This Exists

Nice job Australia.

Respect

And then there's this.

via Ruth!

Today's thought

Who knew?

Happening : Molecules at PF Gallery

The impromptu collaboration of Pete Simonelli, Lynn Wright, and Simon Goff, also known as Molecules, was born in Madrid, Spain in October 2012. Simonelli was promoting his newly translated book of poetry on tour with Wright and Goff’s band Bee and Flower when he entered the dressing room 10 minutes before his set and summoned them to the stage without prior warning. They are a loose fit in a world of tight jeans, offering a mixture of improvised musical explosions and words with a keen on eye on keeping scores settled and psychic accounts balanced.

This Saturday, Sr. Wright and Mr. Goff will be performing with artist Matthew Lusk and Simonelli. They will also play a piece or two from Wright’s score for choreographer Rachel Cohen’s dance Construct,which premiered at Incubator Arts/St. Mark’s Church in August of 2013.

Lynn Wright and Simon Goff both play in the New York/Berlin-based bands And The Wiremen and Bee and Flower.

Goff also plays bass with British band Hope and Social and is active in the European contemporary dance scene, working extensively with choreographer and dancer Lisanne Goodhue.

Wright composes music for choreographer Rachel Cohen’s dance company Racoco/RX, collaborates with writer Victoria Miguel, most recently on her play Laqueria at Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and works in various ever-shifting contexts with composer/laptop performer Chris Becker, Flip Barnes (William Parker Quartet), Paul Watson (Sparklehorse), Tony Maimone (Pere Ubu), and long-time song-writing partner Jon Petrow, among others.

Pete Simonelli is an underground literary veteran and vocalist/frontman for the band Enablers. Lancashire and Somerset have published two books of his poetry as well as a CD of his readings. Both books have been translated into Spanish and published in the fine land of Spain.

This performance is in conjunction with Lusk’s Closed For Alterations show, currently at the PF Gallery.

Numb Skull Wins

Bright eyes and quick thumbs of one Melisha Noosbomb

MLK Jr. Day

A significantly mind opening essay here.

A Hyphenated Note For TB On His BD

A few years ago, after just enough clashes with the powers-that-be and just enough I've-had-enough with the other powers that be, I left a somewhat sure-thing, possibly-cozy, career-culminating path to do something else, only mildly different. On the face of it, this isn't an entirely interesting story to hear or tell, seeing that I'm in the standard buzzard's pattern moment in my generation's forty year old mark, not quite old enough yet to have learned anything, not quite young enough anymore to have done anything, I've got that bullseye on my t-shirt that every New York doer would rather avoid, the one that exposes me as too-slow-a-moving-target. I remember when my father turned forty. We had a big party at our house that went late and is the last time I remember, or imagine I remember, having any large amount of booze provided by my parents. Everyone was given powder blue t-shirts and high-peaked mesh back caps that said "over the hill" in puffy letters pressed undoubtedly at the puffy letter t-shirt store in the Bellevue Square. I still remember that shop, nestled in the southeast corner, right next to the entrance to J.C. Penny. On a later birthday we would get my dad the same hat, in a more royal shade along with an accompanying sweatshirt sporting "somebodies gotta do it" in bulbous, velvety marquee red letters. My father, foreshadowing my own brand of late-startedness, had himself just come to fruition not long before his 40th birthday, having jumped into medical school a good ten or so years post the traditional age after unsuccessfully successful stints at the U.S. Army and IBM. At this point I can take consolation from our similarity, something until this moment perhaps I've never been able to do. All to say the jump from one ship to closely passing other ship has been a good one, one I'd recommend to many, in a sort of why-not shrug of the shoulders, pocket full of war-of-attrition-esque phrases about the meaning of life. No sense in worrying about it, I keep telling myself, it's either right around the corner or it's not, and in the meantime if I'm peeking I'll miss it completely.

Today I listened to the Prairie Home Companion radio show while cooking dinner. One of those Garrison Keillor characters said something like "I'll never be able to choose happiness, that's not something you can choose. But I can choose to be cheerful." I also listened to a whole episode of Car Talk this morning.  Curious.

The waves were good at some point in the last week around here in New York.  Small, clean, slushily slow but crispy all the same. At least that's what the photos said. I purtook not.

Mick sent this through today and it, and much of what it's surrounded by, is good reads.

Happy Birthday to Mr. Tyler Breuer, a real inspiration for those of you looking for that sort of thing.

Respect

Today's Important Thought (Should Watch)

Yesterday's thought

There's The Bible of Surfing, Then There's The Bible of Fashion

via Mick

Something To Look Forward To

Clic le pic.

