Author: brian

i just can’t seem to blog as daily as i’d like to this month. i will improve though. not for you — for me.

i’ve been busy though. saturday at around 4:30, only a few hours after taking my dad to the airport, we got the order to start moving. so we spent about 6 hours saturday night and the better part of sunday hauling our belongings down the street to the summer building in the new building (it’s not new, really, it’s old, and we even lived there last summer. but it’s new for now).

i did, however, quit around 7, and then make the trek a bit later out to spaceland to catch the shiner show. the first band, twig, wasn’t so great. in fact they were sort of stupid. but whatever, they weren’t as bad as that band that opened for the promise ring at least. houston, who are touring with shiner and were the middle act, were surprisingly excellent. what usually happens with a good opening band, you see, is that i think, “hey, they’re decent, i should check them out.” then i download a few of their songs when i get home, listen to them for a month, and if they’re lucky i still am interested enough to buy the cd. with this band i skipped straight to the buy the cd part and bought their cd head like a road map from the merch guy. anyway, very good band. dig the houston.

shiner, i must say, were a blast. i’m a big fan, so finally seeing them live was just great, and they had their own cool lighting and played really well, and put on a good damn show. they played a lot of stuff from the egg,which i love, but i was very satisfied when they played “the situationist” (last week’s song of the week, which i hoped/predicted then they would/should play) as an encore. their songs are just so heavy and grooving, it really begs to be heard live. and josh newton their second guitarist, went psycho with the guitar-pounding on a couple of those songs . . . oh man, it was good.

oh, and today was my first day of work, during which i had not a free minute to blog, even. so far so good, but today was just orientation which included free lunch and little work, so i can’t exactly say how great this job is yet. i can say i get the feeling they actually want the interns to do a lot and be an important part of the office, which is nice. maybe working full time will actually be fulfilling this summer (fingers crossed).

it damn well better be for the amount i’m getting paid, anyway.

see you tomorrow.

[now hearing this: houston – “waves”, from the aforementioned cd; and don’t be confused — both the first and the last track on this disc are called “waves”. i mean the second one, which is way cooler.]

been out of the loop for a couple days. my dear old dad came in thursday night (right before my last post), and i just dropped him off at the airport a little while ago. he was kind enough to drive a car out here for me for the summer since my brother wouldn’t be needing it and so i wouldn’t have to take the bus to work everyday.

having him here for a few days was strange. i’m not used to seeing my family often; even less to seeing them here in california. usually my social and family lives are totally separate. i leave this life via airplane, and arrive to my homelife, then come back here to begin my normal life again. my family’s great, i’m not saying i didn’t like having him here at all — we like the dad and mom, and it was great to see him. just a little odd. guess it’s back to ordinary again, only we’re moving apartments this weekend so ordinary will be in a different room probably starting tomorrow. oh, turbulent college life.

[now hearing this: braid – lucky to be alive. daaaaamn good. whew. so good. and hearing them say their goodbye’s and thank-you’s at the end always makes me sad.]

moving isn’t fun! why do i have to move every 8 months or less? i have to move now, and then again around the beginning of august. fuckin’ weak. and not fun, like i said before.

last night was fun though. hot damn! we went to see the promise ring/ weakerthans show and it was highly excellent. the opening band was a pain though. they were called “say anything” and they were trying SO hard and you could tell they wanted to be good, so badly… they just weren’t. the guy could not really sing and their songs were un-good. oh well.

the weakerthans, who i’d never seen before live, were just fantastic. they sounded wonderful and played great stuff. i think that show upped my respect for them another notch, and it was already at a comfortable level. tres bien. then the promise ring, who i’d also not seen before, came on and were mighty fine as well. great show, i thought. i did pick up the new cd, and some of those songs sounded a-okay to me live, but after listening i have to say i still think “nothing feels good” is their best album. it’s just the most fun to listen to, it’s that simple.

ugh. packing. well i will get back to that, but first switch off the song of the week, by the promise ring as luck would have it, is one of the very pretty songs off wood/water. it’s called “become one anything one time“. enjoy.

