get it right the first time, then you wouldn't have these problems

The Mets dropped two of three at home to the fucking Braves. It's early in the season, really early, but it feels like 1990whatever - 2005 all over again. I can stomach losses to just about any other team, even the Yankees, but I take watching the Mets/Braves rivalry extremely personally. When the Mets lose to the Braves, it makes me want to throw a battery at a motherfucker.

I called my parents to bitch, but they weren't home. They called me 10 minutes later from my grandma's house to bitch about the same thing. My father used the word "fuck" liberally and then passed the phone on to my mom. She wasn't too happy about it either, but she doesn't use "fuck" too much. We said some snippy things to each other and then started laughing about it. It's only April, we reminded ourselves, we've got a whole season of aggravation to look forward to.

All day I've been putting off rewriting this cover letter and resume. I'm putting it off now too. I got some help editing it. I'm afraid of a few things: death, spiders, deadly spiders; but my worst fear is failure. Probably because I feel like I've failed at just about everything. The only reason why I'm applying for another job is because I feel like I've done poorly at this one, and another project I've had a significant hand in is struggling to survive. This doesn't make me happy. I wanted this to succeed more than anything. It still might. I don't know.

This other job seems like a good opportunity. It'll bring me back home, probably get me a bit more money, and allow me to keep doing what I like to do without a lot of the responsibility. But this folded piece of paper--the edited cover letter and resume--sitting in front of me on the desk is giving my stomach fits.

This whole weekend has been like this. A bit of a waste. I didn't do anything on Saturday. It rained all day, and I stayed in bed to read the new run of Wonder Woman comics. I only stepped outside to go to the mailbox to see if my new Netflix movie had arrived. It had. It was Art School Confidential, and I really liked it. Before that, I watched this Woody Allen flick called Anything Else. I didn't realize it was one of Allen's until I got it home. I'd only put it in my queue because Christina Ricci's in it. I liked that one a lot too, though Jason Biggs was a bit annoying. The only reason I left the house today is because my roommates invited me to go to the park. There was cheese, crackers and beer involved. This one type of cheese smelled like ass. I've washed my hands five times since, but the stench is still there. It didn't taste much better either.

I got a little buzzed at the park so we headed to Safeway for more beer. I got a bottle of wine too that I'll nurse at night before I go to bed. I also got ice cream, White Castles from the freezer section and Stephen Colbert's Americone Dream (it's tasty). All of the items were frivolous, so I put them on my credit card. I've really got to get this letter done.

how i learned to love by sitting on the toilet

Or, "Mortimer likes to watch me pee"

My lack of fondness for spiders is well-documented. I believe there's even a journal about it (other than this one, something much more academic); but much like my love for my fellow man and sex drive, my fear of spiders has begun to wane, though not nearly as much as the aforementioned.

Right next to my toilet, since returning from my trip to Vegas, lives Mortimer, a daddy long legs. He hangs from a web between the wall and the counter top and is just below my eye-level when I'm seated on the throne taking a dump. He hardly ever moves. And since I'm completely obsessive about keeping insects out of my house, he must rarely eat. Other than his bizarre hobby of watching me conduct my private business, he seems like a good enough chap.

Daddy long legses are the only spider that has made the cut as far as my arachnophobia is concerned. Mostly because they're relatively tiny, a sort of cartoon-y caricature of what a spider should look like and are almost entirely motionless. Plus, I sort of feel bad for them, because whereas other spiders got sexy nicknames like the black widow, or exotic monikers like the tarantula, the daddy long legs sounds like an old, Depression-era euphemism for a retarded circus clown that has now become frowned upon in polite conversation.

Over the past two months, Mortimer has become a sort of pet. I look forward to seeing him. He's really low maintenance too because all he does is sit there and he doesn't come looking for affection, which is a good thing because I'd probably shriek like a girl and lurch away if he ever came in contact with me. However, this week, for a couple days, Mortimer disappeared. On Monday, I figured he was just attending to spider business somewhere. By Wednesday, when he still hadn't returned, I actually started looking for him, but to no avail. I thought maybe the lack of flying insects in the house had finally starved him, or perhaps he'd found another more bountiful perch to occupy. I worried that he might have wandered into my bedroom which would have ended our friendship in bloodshed.

Luckily for both of us, Mortimer has returned, seemingly no worse for wear from his journey. He's once again hanging on his little web hoping for an errant mosquito to make a wrong turn, and I once again have someone to talk to when I urinate.

Maybe I should start going out again.

you can't cross the wall...nobody crosses the wall...

Spider-Man 3 is the best movie of 2007. I haven't seen it yet, but I don't have to. The trailers give me chills. Seriously. I think about the movie and my nipples get hard. I don't even have to go see it. In fact, I might just buy tickets to it and never go. It's already really fucking good in my head, and I wouldn't want to ruin it. That being said, there will be other movies that will tickle my fancy (I have a fancy to be tickled) this coming year. Ninja Cheerleaders for one. Also, the Transformers movie. That should be good. But the best of the bunch after The Best Movie of All Time Ever may be Stardust, based on the graphic novel by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess, both of whom I've met, so I count as close personal friends.

