Purple?!? No, I would call this shirt lavendar.

As I walked into Winco yesterday I had a thought that I thought was quite funny but was erased from my brain because the following happened:

Immediately after having my interesting thought, I noticed a truck driving towards me and the guy driving and his passanger were looking at me with cartoonish sneers. As he passed me, the woman sitting next to him shouted “I hate your stupid fucking face, asshole.” I assumed she was shouting at me.
I watched a crow fight off a flock of pigeons and fly off with a whole piece of pizza.
I saw a woman with an ICP tattoo in Winco and was a little bit shocked to see a possible juggette in Redding but then I remembered that I’m in Redding and this kind of seems like ideal juggallo country.

I think I just remembered my amusing thought and it was “I think the greatest hurdle for a chubby guy wearing purple is to not look like Grimace.”

Sad-sack sorry gamblers and their drunken ramblings.

I played black jack for a couple of hours last night. I didn't win but when I average this trip with the other time I've gone this year, I still come out a few hundred dollars ahead. Aside from not winning money, this excursion was not all that interesting. The casino was strangely free of weirdos. Last time I went there was a guy who kept demanding high fives and a drunk lady who decided that I was the one who should be told how her friend just puked all over the inside of her car but that it was okay because she had one of those new cars that could be hosed out if it got dirty, though she was concerned that her hair still smelled of vomit.

When I got home early this morning I remembered that I had written something down about my first trip and found a piece of paper with "sad-sack sorry gamblers and their drunken ramblings" written on it, and I remembered how much I love words. One of the things I find most personally rewarding about writing is a perfect sentence, a fantastic turn of phrase, or a beautiful pairing of words. I have written papers around single instances of words I really enjoyed. I doubt this is a very good writing technique, but I'm not going to change because I see no reason to stop loving the lyric beauty of a thoughtfully crafted phrase.

I can understand why somebody would turn off half the lights in the bathroom and sit in the darkened stall the day after Cinco de Mayo, but this has been going on for a very long time.

I appreciate a clean and comfortable bathroom at work. I like having the option of going to a place where I don't have to do any work and I can sit around without pants on irregardless of my intestinal directives.

In my previous job there was a point where I considered the bathroom to be the only safe haven from the all women, post-menopausal work environment. This was taken away when one of my bosses started using the men's restroom for her foul death shits. I never found out which one was destroying the last thing I enjoyed at work but I suspected all three of my bosses thought they were very clever in hiding their digestive problems from other ladies in the office. Either that or a single culprit had a very interesting diet as the tone of the air quality shifted from horror to horror throughout the day.

My current workplace commode is quite nice. In fact, when I was a student here I would relieve myself in this same bathroom, if given the choice, as it is generally cleaner and better air conditioned than many others on campus. As this restroom has become the sole fecal repository I frequent, I have observed the habits of some of my coworkers and what started out as an odd mystery probably should have remained a mystery but I figured it all out nonetheless.

About half the time I enter this bathroom, the light is off. This does not cast the entire bathroom into darkness but leaves no light in the entrance and leaves the handicapped stall quite unlit. I usually accepted this as a power saving effort by somebody on staff until one day as I was sitting on the toilet the lights were extinguished by an incoming waste management patron. With the lights off, the unknown man slipped into the far and newly darkened stall and I left the bathroom (after I washed my hands of course). This started happening on a regular basis. Sometimes I would be in one of the stalls when the lights went out and other times I would walk into the bathroom and the lights would already be out and somebody would already be in the stall. This became an odd mystery because I could never quite catch sight of whoever was doing this but I started referring to him as the Midnight Pooper. I would write 80's hair metal ballads about the Midnight Pooper, fraught with shredding guitar solos and would always turn the light back on when I left because that's kind of weird.

After a couple of months I realized that many times when the Midnight Pooper is doing his business, you can hear the clicking of cell phone buttons. Texting? Surfing the Internet? Who can really tell? I know I'm not going to ask them because there are too many awkward possibilities and I would rather continue my crusade for well-lit toilets with my current motivation.

