two.points.collapsing

the past few days have been the busiest all year, so i haven’t been able to sufficiently document them here. my regret is a bottomless pool.

but here’s what has been going on (so i don’t forget), all of which i will write more about soon:

friday night: participated in bizarre experiment in listening to music. loved it.

saturday: big interview, followed a day with friend, and some ping pong/xbox action with other friend. loved it.

sunday: worked on speech all day to be delievered tuesday. very stressful.

monday: another interview. rocked it. also worked on speech more.

tuesday: another interview. aced it. gave speech. more to do later including radio show and group project, but after that i’ll come back and start elaborating.

see you soon!

apparently marketing departments like to do stuff at the last minute.

here we are, with three weeks left until school is essentially through for the year, and i’m just now getting calls for interviews. got another one today, making three in the next few days. one tomorrow for a position through the LA advertising club, one over the phone on monday morning for an internship doing ad sales for the LA division of a large cable comedy network (yes, that one), and another one monday, later in the morning, to work for an entertainment marketing and promotions company on sunset boulevard. it sucks they’ve all waited until the last minute here and made me sweat, but boy would it be nice to get offers from all three and then finally get to be the one with the decision-making power, for once. you can cross your fingers or say your prayers for me if you like; but hopefully they will meet me and realize i am way smarter than most other people they’re interviewing, and so i won’t even need any luck — right?

note on above: i just noticed how the drawing is a sort-of, slightly mirror image of the little picture of me. now that’s kinda weird.

yeah. normally i really hate these, but i was surprised to discover this one existed, so i couldn’t resist.

shut up, he’s my favorite author. and not that it means much because it’s so obvious which choices go with which character.

anyway, i just like the nice little picture.

Which Member of the Endless Are You?

today is the birthday of someone very special to me. i should have shared that information earlier, but at least i didn’t forget. happy 21st birthday — go easy on the meat-a-balls.

also, this is totally worth clicking on. it will load fast, you will laugh, and that will be that, and you can be on your merry laughing, web-surfing way.

that is all for now. except, oh, i finished naked lunch like i said i would and it was good, like i said it was. just not great. started good, ended good, just too much bizarreness in the middle. the appendix on the affects various drugs have had on him was interesting though. sharp guy, that burroughs.

next up: brian’s first (and overdue) verbal intercourse with a certain nobel prizewinner, goes by the name of hemingway.

sure, it’s obscene and disturbing; but sometimes it’s strangely poetic and cool:

“two agents have identified themselves each to each by choice of sex practices foiling alien microphones, fuck atomic secrets back and forth in code so complex only two physicists in the world pretend to understand it and each categorically denies the other.”

so i’m almost done with naked lunch, and finding it probably the best of the beat poet stuff i’ve read (which isn’t much, so this isn’t a big deal), and definitely quite a trip to read, but not especially rewarding altogether. one of those “glad i read, but wouldn’t read again” types. i hope i finish it tonight, i need to move on.

see, i’m having one of my periodic reading relapses, where after reading like a delighted madman for a month or more and tearing through a bunch of books, i suddenly fall into this slump (which i’m pretty sure is also related to the budding springtime) where all i want to do is sit and stare and listen to music, or play video games. basically not read much, is what i’m saying. so after 6 days of heavy tony hawk 3 usage i think i’m going to hit the lit pretty hard again, if i can (points to me for that rhymed phrase (easily amused)). gotta keep up the pace you know, so i can tackle more formidable foes in the near future.

in other news: a nice guy named arun came into the radio studio during my show last night and said, “are you brian longtin?” to which i admitted i was, and then he told me, “your show is amazing!” or something similarly flattering. he does a sunday afternoon show apparently, and told me he saw my name on some cd’s i had reviewed or something. so, he looked me up and started listening a couple weeks ago, and he told me i did a really good show. that was the first time i’ve ever had someone personally tell me i do a good job in college radio (friends who i told to listen don’t count toward that, although i appreciate them just as much).

so apparently, i rock.

yes, you’re damn right there’s more.

i saw a squirrel on the way back from class today, which for me is a big deal, living in the old concrete jungle. i decided, after seeing this squirrel, that although living in a city is wonderful and exciting and offers so much (not necessarily this city, but in general . . .), i don’t know if i can live in city limits for the rest of my life. it definitely works for me now, don’t get me wrong. but, say what you will about the suburbs, i like the idea of seeing more green than grey. of having squirrels and rabbits frolicking in my backyard like when i was a kid. it just seems more wholesome.

