So little to speak about!

Well I have been lax in posting duties as you can tell and how much has happened in the interim! Good god, a new era has been proclaimed: Novus ordo seclorum has been proclaimed dear friends! I must admit that I am more impressed by our new president than I thought I would be. No so much because of his actual policies but more because of his ideas about governance! Almost the instant he was president he was to narrow the power and scop of the presidency. A clear repudiation of Bush's policies and philosophy about how the president should govern is underway as we speak. I am also ready for my tax cut though it will have little impact on my paycheck I am also a fan of that J.G. Wentworth spokesman's line, "It's your money. Use it when YOU need it!"
But enough of all of this. Things go well here. My roommate got a dog that hates me and the first inkling of spring is upon us. More to follow...

So I am back from the outdoors...

Well, I went out into the great outdoors and I have returned. It was great. Really. Fucking. Cold. But GREAT!!! I realized that while I am not a billy in real life it is fun to play one on TV. The best part was the silence. I took along a very old friend. A friend that you can have conversations with without talking. So while we were splitting wood, stoking the fire, reading, hiking, etc I could look at him or him at me and exchange a thought and not disturb the silence of the those processes going on around us. We eventually got back to camp and started cooking. I had a windup short wave radio and we listened to A Prairie Home Companion and then whatever nonsense came on NPR after that until 11 when the jazz came on. Then of course I had to put on classic country. Tammy and George. Willy. Merle. Dolly. Sitting there drinking Chivas and a few Guinness Extra Stouts. It was great. The moon was huge. I admit that I was really cold that night but luckily I had enough whisky that the first few hours I actually slept and didnt wake up freezing my you know whats-its off until about 4. Then at the crack of dawn it was time for coffee with Baileys and Weekend Edition. Yes, you can be a billy-cracker-ass-mofo and still listen to NPR. Damn it was awesome. I admit I do not think that Simon Critchley's work has ever been consumed around a camp fire in Arkansas but I do like to think that I can get my name in the record books for that. Self-involved philosophical camping that sounds mildly Brokeback Mountain-esque... Gotta love it.
And then we shot guns.


On a more somber note: I went to go see the doctor last week and it turns out my cholesterol is bad. I admit that this is not too terribly surprising as I almost seem to take sport in destroying myself but this time it turns out I am actually doing some irrepairable harm. So I have actually taken upon myself to do something about it. I have been experimenting with cutting pork and beef out of diet (or at least cutting almost all of it out ) and in doing so I am discovering how much I love fish. I made a simple spread today of sardines, lemon juice, black pepper and garlic with a touch of olive oil. It turns out that sardines are rich in Omega-3s and nutrients and because they are small do not have that much mercury in them. It is pretty delicious. I would recommend it. It is also cheap: an added benefit. But I suppose that this all boils down to the that crisis of grappling with my own mortality. That I too will someday die. I do not think that I was ever unaware of it but that Heideggerian concept of the closeness of death (possibly his sole great addition to western thinking) has really snagged me. So green tea, fish, and a sense of finitude it is for me...

So I have time to dash off a quick blog post...

So I am finally getting the hell out of this town. I am almost done packing for my camping/quiet/gunshooting/chivas drinking trip. It is well earned after this week I can tell you. I will be sure to put up pictures to remind you all about how awesome the sticks can truly be.
We will see how things go... If I am not back in 2 days time please send a St. Bernard with lots of liquor looking for me.
xo

So I have been derelict in this blogging business

But here I am in 2009 busting it out big. Yes, I feel that this shall be my year of raising myself up from lost-psuedo-intelletual redneck to a psuedo-intellectual redneck with some sense of direction in my life and preferrably also a lighter psuedo intelletual redneck with some sense of direction in my life. Yes boys and girls an honest appraisal of my girth has brought me to the conclusion that I am fat. Now, I am not sad about this in a way that most might be. I have not resigned myself to a steady diet of only camel lights and diet coke. No, I have not even considered pilates or yoga. That is all silliness in my eyes. Spirtuality and the body? Poppy-Cock. What truly motivates me is not even a fear of death (which there is an inordinate amount of floating around me these days). I suppose it is simply that one should live well and that does not include weakness of the kind I worry about it. But this is a work in project and there will be updates as they arise...
I have no lists to share here. I made a list of sorts. It was a list of predictions for 2009 but it was in a letter that I sending to a friend of mine tomorrow so tough titty as they say on that one. I will point a few high points of 2009 but it is not numbered or scored in any fashion but you should think about them none the less. My friends' band The American Princes put out a record this year that was amazing. It was so amazing that it beat out every self-involved doofus who put out a record this year (and some truly talented people as well) on Magnet's top records of 2009. It is called "Other People" and it is truly a great album. Also we had the movie "The Dark Knight." While no Frank Miller tale (whose on box office attempt was terrible!) it was pretty solid and reminds me of why I love that crazy psycho/socio-path in the black cape. As to the death of Heath Ledger or any other famous person this year I have no comment and I am sure if you asked them they would declare 2008 a total bummer.
2008 was also the year that I think as far as my thoughts go I came into my own. The interesting mix of NYC's love of the post-metaphysical and my discovery of the American Pragmatic tradition of anti-metaphysics coupled with my own profound love and respect of Democracy and hate of bull-shit coalesced into some twisted thinking but one which I am in love with and can truly call my own. I have to give credit where it was due here. To those great and far more adequate thinkers whom I am lucky to call my friend I bow. Time spent at parties, on Bushwick roof-tops, front porches, and in at least two bars spent gave me my greatest insights ( Though that bald guy and that guy who kinda spits when he talks were pretty fucking good too). A lot of thinking was worked out with you over tequilla shots, beer, crawfish, whiskey, malbec, PBR, pigs ears with blood sausage and beans, gin and tonics, whisky, Camillo Punch, biscuits and gravy, that awful white stuff, solaplexis punches, naked back flips, drop kicking of trash cans, and much, much, much, much more booze. And those people and these things were as important to the process. I think that is what willd 2008 will always mean for me. I wonder sometimes if I ever write a book if the words will smell like Whiskey and 13th Street?
Read the Comic Book DMZ. Great.
I make no predictions for 2009. I would say that things cannot get any worse but I know damn well that is not the case. But I think the situation is more in our hands than we would like to believe. I was watching this DVD tonite. It was that bald guy of previous mention having a chat with this French guy. The Bald Guy says that our modern notions of governence seem to make us think we have no place in process and this leads to European Buddhism or something sorta odd and smart and ridiculous. Well, I think that instead of politics of this that or the other we should, I don't know, get involved with the politics presented to us. But alas. Who knows. I am going to do a little bit more and see where that gets me and the rest of you.
But I am going to name this drink I am having right now the 2009: equal parts Perrier and Chivas, a squeeze of lime and a dash of fuck-all and doom.
Cheers!