It's 1 am. In 6 hours, I'll board a plane to begin my two-week trip to Africa. I'm sitting in my office because I don't have internet at home. I biked here, because I decided to celebrate the imminent departure with a bottle of wine (a la nop.bot), and it's roughly 10,000 degrees outside in Tucson (yes, even in the middle of the night), so I'm dripping with sweat.
I find it easier to just stay up all night when I have to fly somewhere far away beginning early in the morning.
#2: okay, I have a story for you. wait, I should wait until you get back...
me: [assuming/hoping it's about a girl and grinning] umm... what?
#2: all right, I'll tell you know. so this friend of a friend of a friend, their grandfather studied birds in africa.
me: [realizing that it's not about a girl and I'm an idiot]
#2: so he gets kidnapped while he's there! it's by some tribe, and his family tries to get help, but the government isn't helping. finally, they find some official who will help ransom him back, and they pay like $2 million to get him back safely. he lived, but he was really sick for the rest of his life.
Mostly, I'm nervous about successfully meeting my friend in Johannesburg and getting eaten by hippos on our dugout canoe safari in Botswana. But I think it'll be okay. Today I bought a guidebook to Southern Africa, which I will read on the plane while I'm not embroidering my messenger-bag-patch.
I've been in need of an adventure. Let's see how this does.
(Pictured above is ginny, who recently departed on her own 3-month adventure to China. Of course, it's far more complicated than that, but I'll let you make your own assumptions.)
Song of the Day: Dispatch - Open Up
Tom Walbank, Al Foul, and Bob Log III (pictured above). All at Plush, my favorite bar.
We tried to explain how awesome this show was to someone who just moved here to Tucson...
#1 draft pick, bitches: best show in tucson, ever
me: well, calexico puts on the best tucson shows...
#1 draft pick, bitches: no. bob log is the greatest ever. and so's al foul. and tom walbank.
me: ok, maybe the 3 of them all at the same show together supercede calexico... but it's close.
#1 draft pick, bitches: whatever. You love Live.
In any case, it kicked ass. We could all use more helmet. I highly recommend that you check out Bob Log's videos on youtube. Most of his songs begin with ok: i'm gonna play this faster than the human mind can comprehend, or this song is perfect: everything that happens in this song is supposed to happen... damn, my shit is perfect... but you can't really understand him anyway, and he rocks out on the slide guitar.
Once again, everyone in Tucson was there. Oh, the vicious, vicious circle.
Song of the Day: Bob Log III - This Song is Perfect (Again)
I use my cell phone as an alarm. When I was setting it to try to get to work before noon, I discovered that I have two random voice-memo thingys on my phone, among my custom ringtones (which I uploaded using some internet tool, rather than the expensive ones offered by the cell phone company). I have no idea how to record things on my phone. How the messages got there is a complete mystery to me: but a gloriously self-entertaining mystery at that (i.e.: an [action]-story).
The 2nd of these is the saucy brute giving me advice about a girl. I explained this to nop.bot, and...
nopbot: July 8, 2006!
me: what??
nop.bot: that's when it happened. there was a bbq, and that's when [saucy brute] was giving you advice about [...]
I was impressed. And he's probably right that I was getting girl advice on that date. But unfortunately for nop.bot, saucy brute and I have "girl talk" (as she calls it) probably once a week or so... and I can't blame him for picking the wrong occasion.
The other one was a recorded phone conversation... apparently nop.bot called around noon on a Saturday and my girlfriend-at-the-time answered the phone. Only his voice is recorded, but there's some discussion about living in sin.
I highly support having random recordings of my life resurface in the future.
Song of the Day: The Shins - Those to Come
My birthday, and day 2 of the Nopey & Action Birthday Extravaganza Week. Wizard's Staff at Che's. In the photograph above, you may observe our grand instruments of magical compulsion. (The wizard with the longest staff gets to tell everyone else what to do.) While I was slightly disappointed that I was the only one who dressed according to the highest level of theme, at least several people showed up in theme-1 bandanas.There was muc
h wizard naming (i.e. Thuggothreenut, Rockoccolicious, Doc Cockulus, Carbonaut, etc.) and other assorted waving about of our glorious PBR constructs. I spent some time as the grand-master wizard, and thus was able to successfully deflect the nefarious wizard Felchencracken (at right) and his foul attempted namings.
Meanwhile the wizard Vomitus Inducius:
VI: hey [action], you want a shot?
me: uh... [pointing to my stack of 8 PBRs]
VI: all right, I'm buying you a shot!
Shortly afterward, Felchencracken finished his ninth PBR and I became known as Santorus Slurpus (left). It's a rough life, alas.
Final count: level 10 wizard, along with 2 shots. I also saw St Vincent, but I honestly can't say if the show was good or not. (Blue [above], who remained sober, said it was all right but kinda weird; while nop.bot, a solidly drunk level 8 wizard, said it was the worst show he's ever seen). Then blue met susan (my paddle), we talked canoeing for an hour or two, and I forced her to leave with Moby Dick.
Wizard's Staff may be the greatest drinking game ever.
Song of the Day: Neil Young - Keep on Rockin' in the Free World
Nop.bot's birthday, and day 1 of the Nopey & Action Birthday Extravaganza Week. The saucy brute and the diamond hosted a barbecue, complete with always-delicious saucy brute cakes. My favorite gift was the bottle of wine and box of chocolate meant for nop.bot and I to share (at some future man-date, I suppose).
me: I feel a little like I'm being taken advantage of, I mean, being drunk...
ginny: well, doesn't that come with the territory?
later:
me: hey, how do we figure out [an embarrassing personal attribute of a person not to be named]?
ginny: what!?! why do you want to know that!
me: umm... because we're awful people? there's sort of a bet, I mean, uh...
ginny: oh, I'm totally judging you. see this? I'm judging you now. this is my judging you look.
Song of the Day: CAKE - Open Book
I got this wedding invitation in the mail today. Not only was it personal and hand-written, but the bride-to-be also included a drawing of our favorite childhood animal. Best wedding invitation ever.
It was, however, a mistake to tell this to all the other bride-to-be's I know that are getting married soon.
Song of the Day: Elliott Brood - Riding in Time
I'm almost finished putting together my satchel-bag. What remains: the shoulder strap, the buckles (for which I'm using biners), some hemming... and a big fun patch for the flap. Above is basically what I want the patch to be. Problem is, I can't find such a patch anywhere I've looked. (If you know where to find it, let me know.) So I think I'll have to make it myself. Saucy brute took me shopping at a fabric store, and I think I've managed to get most of the required materials. And I think I'll get #1 to draw the template onto the fabric.
Now I just need to learn how to do the actual embroidery.
Song of the Day: Bouncing Souls - Kate is Great
