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.

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.

Dan’s wheel was wobbling and hitting his brake arms. What the frikk?

We decided to walk the four miles home, rather than risk an injury or further damage. Dan was afraid that the heat of the descent warped his rims. I thought maybe he snapped or bent an axle. I mean, I can true a wheel like a sumbitch (for not getting paid to do it and having very little experience, that is). But I didn’t have any spoke wrenches on me.  We got home fine, though, and all was well.  I ate half a pizza for dinner.

Talked to Dan Sunday, and he found the problems. Bent axle, but also a snapped spoke. It was still attached to the nipple (huh huh huh), so we didn’t see it. No prob! We hit the shop, bought a spoke and went about getting it on. The freewheel was being a bee-otch and had to go into the bench vise.  The lockring tool had to, that is. That took a while. But then it came off, got cleaned up, Dan put the spoke on, and I got the wheel nice and trued up.  Working on bikes is a hell of a lot of fun.

Also, I was introduced to Lava Soap. Awesome.

[Also for Photo Friday: Professional.]

“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.

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.

My grandfather was buried Friday morning. Countless people that I care about came to the viewings and the funeral. It sounds stupid to say that you don’t know how lucky you can be until something bad happens and all that. But there you go. My family and myself — we have some very good friends, and we are very lucky in that department.

I didn’t get a chance to say “Goodbye” to my grandfather at the viewings Thursday, so I went up to the open coffin to do that Friday when we got there early. Most of the people there were family from his dead beast-bitch of a wife (sorry, Pop). As I was standing in front of the coffin with my wife, some fried-haired bitch of a woman came up and stood behind me. The room was practically empty. But she needed me to move. Right then. That’s the way things were with that damned family. People who were not a part of it but wanted a place in the will pushing the real family away. I don’t think that hag even knew who I was. She had a cross pendant dangling in her low-slung cleavage, too. I thought that was some kind of symbolic image, but I’m not really all that sure how exactly. I spent the rest of the events trying to catch her eye and give her a dirty look, but she’s not the eye-contact kind of person.

Pig’s family was and is just a bunch of tacky gimmees, nasty people with no tact, no manners, no decency. And, now, churchy types who don’t even know what religion they are even though they supposedly go to church a lot. Seriously.

Worse was the pastor. He was the same idiot who professed a deep understanding of people at Pig’s funeral in 2006 but then said oh-so-many untrue things about her and her life. I saw him at the hospital a few weeks ago. He made a point of telling Pop how busy he was but how he wanted to see him. My grandfather donated a travel-Eucharist set ($900 we were told by someone who really seemed interested in how much money Pop had) for folks who wanted to receive Communion but can’t make it to church, a nice thing to do, really. Did Pastor Dick bring it with him to Pop at the hospital? No. I guess he was too busy. Anyway, there Rev. Asshole was, making us all pray, holding hands. He held mine. Too tightly. For ten minutes. When I saw him leaving the potty Thursday, he didn’t say anything to me. He walked to his car at technically, Catholics.

He was mad that the funeral was at the parlor, rather than his hillbilly church. It was Pop’s wishes to not go to the church. Going from the parlor to the church to the grave for Pig was a circus, and he didn’t want to repeat it. So Fr. Jerkass took it out on us all with a long sermon about bullshit he didn’t understand. Apparently, Pig and Pop were “people magnets” because of their faith. I know better. Pig was a magnet because she put on a pity play and took people captive feeling sorry for her pathetic ass. Pop, well, because he was too nice to people he barely knew. By the end of the ceremony, I had twisted, torn and sweat on my double-programs until they were in two pieces. That this man spoke for any God and any faith made me want to cut the brakes in his land yacht (because you need an SUV with all the options to make housecalls, yes) and watch him fall into some kind of hellfire somewhere and probably get my 72 as a reward.

I took great pleasure in telling these hillbillies that I live in THE CITY. And I am not the only one who enjoyed their discomfort when some black members of my family and friends arrived. Stupid crackers.

I am probably a horrible person for writing all of this. I don’t think they have the internet, though, so I doubt they’ll ever find this. Plus, you know, I cover my tracks pretty well.  And it’s all true anyway.  I didn’t do any of this stuff.

After the ceremony at the grave, the priest was making his “I’m sorry” rounds on his quick escape to his huge SUV. (He was first to leave.) I turned my back to him in the hot sun and in my black suit when he headed in our direction.

I am kicking them in the junk.

