Why Don't We Go...?

It's a sad sappy sentiment swathed by a sweetly sincere melody. It's a song that is beloved by English dandies updating their playlists and American teengirls getting over something big. It's not a song that should be played at weddings (too insular, too apocalyptic). It is my favorite pop song of the decade ("pop" defined as "popular" - something played on the radio and at The Gap, something performed on American Idol). It's Somewhere Only We Know by Keane.

I'm breaking tradition by not embedding a video link. You've heard it and if you haven't you will eventually. I, for example, never heard it until 2006, two years after its release. (I have however heard every "official" song ever recorded by American Music Club, Prefab Sprout, Lock Up Your Daughters, Customer Parking Only, and Ween). I want to talk about the immediately familiar sentiment of longing for something meaningful - hoping for the future by recalling a place from the past:

Oh, simple thing, where have you gone?
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on

So he contacts someone from way back and says hey let's go back to that one spot we both love:

Why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?

It should be noted that these guys wrote/performed this song when they were in their late twenties. So if that guy with the mop-head hair and youthful howl was "getting old" back in '04, then I've already got old. But you know that just means I have more places that I know.

Today I was in a Trader Joe's in Orange, California. I had only been in that location twice before, with one person in particular. This afternoon I was there with someone else - my mother. And as we drove down Tustin Street (or is it Tustin Avenue? - they keep changing it), Mom pointed out the places that were there in 1985 when we used to come to Orange to visit the cousins and the aunt. She noticed the Bank of America and the Stater Bros. store and Toyota of Orange. I recognized a different batch of places - from 2007 mostly: Cherry On Top frozen yogurt, Pomodoro, the signs pointing to "Old Towne" (why does 'town' get an extra 'e' and old gets squat?), and the little claustrophobic Italian place where I was exceedingly happy one night.

And there are other somewheres, with other people (for more detail, click on the archives and have at my life story.) It could be a numbered noodle place or an apartment with a blocked view of dark hills. It could be a log cabin visited on Highway 61. Or that stretch of Route 611 where Jim insisted he be placed in the trunk before we drove another inch (we were 18, he liked a girl and wanted to be near her.) Or Lisa's Pizza in Westwood (NJ) or Abbot's Pizza in Santa Monica. Or pizza everywhere because I like it (no - I love it!)

And it's mostly "simple things" that I long for - peace of mind, ease of sleep, love of life, life in love, pizza, basketball, 700+ page novels, etc. They haven't gone anywhere. People and cats come nd go, live and die. Longings keep breathing, their pulse accelerated by how many there are and how few are honored. I vow to help everyone important in my life go to those places they/we only know. If you'll do the same for me.

And now I'd be breaking with new tradition by changing my mind and emdedding the video if those fops from Keane allowed it. Nope. Here's a link instead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EmrS4TfRc0&feature=channel

I will never write about this song again. But I will hear it, feel it, like it.

(Do Not Lean on the Door)

I used to make mix tapes. For myself, for my friends, for the unrequited and the twice ignored. I kept most of them. None were quite right to give away. Some were too perfect to let go.

Then I made mix CDs. I could spend paragraphs dissecting the differences between making mix tapes and CDs - that the torturous task of sequencing and editing tapes made it a more difficult and thus more romantic task, that the ease of click-and-drag and cut-and-paste involved in mix CD creation made it a cheap-and-easy leisure time filler. No - same end result (songs selected and sequenced to impress) with different technologies. It's not about the format. It's all about the songs and what they convey.

And now it's even easier. Just a playlist and a flash drive and everyone I've always wanted to say to you and you and you is said. I don't have to limit it to 90 minutes or 77... 80 or 60. You and you and you can change the sequencing, delete the Ween song, reorder to make it easier to fall asleep at the end. You and you and you (and maybe you) can Google the lyrics and ask me why I put that one after this one.

And what about that sad sad song that sounds so beautiful? (No)

No? But that's all I like. (Okay then. But not that one)

And I know. I've heard the rules before. I wrote the rules: No Steely Dan. No Leonard Cohen. No Bonnie "Prince" Billy. They all work best alone.

I always break one rule.

And why would anyone begin with a song about a funeral and end with one about the birth. Okay I moved things around. Need to go pick up my car. Bye.

