Spending Sunday Afternoon With Michelle True

It's been a rainy weekend here where I live; kind of dreary out, so what's the best way to beat the rainy day blues I thought? Go out to a workshop, which is what I did this past Sunday afternoon. I'd been kind of looking forward to this one, billed as a How To Get Your Poetry Published workshop, lord only knows how hard it can be especially if you've been out of the game for so many years like I have and am now just jumping backing into it.

Make no mistake however; I am a seasoned veteran of being published in poetry journals and performing throughout the United States, so I wanted to see what exactly Michelle True had to offer with her workshop.

I'd been emailed twice about her workshop or so read the email I had received from Michelle True, which looked exactly like this:

HOW TO GET YOUR POETRY PUBLISHED
Date: Saturday, April 30/Location, Niles Public Library, 6960 West Oakton Street, Niles, Illinois Time: 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. Price: FREE!

Michelle True is a published author, poetry webzine publisher, poetry workshop leader, poetry anthology publisher, and Internet radio talk show host/author interviewer who will provide powerful tips and inside information about getting poetry published. Topics include how to make your poetry publishable, how to find poetry markets, how to submit your poetry, how to track your poetry submissions, and how to publish a chapbook of your poetry. This workshop is part of the Inside Writing & Publishing Series sponsored by the North Suburban Library System. Call the library to reserve a seat for this popular workshop! Contact: Michelle True at michelleailenetrue@yahoo.com or visit www.michelleailenetrue.com

So, I called the library and made my reservation to attend her workshop. I asked if there was any room left and a staff librarian implied there was lots of room. What confused me was the email had implied that the workshop was to take place Saturday, yet it was meant to take place today. Mistake number one!

In between the raindrops, I speed along Howard Street from my apartment, took the curve along Frontage Road, parallel to Interstate 94 and turned left at the corner and onto Oakton Avenue and hurried along to the Niles library.

When I got to the meeting room, it was fairly packed; 15 people total. I took a seat to the right of the room, not my normal side, but the left-handed side was pretty full. And there was Michelle True, talking about donating her hair for a worthy cause (well, at least it wasn't her poetry which isn't all that great either, but I'm getting ahead of myself slightly).

The workshop started kind of abruptly, yet it didn't seem like a structured workshop to me. It was more like a questions & answers session with expert mega poetry whore Michelle True, whore in the sense of everything she claims she can do or appear to do all in one blow!

What I gathered from her humble beginnings is that she was writer; well aren't we all? She said she finally returned back to writing poetry in 2003 and "it was like I had diarrhea," referring of course to her spurt of writing poetry.

True explained that she was at first an impatient person and didn't have the time to wait around for journals to let her know whether or not they planned to use her poetry, so she just decided to go into self-publishing, though I don't know if such publishing companies as PrintAmerica, which published her first two books count as real publishing companies, rather vanity presses.

The term vanity press, for those of you who have no heard that term before, simply means you pay someone a set fee to publish your manuscript, as opposed to a real publishing firm that doesn't charge you for publishing your work.

Throughout the two hour session, among other things, True offered up basic information, on how to copyright written poetry and how to perform at open mic sessions, interspersed of course with all of her great accomplishments, including her up and coming new book entitled “The Poet's Manual: How To Go From Aspiring Writer To Published Author And Beyond (LuLu.com, late 2006), being published by another vanity press.

Among the questions she fielded were from a woman who sat directly in front of me who wanted to know how to go about getting a literary agent and how to be published by Random House.

I always have admired someone who aspires to shoot for the moon without having to go through the motions of what the rest of us poets go for in terms of our hard work in the trenches and needless to say, True gave that woman wishy-washy advice, but it was the kind of advice that was meant to satisfy that particular person's question; in other words it was a crappy answer.

When True touched upon leaving a self-published book or chapbook on consignment at a local bookstore, that's all she did. True didn't bother to inform the audience that consignment means splitting the cost up with the bookstore and the author, meaning, the bookstore gets the majority of the profit, while the author gets the shorter end of the stick.

True also touched very briefly on blogging, only stating that "everybody blogs." Needless to say, True didn't offer up any websites for the audience to take a look at.

When someone else in the audience asked her what poetry slams were about and if she had ever attended one, True told the woman she had never been to one and described slams as "dramatic" and also confided that she didn't go because she was afraid of the stinging criticism that often is displayed at a slam against a poet.

As a 1999 Chicago Team Poetry Slam finalist, I can agree with that much; it is a dramatic competition, but at least I've been through it and willingly experienced the scene whether or not I agreed with it. The mere fact that True doesn't want to be criticized by unknowns at a poetry slam or be booed or hissed if the poetry truly sucks (the judges are usually hand-picked by the slam host who assign points), tells me a lot about her; that she's vulnerable to such harsh critiques and is probably in the wrong field if she can't handle it.

It also seemed ironic that True said I'm not a salesperson," when referring to her books, yet a couple of minutes later, she said, "I'm always looking for ways to promote myself." Those sets of remarks truly takes the cake!

This was no prepared workshop I went to; no, rather it was a celebration of self-promotion that was disguised as a workshop to sell moreidealismem> Michelle True idealisms, a true (pun intended) scary thought.

True confessed that her goal is to bring her workshop to every public library in the state of Illinois and southeast Wisconsin.

God! I sure hope not!

The Botox Frankenstein Poetry Series>Wilted (For Tim & John)

Wow! What a crazy, wild and sad week it's been for me, especially noting the loss of two friends parents, one of each, that is and one day after another! So, in light of that, a somber good evening and a quick tip of the kippah! Thankfully the weekend is here to rest up our souls and rejuvinate for the coming week. That little capper has taken our weary bodies and is cradling them back to satisfaction once more and with that, it's time to relax and read a poem. And remember my dear, dear readers; please always-always-always enjoy!

Wilted

I picked one golden daisy
And suddenly it wilted
Like you did the other day
I am sad

Where In The World Has Johnny Vegas Gone>An Occupational Hazard-Act 28

Disclaimer: Money won is twice as sweet as money earned. The subject of gambling is all encompassing. It combines man's natural play instinct with his desire to know about his fate and his future. The race is not always to the swift nor the battle to the strong, but that's the way to bet. In a bet there is a fool and a thief. The house doesn't beat the player. It just gives him the opportunity to beat himself. Fiction can be that way sometimes. Any similarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental & should not be taken or misconstrued as such. Anyone who thinks otherwise probably believes that a race track is a place where windows clean people.

Johnny Vegas has been busted! Trapped and cornered in his own little game! At long last, enemy number one, according to many prisoners here on Devil’s Island, has been caught red-handed at his own game for rigging numbers for his own personal self-gain and momentum.

