western water music...

blank blue. western water music volume 2. nobody. this dude is my favourite. i've been waiting to hear this album since it came out a month or two ago. i had a copy on hold at grooves for a while, and finally my man dj hullewud picked it up for me on his way up here to dj last night. on first listen, i am in love. this is going to easily get as much play as the one he did with mystic chords of memory, which i can't stop listening to. here's a track to check out called "faces." enjoy it, and please, if you dig it, buy it...

fucked up family reunion...

i'm not going to say any names. from what i'm told, a certain family in this town (bayfield, on) hold a large family reunion every five years. people come from all over. 150-200 people. lucky us. it happened a few weeks ago. here's the story...

working at the bar one night. i walk outside to check on the patio, and i see my co-worker **** take off towards the street in front of the bar next door. there is a fight happening in the street. i run after him. a few of us get there and break it up. apparently, two members of the ******* family got into it with each other in the bar, spilled out onto the street, and ended up fighting on ****'s car, which he was not happy about. he got out of his car, choke-slammed the one guy to the ground, some other cat ran up and clocked one of the dude. during all of this, **** and i are just getting in between people, trying to break it up. after a few minutes, it seems like it's over, and i go back to work. over. or so i thought.

the next night, later on, this same family shows up to our bar. at first just a few, then more and more. eventually, there are close to a hundred members of this family invading the bar like roaches. we completely lose control. people are trying to order drinks for their kids. kids in the bar. i'm trying to get them out. these people have been drinking all day and act like they own the world. it's a bad scene, and i immediately get that feeling in my gut like something bad is going to happen. one of the guys shows up who was in the fight the night before. i tell him he has to leave. i don't want any fights. he starts getting aggressive with me, yelling at me. his dad starts in on me. tries to put his arm up across my chest to prevent me from walking through the doorway. fuck. we're screwed. i can tell. outside, it's chaos. the dude i asked to leave accuses me of hitting him the night before. i'm just thinking in my head, "no dude, you got it wrong, **** and i saved your ass from catching a serious beatdown from ****, you have no idea how close you came to being destroyed..." anyway, another one of the guys who was in the fight the night before is on the patio, and **** is asking him to leave, and he won't. suddenly i realize that **** and i are being surrounded by all of the mean in this group, who are egging on their buddy/son/cousin/nephew. i'm kind of disgusted when a man standing behind me says to the guy who was in the fight: "go ahead, do it, pop him, we've got them outnumbered." is this how you people raise your children? at this point it becomes readily apparent that they are simply drunk and out for a fight and there is nothing that we can do to stop it. it's going down. they don't even need a reason. **** turns to me and says, "call the police." i duck back inside and get on the horn to 911. i tell them the scenario. they tell me they are sending officers. i go back outside and it's chaos. about ten members of this family are gangbeating some dude in the street. circle boots. fucking pussies can't fight one on one. the dude's friends jump in and it's an all-out brawl in the street. at this point there is absolutely no hope of us regaining any control. we tell everybody to leave the bar. we are closed for the night. i stand at the gate to not let anybody back in. and wait for the police. the OPP station is only ten minutes away if you drive the speed limit. if they put the cherries on they could be here in five. instead, it takes at least half and hour. at this point a bunch of fights had broken out, broken glass everywhere, it's this family verses the world.

we wait around for a couple of hours, cleaning up, while the police interview people. the family members are claiming that somebody attacked them with a weapon and that they are the victims. assholes. you are in two brawls in two nights and YOU'RE the victims? jesus. i just can't understand this mentality. this priviledged, jock, date-raping, gang-beating assholish man-up type of bullshit. you guys get wasted and go out in a large group and outnumber people and hand out beat-downs and this is supposed to make you feel like men? and, to top it all off, you act this way in front of your children? no wonder your daughters are scared of you.

i wish we could do something about people like this in the world, but unfortunately, at least for now, they seem to be the ones in power.

weirdo dreams...

(pic from here.)
i woke up this morning with an army of bagpipers marching outside my window. at 10am. i would have slept through, i was having a pretty intense dream. pete woke me up, pushing my door open, saying "as if this is happening!" hey man, they woke you up, why are you waking me up? life. in the dream, i was writing a story. strange layers to this. in my dream, i'm writing a story, and visualizing the story as it happens. i love it when i'm actually being creative in my dreams. writing things. singing songs. freestyle rapping. i never remember the things i have created in my sleep. i think the story might have pretty good from the few lines of text i semi-glimpsed in that moment between sleep and wake. the only thing i remember now was something about describing the feeling of holding a gun in my left hand. doing something else with my right. not sure...

more strange dreams, i may or may not have already posted these, i'm not sure...

my towel in the park dream...

