But what’s very weird to me is seeing her re-arranged rowhouse.  While the couch, chairs and TV set have been replaced a few times, the arrangement of the furniture in my grandmother’s house has remained unchanged since I was born.  Seriously.  Even before my parents were married, according to photos I’ve seen.  Now, the dining room table is gone, and there’s a bed there.  Large wooden things have been moved around, and the plasma TV my least favorite uncle bought has been ignored in favor of a smaller TV closer to the bed.  It looks like a different house, and it signals something sinister to me.

That my grandmother is on her way out, not a pleasant thought.  Nor what that means for my mother, her brothers, the ton of grandkids and greatgrandkids.  Not a pleasant thought at all.  I don’t really know what/how I think or feel about the downwardly-sliding situation.  I am really trying not to do either of them.

I do know that it’s frustration to be able to do nothing.

Hon Fest this year was kind of boring for me, though.  It was the same thing as last year.  Even more ignorant county yuppies, too.  Not all people from the county and not all yuppies/buffies.  It’s a special brand of white asshole who walks with zero awareness of other people (just how they drive, which is scary as hell); wears special boring white people clothing that you can only find outside the city limits; displays a sense of entitlement to own Hampden because they went to Cafe’ Hon once — at night!  “Look, Chahllles, the city’s not so frightening!”

I think that a large part of Hon Fest’s popularity is that it’s an excuse for white people who fled the city to come back to it in a way that they feel is safe.  Hampden is still mostly white, and most of the people at the festival are white, too.  Don’t think pointing out a minority you saw this weekend proves me wrong.  I said “large” and “most”!  And I’m only half kidding.

Personally, I don’t enjoy celebrating Hampden’s “heritage” in itself.  The Hon stereotype comes from a lack of money, education (if you say “lack of class” I’ll kick your nuts!) and exposure to other cultures.  If you’re actually from Hampden, you know that the neighborhood’s non-Hon heritage involves racism, punks and blandness, underneath all the things Cafe’ Hon allegedly celebrates.  The only thing to celebrate about Hampden’s past is that it’s gone.

Instead, when I celebrate anything about Hampden, I celebrate what’s new and better about it and about The Avenue.  Places like Atomic Books and Atomic Pop, Salamander Books, Common Ground, Dogwood, Golden West, bike racks, a night life, people who aren’t all white — these are things worth celebrating.  This is all much preferable to the shithole Hampden was in the 80s and early 90s.

Yes, it was a shithole.  If you don’t know that, that’s not my fault.  You weren’t here.  But it’s true.  What’s also true is that Cafe’ Hon didn’t save anything on its own, no matter how much that gets repeated.  It took a lot of people and a lot of business owners to make that happen.  I’m sick of seeing one person get all the credit, and someone who lives in the frikkin county at that.

You should be aware that you broke two laws this morning.

First, in Maryland, pedestrians have the right of way.  That is why there is a big fucking white walkway that you can even see from the vast heights of your SUV seat.  There was even a sign there to remind really really stupid people of this fact.  There’s even a picture on it in case you can’t fucking read.  You are not allowed to drive through a crosswalk with a pedestrian in it, especially not gunning the engine because little pedestrian guy made you slow down.  I am well aware that I walked right in front of you as you turned into the driveway by ten or twenty yards.  That’s my right, wanker.

Also, in Maryland, it is illegal to blow your horn at pedestrians.  People turn around, look at you, and walk into more assholes who ignore people on foot.  Even though you did wait until after you passed and even though all you managed was a pussy little horn pump.  (SUV, sissy little horn pump, guess you’re compensating in a way so classical it makes me sick…)

I thought about going to find your car on the back lot where you were headed and leaving you a nasty note.  Then I saw your Assholemobile out front, where you found a nice spot near the door.  I even thought about waiting for you to come out so that I could tell you that you are, in fact, an asshole.  But, nah, too many nice folks milling around for me to ruin their mornings making a scene.  You did look small in that vehicle.  I’ll bet I could take you.  Besides, salmon colored polo shirts don’t make you look very tough.

And in case you were wondering, yes, that gesture was me giving you the finger in front of old people.  I hope you get a fucking ticket twelve times today, even though the PoPos can’t ticket you for being a douchebag, in which case you’d probably lose your license.

Love and kisses,

This Dude

I had a burned face from a very hot and pretty immense fire that some teenagers we were leading built.

They put extra stumps in the center of it to make it burn longer, because one of them didn’t lift a finger to help and was assigned to put it out.  They were getting revenge on him for his always-lazy-ness.  He did wind up proving them right when he threw a hissy fit and kicked something when he had to put the fire out after he tried very hard to get out of it.  I mean, it’s easier than finding, cutting and stacking wood.

On one hand, I was proud that they stuck together and glad that the person who always manipulates the rest of them and gets out of doing anything he doesn’t want to do got a small portion of what was coming to him.  The whole thing smelled of justice.  But on the other hand, I was disappointed at their revenge impulse.  There were other ways to get him to work, though I can’t think of them.