Break the Silence

Wow, people do read this thing. I guess I need to write more often.

But... what could I write about?

My excitement about getting to watch two important competitive basketball games tonight? Yeah they'll be good.

My anticipation for the new Grizzly Bear album being released in two weeks? Okay but I can't exactly elaborate on that, can I?

My frustration with the size and placement of the closet in my new apartment and how this problem does not seem solvable.

I could fill up some space with a picture of a cat that I'm taking care of (temporarily but it could take a while which is cool because Ringo - you're awesome):













Or I could write about my intense relief that after the LBPD pulled me over on Sunday for an "unsafe lane change" on 7th Street, there was another crime somewhere else in Long Beach that required the officer speaking to me to run like hell to his patrol car and for both officers to speed away in a misty coastal blur BEFORE they even started writing the ticket? I guess I just did tell that whole story so there's not much I could add. I could add that the officer, as he was running away, yelled out "slow down, drive safely!" Or I could point out that they were wrong; the lane change was completely safe and I did signal my turn.

Or I could discuss how my life and the world around me are eerily and beautifully reminiscent of 1989? With some subtle differences I should add.

Have a good evening everyone.

5 songs on 5/5

I should end with the circle being complete but I will begin with it instead:




Which shouldn't but does lead to this:




So today is the fifth of May:




And some leaked Grizzly Bear:




And I end how I began - lifelong-idol-covering-lifelong-idol - and it's back to work:

The 8 Regions of the Greater Los Angeles Metropolitan Area, All of Which I've Lived In: Part One - Orange County

On the night of April 17, 2009, I slept in my new Long Beach, California apartment for the very first time. As an official resident of the LBC, I now could now claim to have lived in every one of the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area's "regions." This allows me to accurately address the unique qualities of each region, as well as the differences between them.

One could argue with boundaries and just exactly how far the metro area spreads. For example, I included Orange County as a separate area but lump the Santa Clarita Valley in with the San Fernando Valley. I decided that I covered the entire Inland Empire by spending seven months in Pomona, ignoring the fact that other IE towns like Fontana and Riverside and Temecula couldn't be more different. I arbitrarily put Long Beach in the South Bay (I say it fits geographically no matter what others may believe.) But at this point in my life I can confidently say that I will never NEVER live in Valencia or Rancho Cucamonga or Hawthorne and this as fine of a distinction as you're going to get. So....

The 8 Regions of the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area, All of Which I've Lived In:

1. Orange County
2. Inland Empire
3. San Gabriel Valley
4. Ventura County
5. San Fernando Valley
6. The Westside of Los Angeles
7. The "East"side of Los Angeles
8. Long Beach/South Bay

(note: due to the unexpected massive word length of the Orange County entry below and the fact that I've had trouble coming up with interesting blog post topics lately, I've made an editiorial change. Instead of discussing all 8 regions at once, I'm making this an 8-part series. You will keep coming back every day, hoping - praying - that I'm finally getting to the weird cooked meat obsessions and civic sadness that clouded my too-many-months in Ventura County. You will then see that I did not update the blog because I likely wasted my day playing a 10-round Scramble game on Facebook with my cousin Ameer. You will try again later that night or the following day. You will continue to wait; the cycle will repeat.)

1. Orange County (1988-1990)

In August of 1988 I packed a Hyundai full of clothes and toiletries and set out from Minnesota to California. I said goodbye to Gopherland, knowing that I would really miss the place but would never be returning. After all, no one ever goes back. I was wrong. I've gone back two times and a third isn't out of the question (it could happen next month; it could happen in 2030.) Yes, I've gone home again twice.

After a few transitional weeks in my aunt and cousins' home in Anaheim (Hills), I moved into an apartment on Date Street in Brea, a town that borders Fullerton. The previous spring decided that Cal. State Fullerton would be the place where I would continue my higher education. I can't remember how I made this exceedingly arbitrary decision but I truly enjoyed my two years in the place and learned a lot about life, love, and empirical methodology.

