I’m sick. I think I might have bronchitis. "It’s so poor and Jewish." Lenny Bruce
When I breath in there’s a "curly" sound. I’ve had bronchitis once before. When I was a kid, my family took a trip to Hawaii. I was sick inside with bronchitis the entire time. I lost a lot of weight. My dad said that I looked like I came from Auschwitz. Nice.
December 19, 2005
December 16, 2005
December 15, 2005
Employment
Job interview today. The guy who interviewed me knows about this blog so maybe I shouldn’t write about my proclivity for working naked, but this blog’s all about being honest. The interview went well so I can write such a thing. I’ve been half-employed for too long. I’ll be writing e-mail copy for an internet marketing company. This is very good news if it goes down.
One of the most numbing jobs I’ve had in my life was grading 4th grade standardized tests. It sounds like it could have been interesting but I really don’t like jobs where you get exactly an hour for lunch, if that, and two ten minute breaks, and you’re not allowed to move in between. We had to ask to go to the bathroom. It took them two hours to explain to us what should have taken five minutes. Adults shouldn’t be treated this way. At 10:00, for the first break, everyone would be watching the seconds and then run for the door. You can see people from these types of jobs sometimes, huddled together smoking with a look in their eyes like they’ve been staring at a clock for six hours. I’ve had more than one job like this, as have most people. Phone polling was another--but that was better, even when people hung up on you. This job was like taking a standardized test for eight hours, every day.
I’ve never appreciated music, listening or playing, so much as the drive to and from that job. Sometimes, during the breaks I’d go sit in the car and listen to music--I was listening to Husker Du’s "New Day Rising" and Lou Barlow’s "Winning Losers" a lot. The job was just so deadening, it made music sound so alive. I wish I could respond to music that way all the time, but feeling dead I can live without. This job prospect seems laid back. He said he was glad that I’m a writer, that my head’s somewhere else as well. Basically telling me that I don’t have to devote my whole soul to the job. So long as I get the work done, he says, he’s fine with it, which is refreshing. I want to possibly work in an office again, after being isolated at home alone. I can actually write for a living.
After that I got a job working as an editor at a trade magazine for industrial construction workers. I don’t really want to revisit that time. Let’s just say that for a few months in Wilmington, NC, I worked for Satan. A cocaine-addicted redneck who beat his wife, worked alongside his wife, and had prostitutes go into his office for hours at a time. They’d come out sniffing and rubbing their noses. His wife had this terrible scar running from her mouth to her ear, no doubt from when he hit her. They got in trouble for leaving their kids in the car in a hot parking lot, more than once. He had so destroyed his nasal passages from cocaine that he’d make this demonic snorting noise throughout the day. That’s when you knew he was back in the office--when he was gone, it was calm. When you heard the snorting noise, it was like kids thinking, oh no, dad’s drunk again. People called him "The Monster." Jesus, it was bad.
Olivia was just born during this time. There weren’t a lot of jobs to be had in Wilmington, for anyone, which is why we moved back to L.A.--also to be close to the grandparents. It worked out pretty well up front, we both got jobs almost immediately. The last few months have been harder.
I need to get a steady job--for them, and for myself of course. With the "Golden Calf" movie being developed, various things getting published, and a new job, 06 is going to start off all right.
One of the most numbing jobs I’ve had in my life was grading 4th grade standardized tests. It sounds like it could have been interesting but I really don’t like jobs where you get exactly an hour for lunch, if that, and two ten minute breaks, and you’re not allowed to move in between. We had to ask to go to the bathroom. It took them two hours to explain to us what should have taken five minutes. Adults shouldn’t be treated this way. At 10:00, for the first break, everyone would be watching the seconds and then run for the door. You can see people from these types of jobs sometimes, huddled together smoking with a look in their eyes like they’ve been staring at a clock for six hours. I’ve had more than one job like this, as have most people. Phone polling was another--but that was better, even when people hung up on you. This job was like taking a standardized test for eight hours, every day.
I’ve never appreciated music, listening or playing, so much as the drive to and from that job. Sometimes, during the breaks I’d go sit in the car and listen to music--I was listening to Husker Du’s "New Day Rising" and Lou Barlow’s "Winning Losers" a lot. The job was just so deadening, it made music sound so alive. I wish I could respond to music that way all the time, but feeling dead I can live without. This job prospect seems laid back. He said he was glad that I’m a writer, that my head’s somewhere else as well. Basically telling me that I don’t have to devote my whole soul to the job. So long as I get the work done, he says, he’s fine with it, which is refreshing. I want to possibly work in an office again, after being isolated at home alone. I can actually write for a living.
