Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1621
Phoenix hotel, ICE closures, anti-nostalgia, Trump horrors, a smidge of optimism, my dashed science fair video hopes.
Good morning good morning how are you doing with this yet another day of all this bullcrap. Holding up okay? I hope you are holding up okay. I hope that, right now, of all my friends and acquaintances, I am doing the worst. Because while I would not say I am doing well, exactly, I am operating within acceptable parameters. I wish that for all of you: to be operating within acceptable parameters.
Seems that some of you got the photos yesterday and some did not, depending on when you opened the email and the state of Cloudflare at that moment. And of course if you’re in the GMHHAY Slack you could see the images there. But if not, I am re-posting Jane’s fall image because, god, so cute.
Just back from the grocery store. Needed cheese sticks. Used it as an excuse to buy a Diet Coke. A Justin Timberlake song from Man of the Woods came on the stereo. It was real good. That guy used to be real good. Took me back to when I worked with him. Triggered my current ongoing internal debate about my past decade of attempts at negating ambition and its probable futility though I am not ready to give up yet. Ran into another Lightning driver there are a lot of them around these days. His Lightning was so much cleaner and less beat up than mine. Glanced, as I always do, at the physical newspaper headlines as I left the grocery store. None of them had the news on the cover.
Rough day yesterday. The president called a woman journalist a piggy. Wait that was the day before. Yesterday he sat next to a murderer and told the world that the journalist, whom he murdered, had it coming. He insulted another woman journalist for good measure. That sucked. I did not like any of that even a little bit.
And then a bunch of plutocrats had a big dinner with the murderer because they all want his money. Elon was at the dinner, making up with Trump because even though he has publicly said Trump his in the Epstein files he’s just gonna be friends with him again because he needs this other guy’s money (he is the dude who, you may recall, like a bajillion years ago Elon thought was gonna back him to take Tesla private and tweeted it out when he got too high with Grimes wow none of that is made up). Of course they all justify it by some variant of “well, aren’t we all murderers, really? What’s the difference” and in a way they are not wrong! Trump is murdering boat people in the Caribbean with impunity and without even a pretense of legal justification. Elon has killed hundreds of thousands this year with his illegal aid cuts. Why not just hang out with a murderer. Also a gay member of Trump’s staff just shook the guy’s hand, even though were they in the dude’s home country, he would have him murdered for being gay oh wait no he wouldn’t, that guy is rich NEVER MIND.
BUT both houses voted to release the Epstein files, and even though ole Donnie probably has a few more tricks up his sleeve on them (the conspicuous insertion of the word “unclassified” in the bill, the supposed ongoing investigations of Democrats, etc.) it was definitely bad for him and good for everyone else that he lost the fight and had to cave. And look. Ryan Lizza Marjorie Taylor Greene is still a bad person but bad people can do funny and good things from time to time and I am enjoying the ensuing drama.
The courts in Texas tossed their electoral maps which is just hilarious and now it goes straight to the Supreme Court and yeah, the court will probably find in Texas’ favor, but not definitely, just probably. There’s still a chance for the funniest thing there, so I will enjoy that for a while.
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We are listening to Paris 1942 today, the short-lived band that was a collaboration between Moe Tucker of the Velvet Underground and the Sun City Girls. It has been re-issued by Superior Viaduct. It is on black vinyl. It is not the best recording and its a bit meandering but I enjoy Moe’s drumming and the guitar is pretty awesome.
Been thinking a lot about the Sun City Girls recently. Nick texted me a pic of the Jason Pierce/Sun City Girls record the other day (I have it, it’s okay) and I’ve been thinking a lot about that Sun City Girls show at the Paradise in the front room what the hell was up with that how did that come to fruition was that a Gibby jam? So weird. But awesome. I am so glad I got to see them once. I never did get to see Moe Tucker play, though. That is sad.
Remember when the Velvet Underground reunited and they couldn’t be bothered to play in America that was really something.
SO. yeah. Super depressed yesterday. My sleep is all fucked up, I have been endlessly tired. Last year this happened and it turned out I had strep. So I guess I’ll go get a strep test. yesterday I finished a meeting and headed straight to my existential-panic massage table I keep in my office for all existential freakouts. You put your head in the ring and your nose and arms go straight down and it is amazing. And I fell right asleep. Day before, mid-day, I felt bad so I went upstairs and napped for two hours. Both of these on days where I had gotten more than eight hours of sleep.
So of course last night it all came to a head and I couldn’t fall asleep till, like 1 AM. Had enough of Game of Thrones, got through the Red Wedding but jesus man that was rough. Switched to the latest book about China I am reading because I’m basically always reading a book about China. People think dudes are always thinking about the Roman Empire but they’re thinking about China. This one’s good, the first two pages are revelatory, but I do not completely agree with its thesis. I do not think the US is a nation of lawyers. Not anymore. I think it was a nation of engineers in the interregunum-between-the-wars years, like the author does. Then I think there was a brief period where we were nation of economists, Bretton Woods and the New Deal and all that. Then lawyers, environmental pushback and growing bureaucracy and inclusion and rightwing court packing.
