Chapstick wanted me to share another couple of things from his jail experience. The first is the evidence that no matter what you think, it’s best to keep to yourself as much as possible; to not stir the pot.
Some loud mouth short guy with a long pony tail came in on Saturday and wouldn’t stop bitching and moaning about this and that. How he didn’t agree with politics, and that’s not the way he was used to doing things. After about an hour of him stirring the pot, about 8 guys (2 from each gang) waited for him to lie down in his bunk, then surrounded it and punched the crap out of him. Then the Wood rep explained to him that he was going to follow the rules that were in place whether or not he agreed with them. The douche was shortly there after transferred to prison. Sweet!
The second thing: As Chapstick was finished with his jailed weekend, back in his street clothes, waiting to be returned his possessions and released to the world to stir things up once again, he heard what he deemed to be a notable quote to share with you all.
The other jailed, while also waiting to be released, were talking about how they couldn’t wait to get out and smoke up for the first time after a whole weekend of not. Smoking weed is big out here in California, especially now that you can walk into a dispensary and purchase it legally. From THC oils, to lollipops, to edibles, to live plants for growing your own, to hundreds of different variety including Maui Wowie (I can’t believe it’s actually real). Imagine a doctor writing a perscription for Maui Wowie, or Purple Haze. They don’t actually do that; they just give you a green card which allows you to buy whatever you want. But that’s a whole separate post.
So, Chapstick chimed in when asked about his smoking habits with “I don’t smoke, I think I’m allergic to it. I just get sick.”
The others looked completely confused and disappointed with this response.
After a short contemplative silence one of the others said, “Man, that’s like being allergic to happiness.”
So I spoke with Chapstick Ferguson the other day, and it looks like he’s got something to share with the readers of Destroyed By Madness. Although it seems like his world is on the up and up, he found himself in a bit of trouble once again. You guessed it, he went back to jail for a pair of weekends to visit his old stomping grounds at the Vista Detention Facility. This time, though, he doesn’t have nearly as much to document in terms of an interesting Blog review. The politics were the same. He arrived to the sounding “WOODS” upon entering the holding cell. This time, instead of sharing a cell with just one inmate connected to a common area, he entered a room with 57 bunks (he counted) piled 3 high. He stuck with his race, ate with his race, read a book called “God’s Prison Gang,” and slept for most of the stay. He recalled the bunks being just as uncomfortable, and the meals being categorized by the same brown gruel, tan gruel, and off white gruel that he remembered.
Although this should be the last time we hear from Chapstick, I did feel compelled to inform you of a prank he witnessed this time around that was pulled at least 3 times over the course of the weekend. It was pulled on the weakest of the bunch, and only to newcomers. Chapstick was wise enough, and strong willed enough to not be the “butt” of the joke (pun completely intended).
Here’s how it works:
A South Sider welcomes the newcomer into the holding cell. He helps him set up his rack (his bunk). And earns quick trust to the nervous rookie. He then explains that everyone there participates in a daily workout.
There are 2 versions of this workout. Version 1 is basically a military push-up: starting from the standing position, squatting down, kick your legs out, do 3 push-ups, back to squatting, and stand up. That counts as 1. The newcomer would be required to do 150 of those.
OR, the newcomer could do 5 “impossible sit-ups.” The impossible sit-up is basically like a normal sit-up, with a partner holding the newcomers ankles to get optimal leverage. The only difference is that another partner holds a towel strategically over the newcomers face, so when said newcomer tries to sit up, he is held back by the tension of the towel pulling back, and being eventually let up to the fully crunched sit up position. This will really give your abs a work out, and will also blind the newcomer for what is to come next.
I bet you can guess where this is going…
So after the South Sider demonstrates this to the newcomer, he asks the newcomer which he would rather do. Of course the newcomer would rather do the 5 “impossible sit-ups” opposed to the 150 military push-ups that would really amount to 450 push-ups. So the newcomer gets in the sit-up position, with a towel over his face, struggles to get the first completed, and once he does, and nothing happens, he gains confidence and trust in the exercise.
