Broke Another Window

Fri March 29

The Best Years of Our Lives is on right now. WWII combatants after the war.

Thre's this recurring pulsing in my left eye. I don't know if it's tension or nerve damage, blood clot. Who knows?  Shirelle smoked with Tori Spelling on the Queen Mary, so she says. I'm hearing it now, so I might as well write it. She's an extra on Beverly Hills 90210 this week.
Tourette's Blackjack Truckdriver flameout kicked out the game pissed in the car-

The GIP and the Thing and Derb and Danny are talking pussy over my shoulder. We've just returned from the Dodgers victory in the freeway series in Anaheim. Jim Crack land.
Tink's the partyer. Dog pussy. How can anyone think around here? Last night the trashcans needed to be put out to the curb, so I pulled my truck up tight behind Shirelle's bug to make room for the trashcans. This morning when I was going out to work I threw the truck into reverse to zip off to work only to find that the front of my truck was hooked to the back of Shirelle's bug! I called up to Shell to throw down her keys so I could unlock the VW and put it in neutra,l and then I walked to the bumper and pushed it down and out from under my truck. Shirelle's head hung out of the upstairs window. I thought I could just toss her the keys, "I don't want to catch them. Just throw them through the window," she said. I muttered, "What if I miss and break the glass?" but it looked easy like at the carnival, to win a stuffed animal, knock over the milk bottles.
Tlink! the keys slowed down and fell against the glass and seemed to stick there a second before the glass cracked and gave way. Tink tink tinker bill

There aint no thinkin' aloud allowed around here.

The Thing said,
I feel like a dolphin caught in a Japanese fishing net."

Everything Is Fictional Reality

3-27-96 W

Stood there, didn't piss, and flushed.

I've been reading this textbook I was supposed to read for a short fiction class in college, but as with most of my studies I disdained reading the course book in favor of a self image that didn't need to study much to do well in college. The Art & Craft of Novel Writing by Oakley Hall, who was the director of writing at UCI (I think), though his credits seem to me to be of dubious distinction: a sci-fi "thriller" that was made into a movie called "Warlock" (I know, I know--Who am I to judge?). His successor. Thomas Kenealy, has the more respectable cap feather of having written "Schindler's List". Having your story made into a movie seems to be the final measure of literary success. It's a bit of a shame, sentimentally, isn't it? I haven't any intention, at this point, of writing for the screen, where the language all but disappears except in dialog. Think of Tom Robbins linguistic gymnastics or the poetic first few pages of The Grapes of Wrath, these could not be written in a screen play. As much as I would like to be known as a good stoyteller, my interest has been in toying with language. Maybe that's why I don't have many good stories to tell.

Language is one of the deep mysteries of mankind. It gets lost in the more common cosmological questions of existence, but how so many people are able to agree on the specific meanings for different sounds and symbols (if they are) is really quite miraculous.

Still though, the story must have existed before language; really language develops from the necessity to tell the story, doesn't it? I mean a dog or a monkey can observe and process related sequences of events, and can even alert others to what is happening, but only man can tell a story. Maybe Koko can, too.

The story gives birth to the language.

Then there is the invention of storytelling--Fiction (non-fiction, too). That's what language is, the invention for conveyance. The stories exist as if by God say, even if the observer is a participant, numerous elements exist apart from the teller; all the teller can do is tell what happens--not true: he also says who it happened to, and where, when, and how, etc.

The Hall book's fist section deals with the rendering of Fictional Reality. It tells about the importance of detail and detail in motion. I believe I have a good grasp of these concepts even if I don't always have the details. They provide Fitzgerald as a fine example of mastery of detail. Also discussed is point of view, much of which I have I think I already well understand, and which was made explicit in the text. For Crack the 3rd person is all lined up. I like the idea of thinking of the narration as a camera's eye which can not only move around the story but see through the character's eyes. Wish me luck.

Training For the Marathon

March 26

Down goes another notebook. Seventy-two pages filled. Almost two months to the day since I started the first page. I'd like to put a positive spin on things, but my first thought is that I accomplished nothing in this book. Maybe with more time this journal could have been the jumping off point for better work. ---Aah, but let's not devalue this an an exercise. Certainly writing is more progressive than thinking alone. I wish I'd been able to sort out more dilemmas, though, then I might have the idea I'd done something rather than this empty feeling. Am I being unfair to myself? You can't run a marathon without first jogging a few miles for training. It doesn't have to be pretty. Still in the next book I hope to reflect some progress toward my goal. I should head into this next vacation with a full head of steam to write the Jim Crack story.