so anyway, now you know i love squirrels, lets get back to bears. what? bears? actually, yes. minus the bear, that is. they opened for piebald (who i’m pretty sure will be next week’s s.o.t.w., so stay tuned) at saturday’s show, and even though i’d never heard of them, i liked them a lot. we were a little afraid because they were playing n.e.r.d. right before their set over the p.a., and we feared we’d get some weird indie-hip-hop fusion wannabes, but instead we got a really musically interesting and intelligent sound. i already told you i bought a shirt with a cute little bear, but i didn’t have enough money for both that and their debut e.p., so i will have to pick that up later. i’ve heard most of it though and it’s really good, despite bizarre track titles — especially the first song, hey, wanna throw up? get me naked.

so there you have a new song of the week, and no regret at all that i sort of slacked and left blue sky goodbye up for nearly two weeks. they deserve the publicity (yes, i do laugh after i refer to this page as ‘publicity’).

i sent in an application to this internship program with the advertising club of los angeles sometime in early march. if you get picked, they place you with an agency or with a client company and you get a full-time paid summer internship. naturally, i’ve been checking my answering machine every time i get back to my room, because this is just what i wanted to do this summer. no little red blinking light for almost a month.

but last night i got an email from them, and i have an interview on saturday (?), at 9:40am (?!?). the time may be weird, but this is excellent. how nice would it be to have a decent-paying job in a selective program (oooh, just feel the resume beefing up), doing pretty much exactly what i see myself doing after graduation?

the answer is, “wonderful, brian. good for you.”

i thought it odd they contacted me via email though. is that standard now? i don’t do a lot of interviews, i’m not really sure. i always thought that first contact was generally made by phone in good professional etiquette — but this is the age of the internet. hell, why do i care at all, i have some proof that my resume doesn’t suck and that judging from it, it’s possible to garner someone’s interest. they could contact me via singing telegram and i should be happy that i’m getting a response at all.

wonderful, brian. good for you.

(come back later for new (and 6 days late) song of the week)

three words to describe the coalesce show last night: sweet merciful crap. simpsons fans will know appropriate inflection.

the only drawback, which at least made for a bit of a spectacle, was the crazy anaheim hardcore kids doing this weird dance that involved spinning and flailing their fists out at arms length in the middle of a big circle, with the finale of doing some sort of roundhouse kick into the crowd that formed the edge of this circle. i was unlucky enough, in trying to get close to the stage, to end up forming part of the front edge of this circle. lucky enough, however, to not get kicked in the head during this little ritual that sure seemed to be directed at getting your foot as high in the air as possible and hurting someone. oddly, because i have been taking this anthropology class and learning about apes, this whole thing reminded me a whole lot of video clips i’ve seen of chimpanzees ‘displaying’, i.e. putting on an intimidation display as a means to establish dominance and status in social groups. maybe i should have videotaped it and gave it to my teacher for extra credit.

i have to say it was a really stupid thing to see people doing, though. do kids in other cities do this at coalesce shows, or are orange county kids just retarded? (mental note: i hope that question brings a lot of search engine results up for this page for “orange county retarded kids” . . . right, i am a loser).

but the show — oh man. it was pretty choice to see “what happens on the road . . .” being played right in front of me. i just hope they don’t break up again too soon.

i learned some things tonight. i learned that this band i’d never heard of called “minus the bear” plays pretty good songs. or at least they do in person — i still have to check into their recorded material to see if it holds up. i did buy a shirt with a cute little bear on it though for only ten bucks, because i thought the cute little bear would get me women. i’ll have to test that out soon.

i also learned that piebald is a lot of fun to see play rock music. i would say if you like rock music and they come to your town, you should probably spend the 11 dollars i spent to see them play. they seem really nice and were very grateful for a crowd that was so happy to hear them play. they said some sappy stuff, like “i just had one of those moments where i realized there’s no place i’d rather be,” from the singer, but you know he was smiling and having a good time and really meant it, so it was okay. i liked them.

oh, and afterwards at in-n-out, i learned that april is child abuse prevention month. you know, i’m pretty sure they’ll give a month to anyone these days. black history month, that makes sense to me. we should really set aside time to pay special attention to a culture we’ve pushed aside in the past. i don’t really actively participate, but i agree with instating it. i don’t know about setting aside a whole month to prevent child abuse though. is it that rampant a problem? are other similar problems getting their own month too? i mean, i think there should be a drunk driving prevention month because that’s totally wrong too. maybe that’s next month, i really wouldn’t know. i forgot to buy whatever calendar would have told me that this month was child prevention month, much less what the other months might be.

but seriously folks, don’t beat your children, during this month particularly. don’t beat anyone else’s children either, actually. and let them win at checkers because they will feel good about themselves.

there, now i’ve done my part for the cause. happy april.