My life has Burnt Down

Although you can’t see it, this Satan nutcracker is the 2009 model. Its painted on his base. This one is different than the 2008 model, mischievous. I know you must think I’m joking, which is exactly why I took a picture. WARNING to everyone, the 2009 Satan nutcracker from Target will ruin your life.

But as many these days are aware, Satan, with the horns and goaty features is actually Pan transformed. Yeah, Pan. Ya know, panic, pandemonium, horney, all that wonderful exploding chaos. The Christians hijacked the playful erotic goat deity in order to demonize paganism. And it worked I guess.

The purpose of Pan as a trickster is to disrupt lies, toss your life about, and otherwise unfold your accordion of bullshit, to play sweet melodies. These melodies are bouncy and dancy. The phoenix dances to these bouncy beats on the stove while you cook your pasta. It farts, lights the gas burns down your house. As it burns, Pan slips away, probably having sex with your cat on the way out.

From out the ashes I will rise again. And again.

In other news, heres a picture of me running Ubuntu 9.10 BETA on this mac. MACBUNTU mofo’s. It rocks. Is your old mac running slowly, why not try a linux on for size? It will fit awesome.

over and out

It is my hoodie!

I see you and/or your ISP!

Apparently someone who had at one point years ago orphaned their hoodie, a hoodie that I have since raised and that knows me to be its father, has come out of the wood work only to make wild accusations about its true family. But really, what is ownership when it comes to a hoodie? Does it truly belong to its biological mother? Even if she abandoned it  becasue it was too awakward to retrieve it years ago?

If you left your dog at a party that your ex lover happened to be at, would you abandon the dog, because it wouold be “weird” to go back for it? Some people would. Some people kill their whole families. I don’t go to those estate sales.

I believe hoodie ownership should be based on merrit of character, and not wether if someone bought it. Hear me out… I didn’t STEAL this hoodie. It was abandoned, hollow and slumpy, in need of a wash and someone to wear it, so it could feel valued again. And yes, I do plan to eventually let it out on its own, but its just not ready.

So who’s hoodie is it? It’s tough to say. Unless you’re me, and I say that it’s mine. I once donated some pants to a thirft store. I don’t look for pictures of them online and then hassel the people wearing them. For one thing, seeing other people happy makes me happy, and for another thing, I have an aversion to looking petty. Its an fear I will most likely pass down to the hoodie.

Back Beezy

Alright, So I broke my promise and didn’t update once for the whole freaking summer. I bet the hundreds of thousands of you who read this got along just fine, and don’t even try and tell me otherwise.

I’m going to get you up to date real fast though, with a quick list, in absolutely no order.

1. Bought house

2. Got Divorced

Easier than getting Married, but more expensive

3. Planted Jalapeños

4. Bought a new pipe

5. Went to Mens conference with Robert Bly

5. Read Just a Couple of Days

6. Quit smoking cigarettes

7. Transfered to a different school

6. Moved in with girlfriend Lauren,

and friend Heather.

7. Built and sold a few bikes

Ginger Balls

8. Started a powder coat sales business

9. Bought first lawn mower

10. Mowed lawn twice in 3 months

11. Bought Honda Ruckus

12. Built a pergola

13. Got mature hat and pants

14. Got health insurance

15. Got a ticket for expired plates

16. Renewed my plates, said “fuck it” and got a city sticker while I was at it. I live here right?

17. Learned how to install drywall

18. Learned how to operate a reciprocating saw

19. Painted inside of new house!

20. Laid patio bricks to make patio

Heather is a Lazy Beezy

21. built a coffee table

One mans garbage is another mans coffee table he made from alley wood

22. Found kitten

23. Lost kitten

24. Lived in roach infested sublet

25. took a series of photos entitled “Breakfast”

Breakfast At Home

26. Grew, then trimmed, and grew more beard on face.

27. Have taken up spying out my window with binoculars

28. Got the Palm Pre and learned to crack it open in Linux

29. Built an office desk out of wood I found in The Cave

30. Learned how to built bicycle wheels!

31. Fixed front and rear bumper on my car

32. Had an awesome summer group! ****

Ok! wow, what a an awesome list. What did you losers do this summer? Just kidding, I’m sure it was awesome. I have one question for you though, which one of these 31 things, is NOT TRUE??? One of these I totally didn’t do! For those who haven’t been hanging out with me, for a super awesome prize, which number is false?

I’m actually gonna update, but things may be taking a different direction. You see, my life has a new focus, and that focus is an academic one. As much as I love writing reviews of Hot Chip songs for a pretend audience, or spending an hour making up love afairs with operating systems I may just have something important to say again.

