I know this has gotten a bit stale at points, and the fact that I'm an asshole doesn't help.
But let's shake hands and try this again.
I recently got into making my clips of video footage into actual videos. Here is what I did this weekend.
"Take Me to Reid's" Zach had all the ideas and wanted to recreate the very annoying but addicting Reid's commercial. It features an Austin folk singer, who isn't bad on the eyes, and a very catchy tune.
"It's Always Sunny in Austin" Zach had this idea as well. We went driving and wanted to scout out some possible things to film for our recreation of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia," but in Austin. I ended up using our scout footage as actual footage, mostly because the holidays happened and we didn't get a night we weren't sober enough to film things, let alone drive around.
"Roosevelt Island Tram" When I went to visit Daniel, I filmed the tram ride from Roosevelt Island as we made our way back to Manhattan. I used one of my favorite Aphex Twin piano pieces, but slowed it down and increased the pitch. I like the way the music now sounds as if it is on the upper 88 keys of the piano, instead of in the middle C chord. It'll make sense when you see it. I also sped up the video 2-fold, which makes it flow a little better, especially with the small bumps of the tram.
Watch them in High Quality! Hope you like them! If you want, you can also leave comments on them, and give them ratings! I'm a whore!
It finally felt like winter. The day never broke over 45 degrees Fahrenheit and the sun never showed his hungover mug.
As we float aimlessly amongst the universe, we finally float at proper angles and distances that our winter, our cold and useless cement bed has arrived.
Today was Kit's birthday.
We went to East Side Cafe for dinner. I really wanted to get the pork tenderloin, what Kit got, but I ended up getting the smoked salmon ravioli.
I should have just gotten the pork.
After sampling a morsel from the generous Mr. van der Hoeven, I became angry as to how delicious it was.
We shared war stories about Kit, and also got to make some more fun of Will.
I have decided that Will is the skinny white version of Dr. Gonzo. He would ask a girl if she was a "back-door beauty," as soon as he'd threaten a man with a knife, or lose himself to the "fear."
Dr. Elmo Prater III, too weird to live, too rare to die.
After we graduated undergraduate, the triad that was Kit, Daniel, and I was broken. Kit and I were left together here in Austin, while Daniel embarked on an odyssey in Dallas then finally finding some comfort in Brooklyn.
Will has become our good dear friend, and our third, but it seems there are others riding the same ferry of provisional living as we. Let's face it, I'm not going to be in Austin forever, at least I hope, so for me, this place is temporary, provisional, transitional.
Are the friends I am making here going to be my good friends? Will they call me every evening and invite me to dinner or for a drink?
I have made friends with a large group that was friends before I encountered them individually. Are Kit and I still outsiders to this world of potential buddies? I think so. I also think we are close to something interesting though.
What's your perfect day?
I imagine a Saturday, where I wake up and its still dark, but I am well-rested. A hearty breakfast waits for me as I watch the morning news and some of the old cartoons I loved when I was younger.
After breakfast and cartoons, I play video games until lunch time. All this while outside it is gloomy, cloudy, the sky full with so many grays that you almost think there was no more color.
For lunch I would take a nice walk somewhere that I can sit outside and read a newspaper or a comic book. A light deli sandwhich and maybe a root beer.
After lunch I would drive somewhere until I find a grassy hill. I would lay on the hill and just fall asleep for a couple of hours. A very important stipulation about this hill is that there must not be any bugs at all. No little bugs or twig bugs or flies of any sort.
After my nap I would paint, or draw, or do something creative and worthwhile. No abstract art. Something actually good. Maybe some pointilism or a comic strip. This would continue until dinner.
I really don't enjoy dinner too much. I much rather prefer breakfast, so that is what I would have. Pancakes or maybe some migas, the way my mother makes them.
At night I would meet my friends at a bar. Talk about everything and anything. See the stars at 2am, closing time. Maybe have some coffee and a late night snack, sobering up for the ride home.
Finally arriving home, just laying on the couch, with a movie playing. I watch half of it and just lose the battle to sleep. The cushions never move out of place and make me uncomfortable. It never gets too hot and my mouth isn't dry.
I sleep until I wake up the next day. Eagerly thinking about doing it again in a week.
There is always something fascinating about the end of the world and rainy days.
For some reason, they feel like one in the same, something interesting that we cannot do anything to prevent.
---
Whenever there is a sunny day, with no clouds in the sky, to me that is the same thing as a blank canvas. Boring, hot, and uncomfortable.
Whenever the clouds turn dark, and the rain comes, everything just feels a hundred times better, a hundred times more comfortable.