After that I got a job working as an editor at a trade magazine for industrial construction workers. I don’t really want to revisit that time. Let’s just say that for a few months in Wilmington, NC, I worked for Satan. A cocaine-addicted redneck who beat his wife, worked alongside his wife, and had prostitutes go into his office for hours at a time. They’d come out sniffing and rubbing their noses. His wife had this terrible scar running from her mouth to her ear, no doubt from when he hit her. They got in trouble for leaving their kids in the car in a hot parking lot, more than once. He had so destroyed his nasal passages from cocaine that he’d make this demonic snorting noise throughout the day. That’s when you knew he was back in the office--when he was gone, it was calm. When you heard the snorting noise, it was like kids thinking, oh no, dad’s drunk again. People called him "The Monster." Jesus, it was bad.
Olivia was just born during this time. There weren’t a lot of jobs to be had in Wilmington, for anyone, which is why we moved back to L.A.--also to be close to the grandparents. It worked out pretty well up front, we both got jobs almost immediately. The last few months have been harder.
I need to get a steady job--for them, and for myself of course. With the "Golden Calf" movie being developed, various things getting published, and a new job, 06 is going to start off all right.
December 14, 2005
December 13, 2005
Book Tour
We recently developed a bunch of disposable cameras we had laying around. Some of them were ten years old and half-exposed. Turns out the expiration date on a disposable camera actually means something because a lot of the pictures came out muddy or with a ghost-like red ring around the picture.
I couldn’t find the picture I took on September 11. I went onto the fire escape after the first plane hit and took a picture with a disposable camera. I felt guilty about it--people are dying in there--and came back inside. The picture didn’t come out, which may be for the best.
What did come out was the one and only picture I have from the book tour for Oscar Caliber Gun. I toured with John Hall, of King Missile: "Jesus Was Way Cool" and "Detachable Penis" fame. Also toured with a poet named Matt Kohn. I recently found his blogspot blog, which I’m assuming is him, unless there’s another documentary filmmaker living in Brooklyn named Matt Kohn. We toured the east coast, south, and midwest in a small red car.
That’s it, that’s all the photographic evidence I have. Glad to have at least that. It was a very fun tour--reading at coffee houses, colleges, some rock clubs which didn’t work so well because people were never quiet. John Hall was always a huge hit. It was harder to read from a novel. Personally, I always zone out at readings of fiction. I forget to listen, and then when I try to join back in, I’ve lost the thread. Instead, I asked people to call out page numbers and read a random page. People seemed to like this. Usually, people would call out "69." That wasn’t the sex scene. I read the live porn scene at a party--page 67--and people were quiet for it.
I couldn’t find the picture I took on September 11. I went onto the fire escape after the first plane hit and took a picture with a disposable camera. I felt guilty about it--people are dying in there--and came back inside. The picture didn’t come out, which may be for the best.
What did come out was the one and only picture I have from the book tour for Oscar Caliber Gun. I toured with John Hall, of King Missile: "Jesus Was Way Cool" and "Detachable Penis" fame. Also toured with a poet named Matt Kohn. I recently found his blogspot blog, which I’m assuming is him, unless there’s another documentary filmmaker living in Brooklyn named Matt Kohn. We toured the east coast, south, and midwest in a small red car.
That’s it, that’s all the photographic evidence I have. Glad to have at least that. It was a very fun tour--reading at coffee houses, colleges, some rock clubs which didn’t work so well because people were never quiet. John Hall was always a huge hit. It was harder to read from a novel. Personally, I always zone out at readings of fiction. I forget to listen, and then when I try to join back in, I’ve lost the thread. Instead, I asked people to call out page numbers and read a random page. People seemed to like this. Usually, people would call out "69." That wasn’t the sex scene. I read the live porn scene at a party--page 67--and people were quiet for it.
December 9, 2005
Hollywood
This is cool. I was getting fed up with my original book cover designer so I emailed another and asked if she’d be able to do a better version of the same idea. She sent this back. She’s expensive so I don’t know if she’ll design the cover, but I like having this.
Meanwhile…
The prettiest girl from my high school class is dating Jack Black and is pregnant. Here they are at the "King Kong" premier. This is strange. Happy for her though. I've been friends with her to some degree. Better friends with her sisters. Their father is Charlie Haden, bass player for Ornette Coleman. For a time, Charlie Haden was the jazz teacher at my high school, before a horrible saxophonist with frizzy red hair took over, just as I was old enough to join the band. I lost out in jazz band to be the "A" drummer to Jake Busey, Gary Busey’s son, who’s now also in movies.
