Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

aim

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First it was purple … TVaB purple, i declared. Then there was a big to-do about whether or not you could see the side of my face at all or if it was just a puddle of three different colors of gray pixels. Then i decided to go blue, as the logo picture also decided shortly thereafter. And, of course, there is the issue of the menu, which currently doesn’t exist.

The apathy involved in this redesign amazed me. It basically got to a point where i knew there was a redesign coming, and i didn’t really want to blog until it happened, but i didn’t really want to work on it. Which, equated to not wanting to blog at all.

On April 26th at noon i was standing outside of the Electric Factory by myself; i was first in line to see Garbage. Seven hours later the line stretched out past the gate onto seventh street, and i found myself up front with a gaggle of cool people. Conversation ranged back and forth for a while, but at some point Blogging came up, as i was wearing my Blogger T-Shirt. The opinions were strong, to say the least. “Blogger… is that still around?” “Personal publishing is so last year.” “God, i think everyone i know just gave up and switched to LiveJournal.”

Suffice to say, i was definitely stymied by their quick opinions on the matter, and driving to Boston that night with three other Bloggers didn’t exactly help me to forget about our conversation. Rabi expressed shock at the proclamation that Live Journal has supplanted the Big B in functionality or usability, and my fears that my webpage had become suddenly irrelevant were assuaged by the fact that i generally drew blank stares from the gaggle when i started talking about switching to Moveable Type and how PHP & MySQL make GreyMatter somewhat obsolete. They just weren’t hard-core bloggers.

By the same token, I’d expect that they wouldn’t refer to me as a hard-core Garbage fan; i missed meeting Shirley Manson because i was on the phone with Amy trying to bribe her into coming to the show, i didn’t buy the reissued record of Shirley’s old band, and i don’t own a single MP3 of Garbage – not even their apparently hot new cover of the Rolling Stones classic “Wild Horses.” Of course, i have met (and spoken with) the entire band before, i do own a Guild Guitar signed by them, and i did collect a complete set of their B-Sides on over twenty import singles.


They are, as i like to mention, my favourite band.


My point would seem to be that everyone is a fan in a different way – i don’t read fan boards or subscribe to ‘zines, but i do know all of the chords and own (yes, own, not download) all of the songs. It’s really just like how everyone weblogs just a little bit differently; weblogging might be so-last-year for those who jumped onto the bandwagon, but for those of us who found it as a natural extension of our old decaying pages on dreadfully unreliable free servers it never “got hot” and it will never “be over.” And, after all, it’s not how big of a fan you claim to be, but what kind of things you do to prove it.


And to keep it to yourself.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/05/85065287/

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Some more links.

First, and for-sure-foremost, i wish Henry a very happy birthday! I swear, if i could sign up somewhere to eventually have a kid that precocious i’d totally get on the list right now :p

Meanwhile, the ever-educational JillMatrix provides some enlightening links on the topic of Internet Radio and Conglomerate Takeover. Though i generally tend to side with record companies when it comes to what they don’t consider fair use, i do object to the neutering of my home computer and my electronic media. Sadly, these two positions tend to conflict with each other … while i feel that the record companies have the right to object to illegal distribution of their artists’ songs, i don’t feel that rendering a compact disc unplayable by a computer or making software i use to record and upload my own songs illegal is any kind of answer. I enjoy listening to cds on my computer, i make music rather than stealing it, and i probably spent 1000% of the typical American’s yearly expenditure on albums and concerts last year. I’d appreciate it if i receive some respect with the next cd i buy instead of a stupid anti-theft thing stuck to the inside of the cd tray. Thank you.

On a related topic, Rolling Stone‘s new darling the Recording Artists Coalition has a website up to help you understand just what they’re complaining about. Headed by such industry luminaries as the venerable Don Henley and the Grammy-magnet Sheryl Crow, the RAC is looking to win recording artists more rights when it comes to being employees and when it comes to their own songs. One major point of contention is that a typical recording contracts signs an artist not for a number of years, but for a number of albums. This means an artist can wind up stuck with a record company for their entire recording career, whether or not they have the best interests of the artist in mind. Examples include Aimee Mann, whose label left her hanging when it came to her last album Bachelor No.2; after having a smash critical hit with her songs on the Magnolia soundtrack, Mann bought the album back from her company and released it independently. Even on her own she’s still having to battle labels both big and small, as this letter shows. But, back to the RAC, i find it rather amusing that they needed to run four fundraiser concerts and get biweekly coverage in RS while Courtney Love is slowly achieving what they’ve set out to do on her own.

On a slightly less musical note, ClosetBoy had a bad sitcom moment where he felt like Vonda Shepard was going to loom up behind him with her piano and start crooning. I find this amusing because today i was following Izabelle and Amy around while playing guitar and they turned around to remark “I feel like i just walked out of a break-up scene on Dawson’s Creek or something, and you’re the sad breakup music just following me out.” A year ago i would’ve cringed but, aside from the current Dawson’s renaissance, Peter Mulvey (my personal idol) was played on Felicity a year or two ago. So, who am i to scoff at the WB?

On the subject of getting effed over by corporations, the usually user-friendly DreamHost seems to be pulling a con-job on good-ol’ KevRock. Definitely a bit underhanded, in my opinion. And, in other SurvivorBlog Alumni news, why the hell isn’t Josi on my sidebar anymore? I surely don’t have a clue.