As stated in this series previously, Johnny Vegas, the numbers game rigger, lucky streak recently came to an end once it was revealed that Josie Peppermint confessed to The Most Holy Father long ago and far away, Miz Lou & the late Va Va Voom were correct in their observations of Johnny Vegas’ numbers not making sense, no sense at all.

But let me back up to the beginning…it all started early on when Johnny Vegas first arrived on Devil’s Island with a suitcase, a trunk, a bagful of tricks and the clothes on his back. They’d caught him in the middle of a poker game, trying to undercut the dealer by making a backdoor deal. Such is the charm of Johnny Vegas.

When Johnny Vegas first arrived on Devil’s Island, they ran him through a battery of tests and of course, he leaped and jumped through every hoop that he was shown. Then they brought him up to higher and higher levels until he came upon our sect of prisoners and was instructed to follow our every movement and lead when it came to the “numbers game.”

To refresh your memory, here’s a brief rundown as to how the numbers game worked and what followed within the numbers operation in the days that followed afterwards: a pool of prisoners bet on each other to how long one would outlast the other via varying torture methods. The Most Holy Father ran the numbers game for almost two years, almost exactly the time he was awarded the prestigious & truly coveted award, “Prison Boss Of The Year.”

In the meantime, The Most Holy Father instructed Josie Peppermint to work the numbers within her group of prisoners she infiltrated. At some point thereafter, came the sudden & unpredictable execution of Va-Va-Voom, who some still say to this very day was executed in order to keep him quiet about the numbers game.

There was also the removal and relocation of Miz Lou, who hasn’t been seen or heard from in many months. Some suggest she was silenced or bought off, but since no one has seen her since she nearly blew the whistle on Johnny Vegas, nobody knows for sure.

As it turned out, the best numbers runner was none other than Johnny Vegas, the man who everyone fell for, including Josie Peppermint, The Most Holy Father, Upper Prison Brass and many others too numerous to name.

No one, ever questioned what Johnny Vegas did, including The Most Holy Father, who accepted everything Johnny Vegas did at face value.

Johnny Vegas befriended way too many prisoners and stepped on them like ants and squashed them like roaches. He is as slick as slime on a crusty sewer cover and boy did he know it!

But one day, when he least expected it, The Most Holy Father launched a secret investigation that linked Johnny Vegas to wrongdoing; there was in fact a giant paper trail that followed him everywhere he traveled; and it didn’t stop, it just kept growing and growing, until the evidence weighed strongly against him.

Rather than show egg on their faces and admit guilt, both The Most Holy Father & Johnny Vegas agreed to let the incident slide without question. The Most Holy Father decided to ship Johnny Vegas to a better place within the prison system, a place where he would be put to good use.

Where that place is, however remains a mystery, as The Most Holy Father will not reveal where he has been sent and having said that, the case of Johnny Vegas remains open. Perhaps no one will ever know what happened to him and perhaps some will, if only they ask the right questions. After all, this is Devil’s Island and nobody knows much of anything for certain!

The Love You Take Is Equal To The Love You Make>An Occupational Hazard-Act 27

Disclaimer: The best thing about the future is that it only comes one day at a time. I never think of the future. It comes soon enough. We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We grow partially. We are relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations. The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is. A brief candle; both ends burning An endless mile; a bus wheel turning A friend to share the lonesome times A handshake and a sip of wine So say it loud and let it ring We are all a part of everything The future, present and the past Fly on proud bird You're free at last. Fiction can be that way sometimes. Any similarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental & should not be taken or misconstrued as such. Anyone who thinks otherwise probably believes that in times of change, learners inherit the Earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists and that tfuture has a way of arriving unannounced.

It’s strange how the old game is once again switching; everyone is twitching like rabbit ears tasting sour milk, the lone dread of a lost ilk of another hastily appointed prison guard, trained to behave silent, sweet and helpful, but in reality she is geared to personally attack any prisoners she feels might be a fresh competitor to her newly granted livelihood.

Welcome to the Fifth Annual Paranoia Fest, 2006 on Devil’s Island! Preparations for Paranoia Fest began nearly one month ago on Devil’s Island, when entire cellblocks were being shifted into one specific area, as if Upper Prison Brass, The Most Holy Father, The G3 Boys & The Barnaby Boys were getting ready to unveil their latest scheme devised to cut down on excess prison population.

Old familiar faces have been disappearing within the prison populations in recent weeks and months, mostly early parole due to good behavior, model prisoner factors or a complete lifestyle turnaround.

But none of the prisoners here on Devil’s Island believe more in cruel harsh fate more than Silent Sims who believes the worst is yet to come. He is often seen gazing into his ashtray full of cigarette butts too many to count, yet he is able to read the ashes and not only predict the future of those left on Devil’s Island but the future of Devil’s Island itself.

Prisoners have been lining up outside his prison cell in droves, including the likes of the great& boisterious Loudmouth Lucy, who has been showing signs of extreme nervousness lately.

Also spotted in line was Broadcast Betty who has been seen visiting empty prison cells (when no one’s looking) and talking in mid-sentences as if someone was actually in the cell with her or perhaps she is trying out a new broadcasting technique, you know the type, where Broadcast Betty will make an absurd statement and some poor unfortunate prisoner answers her in complete innocence, without realizing how much valuable private information they will be giving away to Broadcast Betty.

Other prisoners who have been lining up outside Silent Sims’ prison cell include Matterhorn Mary & Brimstone Bettina, both religious women which seems strange when both of them depend so heavily on The Most Holy Father to do their dirty work for them. Then of course there’s Danceman Darryl, a most participatory paranoid player who also believes that the end is based on the drop of a hat!

The biggest surprise outside of Silent Sims’ prison cell is none other than Johnny Vegas, the numbers game rigger, whose lucky streak recently came to an end once it was revealed that Josie Peppermint confessed to The Most Holy Father long ago and far away, Miz Lou & Va Va Voom were correct in their observations of Johnny Vegas’ numbers not making sense, but more next time on that.

In the meantime, Silent Sims is racking up quite a business within his cell and while Upper Prison Brass, The Most Holy Father, The G3 Boys & The Barnaby Boys are all playing a cautious card game, while they too have been spotted outside his prison cell, listening to him speak the truth at about “the end.”

American Yarnprose>No More Mean Willie Brown

No More Mean Willie Brown

I am not sure anymore about anything, one thing is for sure, when Thursday rolls around, I will be a free man, free of Mean Willie Brown, the stupid corporate clown. My life is a mess because of him and I am far better off without him. My life is completely fucked up thanks to him, especially in light of the fact that he knows nothing of how to take care of someone and treats them like crap, and I am left behind, just holding the bag.

Let’s see, what else can I rag about? Oh yeah, the way he always would help himself to me. Nope, the roving eye sees all takes advantage of all and eats me like I will never get it back or whenever he feels like it. That is called being taken for granted. He doesn’t really care either, as if he is so innocent, when he is as guilty as charged of fucking with me!

