MADDEN - 2/3

the niners move on to 11-0 after a bit of controversy. i played the chiefs for the first time two days ago, and they put up a hell of a fight for a 2-8 team. they were actually on the verge of upsetting us when we mounted a comeback late in the fourth quarter and, down 30-22, scored on a 38 yard touchdown pass on THE LAST PLAY OF THE GAME, then with no time on the clock got the 2 point conversion to send it into overtime. the chiefs got the ball first, and our defense stopped them, and then we drove down to midfield, and on first and ten ran a pass play...that was interrupted mid-play by an IM window popping up on my computer. yeah. so the pass was intercepted and ran back for a touchdown by the time i could alt-tab back to the game.

so i faced a bit of a conundrum. what to do to resolve the game in a fair fashion? i had a save point at the beginning of overtime i could roll back to, but then that would be giving the chiefs the ball again and forcing me to stop them before having the chance to win, which i likely (but not certainly) would have done had i not been IM-tercepted. well, before i get all Kafkaesque on this, let's just say i decided in the interest of best preserving the integrity of what might be the niners' first ever perfect season, i would just restart the game entirely. so last night i replayed it. mostly to my benefit.

the niners rolled to victory, 29-10. mostly on account of the fact that the chiefs were pretty much unable to pick up any yards in the first half. then there was the 250 rushing yards gained by the niners, including 160 yards by bowes and a 75 yard touchdown run by me, THE QUARTERBACK.



sparks had three interceptions, which is, i think, more than he had the entire last season. it was largely pretty disgusting. i'm not sure what happened to the chiefs between the first version of the game and the second, but it wasn't flattering to them.

entropy...never came my way...

so, when i was a kid, there was this book...and it was either Madeline L'Engle's "wrinkle in time" or the trilogy of awesome time-traveling dolphin-riding kid-witches books by Diane Duane...that had a character or concept in it called "Entropy". this was my first experience with the word, and the idea of this evil Sauron-type darkness that wanted to destroy everything in the universe made quite an impression.

EDIT: found the book on wiki...here you go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Wizards#The_Powers_That_Be

needless to say, by the time i spent some time studying quantum physics and theoretical mathematics in college, my idea of entropy had changed a bit, but i was still also intrigued with my original idea as well.

ultimately, it's a pretty realistic portrayal. despite your spiritual beliefs, etc., at least on a material level the universe tends towards nothingness...just like there's no way to build a perpetual motion machine, eventually the energy that created us will run out. and since we don't know how everything started, maybe there's a chance it'll start over again, but this run, such as it is, will eventually be over. it's as true on a personal level as it is on a "universe" level. everybody's going to eventually die, and it's nice to think that at least for awhile the memories of individual people will continue on, but ultimately that's not really how things work.

anyway, i'm getting at something. i'm not trying to be depressing because i don't think it IS depressing. if there wasn't that definite end to demarcate when we'll stop being around, combined with the randomness and the possibility of that end coming today or 70 years from now, i for one would honestly find it difficult to have any reason to get up in the morning. why not put off what you can do today if you can always do it tomorrow?

but without getting too far into my paradox-laden and yet perfectly functional belief system, here's my point for the moment. it seems this week the topic du jour (yeah, that's wrong, but i forget the french for "week"...topic du semaine?) is micromanaging one's life/appearance/health, etc. i've been talking to a few people this particular semaine about this, and i just don't get it. i mean, i'll admit at one point in my life i used to treat my health/body/spirituality/social life/etc. the same way i treat my kitchen, in the sense that when one thing's out of place in the kitchen and i feel like cleaning it up, suddenly everything else that's out of order in the house gets cast into sharp relief and i can't stop cleaning until everything is perfect. so many people seem to treat the more metaphysical aspects of their lives this way, but to me it just seems pointless. i mean, ultimately, the endpoint of our lives (at least on earth, depending on what you believe) is to die and turn into dirt. whoo-hoo! i mean, that's pretty humbling. so i guess i just don't get the point in trying to project this image that you're the perfect person, or that you don't have issues, or that you've managed to defeat entropy, because you haven't. and it's just wasting a lot of your time you could be using to actually enjoy the time you have in your own idiosyncratic ways.

sure, i mean, you could look at a heroin user or something and say "well there's a guy/girl who's not concerned about being perfect and look what it's doing to them". but there are extreme examples of any type of behavior, and that's not what i'm talking about here. i'm talking about people who are afraid to admit the fact that there can be darkness and you can still get up every day and do something that matters even if you don't have that darkness completely under control. because you won't ever have it completely under control, at least not until you die, and then it doesn't really do you any good. :)

one of the great qualities of humanity is the ability to carry on as if death isn't staring you right in the face all the time, but forcefully ignoring death just because you live in a culture that allows you to be affluent enough to pretend it doesn't exist is just stupid. so chill the fuck out and hit the streets for some disco and a burger. peace.