Interesting Packages

My tai chi teacher sent me this today.

More Yes

via D•9•sª•plac•mmm.... oh screw it... these guys.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

via SMASHola

Yes

Pondering Weather I Despise

Yeah, so it's true what they say. It's cold. The dog pee in the street is frozen stiff but minutes from the wizzer. Fingertips don't want to punch buttons, faces would rather not smile, then really want to smile then rather not smile again. Ears burn no matter how thick the hat. Of course, if you happen to live in a rather drafty apartment like mine, where the warmth of cruddy heaters mingles seamlessly with the seeping wind chill, you sleep great in a cozy cocoon of half warmth, sanguine with the knowledge of how bad it actually could be.

This may be the starting bell of the second round that follows what could be considered an extremely long first round ( the first round being everything that has come before.) Dukes up and eyes bright, move your feet not always forward.

A few things to remember:

Every time you paddle out, simply expect there to be something scary lurking in the dank black, unfathomable fathoms.  Because it's there. Don't fool yourself into thinking you're alone. You are always in the presence of something more acquainted than you and you might as well get used to being the most uncomfortable bobbing bit of flotsam in the water. Better to get comfortable with this early, late or anytime.

Don't feel too bad if you're unwittingly the one who messed up that lovely single feeder line, barging unknowingly upon the cash register, forcing everyone to rethink their mindful acquiescence to the norm. Yeah, the single feeder line was a better idea, a more equanimous solution, but really the three lines that have now formed in front of each register isn't hurting anyone. Just pay more attention next time.

Imagine yourself a jellyfish, gently drifting with the most obscure and ineffectual of self-propulsion amid the gooey soft center of a filled donut. You exert only the most minimal and weak control in this jammy gunk of nature, corruption and ignoramity. Be at peace with the jelly.  Yours and its.

Respect

When Life Gives You Marbles, Make Marble Sauce

You gear yourself up, really ramping, winding every sinew into an intention hurtling volcano hurricane of desire. No quitting, abdicating, wimping out, turning back or rerouting. Inspiration beckons! Waves await! The seat warmer is on full tilt! Heat blasting on your toes! Thank god for this leased car! It's warmer than the old free car! Budweiser commercial! Juicy Fruit gum! Joie de vivre! Ah but you got a late start. You had to let the cleaning lady into the office. You needed to bring the eggs home, get coffee, poop, eat a currant scone. And the wind shifted irrevocably in your absence, in your tardiness, in your haste to make sure everything else was taken care of.  And you find yourself staring at blown out, wind swept, freezing, churned up swell. Shoulda been here yesterday. Shoulda been here three hours ago, ding dong.

But, frankly, all is not lost. New York will always be good to you if you know where to look.

The Crystal Ball Refuteth Not The Unnerring Attempt Upon The Cowed And Slowly Molecules The Saline Addled Merfolk.

There was a myth I created for myself a long time ago, probably borne of being something of a self-induced outcast, a myth many outcasts everywhere no doubt concoct to protect their beaten egos from further self-induced abuse, that I was smarter than most. This has been one of the more intractable of personal legends, stubbornly refuting all empirically obvious claims to the opposite account until relatively, embarrassingly, lately. Not that I have in the past handful of years deduced that I am in fact stupid. Rather that I am more quickly adept at conniving my way out of the trouble I create through my own ignorance than certain others. That being said, the tall tales I tell are often mental midgets, trotting along on stubby allegorical legs, destined for a depleted destination in the annals of other's minds. That being furthermore stated, I'll say there are dumber things to do.

Pfeil a la minute

Soft Top Revolution Episode Cinquo

I successfully negotiated two weeks of surfing from Sunset Cliffs to San Onofre only touching a proper hard board twice. Surfed a six foot, seven foot, 8 something foot and ten foot soft tops in every possible condition. I had a ball. Coming to a Long Island beach near you: me, sucking, giggling, spinning and dorking around. Business as usual, basically.

Observations From A Surf Vacation Volume 5

Open the window. It's a midday flight.

Take off those sweatpants.  Have some pride.

You're not a business traveler, that oversized rollaboard isn't for you. 

When you bang someone's shoulder, "excuse me" is an appropriate follow up.

It's not true, whatever they taught you in flight attendant training every flight doesn't need a grumpy stewardess.

You don't have to recline your seat at warp speed as soon as the plane takes off.

You also don't need to be told three times to return it to the upright position before we land.

Stop bouncing your knee nervously.  

2014: The Official EBNY Year of Becoming Great Or At Least Better