There is nothing like going through the day, with the sinister sun beating on you, like a mugger, then to feel the cool air brought by a rainstorm.
There is nothing like it, and you know it.
Whatever happened to Tony Danza?
I don't normally follow local bands, but the last time I saw a band this good, was at the Lemur's show at Emo's.
This band was introduced to me by Zach, as he happens to work with the lead singer. I rarely, and I mean this honestly, rarely ever hear a song and thingk it is good, and I think this song just rocks balls - its great.
Check it out, its my new favorite song for the month.
Before you worry yourself that this will be days in the making, stop worrying. In case I have to write an "Everything Pt. 2," at least it will be a little smoother lookin'.
I think I write or keep up with this thing enough, considering the amount of time I spend working and recently the amount of time I have spent "greiving" my father's passing.
For those who still read this relic of mine, on Sunday the 16th, 2008, I found out that my father died.
For some reason the first thing that came to my mind when I got two abnormal phone calls and one curiously vague e-mail was that, "oh, I bet my dad is dead." Either my foreshadowing abilities were working on overtime that morning, or I am the worst possible human being ever. Either way, I was correct. I guess the odd e-mail and phone calls helped, but I am sure it could have been innumerous other things.
The next day I headed to Corpus Christi, Texas to be with my relatives. I honestly didn't know what to feel. I felt numb, but not sad. Just felt like I had to do this, and I had to be there for my mom and my dad's side of the family.
I got there rather late Monday night, but everyone was still awake.
--
A little more background on my father. He was a man who liked using his hands. He was quite possibly a genius craftsman and an artist, but he didn't know that. I spent a lot of time resenting my father as he never knew how to show me he loved me. I didn't know what to tell him when he called me from the various places he went after my parents divorced. I would tell him I loved him even though I didn't know if I really did.
--
We made plans on what to do with his body. He wanted to be cremated, and have his ashes released. He said he didn't want to be in a box, didn't want to be eaten by the worms or the soil. I can respect that.
The next day we had a closed coffin rosary reading, which is a Catholic thing (he was Catholic). I told them that it should be closed, since he probably didn't want to be seen in a coffin.
At the end when everyone left, I got to see him for the first time in 2 years. He was clean shaven, and his hair combed. Just like he would dress when we went somewhere fancy, or took those stupid photos that every family takes, with the son standing behind his father, as his father sits on a chair. "Look at my heir, my son!" it proclaims. He looked as he did when he slept, as when I was a child and would go into my parents bedroom and open their eyelids and ask, "are you sleeping?"
I immediately began to cry. Like a baby that fell off its high chair. Like a fool who didn't know what to say next.
I grabbed my fathers hands and told him I was sorry for not knowing what to do. Not knowing what to say. Not knowing whether or not I loved him.
I stood there and touched his face, cried more, and took shallow breathes.
Then, unexpectedly I grabbed his shoulders and kept asking him to wake up. I don't know what came over me, but I felt as I was a kid again, and would travel back in time to do it all over again, and do whatever it is I needed to make everything right.
At this point I just completely lost it, and realized my father was dead. I couldn't take it, I didn't want this to happen, and I just wanted him to wake up.
I had nothing on me, no notes, no flowers, nothing except my wallet. I reached in and put an old driver's license I had. It had our old house address, and a picture that I took when I was 18. I wanted it to burn away with him. Maybe something subconsciously significant that I would realize later, or just something of mine that I wanted to be with him while he was cremated.
As I walked away I cleaned my face and took another breathe. I told him I loved him, and I knew I really meant it.
---
Later we went to Port Aransas, Texas.
There was a rickity old pier he had taken me when I was much younger. He used to take me fishing all the time as a child, and it seemed appropriate that he would want to be with the crashing waves, and just be apart of the sand. Almost as if he could be with ocean, and see the sun rise for as long as this stupid grape exists.
I didn't want to be the one that released his ashes, but I made myself watch and remember what they looked like in the wind. They looked like perfect verticals lines, fading off until they landed in the water. It was too hard to believe that he was no more, and its still hard to think he doesn't exist, even as a human body, just carbon in the sea.
As you can imagine, I feel like a piece of shit. Just wishing as everyone does when they to rewind time and just try to make things right before some large apex of distress. But I can't, but I just hope that he knows I loved him as much as he loved me.
Note: I didn't write this to get pity or "I'm sorry for your loss" sort of comments. I just wanted to say it to someone, but everyone seems busy with their own things, and I don't like bothering anyone or bumming anyone out. So I'm sorry if I bum you out.
