This blog is brought to you by insomnia, keeping me awake since 1997. It is also brought to you by the fact that I mistakenly took day time cold medicine when I should have taken night time cold medicine.

I’ve felt off all day. headache, runny nose, stomach-type issues, lack of energy, etc. Can’t quite put my finger on it, so to be safe I have bombed my system with vitamins and over-the-counter medication designed to alleviate all these symptoms and then some. I suspect I will survive.

I had intended to write about the passing of Norman Mailor, his work, his life, his impact – both on me and the world around him. That seems out of my grasp at the moment, so I’ll have to leave that for another time. But for the record he is dead, he was 84, he won the Pulitzer Prize twice and I just watched a video of him brawling with Rip Torn in a field in the 1970′s.

Insomnia is tricky. It provides me with private time in the middle of night to do what I wish, when I wish, how I wish. The problem is I have too many wishes and not enough energy to do a single one of them.

I could throw in a movie. I could read. I could re-kindle the fire in the yard from earlier this evening. I could play my guitar. I could play pool. I could do laundry.

Each idea exits my head at precisely the same speed which it entered. I have somehow managed to solve the riddle of perpetual motion, it exists, in my skull, right now.

I could really go for a sack of white castles.

A new song is running through my head over and over again. It is called This Rock. It is the newest single from the uber talented Alison Lewis, who also happens to be a friend of mine. I like having artsy-fartsy friends. I often feel like an anemone in the tide. Anemone. Anemone. What a fantastic word. Anemone.

I just filled the dishwasher. That was productive. I am giving myself a gold star.

The other night Tim and I found ourselves alone in the house, unsupervised, and with access to alcohol. This scenario is almost always ripe with equal parts creative genius and unabashed stupidity. New games were invented. There was spinny-chair football, which entails sitting indian style on a stool that spins so the other person can spin you around and around and around and throw a football at you. The object is to catch it and throw it back. The realistic goal is to not fall off, not stand up too fast and to not throw up. Great Success! There was also spinny-chair try and hit the paper ball with the foam kitana I bought at the dollar store. Yes, I realize the title lacks panache, but it redeems itself by being self-explanatory.

Tonight Jureg and I watched Cool Hand Luke on AMC. It was his first time seeing the film, I can not count how many times I have seen it but I assure you of 2 things – it’s a big number and still not a big enough number. The eating 50 eggs in an hour scene is classic. Fortunately we never have that many eggs in the house.

My bowling team won its’ first game of the season last night. It was a very exciting finish cultivating with Sheila (of the 96 average) throwing a strike and a spare in the tenth frame of the final game of the night to secure a 4 pin victory. There was much rejoicing amongst the members of team so is your face.

I am considering heading downstairs to the living room to sleep on the couch while flipping through the channels of what is sure to be stellar television programming, at 3:38 AM, on a Saturday night. Yeah. That’s gonna be either Leave it to Beaver in spanish, that ridiculous infomercial with the twin super-midgets on a yacht, mind-numbing reality TV or Adult Swim.

Anemone.

Have you ever went into the bathroom when it’s pitch-black, stood in front of the mirror, put a flashlight in your mouth and turned it on? It’s fun. You should try it.

The small fake ivory Buddha on my desk is staring at me. He is like a dog in the sense that he will stare at me until I rub his belly. Whenever I do I make a wish -nothing earth-shattering or overtly profound, maybe to catch all the green lights in traffic or a chocolate chip cookie, or an autographed photo of Abe Vigoda.

I am typing words for no other reason than I am awake and can not seem to motivate myself to do anything else. You deserve better than this. I’ll stop now. Ok, in a minute.

Colonel Sanders, CVS Pharmacy advanced healing fragrance-free lotion, jughead, that truckin song from Smoky and the Bandit is in my head too, black plastic things, melon ball, Hubert Humphrey, Vanilla beans, ear protection, Bob Dylan, winner winner chicken dinner, livestrong, white rice.

Anemone.

Hazaa

Last night my beloved Boston Red Sox trounced the Cleveland Indians 11-2 in game 7 of the ALCS, winning the American League Pennant and advancing to the World Series, or the World Serious as my father used to say. I adopted the sox as my 2nd favorite team years ago. Their fans are fervent, the ballpark is steep with history, Fenway Franks are good and the logo is cool. Plus, there are few things more fun than listening to drunk South Bostoners (aka southies) tell the tales of years of anguish and defeat. Even though the curse of the bambino was broken in 2004 they remain, at least in my eyes, the lovable losers.

I fired up the barbeque in the back yard last night, enjoying this odd extended summer while roasting up sausages, chicken, mushrooms and zucchini (thanks to Sheila). I don’t barbeque as often as I would like to. Not sure why. It’s right there in the back yard. It’s easy to use. It’s satisfying in a caveman sort of way.