I’ve held onto more stress and headaches than I could have ever asked for. When your soul is your property, you have to ask for permission to use it on a regular basis. That Mean Willie Brown! Stupid corporate clown! Don’t assume just because you have special privileges to use it, doesn’t mean you take it for granted without asking, that’s so fucking rude and small and disrespectful.

But, hey! Why should he care! He is Mean Willie Brown, the stupid corporate clown. No longer will I have to put up with crazy crap like his tantrums listening and no more forcing me to do shit I don’t want to do, no more abuse of my soul, no more control issues, no more of him ordering me around telling me what to do, no more reverse psychology tactics, no more, no more no more no more no more nothing!

The MishegasMaster Confessional>Dropping Out Of Local Poetry Performance Land-Act One, Scene One

I’ve brought myself down to planet Earth again, back to square one actually; the place where I started out when everything began so very long ago.

I’ve been drowning for a long time; drowning in my own inabilities to take matters into my own hands and make them work…well, maybe not everything.

All of my artistic abilities I’ve been making work with little or no help provided other than the training I’ve received for those new and recently acquired skills, yet other parts suffered as a result, namely my writing abilities and my poetry; that is until I found a new outlet.

One can always find a new outlet for creativity even when the most obvious bridges have been burned or have disintegrated into ashes over time.

Blogging has helped me tremendously; it’s reestablished myself as a writer and helped my voice as a writer reemerge once more. That leaves my poetry and lyrical voice that has been utterly neglected and nearly silent as a result.

But this isn’t the only trouble I’ve had. No, I blame my lack of interest on something far greater and that is lack of interest in as far as what poetry offers me in my own surrounding area.

Not a lot has changed since I dropped out from reading live, other than the plethora of new embodied voices being heard and the old guard of poetry gangs gathering together and forming a conglomerate.

But poetry in this town remains the same overall. Nothing new is being said or being written about. Friends are still publishing their friends even if their work stinks to high heaven; poetry presses that bill themselves as legitimate presses are nothing more than vanity presses with an imprint on the inside cover.

Then there are those who proclaim themselves as kings or queens of the poetic heap and they are just that; kings and queens of their own dung heaps. Sometimes they make so much noise with accusations and unjust criticisms bordering on hurtfulness and cruel desire and even go as far as using their websites or power of the open mic when the opportunity knocks, just to stroke their own egos.

It’s enough to make grown men and women cry, become disgusted with the shamefulness and drop out completely.

2005 was a banner year for stupidity within the poetry scene I watch and scratch my head at nine times out of 10. 99 percent of the writers, poets and all others involved were completely fooled and duped when a popular poet turned out to be a fugitive on the run for nearly two decades.

It sparked a major name-calling and denial debate among those who felt they represented the rest of us who supposedly didn’t have a voice and yet those were the same ones who didn’t own up to their own responsibilities of backing up their statements to both the local and national press.

It seemed almost ironic that such a person with an egomaniac ilk who enjoys bathing in the media spotlight couldn’t even back up their own statements they made either in the local news or to the press.

Yet nobody dared to cross their path and point it out, for fear of website repercussion or permanent bans from all future gigs they produced throughout the scene.

I crossed that line however some years ago when I pointed out the mere fact that girlfriends of the egomaniac, both present and former were given top priority regardless of their talent. Kind of makes you scratch your head and wonder why, doesn’t it?

I suspect that’s how the last one got ahead and no one dared to cross the path for fear of the wonder-lust spew of words, filled with veiled threats and dry venom that never amounted to much, except for wasted breath and energy oh yeah and more lost local appearances.

Big deal!

Pettiness is a game often played by egomaniacs to get ahead of everyone else who has merited situations on their own, even if their own ethics are compromised.

Maybe it's better that I dropped out, as I think of all the wonderfulness I've created on my own. But when I go back and think about all of it, I really believe it's all very sickening. And yet, the egomaniacs thrive on it.

Cosmically, it won’t amount to much long after they are dead.

Not that they aren’t now.

American Yarnprose>Underground Lovemaking Apartments

Underground Lovemaking Apartments

Inside, I am led into a secret world of shyness and masturbation by young adult suburbanite with her partially broken-in blue designer jeans.

Slowly and frustratingly, she says, “Come. I have something I want to give you.”

She plants a kiss on my warm, granite-like cheeks. She wants me to touch her in ways that she’s never gone before. But frustratingly, appealingly in her efforts, she teeters in her fingering motions, gently sloping her left index finger down my throat, past my chest until she lays it directly on my pacific pipeline. From there, she opened up the rest of her hand and makes touchy-feely groping motions.

I wait, more impatiently because I feel the impending growth in between my thighs and the ever-present strange wafting wetness between her legs, which at the present moment was getting crazier and crazier. She lifts her clothing in upward fashion, exposing the most café-au-lait thighs I’d seen in many, many moons.

She rushes against me, throwing her right thin-boned arm against my neck, kissing me wildly, stringy brown hair caressing her now, naked waist side, while she works me over with her left hand, fast and furious.

She knows what she’s doing, I think to myself, no question about it.

And then it happened.

The slide whistle into the tiny mouth, with a sort of thick thump-rump-bump. She wanted love. Fast love. Good love. Cheap love. Sick love. Orgasmic love. Slow love. Hard love.

Within seconds it happened...in one mumbled lyric she eerily and crazily sang,

“Howrepulsivethelovejuiceinthelovenightspatteredwiththudlikeslowsquealingnoisefrom espressocoffeebarmachine.”

And with that, the ocean waved, fishes swam with other fishes along the current. Skyrockets popped and screamed overhead as she pushed atop me, yowling and writhing like worm on wire hook within moments of indigestion by fish. She loved (fucked) me hard and I loved (fucked) her hard back, pushing in and out, like plunger on injection needle.

At last, her eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.

She was flooded with sex.

Sexuality from me and then she heaved forward, lunging her sweetness forcefully on my pole, releasing a river of gratitude, both in sweat and sex.

How beautiful it all was.

American Yarnprose>Sex Parts: Small-Ass>Act One

Sex Parts: Small Ass>Act One


In my travels throughout the modern free world as a writer & blogger, I have encountered many lurid tales of love, in varied detailed accounts through films, books and the human experience. Yet, I have never told any of them publicly. So today, I will launch into the few, the proud and the sexy. Be prepared to laugh, I know I did when I heard these stories, viewed them or experienced them.

Let us begin with tales up the tuchas. My good friend Erin works as an x-ray technician in the hills of La-La Land. One day when we were talking, he had commented on one of my numerous stories, describing it as, “Kind of dark, sad and funny at the same time.” Then he says to me, “Want to hear something really sad?”

And I say, “Why certainly, Erin.”