Why is it Okay to make fun of me for not having a job just because the Mrs. has one, and the bills get paid? What? Oh? It’s not. Yeah. It’s rude at best. Mean on average. It’s not as if I like not having a job.

And the education: making fun of. “All that education and…” Can you mask your jealousy and/or insecurity a little thinner? Yes, I went to a lot of school. Yes, I have a lot of non-practical knowledge. Yes, I read a lot. Yes, I think about things a lot. You know, this might be more of a good thing than a bad thing. I would be a jerk to make fun of people who didn’t go to college. But I don’t have a chip on my shoulder wherein I have negative thoughts about people without stupid letters behind their names. So I would have to fake it to make it up. Maybe I have anti-higher-ed tendencies at times*, but those come from experience, not insecurity and/or jealousy.

Of course, there’s the defense when someone calls me “college boy” that they are just kidding. Joking. That I’m too sensitive and can’t take a joke. Like insensitive people’s required standard of sensitivity means anything to me.

Well, fine. My kick in your crotch is a joke, too. Don’t be so fucking sensitive.

[* I am told.]

Maybe even when he is fictionalizing his “stories” he was still honest to some degree, more so than one would believe when I started writing this post. Maybe he was a complete liar. I don’t know. Either way, you should still definitely check out this book. Or anything else by Chatwin you can get your hands on. I found this book, first edition, sitting on a stack when I walked into Normals one day this fall, after looking for that book for a long time. I exclaimed out-loud, “I’ve been looking for this! It’s like it was here just for me.”

But now I am restless. Very. When I read the first essay last week, I went shopping when I was pretty sick (and got sicker) because I could not stand the idea of staying home all day after reading something like that. Is that sad? I have finally gotten around to filling in a travel journal from our research trips in fall 2006. They were a bit of a pain at the time, when I was trying to get a dissertation written. But now I wish I could go back to New Haven for another chilly Friday morning wishing I brought something other than sandals. Or to New York for a thunderstorm on Broadway, ducking into the largest Barnes and Noble I have ever seen. Or to Boston, within a mile of where I lived for two years, remembering all things I loved and hated about that place. Hours at my favorite cafe’ there.

For now, I have to settle for books and other people’s experiences. And, of course, remembering my own.

[Larger images here.]

Yes, people sitting in their cars with the engine running kind of creeps me out.

I looked, and amidst all the colorful lights and dingies and flingies and beep-beeps [I imagine], there he was.  Quietly winding his watch.

How strange.

Happy Valentine’s Day, from a happy little Valentine. I know, tons of people hate this holiday. It’s Hallmark, the Devil, the Man, the Machine, yes. I am sorry. But.
I don’t care.

I love Valentine’s Day.

That’s easy for someone with a soulmate to say.

I know.

I am sorry if I break your heart with my exuberance, I really am. I will give you chocolate and a hug, if you require. French press of coffee and another hug.

We are off tonight (after Mrs. P. gets off work, actually) to what I consider my (maybe not the; I don’t know) most romantic place to eat in North Baltimore, the Papermoon Diner. I went there on my first real Valentine’s Day date when I was a teenager. From there we proceeded on a double-date with my brother to watch A Pyromaniac’s Love Story, a film chocked full of mid-90s optimism and impossible romance. Too bad it’s not on DVD and that I don’t have a VCR. I own a VHS copy, which I should digitally convert and offer the world on my website until the Man shuts me down.

So many acronyms.

The Papermoon does not remind me of a person. No, it’s a feeling. I miss the 90s and our feel-good apathy and when coffee made you almost cool. Now we are all afraid and all over-caffeinated. You can get good coffee at freakin’ McDonalds. Geez. There is nothing special about drinking strong coffee after dinner anymore and knowing what’s in all those fancy drinks.

But I digress. We insisted on a $20 price limit for gifts this year because whenever we decide on no gifts, we both break that rule. Twenty bucks is for sweet presents. Thoughtful things. It was my idea for homemade cards. So I pulled out my watercolors yesterday and painted extensively for the first time in over ten years, decorating the craft paper gift wrap and making a card complete with red ribbon and superglue all over my hands. Mrs. P. made me a giant cookie card. Yum and dang.

I hope I am not the only one to have a nice V-Day.

[Also for Photo Friday: Infinity.]

Do not adjust your screen. That is in fact a photo of two copies of the same book. Baudelaire’s Intimate Journals. I received a copy of it in June 2003 when I finished my MA from an old friend. I was excited about getting to read what I wanted to read between grad programs and was generally giddy about starting my PhD program. I finally read Kerouac that summer and listened to a lot of great music.