This isn't the end of the mystery, however. One day as I washed my hands I was plunged into semi-darkness as the head of the counseling services walks in and enters the darkest stall. This was when I realized there are multiple Midnight Poopers and began to wonder what the reasoning was behind obscured defecation that was not due to an attachment to technology. My current theory is that the counselor has phobia about seeing his own feces. Maybe his dad was a plumber and died in a horrible septic tank accident and was raised by his puritanical mom who refused to be in the same room to potty train him and would shout through the door "You better clean up all your filth you dirty little sinner." And at some point he asked her what poop was and she shouted at him "It's your dirty sin you beast." and then she locked him in the pantry for three days and beat him severely for soiling his trousers.

It's a theory. No matter the reason, I hope I freak every Midnight Pooper out each time I turn the light on and disrupt whatever it was he was doing.

"Just" is my favorite Radiohead song. You got a problem with that? Are you challenging me to a duel? Fine then, I get to choose the weapons. I choose bicycles. A slow, painful, endurance race to the death is the only thing I can prove my point with now.

Riding a century is a pretty awesome feat. They could have called it a 100 mile bike ride and it would still be bad ass, but calling it a century adds an epicness to it. Sort of as if you are transcending space and time, or making the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs.

I completed my first century at the beginning of the month. I rode from my house in Redding to my in-law's house in Paradise. It was raining the entire time and there was a headwind of ten miles per hour that increased to about forty miles an hour. The last five miles of the ride gained nearly half a mile of altitude. If it had been a ten mile bike ride it would have sucked. This ride was straight stupid.

Don Quixote helped me keep going. I listened to the king's portion of the book on that ride. It is wonderfully cyclical to be listening to the exploits of a crazy person doing absurd things while attempting to complete an absurd task yourself.

Lauren also helped me keep pedaling. In January I was speaking with my sister about some of the feats and challenges I was to attempt and she added another: she challenged me to ride one thousand miles on my bicycle before she gave birth to her baby. I had a little over three months to complete this challenge and in that time I started training to ride a century, eventually coming up with a plan to have the completion of my first century coincide with my thousand mile challenge.

I believe, however, that the main thing that kept me from stopping is my amazing stubbornness. I used to think that I was a pretty patient guy. It has taken me a long time to realize that biding one's time may look very much like waiting patiently though in reality it is an entirely different sort of beast. You may have faith that moves mountains but I have the stubbornness to wait for the rocks to melt and the dust to drift away on the breeze.

It may have taken me almost thirteen hours but I completed my first century, and in doing so, reached one thousand miles. I was surprised at how sore one's entire body can feel after a bike ride of this nature. Football never made me feel this sore, and I sucked at football so I got smashed around a lot. I felt the way Bruce Willis looks by the end of every Die Hard movie. But I didn't fight terrorist or avert any disasters; I defeated my unborn nephew. That little sucker was so embarrassed, he didn't even show his face for another couple of weeks. You may call him Titus Ransom Soini, but I will always refer to him as that kid I already beat. Not that I beat kids on a regular basis, but I probably could if I wanted to. It would be totally easy actually: They are small and lazy and I'm pretty sure they're illegal immigrants because most of them can't even speak English.

Anyway, this weekend's century was a little bit different. This is already kind of long so I will start out by telling you the ending: I only rode ninety-three miles. And by start I mean end. . . for now. My drink wants ice and my brain wants drink. Three more days till my third century: one success, one failure there's no third option so it's all repeats from here on out.

"Memory and Realization" or "Bad Poetry, Oh Noetry!*"

It was in seventh grade that I learned that I am horrible at poetry. There was an assignment which required me to write two poems: one had to be about the Bible and I believe the other was a personal poem. I put a lot of effort into my poems and was very proud of the results. My content was superb and my rhyming skills most excellent.

We all had to read our poems in class, and after hearing several of my classmates’ work, I knew my poems would be the best. When it was my turn I proudly stood, ready to bare my soul as I shared the poem that had come directly from my heart. A very strange thing happened as I recited my poems; every couple of lines one or several of my classmates would laugh. “What are they doing?” I thought, “This is serious stuff.” I began to blush and would chuckle nervously with the other students in an effort to fit in with the group. As I read the lines “John the Baptist lost his head / Jesus died but didn’t stay dead” I came to the realization that what I had written was patently absurd and in a moment of brilliantly quick thinking that spanned the intake of breath from one line to the next, I made a decision that I now believe shaped much of my adolescence: I owned it. Because all of my classmates thought it was funny and they liked it because it was funny, I decided that it was funny and that that had been my intention all along.