“I had to go up to surgery a few days ago to take an image on some poor old fellow’s stomach.”

Erin explains to me that this man, 60 years young, had been messing around with his partner and somehow or another, he managed to get a mannequin’s forearm caught up his ass. As I am laughing uncontrollably, Erin says tears rolled down his cheeks because, he too was laughing so hard. Then I asked Erin, if surgery was a success and without missing a beat, he says, “Oh, the trouble we had trying to extracting that thing, we couldn’t pull it out of him, so we had to try to get it out from his front end,” Erin says laughing. “The poor man almost got saddled with a colostomy bag because of what happened to him.”

Just as frightening, Erin also relays two other stories where a young man was hauled into the emergency room, who was screaming in pure pain and was x-rayed, only to find out that this man had a pair of tongs inserted up his ass. That guy was immediately brought into surgery. And another time, an elderly man had apparently shoved a vibrator up his ass and it was still vibrating as they wheeled him off to surgery, as they were unable to pull it out.

Therefore, I ask Erin, “Why is it only happening to men. Why not women?”

Erin responds, “Well shoot, must be that women know how to handle the hardware a bit better than guys, you know? I have virtually seen it all; people will come into the hospital with soda bottles, vacuum hoses and instruments, instruments, attached to their penises. It is honestly has to be the craziest thing that I have ever seen in my life, man. I guess Playboy doesn’t work like it used to,” he says with a puzzled look on his face.

I guess not either.

The Botox Frankenstein Poetry Series> Grasshopper

Well, here we are, and it's the already the midway of the month and it sure has turned out to be a great day; having a day off helps every now and again. So good evening one and all and a quick tip of the kippah! Thank Jah the weekend is here! Hip-hip hooray! Time to kick back and relax because that chipper little capper has found us again. So now, time for a poem! And remember my dear, dear readers; please always-always-always enjoy!


Grasshopper

Japanese moonlight rolls across the water,
While thousands of worshippers
Bow for blessings
And pray for praises

American Yarnprose>My Name Is Stereo-Type: Fraidy Cat In Red Neck Country

My Name Is Stereo-Type: Fraidy Cat In Red Neck Country

In the breadth of the winterized morning of a backseat driver that dives into the traffic jam of life after 5 PM, that is when spoken to about jobs that don’t exist after the fact of jelly beans softly rotting on the sides of weird peoples’ throats as they merrily, merrily enjoy the stroking cigaretted teeth of strange cab drivers who have (a) real attitudes about any city than theirs!

Why shit! If white Unitarians, black Catholics, yellow Christians and red Processors all got together and started another war, love letters would be brought in by teddy-laced Catsup bottles that throttle Coke cans for breakfast, garbage cans for lunch, good-looking men for dinner at Staley’s and transient creatures for midnight snacks.

Feh!

The heck with Woo-Woo the horseman, the guy with the tooth decay policy who is set by the standards that are...

Well you know, it’s just that lo and behold the magic (magic) kingdoms of St. Louis, Chicago, Milwaukee and Seattle and fascists, young ones that believe if you sport a beard and make eye contact with young males then you’re considered gay.

I never knew that insulting was a custom ‘round here and the mere fact of the matter is, I’ve been sitting too long and I wanna go home and the sooner I’m out of St. Louis the safer I’ll sleep!

American Yarnprose>The Plastic Bastard

The Plastic Bastard

I felt sad. The grief had piled high all around, like broken dishes after a domestic fight between television sitcom couples. I could hear it in her voice. She was truly sad, the firehouse Dalmatian that waits patiently for the fallen firefighter who is destined never to return.


Trembling in her complaints, gripes and grumbling, I had heard it all before and yet, you could truly see the depression polluting her skyline; a place where the sun never shone, and a city where the rain would forever pound the pavement, thereby causing scattered vehicular accidents everywhere.


She nervously lit a Pall Mall and stroked her cat, Mandy. Tears streamed down her face, a face, just one of the one in a million faces where lives are played out by unknown actors on the set of some forgettable melodramatic episode of an unintelligible soap opera.


I, being many miles away, just then, wished that I could help her, be with her, comfort her in her time of need. The closest I came, however, was soothing her with my voice over the plastic bastard instrument called, "the telephone."


The telephone. The great plastic bastard implement of destruction, which much to my chagrin, I had found many moons ago as a destructive suicide instrument in itself.


And indeed, what a suicide instrument it became for me; swearing off friends, lovers, parents, creditors, would-be telemarketers, pranksters, pollsters and just about any other type of village idiot you could imagine.


Frankly, however, that did not seem to alleviate the situation and only made matters at hand worse. She was still nervous, felt depressed and deprived of that one glimmer of hope that she longed for, just snuffed out like a stale cigarette butt, ashes scattering about.


Listening to her over the plastic bastard, you could hear her pathetically struggling, singing of her homelessness, her deadly boring life and latest “woe-is-me” story.


I tried to think of words to say, but as usual, she beat herself up to a bloody pulp, which always made me sad. I did my best to comfort her by giving her a long distance hug and told her she had a friend in the land of Lincoln, as I hung up the plastic bastard, just as equally depressed.


I suspect I would hear from her tomorrow.

The Martians Have Landed>An Occupational Hazard-Act 26

Disclaimer: Our constitution protects aliens, drunks and U.S. Senators. Babies have big heads and big eyes, and tiny little bodies with tiny little arms and legs. So did the aliens at Roswell! Aliens have always been a problem in the United States. Most new literature reads like coded messages passing between lonely aliens in a hostile world, yet, we have quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. Fiction can be that way sometimes. Any similarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental & should not be taken or misconstrued as such. Anyone who thinks otherwise probably believes that Texans are proof that the world was populated by aliens, while our inheritance is turned to strangers and our houses to aliens.

Seems to be an awful damn lot of quirkiness here on Devil’s Island lately, but not anymore than the usual hustle-bustle and behind-the-scenes shuffling of papers in neatly piled stacks; something fishy is going on here at Devil’s Island and that amounts to a cover-up!

What is the utmost cover-up prison officials could want to hide from its population??? An alien invasion and possible alien abduction, that’s what!!!

It seems that lately the extra-terrestrials have been arriving almost in droves lately and how they’ve managed to slip themselves into the prisoner population of Devil’s Island according to extra-terrestrial by-laws when it comes to the planet Earth is beyond comprehension.

Take Ichebod Tunney for starters; now there’s a fine example of a space invader if I ever saw one! That alien hid himself within the marshes for weeks until he slipped into the prisoner population. Once inside, Ichebod Tunney stripped away his Martian-like features and designed himself to look a lot like an older Cary Grant, yet with a brain somewhat like Frankenstein, not to be confused with the late-great Botox Frankenstein, no siree!

Ichebod Tunney's movements can be slow and confusing sometimes, that it sometimes can leave a person to wonder if those movements are designed to fool others or if they are very real. No one knows for sure.