Finally, i am officially addicted to Cafe Latte Jelly Belly jelly beans. Can you argue with a jelly bean that actually has caffeine in it? Nope, didn’t think so.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75041577/

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A few days after Christmas Amy and i went to IKEA to buy various pieces of furniture, and while we were there i bought a set of four 12oz rose-colored glasses. For the entire next week, they were all i drank from.

One just broke. I have two, now. This post is about permanence, and the lack thereof.

In 1998, four years ago this week, my grandfather died. At that point in my life i had lived in the same house for over a dozen years, written a dozen songs, and had never kissed a girl. It was a day like any other; i had probably just gotten home from a late rehearsal, walking down 64th street breathless and running lines in my head. Turning the key in our flimsy front door. I remember my mother was on the couch, and when she spoke it was just like a scene from a movie. I numbly walked upstairs to my mint-green room, put on track 9, and laid on my bed.

I cried there for an hour, alone. That day i wrote the first song that i would actually go on to play for someone other than myself. Since then i have moved four times. However, it was a while before i kissed anyone.

I am an easy person to convince of things, despite high surface levels of skepticism. If you’ve been dating for a year or two and tell me you’ll be together forever, i believe you. I start angling for a spot in your wedding party. I take it on faith that if you’re used to each other and happy that nothing will ever go sour; i’ve never done it myself, so it must be possible.

I wound up getting the question about Fallacy of Ignorance right on my Philosophy final, but i might have not gotten the point.

When a couple breaks up after two years together, it’s hard for me to understand how the world will work afterwards. For me, and for them, and at large … how can i believe in anything if nothing lasts forever like it says it’s going to?

Just before spring of 1998 i wrote “I never kissed somebody so that they would break my heart” in a journal i shared with my best friend Andrea. She replied that she never much cared for Lisa Loeb. The other day i found myself singing the same line as i walked down Walnut street. It still sounds the same, but it means something different now.

My mother is taking a loan to pay off her credit cards; she wants to buy a house. I might fail a class for the first time ever, and it’s my own dumb fault. Auditions are Tuesday. I’m listening to Firecracker.

I can’t tell if things change or not. Thoughts?

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/02/9831165/

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I don’t know what i was thinking, really. First i just wanted to give Amy her Christmas present, then we were going shopping, then we were going to IKEA, and then i decided that it was a good idea because i needed a new cd shelf.

Little did i know i would come back having spent the last of my Christmas money and in possession of three brand new pieces of furniture, a 20-piece dish set, a half dozen wine glasses, four rose-colored cups, and one new skillet. One minute Amy and i were just following the arrows on the floor of the uber-decor store, and the next i was pushing a shopping cart with one hand and pulling a hand-truck with the other. But, oh, no it doesn’t end there… because, other than couches everything IKEA sells comes unassembled.


How long does it take a single college student to build a double-width shelf, a six-tiered utility unit, and a waist-high bureau? Approximately 24-hours, taking breaks only to sleep, eat, go to the bank, and watch Momento. Which, actually, was quite a few breaks. I could’ve easily worked right through the night last night, except that i had come upon the hammering bit of the shelf just as my two roommates and two houseguests came upon their sleeping bit of the night. Myself, i was wholly oblivious to any noise being made by my hammer because i had the rather large headphones from the last post on and was being soothed by the folk of Gillian Welch down to the very core of my being. So, it came as a great surprise when an especially cranky Erika emerged from my stairwell to tell me, in no uncertain terms, that the time for hammering had come and gone.

Around there is where the sleeping-break came into the picture.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2001/12/8248519/

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I had had a pretty insular week after returning from my whirlwind boston excursion, so last night Aim and i decided to head down to South Street and see the Beta Band on extremely short notice just to get out of our respective houses. It was great to see Amy again; her presence has been super-lacking in my life since she started her new job and i got back to classes. But, anyway, that’s not the point.


The point is that i returned from Beta Band to find that the roomies were entertaining at the apartment. At first it was superfun… we had a bunch of people around who i don’t always get to chat with, and i was enjoying myself. I even had a beer.


When it comes to parties i am a floater… i very rarely have a strong connection to any person or conversation so i just mingle around until i get miserable and leave. That’s my modus operandi, and it’s inevitable; eventually i’m so frustrated with my inability to be connected to anyone else at all that i wander home and go to sleep. In my own home i figured it would be different… i wouldn’t be on the outskirts of the conversations because i would be in charge… i would be the host.

I was wrong. It turns out, as soon as you amass a big enough group i immediately turn off socially (even if i’m friends with them all individually). Even before everyone started wandering away to their own cliques in different rooms i had reduced myself to tiny inserted comments and laughing along with the crowd. I endured the typical jokes which i do not enjoy, and i mingled from room to room unable to connect to anything that was happening even though i owned the lamps and cushions people were clustered around. Eventually i just locked my door, stripped off my clothes, and went to sleep to Death Cab turned down so low that all i could hear were the upper registers of Ben Gibbard’s voice intoning “highway” over and over on the second track.


It’s not fair. I refuse to have my own home be a gathering place just so i can be trapped there without anywhere to escape to. I don’t know what our social future will turn out to be, but i’m starting to think that it’s out of my hands: i don’t have any say in it, but i’m not taking any responsibility for it either.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2001/10/6485340/