But this isn't supposed to be my life story. This is supposed to be a comparison of the places I've lived. I'll just tackle Brea and the northern country area and I'll be succinct: Brea was (is?) awesome. Brea could be summed up by what happened on the night of October 30, 1988. My friend and roommate John and I had gone to see one of our idols - Leonard Cohen - perform at the Wiltern Theatre in Los Angeles. I still consider it one of the best concerts I've ever attended. We drove home from L.A., dutifully taking the 60 to the 57 to the Imperial Highway exit. Instead of taking a left on Imperial, we decided to drive straight into the shopping center that housed the only restaurant still open in Brea: Denny's.

(A few weeks later, we would learn of the existence of Herschel's in nearby Fullerton, the far cooler and tastier 24-hour alternative until they turned it into a f-ing Spoons. (For those of you not familiar with Orange County food culture in the mid-late 80s, Spoons was Chili's before Chili's was Chili's. Eventually Spoons became the RC Cola to Chili's Coca Cola (Applebees is the Pepsi of course.)))

We took a booth near the front of Denny's. Although I had moved to California in August, John had just arrived the night before. I'm sure it was a dizzying dazzling first 24 hours - arrive at the airport, sleep in his very own bedroom in La Casa Brea (the actual name of the apartment building; it means The House of Tar in Spanish), visit the mustard fields of his short-term childhood home in Claremont, see Leonard Cohen on his banana-T-shirted I'm the Man tour, and eat at Denny's. That would be enough for anyone. But so much more happened.

I can't remember what John and I were discussing in our booth (my memory is 70% sure that we were talking about either David Bowie's career arc or whether A Fish Called Wanda was actually funny.) Whatever it was, it fascinated the two gentlemen in the adjoining booth. They joined our conversation. We discussed our recent relocations to Brea. They welcomed us. We talked about books and museums and (still can't figure out why) Love and Rockets. They became our friends and remain so to this day, despite the lack of contact between '91 and '07. These days I see Matt and Jim come up on my Facebook page with welcome frequency. Plus, the meeting at Denny's led us to meeting Katinka and Haley. I met 8% of my Facebook friends because John and I were hungry and Matt and Jim were nice.

The thing about Brea and northern Orange County in general is that it went against the stereotype of Southern California and, in particular, Orange County being a region of "the self-satisfied materialistic children of entitlement." These were the actual words of someone I went on a bad first date with in Minneapolis. Sure, that "element" existed all over the county (as it exists in the outer suburbs that ring the inner suburbs that ring Minneapolis and most major American cities.

But there was also a subculture of smart subversive savvy kids and young adults who went about operating their meticulous network of good record stores, strange restaurants, and tiny comic book stores. You'd have to go out of the way sometimes to find these places, sometimes to the grimier parts of Anaheim or the shinier parts of Garden Grove. Many of the houses in Fullerton and Brea were built when the ex-hippie baby boomers were buying property and settling in the great Valhalla between the mountains and the sea. So, by 1988, the children of these hippies were hanging out in Denny's and bridging the gap between the West Coast and the Midwest.

(Before I removed it, the previous sentence included a rather strained metaphor invoking the following: 1) the Walshes of Beverly Hills 90210; and 2) the skillful scaling of the barrier presented by the Rocky Mountains, conveniently located halfway between the West Coast and Midwest. You'll thank me for making that edit. Oh and because it's al ittle hard to see I'll just explain the picture alongside the preceding paragraph - it's a Deadhead sticker. On a Cadillac.)

If I had to rank the eight greater L.A. places in terms of where I'd live again, Brea would be in the Top 2, just behind Santa Monica. Long Beach would be recused from being placed on the list. Too soon. I'll close with 5 memories of the time I spent living in Brea:

1. After learning that Matt was performing as Santa Claus at the claustrophobically-designed Brea Mall, John and I went to go pay him a visit. He was wearing a full Santa outfit, with realiztic white beard and added padding. But to me he looked nothing like Santa. He looked like Matt.

2. Also at the Brea Mall: One Saturday afternoon, Katinka learned that boyfriend John and ex-boyfriend(?) Matt would both be unable to accompany her as she went bikini shopping. She asked me to join her. Seeing my close friend's beloved girlfriend in eight different swimsuits in the fitting room sections of three different stores was an odd experience. Today it wouldn't phase me at all. Today I can move mountains and dismantle IKEA bed frames and Google-map directions to Whole Foods stores to people 1200 miles away while I analyze survey data. But then I was a shy kid who likely overstated the importance of being chosen for the bikini shopping duty. I didn't know what to say - they ALL looked good.