I believe that may very well be the moment I decided that I must be the funny guy, a class clown. Being hilarious was my invincibility because even if you put your heart and soul into a project, if the final product was stupid or a total failure, you could always laugh it off. Comedy is the invisibility cloak of baring your soul gone awry. I held onto this identity until my senior year in high school.

It is amazing how thoroughly a person can trick one’s self. Somehow, at the time, I never felt disappointed or embarrassed by that terrible poem. It took me a while to remember that I had written those poems in all seriousness but I think of it every time I consider writing poetry, or reading poetry, or when things rhyme.

I have almost never attempted poetry since junior high. In fact, I have hated and avoided poetry for most of my life, and it was only in the last few years that I came to appreciate or understand poetry at all (this is hard for an English major to admit) and this was mostly due to a love for Aesop Rock (I have no problem admitting this).

I am currently going insane. Working in finance is antithetical to everything I want to do in my life and I have been forced to put a shit-ton of energy into work lately by working the odd ten hour day and some Saturdays (I typed "work" so many times in that sentence that I nearly gouged my eyes out with highlighters). I have had almost no time to sculpt or write and the little bit I have written of late has been steaming piles of shit. This has brought me to a decision: I have decided to own it. I am going to take my horrible scribblings and poorly worded rants and make them worse by turning them into poetry.

I am pretty sure my brain isn’t working very well right now because this seems like a good idea.


Am I reaping the results of a youthful indiscretion or am I simply growing older?
I pierced my nose seven years ago.
Ever since then
My nose hair has grown wild.
It may very well be the natural course of things
Growing hair in odd places
Losing hair in others,
But I like my explanation better.

From time to time
I have to pull my nose hairs out.
If I do not do this,
My nose gets irritated
And I sneeze a lot.
And my sneezes are pretty violent.
People at work,
Two walls separating my office from theirs,
Will call to say “Bless you.”
I no longer pick up the phone when it rings after I sneeze.

I did not sneeze very much today;
I plucked nose hairs before showering.
The pleasant pain conjuring nascent tears
Was better than a pot of coffee to wake me up.
And when I looked down
The sink looked as if I’d shaved off an eyebrow.


*The magical wordsmith behind Toothpaste for Dinner, Drew, is responsible for this excellent phrase. If I was a doppelganger, I would definitely eat his soul and assume his identity.

Whitfield's Big Mistake

“Where did you go last night? I thought your host family lived near mine.”

We had only been in Mexico for a couple of weeks before Tequila Nights became a midweek staple. I am not sure about the logic of prefunking for $2, face-sized margaritas at Mama Mia but no one ever said that the world of drinking made sense. We would eventually come to be familiar enough with the cobblestone streets of San Miguel de Allende that we would make our separate ways to our host homes, but we started out the tradition with the home-bound mindset of strength in numbers, which was why it was weird when just as we left the bar, Antonio said, “I’m gonna take a short cut this way. See you at school tomorrow.”

It wasn’t until I had walked halfway to La Academia with Antonio the next morning that I thought to question his directional sense, “I wanted to swing by El Lounge,” he replied.

“Is there really a place called ‘El Lounge’ here?” I scoffed.

“Yeah,” he said, “it’s the only bar open till daylight.”

I would later come to find out that this statement was not completely factual. There was another bar that was open nearly every hour of the day called La Cucaracha, which, aside from being named “the Cockroach”, I did not want to drink there because women were not allowed entrance and the patronage of gringos of any kind was strongly discouraged, usually through violence (I have always thought of as the Cantina and since I have neither the Force nor a fully functional light-saber, I wisely stayed away). So, while Antonio’s statement wasn’t technically true in an absolute sense, it was true in enough senses that made El Lounge the only after-hours bar I would enter during my time in Mexico.

“You seem awake enough. How late did you stay there?”

“Uhh, I didn’t actually go in.”

“Why, what did you do?”

“Well, I got to the door and just as I was going in, this chick walks out and asks me if I want to go home with her.”