The second one, however, happens all to fast and with an ending that is as unexpected as it is unpleasant. Another South Sider squats over the newcomer, facing the partner holding the newcomer’s ankles, pulls down his pants, and prepares for the towel South Sider to let go of the towel as soon as the newcomer is in full struggle to do the sit-up. The newcomer then shots upward, finding his face fully implanted in the mooner’s crack. It’s disturbing to watch, and I can’t even imagine what it’s like for either person, the face-planter, or the crack filler.
Chapstick wanted me to ensure to the readers of my blog that he was not the butt of this joke in any way. Upon entering the holding cell, he was asked if he wanted to work out, and without a missing a stride, he replied, “Not a chance.”
Chapstick’s favorite workout prank was between 2 people that were either homeless, retarded, or a combination of the two.
The content of this one was largely similar to Catcher in the Rye, although the style was not nearly as painful for me, the reader, to read. The main character Meursault (the stranger) was generally disconnected within society and could not really relate to those around him. He was not entirely connected with his girlfriend, who asked him whether or not he loved her, he responded that he didn’t, but it didn’t really matter anyway. He said he would marry her if it was what she wanted, though. He didn’t cry at his mother’s funeral, and couldn’t understand why, nor why he should.
The book was split into two parts. The first one ended with Meursault killing another man, an Arab armed with a knife, and the second started with Meursault in prison awaiting his trial.
The plot ends as Meursault engages in an argument with a priest who comes to chat about his sins and accepting god before Meursault receives his death penalty by guillotine. Madness and enlightenment is the resulting end. At least that’s what I got out of it. This was another pretty short book by volume, and I enjoyed a bottle of wine while I read.
What was more strange than the ending of the book, was the result of my finishing the book. After reading for a good part of the afternoon into the evening, during my slumber I had a dream that my good friend Eddie was to be put to death by guillotine, which happened, and I caught his head after it was severed off. Then, in my parents lawn shed, I was torn up about how to break the news to his family, who I was sure would blame me somehow for involving Eddie in something that resulted in his beheading. But I was also trying to get in touch with my brother, who had stolen my parents Jeep, and was joy-riding with a friend in downtown Philly. The on-star lady told me that he was drunk, and there was nothing she could do to help.
So, what’s the moral of the story, you ask?
If you read The Stranger, and drink a bottle of wine, you will have some fucked up dreams.
If you have been following Beck’s Record Club project, you know that his 4th installment has been shared in it’s entirety. Much like the clean-up hitter in baseball, the coveted 4th slot has knocked one out of the park. This time the artists are covering INXS’s Kick, and it is obvious that the audio and video recording has reached new levels of fantastic with the experience gained.
I’ve just recently been really into St. Vincent, She/They have been getting plenty of rotations on the turntable lately, so it was especially cool to see Annie Clark pop up in Beck’s Record Club. If you haven’t heard her stuff before, definitely go check it out. She’s an incredibly talented musician, bound to do great things.
So either I could tell you about each song, and lose you in the thicket of boredom, or I could just share this stuff with you. So take a hit and take it in. It’s some really good stuff.
I wrote this post a while back, but never published it for a reason that I can’t figure out today. Happened upon it today by accident, really. Consider it part of the archives.
What’s the thin white line? No, I’m not going to write about riding my motorcycle on the dotted white line, splitting traffic down the freeway, experiencing the thrill and tunnel vision of this one-of-a-kind high. This one’s about cocaine.
Insert dramatic pause.
I’ve originally started this blog to document oddities, irony, absurdities, and insanity. I had written a post in the beginning of my blogger days about a fantastic experience with some crazy mushrooms. It was a fun post, and a great experience. It wasn’t my first psychedelic adventure, and definitely won’t be my last. Since that time, I have made the conscious decision to grab life by the horns and not let one experience pass by without at least a little taste. When presented with a little bag of coke, I figured why not.