The Best Trick the Devil Ever Played

Mon. March 25

Back on the old bummer of not having enough freedom in the old day-to-day of bills and work to liberate my stunted imagination. Can't think with the stars exiting their limos and streaming up the red carpet. What separates them? Is it luck or talent or ambition or what? I lack all in all three. Focus. Always multiple simultaneous preoccupations. Need to learn to separate so I can put energy into one thing at a time. It's not enough that I try to devote a block of time to Crack only. I need to zero in on the plot structure so as to better render each sentence. Once plot is worked out, shouldn't it only be a matter then of filling in the blanks with original sentence structure and word choice? Then dialog will fall into place, right?
Still I'd like to act, definitely need more action in my life, this stupid awards show reminds me of how I drool to be an exception, as if fame and money would make me feel like less of a loser. Would it?
Dean and Olivia are throwing a little party to watch this thing. Olivia's an art dealer and an artist. Her mtoher set her up in said capacity, from what I hear. She and Shirelle were classmates at Fairfax High. Dean's her beau. Makes jewelry and marionettes and masks. Just heard an interesting line: "The best trick the Devil ever played was convincing us he didn't exist." Still I think evil is an invention of Man.
My head just started hurting and belches of nitrogen blast my insides, the gas erupts past my aching jaws and teeth.
One time, Chuck Jones came to the Four Seasons and I parked his car. When he came out showed him my Wiley tatoo, and the boss wrote me up.

Hitting on my Sister

Sun Mar 24. 1996

Just flew back from Vegas on that damned Friends Fly Free deal on Southwest. Peachtree and I sat at the bar drinking. Eventually one of us looked at a watch and learned that our plane had left.

Bah-dum-pum.

We were able to get on the next flight. I was robbed. At the blackjack table. I supposed it's more accurate to say that I donated the money. Whatever. You think they're not controlling your account with computers? It's the Card Guild. There's such a thing. I researched it. There's a Numbers Guild, too. Something unholy about it, don't you think?

I never heard that tape I made for the party. What's it matter? Saw that movie "Fargo" today. No comment. Why's everybody like it?

Come on son, go, go, go, go, get going--What to do, what to do--I can't think.

They're barbecueing downstairs. Danny brought over some meat. At the party he was hitting on my sister. He asked her out. He's mad at me. I told her he has crabs.

I broke my pencil. I just want to watch TV anyway. One Life to Live

Soul Sold

TH Mar 21

I feel like a loser again today. I'm skipping class tonight, tomorrow night, and Saturday to go to Vegas. How disgusting is that? What if I lose hundreds of dollars? I bet having kids would be less expensive than the way I live now. Ugh. It tears my aorta. I'll wish I wasn't there. I ought to perfect an easy-going, unassuming--no, no. Now I'm a little high, too. I liked the movie "Coogan's Bluff". Last night "Thunderbolt and Lightfoot" was on TBS. Lot of underlying homo themes. George Kennedy's character kept asking what people were queer for. It was a strange movie. There is the implication that Bridge's character is bisexual, from his limp-wristed walk in the opening sing, until his dress-wearing death, though, the theme is imperceptible in the plot. "Coogan's Bluff" was like some New York writer romanticizing a Texas marshall in the Big City. Coogan's Bluff is right over where the Polo Grounds used to be. There's a show on ESPN, Voices of the Game, about the great radio announcers. "Oooohhh, Doctor!" It's 6:30 PM right now, in case you want to know. I regret those burgers. I wonder what all kinds of consequences there will be for me in the coming weeks.
I havent' been reading much lately.
It's been a tough week at school. Nobody seems to care much anymore. I don't want to think about it. I talked to Ocar's parents and Christian's mom. Danny was walking out of the class with a pencil in his teeth, and he leaned his head back like a sword swallower to look at me behind him, and I made a motion to smack it down his throat with my palm, and he bounced away. That was when I looked up and saw Oscar's dad and told him his son screwed around too much. X-RAYS OF DEAN'S HEAD REVEAL NOTHING. "Sing something, Diz," said Peewee.