“That’s ridiculous.” I said to the five foot four, pudgy, sun-burnt, Texan “There is no way that happened.”

“I have been here for four months and I can assure you that that does indeed happen, and quite often I might add.” He continued his story while I made numerous mental notes reminding myself to not shake his hand or share a drink with him for the remainder of our acquaintance. “So, this chick invites me to her place and I think ‘why not?’ so I go to her place. Now later, I’m on her roof and I say to myself ‘Whitfield, you’re gonna need to smash this window’. . .”

“Whoa! Hold on a sec there. It seems to me that a large and possibly important part of your narrative has been misplaced. How did you come to find yourself on this roof and was I correct in hearing that when you speak to yourself you call yourself Whitfield?”

“Well, Whitfield is my actual name. I started going by Antonio because that’s where I’m from and no one here in Mexico can seem to pronounce Whitfield.” This being a suitable explanation I was able to move on and with the aid of the crowd that had now gathered,I was able to urge Whitfield to fill in the gaps of his story. It was revealed that the diminutive Texan had indeed engaged in sexual relations with a stranger who had passed out promptly after their coupling. Whitfield let himself out only to find that he was trapped in the courtyard which was hemmed in by a large wall topped with broken glass and jagged metal. The door to the house was locked and his lover could not be roused by any conventional means, leading him to climb upon the roof so that he could break a window, climb inside, and rouse the stranger long enough to gain access to a key that would allow him to make it beyond the courtyard and into the street.

Though this story was odd and entertaining, it seemed like Whitfield was still keeping something from us and, after further probing, it was discovered that the amorous activity was anal in nature, he had not used a condom, and that Whitfield had been so drunk that he could not recall if he had ever glimpsed the front of the stranger leading him to grudgingly question the sex of his partner. Luckily, one of the twins soon began dating a horse-faced local girl whom even the instructors at La Academia referred to as “Cabesona” who had been outside El Lounge on that fateful night and was able to clear up our mystery.

Have you ever accidentally used Holy Water to make your coffee. . .

. . . resulting in sharp pains in your stomach due to some sort of internal cosmic warfare in which the power of Christ compels the demons of feculence to be exorcised into the abyss?


I have recently finished an experiment which lasted the whole of 2009. I committed myself to a reading list, but one that was descriptive rather than prescriptive in that I only added books to the list once I had completed them. I have never had too much of an urge to create a reading list to follow for any period of time but I have toyed with ideas of recording my reading habits, and must thank Evan for suggesting this wonderfully simple one that I overlooked. Below is a the list, broken down by month, of what I read in 2009:

January:

Twilight Watch, Starship Troopers, Care of the Soul, The Reason For God

February:

House of Leaves, Preacher TPBs 1-9, A Game of Thrones

March:

A Clash of Kings, Bird by Bird, Y the Last Man TPBs 1-10, A Storm of Swords, A Feast of Crows, On Bullshit, Fables and Fairytales

April:

American Gods, Assassin’s Apprentice, Royal Assassin

May:

Assassin’s Quest

June:

The Bible, War and Peace

July:

Dead Until Dark

August:

Hood, Living Dead in Dallas

September:

Club Dead, Dead to the World, Dead as a Doornail, Definitely Dead, All Together Dead

October:

Les Miserables, When You Are Engulfed In Flames, Luck in the Shadows

November:

The Name of the Wind, Foreskin’s Lament, Player Piano, Last Watch

December:

Fahrenheit 451

First of all, I am a little bit ashamed that I only completed 36 books in 2009. True, The Bible, Les Miserables, and War and Peace are all beasts that are several times longer than the average novel, but I still feel like I should have been able to complete more books in a year's time. One may look at this list and say "Shit Andrew, you sure have a lot of goddamn silly books on that there list." To which I would reply "That is true" as I fire my automatic shotgun into the advancing zombie horde (because obviously this question was asked by a well read yokel during a zombie apocalypse in which we are fighting our way to freedom through a bayou. I think that it is important to talk about things like reading, self reflection, as well as future goals during the realization of any type of apocalypse, because, aside from basic survival, there are many good reasons to clear the land of the violent undead. Not the least of which being that as one of the sole survivors (due mostly to my excellent shotgun skills) I would be in an excellent position to reshape society into one that once again prizes books above other forms of entertainment).

