the end of the world as we know it

Other than the fact that the newest in a long line of retread-pixar-esque animated films is about the life of bacteria in a bathroom, (oscar time people), there is a new sign of the apocolypse upon us. Bob Barker is retiring at the ripe old age of 83 from hosting "The Price is Right."

Say what you will about Bob. Joke about his age, his cameo in "Happy Gilmore", the sexual misconduct, what have you, but never, and i mean never put down the "Price is Right," and the part he played on it. It is the greatest game show ever and he, in turn the greatest host.

I have watched Bob do his thing since my early days, and his, when he had dark hair. Then after I was forced to be educated and sent to elementary school, i was seperated from the show, but still longed for the summers when I would stop what I was doing at 11 am and watch the pricing games, playing along, honing my skills, becasuse one day, you never know, I could end up on the show. Through junior high and high school caught glimpses when I could. When I was hospitalized and recovering from Luekemia and chemotherapy "The Price is Right" was part of the morning triumphirate that included "Fantasy Island" at 9am, "The Love Boat" at 10 (I've seen every episode, even the lame reunion movies and can sometimes be heard singing the theme song made eternal by jack Jones, however, my spoken word version is wuite good) and the "The Price is Right" at 11. In college I scheduled classes, newspaper business and Spades tournaments around it. At the US Open it became a fixture, once the TVs were installed, even putting a halt to hacky-sack and balle. It is an old friend, Bob Barker included, comforting, entertaining and yes, even intellectually stimulating (on several occasions I have guessed with $100 of a showcase, thereby winning both). I actually wrote a scene for a screenplay I have worked on and off for 10 years that took place during a taping of the show. All that will be over in June, when Bob hangs up his mic for good.

So I have until then to make my way to Television City and make my way to the "Price is Right" studio and make my bid, literally, i've always thought of it as one of those things i wanted to get to before it was too late. Well, time's a wastin'. If things go the way they should with the chairman's work, and i can find my way out of purgatory I will sandwhich that stop between 'Zona to see the boy and the pacific coast highway. But until then, here's to you Bob, a job well done.

mofo

E.A.A.—Trick or Treat motherfuckers!

...on hygiene class

ok kids. we're going to learn about proper hygiene. you see it's really really important to keep yourself well clean and groomed for when you go out in public. it comes in handy when you're trying to pick up the ladies and you don't smell like 3 day old cheese. it comes in handy when you get to the deal closing phase with a woman and you don't have say....scabies. so you should keep yourself clean and well groomed (and scabie free) but you should do all of that at home. not on the e-train.

so i have to tell you guy next to me, clipping your nails on the train is BY FAR one of the grossest things the public has to endure on their commute. i mean i think it's really great that you put the good nylon stocking cap on today so, that you can hang with your homies after that big job interview but, clipping your nails in public, let alone on the train is kind of disgusting. let's not forget your expert disposal of your clippings on the floor. yeah, i know the train is already dirty and all and, oh yeah, "fuck tha po-lice" and all that good stuff but, maybe you should have done that this morning before you got on the train.

—the bastard

P.S. ummmm, lady across from me with the bad contact lenses that make your brown eyes look all silk screen colored, with deer season approaching, unless you plan on walking through a pink forest, there's no need for pink camouflage. it's no trouble at all. you can thank me later.

video killed the radio star

Here it is—bam— the ol' motherfucker writing his first entry on the new digs, the brand new 13" macbook. It is technically the first computer I've ever owned.

I was introduced to Macs via St. John's Universtiy's The TORCH, the official student newspaper of SJU, of which I was a writer, a sports editor and managing editor, although I was basically the editor in chief since JB spent most of his time acting more as a figurehead and left me to deal with the Dylans (loved the guy but he just never could lay out his own news section) and the Schads (Joe Schad, if you watch ESPN is a contirbuter to the networks college football coverage, an insider if you will, and yes, i taught him everything he knows, and I reguarly embarassed him in front of his woman on the basketball courts on Utopia Pkwy and 73rd ave.) of the world at 5 am. The bastard (aka my brother, the bastard) let me use his for writing and email at his apartment until the nice lady and him bought one for my parents which continues to reside in the QV mo headquarters to this day. Since I've been in purgatory I've been forced to work on a windows computer, which you know is correctly represented in the latest Apple comercials with the dude from "Dodgeball."

After calling the Chairman a couple of weeks back to see if it was ok to talk to his mother, (she divorced Uncle Drew, the Chairman's dad and my Godfather), he offered the opportunity to do some copy writing for his clients, what the bastard (aka you would know the bastard if you saw him) "devils work", and i accepted, so through the bastard I'm on the chairman's payroll.