I had never done coke before, and quite honestly, don’t really feel the need to do it ever again. As a high risk for addiction drug, I don’t really get it. The high is ok, I suppose, but really short lived in duration. Maybe the addiction comes from wanting to do line after line in a single night just to maintain the high. Of course, there is also a very good possibility that the quality of the coke was sub-standard at best. But whatever the case, I wasn’t impressed. When it comes down to it, the high is very much like taking a Stacker 3 diet pill that only lasts for like 30 minutes. So you take another line, and another, and another after that. Bump crazy. It gives you a ton of energy, shortens your attention span, and makes you feel open to anything.
It’s been too long since I’ve reached out to my tens of Destroyed By Madness friends out there. OK, so tens might be stretching it a little. Most readers happen across my blog by typing in some seriously strange keywords in Google. The most common is a variation of the words princess, disney, and whore. That’s right, whore. The variations sound a lot like, well, I’ll just take today for example. We have slutty disney princesses, whores disney princess, and of course real disney princess slutty. Another major term that is used to find my blog is the word mohawk. There is no doubt that in either case, I have a more than slightly disappointed reader at the other end of the terminal. One that is either sitting in a dark room wearing nothing but his underwear and a mickey mouse hat, or one with a wallet chain, both left unsatisfied and disappointed with Destroyed By Madness.
But that’s not what this post is about. It is about CocoRosie, and the amazing show I saw the other night at the Belly Up in Solana Beach. They played a variety of songs from all their albums, focusing mainly on their newest release, Grey Oceans. You can find my initial review here of that album. I gave it 3.5 stars. I’m fully willing to change that to 4 or 4 and a half after seeing them do it live. The combination of one sister, Sierra, a classically trained opera singer, keyboardist, and harpist, with Bianca Cassidy, the freak folkist, manipulating many different kinds of electronic, usually toy, instruments (see Circuit Bending), and they work perfectly together. Although not engaging with the crowd through words, you really could feel the passion in their music. It was a perfect showcase of everything that I love about smaller crowds with an ideally eclectic band.
The cherry on top had to be the near show-stopper, human beat-box named Tez. He is a guy that does things I never thought possible using only his voice. The bass, you can feel in your bones, and his beats are perfectly shaped rhythms that move your body. If you are at work, beware of the f-bomb drop. Check out a little something I found on YouTube…
So the point of my rambling is that that if you are ever presented with the opportunity to go see CocoRosie, don’t be a slouch. You can be confident that you are in for a wild ride.
CocoRosie presented another wonderful thing to me as well. I know you are saying “WHAT!? The show sounded like some kind of overwhelming awesome that another wonderful thing is just TOO MUCH!” I do understand what you are saying, but nevertheless, it’s true. Near the end of the show, the one and only Jen came up to me to say “hi.” I was awkward, and weird when she did as I was caught completely off-guard. But what that “hi” has evolved into has been coffee, dinner, swing dancing, and a lot of long overdue great conversation. So if you are reading this, Jen, thanks for the “hi.” Seriously.
Earlier that afternoon, I had a feeling that I would see Jen. I usually don’t get premonitions, and when I do, if I do, I usually don’t notice them. But this one hit me like a ton of bricks. I know, you’re saying that it’s a no-brainer, going to see a mutually enjoyed band later that night, you might run into her. But I say nay to that. NAY! I did not know the CocoRosie concert was that night until about 8:30 pm when I decided to go on an impulse. In fact, I was supposed to go to a Devo concert with my roommate which I reluctantly turned down.
All in all, it was a fantastic night filled with great live music, human beat-boxing, and coffee with an old very special soul.
Maybe I should start listening to those premonitions more often….
Happy Chang’s Army likes it hot, and so does my favorite restaurant. In the consistent strangeness of taking pictures in men’s bathrooms, here’s the latest installment. Enjoy!