[now hearing this: piebald – we’re the only friends we have. a month since i saw them live and picked up this cd and it still rocks my world. highly brian-endorsed.]

i don’t think i’d had any alcohol in my system (worth mentioning — i had one drink at this thing i went to last weekend where drinks were five bucks and i only really ordered one to feel cool about being 21 and that was that) since well before spring break, if i’m not mistaken. which is weird, because i had a couple stiff drinks tonight, and you know what? it’s fun. it’s not scary and not even really that stupid if you’re not an ass about it. stay away from cars, don’t pick fights, and being dizzy for no apparent reason and speaking more freely — these are enjoyable things, i think. puking’s not so great, but i’m miles from that danger zone.

anyway, i still feel like this whole world of alcohol is new to me so forgive my childish-sounding thoughts here. i just got back from a “school’s over for the year” party and i’m feelin’ fine, so i had to, of course, jump on the blogger and put down a little cheerful musing. i can just see my little sister reading this and shaking her head at me for praising the use of alcohol so carelessly.

JUST DON’T EVER DRINK AND DRIVE, LITTLE SISTER (name withheld for security purposes), OR GET IN A CAR WITH SOMEONE WHO DRANK.

the end.

this afternoon — monday, that is — i took my last final of the spring semester. i came home a little after four and i ate the late fast-food lunch i had picked up and i was glad. glad that again, i have made a little step along the road. accomplished another little sliver of personal development or at least completion on paper of the path to a goal. good for me.

so this evening i was sitting on the couch with two of my roommates, and turned to one and said, “this is a great feeling — tomorrow, i have nothing. no work, no class. not even something looming, as in like ‘i should study for this test coming up’ or ‘i should read for that class’, because it’s over. there’s nothing. and that’s great.”

and do you know what he said to me? he said, “yeah, but we still have to pack and move later this week, don’t we?”

that bastard.

other news: waking life comes out on dvd today — tuesday, that is — but i can’t afford to buy it until i start getting paychecks in a week or two. anyone feeling generous? and tomorrow — wednesday, that is — i’m going to see the promise ring and the weakerthans. neat. first summer concert. i’ll let you know about that one.

[now hearing this: the smiths – very best of . . . yeah, so i have a greatest hits collection instead of all the actual albums, so what. it’s cheaper this way and i’m not sure if i like them enough to buy all the separate discs anyway. what are you going to do about it?]

good weekend. really good.

friday night we did make it out to spider-man, even if we had to wait for an 11:30 show to get tickets. what can i say about that movie besides wow. it was just what i wanted it to be — not a great life-changing movie, but a fun-as-hell comic-book movie. and this movie was very comic-bookish, but to me at least it was in a very good way. i liked it a lot and unless you have something against the comic genre, i would recommend you check it out. plus kirsten dunst did a good job of playing a female character from a comic book, if you know what i mean (nudge nudge).

yesterday was perhaps even better. our friends mel and josh (not roommate josh) got a new place near beverly hills, so myself and my lady and my roommate josh and future-roommate justin hopped over for an afternoon barbeque. it was to me the first afternoon of the summer, in my heart, because sitting around in the sun eating cheeseburgers and chilling with friends is what summer is all about, really. it was pretty much perfect. then we made a trip to cold stone creamery (my first) for their fun ice cream projects — if you don’t know, they take a flavor of ice cream and fold in your choice from like 30 toppings like fruits, candies, etc right in front of you — and i started off the summer with a safe bet: coldstone combo #1 — cheescake ice cream w/ strawberries and graham cracker crust. i’m going to keep track of what i get and make sure never to get the same thing twice. anyway, this trip was delicious as expected.

now it’s sunday, so i will be trying to put a bigger dent in infinite jest, which i’ve been neglecting in favor of my lady (not a bad thing), and probably writing a letter. studying, however, is not on the list of things to do; open book examinations are my favorite.