—I don't consider it the devil's work cause i don't believe in the devil. I say I'm working for the man, and if you want my feelings on that, watch the last 10 minutes of SLC Punk, there's a pretty good explanation for my actions, cause I don't have time to get into my Thomas Jefferson—fight the power spiel.—

Anyway, while in the NY for EKG's and fire, I bought this laptop, Bunx, named after the immortal words of the Thrilla. I just didn't realize how much of a hastle it would be to get my shit together with this computer. I'm not the most savvy computer guy, I can rock Quark and micro-word, and a little photo shop, but trying to get used to being the guy who has to actually take care of said machine has been trying. I mean yeah, one year warranty and my brother can help with diagnostic problems but god damn it i dropped $150 on a bluetooth phone in order to link it to bunx so I could have internet access anywhere I could get a phone signal which is basically everywhere except for the bathroom on Bowman's beach on Sanibel Island (it did work in Waves, NC (Hatteras Island) staring at the Atlantic Ocean) and it can't be tethered to my machine for that purpose, at least not in normal means. The geek who had sold me the phone the night before as well as unlimited internet access and the cutie tried in vain to get it to work, but the more they tried the more futile the mission seemed. I went home and called Apple to see what they could do, and i was told that "Apple does not support what your trying to do." I almost thought Jobs and a crew of stoned out Michael Douglas look-a-likes from "Falling Down" were going to bust down my door, take bunx away and bury me 20 feet underground in a dungeon outside of Sacramento. At this point already frustrated from the failure, the amount of money I laid out for bunx and the phone and the added stress that comes with paying bills by the end of the month with three lost days of pay (my trip to NY did not come with sick or personal days and save my whole one week of vacation for my drive for Christmas) I get a call from the bastard (aka the bastard with the bad timing) who proceeds to bring my ire to the boiling point.

—It's not his fault, completely, you have to apreciate the history between him and I. Truth is, he can yammer on about anything, forever, that's just one of his super powers, whatever, I'm more of a short and sweet conversationalist, especially at times like this.—

After exploding for five minutes I found space in my rattled skull for some clarity, and decided to pay for a month of hot spot use from T-Mobile and made my way to the Cingular Store to tell the cutie and geek (who were both helpful and valiant in there efforts to tether my phone to bunx) about my dealings with Apple and to cancel my internet deal with cingular. The cutie told me she meets with a group that discusses things of this nature and she would get back to me after doing some research on the subject. So indeed, cooler heads prevailed and this mofo may have the hook up with a cute nerd, the mofo has never had one of those. She told me my computer scares her, is that a come-on?

Well so went my first foray into what the bastard calls 21 first century computing. Fuck it, gimme' an abacus.

mofo

EAA (Extra Added Attraction): Yes, that is a New York Post, and yes, man is still biting off wife's nose. It's a 25 year-old inside joke—you dont' have to get it.

tower of babel

Attention Tower Customers, Tower Records will be closing in 15 minutes, please take all of your final purchases to the cd register and pay for them there, we will be open at 9:00 for all your shopping needs, once again Tower records will be closing in 15 minutes, please take all your final purchases up to the cd register and pay for them there. Thank you...and have a good night.

So I come back to New York for the weekend for my obligatory Dr's appointment and a camping trip the old boys, (forever wild bee-otches), only to find out that tower records is closing it's doors in a mere matter of weeks. Why does this matter, because I spent 6 of the finest years of my life inside the walls of one said store located on Old Country Rd in Carle Place. The rise and fall of Nirvana, the macarena, the relevance and irrelevance of Lollapolooza, the death of Tupac and Biggie—anything that was happenening musically between December 12, 1991 and December 30, 1997 had some sort of effect on me.
But the music was only a bit part in the saga that was Tower Records. For six years that place was my life. My work was there, my friends were there, tons of free music, (free for me, not so free for everyone else). I met great people there, people I don'tnecessarilyy see very often but when i do there is a bond above others.



Attention Tower customers, Tower Records will be closing in 10 minutes, TEN MINUTES Tower Records will be closing. Please take all of your final purchases to the cd register and pay for them there. We will be open at 9 am for all you shopping needs. For the benefit of the hearing impaired I will repeat the last announcement in sign language...

Of course it sounds cheesy, It was a record store. But in those days, Tower Records, as a chain, was abehemothh. It crushed every record store known to man. The Wiz moved next door and sold record up to $3 cheaper and still went under like Joe Namath's career. It was a business that didn't act like a business. No dress code, we played whatever we wanted (explicit and all) over one of the greatest sound systems known to man, and the employees came from all walks, deadheads, hip-hoppers, goth's, kiss army, US Army, mental institutions,whatt have you, it was represented by the staff. People would come to Tower just to hang out, cause it was the place to be.