The bulk of my previous bbq action has come on a gas grill. They are easy to use. You press a button, turn a knob and voila, cooking time. This grill however is of the old fashioned variety. it requires charcoal (which we have), lighter fluid (which we have) and patience (which I don’t have). I had a moment of frustration trying to get the coals just right. These things take time I had to remind myself. Eventually I slumped into a camping chair with a cigarette and a beer, running inside every few minutes to check the score, and settled into a peaceful cookitude that produced dry chicken breasts and burnt sausages. I’m still getting the hang of the charcoal thing. Alas, Sheila, Tim and I were fed.

There is a new roommate in our house, his name is Jureg. He is German. Jureg is German for Greg. Well, not really, but I like to think so. He moved in to replace new Greg when he departed, who moved in with Tim a couple of years back when original Greg moved out. So as you can see, there is a certain need to have a Greg under our roof.

English is his second language, which he speaks quite well. However, there are certain nuances of American English and our culture in general which take time to master. He has asked me to help speed his education in this arena. I am honored and frightened all the same. I have, and will continue to impart nuggets of Americana onto him, including but not limited too various bits of slang, the rules of baseball and american football, disc golf, how to shotgun a beer and the glory that is the 7 brothers – you know, all the classy stuff. He’s a good kid. He’s 23 and interning at BMW for a few months until he will return to the motherland and probably share with his countrymen how odd and obnoxious we americans are. In exchange for my tutilage he is helping me with my German and serving as a worthy in-house competitor in games of pool and chess.

During a conversation the other day he informed me that his girlfriend in Germany had asked him to ask me what Americans tend to think of Germans in general. I explained to him that I am one man and can only render my personal opinion accordingly. He seemed perplexed by this. I think it was his assumption that each and every American had a standard, government issued opinion of his countrymen that was universal and unbending. It seems in Germany this type of garden variety summation of Americans is commonplace. Perhaps this is simply a matter of lost in translation, perhaps I am taking foolish pride in our “free” country that many of us have different opinions, perhaps I just didn’t have the grapes to rattle off the stereotypical comments regarding Germans. In any case, it reminded me that diversity is a good thing, which I in turn reminded him. I don’t think he got it. That’s ok, he’ll be here for a few more months, I’ll see what I can do. If that fails I’ll at least teach him a southern accent and send him back to bavaria sounding like a hillbilly.

I saw Wilco last week. Excellent show. I caught part of their set at Bonnaroo this summer but had never seen an entire performance. With a catalog that big and a cult fanbase it was no surprise they played two hours to a rowdy group. I don’t think the Fox Theatre was built for a show like that. Andrew Bird opened, I was unfamiliar with his work. He used to be with Squirrel Nut Zippers and is in my humble opinion a fascinating and gifted performer. I’ve been listening to The Mysterious Production of Eggs all day.

I found a recipe online for waffles with peanut butter and jelly. Simple. Homey. Perverse? nah, just juvenile, but I’ll bet delicious. I intend on making them this Saturday morning for my bowling team after our usual Friday night drunken forray into one of our nations finest sporting contests. You see, I bowl in a league every other Friday with Sheila, Mike and Colleen. We bowl in Oxford. Oxford is far away. When we bowl, we drink. Far away + drunk = prison if I attempt to drive home afterwards, so Sheila and I end up crashing at their place around the corner. It has become tradition that the next morning I make breakfast. While my culinary abilities in general are somewhat limited, I have been known to whip up some mean eggs. No one has forced me to do this. I enjoy it, and do it willingly. It allows me to be domestic without being domesticated. There is a rather basic and simple pleasure in preparing a meal for people. Knowing that I have put nourishment in the bellies of friends, even if only bi-weekly, is a sense of pride.

Allan Ginsberg was one ugly son of a bitch.

There is a picture in a frame on a bookcase in my bedroom of he and Bob Dylan circa 1965. It’s a wonderful photo. It came in a book of postcards of beat generation artists I bought at City Lights a couple weeks ago. When I see that big burly fuck all I can think is thank god you were a gifted poet because that is a face made for radio if I ever saw one.

Speaking of ugly, “President” Bush is expected to ask Congress for an additional 46 Billion dollars in funding for his war in Iraq today. This would bring the total amount requested for the current fiscal year (which began Oct 1) to 196 Billion dollars, and the overall total since the beginning of combat operations to an estimated 455 Billion dollars. I’m sitting here trying to imagine what half a trillion dollars looks like if you stacked it, or lined it up end to end or some shit like that. I’ll bet it looks cool. I’ll bet it looks like universal health care or world class public schools. Oh well, that’s what dreams are for right?

I will leave you with a haiku stolen from a friends blog, which if memory serves me is in turn stolen from a T-shirt she saw at a tractor pull. I think it summarizes quite nicely the complexity of a beautiful autumn day. Kulik, please forgive my pirating of your material, this was too good not to share.

Haikus are easy

but sometimes they don’t make sense

refrigerator

Hazaa