There Will Be No Happy Thanksgiving When November Comes

There were too many coming at him at once, and no matter what angle he viewed it from there was no way around it, and that's when he decided that the window was his only option, so he ran and he leaped but one of them grabbed him and dragged him to the ground, putting all of its weight upon him, and he could feel it, he could feel the pressure on top of him but there was nothing he could do to get up, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how much he struggled, and so now he looked for help, and he screamed and screamed and he saw his family and his friends and his lover and he looked at them all and tears were streaming down his face and he wanted them to understand, he wanted them all to just understand what was going on with him and what was going through his mind and fuck where are they going, why won't they just help me, he thought, and with each step they took away from him his screams grew louder and louder but eventually his voice grew hoarse and all he could do was cry in long, silent, draws of breath and low rasps, and he could feel his body giving up even if, somewhere in the back of his mind, he wanted to fight on.

Lists are like protests in that they both accomplish nothing

Here is what I want for birthday (OCTOBER 8!!)

The Green Lantern Green Arrow Collection (IN HARDCOVER)

Sort of the HOLY GRAIL of my wish list. I've seen it on eBay for like 40 bucks but I was outbid. Every once in a while it can still be found floating around on there. Sadly, however, I think I will go my whole life without it.

Little Nemo In Slumberland HC Volume 1 Limited Edition

"So Many Splendid Sundays" looks much, much nicer in its full-size format but this is much, much cheaper and doesn't leave anything out like "Sundays" does.

BOX SETS!

The Jack Kerouac Box Set

Rockin' Bones: '50s Punk & Rockabilly

The Complete Stax/Volt Singles

The Brit Box: U.K. Indie, Shoegaze And Brit-Pop Gems Of The Last Millenium

OTHER THINGS!

There's a bunch of shit I've been meaning to buy but have never come around to doing it. I think I'd like to own a lot more stuff by Vaughn Bodé, especially his Cheech Wizard stuff (and no, not just because I know all the words to Sure Shot); really anything by him at all, except the collection SCHIZOPHRENIA, which I already own.

The West Wing was always a good show I never bothered watching because I got into it so late. But now there's DVDs! Don't you guys just love living in the 90's? Season 1 would be a great gift.

Speaking of DVDs, any of the following Criterion Edition DVDs would be just swell:
Rushmore
Time Bandits
FISHING WITH JOHN <----- Would probably be my favorite gift
The Last Temptation of Christ
All That Heaven Allows
Sullivan's Travels
The Vanishing
Man Bites Dog
Down By Law
Videodrome
Slacker
The Battle of Algiers
Short Cuts
My Own Private Idaho
Heaven Can Wait
Dazed and Confused
Kicking and Screaming
If...
Brand Upon the Brain!
Bottle Rocket (is this even out yet?)

And finally, if anyone cares to go with me, I'd like a trip to the Taschen store in SoHo, where I can buy the book of my choice (nothing too pricey; I'm not talking the giant book on Muhammad Ali or anything, just something small. I've had my eye on this Dada book for a while and they sell it there.)

Thanks for indulging me for just a little bit while I toss out this here wishlist. I don't forsee me getting any of the items on here save for like one thing Jen gets me because she's the one who asked me what I wanted, which actually prompted me to write this. So don't call me greedy or self-serving, this was all for Jen! Jen, you're welcome!

Love,
Paul Ringo DeBenedetto

Excelsior!

Note: This was a short story I started writing in the summer of 2005. I was taking a class on Religion and Transcendence to finish up a final credit and we were watching a lot of documentaries, mostly narrated by British men. In addition I had just started reading The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy and was in total anglophile mode (no jokes from the peanut gallery please). I was bored in class one day and started writing this, and decided rather than write something I know about to try and write in a completely different tone and setting than I was used to. I have about 3 chapters and a prologue done so I figured I'd transcribe those and then continue from there. When I started it I didn't have much time to write so I'd just do these small chapters, a few paragraphs long; looking back they seem most appropriate for the BLOGOSPHERE (if you will). I'm not sure, in hindsight, if it works or not but its the format I started in and I'm going to try and finish. I think only a few people have read this in the past; one time I let Allison read it, and anyone else would have read it when I had briefly posted it on my MySpace blog. Reading it now its a little embarassing but it was a work in progress and deserved to finally have its time in the sun.

Prologue

There were things he wasn't aware of as he took that seat on the bus one fateful morning. He wasn't aware that right at that second situations were escalating overseas. He wasn't aware that the man sitting behind him with the sunglasses, the cane, and the stupid crooked haircut that didn't quite cover his eyes was going to be hit by a car later that day and killed. He wasn't aware that a record label had just paid out of their asses for the rights to Joy Division's B-Side catalogue, and was planning on releasing a boxed set. He wasn't aware Hollywood was planning on starting a franchise of movies based on the comic strip Marmaduke.

And on 19 October 2005 at 08:07 (BST), Charles Martin was in no way aware that in twelve minutes he was going to walk into an empty house.

