And now on to the normal crawl, L.I.F.E. on a pixel, life on a bristle, life on a sheet: things I did, thought and ate, January 6th, year of our wonder and sorrow 2008.

While I made coffee or possibly lunch (Sunday meal plan = dinner: pasta with trader joe sausage sauce, lovely cheese, fresh onion/peppers/mushrooms; breakfast = granola + yogurt; lunch = ??; also had two glasses of tang, a sip of a root beer float, three beers), Bonsky said, “Tom, you thought it would take you twenty minutes because you have no sense of time.” We were talking about how I went to Kinko’s to make that zine up above thinking it would only take me twenty minutes to go in, print and get out, when it took upwards of two hours.

After reflecting on it (during Alphaville and Training Day mostly, both of which are terrible movies), I got to thinking that maybe the issue isn’t so much one of time lapse, but more generally of primarily storing experiences in impressionistic ways rather than in emotional or empirical ones. This seams to speak more fully to the ways I think about reading, listening to music, cooking, traveling, and so on. Not that I don’t perceive time in these things, but I do find that time (and emotional response, and empirical fact) often distorts around the more prominent forms of memory, i.e., light, color, temperature. We can talk about it maybe.

Asked for examples of my not being able to perceive time, Bonsky went on to point out that I often used to say I would be over “in a little while” and then not show up for three or more hours. I think this is more just my being socially untimely and cluttered than my not being able to understand time, but I’m including this point of his so you might form your own opinion.

At night I went to see the mighty Blues Control and everything shuddered back into place. I always know when I like bands and when I don’t, but sometimes I forget when I straight up love bands. Total jammers. Check these dudes outtttt!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Ten years ago I was a creator on the Discworld MUD. I had just “met” Larissa Sky, while Jeremiah and I had already worked together on at least one major project. Good heavens.

Next in life = planning a tour to New Orleans and back.

Sunday Dec 16th year of our lawd 2007 I spent in Boston. I ate Trader Joe’s raviolis, a chicken sandwich with sauce and cheese for lunch, and toast with butter and jam for breakfast. I ate a box of “Men’s Pocky” during snack. I watched Ace Ventura Pet Detective, a special about Charles Manson, a special about Jeffrey Dahmer and a hundred and fifty thousand youtube videos, and the new movie Juno. I enjoyed several of the youtube videos. I don’t think Manson poses much of a threat to anyone, and watching him, was reminded chiefly of Stinky Steve. Dahmer inspired pity. Juno was shrill, in part because I am not nostalgic for the 1990s.

Jen may or may not have moved into the Random House today. When I get back, I’m building a tall couch in the middle room and harvesting furniture.

I am working on a gigantic pile of stuff for a show on January 5th in South Philly, joined by Heather’s Black Sabbath band and some others. Ospreys is playing on the 30th at Katrina’s house and in Lancaster at KPPL on the 12th. Allen is hopefully coming to Philly on the 2nd and staying for a while. Travis is working on copying our zine. I’m sketching for a final version of MDBT-R.com and hoping to launch that by end-of-year. My Christmas work party was amazing and mind-blowing.

My mom and I went to dinner tonight at a restaurant near Scranton. My mom asked me if found the music offensive. I didn’t, but the low lighting was somewhat unpleasant. This was remarkable because, taken as a general, what happened was this: A person thought a thing I cannot control that I hadn’t noticed was upsetting me, but it was in fact a different thing that I cannot control that they hadn’t noticed that was upsetting me. The key philosophical questions that arise are A) What does a person’s misreading of what in your shared environment is bothering you tell you about how that person conceptualizes you; B) [How] does this simple miscommunication affect other conversation; C) Is there ultimately a difference between being distracted by one thing or another in this way (minor and ambient), except in the difference between a second person’s perception or misperception of your distraction and how that plays out as in question A.

At dinner I had a gin and tonic. It was Gordon’s Gin and I tried to tell my mom some “tales of the unbreakable bottle” but she doesn’t like to talk about my drinking. Earlier in the day we had a hilarious car ride back from the mall, where we went to buy shirts for business breakfasts but instead ended up buying paint pens, during which she was appalled at the thought of using paint pens to write graffiti.

Also, let it be known that none of the above is a metaphor for or pointer to anything else in my life, nor is any of it a rhetorical secret internet message. However there are secret internet messages elsewhere in this entry.

I’m going to sleep now, back on a normal schedule. Tomorrow I’m going home and hopefully out to Lancaster and Monday I’m going to New York and Tuesday we’re playing a show and Wednesday I think I’m going to Boston.

I slept in my childhood bedroom last night for the first time in a few years and tonight – though I was planning to go back – I’m sleeping in my room in the attic. I walked up the night steps at 6am after drinking a bottle of wine and I turned off all the lights and looked out at the 1996 streets from behind my old curtains.