[now hearing this (and i know i forgot this the last few times): mp3 of jeff tweedy (wilco) live & acoustic singing “i’m the man who loves you”, from yankee hotel foxtrot]

i normally try to keep from posting three times in one day, but this is too good to let wait.

check out my new desktop, courtesy of kai, who definitely knows how to party hard.

this fucking rules.

today, i saw the andrew w.k. video for “party hard” for the first time on mtv2. i immediately turned it up to extreme volume, because that seemed like what this video wanted me to do, and immediately after that began laughing hysterically. “let’s get a party going!”? . . . “we do what we like and we like what we do!”? . . . oh my god, it was amazing. i didn’t even fully conceive of how hard i was laughing until after it was over, and in the moment of silence before the next video, my roaring laughter carried over into the quiet as i clutched my stomach. it was inane, and there were four guitar players for some reason, and he was pounding on a piano for christ’s sake! it was stupid and childish and completely over the top . . .

and i think i liked it. i don’t know how to feel about myself. i take comfort in the fact that at least i was laughing at it. i mean, i laughed a lot at the good old linkin park videos (i intend to get their dvd collection in the next month once i get more cash. . . heh heh), but this was like a linkin park video squared. oh man, good stuff. i downloaded it and watched it a few more times, and can’t keep from cracking up at him headbanging against a neon sign background that says “party hard”, and which occasionally reverses or scrolls right or left. jesus, that’s good stuff.

also good is spending an afternoon sitting out on a campus bench in the breeze and sunshine, and also hopefully good will be our jaunt out to see spiderman this evening.

party hard.

oh i’m getting lazy. i took my last final yesterday afternoon and haven’t been up to much of note since then. not doing nothing, mind you — i’ve been spending quality time with friends, with books, with music (some friends have invited me to help review music for a website; isn’t that a truly novel idea? i feel like there is no shortage of music reviewing on the web, but at the same time who can resist to add their opinion? and i really respect the opinions of these friends, and would like to collaborate with them. anyway, i think it will end up being good even if no one ever reads it (the site, that is), but i will put up a link once there is more to see there, in case you actually are interested. we have excellent taste, if i do say so myself . . .).

all in all i’m great right now. it’s post-difficult-finals/pre-summer-job time, so it’s all about sitting around like a bum. i’m loving it. i’m such a bum, in fact, that i forgot totally to switch the song of the week, so that switching it now will shortchange whomever i pick. so, i will pick an old favorite that wouldn’t normally get pulled out or pasted up under the normal “what i’ve been listening to a lot lately” theme for songs of the week. i think this week it will be shiner, because they are at long last touring through southern california this month. i will sadly be missing their show in anaheim tomorrow because no one with a car wants to drive down for it, and i am a carless child at this point. however, i will most certainly not miss the show in hollywood when they swing back through LA next weekend, and will finally get to see one of my favorite bands on a stage in front of me, at what i’m fairly sure will be my first 21 and over show. aren’t i old and wrinkly.

anyhow, i’m hoping to hear a decent amount of their old songs played too, because lula divinia is a fabulous album (as is starless, but i guess it could just be that i’m a fan). for example, if they throw down the situationist, a nice chunk of shiner rock action, i will be thoroughly pleased.

[now hearing this: the song of the week]

one final down the tubes. taking a class pass/fail is the best, because you only have to try half as hard as you would in a normal class and you’re still pretty much fine. it’s a fun little taste of mediocrity.

i have another tomorrow, but i’d really like to spend a little time with my lady before i study the night away. and since she’s not around right now, well, i still can’t study yet — it’s too bright outside still. intensive studying is best done in the absense of sunlight, i find.

i’m so glad it’s almost summer too. that’s made extra exciting because i’m predicting this to be the most socially rich summer of my life to date; because fortunately for me (and unlike last summer), it seems like a substantial majority of my circles are sticking around LA for the summer and without the weight of homework everyone’s ready to have fun every night and weekend. it’s going to be [grinning; nodding slowly, repeatedly] “niiiiiiiiice.”

i also failed to mention (i’m writing choppily all over the board today, this i realize) that i am about 10 days and 260 pages into the panaphobically, pirouettily, former-braidily praised infinite jest, and seeing why it could be a person’s favorite book. will suspend judgment until more days and pages have passed. i hesitate to share this and give the idea that to my feeble mind, this is the only thing noteworthy about the book (hopefully you’ll give me more credit than that), but i will anyway: the description of the ennet house residents tormenting the mental patients was a fucking riot.

yeah, the other couple hundred pages are really good too, though.

[new unoriginal feature i think will be fun to try for a while as a way to trace my personal music chronology:]

[now hearing this: deltron 3030 – “positive contact” off of deltron 3030 … this song is phat. as in, “damn, that’s a phat beat.”]