TRAVEL JOURNAL - 2/2

here's something new i just started the other day. it's more semi-fiction. i'm not sure where it's going. but there's going to be a tornado involved, so it's gotta be badass.
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The bird, which I had originally mistaken for a tumbleweed, froze at the sight of our rusty blue GMC pickup bearing down on it. It had almost completely crossed the road from right to left, but in a perfect Darwinian moment, it turned and sprinted back in the direction it had come from - back in front of the truck. To this day I still don't know what kind of bird it was: maybe a foot long from head to tail, brown on the back, white on the belly, with a bit of a red crest on its head, chubby looking with spindly legs and wings much too small for its body.

I don't know if it realized it couldn't fly, because it tried. Then it disappeared below the windshield and a split second later there was a sickening thud and a shudder that rattled low in the body of the truck.

I've rear-ended an SUV before, and this was mostly the same sensation. I winced, thinking of possible body damage to the truck in the context of the 20 days of driving we still had left. I felt a bit guilty for the lack of sympathy I had for the bird, but images of trying to find a mechanic in the middle of western kansas that wouldn't charge an arm and a leg to pick parts of the truck's grill out of the drive belt were foremost in my thoughts.

My brother was not nearly as concerned. He leapt up as far out of his seat as his seatbelt would allow, and pumped his fist into the air as high as he could without punching the roof of the truck. "Oh my God!" he yelled rapturously, "you fucking owned him!"

I didn't bother to respond, though it was hard not to crack a smile. I checked the side mirror and signaled right. Nobody was behind us, which wasn't much of a surprise considering the wall of black disaster-movie clouds looming a few miles ahead. I drove the truck onto the dirt shoulder a little too quickly and as a result bounced my head off the roof for the umpteenth time in the last 800 miles.

This was the first time I'd driven a truck through the midwest, and it was much different than, say, the wagon or sedans I'd driven before; there was something about the high center of gravity and the girth of the truck's body that made me want to take ridiculous chances.

We rolled to a stop just as I registered surprise that the car was still working at all, and I dropped the transmission into neutral, slipped the parking brake into place and turned off the engine. It sputtered angrily as it turned off, and I wondered for a moment if I should have left it on, especially with the storm bearing down on us.

The doorframe on the driver's side was slightly warped from a previous owner's traffic interpretation error, and so I gave the door a single well-placed kick and it creaked open on hinges coated in rust and dust from the Badlands. Bypassing the running boards and dropping directly to the dirt, I squinted for a moment in the direction of the sun that was still gamely shining in the face of the oncoming storm and then with a mixture of resignation and frustration, walked around the front of the truck to see how far the bird had managed to kill itself into the engine block.

NEW MUSIC - Susan's 12.29.07 (mp3 format)

Mike and I (mostly Mike) did an impromptu recording of the Susan's show over Christmas break because there were going to be a lot of people who wanted to see who weren't going to be able to make it. So I finally sat down and mixed the whole thing to the point that I'm pretty happy with it, and thought I'd post it up for anybody who might be interested. I have a lossless version too, but I didn't think too many people would prefer the ~500 mb file size...but if you want it, ask, and I'll set something up.

Anyway, this is exciting in that it's the first show I've ever played with other people, and excellent musicians at that. Imagine what they could have done had I given them more than 2 days to learn 28 songs.

Sorry especially to Justin who tore the crap out of the drums and then ended up so low in the recording mix...

Here's the setlist. It's all notated and whatnot (the zipped mp3s you can download include a text file with recording info...I'm a detail freak), so you'll know what's going on. I decided, sort of on my own, to call our band The Ricochets. I think it's appropriate for a lot of reasons and it's also the tentative title of the record I'm working on after I finish the California EP. Also it's the name of a rock band from the 60s, apparently. This might surprise you, but this recording is NOT OF THAT BAND.