I have read a lot of fluff in the last year, and I hope to change that somewhat, but the fact remains that reading, for me, is definitely a form of entertainment. I love the books that require a bit of brain sweat, but I also like the books that allow me to turn off the unending self-reflection, social commentary, insane ideas, and inane chatter that is my cerebrum. Also, I feel I can defend almost every book on this list (except for Luck in the Shadows, fuck you Powells for suggesting this book as an acceptable place holder for George R. R. Martin's tardy novels. Fuck your stupid face and this awful waste of paper.). Even the Sookie Stackhouse series contains some very interesting complexities and social commentary. Plus, I read that series via audio book (if you want to argue with me about the validity of "reading" audio books, go right ahead but I cannot think of a safer way to read a book while driving or riding a bike.) and I am falling in love with the accessibility of audio books and find that I would rather listen to a book for a half hour than watch just about any show on television.

For the next year, I plan on continuing my reading list, but I hope to post it each month with a short defense of each book I read. I say defense because I don't want to do a full fledged book review, and I know that I will continue to read many fun books but feel that I ought to try and keep myself accountable that the books I read are also reasonably worthwhile. I also hope to read a lot more books this year, and, as I have already finished three books this year and in the midst of two more, I believe I can reach this goal.

This is but one of several challenges I have set for myself in the next year, and, like this reading list, I believe that I will only post them once I have successfully completed them. That way, if I fail miserably, no one will ever know. But if I don't post any completed challenges, feel free to assume I have died or my life has fallen apart completely and I have moved into my parents basement/tool shed where I chain smoke in between shots of some horrific grain alcohol as I play World of Warcraft and masturbate furiously in my specially reinforced chair that is necessitated by my corpulence.

Halden: "This is, to date the most scientifically accurate summary of the nature of our blog. For the record."

I have started an experiment with me most excellent freind, Halden. We have decided to combine our culinary skills and editorialize them on the vast series of tubes you see before you. They will reside in a magical mansion who’s front door is a perfectly smoked slab of baby back ribs. . .where taps are never for water. . .where beautiful mermaids serve you buffalo wings of mind blowing deliciousness on a platter of magic bacon cooked by a unicorn’s laser vision. The drinks are always cold (unless they are supposed to be hot, in that case they will be hot. . .but not so hot you would scald your tongue because that would just ruin the whole experience), the food is probably bad for you (but always worth it), and, depending on how much we have consumed of either of those two, the posts are interesting.

We invite you to enter into the world of two minds in perpetual synergy. Our dreams will thrust themselves upon reality, pleasuring her with our wonderful meat and most excellent alcohol. You are welcome internet.

mightyvaldenkor.wordpress.com

Take a look, it's in a book. . .

I found out today that I am now older than Reading Rainbow. Reading Rainbow first aired on June 6, 1983 and continued airing new episodes until November 10, 2006. Reruns were aired until August 28, 2009 when PBS pulled the plug on Reading Rainbow completely. This means that as of September 8, 2009 I have actively existed for longer than Reading Rainbow (I was born ten days after the first show aired).

Initially I was surprised to find out that Reading Rainbow had continued to exist long after my childhood, but then I became nostalgic. I remember watching Reading Rainbow quite often. I am not completely sure why I watched this show; in fact, I am pretty sure I never read a single book LeVar Burton talked about. We didn’t have cable and my parents could plop us kids in front of the television with this on, secure that there would be no boobs or cussing (most people would add violence to that list but as most of my childhood games were competitions/battles with my brother involving fire, falling or pushing each other from heights, burying one another, or other forms of violence and we would only get in trouble if one of us had to go to the hospital or damaged somebody’s property, I figure that my parents weren’t all too worried about exposing us to violence as we were pretty good at being creatively violent all on our own).