I’ve been in my fair share of restrooms in my life. I’ve used urinals, I’ve used troughs. I’ve stepped around mysterious puddles, and have even somehow avoided touching a single thing in a public restroom using the Kung Fu kick to flush and Jedi Knight abilities to work a faucet and open a door. If I entered a men’s restroom and found nothing but a bucket sitting on the middle of a small room, I probably wouldn’t think twice about it. Just take aim and fire. But (earmuffs girls) why the hell does every men’s room in America have to be the epitome of infestation?
Last night, I was out playing pool at a bar in San Diego. The floor was wet. There was an abundance of paper product forming an impenetrable surface in the toilet (an unwalled toilet, I should add) that seemed to be saying, “I dare you to flush me.” The walls were dirty where messages of hatred were carved. And the crown jewel was the metal wall-hung vending machine that dispenses various sex products. There was a glow-in-the-dark, ribbed cock-ring. Some kind of condom that screams, “If you want to be a VD dad, try me!” And of course, pornography.
I can understand the concept behind these machines; in a bar with a chick, about to go home and get some sweat mixing on, and you don’t have any protection. But what is with the cock-ring and porn? It just doesn’t add up.
And why the hell do I keep taking pictures in men’s bathrooms? That doesn’t add up either.
If Catcher in the Rye ate my soul, Cannery Row punched both Holden and Sallinger in the face, reached in their stomachs and gave it back. I read the first paragraph and was hooked instantly. It was poetic; it was perfect. Steinbeck, who grew up in Northern California, describes a small town in Northern California, and although this is a work of fiction you can’t help but wonder where the fiction stops and the truth starts.
Cannery Row in Monterey in California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream. Cannery row is the gathered and scattered, tin and iron and rust and splintered wood, chipped pavement and weedy lots and junk heaps, sardine canneries of corrugated iron, honky tonks, restaurants and whore houses, and little crowded groceries, and laboratories and flophouses. Its inhabitants are, as the man once said, “whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches,” by which he meant Everybody. Had the man looked through another peephole he might have said, “Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men,” and he would have meant the same thing.
Cannery Row is a different style of book than what I have been reading. Steinbeck is more focused on the surroundings and scene than he is on the actions of a particular character. Once he sets up a particular time and place, he allows the story to slowly creep in on it’s own. So, there isn’t much of a plot in this novel. If there is one, it’s mainly about how Doc is a standout guy, and because of that, Mack and the boys (the bums of the Palace Flophouse that swindle with good intentions) throw him two parties, both with similar outcomes, but one was a failure and the other a success.
Each character is interesting, and the adventures/events that lead up to the two parties are captivating and sometimes moving. Between the frog massacre, the Place Flophouse, the Bear Club whores, and the guy named Gay, this novel is a must read.
If there is anything that I will walk away from this book with, it is in the last page of the last chapter. It is the final section of a poem that Doc was reading at first to the party, and then to himself as he was cleaning the next day:
Even now,
I know that I have savored the hot taste of life
Lifting green cups and gold at the great feast.
Just for a small and a forgotten time
I have had full in my eyes from off my girl
The whitest pouring of eternal light
It must be the apocalypse. It’s gotta be. I just saw the most messed up headline I have ever read in my life. It’s very wrong on so many levels. Here it is:
So it turns out that this kid stabbed his girlfriend of 3 years, mother of his 1 and a half year old baby girl, in the neck with a kitchen knife. The girl was taken to a children’s hospital, her child was taken to relatives, and the boy fled the scene shirtless.
Let’s do the math together: The child is 18 months old. A normal pregnancy duration of 9 months. Potentially 2 kids that just had their birthdays. This equals a mom at age 10 and dad at age 11.
Let’s take this a little further: The child is 18 months, divided by the pregnancy of 9 months, equals 2. 2 times the mom’s age for 2 parents to make the satan spawn child equals 20. the dads age is 11. Kinda sounds like 2011 to me.
Or how about this one: the child was born in a 619 area code. The 1 could easily make a fraction that looks a little more like 6/9. 6 divided by 9 equals .666. Yikes!
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