What a way to start a birthday.

50 Things I Love About Comix

I saw this on someone else's blog. I thought I'd give it a shot.


In no particular order:


1. Geoff Johns
2. So! Many! Exclamation points!
3. The All-Star Squadron
4. "Okay suckers, you've taken yer best shot -- now it's my turn!"
5. SUPERPRO!!
6. Sexism
7. The Spider-Man 9/11 issue
8. The Spider-Man issue about drug abuse that single-handedly began the downfall of the useless Comics Code Authority.
9. Speedy's a junkie?!
10. LGBT Superheroes
11. The crippling of Batgirl
12. The death of Jason Todd
13. The death of Elektra
14. The resurrection of Green Arrow
15. The resurrection of Green Lantern
16. Adrian Veidt saving the world thirty-five minutes ago.
17. Batman kicks the shit out of Superman.
18. Just the idea of Twilight of the Gods
19. A warrior Aardvark.
20. "No more mutants"
21. Blue n' Gold!
22. Ralph Dibny not being able to control his own body at his wife's funeral.
23. Krypto, the super-dog
24. Beppo, the super-monkey
25. Animal Man #25
26. Animal Man #26
27. The Question
28. James Sturm
29. That Nightwing Annual, post-Infinite Crisis, that shows Barbara Gordon taking care of Dick Grayson during the lost year.
30. Sterotypes
31. Archie doing just about anything to get Betty.
32. That one time Luke Cage went after Dr. Doom for 200 bucks.
33. This.
34. Also, this.
35. Bone
36. Deadpool
37. SCUD!
38. For The Man Who Has Everything
39. "Surrender? SURRENDER?!?!? You think this letter on my head stands for France?"
40. "It cost 1 million dollars to find a rare meteor fragment to take down the first alien. For you, all I'd need is a penny book of matches."
41. Just the idea that ComicCon actually exists.
42. Y: The Last Man
43. Molly Hayes punching Wolverine in the stomach.
44. Molly Hayes punching Punisher in the stomach.
45. Molly Hayes.
46. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
47. Milk and Cheese
48. SAM AND MAX
49. Christmas coming every Wednesday.
50. Passion.

CHIX ON SPEED (CHAPTER 4)

Colleen awoke with a burst of energy. Looking around now she saw an IV, an EKG machine, and other fancy equipment with abbreviated names that you'd expect to find in a hospital. Peeking down she saw that gone were her leather jacket and ripped jeans, replaced instead with a blue medical gown. She moved her head to the right and glanced into the mirror. She saw the damage done to her beautiful face (Wasn't that what he had called it? "Beautiful"? What if he saw her now? What if he saw this mess that was soon to become her new identity? No one, including he, would be able to get passed the horrible scarring and it was all his fault. That stupid smug son of a bitch.) Then Colleen realized one more startling thing:

Muffins.

Colleen tried to scream for him but nothing came out of her throat. What did you fucks do to him? Where the fuck is he?
--



I'd like to pause here to check in with our friend Mr. Muffins. Since the explosion and subsequent drowning Muffins is down one life out of his remaining five (he had lost one on his first overdose, one after hanging himself while high on crack-cocaine in a Madison Square Garden bathroom after an Elton John concert, one after being hit by a car driven by David Letterman, and one from old age). It gets to a point in a cat's tenure (they call their existance a "tenure" rather than a life; they have nine lives, you see, all of which make up a tenure) where he starts thinking of his own mortality. This was to pose a problem for our poor Colleen, of course, because no one else knows about the dastardly plan of Phantom Mannix, or how he has her trapped in his lair, the Phantom Annex. Now clearly no matter how much affection poor muffins feels toward the lovely miss Colleen he's not going to waste one of his lives just to save hers. But don't fret, dear reader! As we're about to see, the ever-resourceful Jonathan Muffins always has a trick up his sleeve!


--

The door to Colleen's room opened, and two of Mannix's henchman walked in. It was the girl, Liza, and the green skinned fellow from the aircraft carrier, whose name Colleen hadn't caught earlier.

"Alright, up with ya", the former croaked. "PhanMann's got a lot in store for you."

Colleen cocked her eyebrow. "Did you just shorten his name to PhanMann? What is he a professional athlete?"

Then the room exploded and everyone died because Paul got tired of writing this stupid story. The end!

Chix On Speed (PROLOGUE)

Running through time now all she could hear was her own footsteps reverberating through her body and the deep rhythmic inhalations of oxygen into her lungs. How long had it been now? Ten minutes? Twenty? It was impossible to tell; the peyote made her concept of time a little fuzzy. All she knew was she couldn't stop until she felt ready. And so now, miles from her original location, across the alkali flats of Salar de Uyuni, she saw the first signs of life in the region rise from the water; she saw the first man slicing a freshly caught fish; she saw Lake Minchin drying out, leaving that desert of salt; she saw the first salt miners, and she saw the first scientists. She saw all of this at once.