i am at doidge park, in london, ontario. standing on top of the hill, at the waterloo st. entrance, where the little side street ends and the hill goes down into the park. [obviously, most of you will have no idea what i'm talking about.] there is some sort of race going on around the block that surrounds the park. people in the park as well. there is something sort of disturbance across the park. i am with some other people. we start running towards it. running down the hill, i realize that i am only wearing a towel. i fall, the towel comes off, and i realize other people are wearing only towels as well. [there is more, but i can't remember...]

some weirdo crazy dream...

walking down the street, in a parking beside an apartment building, there are a few moving vans there, with people unloading couches and setting them up in the parking lot. people are sitting on them. it looks like a party is going on. then i see what looks like a parade float, but with more random old couches all over it, and people sitting on the float. i jump on the front. it's a birthday party or something. in the parking lot, they are building more floats with all the couches. i am sitting on the float, with my feet dangling off the front. we are driving through traffic. swerving left and right. then we're going over a wooden bridge, with three separate lanes, with dividers between all of them. we swerve into the lane on the left. i see a dog in the water below us, swimming, desperately trying to make it to a nearby rock. off the bridge, we are now in water. we are a boat/float. my foot catches on a wave, and i am pulled under, into the water. caught on something, i struggle. my foot feels broken. then i am on a little commune. people are tending to my foot. there are lots of little tents and gardens and vegetable plots all over. people are planting seeds. tending to their crops. an old man is looking at my foot. there is a purple stripe across my foot, we are examining it. [i am examining the foot as if it it not mine, as it is right in front of me, even though i know the whole time that it is my foot.] we conclude that the foot caught a wave and was slammed into the bottom of the boat, snapping it. my foot is being wrapped up, and i look around. i see ***** walking back from a garden, looking angry, and i hear somebody saying that she is pissed off because somebody else's garden had crossed the line into hers. they decide they will talk about it later. more people are there that i know. ***** and *****. i wake up.

my fucked up funeral dream...

this is one dream i hate to share;
as i found it deeply disturbing...

i am at a funeral for *****. i am sitting in a chair, overlooking a little hill, where the funeral is taking place, people on my left and right in a row of chairs. i can't take it. i start freaking out. i stand up, pick up my chair, and start smashing it into the ground, kicking at the air, screaming and crying at the top of my lungs, insanely upset at the unfairness of this young person's death. loving this person so much, frustrated at the random cruelty of life. raging. the dream then switches completely, i am in ***** and *****'s house [not the same house they live in in real life, but i can tell in the dream it is their house], sitting on the couch, talking to ***** and laughing at the funny things kids say. the family is all around. everything feels fine. it is a short dream, but it goes back and forth in these blurry flashes between this tragic funeral and this happy family get-together...

i woke up at 5am in a panic. i almost called to wake ***** and ***** up to check on ***** and ***** to make sure everything was alright, but for some reason i had this feeling that it was okay, that it was just a dream...

but my history of experiencing foretelling dreams had me writhing about this one...

if it happens again, i will call...

that's it for now. more stupid bar stories to come. it's been a strange few weeks up here in bayfield...

compton to scarboro...

i just saw this for the first time. just now. wow. crazy. good work fellas. intense.

www.urbnet.com/thecarps

who's gonna save my soul...?

this video starts off really awesome, then i kind of started to think it sucked, and then it was amazing...

(thanks to my man click for the link.)

living with baduism...

man oh man, this shit made me laugh so fucking hard. check it out here.
i remember hearing a year or two ago that she was having a kid with the d.o.c., anyone know if there is any truth to that? i think he's probably immune from the same affliction that has affected andre 3000, common, and who knows who else. i just can't picture the diggy-doc wearing knit hats and capes and wrestling boots and shit...

(ps. i first found this link here.)

crop cirlces...

so, apparently, crop circles have appeared on a farm just a few minutes from where i'm living, close to the nearby town of holmesville. click here for more. later today i'm going to take a drive over there and check it out. crazy.

montreal...

for vinyl, i recommend checking out paul's boutique, on mont royal, about a 1/2 block east of st. laurent. i picked up some old public enemy records. i spent about two hours in there, getting my fingers dirty, but i could have spent the whole day...







i also checked out this other record store, just around the corner. i can't remember the name of it, but there were some nice people hanging out, and we ended up chatting for a while. record store people are funny. it started out with one dude noticing the public enemy logo through the plastic bag i was carrying. "what public enemy record is that?" next thing you know we're all having a half-hour conversation about public enemy, the music industry, punk rock, montreal's music scene, the fate of independent record stores... you know, the whole nine. anyway, turns out the dude who runs (and, i assume, owns) the store has an online realty show about it. check it out at www.4486coloniale.com.







ben and kaori, at, what mike calls the "japanese hippie house."

d-tox to re-tox...