Its been a while! So I leave you with this symbolic and iconic photograph of myself which represents my new direction. Holding the wild grass of youth, I gaze upward with the vision of dedication, while holding a plastic bag with the DVD player of ingenuity which I plan to return to the wallgreens of expenditure the following day, after staying the night at the hotel of restoration, with the girlfriend of tenderness, and watching the DVD of artistry, that Lauren net fluxed from the account of justice… And I’m just warming up!

Mah Blag is Back

Alright, So I broke my promise and didn’t update once for the whole freaking summer. I bet the hundreds of thousands of you who read this got along just fine, and don’t even try and tell me otherwise.

I’m going to get you up to date real fast though, with a quick list, in absolutely no order.

1. Bought house

2. Got Divorced

3. Planted Jalapainos

4. Bought a new pipe

5. Went to Mens conference with Robert Bly

5. Read Just a Couple of Days

6. Quit smoking cigarettes

7. Transfered to a different school

6. Moved in with girlfriend Lauren,

and friend Heather.

7. Built and sold a few bikes

8. Started a powder coat sales business

9. Bought first lawn mower

10. Mowed lawn twice in 3 months

11. Bought Honda Ruckus

12. Built a pergola

13. Got mature hat and pants

14. Got health insurance

15. Got a ticket for expired plates

16. Renewed my plates, said “fuck it” and got a city sticker while I was at it. I live here right?

17. Learned how to install drywall

18. Learned how to operate a reciprocating saw

19. Painted inside of new house!

20. Laid patio bricks to make patio

21. built a coffee table

22. Found kitten

23. Lost kitten

24. Lived in roach infested sublet

25. took a series of photos entilted “Breakfast”

Breakfast At Home

Crazy week

I don’t have a lot to say for once. I was disappointed however to discover that pictures are worth 1000 words and not 1000 dollars as I had been told. On the bright side, this post will have about $5000 dollars worth of pictures.

But before that, I would like to speak directly to the advertising scouts that frequent my blog. In my social movements class, we discussed the possibility of projecting advertisements on the moon, or in space for billions to see at once. This brilliant advertising innovation sparked one of my own. I know as well as you do that reaching people in this economic crisis is incredibly difficult. I would like to offer you the opportunity to potentially reach hundreds in a new and innovative way.

I am selling Personal Disaster Advertising. You will provide me with a collapsible, albeit enormous poster advertising your product.

So it works like this, I’m driving down the highway in rush hour, I wrecklessly crash into another car, and awake minutes later, covered in blood as my car is on fire. I crawl out of my car and grab my cell phone, and your huge poster out of my trunk. With grubby numb hands I put up your sign, so that everyone who is invariably slowing down to watch my tragedy, will also see the Crest Toothpaste logo. I call the cops, then pass out.

Ponder that, send me feedback. Let me know if you’d like to sign up. The following is a photo diary of my week.

Here is a picture of me on Saturday, riding a horse at my voice teacher’s home. Watch me ride bareback.

Here i am on my bike

This is a business baby. It has a short glass of gin in the background, but you cant see it because its infant comb-over is too distracting.

Business Baby

This is a seat with glasses.

Focused Seat

Black Sabbath PT Cruzer

busted car

This, in case you cant tell, is a photo I snapped durring a crime scene investigation. Apparently this car was broken into and an iPod was stolen out of the front seat. This is clearly an armature, rural car thief. Professional urban car thief’s have a code of conduct and an organization which provides heavy oversight. As a teenager, i was a part of the car thiefs union, and paid my dues with the stolen change, and Ace of Bass and Alanis Moressette cassettes. I got out of the game after the cops chased me once and I ate shit on my roller blades. I had to hide in the back of a beadshop: with the dough.

One of the most important codes in the union involved a formula for calculating which car window to brake, provided the car wasn’t open. If the assessed value contained within the car was under one thousand dollars, it was required that the thieves break the small, triangular back window. Some people ignorantly assume this is to be kind, but really it is to ensure that the victim has the money to replace the window, and repopulate the car with goods, only to be robbed again and again, until the end of time. Breaking the front window is only acceptable if there is over $1000 dollars worth of merchandise in the car, like if you see an Xbox and a wedding ring, bash away. Or whatever. Braking the windshield is considered reprehensible, unless there is a treasure chest in the car, which is filled with gold too heavy for one person to lift.

This armature rural car  thief probably spent all night in smoking tweak out of a weed bong in his leanto apartment in rurual Wisconsin, listening to buck cherry and thinking about robbing someone. He knew the rich college kids at Beloit would be stupider enough to leave one of their many iPods on their dashboard. He probably picked up a human skull and smashed the front window.

I finally cleaned all the garbage out of my car, in case anyone wanted to steal twenty empty bottles of muscle milk, and put them safely in my trunk.