3. Before John and the rest of them began to define the town, it was my childhood friend Patrick who was present in the very early days of my move. Patrick was visiting me from New Jersey. I had to go to school most days and I was using my car. So Patrick kept busy walking around the busy retail zone near my apartment. He struck up an unlikely friendship with a clerk at Tower Records named Philthy Rich (not to be confused with the hip-hop record label formed two decades later). Philthy looked like a cross between Quiet Riot's (late) lead singer and Andrew Dice Clay. Philthy was an imposing and sullen figure who performed in a local metal band, the name of which is un-Googleable. Some days later, Patrick returned to New Jersey and Philthy was never seen again in Tower Records.

4. Speaking of Andrew Dice Clay, one of my favorite memories of the last few months of my Brea tenure was seeing Dice's movie The Adventures of Ford Fairlane at the Brea Marketplace theater. By the summer of 1990 John had moved to Ohio, Jim was in an unknown location, Katinka was in seclusion (pregnant and kaleidoscoping), and Haley was all alone up there in the 909. Matt and I were all that was left of our golden town. Now, Andrew Dice Clay would be the last person in the world you'd expect to star in the only movie Matt and I ever saw together without John around as our sidecick. But that's the movie we picked and I can't remember Matt's opinion but I thoroughly enjoyed the film's indie cred and quirk charm.

5. The final day in Brea: late July 1990. John has flown back to say his goodbyes and to help me drive the rental truck back to Minneapolis. Yeah, I was homesick for lakes and freaking Trip Shakespeare. After loading the truck with all of my possessions, I had an errand to run. I was giving away some of my furniture and Matt had expressed an interest in my desk. So one sunny morning, as I was driving down Lambert Road approaching Brea Canyon Road I heard strange noises. A woman illegally passed me (using the oncoming traffic lanes!) to get my attention. I rolled down my window. She said "Everything is falling out of the truck." Fuck. Damn. Wow. For a block down Lambert Road, we saw it: boxes (closed and open), furniture (broken and intact), unpacked miscellany (an icebox, an overused down comforter, stray cassettes). The desk Matt Really wanted was in pieces. I think I might have just left it there. It was too hot. It was too much to handle. Luckily, that wouldn't be my final memory of Brea. A few good things happened years later.

One Night in Hinckley

(Sunday morning)
I left my umbrella in the suitcase. I left the suitcase in the guest room. I'm in rainy Minneapolis, in the same place I wrote from yesterday. I'm staring at a steady downpour, feeling lucky that I'm parked just a half a block away, on the corner of University and SE 14th.

So the question remains: do I belong here or there or somewhere completely new? There is rain everywhere and forgotten umbrellas in most interiors. I moved to Long Beach nine days ago and I still can't picture the apartment. Although I do see glow-in-the-dark cat eyes under furniture and I still hear the distant race cars going faster than I ever could dream. I, on the other hand, will slow down and walk the ill-numbered streets (should there really be six blocks between 1st Street and 4th Street?)

(Saturday night)
The wedding reception was a subdued affair. Given the legends I had heard about the groom's family gatherings and the bride's hometown, I had expected wild singalongs, drunken jigs, and long rambling toasts involving sailors, amplifiers, rural Minnesota outlaws, rogue cable guys, and the darker side of the sub-Hollywood elite. Instead, it was oddly (bot not wrongly) quiet for a wedding - almost regal without being too formal.

Sure, I could have danced to more than one song and maybe I could have told that inappropriate story involving guitars, women, and the Afghan Whigs. But I had other myths on my mind. I am forward thinking in my legends. What is most important is that the bride and groom love each other (yes), their families and friends are happy for them (yes, yes), and someone had the guts to request Jack and Diane (yes because what's more appropriate at a wedding than the words "Life goes on. Long after the thrill of living is gone"?*)

The ceremony itself - held at a fur trading post - was a nice one. I choked up at one point. A woman with a beautiful voice was singing a bible-adapted Daniel Johnston song as a harpist played a completely different song. The woman with the voice was looking at the bride and groom. The harpist was looking at the harp. The voice and the words it was singing won out over the harpist and her biblical lilting. The singer's song built and built and repeated its first words ("love is patient and kind") and its final words ("love never ends.") Somewhere in Texas, Daniel Johnston himself raised a Mountain Dew toast and grinned widely. In front of him, a black pen rested on a drugstore notebook scrawled with words better than these.