Mostly, though, I’m afraid I might have instilled this revenge instinct in these youngins.  I hope not.  They are some nice people.

Friday night, I used my cell phone as an alarm clock.  I wanted to get up first, get a shower, make coffee, etc.  I had it inside my sleeping bag so as not to wake anyone else up.  But when it went off, I was on top of my arms, which were asleep and numb.  I could not move them to shut the dang thing up.

Maybe I’m the only one that thinks this was funny.

I damaged a few pieces of gear this weekend, which usually drives me batty.  But I didn’t really care.  Could it be that I am getting closer to relating to my possessions like a normal person?  At least, the utilitarian ones?

I figured out the source of the bruise on my rear: when I kept falling on top of my metal flashlight during a skit about beans.  The flashlight looks like it got run over by a small car or several bikes from my big butt hitting it repeatedly on top of rocks.

Come on, that’s funny.

Bikes locked together at the Ecofestival a few weeks ago.  Mine is on the right.

Photo Friday: Difficult Shot.

I follow religiously every morning.  Yesterday, this almost made me cry.  Getting sad over the death of a cartoon character might make me suck, but remember that watching “The Simpsons” is — as one family member has pointed out — like a church or mass or some such act of devotion for my brother and for me, doubly so when we are together to watch it.

I mean, I think it’s only logical.  “The Simpsons” is probably the greatest thing to be invented since bikes, even better than Dunkin Donuts or pain medication.  Watching it whenever you can just makes sense.  It proves that, despite my walking into things and spending my adult life in school, I am not a complete idiot.

You should love the Yehuda Moon comic and “The Simpsons” — prove your worth, I say.  (And buy me a shirt while you’re at it.)  I mean it.

“Yes!  My @#$%ing finger has been hurting all day.  Is it your index finger?”

“My right one.”

My left finger was hurting yesterday, like it got crushed in something.  And, while I am clumsy, I know I didn’t crush it in anything.  Both our fingers hurt, for no reason.  His left, my right.  So I have to call our middle brother this weekend to see if both of his hurt, in an act of brotherly symmetry.  How creepy and…connecting that would be.

Frikkin cosmic.

Here’s to hoping they will celebrate with a bike ride together. Nothing beats the stress from everything that’s happened in our family in the last three weeks like some nice cycling. My father has some sweet new fenders I get to install for him today at his house. And a rack that I hope fits. My mother’s trike has custom fenders and a huge basket. Can you say PICNIC?

I feel like I should have something more to say about the thirty year mark. But I’m not even that old yet and can’t really understand it. Awe is about all I can muster.

I mean, the whole “green” thing was hot last year. It’s hotter this year. Like a lot of people, I was worried that it was just a fad. That the fixie crowd would ditch their bikes, that organic food would dwindle again, that hybrids would get fewer and uglier. But it seems like it’s either a long-living fad or becoming the norm.

My initial concern is that I’m losing some cool factor. Recycling and buying recycled goods are getting mainstream enough that I’m not that awesome for wearing a recycled steel necklace and junk. Lots of people in Baltimore brave the traffic and the hills to cycle now. But this is something I’m happy about. I mean, “the more, the merrier” applies here as much as it possibly can. With my windows open on University Parkway, I constantly hear freehubs and old freewheels clicking by. I want to cheer everyone on, but there are too many. So I stick to yelling at joggers who ignore the empty sidwalk to run in bike lanes.

My other concern is that we’re all going to half-ass any green efforts. Ooooh, there are some recycled Coke bottles in my shirt. BFD — what are your jeans made of? Too much of the green craze revolves around buying shit, which is largely how we started messing up the planet so much anyway — material showing-off. [My TV is on because I wanted to hear a weather report and not get too into NPR to do what I need to do this morning. Ed Norton just said that plastic bags are the stupidest things we are doing. Hey, dude. Yeah, you. Heard of cars?] I know; I do that, too. I’m just saying. Driving a big SUV pretty much cancels out most of what else you do for the planet, doesn’t it? I mean, seriously, look at how much of your carbon footprint your car is, even hybrids, which are made of the same junk as any other car before you even buy them.

Off my high-horse now because everyone I know has a car. So at least I retain some of my awesomeness, being the only (aside from my wife, of course) intentionally car-free person I currently hang out with or am related to. [Though Mr. D has gone mad car-light with The Mule and pedals around town constantly.] And I don’t pretend that environmental issues are the only reason I went car-free, either. A large part of that decision was my own neuroses.

I don’t mean to insult anyone, and I totally get some bummed rides all the time. Don’t send me hatemail because you love your car. I realize that my bike was made overseas, that my pedals, lock and tools are covered in vinyl, that the metal and plastic on The Duke didn’t grow on trees. I know my own shortcomings, too, like non-recycled, imported notebooks, my fleeting weakness for French bubbly water, my Tevas, my fondness for cheap pens in spite of my collection of Goodkinds, my failure to remember travel mugs, etc. Very verily etc.

But I’m not the only one with a long way to go.