The Apartment People

So I’m looking for a short term lease in Chicago on an apartment for the summer. Its going alright, ya know, but I stumbled across a craigs list ad, advertising a pretty cheap one bedroom, but it was through The Apartment People.

The thing is, they  are NOT the apartment people, I am the apartment people, they are the make shit endlessly complicated so I can’t get an apartment people. For example, a while back Heather Verdak Blog and I were looking for an apartment, and went to the apartment people for guidance. How foolish. Some nice girl drove us around and showed us places, we found one we liked, and began the negotiations.

This is why the so called apartment people suck. The way it works, for those who don’t know, is the apartment people act as a middle man (or woman) between you and the landlord. The landlord lists their property for free with the apartment people/apartment finders/whatever and the apartment people then show customers the properties in their database. If the customer decides to rent the property, the first months rent, instead of going to the landlord, is paid to the apartment people as a fee for listing their property.

This makes it vitally important that the customer NEVER speak directly to the landlord during the negotiation process, as the landlord may decide to skip the middle man, and keep the finders fee! Treacherous!

Ok, so if this doesn’t sound totally annoying to you, you should be a tax lawyer or something. Regardless, as goofy as this may be, they provide a service, and as we know, there are plenty of services that are just plain stupid, (like the bike messenger that delivers sparkley dongs to lonely ladies who need to rub one out on their lunch break, on those days where their hands or any old thing around the house just wont do) but my beef is with how the apartment have defied the very laws of capitalism in the name of their bureaucracy.

K- “Hi, I’m calling about your ad on craigs list for the one bed room furnished apartment for rent. Is it still available?”

AP;”Yes, it’s still available.”

K-”Ok, I would like to set up a time to come and look at it. I’m interested in the short term lease”

AP-”Thats fine. We’ll need to run a credit check and require a deposit, so at this point we may not be able to move you in right away because of the time it takes”

K-”Actually I’d like to pay all three months up front in cash.”

AP-”We still need a deposit and credit check.”

K-”Why would you need a credit check if I am going to pay the entire cost up front? Isn’t a deposit, and credit check to ensure that I pay? I am paying the whole thing all at once.”

AP-”We would still need a credit check and a deposit, I’m sorry”

I rolled my eyes so hard she felt it through the phone, and told I’d call her when all the apartments in Chicago burn down again.

popular searches

Interestingly enough, the top search term to refer people to my blog this month was “heather verdak blog”. Its crazy when someone you know has a blog that is so famous, that the runoff from their blog constitutes the readership of yours. Anyway, thanks Heather. I can only hope that I may return the favor and send you some traffic to help build your already substantial fame.

I am myself too much, you’re not yourself enough: life

Gonna Kill You!

So on Saturday, someone, who I wont name told me that I talk too much. (it wasn’t Lauren; she loves when I never shut up). Where they got the crazy idea that I would give a shit is beyond me. The problem here is that the issue is not with the amount I talk, but rather the case of yet another hater in a long list who is jealous of my word skillz. And in fact, it was only after I noticed a bunch of pathetic passive aggressive comments made by this person, and called them out, did their feelings about my verbosity surface. Everyone likes to project something different, my favorite is the acknowledgement of my word skillz, but neutralizing it by saying that my words are “all bullshit anyway”. If you’re stupid enough to hang around me long enough to realize that I’m totally full of shit, no amount of explaining this to me is going to make you less of a retard. For fucks sake people. I don’t cry and piss and moan when someone can play guitar. We can’t all be good at everything.

Left to right: Heather Verdak, Girl with stupid pants, Kyle BD

Needless to say, I wasn’t going to take this hatin’, so It got real ugly really fast. At one point, everyone I was with, all 17 of them, felt like jumping in. I was a Samurai, cornered on a hilltop, slicing the heads off of hundreds of soldiers, triumphant as they lay bleeding- BUT, as cool as that is, (and it IS cool, especially with this group) I guess it’s the total opposite of what I SHOULD be doing, which is gently dipping into the fondue of the Soul with the two pronged fork of the journey.

Seems like I’ve always got it backwards. But on the upside, now that everyone is acutely aware that I will not be eating their human feces crushed up in my journey oatmeal, back the fuck up, and prepare for a softer, gentler me: fuckers.

Just kidding – but seriously, I take my sacred work (which i refer to as my path to badassery) very seriously. It was a shock to realize that my relationships have no SOUL.

Its not my place to determine if thats 100% true, or how it breaks down. (I’m sure some people think I’ve shown them my buttery sweet essence) But to instead use this unpleasant little factoid to take me deeper into the chasm of my inner world before it explodes with pain and agony on the Vision Quest. That’s right, I quest for visions, whats it to ya?