Turning northeast now, hitting the water within seconds, still running. The Netherlands Antilles looks like a Jackson Pollack painting. She can hardly make out a slave ship before losing it in the void.

And now where? France? No. Italy. What feels like inches translates to miles, and by the time she's tired she's already circumnavigated the globe twice. She stops and looks around.

And she's in Atlanta. And she thinks to herself, fuck. I hate the Braves.

Picking a vacation spot is hard for someone with super-speed, especially when they're high. Luckily for Colleen her sponsor was already abreast of the situation.

(*Spoiler: Colleen's NA sponsor is an anthropomorphic cat who finally kicked the habit after overdosing on heroin in 1994.)

At the speed of light Mr. Muffins was on his way.

Speaking of 2007, these were TITZ:

Paul Pedersen's top records of 2007, in no particular order:

Battles - Mirrored
I like Animal Collective, but this shit was like if Animal Collective got together and decided to make songs that people could reasonably sit there and listen to for long periods of time without feeling embarrassed. Probably my favorite record of 2007.

Dinosaur Jr. - Beyond
Found on the desk of J Mascis:

Dear world,
You're Fucking Welcome
J.M.

Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
I consider myself a fairly masculine guy, I think. Sure I'm comfortable with my sexuality so I'm not always proving it or whatever, but ultimately I like American beer, sports, the occasional fight, and jerking off. So how come when my friend asked the question "is it gay that whenever I listen to Jens Lekman I imagine him spooning me," I had to really think before answering, "I'm really not sure"?

Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
Ok, ok, we get it. You're very good.

Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?
Arguably the most fun record to come out this year, Kevin Barnes' latest opus combines catchy as hell dance hooks mixed with his now-typical lyrical prowess. This man is one of the most original and profound songwriters that no one cares about.

Blonde Redhead - 23
Best. Blonde Redhead album. Ever.

Les Savy Fav - Let's Stay Friends
Anyone who knows me will tell you that the Murder City Devils are my favorite band, but I don't think I ever legitimately cared about a band as much as I do this one. I used to frequent their shows so often that I ended up stalking out the lead singer and becoming his Friendster friend when I was 19. My main photo was a picture of me and him. It wasn't just that I liked the music, I generally think they're just such nice people that it really makes me happy when they put out a release like this; one that makes you laugh at the same time it completely kicks your ass. They get extra points for putting me in the liner notes! (OK, I'll stop now)

Dirty Projectors - Rise Above
Without a doubt the coolest idea for a record all year. Dave Longstreth decided to re-record and re-imagine Black Flag's 1981 masterpiece Damaged. All the lyrics are essentially the same except for some random fuck ups and added lines, but all the tracks are like 5-6 minutes long. The first day I heard this record I listened to Rise Above about 4 times in a row.

Others:
Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
The Weakerthans - Reunion Tour
The White Stripes - Icky Thump
Black Lips - Good Bad Not Evil
Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity
Radiohead - In Rainbows
Panda Bear - Person Pitch

Hey here's the movies I saw!!
Smokin Aces Laughable.
Black Snake Moan Made me a little uncomfortable.
Zodiac Awesome.
300 Mediocre adaptation of an amazing book.
TMNT Hey fuck you, I liked it.
Grindhouse Good, if not a little silly.
Spider-Man 3 Great comedy. Oh wait, it wasn't? This was arguably the worst movie ever, much less worst of the year.
Knocked Up Unbelievably funny.
The Simpsons Movie Bearable, although I did fall asleep (tired, not bored).
The Bourne Ultimatum Seriously kicked so much ass.
Superbad Best movie of the year.
The Darjeeling Limited More of the same; that isn't even an insult, I don't think.
Michael Clayton Another accidental snoozer. The parts I saw looked really awesome though.
Juno Little Miss Sunshine Has A Baby; cute, but poorly written. Jen Drake (who actually liked this movie) had it right: Too Dawson's Creek. Every line of dialogue is a fucking paragraph long.
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story Had its moments, but a bit of a disappointment.
Air Guitar Nation So good. Soooo good.
Pan's Labyrinth I technically saw it last December...
Hot Fuzz One of the most fun times I've had at a theater in a while. Runner up to SuperBad.

Is 2008 really that exciting a prospect?

A friend of mine said something today, to the effect of "all this talk about 2008 (2000 and great) is starting to make me feel a little skeptical." And that's true, right? For anything. I mean even Chuck D. said "don't believe the hype." But I will admit that 2007 was such an awful, dismal year that even cynical Paul Pedersen couldn't hold in his excitement for the 2kgr8.

Let's see, where to begin; broke up with my girlfriend, drank like a sauce hound, couldn't save money for the life of me, dated some crazy broads; it was all just so overwhelming. Things have been better for the past few months, and I guess that's where all of this 2008 optimism comes from, but its admittedly a little irresponsible to get so excited.

That's why this year's emotion is officially "unmitigated indifference"; because getting worked up is for suckers.