February 10, 2012 Friday

6PM - Frank's Falafel at 65th and Franklin with Jack Jackson. We're supposed to meet up with Austin Hurley from Primal at some ritzy little place across the street from Happy Hound but both decided it was too expensive. He had just shown us this property he bought. The idea is for Jack to rent out one of the 2 apartments above the space at Starkley and Lorain. I went along to peek at them, I guess the previous owner had ran the spot as a jewel store. The guy had died though. There was a bit of a strange air about the place, not just being that it was practically gutted, or some of the left behind furniture, or the "gimp" room in the basement. Maybe the guy was a mystic. The place just seemed sad, and I kept spooking myself. Austin plans to put a Primal Coffee bar and sort of Co-op style market in the store front. Man it's got along way to go. Who knows, maybe it was the shaking fan, or the mysterious old key, or the valuable discarded stamps, or the bad blue carpet, I don't think John will be moving into the place.

We agreed after Ronnie Doyle came into conversation regarding the idea of making movies, namely "Clevelandia", hip modern kids trying to be apart of the "movement" to revive a dying city that we would all meet up. A trip to The Path and landing in during really awful guitar virtuoso at the helm we were going to drive out to Ronnie's native Parma as Jack said. It ended up being "Seven Hills", entirely different. Right around the corner from where mom works in Liberty. Ronnie's bleak neighborhood looked like a jet runway with houses on it, and his house looked like every other house in Settler's Reserve in Westlake, or like Mr. Dante's family home in Canterbury Estates. I told Jack that's where all the partying kids I heard about or met at Westlake High lived, Settler's Reserve. All of the kids whose parents would always be out of town or something of the like.

Ronnie seemed very energetic to have a new guest. As his scruffy looking older brother scurried around, most of which you could only hear, we were getting the small tour. The house was very much like Jackie's. Stairs up front, tv room, kitchen in the middle, extra family room on the right. What I remember about Jackie's is the pile of white tapes in boxes sitting in some nice chair he was working on. Everything reminds one of something, and things all too often remind me of Jackie or some little experience I had around him. He is never far from my mind. Even when he is very far indeed. So I tell Ronnie how it is so like the house I dreamed of living in growing up. The sunken tv room, full of windows, as Ronnie uproariously points out all of his mothers decorating choices he can't stand. The weird apple stickers and motifs on the walls under cabinets in kitchen. I tap on the fake-ass apple pie on the kitchen island that has a few cracks in it's otherwise perfectly preserved state. It's been dropped a few times. We sit at the table and he gestures to a center piece bowl of pine cones calling it "lazy". It's a very suburban home.

He shows off his little bedroom upstairs, blonde hardwood flooring, in socks you slide so easily. It's certainly a video making kid's dungeon. He points out his dvd racks he got from a closing Blockbuster. His Star Wars memorabilia, namely his two ended light saber signed by Darth Maul. He also has some Skywalker ray gun in a case. Looks real. A signed "Room" poster. He Elaborates on his emails to the director. While we visit Ronnie we are viewing several of his films. We watch his final 411 Steinman  project "The Robot Rapist". Self-explanatory. Little comments from cameo of J. Jackson, coat hood up scoping out a mutilated robot carcus in a dumpster. A bistandard. We notice there is this ghostly shit smell lingering around the couches and I make a cell phone video of Jack and Ronnie wrestling over "string thing", this little "candy raver" style toy that rotates a colorful string and shoots a black light at it.

Later watched "Blade Runner" at Kev Brennan's house with Kristen and Josh their roomate. I was disappointed, granted, a great looking movie, the characters were for the most part un-interesting and underdeveloped. I felt very un-invested.

February 8, 2012 Wednesday

Salvation Army, Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio with Emily Bernstein. Helping her shop for her shop. I've helped with some decision making, found a couple pairs of pants. I'm walking away with a pair of red macramé  flats. 50 cents. Nice. If I never wear them I'll just give them away. Maybe Marie Whitman. I've had to stop myself a couple of times. If I bought every neat coat I ever found, I would be in sure trouble. It's really a gamble whether or not thrifts will have leotards or dancewear this time of year. Note: start taking staplers to thrifts for the sake of switching tags.