School is almost out, I promise to post over summer if you promise to read it. Hearts- me

bike trips

laaaaaidd back

This is a picture from a 33 mile round trip Lauren and I made from Chicago to her folks house in Des Plaines. It was a really fun trip. My butt was sore, even with the cushy saddle on my winter bike. This was one of the nicer days from Spring Break 09. whoot whoot!

In other news I deleted my facebook. Yeah, fuck you facebook. You’re a bad friend. So annoying. Wanting to know what I’m doing all the time, telling me who isn’t dating who, and flooding my inbox with messages from people I went to highschool with, that I pretend to not know when I see them in real life. “You may know this person”. Dont fuck with me facebook. You KNOW i know this person.

I made what should be their new logo

One time I went to a party with facebook, and F.B. was all like, “hey man, i wanna introduce you to someone”. Then he totally brought me to a group of everyone from third grade. I went to get some soda from the fridge, and he was all like, “whats goin on, you must be thirsty, is your status thirsty?” Just to be be funny, I said “my status is ‘taking a dump on the coffee table”. He proceeded to stand up on the kitchen island, and shout “yo yo errrrrrbody, You may know this person; Kyle King. Kyle King is taking a dump on the coffee table”. fuck you facebook, I was totally kidding. By the way, I said you could LOOK AT those photos of me and my friends, not appropriate them for your own stupid purposes.

So, for the remainder of the evening I wandered around, exchanged pleasantries, nothing exciting, until facebook stumbled up to me, totally wasted off PBR and a few tears off a six foot weed bong,  “hey man, you  totally need to see these” and then opened what looked like a sixty pound photo album, and started showing me picture after picture after picture of older looking versions of my high school friends at bars and clubs, making snarly sexy face, next to their douchey looking boyfriends and girlfriends.

At this point I was happy to run into Myspace, even though all he felt like doing was sitting in the back room, looking at pictures of fat chicks taken from downward angles. whatever. You both suck, at least M.Space knows when to leave you alone.

ANYWAY, after deleting my facebook, I found this video of me made by someone I go to school with. Its oddly flattering. Even with the starwars music. Check out the still of me skidding.

Spring break 09 (this image not actually from Spring Break 2009)

It seems like a lot of work to photoshop that still frame to make my chest look so buff, but whatever. Honestly though, the hardest part of that run was when I started off pedaling backwards, went into a reverse skid, did the “suck it” hand motion, and proceded to skid backwards 25 feet up a hill.

I’m actually selling tickets to my next trickstravangaza. Dunkin DoNuts parking lot, chicago, 35 bucks. I’ll be doing my signature trick; the 340 degree pedal backwards fake out.

Good Morning

Ready to Face the Day

Today I opened envelopes and paid the papers inside them. It was awesome. More later.

It’s the end of the world: whatever

This weekend John came to visit me. After discussing personal matters, the first order of business was to calculate the amount of canned beans that could fit in the back seat of a Honda civic. As it turns out, there would be just shy of a years worth of food, but unfortunately the car would bottom out anyway due to the weight. I suggested we would be much better off looting the Walmart for the compound bows and exploding arrowheads in the hunting section and mounting them to aero bars.

Interestingly enough, the bike slash apocalypse idea came from some research which revealed to me that the bicycle is in fact the most efficient vehicle ever created. Of all the bicycles, the most efficient is the recumbent. Unfortunately it is also the most stupid as fuck looking.

The weekend was all fun and games until we were rushed to New York by tiny boat. Here are some photos of John, Cassie, Nathan and I dancing on the tundra which now surrounds the statue of liberty.

And as this picture indicates, as long as I have breath in my body, blood in my veins, coffee in my hand and hips that can thrust in cocksure victory the beginning of the end is nothing to fear. On the contrary. It is just the beginning of things being even more awesome. Where did I put those fucking pants made of belts?

Nathan and I went to breakfast at Around De Clock Sunday morning. They have surprisingly good breakfast. (For those of you waiting patiently for the verdict regarding the WIFI: Around De Clock does in fact have wifi, but they have no intention of releasing the password to the guests. Apparently, the owner is afriad that the three people that go there between the hours of midnight and six in the morning would just stay all night)

Arond De Clock

This is what it looks like on the inside. (This is also a panaramic piece that will be included in my online photo show comming soon. )

On our way out, Nathan and I saw this truck

This guy listens to buck cherry

I didn’t notice right away, but after taking my camera to walmart to have my digial prints developed, I brought it back to my dorm and scanned the print and noticed the triple endorsement sticker on the sliding coon window. (Referred to as such, due to the triad of names). But this isn’t the first time I’ve seen a coon window, or a suspicious triple endorsement for that matter.

Anyway, I’ll probably fly back to New York over spring break and start digging out the statue of liberty with a machine gun. Have a great spring break, and check back soon.

-Latah