Disc 1 (Acoustic Set)
1. Intro (2:36)
2. Angel From Montgomery (John Prine) (3:54)
3. Autumnsong (5:17) *
4. Hey Sue (Do You Miss Me Now?) (3:57)
5. My Winding Wheel (Ryan Adams) (4:16) *%
6. Millie (5:57) *%
7. Back To Ohio (7:18) *#^
8. California Stars (Wilco/Billy Bragg) (4:02) *@
9. Lady Gray (3:14) *#
10. I Still Miss Someone (Johnny Cash) (2:44) #
11. Dusty Roads (4:55) *
12. Friend of the Devil (Grateful Dead) (4:45) *^@

Total Time Disc 1: 52:18

Disc 2 (Electric Set)
1. Intro (1:59)
2. Enemy (5:34)
3. Dreamed I Was God (2:48)
4. Palace (4:18)
5. Not The One I See (4:22)
6. The Melody (4:10)
7. Love Song In D (4:31)
8. Molly (5:20)
9. Sunshine (3:22)
10. Sample In A Jar (Phish) (4:32)
11. Not California (4:16) ^

Total Time Disc 2: 45:08
Total Show Time: 97:26

Band Line-Up:
Ben Bunting - Vocals, Acoustic Guitar (first set), Electric Guitar (second set), Harmonica
Mike Prewett - Backup Vocals, Acoustic Guitar (first set, except where noted), Electric Guitar (second set), Bass Guitar (where noted)
Justin Bunting - Percussion, Hand Drums (first set, where noted), Drum Kit (second set)

* Justin on Hand Drums/Percussion
# Mike on Bass Guitar
% Mike on Electric Guitar
^ Andrea Bussinger on Backup Vocals
@ Andrea Bussinger on Violin

Thanks again to everyone who helped/played/recorded/thought about/donated food to this!
As always, if the links expire, let me know and I'll re-up them.

Acoustic Set mp3s
Electric Set mp3s

Also, apparently I'm capitalizing things today. Weird.

TRAVEL JOURNAL - 2/1

Someone asked me not too long ago what poetry is. I've always written poetry, but it's been heavily influenced by beat poets and British WW2 poetry - so in other words, it's really straightforward, no rhyme scheme (usually), no fancy stylistic distinctions. Then I ran across this quote on my homepage this morning and thought it was appropriate:

"A prose writer gets tired of writing prose, and wants to be a poet. So he begins every line with a capital letter, and keeps on writing prose." -Samuel McChord Crothers

Anybody who reads this that used to go to Brady's in Kent will probably share the same laugh I had when I read it a bit ago. So in honor of Mr. Crothers and Brady's here's some "prosetry" from last spring.
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the night alternates between
hard stillness, blank quiet
and laughter: soft, warm, maybe a little drunk.

dirt rubbed into hands, knees, shoes
and now my face as i absentmindedly scratch my chin

some joke, some history
of some railroad.

this one time, in high school
you remember, what was that dude's name?
he was a tool, but his sister
oh, shit. that's right. that dude.

it's getting cold. to the point that it's hard to ignore.
trudging around on the hillside isn't much fun.
there're trees but
they're boxed in by barbed wire
a weird thing to cordon off, trees.

ground's too cold to sit
feet too cold to crouch
snow's too cold to stand

contemplative silence, like a blanket
over all of us at once.

for a moment, we're anywhere
next to the CSX line in ravenna, 2007
next to the CSX line in akron, 2005
the hill next to the reservoir, somewhere, 1999
western russia, 1952

silence is cut
circumstance is located in time and space
the whistle slices the air
breaks the calm

suddenly the air is palpitating
the ground vibrating
unsubstantiated muck is defined
by a single ghost light
pushing through

there's no violence
just nothing becoming something

we scramble for cover
wedge into the frozen earth
excitement working like a space heater
breathing vapor

murk transforming
into liquid light
dancing

the sound and light
simultaneously crescendo
the wall of air hammers by
then still

cars pulled behind the engine rattle along
squeaking, snarling, whining
sound is harsh, but now unlike
the violence of that first, breaking moment

grins on all faces
then the last car rumbles by
red light flashing
signals the tail of the comet

night covers light
silence covers sound
cold covers heat
we settle in to wait.