I also remember watching it often on my own, even before I learned to read at age seven (Yeah I started late, I blame my mother who “home-schooled” me until 2nd grade which allowed me to discover fire and all the aforementioned games, but never allowed me to learn to read). I had the theme song memorized and anticipated the ironic one liner that ended each book review because I definitely did trust Mr. Burton’s word but if he insisted, I guess I could try to force myself to doubt him. How could you not trust the helmsman of the star ship Enterprise? If the operator of a fucking spaceship tells you that a book is good, you better believe him. And if said operator is Geordi La Forge, a blind guy who can see with the aid of a kick ass mechanical visor, pretty much making him a cyborg, and this guy shows up and tells you that reading is cool, then you know without a doubt that reading is totally fucking awesome.

Whew, got carried away for a second there, but Reading Rainbow is a great show. Several tattoo shops I know of have a couple of free tattoos they are willing to give people. Usually it is a crappy drawing of a stinky beaver or some such nonsense but I have always dreamed of finding a tattoo shop that has the Reading Rainbow logo as a free tattoo. I would take that deal in a heartbeat.



I am currently reading the unabridged version of Les Miserables; a monstrous tome and a fantastic literary work. I feel that I have come a long way since I learned how to read as I am pretty sure that I just remembered the first book I ever bought (I have absolutely no idea what the first book I ever read was). It was a school book order and since I attended a Christian school we had to order from some shitty Christian publishing company. The first book I ever bought was the initial installment in the nearly unremembered, Christian, science fiction series, Zaanan. I remember thinking that these books were cool because instead of being rectangle they were square. That seemed totally futuristic to me for some strange reason. I believe that Zaanan was some sort of galactic police officer or detective or something like that because I remember mysteries being solved. The best thing about Zaanan, however, was that he got to wear these bad ass bracers that could shoot laser beams. I throw around words like “best thing” and “bad ass” but really, the only good thing about these books was the idea of these books. I am pretty sure that even in second grade I realize that the Zaanan series was pretty lame. . . But don’t take my word for it.

Found Poetry: A recorded testimony of drunken brotherly love transcribed for your reading pleasure.

I woke up in the middle of the night and listened to the first message for some unknown reason and, as I was mostly asleep at the time, the message integrated itself into my dreams and I had drunken, poetic conversations with Jordan all night. I did not recall this until I received the second message which allowed me to discover the first message as well as the text. The process of writing these messages down was necessary for both posterity and comprehension. If you would like a dramatic reading, feel free to give me a call.

7/26 6:00am (text)

Everythinh’r good,

nothing’s great,

things are stuff, yet all is well.

Love jordan. L & s…

Good morning butthorn.

Sometime while I was asleep on 7/27

Huurrr Ho ho ho ho ho

Here’s a uh, little message

from Jordan,

your brother

uumm

Clap clap clap

ahhh sometimes we wish

sometimes we piss

sometimes we wander

other times we Saunter

aaaaand other times we falter

and the other day I met a guy named Walter

Sometimes there’s splash

Sometimes you just go and pass

And then there are other times when we see a light

Aaaaaand there are other times when we see a fright. . . movie.

But in the end,

sometimes we just send…BAD phone call messages

Great!!

Ate, sate, bate, crate, late…as always

Click…

lick, slick, tick…

The end. . ..dick

7/28 4:28am

What!?!…

what what what, is that soot

on my foot.

My foot, my shoe, don’t you?

Did not do those things that we did

and was done back when we had fun

now how did we… wow!

Those great crops

and give me props for not selling,

reeling those silly feelings that I was selling…

But please, don’t be a tease,

I say excuse you

when I sneeze.

Aaaaaaaaaand take cord when you snore and ignore…

myyyyy upbringing?

I see a stop sign

and I did not see Coralline

cause the movie looks like a little bit of a sloosey

and stuff

Safeway is the wrong way

I much prefer danger way.

If you remember that September or October and November

where we painted and instigated

much paintings,

many feastings…

Rooftops are great by the way,

I’m feel okay

It’s not all it’s up to beeeeeee…

and we see which is me Jorban,

Lorban, Jobs, Cobs, not Nobs

Okay…

I get punched in the face in the end

so send me a message and we may uh, chrisbinosomebitch…

woops, now I’m just making up words.

were nerds,

butter turds…

Aaaaaaaaaarrrrllllllhrhghgsge sue poo you crew too

The end.

Holler back… girl.

Huh, jen, dun, du du duuu uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Boop!