I am usually too quick with a solution for the encounter to grow into the stuff of which fantasies are made.

I


t was another grueling afternoon that I spent in Cocke Hall, hashing out the details of the weekend. It's a labour of love but it's also hard work, requiring enormous discipline and concentration. I manage to drown out all the distractions with music blaring from my headphones (in this case Mag Earwhig by the increasingly hi-fi Guided by Voices). Still, there are the perfumes, farts, belches, and (today most especially) apple-scented shampoos, of the pressing mass of collegiate humanity. As an imposter I'm a half-assed voyeur of it all, but I have work to do and cannot let their constant shuffling around me become of much importance to me.

Still, it's surprisingly nice to be suddenly jarred out of my trance by some stranger, invariably a girl wearing excessive makeup, wanting help with her computer. I am usually too quick with a solution for the encounter to grow into the stuff of which fantasies are made.

(He calls me "Staunton" after my hometown.)

Back in my neighborhood, I went on a beer run to the Seven Day Junior and became sidetracked by a little nearby Chinese convenient store (I forget the name). Matthew Hart raves about the place, which sells very inexpensive provisions for the making of oriental cuisine. I went in, expecting to find beer, but they had none. Instead I got a big old box of Oolong tea. A hundred tea bags for $3 is my idea of a bargain. The only drawback was the wait in line, where I chatted briefly with Mike, a former (or perhaps current) bartender at Millers. (He calls me "Staunton" after my hometown.) Meanwhile all the employees were too busy to ring up my tea and the owner/operator (so it seemed) babbled on and on with Mike and girlfriend, ignoring me completely. This went on for maybe ten minutes.

Meanwhile the poor get low SAT scores, meet each other at the bowling alley, and have little ignorant crumb crunchers with bulbous foreheads, flattened features and wide-set eyes.

Annoyed, I picked up a US Today and read an interesting article about the Scholastic Aptitude Test. Research has evidently shown that people who do well on the SAT generally come from wealthy neighborhoods, get into prestigious universities, and marry other people like themselves, going on to perpetuate their exalted kind, silver spoons included, in the next generation. Meanwhile the poor get low SAT scores, meet each other at the bowling alley, and have little ignorant crumb crunchers with bulbous foreheads, flattened features and wide-set eyes.

When hell finally froze over, the Pope converted to Buddhism, Bill Clinton denounced homophobes and I had my box of Oolong tea, I picked up a six of Beast Ice at the Seven Day Junior.

"Oh, that guy's called 'Mick Jagger,' he's like this discovery by a college radio station in Morgantown, West Virginia."

B


ack again at Kappa Mutha Fucka, I found myself sort of liking the video for the latest Rolling Stones song, "Lookin' for My Baby" or some such crap. If only Mick Jagger could suddenly make himself obscure and rise from that, he'd be so cool. "Who's that old guy with the big lips?" people would ask. "Oh, that guy's called 'Mick Jagger,' he's like this discovery by a college radio station in Morgantown, West Virginia." I notice that the Rolling Stones absorb a little of the current trend in popular music in every album they release. I suppose they have to. I'm old enough to remember their stabs at disco in the late Seventies and will no doubt live to see them absorb a lot more hip hop and techno.

Matthew Hart came home with a new Johnny Cash CD, Ring of Fire, a best-of compilation from 1963. But when he played it, he wasn't so impressed. The backup vocals and Mexican horns were kind of cheesy, and there was none of that half-cooked gritty sound you hear in Cash's far more recent Live at San Quentin/Fulsom Prison. But despite this disappointing purchase, Matthew was in a good mood, perhaps largely because Leah had come to visit him this morning saying she'd made the biggest mistake of her life, and asking did Matthew end up having sex with Angela last night.

Matthew had the satisfaction of replying to such inquiries with "it's no concern of yours."

Truth be known, Matthew did wake up this morning in bed with a not entirely clothed Angela (along with a fully-clothed Sam) beside him. But "nothing" had happened. It wouldn't have mattered anyway; it turns out that Angela and her boyfriend actually are broken up and have been so for a month.
Matthew had the satisfaction of replying to such inquiries with "it's no concern of yours." He did end up driving Leah to work though.

I went with Matthew to the JPA Fastmart to get the evening's beer. Deya and her little kitten "Nicholas" joined us after we returned with a six of Brooklyn Brown Ale and a 12 of Natural Ice. Matthew and the micro-cat are getting along better than they had; it (no one knows its gender) seemed to take perverse delight in climbing into Matthew's lap.

---

At Comet tonight, I set up a musings mailing list for people who want the unbridled truth, free of moral and social restraint. I would advise all of my readers who do not know me in the flesh to join the list. I'll also admit some of those who do know me on a case by case basis, aware of course that I can pick and choose who gets what list messages. I'm list dictator, and I'm drunk on the power!

The number of people on my list is huge: more than 70 (there's even a guy from Antarctica). But how could my readers resist? Censorship sucks!

I call the background colour "Daily Epiphany Brown."

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