(OK...on a side note, here's how I think Spider-Man 3 is going to go. At first, I thought it looked like putting Venom in it would be too much, because there's already Harry Osborn taking the mantle of the Green Goblin and the Sandman as Uncle Ben's killer and I figured they couldn't do that all in one movie. BUT, then I started thinking about it: So, Spidey finds out this new supervillain is really the mofo who offed his uncle, so he seeks revenge and fucks him the fuck up. This rage causes bad feelings to swelter which opens him up to the new black suit symbiote thing. THEN! Harry Osborn is all uppity so Spidey serves him something fierce, but they were tight homies so Spidey is all bummed. He realizes the suit's making him do bad things so he tears it off and then it finds Eddie Brock and becomes Venom and then Spidey has to engage in a metaphorical and actual battle against the rage that consumed him. And he makes out with Mary Jane a bunch of times. And I'll probably lose my shit in the theater and scream "FUCK HIM UP SPIDEY!!!" I've put a lot of thought into this.)

Anyway. Stardust. Here's the trailer. It stars Michelle Pfeiffer, Robert DeNiro, Ricky Gervais and Claire Danes, who I thought was super dreamy back when the graphic novel was originally released.

In other movie related news, rumors have surfaced that Kate Beckinsale may star in the Barbarella remake.



Squee.

so it goes...

RIP, Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007).

i'm alive, if you want to call it that

Over the past month, I've had a host of interesting and wonderful and frightening experiences.

1. I went to Texas for South by Southwest, the music industry's biggest schmoozefest. I drank a lot and saw a ton of cool bands. I interviewed some of my favorite artists, including the Meat Puppets' Curt Kirkwood, who took me to his house for the interview and we hung out for almost two hours. When we were done, his brother Cris gave me a ride back downtown. It was an amazing experience to hang out and speak with artists who had made such an impact on my life and it was even more amazing that they weren't dicks to me. I also go to see them live for the first time since I'd seen them play a free show for Earth Day at the South Street Seaport in Manhattan. I think I was 14 or 15 years old, and it was the first time I was ever in a mosh pit. They put on a killer show in a medium-sized, packed club in the middle of the day. I drank a bunch of free drinks and stood in awe of Curt's guitar playing. He can just fit so much into a song that doesn't seem like it should be there; somehow, he makes it all work. They played mostly new stuff, and I found myself liking it even more than some of the old stuff, though their version of "Plateau" gave me chills. A couple days later, I got to speak with Paz Lenchantin, who in addition to being amazingly beautiful, is also one of the most talented musicians in rock music. She was extremely nice and open and I got to meet her dog. Later that night, I checked out her band and they put on the best set I saw at the festival. They're called Entrance, and if you get the chance to see them live, you should probably get off your ass and go see them. I also had to stay in a hotel room with about seven other dudes for a week. That sucked. But the BBQ was good.
2. My sister got married. My baby sister. I flew to NYC and attended the wedding in NJ. I was a groomsman and ushered my new sister-in-law down the aisle. I'm stoked that she's apart of the family now because she was really funny and can drink me under the table. It's weird having in-laws, and I'm excited that my family's larger, but I just wish I was closer to everyone to actually enjoy it.
3. I interviewed Tori Amos a couple days ago, and I was really nervous about it. It was just over the phone; in-person probably would have driven me nuts. I'm not as much a fan of her as I used to be, but when I was a big fan, I was completely obsessed. People who'd spoken with her before informed me that she was a great person and a great interview as long as you asked good questions. That little caveat got me working harder than I have in months to make sure everything went well. I read and researched and listened to albums for four days. The interview went off 20 minutes later than scheduled, which in the rock world is pretty much right on time. Tori was funny and friendly and really passionate. I was pretty happy with how things were going, but 12 minutes in, the publicist got on the line and told me that we had to wrap it up. Then Tori said, "No, I want to give him more time," which is the first time any artist had ever done that for me. I was honored. We talked for another 12 minutes before we had to wrap it up. When we were done I thanked her and said I really enjoyed the conversation, because I did. She said to me, "Well, J. You got a lot more out of me than most people, because you're so darn sweet." Swear. I giggled and hung up. Ten minutes later, I got an e-mail from the publicist that read, "Tori absolutely loved you." I added the italics, but you get the picture. I'm pretty fucking awesome.

I've spent a whole lot of time away from home and am slowly coming to grips with the fact that I don't have anywhere to go or any major thing to do for quite some time. I'm pretty bummed about it. It's hard to go through all this crazy activity and then readjust to your regular boring life. It's not helping that the climate at work is getting more and more tumultuous, and I'm not sure where that leaves me. I'm kinda nervous about it, but I've been pretty good about checking all the usual sites for jobs just in case. Nothing's really jumped out at me thus far. In the meantime, I'm trying to treat myself as much as possible, mostly in the food department because the bars are getting pretty boring. I made the best T-bone steak I've ever had on my barbecue, and made killer shrimp fra diavolo for Easter. My roommate chipped in on the latter by making fresh pasta with black pepper mixed into the flour. Afterward, we checked out this Pavement movie and I remembered how awesome I thought they were. I've had these two songs playing in my head ever since. I think it's time for a money-grubbing reunion tour, guys.


Pavement - "Cut Your Hair"


Pavement - "Shady Lane"