Jack Black went to my high school. He was a couple of years ahead of me. When I was 15 I played drums at a party in a band with Jack Black singing. We played covers of "Iron Man," "Crazy Train" and others. He was really flamboyant and talented and an exhibitionist back then. I’ve wondered if there’s any video of that party that could make it into a "True Hollywood Story."
This is why I write about Hollywood.
Stanley Kubrick
Finished this last night. I haven’t seen "Eyes Wide Shut" since it came out and I’ve never read Raphael. Raphael paints himself as the most successful and sophisticated man on planet Earth, but who knows, he might be. It kind of reads like a blog--look at me, look at me!--but what’s more interesting than a blog about making a movie with Stanley Kubrick? It’s not every day that I finish a book in five minutes, so I wanted to write something about it.
There are a lot of criticisms on Amazon about Raphael’s self-absorption, and they’re right. It reminds me of a book I read by Elvis Costello’s bass player, Bruce Thomas--I can’t remember the name of the book. He’s an incredibly pompous ass. Throughout the book, he refers to Elvis Costello as "The Singer" as if Bruce Thomas is the focal point of the band, and he’s not just an Attraction. Frederic Raphael writes with a similar condescension. Kubrick is painted as fairly hapless, visionless, and directionless. It might be true to some degree. His major movies have been based on novels: Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Barry Lyndon, Lolita, Full Metal Jacket. Maybe he didn’t have what it took to make an epic movie out of a shorter piece. Weirdly, it sometimes feels like the Metallica documentary, "Some Kind of Monster"--collaborators trying to make something on the fly, when it really needs to flow naturally, out of inspiration.
There’s name-dropping throughout of both people and his own knowledge. Raphael writes things like "Stanley was Eurystheus to my Herakles…" I will freely admit I have no idea what the hell he’s referring to. He also writes, "Working for all those months with Stanley was like being in solitary confinement without the comfort of being alone" which is a good sentence no matter who he’s writing about. Perhaps he really is hanging out with John Schlesinger and "Marty" Scorsese. Perhaps it’s impossible to display your knowledge about certain things without seeming pretentious. Like, for instance, listing the number of Coltrane albums I own and listen to (last post). Maybe Raphael really does know and love all his Greek references. It gets harder to draw the line between pretension and information when you’re talking about high-brow stuff. Last night, as I finished this book, I was listening to Prokofiev’s piano concertos played by Martha Argerich. Seems pretentious to mention that, but it’s true and I enjoyed it. Raphael, though, goes overboard.
I recommend this to anyone who’s ever written a screenplay or thought about it to get a glimpse into what it might have been like to collaborate with Stanley Kubrick. For that alone, the book is worth it.
Tomorrow I’m meeting with someone who wants to direct OCG/The Golden Calf. See where that goes.
December 8, 2005
Parolee
Just finished a first revision on the novella "On Parole" and it was really damn bad. I mentioned that I haven’t read it in five or more years, and there was sentence after sentence that made me cringe. At one time, I thought it might have been the best, most honest thing I’d ever written. A friend of mine called parts of it embarrassing, but I thought he was just being a hard-ass cause he liked to do that and our friendship was falling apart during that time. But he was right. I think I can turn it into something because the basic structure is there and I like the story but it was pretty humbling. Maybe it’s better to wait five years between the time you write something and think about publishing it.
I don’t think I’m going to try and get it published at all and instead make an e-book out of it. That way I can hunt down e-book directories which is something I like to do because, you know, I’m an internet addict.
Listening to this for the fourth time in a row:
At one point I was a complete Coltrane fanatic. My favorites being this one, Jazz, Coltrane, A Love Supreme, Live at Birdland, with Duke Ellington, Crescent, Transition, Soultrane. I put them on when I want to resurrect myself. Not surprisingly, there’s a Church of John Coltrane. Traneing In sounds like fall.
RIP John Lennon.
I was eight-years-old when it happened. My brother, a Beatles fanatic--which I wasn’t yet--woke me up to tell me about it. One thing I can claim is staying inside in kindergarten listening to "Let it Be" while the other kids splashed in a kiddie pool outside. But that might have been a dream.
I’m finishing a book that I’ll probably write about tomorrow.
I don’t think I’m going to try and get it published at all and instead make an e-book out of it. That way I can hunt down e-book directories which is something I like to do because, you know, I’m an internet addict.