[ghetto sox, timbuktu, d-ray, soundminds, etc.]

i didn't finish posting the last few days of the d-tox, i'll see if i can find my notes photos and get 'em up here. things got busy...

wild rose d-tox (day six)...

this is the morning of day six. i'm almost half way. it hasn't been as bad as i thought. but i have had my moments. breakfast today: scrambled eggs with peppers. no cheese. i picked out the mushrooms (forgot to ask). i ate the strawberries, but not the other fruit. (not supposed to eat tropical fruit on this thing.) more green tea. water. drops. one thing, again, about this detox, is the, er, surprise and sudden immediate need at times to find a bathroom. i was mid-conversation yesterday with a friend of mine who was in town and mid-sentence it was just, "uh, dude, i gotta go." he was like "hang on a few, i'm just finishing up my beer, i'll roll with you," but i was already out the door walking back to the crib as fast as i could. (sorry brando, i stuck you with the tab for my san pellegrino.)

wild rose d-tox (day five...)

chicken breast and hard-boiled egg. late night snack on day four. didn't get a chance to write yesterday. day five as follows... breakfast: soup. some kind of black bean soup. with some veggies in there. dinner: salad. veggies. i didn't use the dressing they gave me. and i picked out the mushrooms (forgot to ask them to leave them out). for breakfast on day five: oatmeal with berries. i had a turkey burger (no bun) and salad for dinner. forgot to get a photo of it. it was good. okay, there we go. symptoms? feeling a little light-headed still. unfocused. slow. could still be the lack of coffee. i don't know. how long does it take to get over a caffeine addiction? i would think it would be a mild addiction. shouldn't take too long to get over it. a few days at most. five days without a cigaratte as well. i almost cracked at the end of my night last night. luckily, i didn't have any cigs on me. i think i would have smoked one. today, i am thankful. a moment of weakness. oh yeah, i think i might have been a bit of a total bastard during the day yesterday. just one of those miserable sods who is no good to anyone. i was doing my grumpy old man thing. of course, at the time, every little gripe i had felt completely justifiable. funny, the perspective offered by a single day. anyway, yeah, i'm considering doing a total fast when i'm done this detox. another 12 days, no food, just water and lemon. considering it. we'll see how i feel. if i make it through today (and i will!) i will be halfway through the wild rose d-tox. i'm still getting used to drinking green tea instead of coffee. i think, over time, i might even grow to prefer it...

wild rose d-tox (day four...)

this is the rest of what i ate yesterday. lunch, a couple hard-boiled eggs, more chopped green onion, a few baby carrots, and some cucumber. with herbs. and water. mmmm.

went for a jog.



dinner. salad. some turkey on there. avocado. egg. lettuce. no dressing. you don't need dressing when you can stab a tomato for each forkload.

late night snack at the bar, chicken breast, and an egg. (maybe i'm eating too many eggs.)

i woke up feeling pretty good on day three, but by the end of the day, i was a wreck. irritable as shit. at one point at work i misplaced my swipe card and started throwing shit around. not like in a rage, just sort of half-pissed/half-joking, but still. my memory was fucking up, forgetting orders instantly. also, my hearing is fucked. i don't think i have the best hearing anyway, but i found myself asking people again and again to repeat themselves, unless i would just walk away saying "i can't understand you." also, i dropped a few glass last night. i don't often drop glasses at work, so this thing is making me clumsy. by the end of the night, i was a wreck. at one point, when i was putting up the barstools, i had to sit for a couple of minutes, as i felt faint and thought i might drop to the floor. that's day THREE. today is day four. we'll see how it goes...

wild rose d-tox (day three...)

day three. i crashed so early last night. had a great sleep, despite the loud music in the bar downstairs waking me up a few times. woke up at seven am, which, for me, is just shy of a miracle. feeling a little slow today. not drinking is nice. i lack the sharpness of mind that coffee brings, but this will change. going back to go forward. green tea is good. i could learn to even like the stuff. got a slight headache, but it's barely noticeable. nausea? not yet. stomach? yeah, the laxative is working. i'm at the artsee cafe now, holding it in, but i'll be making a run home soon i'm sure. oatmeal again. this time with apple slices and some berries. i guess i'm allowed those. just certain fruits i can't have (oranges, melons, tropical fruits). this is also day three of not smoking. lungs feel tight. a little. expect some "flu-like symptoms," they said. maybe tomorrow. we'll see.

i'm off. did a phone interview last night with sol guy from 4real, for zink mag. gotta finish it up and get it to my editor before work tonight...

wild rose d-tox (day two...)

okay, day two. breakfast. oatmeal. nothing else. yup, oatmeal, plain. and green tea.



a couple of pots of green tea at work.



lunch. grilled chicken breast on spinach salad. with egg. and walnuts.

went for a job on the beach after work.



dinner. salmon. carrots. asparagus. bok choy.

