayer played Charlotte last night. The lawn seats this year compared to the 12th row last year didn’t hurt at all, because last night’s show was amazing. He covered Eric Clapton and Paul Simon. He played “I Can’t Trust Myself With Loving You,” and “Wheel,” which are two of my favorites. He ended the set with Gravity…

So, I had positioned myself perfectly, stage center. As it got darker, I noticed the moon cresting above the roof of the amphitheater. It was all dusty and brown, a Harvest moon it’s called, according to my concert buddy (not my Mom this year!) I thought it would be cool if as the last notes were being played, I would find the moon positioned perfectly stage center as well. And g. what? It totally happened.

He ended the encore with “Say,” and right before the final notes of that song, Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson appeared on stage. Jack was dressed up as the Joker, and he said he was pissed about how everyone thinks Ledger is a better Joker. Morgan was shot out of a cannon across the stage, where he crash landed onto a piano. Then, Jack pulled out a gun and pointed it at John. As Jack pulled the trigger, millions of cameras flashed. Morgan, leaped from the piano debris and jumped in front of John. A stick shot out from the gun and a small red and white flag unfulred which read, “Say.” Thus, John picked up where he left off and finished the last few seconds of the song. Personally, I was angry that I didn’t get to hear Morgan Freeman’s voice…

I’m waiting for someone to post a live recording of last night’s show so I can transcribe J. Mayer’s speech during the Gravity finale. It was about debunking how “short” life is. He said Life is long, when you’ve got to live it. It seemed important at the time. I was drunk and hadn’t gotten much sleep lately, so my brain was doing those crazy oxygen deprived loop-de-loops. Plus, I was trying not to cry at all the sissy songs he played like “Wheel.” And I was trying to think of hilarious things to say to my concert buddy so I could impress her.

Anyway… I guess I should give a little more on this post to make it less gossipy. Here are some questions to think about:

Does everything happen for a reason?
Do we all want the same thing?
Do good?
Do what?

Until next time, fan(s?)…

The next Harry Potter film was delayed from this November to next July.  No fun.

http://johnaugust.com/archives/2008/comic-politic

I’ll spend the rest of today thinking on this.  Maybe have some thoughts on it posted later.

Messed up an order today.  Guy said he wanted no cheese on his pasta.  I didn’t think they put cheese on the pasta.  They did.  So, the pasta guy had to remake, quickly, another pasta dish.  I appologized to the chef later, since I had created more work for him.  The chef said, “S’okay, you know.  Everyone makes mistakes.”  Then he pointed slowly to toward the ceiling.  I looked up, then back at the chef.  “Only one is perfect,” he continued.  “And that’s God.” 

“True,” I said.  “We should hire him.”

Oh, and, uh, DK, if you read this… yes, the chef pays cash only.

Space Chameleons!

Tragedy/Comedy

And the fine line between the two.

Seriously.  I give up.

It’s strange that the real audiences for shows are sometimes younger than the people that the shows are about.  I think this trend stops once you enter the 18-24 demographic (isn’t that disgusting, what I just tend, describing life in demographics).  I watched Saved By The Bell in elementary and maybe middle school, but by the time high school came around, I’d lost interest.  I was surfing channels for curse words and skin, if I was surfing channels at all.  “Greek” is almost surely ignored by anyone actually in college. 

So, did anyone catch this “Secret Life of the American Teenager”?  No, I’m not joking!  My 11 year old sister is obsessed, and it’s a TV show, and as I somewhat sort of believe all TV shows are created equal, I decided to watch it with her and point out all the flaws.  Fresh out of her Hannah Montanna phase and starting middle school in a few weeks, I want to be as much a part of her Beaux Arts education as possible. 

First off, I was irked that the advert campaign for “Secret Life” totally stole their font and low grass/high clouds thing from the original adverts for the “This American Life” tv version on Showtime. Secondly, I didn’t like the pilot at all for “Secret Life,” but lil’ sis kept watching, so I watched with her.  There’s alot of crap melodrama, true, but there’s also some surprising twists in character.  Really, I view at as a soap opera that finally matched the physical age of their characters with their psychological age.  Of course, maybe I’m laughing when I should be empathizing and empathizing when I should be laughing.  Sort of what the British version of The Office does on purpose, come to think of it…

By no means am I giving the show a thumbs up, but I found myself getting home from work tonight and watching the latest episode on the DVR… BY MYSELF!  Embarrassing, yes.  But the upside was that this was the first episode that really broached the topic of abortion, thus I was spared any awkward “What’s abortion?” questions from the younger sibling. 

That said, what happened to “Greek.”  I started watching because of this cool blog: aspiringwriter.blogspot.com  

And I was hooked for maybe the first dozen episodes.  But then it just got boring.  The conflicts (and jokes) started repeating themselves.  Dale, I thought, was a winner.  When the smartest character on your show hangs up a confederate flag and holds weekly abstinence club meetings, you know you’ve got something good cooking.

Well, here’s to the new season of shows starting up in September.

Oh yea… I Got a Job! 

Quick UPdate:  Just saw new Harry Potter trailer… Geekgasm!  Or is it Nerdgasm?  Some sort of ‘gasm, indeed.

And no, I haven’t lost touch with entertainment/art for adults.  I’ve been engrossed in Susan Sontag’s “On Photography” lately.  The amount of ideas per page is something like the odds of getting eaten by a shark.  Which is 100,000,000:1, btw.