Wrong Foot

There isn't much I can report of my bachelor party without potentially incurring the wrath of any number of my partners in crime.  Pretty much the only thing I can mention that could possibly transcend the typical 'we had so much fun'  and 'I almost died' generalities revolves around my tendency to fly off the handle at a moments notice.

As I placed my luggage on the conveyer belt beside me and struggled to take off my shoes and take inventory of all of the accessories and pocket items that might set off a metal detector, my cell phone rang.  Already faced with the daunting task of multiple tasks -not one of my strong suits- I picked up the phone.  It was Marty, a close friend of mine and the other bachelor we were simultaneously celebrating that weekend.   He was already in Montreal, along with his brothers, my brother, and an assortment of mutual friends that had also been able to take the day off from work.  I had actually received a flurry of text messages from them throughout the day, each of the 'Almost everybody is here- you should be here', 'We're having drinks' and 'When does your flight get in?' variety.  Needless to say, I was chomping at the bit to get on that plane.  I could not frigging wait.  

But I digress, after telling Marty to hold while my phone was screened for weapons of mass destruction, I picked it back up on the other side, greeting Marty while clumsily fetching my belongings and redressing myself.  His tone was business-like, but this didn't strike me as odd. Marty's verbal cadence is almost always terse and barked with benign impatience.  

"You gotta do something about your brother," he said. 

My gait slowed to the point where I was no longer moving.  I could feel the blood either rushing to my head or away from it as I responded, trying to mask my frustration with his timing and purpose beneath a veneer of calm.  "What do you mean?"

"Those of us that are already here went out for lunch.  We all had a couple beers, but your brother started right in with vodka drinks."

My brother used to be a bit of wild card.  While he's done a fair amount of growing up since he turned 21 (he's now 24), it was not difficult for me to picture him in Montreal, overexcited to be in another country for a bachelor party, sprinting out of the gate instead of walking.  Be that as it may, feats of true belligerence are behind him.  Or so I thought.      

"So what? It's a bachelor party," I responded as cavalierly as possible while my heart rate picked up in anticipation of what he might tell me next.  

"He's hammered.  And he's out of control.  He already tried to fight one of my friends."

"Well, where is he now?!"  I yelled from the center of an intimately sized and near silent terminal. "I obviously can't do anything about this until I get there. "

"I don't know.  When we left him he was running around... picking fights with strangers, making fun of their French accents, telling everyone they're pussies.  He's being a dick."  

"Are you fucking kidding me?  Why are you telling me this now?  Can't you just deal with it?!" I yelled, volume sputtering out of control in accordance with my temper.  I could feel looks of disgust being shot at me from every direction.

My other buddy, Ryan, took the phone and told me much of the same, adding, "You really do need to reign him in, dude."                          

All of the excitement and anticipation I had been feeling leading up to this moment was gone.  Originally, I'd foreseen nothing but a weekend of lighthearted revelry in good company.  Now my primary objective was to find my brother and prevent him from being arrested.  If I wasn't too late.   Never mind the looming task of choreographing some sort of reconciliation, his having successfully alienated some of my closest friends upon arrival.     

"Dude, you should give him a call.  At least to make sure he's OK.  He won't listen to any of us.  Seriously."

"Fine."  

I hung up the phone and called my brother in one fell swoop.  By now I was simultaneously embarrassed about my behavior and too pissed off to give in to self-consciousness.  As the phone started to ring my mind raced.  If he's really fucked up, I might need to tone down my anger or it could send him off the deep end and make things even worse.  Then, who knows what could happen?     

My hands trembling, I started right in.  "Dude, where are you?"  

"In Montreal" he slurred. 

"Where in Montreal?"

"What's our hotel called again?  I don't know where I am?  Everyone left me.  Where the hell did they all go?"  Individual consonants and vowels alike were painfully prolonged.   