We stop at Miss Jane's for food. Local vegan place on main st. easy to pass up it's in a 3 store front plaza. I think that Chris guy sells his hemp stuff here. Both get a 7 dollar macaroni w/lentil chili. 4 dollar kombucha. So much more money than I should spend saying as how I have no idea if that mural gig's ago. The hot sauce is fucking hot. And the lady behind the counter isn't very nice. In fact, unfriendly. Nobody else is here. Eclectic furniture. Probably for bargain prices. I'm pretty bothered actually by the put-offness of this counter lady. But what can you do? Nothing... you can spend 11 dollars on a meal. Emily shakes her kombucha. It doesn't explode much. The place gets awkward. The kind of awkward you can cut with a knife when the music goes off and isn't started again. I wonder what kind of busines this place does usually. This town reminds me of the Pennsylvania town in "The Fabulous Stains", especially a day like today, super overcast, cold, a little fleck of snow here and there. Venetian blinds.

The shift changes. Heavy hippie woman with her long long wavy hair and droopy purse. It happens!

Checkout line at cash register 6 at "Village Discount Outlet" on E. Waterloo. Emily waits in line to buy some pinstripe shorts. A dad tries desperately to get his kid to stand up and "get off the floor" the little rebel looks like a rag doll. So called "collectable" clothing items hang on the walls. Hooks surrounded by gray scratches the product of someone with one of those hook sticks with really bad aim. I can see it now.

11PM - Happy Hound. Henry Abbot DJs modular synth music. I buy a coca cola. Girl talks to him. Man I learned her name last week but cannot remember. She graced our house once. I think it was back during the one Hydra/ Teen Wish show. Wearing freakishly short shorts. Last week it was Felix the Cat, this week Miss Betty Boop plays on the screen. Bonnie is not working the bar tonight, so I paid for the coke.

February 7, 2012 Tuesday

1:AM - I'm really getting some mileage out of this Kawai drum machine from Andy Wright. Recorded this song tonight. I call it "Regina" for Mr. Regalo, not necessarily for any one reason but because I would like to. I used an old line of mine "I will pull you from the pavement". Although this is the first song I can honestly say I recorded vocally by stream of conscious. I sang whatever popped into my head. I almost gave up on the track tonight as I had hoped to be recording some version of "Chameleon". It just didn't sound right in the end. "I will lay you in the sun". For Mr. Regalo maybe. Online I sync the soundcloud upload with an archival 1700s picture of a man or perhaps a woman in an old straight jacket. Man... begoten sadness in their face is super intense. It's black and white and heavy all over. I emphasized the volume on the drum machine. My favorite part. It's like it's grabbing you by the colar and shaking you to the beat. I like that in Carmody, Iron Curtain, Martin Dupont. Drum machine has become as emotionally colonizing as distinctive vocals to me, essential right now. The vocals in "Regina" are 2 tracks on top of each other. Harmonizing and honestly in the final mix, you can barely make out any of the lyrics. Strictly for the sake of vocal melody, I am glad this song happened tonight. I became the human arpeggiator with the keys. Wanting a somewhat Giorgitalo sound I tried, but perhaps the vox removed it. Elizabeth Frasier is barely understandable. There you go! Those keys were such a pain! Must have taken some 30 different tries, I felt like a freshmen in high school again trying to record the keyboard part to "Suffer The Children" to tascam for our talent show audition. Impossible! Too angsty! Midway through recording I spot a coffee cup on the dresser, and god dammit the bottom has composted out! And on my butterfly cased J. Dante tape! Hell, of all it's brushes with death. I can't believe this coffee! I think it's saved only one of the photos, everything pretty much is stained with coffee. Besides the green photo. Jesus, coffee, love of my life, staining everything forever. Say goodbye to your turquoise-Cory-Haim sweater vest. Mother fuck.