At one point in the evening, my ex-girlfriend and ex-wife were seated to the right of me discussing the killing of a Nazi with a lead pipe. To the right of them, my ex-wife's new boyfriend was urging the groom's best friend (a 40-year old gay virgin with a carpeted bathroom and a frequently updated LinkedIn profile) to do shots with him later. Meanwhile, I was talking about public transportation options in Chicago and Los Angeles with a librarian that Mike probably should have introduced me to sooner.

And then they took our dinner plates away. And then they brought dessert. And then I remembered California and the cats and the problems and the ocean. The small world got too big. Dessert and coffee and more table conversations passed. I went to the bathroom to stare at the mirror and consider all of the circumstances in my life. The groom's family's monsignor was in there combing his hair. He said to me "What a night." I smiled and nodded and washed my hands.

(Sunday morning)
And now I sit in the half-booth in the corner. I notice that the rain has slowed down. I have three people to call, to talk about possible lunch and dinner plans. No, make that four. I want to see them all before I fly back tomorrow morning. I might pull it off. There's a young couple seated next to me. They're doing the Sunday crossword puzzle together. I'm so happy for them.





(scrolldown afterword)
The young couple gave up on the crossword puzzle and are trying Sudoko instead. I'm less happy for them.

End of the Century

I'm in Minneapolis today. I'm in town for my friend Mike's wedding and the related Gaintoberfests that will be occurring. I'm in the Espresso Royale coffeehouse in Dinkytown (same table, in the back, by the mirror). They're playing the Ramones a I remember being here the day Joey Ramone died in 2001. All day long they played the Ramones box set. It was a sunny day and I was in the middle of my tenure at the University of Minnesota. Despite my sadness over the death of one the greatest rock singers ever, I remember feeling inspired and connected to the universe around me. Yeah it sounds corny but it happened. I had to teach a class that day and both before and after class, I came in here for coffee.

The last song I heard before I left for class and the first song I heard when I got back was Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio? I loved that song. I loved it not for its nostalgia for a better time for radio (the year the song was released - 1980 - was actually the peak year for radio, not the late 50s/early 60s period the song celebrates). I loved that song for the aggressive guitars and complex song structure, Joey's perfect vocals, and the stellar production by murderer Phil Spector (listen to the Spector-produced album End of the Century - a lot of Ramones fans hate it and Phil did pull a gun on the band a few times during production but its Spector's masterpiece.) Oh and I loved it for one of the best couplets ever (written by Joey):

It's the end, the end of the seventies
It's the end, the end of the century

Logically, it doesn't make sense. In every other way, it explains everything.



(Have a good wedding Mike. I'll be in the back thinking about which, if any, story to tell during toast time - should it be the one about the homeless guy at In-and-Out Burger? Or the one about the lost weekend in Vegas? Or how we cowrote the greatest unfilmed screenplay ever?)

I'm finished with my latte. My parking meter will expire soon. Better go.

Yes, I Lied

I said I'd be back Monday. It's Thursday. What can I say? I currently have two apartments and 1.25 jobs and - for a time period that could last anywhere from a few weeks to several months - two cats (with two separate eating arrangements and litter boxes). I have a wedding to attend this weekend 2000+ miles away. I just spilled coffee on my pants. And - in an event that will never be duplicated by anyone, ever - while driving home from work yesterday, I spilled orange-mango into my eyes. And I was wearing sunglasses at the time.

So you're wondering how I'm adjusting to my still-in-progress move? It's going okay. Still need to clean the old place. No, you're wondering how I can spill orange-mango juice into my sunglasses-covered eyes while driving. This is how it happened:

(all times are estimates)

3:17pm: I'm at work. I go to the market in the temporary campus dining tent. I purchase a Diet Dr. Pepper (for late afternoon energy) and a Fuze Vitalize Orange Mango Drink, along with a Kashi Go-Lean Bar. It's important to note that despite my use of the word "juice" in the first two paragraphs, the Fuze beverage is actually a "drink." This fact is vital to the story.