The motherly patience I'd somehow mustered to make the call was wearing thin.  "Did you try to fight Marty's buddy?  I don't remember what the hotel is called.  It's French.  I can barely pronounce it when it's written in front of me.  You're there!  You've been in the hotel!  You don't know what the fucking hotel is called?!  Or where you are?"

"He was fucking with me, Seamus.  You know how I get when people fuck with me.  Seamus, you know how I get.  What's the hotel called?  Do you know what it's called?"      

On some strange level, I actually empathized.  There he was, in another city with my friends and Marty's, some he knew and some he didn't.  He was at least 4 or 5 years younger than everyone.  It was almost not even his fault.  I was barely even angry anymore.  Resignation set in.  I just didn't really want to go to Montreal anymore.

A brief but painful silence was broken when everyone in the hotel room broke into hysterical laughter.  

"Seamus?"  my brother asked, drunken drawl suddenly gone, "You there?"   

From amongst the crowd, Kevin grabbed for the phone, laughing while he tried to initiate a conversation.  

I hung up on him.  I hung up on all of them.  It took me at least 45 minutes to cool down.     

Sulimay's

Since I'm apparently lacking in any semblance of inspiration, check out what these old farts have to say about Young Jeezy and Animal Collective. I will continue to look for my muse I guess.



I hope I die before I get old.

DVR

Pearl Jam will perform on the June 1 premier of "The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien".

Do I?

have the biggest eyes in the universe, or do random foreign particles (dust, debris, etc.) blow into every one's eyes at least 10 times a day?  Why the world so dusty?  Someone should do a composition analysis of the random shit that lines the streets and so often blows through the wind and into my eyes, to figure out what it's made of.  I assume there is quite a bit contributing to the cause in one way shape or form.  To make the results easier to understand and interpret, they should make a pie chart.  I'll get us started with some likely offenders that will be pre-filled in your spreadsheets:   

dead sperm tails

dead sperm heads

various dead cells from the various parts of various animals

dust from old dead cells

pavement

cement

leather fragments

tiny shards of glass

pollen

baby rocks

shards of rubber from tires that drove over dead animals

dirt

grass

drugs

Whatever, isn't everything made out of carbon anyway? 

This was an exercise. 

Let The Rumpus Begin

Moose passed along to me an article in an online trade magazine called AdAge.  I'd post it if it didn't require a subscription.  The fact is, unless you're weird enough to want to read marketing mumbo for shits and giggles or you are in the industry and already blessed with access, you'll just have to take my word for the sentiments expressed therein.  

The crux of the article is the perspective marketing tactics being deliberated by the studio that funded Where The Wild Things Are.  This is apparently the biggest dilemma in the big budget movie studio world of LA LA Land right now, at least according to the article.  I'd like to start with a quote: 

[The studio] may simply have lost control of the creators. Mr. Jonze, the director of quirky, sophisticated adult films such as "Being John Malkovich" and "Adaptation," was hardly a "safe" choice for a kids' movie. The "Wild Things" script comes from the Gen X literary icon Dave Eggers, author of "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius." Neither man screams "Bambi." 

If you're trying to market this very big budget movie, I suppose the tone and its overriding themes potentially make your job either easier or more difficult, but I found myself immensely annoyed by the illumination of the fact that business people decide what movies get made, and with whom they can market them to in mind.  I don't like to confront this aspect of showbiz any more than I have to.   

So it appears the studio may have botched this one, unless artistic integrity trumps the almighty dollar.... and it obviously doesn't.  Currently at the heart of the debate, did the studio unwittingly set itself up to lose money by spending so much of it funding a film lacking in mass appeal that will not easily translate to McDonald's happy meals?  If Spike Jonze and Eggers both don’t scream “Bambi”, well, then perhaps you look elsewhere for your creative talent.  I'm sure if they had, this movie could have easily been one that didn’t get my attention beyond, “oh, they made Where The Wild Things Are into a movie”, but one that did warrant a marketing blitz akin to the Harry Potter franchise. 