________

Guy feels like he already sold his soul to the Devil.

Yeah, but I'm not that far behind him. World's Biggest Blow-It.

I missed the Bible last Sunday. First time in a few weeks since I instituted it that I missed it. This pyramid hisses. More of a deal-with-guilt kind of guy. I would like to be Morman. I've lost upwards of $600 since I got here. I feel like a no-account moron
made up of a whole lot of bad moves

If you care there's no reason not to let you try
Bob Fleming's line" You don't ever need rigged bets and Magicians.

Good Thing the Tubes Are Clogged

Wed March 20, 1996

First day of spring. Jimmy and Carlos weeded the garden in front of class, bit I asked them to leave the mustard flowers alone. They did a good job.
Last year on the first day of spring I was in Death Valley, frying, and not because of the temperature, with Michelle, who I called Disco Inferno the whole weekend, because she was such a burn. That place would have been a trip even if I wasn't frying. I'm too lazy to recall it in any detail now, though. Maybe some other time. I got great pictures and thought I should write an article and send it to some travel publication. Yeah, right.

The Menendez brothers were found guilty today. I think so, too.

I've got to go to Vegas this weekend. Utter focking foolishness. Peachtree bought one of those "Friends Fly Free" tickets, that you have to get six weeks in advance, and the friend can't be changed, so I pretty much have to go. I'm going to miss class and a group project this weekend.

I kind of feel my life going down the tubes. The tubes are pretty clogged though.

I can barely breathe.
So I take another toke.


My little tape recorder won't work anymore.

"Wednesday will be dialog day," he announced aloud to himself. "At least a page of it, you know, for the exercise."
"Good idea," he responded to himself.
"What shall be said?" Himself asked He.
He said," Well, it depends on who the speaker is, I reckon."
"Sounds like a split personality," one muttered.
"Switch pronouns, then," they agreed.

One time the head coach on my sophomore football team shook my head around by the facemask, yelling at us to hit each other, screaming at us to hit each other harder.

Gotta stop smoking pot. Gotta be a healthier way to unlock creativity.
Normally I wouldn't even want to write such blasphemy.

The Infernal Revenue Service

Jeopardy!'s on. Yasser Arafat, uh, who is? Beirut, what is? Mississippi. Chesapeake. Okeechobee Colorado New York--Ooh, wrong. phobias, physique phylum pharos. Applause commercial.
I need to make a move in this chess game of life. To be or not to be--phrenology--a registered voter? Peso.
The Farmer's Almanac.
I did well on that Jeopardy!.
Raye's arms have little sores all over them.
"Thunderbolt and Lightfoot" was going to come on, but this Knick/Pacer game went into OT.
I'm flabby and weak.
The Knicks won. I have to write in my school journal, clean things for the benefit of society.
I bought some crap at the market. The boxgirl said, "You must not want to cook."
Suddenly it didn't look appetizing at all But it was too late, I'd already paid.

