and i made photo essays

we were supposed to surprise Raymi the sphinx this saturday on her birthday in Toronto. turned out Raymi was going to be in Waterloo with Matt Good the minx on his acoustic tour so the surprise was on us cuz she wasnt gonna be at the party.

fortunately or unfortunately mr matt good told Raymi about the surprise, so im being told, which is actually good news because now we can all try to plan this party.

but its falling apart because waterloo is two hours away from Toronto and i have a 7am flight in the morn. which means i have to be there at 5am-ish, which means i have to leave waterloo at 3am.

its going to be a hellish trip because i have to leave LA on saturday morning on a 7am flight.

basically theres going to be a lot of AMs going on in my life this weekend if i wanna go to Toronto slash Waterloo.

so heres the question i have for my toronto readers… are there any of you who want to party with me and pitt and raymi and fil and mike grimshaw and chad and possibly matt? and is there anyone who wants to drive me back from waterloo at 3am to toronto while i drink rum in your car and hit on you or your sister(s)?

all of this is very bizarre. id like to cancel it because i was supposed to go to a stag party/bachelor party before i found out an airline ticket was being bought for me. you people are far far far too good to me. far.

i suppose there are worse problems than the ones i have. mr pitt for example is going to go back to war in a few months. the lakers still dont really have a center. and the cubs have two guys in their starting rotation who ive never heard of an their last names dont end in ood or rior.

one thing ive learned from the Bush Administration and now mr. delay is theres no problem too big that you cant smile at.

after talking about sex to an ex and eating dinner while watching someshit on tv i dont know what.

fucked up because i woke up around 11:30p with South Park on and i didnt run straight to my bedroom to continue my slumber. so now i’ll be awake all night.

when you wake up after a late night nap, refreshed, stoney, dreamy, lucid, sometimes waves of euphoria mixed with an unnatural sadness envelope you. thats what happens to you. what happens to me is i get all the above minus the euphoria. all i get is this bizarre sadness and it makes me think that the devil himself caught me dreaming and laid on his side right next to me to whisper sour nothings.

and as the fireplace crackled the last bits of ember he woke up not realizing that he too had slipped off into a nap, checked his pocketwatch and realized he was running late, and sped off into the night taking his warmth with him.

the sudden change of temperature and lack of whispers woke me. i was cold and cartman’s cranky voice seemed so loud that i wondered how i could sleep through it. but now i know. and now i know why the first things ringing in my head when i woke was, “youre a failure because you never became a journalist. youre a failure because you never became a columnist. youre a failure because look at you youre alone.”

i do a pretty good job of fighting off the negative thoughts that seep into my conciousness. and i have a little help from my friends, the angels. so its always interesting when a few of them get behind the defense shields. like hearing french being spoken in compton. its more curious than alarming.

truth is i am a failure because i never acheived the goals i had in my life. and ironically enough i didnt get there because i didnt practice enough.

you practice plenty the angels argue, flickering shiny things out of the corner of my eye so i dont dwell on the not-so-swell, reminding me of the newest shipment of xxx on the pile of mail.

trouble is, i have practiced. ive practiced at being precisely the columnist ive always wanted to be. the one royko was and caen and rooney and king and hunter. men who werent ashamed to be themselves. men who got paid to write or say whatever it is that they wanted in a way that was like no one else but them. men who did it so well that anyone else would look like theives if they tried it, so no one tried it. and now you dont see younger men try it, and you dont see women even think it.

being a gigantic fan of charles bukowski has its plusses and minuses. the plus is he taught us how to keep our voice no matter what the consequence, no matter who rejects us, no matter how poor and ugly and fat and miserable you get.

the minus is he gave us all the hope that success isnt something that can be determined at 20 or 30 or even 40. that your train might not leave the station until youre, dare i say it, old.

but at least your time comes.

and although pablo picasso was never called an asshole

vincent van never got his baby grand.

the pants + shane’s writing project + famous guitarous