At this point, I think they should put their marketing eggs in the hoards-of-people-in-their mid-20’s-to-mid-30’s-are-going-to-want-to-see-this-movie basket.   And I only mention with certainty the demographic I'm reasonably familiar with.  This is a book was actually written in 1963.   So we're talking about a lot of people who loved this book as children, a book that captured the imagination with dark playfulness and childish simplicity.   Well, they've all grown up and out of children’s books and their big screen counterparts.  And many of us don't have children, let alone kids old enough to take to movies.  This seems so obvious to me. Everyone I know already wants to see this movie and they've only released the trailer.

Thank god for people like Jonze and Eggers.  I don’t think any studio ever has control over guys like this, which is why it's so great that they're out there and continually manage to get work.  I'd like to think some big swinging dick movie exec ultimately signed off on this because the prospect of this material in Jonze' and Eggers' hands got them excited, and not just because they thought they'd end up with a merchandizing extravaganza by following some blockbuster formula.  

While I suppose it goes without saying because it hasn't been released yet, I haven't seen this thing...  So I'm not exactly sure why this movie and this innocuous article spurned this rant.  Especially when I haven't written anything in ages and the entire world's going to shit.     

Mr. Mayor

I'm trying to find inspiration to start writing again.  This isn't it, but it will have to do until then:

Bachy

My bachelor party is this weekend.  I have a feeling it will go something like this:

1918!!!!!

Available for One Week Only

And I'm not exactly sure when that week began.  This was pulled from Pitchfork's "One One Week Only" feature.  It's a 17 minute clip of Sigur Ros recording a song from their most recent album live accompanied by a full orchestra.  It's pretty good.  Pretty beautiful actually, Jonsi Birgisson's voice in particular.  With all those impeccable ears gathered in one room I can't help but wonder what the musicians in the orchestra, and the children's choir for that matter, think of the arrangement, the song, and Sigur Ros as a band. Presumably, some of them were at least vaguely familiar with the band.  By the same token, I bet several had never heard of them before.    Moreover, it's interesting to hear the band members insights as to the impetus for recording this song this way.  

Dave

Animal Collective played "Summertime Clothes" last week on Letterman. This is my favorite song on their latest album, Merriweather Post Pavilion.  I love these guys.  

Apache

Sordid

Grizzly Bear - "Knife" - A Cappella

Broken News

Three Fingered On Class Trip to Washington D.C.

Cavernous Navel

Does this pandemic have special meaning for Kosher Jews? Was this prognosticated by the Old Testament? Was the whole purpose of Kosher an anticipated defense for THE chosen people against this horrible plague at this moment in the history of mankind??? Probably not. The Kosher aversion to all things swine is probably just as stupid as it has always seemed.

"I do not always drink beer, but when I do, I drink Dos Equis." What? So because this flaky Spanish guy who goes hiking in a tux, once played jai alai, and once had an awkward moment "just to see what it would feel like", that DOESN'T DRINK BEER OFTEN, drinks Dos Equis when he does, I'm supposed to feel compelled to do the same? Please, I'd much rather heed the beer advice of some couch potato who's never heard of jai alai and doesn't know how to spell tuxedo. I'll never drink another Dos Equis for as long as I live.  

The other day, on the television that adorns the wall of the deli I've come to frequent recently, CNN played the most egregiously obscene "news" segment I have ever seen in my entire life. How this was not immediately diagnosed as staggeringly stupid, if not racist, is beyond me. Basically, CNN transparently cast a black anchor/correspondent that I'd never before seen, but who apparently had the requisite "swagga", to sit down with a bunch of Al Sharpton clones to discuss what it is about President Obama that made them so sure he was a "brotha" with "swagga" in spades. As if this framework weren't insulting and stupid enough on it's own quivering legs and feet, the explanations given by this distinguished panel helped push the segment into outer space and into the heart of malignant vapidity.