- As far as still being jobless... you know. I'd say I've done alright so far with this time. I have material put out on tape or I will with Kerry, so I'm creating. Designed a tape cover in one afternoon that I can honestly say I'm happy with. An image taken from Debbie & Carlos Rosa's "Non-Impact Aerobics" book, drawn in red colored pencil with value change in red, blue cursive "Swallowed Whole" on milar, squished against another milar with purple-red water color paint in between. A total pain in the ass trying to get it to maintain any kind of consistency in placement. I thought It would dry. But it did not. It continued to move, and anytime I thought it looked good, my scanner source would prove futile and I would have to retire it once again to the sketchbook. Julia's in Westlake finally came through for me. Geez. But I regret the color. It lost some of it's deepness, so what I had to do what take the colored copy from the earlier and stick it behind the layers you could see. It looked pretty alright in the end. And all inconveniences aside I feel pretty inspired by these techniques actually. Maybe I'll start doing colored pencil drawings on milar then I can squish water colors behind them. Maybe even on glass! I can maybe even light it from behind. It could be so real! Kind of psychedelic. Maybe even where it can cast colored shadows on the walls. Hell! I want to create something for Alan's shop! That could be super cool! I walked in there the other night. He was staining a crap ton of wood for the record bins he's building himself. Building the counter too. The walls were chocolate-like in color. I'm very happy for Alan. I'd still like to make him that list. Records to get for "Frauline". Is it creepy to make artwork, giant renderings of peoples faces who you adore when if decent, they will probably find out about? I don't know. Listening to "Life Preserver" again. My favorite track I think is the one called "Ocean Skin". Funny surfer-guido-men.

I like the color of my bedroom walls. Sea-Foam-Green. And with the pink lantern light it makes me feel  pretty happy. That pink feels good in my soul. And my favorite things hang on strings above me.

February 6, 2012 Monday

At home, half box of Snow White Donuts all smashed into each other from a ride in my bike basket sitting in front of me on yellow formica kitchen table. Adam and Sara make reheat chili. Making a french press for the donuts. Got really lost trying to get myself to Snow White earlier. Took 480 and got off at the wrong exit. I barely know Old Brooklyn streets. So I might as well have been blind, because even after calling for directions I made my way back to Ohio City before I even found the place. I was very angry. I tend to really flip one in a car when I screw up directions, or get lost. I wish I wouldn't. I find myself asking myself "What can I do to calm myself down?" listening to recording of my radio show. I finally find the place. A dozen plain, 2 PB&J, 2 maple crullers, 2 chocolate crullers. Damn sugar. And a last minute salted caramel. Talked for about 20 minutes with the lady behind the counter and the owners dad, a former Cleveland cop. Wanted to stock Snow White Donuts at Dark Star Cafe. It was kind of a dark and awkward experience for a minute when we got onto the topic of riots & the projects on W.25th. He said their used to be a Sears on 70-something and Euclid and they hired guards during one of these riots that were ordered to shoot down any of these "folk" who came onto their property. This old former-copper blasts on the stupidity of politicians these days with their way of dealing with situations like so... "Soon word got out that they'd shoot yah, and they weren't coming around anymore" ..."Sometimes things need to be done the old way." What do you say to that but, "That's pretty dark, whoa." Who knows what kind of twisted shit this old cop got into in his day. I hate to imagine it.

I took donuts to Dark Star Cafe new roasters, and future cafe at Cathedral & 29th. Leslie was there with journalist Ashton. They bickered in jest about Leslie passing up canoli Ashton brought but going in for Snow White. The space is super beautiful. Big glass garage door, indoor windows, hardwood floors,lots of wood on the walls, hanging orb lamps, some stuff to be changed later of course. Wall paper boarders & paint. The old fireman's pole unfortunately out of commission. Sealed up top. I can easily see a great little cafe in there! For the kicker, there is this out-of-this-world space in the back that Oscar, the building owner is trying to rent out. It's pretty raw as of now. 1700 Sq. feet. Some hardwood floor some cement and then this giant soundstage. Id on't know what you would call it. All white painted the cornering walls transform right into the floor, you could skate board up it if you wanted to. he showed it to me with all my enquiry. The natural light needed some definite improvement, but with the replacement of the garage door for glass, it would be no problem! He didn't give me a price, but he said it is all dependent upon the build-out. Live/work would mean bathroom/kitchen, the lease would determine as well. But boy my fantasies run away with me! That soundstage, and on top of that how the whole place is basically all soundproofed already! Perfect for dancing, for filming anything, dance videos, music videos, really anything at al. So many possibilities and the lofted spaces you could design and create! My god! All open floor plan, so spectacular, I just dream away, like a homelier Cynthia Dale is how I feel!