Then there’s Magnificent Macy, who appeared at first as a vision to Broadcast Betty on Devil’s Island. Broadcast Betty saw Magnificent Macy in the three unbroken yolks of the plate of eggs she was about to eat one dreary morning. When she announced to the entire population what she had seen, no sooner did Upper Prison Brass arrive with the G3 Boys and away that plate went!

As the egg yolks were being transported to the Devil’s Island laboratory, Magnificent Macy disappeared out of the egg yolks and transformed herself into an elderly looking Cozy Collette and heaven only knows where Cozy Collette has been lately as no one seems to have seen her for the past several months.

After analyzing the egg yolks for several hours, they realized they had been quite dishonorably duped by Broadcast Betty who only sought attention for her lack of inefficiency to cope normally and decided to punish her to one week of hard labor camp.

Then there’s Silent Sims who shows up like a sudden breeze, when the occasion arises for need and comfort; no one knows too much about Silent Sims, for he does not speak, all more the mystery or perhaps it’s out of respect he remains quiet, waiting for the right moment to unleash the secrets that he has been assigned to promote on Devil’s Island. What could those secrets be???!!!???

No one knows for certain and while those secrets remain under lock and key, but best be sure, that all of Devil’s Island is on high alert. Or are they? No one seems to know.

Lastly, speaking of not knowing, Upper Prison Brass is still trying to decipher the strange coded message left behind in the empty cell of Leering Lonnie’s a few weeks ago. Everything of his was left behind, untouched.

While prison guards weren’t looking, Broadcast Betty slipped away from hard labor camp briefly and took several mental photographs of the message and began sending out telepathic signals to anyone who would listen. The trouble was that she sent it out garbled and it took several hours to decipher it.

Unbeknownst to Upper Prison Brass, we now have a copy of that message. It reads: “…Stendhal crashes one rescue obliterate onto hackers. We at Mission Control are pained to have yet fixed it. You will find throbbing file next to chainsaw, in which to share with Humble Agent. Do not stress; Big Sledgehammer is on the way to make it happen…”

What does it all mean? Does anyone know who Mission Control is? Why does anyone refuse to decipher this code? Who is Humble Agent & Big Sledgehammer? What does throbbing file signify? Where is the chainsaw? Why has no one offered an explanation? Is Devil’s Island even aware that an alien invasion has taken place? Stay tuned!

The Botox Frankenstein Poetry Series>Cold Fingers Inside The Flesh

Well, here we are, and it's the already the second full week of April behind us,and yes I know it's awful early to be posting, but of course I couldn't sleep, so why not? Besides, while I'm awake I can give each and everyone of you a quick tip of the kippah to you one & all. These weeks keep getting rougher and rougher, too much stress can take its toll on a man, but...thank goodness the weekend is here! We can kick back and relax because that happy little capper has found us once more. And now for a new poem! Please remember my dear, dear readers; always-always-always enjoy!

Cold Fingers Inside The Flesh

I'm cold and you didn't answer the telephone
There's peanut butter & crackers on the table
And newspapers & magazines scattered on the floor
My eyes so red, incredible with fear
Submerged within one univeral tear
Not feeling sorry for what I've done
I've been had by everyone

I sleep alone I must confess, while I count the cracks between cold fingers balled up inside the flesh
I'm not surprised that this time is the last time
You forgot to remember that I still care
Whether it's tattooed across your heart
Or imprinted on your brain
I confess I know nothing but disenchantment for the sadness I feel tonight

New American Yarnprose>The True Story Of A Pea-Brain Nine Days Old As Told By Jack Kessinger

The True Story Of A Pea-Brain Nine Days Old As Told By Jack Kessinger

There is a numbness I feel in my brain; a numbness that spreads like pasted glue between thinly assembled lines of cardboard waiting to be shredded. When you leave the house without combing your hair or wearing the same shirt, same pair of pants and same pair of gym shoes week after week, this is what it feels like.

I can write a good game, but I can’t pullulate as well. There’s a burning internal forest that attacks my anxiousness, like a big black bear that is always looking for food and will stop at nothing until it finds one hamburger patty inside a hamburger roll.

I invent, re-invent and ventilate all in the same perplexive moments, but still it does me no good; more harm than good and still I stand by and accept it as such because I slowly sit by and kill myself with anger and blood spit back in my face. I’ve accepted the fact that I’ve been left to die at the side of the road, while everyone else happily speeds along.

It’s a NASCAR mentality that seems to poke me in the back and laugh out loud and directly into my face when I least expect it. Lately, the laughing has been carrying on nonstop and it makes me feel stepped on as if I don’t exist; oh woe is me, another cog in the wheels of operation in space designed to destroy me with whatever I have left to breathe with.

A rising star I was destined to be, I have fallen and smashed to the ground split apart in so many pieces, unable to comprehend what I once was or what I was supposed to be. It’s similar to being in a daily drunken stupor like so many men and so many women have been through, day after day, night after night, promising themselves they will stop, but of course they never do.

What does it take for them to realize that something is wrong and yet everybody stands by just watching and doesn’t bother to help them in their time of need and just lets them fall to the ground?

Remember me who once lived there, who ate with you, who slept with you, who drank with you, who got mad with you, did everything you wanted me to do with you and when it came around to helping me out, you said “Forget it,” grabbed your hat & coat and flew out the door without saying so long.

Oh dear God in heaven; let it bleed, let it rain corpses on my death parade. Well, I don’t mind, it’s not like I haven’t been there before, so I shall just breathe in slowly and let the magic begin.

New Spontaneous YarnProse>Selection Two

I am calling you. Can you answer me? I am worried!!! I will try again in 5 minutes. I have heard the callings but they do not call for me. The calling has long left east and left me here to hang myself out to dry. I do not hold an umbrella when it rains, as I love the drops of tears from her eyes that taste like salt in the wound. Hold me when I fall, carry me to the pillar where my soul rests comfortably...

New American Yarnprose>Finding A Condom Within McDonald’s (For Vida Wolk)

Finding A Condom Within McDonald’s (For Vida Wolk)

I feel lost within an America I used to love. Everyone and everything looks and feels the same to me; I can barely breathe let alone feel happy about what I see, as every other minute it’s someone talking loudly on their cell phone, clutched to their ear like a lobster claw; if it’s not that it’s big, bright, blaring signs shouting their mutant wares at me. Cars all look the same, new or used. Attitudes while snappy and brisk remain glued together like bad television sitcoms.