Many a time there I would be holding court outside the doors smoking a cigarette. I spent a lot of time out there generally hanging out and learning about life. You see there is a lot to learn about people in the parking lot of strip mall located between one of the richest parts of Long Island and one of it's poorest. Mix those people together and it makes for quite a show.Sometimess I considered my time out there more of a social experiment than just me sitting out there smoking a cigarette and not tending to the duties I was paid for by MTS Incorporated.



Attention Tower Customers, Tower Records will be closing in five minutes, FIVE MINUTES Tower Records will be closing. Stop what you are doing this instant, do not pass go, do not collect $200 and proceed to the cd register immediately, and pay for final purchases there. We will be open at 9:00 for all of your shopping needs. Thank you...and have a good night.

Another place I spent a lot of time is the pic above. It's a point of view shot. By standing there apersonn put him or herself in a perfectblindsidet from registers, and from security cameras. Did I steal from Tower Records? GreatSpaceghostt, no! Did I liberate? Just call me Che. You see one evening I was reading a music magazine, the exact one I don't recall, I believe it was around 1993, about a year and a half into my tenure there. It was an article about Kurt Cobain, Nirvana, and how they made a lot of money for the record selling industry. Kurt, explained that he used to work for Tower Records, and this and that and it sucked because they only paid $5 an hour (like we were every worth more than that). The magazine called out Tower Records for this but to it's credit actually reached out to the head man Russ Soloman for comment. Russ, in his infinite wisdom and probably right after snorting a line of coke off an 18 year old girls ass while wearing nothing but those ridiculous looking cowboy bootsasided, and i paraphrase, that the reason the pay rate was left so low was because he felt there was a large number of his workforce, (at the time there had to be over 50 stores nationwide and a couple here and there overseas) if not all of them were stealing. Really. Stealing. Well, let's just say I got up from the lounge table and a legend was born. And since the legend doesn't know statute of limitations on such matters, this is where this part of the story ends.

Point is an important part of my life was lived within those walls, I can't go into all of the stories, maybe one day I'll finish the script, (I'm about 3/4 through give or take). There are so many stories, so many people, so many things about that time I can't really put into words. For a time it was my home. So i walked in there Thursday afternoon and said my goodbye. Maybe it will still be open when i make my way up at Christmas. Maybe I'll take one more trip behind that blind spot. We'll see.

Attention Tower customers, Tower Records is now closed...GET OUT, GET OUT, ALL I HEAR IS GET OUT!!...We will be open tomorrow morningg a nine o'clock for all your shopping needs. Once again Tower Record is closed do us all a favor and leave immediately...Thank you... and have a good night.

mofo

i don't know if the bastard has ever told you this but...

...i loves the smell of a man who smells like whiskey in the morning. oh yeah, when i gets on that morning train, there's nothing the bastard likes better than standing next to a guy who spent the last 15 to 20 years of his life having whiskey for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. it gets into your pores and when you break a sweat, you smell like a cross between a bottle of glenlivet that has been left out in the sun and like you've been bathing in a bathtub full of nighttrain. i tell you it TURNS ME ON. whew, i so have to find a way to bottle that scent. it sooooooooo attracts the ladies. i tell you, it's a love that dare not speak it's name.

...on logistics and jackboots

well here's a fresh one. the escalator is out and bastard is late already. oh well, what's a few more minutes. there's some opie-esque policeman playing the jackboot while his smooth latin partner plays the easy going cop. i love good cop, bad cop. it's one of my favorite things from television that has bled into the real world. hell, i like the fact that someone from the NYPD had the sense of humor to partner these guys together. it's like watching an episode of CHiPs.

so my first thought as jackboot john is screaming "get to the back of the line!" at the top of his lungs is "wow, what a lineup". i never seemed to get weary of the kids in the hall flying pig sketch. but, while john screams, ponch is at the back of the line, being smooth.

So eventually the line moves in it's own slow little fashion all the while, john yells for us all to stay in line like good little commuters. john then yells, "if you don't stay in line then you aren't going to get to work on time!".

"we already ain't gonna get to work on time!", shouts a disembodied voice. the crowd laughs, a fight breaks out upstairs, somehow an enormous woman in an MTA uniform breaks it up while singing some of aretha franklin's lesser known hits and all is right in the world. now get to work shiteyes!

—the bastard

racked...

i'll get back to more on the forever wild close of the camping season cotillion 2006 later. the pics are scattered and my arms are killing me. also, i could use at least one more good night of sleep as i spent last evening ushering the mofo into 21st century computing. so more later. go back to work.