4:42pm: I leave work 18 minutes early, justifying this behavior by noting (to myself) that my lunch break lasted only 20 minutes. By this point, I had consumed the Diet Dr. Pepper and Kashi bar. I decide to take the unopened Fuze drink with me for the drive home.

5:07pm: I'm on the 110 freeway heading south, going home. I never envisioned that my life circumstances would lead me to be on the 110 south going home but there I was. I'm thirsty. The orange mango drink is sitting there on the passenger seat. I grab it. I unscrew the cap.

5:08pm: My cellphone vibrates in its resting place in the left cup holder. I put the bottle in the right cup holder. I grab the phone and look at who's calling. I decline the call (it wasn't you.) I put the phone back in the cup holder.

5:11pm: I remember that I'm thirsty. I grab the Fuze bottle. Despite the fact that this is a processed drink (not juice), I decide that I need to shake the bottle (like when I get that Minute Maid Pineapple-Orange juice and have to shake it so the flavors blend and the bottom of the drink isn't too sugary. You may have noticed that earlier I had unscrewed the cap. When the phone rang, I only partially screwed the cap back on. When I shake the bottle vigorously while driving at a speed of 70mph, a good 6 ounces of orange mango drink flies out of the bottle and towards my face. Most of it hit my sunglasses and the area above my right eye but enough of it ended up spilling into both eyes.

Even if you've never experienced a citrus-rich liquid entering your eyes, you can imagine that it might be unpleasant. It was. My left eye recovered quickly enough to see a moment later. My right eye took a few minutes to be fully healed from the acidic sugary invasion.

That's my story. That's all that's happened to me recently.

This blog will be back on Monday - bigger, better, blueprintbluer

Stars of Track and Field

Thanks to the randomness of the iPod shuffler, I had the experience this morning of hearing Belle and Sebastian's The Stars of Track and Field while walking past the actual track stadium my employer university.

(Note - the fact that this seeming synchronicity occurred does not mean that the shuffler is non-random or that the iPod has a "mind"; sometimes random things are meaningful in non-random ways. If it really had a mind, then why did it recently play Lynyrd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama before Neil Young's Southern Man, rather than after, Sweet Home being the answer song and all?)

I was struck by how perfect and inspirational The Stars of Track and Field is. It was the first Belle and Sebastian song I ever heard and it was the likely cause of me hearing and owning every other song they've (legitimately) released.

There are four verses in the song and each verse's opening line is so good that what follows has to work hard to equal it.

Verse 1 opening line - Make a new cult every day to suit your affairs
(about as meaningful as ten words could ever be)

Verse 2 opening line - Have you and her been taking pictures of your obsessions?
(hammers home the sexual/visual themes/ambiguities)

Verse 3 opening line - Could I write a piece about you now that you've made it?
(you already have; you're singing it... but to ask permission is pretty bad-ass)

Verse 4 opening line - Could I write a requiem for you when youre dead?
(don't let what I just said get to your head; is this the requiem or is that another song; maybe the most poignant line ever written)

And in between is the wonderfully melodic / artfully simplistic chorus:
The stars of track and field, you are
The stars of track and field, you are
The stars of track and field, you are
Beautiful people

From third person to second, it's enigmatic enough to inform and puzzle the listener at the same time. And tuneful enough to sing along all day after hearing it first thing in the morning.

When I walked past the track stadium this morning in the just-past-sunrise Los Angeles (non-fog) half-mist, the people running in the six-laned oval or stretching in the grassy middle were not the stars of track and field. The stars show up around mid-day with their pole vaults and aerodynamic shoes that weigh less than zero. These were the university employees getting a round of exercise in before their 7 1/2 hour work day. I recognized one of them - she's on one of the many many many committees I have found myself a part of over these past few years. She runs all the time. If she's not running, she's walking. She's painfully skinny which i could criticize her for but she's the one running, not me. I'm the one who fills out half-marathon registration forms and then changes my mind about hitting "submit" because I just don't know if I'll be ready by November. I could easily be ready by November if I work hard enough and get up 30 minutes earlier.