But now we are a nation of influencers and financial manipulators. Neither is good.
Mark has a good name for it. Scamocrazy? Grift Economy, I think that is it. We are in the Grift Economy.
But ha ha joke’s on you even though I got less than six hours of sleep I am fine today because I’ve been oversleeping for days.
I read yesterday that the Phoenix Hotel in San Francisco is closing and it sent me on this insane guilt nostalgia spiral. Used to be my home-away-from-home that hotel. First stayed there in ‘96 on the Cindytalk tour, loved its blend of kitsh and rock and roll and kept staying there through most of my years of bicoastalism. Met so many rock bands there at the pool. I mean sure, in my more flush days I dabbled with the W and the Clift and the Four Seasons and that Japanese one oh and the Kimpton one because I was lazy and it was next to the office. And the Rex because of its bar. And I had that apartment on the amazingly named Dashiell Hammett street for a while. But the Phoenix Hotel was it, man. Loved that place.
Then that sent me down a spiral thinking about this girl I used to run around with back then and I was flooded with emotion for how much I cared for this girl that, well. I wouldn’t say I treated badly but I treated… superficially. And that sent me down a spiral of guilt and shame for how unaware I was of emotions back then and the dreaded dual-prism-of-past-memories cropped up, where you can look at the same events and think you are the absolute worst person in the world or look at the same events and think you were totally fine and you will never know which is true without some kind of reckoning. Sometimes you do get that reckoning with the person, that is so nice. But sometimes you never do, you never will, and you gotta just suck that up.
So, you know, that was all pretty awesome.
Oh and for good measure I started thinking about this random trip to NOLA where my friend Ryan and I went on a good solid multi-hour, four-stop (five maybe?) bender and eventually at the end I cracked and ghosted him, pretending to have a cigarette and just hopped in an Uber and bailed, because my body was on drunken autopilot back to bed. And how lame that was. Then coincidentally I saw some recent news about him on Instagram so I messaged him and also apologized for that one, specific, random bender from like a decade ago like it was important or something because I am crazy.
Also we tried to go to our Mexican restaurant for Taco Tuesday last night and it was closed because the entire staff stayed home because ICE is in the area and seriously fuck all of them and then we had to go to Taco Bell because there was no other manner of managing Jane’s Taco Tuesday Disappointment (good band name) and because of course no latinos are working at Taco Bell.
And then at Taco Bell I had to endure teenage boys and they were totally fine, Emma pointed out later that they didn’t look at their phones at all except once to take a picture of a pretty sunset. But so what they are teenage boys and teenage boys in groups of two or more basically give me massive anger and anxiety because of the bullying I endured in high school and man I didn’t even like teenage boys when I was one and why does that fucking guy keep trying to friend me on Facebook seriously my bully has been trying to friend me on Facebook for, like, YEARS and I do not know what is up with that.
SAD.
OH and then last night we needed to make a video for Jane for her science fair project and I was all excited to do it and get her in a lab coat with a pointer and it was gonna be so cute but she just absolutely insisted she didn’t want daddy to do it at all, she just wanted mommy to do it. And that made me real sad because she was pretty unkind about it, eh, not that unkind. Brutally honest, shall we say. And I was in a pretty tender state so, you know, I just went away and moped and watched aggro man music (new High Vis KEXP set is so good) and moped. She did eventually say sorry and I told her her opinions were always valid and I loved her anyway and she said she loved me but still, man. When you’re already raw and you’ve been on a run of your daughter telling you you’re the best daddy in the world, that stuff can sting.
But I will leave you with a small joy. We have a #smalljoys channel in our GMHHAY Slack and it is deeply rewarding. When I cleaned out my mom’s house this spring I found the tape dispenser. The heavy, metal (not heavy metal the comma is important here) tape dispenser that was the tape dispenser of my youth. And it still had the 1970’s owl stickers on it. And oh my god I love this totem of my simple youth so much. It is sitting on my desk now, right next to my photo of a friend who passed last year and Garner’s Modern English Usage. It is bringing me much joy. I love this tape dispenser. I’m gonna hug it right now.
Gonna use the same Jane picture as yesterday because it was cute and I don’t want you to miss it.
Been a long time since we’ve done one of this series — the archives tell me the last one was February. But yesterday when I was in my state I desperately needed to hear “American Dreaming” by Dead Can Dance which is not, strictly speaking, a depressing song, except… it is? But that inspired me to flesh this one out since it was so close to being done. I am going to listen to it all day on repeat you should too let’s all be depressed together never listen to this playlist ever.
Talk to you tomorrow I will be better, I’m sure.
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Thanks for reading.
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Good Morning, Hello, How Are You vol 1.