It’s getting hard for me to fathom, but if you’re not beautiful or have a headful of hair, then nobody wants you except for insane ostracized people who will end up with heart problems later in life and who wants that burden? I’ve never been one of the lucky ones; had the right looks and all, but my slowness to trendiness has pegged me for failure AKA Doomsville and who knows? Maybe I’ll end up going around in circles singing and dancing and talking to people I don’t know and people I don’t seek out, but somehow they always find me and at times, just like now, I feel cold, broke, depressed and in general feeling sorry for myself like I do at this very moment, oh so they say; who is “they” anyway?

Oh well, I’ll get over it. A guy my age gets sick of all the same old clichés, same old confessionals where nothing is happening. There are no parties; there are no eyes smiling or full heads of hair laughing at nothing but sticks in the air.

I want sunshine out of apples. I want a cat to tell me how much she likes it when I pet her and how kind I was to choose it from all the other cats in the world and take it home. I want all the jazz songs in the known jazz markets of today and tomorrow to begin anew. I want a seagull to kiss me and tell me that she appreciates the fact that I tried to mimic her sound, but knows we’re not compatible. I want my silence to be filled with golden joys and sweet caresses from voices I have yet to hear or feel imprinted on my heart.

I hate being passed up, talked down to, looked at funny, snickered at; in fact, I want my youth back, my rusted dreams restored to a copper blue; I want my vitality; I want all of my good qualities to comeback; I want all my old girlfriends back for one week so I can tell them what inner damage they incurred without even realizing it.

I want to be the one arm-in-arm with a beautiful woman who is not afraid of exploring the unknown with me. I want my summer to be cool in the evening and sunny during the daytime. I want tragedy to turn comedic and comedy to fall into the sea.

In essence, I want everything that I cannot have and that included an America I will never get to know. And this one ill-at-ease feeling will make me empty like a discarded cigarette butt wedged between the cracks of a crowded sidewalk.

Wonderful Just Wonderful-New Spontaneous YarnProse>Selection One

Dear Readers,

I have been working on a new Spontaneous YarnProse project for the past few weeks and I am happy to share it with you at long last. This is a new experiment, as well as new experience for me, so what it really boils down to randomly written sentences that somehow make little to no sense at all, it sort of picks up where I last left off with this work sometime late last century or basically, 1989-1991.

If none of this makes sense to you and it seems as if I am just babbling, well, so be it. it could be several paragraphs or even two sentences long. In any event, enjoy!

"Wonderful, just wonder, " says old Joe The Spider; did you know that spaghetti westerns are like taking the baby out with the dog on the leash and just leaving them there to starve on the empty sidewalk? It's a lot like that snobby ruffled feathered goose that tries to fly over a high tension wire and clips its wings while in the process and falls smack into the ground like no-tomorrow style and boy what a mess that is...on the other hand, if you don't mind eating roadkill, says Little Lindy, the king of all Iowa Hobos, then it's a meal to be had by all..."

Remembering Phil Ochs: December 19, 1940 To April 9 1976

There are rare times when I don't say much on my blog dear friends, but today is one of those times. If you find time in your busy schedule wherever you might find yourself today, please say a silent prayer for what could have been, if only...(and yes, the poem is written by me for him)








John Train

The words roll through my brain
A tired heaving man
Eking out a sigh of pain
The greatness of the hour
Unorganized and confused
So witty and energetic
Now breathless and pathetic
Wasting away in a chair
Like a pile of rags
Too drunk to notice
Too weak to cower
Roaches
And
Shit
And
Paper

The Subliminal Freedom Behind The Gospel>An Occupational Hazard-Act 25

Disclaimer: The concept of God seems loving and divine on one hand. But when one observes the God-men out there who are fighting and killing in the name of God, one really wonders. Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. Fear not, then, thou child infirm; There’s no god dare wrong a worm. Be sure that God, Ne’er dooms to waste the strength he deigns impart. Fiction can be that way sometimes. Any similarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental & should not be taken or misconstrued as such. Anyone who thinks otherwise probably believes that Deity ever vindictively, Made in his image a mannikin merely to madden it?

It is said that if a man believes he has done no wrong despite what others think they know, than he is a greater man who shall rise over the heap of accusers and live to tell about it.

Such is the strange plight of now paroled and former Devil’s Island inmate Knee-Jerk Johnson, whose criminal record on Devil’s Island stretches far and wide. In previous tales of Devil’s Island, I have written extensively about Knee-Jerk Johnson who arrived at Devil’s Island about the same time that I arrived with no luggage, just the clothes on my back and introduced into the concentration camp-style rituals.

But for Knee-Jerk Johnson during the past several months, things for him began to slowly change and within time he made a solid transformation into an overall positive attitude, which is a strange trait to behold on Devil’s Island, even if you actually enjoy life in general.

Knee-Jerk Johnson's fellow inmates began noticing the changes too, particularly his gang-banging friends of old who couldn’t believe their own eyes and ears when he began preaching the Gospel.

The strangest part is those who did reach out to him, were none other than the likes of Priestess Paulette, Matterhorn Melissa and Brimstone Bettina, who came onto him like women who had seen the light of The Great Divine Spirit.

They gathered him to their breast (as luck would have it of course) and spoke kind and gentle words to him as he listened to them preaching the Gospel of all life had to offer here and beyond Devil’s Island.

And Knee-Jerk Johnson bit into it, just as one would bite into a holy communion wafer, he bit into it and swallowed every piece and every crumb of knowledge they had to offer, which was very little when one thinks about what imprisoned religious could really offer to soothe one’s soul, other than a piece of biblical comfort, which is all anyone is looking for when they are sitting in a prison cell.

As legacies are born they also die and as much as Knee-Jerk Johnson was loved, he was also disdained by those who felt he was responsible for the demise of so many other prisoners who were executed wrongly and unjustly here on Devil’s Island.

Yes, some will continue to question the legitimacy of his new-founded path of Gospel, whether it is real or if was a ploy to get him paroled, but frankly, we'll never know.

In some regards, Devil’s Island is much better off now that Knee-Jerk Johnson has been paroled for good behavior and for choosing to preach the Gospel; on the other hand, like many others that have gone through the iron gates and into the world anew once more, one piece of advice; be careful out there, will ya?

The Botox Frankenstein Poetry Series>Old People's Teeth

Well, here we are, and it's the already the first full week of April behind us, but it's so darned cold outside, that is if you live where i live! Happy Friday evening everyone and a little tip of the kippah to you all. Well, talk about hard week again! But thank goodness the weekend is here! We can kick back and relax because that great capper has found us once more. And now a poem! Please remember my dear, dear readers; always-always-always enjoy!

Old People’s Teeth

I got old people’s teeth
Growing inside my mouth
Ripe, sharp and crisp
Like cheddar cheese
Stuck in my upper lip
Like toothpicks through do-dads
On a party platter tray

Get With It Cats & Chicks! It’s Jazz Appreciation Month!