no severe side effects so far on day two. i'm a little bit spaced out, moving and thinking a little bit slower than usual, but this could just as easily be from not drinking coffee as it could be from the cleanse. (the green tea helps.) the herbal laxative is working. i've been taking more frequent trips to the bathroom, but nothing too gross or anything. i actually felt pretty good waking up on day two. i felt like i had a good amount of energy, but had to use it more slowly, if that makes any sense...

wild rose d-tox (day one...)

this was breakfast yesterday. day one on the twelve-day wild rose d-tox program. you buy the box and get three bottles of pills and a bottle of liquid. twice a day, with a meal, you take two of each pill, and drink water with 30 drops of the liquid in it. the liquid says: CL herbal extract. the three pill bottles say: "biliherb" (bile flow stimulant), cleansaherb, and laxaherb (herbal laxative). they also give you a list of foods they recommend and ones that are banned while doing this detox.

for breakfast, i had three hard-boiled eggs, a can of tuna, with a few slices of cucumber, a couple of baby carrots, and some pieces of green onion.

lots of water throughout the day at work.



for dinner, a piece of trout (fresh, caught in the morning), with asparagus, carrots, bok choy, onions. good times.

later on i had a snack of one chicken breast and one hard-boiled egg.



i'm writing this on the morning of day two, and haven't noticed any effects yet, but we'll see. the literature tells me to expect to experience some or all of the following: "increased bowel activity and urination, mild feelings of nausea, mild headache and other flu-like symptoms, muscle aching, irritability, or an existing condition (such as a skin problem or arthritis) may initially get worse before it gets better."

all i felt yesterday was incrediblty tired and a little bit out-of-it, but i think that had more to do with a few days of lack of sleep, and not having coffee yesterday, the absence of which renders me zombie-like for at least a couple of days on its own.

strange dreams last night. sitting in an apartment somewhat like my former apartment on christie st. in toronto. a bunch of people over, everyone is drinking and hanging out and going outside on the patio to smoke, including this woman ***** who i dated briefly a couple of months ago. in this dream she just showed up and i was kind of surprised but then we instantly were completely getting along and together in a relaxed and comfortable not-worried-about-anything-at-all kind of awesome way... strange.

i feel great not drinking. oh yeah, that's another thing on this. no booze.

more great dreams to come i'm sure. always happens when i'm making a lifestyle transition, adding things, taking things away...



for breakfast today - day two - a cup of green tea and a bowl of oatmeal (no syrup or honey or fruit or jam or anything, just plain oatmeal). it's tolerable, surprisingly...

random goodness...

so, a couple of hiccups, but my health kick is going pretty well, been eating good meals and biking/running/walking lots. with the exception of the copious cider consumption, smokes and cheeseburgers, i'd say i was doing pretty well. kidding. seriously though, i just picked up the wild rose herbal d-tox kit, i'm reading through the instructions right now. i'll be giving it a whirl in the next day or so. thanks to alexis for the recommendation. have you tried it? or anything like it? let me know.






YOU'RE!



my friend mindy's dad griff took me out for a sail. awesome! thanks dude!





these cats lost their engine; we gave them a tow into harbour.

nazi fucks...

here's one for you. last weekend, i'm bartending, and this dude walks in, probably in his 50s, grey hair, ponytail, wearing a tanktop. he orders two drinks, and as i'm making them, he turns to his side and i see a huge nazi tattoo on his bicep... it's an eagle or something, carrying the swastika in its talons. so i walk back over to him and tell him that i won't be serving him tonight. he asks why. i tell him because of the tattoo. that i don't want that tattoo displayed in the bar, that i feel it could make people feel uncomfortable and i won't allow it. he tells me that it's an old tattoo from thirty years ago when he was a different person. i tell that may very well be, but as of right now, it's on display, and i don't want it here. he then says something to the effect of, "i thought this was a free country," which is ironic, considering he's using the "free country" argument to argue for his supposed right to display a symbol which represents that exact opposite. the irony is lost on him. i tell him he's welcome back with a shirt on, but in that tank top, no fucking way. then his lady starts chirping in at me, saying that i'm judging him because of it, again with the "it's from a long time ago, he was a different person..." argument. i tell her, no, in fact, i'm not judging anybody. i say to her "have you heard me say one thing in judgement of his character? no, i haven't. i have simply said that i will not allow that symbol to be on display in this manner, for the sake of the rest of my customers." anyway, they keep trying to argue, until finally i just say, "this is not a negotiation, this is final, you have to leave, good bye."

i just don't get people like this. dude, you have a GIANT FUCKING SWASTIKA tattooed on your bicep. why are you acting surprised about shit? and i don't care if you are a reformed former little nazi piece of shit, guess what, i got two words for you: tattoo removal. or try these three words: long sleeve shirt.

anyway, i later found out that this dude is either the son or grandson of the head of this area's local nazi organization, so, whatever...