I was in a funk often during the school year of 2002-2003 wherein I was feeling very shallow, materialist, boring and cold. I worked too hard (really, I used to do that), lusted for things like more jeans than a person can actually wear and an army of coffee cups. I tried a number of things to get myself more, I don’t know, more alive.

One of these things was that, during the spring of 2003, I read poetry every single day. I found those cool little Pocket Poets series books at the Harvard Bookstore (no relation to the school) for like $4 and built a stash. Perfect for taking on the subway, when I was underground with no people and spring to look at. I read Whitman because I always liked his work. I was enjoying Rimbaud’s younger verses, perfect for April and May. I got into Baudelaire at the recommendation of a friend, and I found something very moving.

I’ve talked about Baudelaire before.

One day, I swear I will learn French. I have that software; you know the one. I will tell everyone that it is for my eventual trip to Paris. But it will largely be so that I can read Baudelaire in French. Rimbaud, too. And watch Amelie.

Anyway, my favorite passage from this book made it’s way into my dissertation, during the chapter on enemies bringing out the best in us:

A man goes pistol-shooting, accompanied by his wife. He sets up a doll and says to his wife: “I shall imagine that this is you.” He closes his eyes and shatters the doll. Then he says, as he kisses his companion’s hand, “Dear angel, let me thank you for my skill!” [Baudelaire, Intimate Journals, pg. 37.]

With spring coming, you might want to pick up some of the books I was talking about and which I wrote about very shortly after I began blogging. Read it here. You can sometimes find them cheaply at the physical locations of Daedalus, if you’re in the Baltimore area.  My stack has grown to around twenty volumes these days, though I don’t get to read much poetry lately. Don’t get to because I’ve been reading a whole lot of fiction. I’ll dig into my tiny poetry books soon, though.

By the way, my blogging history turns four tomorrow. Make me a cake please.

Take the stupid bitch we have all heard about recently who killed a cyclist, apparently on purpose(?), while drunk behind the wheel. She was driving on a suspended license from getting caught driving shit-faced before. Wtf? Yeah, I would apologize for my nasty language, if you could tell me a better term for this, this thing.

See also the hag bitch whose car killed the police officer here in Baltimore on New Year’s Eve. It’s still not clear if she was driving(?), but why the hell did she still have possession of her car? She was arrested for not showing up in court for a drunk driving charge after the death of the police officer. They should have taken her car away when they caught her drunk driving, no? They should have gone looking for her when she didn’t show up for court. What is the lesson? That you can drive drunk in Baltimore, not show up for your court date, and you can just go about your business — unless someone kills a police officer with your car, at which time they will drag you out of your house, cameras filming your old saggies falling out of your shirt and your fried hair blowing in freakishly warm January air?

I would give up all the nice new bike lanes we are getting in Baltimore, the signs, the bike route markings, the reminders to drivers to not kill us. I would give it up if the money got spent on keeping scum like this off the road. I mean it.

Besides, I almost got hit by the same idiot who also almost caused an accident with cars this weekend — twice. Because he didn’t know where he was going. Because the fact that he did not know where he was going somehow excused him from darting out into traffic (almost nailing me), cutting people off to change lanes, stopping, darting back out of traffic (causing me to skid hard, and, damn, thank the gods I lock my arms when I stop like that, lest I would have gone over the handlebars).

I would hope that, with time, people think more about who else is on the road. But they won’t. They don’t even think about other cars. This jackass yesterday caused a problem for more cars than the two bikes he nearly wrecked.

Most* people are stupid when they are in cars. I know. I was, too. I used to sit in my car and plan out stuff to buy, think about people I hated, listen to music and drive around the country to forget problems I did not want to think about or deal with. I would sometimes get aggressive, blowing the horn at morons in Carbondale who did not stop at STOP signs, apparently one of only five people in that town who used the car’s horn. I honestly drove several times when I was too damned tired to be driving and probably put myself and other people at risk in doing so. But I was in a car, so I thought I was unstoppable. I don’t know; maybe cars only made me a jackass.

I hope peak oil means less idiots driving around in metal boxes that can kill people. We have lots of roads cyclists can use. How freakin sweet would it be to ride up 95 to Boston for my 40th birthday, in a dozen years? I like the idea of riding across the country on former highways. Sort of evokes something from Fight Club and puts me in mind of a hot-air balloon propelled by bike, so I could ride to Paris and look great when I got there. All buff and stanky and really in the mood for a nice cafe’ au lait.

[*Calm down. I said, "most."]