Listening to this for the fourth time in a row:
At one point I was a complete Coltrane fanatic. My favorites being this one, Jazz, Coltrane, A Love Supreme, Live at Birdland, with Duke Ellington, Crescent, Transition, Soultrane. I put them on when I want to resurrect myself. Not surprisingly, there’s a Church of John Coltrane. Traneing In sounds like fall.
RIP John Lennon.
I was eight-years-old when it happened. My brother, a Beatles fanatic--which I wasn’t yet--woke me up to tell me about it. One thing I can claim is staying inside in kindergarten listening to "Let it Be" while the other kids splashed in a kiddie pool outside. But that might have been a dream.
I’m finishing a book that I’ll probably write about tomorrow.
December 7, 2005
A Parent
I haven’t written very much about being a father. Last year sometime I put up a picture of O. so people could see what she looked liked. I took it down a week later because it creeped me out to have a picture of her online. The Internet’s not an entirely safe place. I’m a protective father, but I don’t think overprotective. Sometimes it amazes both of us that we’ve managed to raise a child for almost three and a half years.
A few weeks ago we were about to lose our minds. She had become impossibly demanding. "Can I have some juice, daddy," she would say. I’d get her the juice, she’d finish it, then, "Can I have some cereal, can I watch a movie, can I go to the playground?" Nothing was ever enough. I think she just liked the experience of us getting her things. It cut core to our feelings of guilt as parents--that we’re never doing enough. For a time, when she got really tired, she would start throwing tantrums and calling us stupid--a word she learned because she heard us say "Stop it," and it got transformed.
So we were getting really burnt out and were about to have a nervous breakdown. A few days later, she woke up with a better grasp of language and she calmed down a lot: she couldn’t express herself clearly and it was making her frustrated. She’s gone through many of these major leaps.
Last night we went to the L.A. Festival of Lights at Griffith Park. You drive along display after display of Christmas lights. Kind of weird and cool--very strange Christmas music was being piped in. She loved it:
Afterwards we went to my brother’s house and she played like crazy with her cousin. That night, she came into our bed at 5 am because she had wet the bed. She’s potty trained but we’ve been trying to get her off of wearing diapers (pull-ups) at night. She may have to go back for a little while longer. Anyway, I wanted to get some of this stuff down because I don’t write very much about being a Dad--even though it’s most of my life. Perhaps because it is most of my life, I use this blog to exercise and explore other parts of me. She’s perfect, we are lucky.
My wife also has a blog. You get a prize if you know what it is. I’ve never linked to it because my family reads this blog and she wouldn’t be able to be as honest if she knew they were reading. She’s an ex-stripper writing about her life. I’m really proud and impressed with what she’s done. It's been very successful and a great experience for her. Email me if you want to know what it is.
A few weeks ago we were about to lose our minds. She had become impossibly demanding. "Can I have some juice, daddy," she would say. I’d get her the juice, she’d finish it, then, "Can I have some cereal, can I watch a movie, can I go to the playground?" Nothing was ever enough. I think she just liked the experience of us getting her things. It cut core to our feelings of guilt as parents--that we’re never doing enough. For a time, when she got really tired, she would start throwing tantrums and calling us stupid--a word she learned because she heard us say "Stop it," and it got transformed.
So we were getting really burnt out and were about to have a nervous breakdown. A few days later, she woke up with a better grasp of language and she calmed down a lot: she couldn’t express herself clearly and it was making her frustrated. She’s gone through many of these major leaps.
Last night we went to the L.A. Festival of Lights at Griffith Park. You drive along display after display of Christmas lights. Kind of weird and cool--very strange Christmas music was being piped in. She loved it:
Afterwards we went to my brother’s house and she played like crazy with her cousin. That night, she came into our bed at 5 am because she had wet the bed. She’s potty trained but we’ve been trying to get her off of wearing diapers (pull-ups) at night. She may have to go back for a little while longer. Anyway, I wanted to get some of this stuff down because I don’t write very much about being a Dad--even though it’s most of my life. Perhaps because it is most of my life, I use this blog to exercise and explore other parts of me. She’s perfect, we are lucky.
My wife also has a blog. You get a prize if you know what it is. I’ve never linked to it because my family reads this blog and she wouldn’t be able to be as honest if she knew they were reading. She’s an ex-stripper writing about her life. I’m really proud and impressed with what she’s done. It's been very successful and a great experience for her. Email me if you want to know what it is.
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