Go Charlie! Blow Dizzy! Squonk Sonny! Belt Benny! Jump Jackie! Oh yes, oh yes, you guessed it! It’s the third annual Jazz Appreciation Month! Jazz is by far THE best music in America, let alone this very universe! It lightens up faces, perks up ears, emblazons eyes into one giant, magnetizing glazed hypnotic trance that is hard to break away from both fully and completely. But why would anyone really want to do that? It soothes the soul; the good side of jazz that is.

All that other stuff they call “smooth jazz” was a horrible bowel movement waiting to happen, which has. Smooth jazz by my definition is more than anything, music that doesn’t sound at all like jazz, rather terribly awful attempts to be.

Back in the day, when the category was first created, say about 1995 or so, everyone who was anyone, musician-wise that is, was shoved into that category, including well-known rock and roll artists like Dire Straits and Sting, who were initially miscategorized, but perhaps it was all a plot just to sell more records.

Later as smooth jazz became more organized, more and more musicians who didn’t exactly play jazz were inserted into the mix, yet were thrown into the category, only to sell more records, thus being further mislabeled.

One musician who’s made more dough than any other including John Tesh, is Kenny G (not to be confused with Kenny Garrett). Kenny G’s music is mindless sounding more like bad cheesy music behind a terrible porno flick, yet many uneducated women can’t get enough of him. As my good friend Sergio in Belgrade says, “His music is shit, but it’s great to make love to…”

But enough about crap jazz!

Jazz has many styles including, but not limited to: Bop, hard bop, bebop, free-jazz, avant-garde, traditional jazz, Dixieland jazz, swing, big band, improve jazz, modern, acid and virtually every other category and sub-category that one can come up with, whether the category exists or not.

Jazz, unfortunately, according to statistics, is listened to by less than five percent of the general population. Yet, it has been making a slow to moderate comeback, by the very likes of coffee shops, film scores, television programs and even television and radio commercials too.

Perhaps it’s all a great subliminal campaign to lure listeners back to a great body of work or perhaps good solid jazz has replaced the onslaught of all that rattle-clatter-bang-rubbish they call music these days, the stuff they call shit-hop or rattrap (sic), but anyway…

It’s National Appreciation Month! Go out and see some great live music at your cheap or semi-cheap venue or go grab some from your local library; either way you won’t be disappointed!

http://www.ed.gov/free/jazz.html

With Compliments From The Senator

My mom, The Arizona Babe and another lady, not far from The Valley Of Golden Happiness, have been teaching a United States Citizenship class for the past month and a half with much enthusiasm and excitement.

A few weeks ago, The Arizona Babe reached out to me for help. She told me that she wanted to give her students little study incentives such as American flag stickers for their gallant efforts in their quest to becoming American citizens of this sovereign nation of ours, but was having extreme bad luck.

It seems that when she called her U. S. Senator’s office, who is none other than John McCain, wealthy Republican, Vietnam veteran poster boy and potential presidential candidate, his office couldn’t help her. They told her that they had nothing to spare and suggested she buy items from a pricelist of items and other propaganda they offered up to her.

So she turned to her middle son, The MishegasMaster (me) for help and hoped that he could help her out. As we spoke on the phone, I went over the trusty Internet to see what we could scarf up together and after cross-referencing several words and coming up virtually empty, we decided together that I should contact my local U.S. Senator’s office, which was formerly her Senator’s office, before she moved to Arizona back in 2001 with Rex Pater Homo.

“Leave it to me,” I told The Arizona Babe. And that’s exactly what she did.

The next morning I called U.S. Senator Dick Durbin’s office in Chicago, who referred me onto their Washington, D.C. office with the same request.

When I called the D.C. office, I was referred to a kind woman named Lexie, who once I explained my dilemma to (without mentioning McCain’s office response at first), she asked me a few questions about The Arizona Babe’s class and promised to get back to me that afternoon.

Sure enough, Lexie called me back that afternoon and kept her promise. As I expressed my gratitude to Lexie, I explained to her that not only was The Arizona Babe formerly of the state of Illinois, but told her of the trouble she encountered with McCain’s office.

It was right about then I declared, “That’s why we love our Illinois senators,” to which Lexie responded, “That’s what we like to hear.” Lexie promised to me what she had would arrive in a couple of days.

Earlier this week, I received two big brown envelopes containing several pocket-sized editions of the U.S. Constitution & the Declaration of Independence. Meanwhile, I had posted an advertisement on the Chicago version of Craigslist (www.craigslist.com) to see if we could perhaps get some American flag stickers for her class.

It wasn’t but a few hours later, when I received an email from a nice lady named Kathy who told me she had some stickers and would be happy to send them along to me in the mail, which I received a day after the items from Senator Durbin’s office had arrived.

You see my dear friends; there are people out there who are willing to help one another without payback or reward. Rather their reward is satisfaction and joy of helping others out. It is nice to know that there are wonderful people in the world like Kathy and Lexie to help out folks like myself and The Arizona Babe.

Sharing with others is a good feeling. Helping out your fellow neighbor is even more wonderful than you may ever realize. Try it sometime; you might enjoy it. Most of all, thanks to people like The Arizona Babe and her teacher friend, there are more potential citizens who can join America with a sense of pride and good patriotic spirits.

Isn’t that what sharing is all about?

The Untimely Death Of Velvet Dissident-The Man & The Blog

There’s a lot to be said for inspiration; I’ve done a lot on my part too, that is inspire or perhaps it’s perspire others into doing things they wouldn’t normally do. I mean that’s mostly said on a positive note, verses a negative one.

As far as blogging goes, I’ve inspired at least 10 people to start their own blogs or online journals; some of those folks write everyday, while others write when they feel that they have something to say. Me? I try to write every single day, although with all the chaos and construction going on in my life. It’s been rather hard to keep up with a schedule that’s typically normal.

One person I inspired purposely created their blog to keep tabs on my personal life and would only write whenever I experienced a personal loss. Well, I haven’t seen an entry in that blog for months. That blogger used to leave extremely nasty, hateful and spiteful remarks on blogger comments page, which is one reason why I closed off the comments box until I find a better way to monitor the response system.

In the meantime, what saddens me greatly is when a blogger decides to close up shop for an insufficient reason; that being said, I publicly mourn for the loss of the blog Velvet Dissident, whose reason to commit blog suicide was due to being impatient; in other words no getting the blog to be noticed fast enough other than friends and family.

Velvet even asked me to mention the blog on my page a couple of times, but I failed to do so, primarily because I was writing thoughts that I feel just didn’t fit in and was waiting for the right moment. I suspect Velvet reached out to me because my blog was more visible than a brand new space. But of course in blog-land as well as real life, there is never a right moment to jump in the mix, you just do it.

Velvet claims that on a spur-of-the-moment impulse, he just pushed the button and…poof! It was gone forever. Blogger is like that, unfortunately. It’s a shame, because I really grew to like Velvet’s blog. I wish he would have reconsidered before killing it. His blog was a breath of fresh air, much like the persona and soul of Velvet Dissident.

