Half-day at work tomorrow, haven’t really told anyone – just gonna sneak out. Hope to be putting road behind us by noon, speeding along the nine-ish hour journey from the kiln-hot weather of Northern California to the will-it-or-won’t-it rain toady clouded uncertainty of Northern Oregon. Already tonight I feel better for getting off my ass and finally beginning to tackle some of the domestic duties that my laziness has been roadblocking. I got the dishes done, and am only typing now as a “pause” between vacuuming and sweeping then mopping the kitchen. Still need to pack up and stow the camping gear, that’s to-be-done, oh and unpack the suitcase from NYC – just shy of a week from returning. The goal is to return to something that’s not an insurmountable disaster but a maintainable tidiness. And I’m only writing now in between tasks, to let the sweat settle.
I’m always late paying my bill to the city, y’know, the one for water, sewer, and trash service. It’s forever one month in arrears. The way I figure it, it’s not my fault. They only accept the most outmoded form of payment: the once viable now laughably analog personal check sent through the stone-age holdover that is the US Postal Service. I can’t be held responsible if I’m expected to collect my mail in a timely manner, open it, comprehend it, and then reply with some scrap of paper that I have to write on with my hand. C’mon folks, gimme something I can log-on to, something I can click through, whatever verb I use to pay this bill I want to it to have an ‘e’ and a hyphen preceding it. For God’s sake I learned to write a check in the mandatory “Family Life” class they made us take in 9th grade, and they were already out of style then. Get with the times, get hip, save yourself the processing costs. You are the sole bill I can’t auto-pay online. So anyway, tonight I paid it… some $200 of back-owed fees. It’s a wonder the nice garbage men still collect at our curb and we get fresh water when we turn the tap.
New music, let’s see… what am I listening to? As I mentioned yesterday, this Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! album is great. Funny thing is, I checked their webpage – and their most recent show was with a band called Dirty on Purpose, which I immediately recognized as a name I’d seen before. Turns out Ben’s bro’s band, the also-Brooklyn-based Autodrone, has played with Dirty on Purpose several times in the past. While doing this research, I learned that Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! played a show in NYC this past Monday – the very day I was in NYC bumming around with nothing to do. That Knitting Factory must be a popular place, I see Autodrone and Dirty On Purpose have also played together there before, and apparently the ‘drone were set to play there this weekend before the avocado incident. Hindsight is 20-20 y’all. Anyway, back to the Clap (chuckle) – you have to, must, just gotta check out this track (Flash required). In other tunes, I also grabbed the couple new tracks from the post-Unicorns outfit, the Islands, since PF tipped me off. Not bad.
Hey. I just realized I never ate dinner. I mean, I had several handfuls of Wheat Thins around 6pm, but… that’s not really dinner. Man, I love some Wheat Thins. But now I’m sitting here and it’s 11:30 and on TV Barney is talking about mozzarella pizza in Mayberry… and I’m hungry, I want some food. The smart man would ignore this and go to bed – sleep is a sure-fire cure for hunger. But me, I’m rummaging through the pantry… considering a can of Minestrone soup… or maybe some Rice-A-Roni. I think I’ve settled on the Minestrone, Sharaun’s reminding me, “It’s eleven-thirty at night baby,” yeah… I know. I’m hungry.
Independence Day holiday in the USA this weekend, don’t expect posts Monday or Tuesday, if the come they will be unexpected.
Goodnight.
Also written on this day...
- far from over - 2019
- salvaging the harvest - 2010
- to ease my conscience - 2008
- if you could sit here in this room - 2004