February 5, 2012 Sunday

In room, bedroom listening to Life Preserver record. Just spoke to Maddy not long ago. She was by herself walking in downtown Seattle, WA. Had just said Goodbye to Duncan. took the train back up to Vancouver, Jackie guitar loops in track 3 side 1 right now. I miss Maddy. She keeps my feet on the ground, Makes me feel not as crazy. Then more crazy. The trouble we have with males in our lives. This weekend with Allison was intense. I'm glad that even though, we don't spend much time together that she relates enough, finds me friend enough to lay it all down for me, her feelings about things. Mainly men, and boys. And she listens to me. What I can't just talk to anyone about. Sometimes it's just relieving to let out in audible words to listening ears your love for another person, even if that very person can' hear you. She's currently in some trouble with this 2 years-post-mormon, 32-year old guy in her breakdance zone named Stefan who lifts weights and barely listens to music. Strange stuff. She though with waning interest for him herself, is hurt feeling that she's been used. A weekend of on and off girltalk, cat talk. Laying on stomachs on my bed, over hot dogs and tots at Happy Hound on Friday, Steve's Lunch perogies, and bad service this morning at Jo Jo's over coffee, 3 dollar coffee and croissant and muffin. Don't go to Jo Jo's Sunday at 10:30 am if you don't want to see the yuppie-parents -of-the-white-kid-you-had-a-crush-on-your-junior-year-of-high-school-but-was-a-year-older-with-the-Cramps-tote-bag. I called them out before I remembered who they were. Funny, I also saw Rob driving down 25th St. In a white sedan, windows down, music blaring just the other day.

Mom and I watched Audrey & Alan Arkin in "Wait Until Dark" tonight after a Madonna super-bowl halftime show. I finally got my tape artwork scanned at Julia's after many failed attempts at other sources. Realizing I would rather my shitty pop star name be "Regina Regallo"after "Reginald Regallo" , revolutionary psych doctor in Italy in think in the 1700s who said "if we treat the mentally ill with kindness we will cure them." More likely at least. Screwed that at anytime ideas like that had to be revolutionary. one man freed from chains and darkness after 40 years exclaims at seeing the sky "How beautiful!". That really resonated with me. So at some point, "Regina" it will be. Listen all of this talk of history and philosophy. I'm beginning to sound like John Hurley. You visit his home, and you get a lecture from him on Constantinople and the reality of Jesus as he passes in front of you sitting on his couch while smoking 8 cigarettes and then saying he'll punch you in the face if you try "falling for him"

Maddy comes home on Saturday morning.

February 4, 2012 Saturday

I'm in my room. Allison from Rochester is here, but she's at a breakdance workshop at Case Western. Time to come up with a cover for my tape. Jackie Dante is in New Zealand for the Life Preserver tour.

7 something, at Slunch with Allison from Rochester. So today in and out of the bedroom I crossed paths with Adam on the way to see how it felt outside. "You got a package from a baseball player!" says Adam with smirk on his face. I was completely surprised but boy fireworks started going off inside of me! Who else. The real Jackie Dante sends me a parcel. In it is a Life Preserver record in all of it's late 80s/early 90s looking beauty. On back all kinds of funny stories however far fetched about drips to Santa Barbara for spring break, meeting princes, rich with prety girls. It's everything it should have been even came with a poster of Jackie and Layne against a collage of surfy photos. Not sure if it's a mis-print or not, has Life Preserver printed backwards and upside down. Cool anyway. Not sure if it would be okay for me to hang up something like that. Being that he's my super super crush. As if he didn't know. He also sent me a Propaganda record. Cool! He bout it at some often visited record store in Pittsburgh. "Jerry's". I think. Haven't listened to side B yet. Big printed letters over a super dark picture of man and woman, woman at mans knees maybe. I tried to copy the letter style on "Swallowed Whole" but did not manage well. Just ended up cursive. Plain and simple.

On the postcard is pictured a gigantic sandcastle in the "San Diego Sandcastle Competition". I wonder when I will see him again. I am meaning to make him a tape. Maybe write him a letter telling him why I think "The Crying Game" is so great.