Perhaps he’ll reconsider and start a new blog. I’ll stand by and pray that he does.

Thoughts On Rejoining The Rat Race

It was a typical sunny day in the city of Lincoln, county of Logan, state of Illinois. I was sitting in an English composition class, wishing I was elsewhere, just as I sit in my holding cell at the present moment, wishing I was elsewhere.

I never did appreciate people in charge, people who claimed they knew what they were doing; of course you they really don’t know what they are really doing and the way they climbed the ladder was not through hard work and skill, rather ass-kissing and who they knew to get that good job.

Back in my 20s, I understood injustice, I understood unfairness and I also understood the need to want something and to work hard for it. In politics, the same logic follows. If you want something bad enough, you work at it, earning the respect of the people, getting them to put their trust in you.

But it’s not always like that as I learned later in life, that the same people who believed in truth, justice and the American way sell out. They want to get ahead and win the rat race.

They prefer good meals like steak and cheese as opposed to ramen noodles and mustard sandwiches. They prefer family life over a plethora of girlfriends or boyfriends. They prefer stability, wealth, material possessions, and status and power verses living on the edge with or without trinkets to make them happy.

At some point of my life, probably when I was high school or perhaps earlier, I aspired to be all of those factors and more; I aspired to have a family and work at a great metropolitan newspaper. I also aspired to be a U.S. Marine, but when I found out my shoulders dislocated frequently, that aspiration dried up very quickly.

I've always worked at being a journalist from my senior year in high school until now, letting it take on various shapes and forms. Officially, I ended my regular writing gig with a Jewish newspaper that I was freelancing for in autumn, 1995.

I already had a full time job that was, um, just okay, just a job that paid the bills until something else came and that broke me in two. And with that in mind, I decided to find my way back into the journalism business and to be quite honest; it still seems like a great and laborious task to get to where I need to be.

I’m not sure where it is I belong, but one thing is for certain, I have jumped back into that great big newsprint ocean head first. Sure the water is cold and tepid, but once I get used to it, the water will be just fine!

American Yarnprose>The Slob

The Slob

He
spent
his
days
freewheelin’, poppin’ pills, stayin’ inside for it was safe in there, much easier to hide. He saw a middle-aged woman wearin’ nude stockings. She caught his stare and she just smiled. The cool approach of the unhip makes it all worthwhile.

He stares at women’s chests. His back to the east, his eyes toward the west. His roommate calls him a slob but he knows what he’s doin’, for after all, the hypocrite should stay focused on his own prob-lemme see, my head is spinnin’, I feel so dizzy,

Too much isolation, not enough to eat, dreamsbout women walkin’ down the street. A homeless man comes up to me and tells me he’s hungry, can I help him out? So I say, I can barely feed myself, let alone close my mouth.

The sky is blue. My hair is gray. I am told I worry too much and that there is no reason to feel this way. I see a transvestite all dolled up in black and gold. Ain’t nobody’s business if he wishes to be a missus, like a Jane, Sally, Marg or Peg, but that man, who’s dressed up like a woman, ought to at least shave his legs.

A man in brown holds bags of white that are drooping like the floppy ears of an old hound dog. His eyes are singing, his mind is clear. The only thing that keeps him goin’ is the study of reflection inside his bathroom mirror.

Project MishegasMaster: Cleaning Out My Apartment

Lately my apartment has been going through a change, a change so unique and wonderful, that even my own father, Rex Pâtér Homo cannot believe his own ears.

I’ve begun to clean it up and make it look like an apartment as opposed to living in a storage space. I suspect for years I have been living like this and anyone who is anyone has told me I have too much clutter, but you know I never listened to them, that is until recently.

Ever since I decided to get the Internet at home, I decided to make it a goal of mine, to clean up my apartment. The best way to do this for me though, is to go through all the boxes piece by piece. Now of course I realize this will take some time, as I don’t make enough of it myself, either because I am online talking, looking, poking, engaging or provoking minds among other things.

I have begun to go through the boxes; in some cases it’s like finding a treasure trove of long-forgotten items that I know I really don’t need anymore, but hung onto them for whatever reason.

In terms of my audio-visual trinkets like CDs, I have been going through my collection and pulling out music I don’t listen to and selling it for store credit at a local music shop. I’ve been doing the same thing with my audio cassettes, video tapes and DVDs, although I don’t have a DVD player just yet.

I don’t get much in store credit, but I don’t mind either, I can get music that I love and that’s the important part. Sure it’s more clutter, but it’s the clutter that I enjoy and cling to the very life of; music makes me happy whether I’m on the job (it’s humming in my head throughout the day) to driving in my car to wherever I go. It’s all there, waiting for me to listen to it and be inspired by it.

Each time I go, I hang out at the shop for at least an hour, because it’s about a 45 minute drive there from my apartment, besides I like talking to the music sales clerk about good and bad music. I made a killing in store credit last time I was there, close to $193.00! Is that incentive enough to dip into your collection and sell it off too?

Well, knowing most die-hards that I know, especially those who hang onto their vinyl, will most likely keep their records until they die. Upon death, someone else will likely get it and the lucky recipient will more than likely give the records away, sell it on EBay, barter for them on Craigslist or do whatever they choose to do.

So what’s the point in saving anyway? You can always replace them. If it’s money you’re after then sell now. Unless your records are in mint, pristine or in decent shape, most used record shops aren’t going to bother looking at them, let alone buy them from you. If they do, it’s not going to be that much therefore your pipedream will burst like a raging flood and get you all depressed.

What I’ve learned over the years is, that you cannot take everything with you when you die, so it’s best to enjoy what you have around you now, and get rid of what you don’t need so someone else can enjoy what you used to enjoy.

I learned that lesson the hard way when my parents, The Arizona Babe & Rex Pâtér Homo decided to move to the Valley Of Golden Happiness back in 2001. I had to move everything I could out of their home and into my apartment in Chicago. My roommates were not happy, but I had no choice. The only items I kept in my car that summer were my records; and when I had to make room for other stuff, that’s when I decided to sell them.

I remember getting over $200 in store credit, which of course doesn’t buy very much in today’s economy or marketplace, but that’s when I decided to take on the new attitude policy in my life.

And it’s working, working for me. And I like it.

When I pass over the universe someday, I certainly hope that my collection of music, art and books will be enjoyed by the next generation of young and old and willing ears.

Slowly and surely my apartment will look like an apartment again. Then after the boxes, it’s the clothing and the books and lord only knows how many of those I need to go through.

And as I work on the apartment, I will also be cleaning out my Saturn, my own moving storage space on four wheels. It would be nice to see the back seat once more.

After that, it’s my storage space.

I’ll need a steam shovel for that.