—the bastard

...the last

...or the bastard's shortest cbgb post ever

i'm not going to bore you with links back to the bastard's many tirades about my disdain for the closing of the birthplace of punk rock. part of it is because my body is racked with pain from chopping wood with an axe. part of it is the fact that i'm tired of shouting from the fucking rooftops about how wrong you are (and you know who you are). but mostly, i won't run a long one because as i'm getting older, i realize that like the old poetic addage goes, "the world doesn't end with a bang but with a whimper". so i leave you with this,

dear new york,

a place that was uniquely ours is leaving so that you can sleep at night in apartments you should have never thought of as a good place to raise your families. that's what suburbia is for. now when you wake up 10 years from now and grow up to be just like your parents, and your kids head west to search for underground culture, just remember that, underground culture used to live 2 blocks away from you. and it was yours. it was ours. we all lose today. go to hell.

love always,

—the bastard

...on office space

so late last month, the bastard had mentioned that he liked his new tent so much, that he was thinking of subletting out his two bedrooms for some extra pocket money. i decided that with winter coming, this might be a better warm weather option. and besides, i have ample side crap that will send me to that special hell that is reserved for marketing execs. so anyway, after what was a cramped commute, i get in to find five dollar johnny and willy dub setting up a tent in the office. now i know that our publishing group is up on the block (the bastard doesn't like to discuss pertinent office business but that's kind of public domain about now, look it up, jerk), and killing stuff monthly is down a few pwople but, i had no idea that we were now strapped for office space. oh well, it looks like the bastard will have to trade in his cubicle for something a little bit more cozy.

that said, i'm going into the woods this weekend. the bastard hasn't had much of a vacation as he's been spending his time working excessively and not making headway. and i didn't want to vacation while living with the rents (it's depressing), so, camping is my inexpensive escape. so the bastard will be heading up north with the regulars and as a bonus, the mofo has flown up from purgatory for his bi-annual adirondack fix. so, i'll be back later with more tales of hot toddies and doggie bunx. try to get along without me, ok? come on, i'm sure you can like, watch the mets or some crap or read a book or something.

—the bastard

...on abbreviations

"so i was figuring that we'd have dinner with the chairman on sunday night"

"when the hell are you going home, mofo?"

"oh. monday."

"ok"

"so i was thinking we meet up with the chairman on sunday"

"you want sushi"

"i want to talk business"

"well natch", i retort.

"i just figured that we could all....did you just say natch?"

"ummm, yeah. i did"

just then the mofo, lifts his middle finger and sticks it right in my face. "you realize that you now speak like you text people"

"you know i think you're right", the bastard responds. "i've been abbreviating alot lately."

"yeah, it took me a couple minute before i figured out what the hell you meant by 'deets'."

came home from dropping the mofo off at his friends house and stopping by the garage to pick up some gear, i park in the sweet spot (one of these days, i'll get into the sweet spot, the bad block, and the ludicrous parking location system the nice lady and i devised so that we could locate the car at various points in time), and on my way back to the apartment, i see this car, with this plate. there you go shiteyes...natch.

—the bastard

...on risk 2...

...or best day off ever!!

a couple of months ago, the bastard had mentioned that he had won an ebay auction for a motorcycle. that was in march. the bike had gotten here at the end of may. then we tinkered with it and i bought a helmet for it in june. then it had trouble starting. we had never taken her out for a proper spin (mostly because, i had never ridden a motorcycle before) and by the time i had a helmet, the problems ensued. so we finally found a mechanic (because zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance can go to hell), and now she's ready. so this morning while my other vehicle is in hock as well (the starter), rookie cop came to pick me up with his trusty motorcycle trailer to go and get the old bird. yeah i think that's what we'll refer to the bike as from here on in...the old bird.

long story short, the old bird runs like a top. she sounds beautiful and she starts on the first try (except for when i close the pecock valve). so here's the best scariest part. without ever having been on a moving motorcycle in my life, and without wearing any protection (because i picked her up in my street clothes, and because i'm an idiot) i rode the old bird right into the garage in one of the scariest moments of my life which will go down later as the fourth scariest moment of my life as i rode her back out of the garage and up and down the block without ever having learned how to ride the damn thing. it was both the frightening (as mentioned) and exhilarating and i will no doubt do this again before gettin gmy permit as my mechanic recommends i run her once or twice a week just to keep the fuel system moving. but, i think from here on in, the bastard will be doing it with the stuff he invested in to keep himself from turning into a smear on the tarmac.

bonus batter, i came home and the boots i ordered for the bike came in. best day off ever.

—the bastard