February 3, 2012 Friday

Litchfield, OH around Noon . Came down here to Dark Star roastery with Jack Jackson to look at the goods. It's small, one 12 Lb roaster. Just Leslie, Danny & the two of us. Lots of paraphernalia. Grinders, tea pots, buckets, espresso machines. I'm describing to them Snow White Donuts, how good they are. Best glazed I've ever had, how nobody serves donuts. It's so simple, and people love them! Danny is pretty into it. Danny & Theo went out to Frisco late last year and did lots of shop scouting too.

Jack Jackson and I are left alone in shop while Leslie and Danny go to the bank. Jack thinks I should call the tape "Swallowed Whole". Angsty and sexual a bit. I guess that's okay. He had a point, the more you think about the title, the more pretentious it is going to sound. That could make sense. Now just to finish naming groups involved. Maybe just stick with "Idea" and the "modern", even though I hate the name, I used to think it was so "it".

Now Leslie is being interviewed by a journalist named Ashton. His history, etc. really anything. Ashton writes in a notebook. No tape recorder. A Moleskin, maybe a Leuchturm, not sure. That style college ruled lines, he writes fast and covers multiple lines thick. Train of thought style you'd say. He looks over at me. I wonder if he's nervous. Writing at the same time. I wonder if I'm pissing off Leslie. Not a good idea I suppose. Ashton switches hands. Maybe he's ambidextrous. Maybe he's worried I'm copying his notes. Oh Shit! Sounds like Leslie's wife is a black belt. Is that journalism sense of humour? "She's kind of a badass is what you're saying."

Jack Jackson busies himself packing 112 g sample bags of coffee. I enjoyed our ride down here. We had to stop at Bellini's in North Royalton to get some supplies. Filters, green coffee beans decaf. We got to take a little tour of their warehouse by chance, this guy, maybe the owner, named Steve. It took two people to bring john his can of purel caf and coffee bags. It made me feel a bit like I was in the Twilight Zone. Like, David Lynch's own coffee warehouse. I mean, besides the fact that I'm sure he does in fact have one. One of these messengers looks like a high school intern and the other looks somewhat handicap. In fact, is handicap. Funny two fairly light-weight items took two people to deliver. The one lady had a cane for heavens sake. She looked a bit like a really old Shelly Duvall. Lynchian again! As we walk through the warehouse past the towers of Monin syrups and instant smoothie mixes in and out of the rainforest of white boxes and industrial metal shelving, in and out with wheelie carts zoom very unhappy looking middle aged men that don't look like they get enough sunlight. Receding hairlines, tight sweatshirts, high - water pants. We're almost startling them it seems. Unfamiliar faces. Walking through. They are with backs hunched, stuffing bags with smelly coffee. The whole place reeks of chocolate covered cherry flavoring. Like Frankenstein's castle it seems by the time we get to the roasters, so tall some of them have custom built 4x4 staircases. We disrupt their world of sugary air waves, mug shot faces. Like the ones we see in the mail, and cubicle corners. Not to mention the coffee bean paintings that look like they belong in star wars. Exploding beans in space, a pile of eggs with one hatching a batch of roasted beans.

Jack makes a vacuum press for Ashton as they all have a laugh fest about Jack's ancestor explorer, some heavy Norwegian name. Maddy sends me a picture of some super thick americano from "Olympia Coffee Roastery". Ashton used to work at Thoughtstream. Danny knows his voice. "I love you", she says, non chalantly calls her short and cute as he refers to meeting Jack at Loco, Coffee shop in Playhouse Square. Tall Blonde guy instead of short cute girl. Laugh Laugh you know... I feel like a reporter writing on the inside of someone else's interview. Jerk yeah?

Now we're getting into talk of ESOP plans, employee ownership plans, to print or not to print. It's actually kind of awkward, busting in on this shining moment of print acknowledgment for them, saying as how I am not "a partner". Jack sends "write more of anything" as if he revels in this strange strange moment. But I see the magical proud looks on everybody's face and I get a little jealous in my lonely place. Did you know that coffee, more than wine, more than vanilla, is the most complex food in regards to the number of chemicals involved in the taste? About 700 chemicals.