The Saint Patrick's Day Party

Tu March 19, 1996
"I've flaked on this all week. Not sure why. Well, duh. We had that big St. Patrick's Day party on Saturday. I myself spent upwards of $430 on alcohol, and that doesn't count what all the GIP spent and what people brought of their own. Perhaps I should spare us the details; it got ugly. No, no, of course, let's have all the gory details. We put green bulbs in all the lights and had a keg of Harp upstairs and Guinness downstairs and a full bar set up on the back porch where we'd slung a table cloth over the washer and drier. At least a hundred people showed up. I spent the night drinking Bushmills. Nobody threw up. I partook of a little smoking o' the green. And took a few ephidrine tablets to stay alert. Yeah, I wanted to be drunk, high, and alert. Around five AM we had the traditional scuffle when Peachtree was trying to bang Hosebag's wife in the the Thing's room. Not sure who get's the prize for mental unstability there, but I guess Hosebag's wife would win by a nipple. The Thing was hammered and threw a two-year-old's temper tantrum about Peachtree and Hosebag's wife bein' naked in his bed where he wanted to sleep. Hosebag's wife could stay, but Peachtree needed to find a place on the lawn. Peachtree then bounced the Thing's head off a few walls and would have proceeded had I not got between them, but then the Thing, apparently not recognizing that I had intervened on his behalf, tipped over my chair, threw my guitar case across the room, and smashed my marble chessboard into the payphone Rawler had mounted in the hall. When I went after the Thing he went into his room and slammed the door behind him. I put my foot out to stop the door from being slammed in my face, but all that happened was my foot went through the door and the door stayed closed. I extracted my foot from the splintery hole in the door and turned the knob. I felt pretty calm, but I wasn't sure if I need to knock the Thing out or not. I hoped I could calm him down. That was when I noticed Hosebag's wife, curled up in a fetal positon on the floor sobbing. I bent down and picked her up and dropped her onto my bed, just to get her out of the way, not thinking at all about the implication of throwing a naked crazy chick into my bed, but then Shirelle freaked out shrieking, what was I doing throwing that crazy slut into our bed? "Our bed?" I said and she started sobbing. Then Thing started waving around the pistol that his uncle gave him that he keeps in a pillowcase up n his closet.  I don't think he has any bullets, but Hosebag's wife started screaming and ran out of the house and down the street wearing nothing but my blanket, and Peachtree went chasing after her. She got into her car, tires screeching, screaming out of the window how evil my house was, and she drove away naked. Peachtree shrugged and went back and poured himself a beer. Hosebag, I should add, was sleeping comfortably in a guest room we had set up in the garage.

Earlier, when we had run out of beer, I went to the Ralph's at Third and La Brea to get more. I presented my credit card to a pasty faced Chinese chick who looked at my flashing eyes, my floating hair, and decided the signature I signed on the slip did not match the signature on the back of the card. One thing led to another and I called her the kind of thing a drunk a-hole might call a woman in such a situation, something along the lines of a less than intelligent female dog. The security guard came and escorted me from the premises. Then we went to another Ralphs where they inexplicably do not sell beer after midnight, they were unwilling to go above and beyond the call of duty to save a fine St. Paddy's Day party. So we went to Seven Eleven and the Pakistani there was happy to sell us ten cases of beer.

Ealier that night Tyson had rocked Bruno in the third round, perhaps setting the stage for the atmosphere of brutishness that would ensue.

Mostly, though, the phone had been ringing with people saying what a good time they had. So there.

Birdbrain

Tuesday March 12

I wondered if moving from the TV room to the table here at the kitchen window would be any less of a dead end. I'm gratified to find that the immensity of ever-transforming clouds are as when I watched them in a rain puddle, a (w)hole in the steet you might step into and fall into heaven, as sculpted by God.

The little boy icon in his yellow slicker and rainboots squatting alongside a puddle full of sky, after the storm, I distinctly remember a day on Essex Place, the profundity of blue making ever more appearances between the everchanging billow of white and slate. I said that God and angels lived there, when I was a child.

There's a mo(u)rning dove in the bare bones on an elm about which a flurry of red-breasted finches dart about on the lawn, gleefully chasing each other to each delectable worm risen to the surface in the rain. Except for the far-off roar of a jet it sounds more like a rainforest than a city, so many birds chatter.  I bet a bird is never happier than when a storm clears, and it's bright out, and water everywhere.

If there is daylight out my kitchen window then there a birds out my kitchen window. I like that.  It has begun to rain again and it's so funny the way one of these almond colored doves and a fat little blackbird perch right alongside each other, peeping a non-chalant conversation about the weather, unmindful of their differences. Two gulls flap far out there, too. Is that a lark darting? Yeah, yeah. The dove's solemn coo flutes ryhtmically.

A rainbow! Could this get any gayer? Nah, but it's almost Saint Pat's. Where's me pot o' gold? Now look at all the Brewer's black birds on the wires. There are easily two dozen. Way the hell out there a helicopter beats over the 110 freeway, relaying jam info to the people who already know all too well.

Oh, man. Now I feel jagged. Tomorrow I have to present my portfloio but the final presentation is not until May.

We've just come from the Red Lobster. I'm stuffed with shrimp and butter, blech.

The GIP got gonorhea. He's lucky it's not worse. I told him he couldn't keep deluding himself about his immunity. That's the mistake Magic and Tommy Morrison made.

The Mighty Ducks beat the league-leading Colorado Avalanche to overtake LA for the final playoff spot.