according to the calender, its been seven months since i've use this. approximately 78 fleas have feasted off my legs. i have ate six or seven blocks of tofu. i pooped. i photographed. i drank and i ate. i was payed a large sum of money to withdraw myself from the house we didn't pay rent for. there was house shows. there was tour. there was traveling to texas and swimming in new mexican lakes seemingly lacking in blemish. we soaked a pitbull's head, called things seitanic, hung out in long beach, and barely fell off our bikes. i got "hired" to make a record's lyric sheet zine. i played a show in a band i'm not in at a dilapidated LA bowling alley. 

i got a new bottom bracket, and there are no cotter pins. i moved into a west oakland dreamhouse. there's a puppy here. i drank more coffee, and found things less disposable. 

"there's no place like hella."

[b]est street

coffee

i half drunkenly submitted an essay

to tea party magazine and they refused to print it. oops.

            My grandparents went their whole lives believing there was no such thing as a free lunch. These days, I hear a lot about the dying state of the free place while stumbling down Telegraph Avenue, staring bleary-eyed into a screen reading Amazon book reviews[1], waiting in line for another cup of coffee. The people we come into contact with are increasingly hopeless; often unadmittedly[2] apocalyptic. Half of them don’t wave anymore. We search out specific relationships and states of being we can’t put into words, yearning for that which is seemingly untainted by economic “value”. We are still a spectacular society.[3] We sit on fucking plastic Ikea chairs between a rock and a hard place, wondering if the mutual aid analysis of a dinner party is yet passé.[4] At the turn of the century, just as we began to notice our own alienation, they gave us goddamn virtual communities.[5] So instead, our estrangement comes out in mental abstractions, suburban drug use, lying to ourselves, and certain admirable Temporary Autonomous Zones.[6]

            Still, when many of us fantasize about the “free”, its in the form of energy drink samples outside university campuses, or very conventional “babes” giving out Camel Filters in a dimly lit nightclub. In this world, giving away soup under the guise of Food Not Bombs is illegal, as is subsisting off the incredible waste of capital. Kids don’t participate in unmediated (free!) activity when they’re nine anymore. Houses rot to death while their inhabitants are forced to the street. Pockets of sanity co-exist within this world, but they’re at high risk. Its getting harder and harder to find free punk shows, free boxes in folks’ front yards, and a place to simply be.

            Having subscribed to hella dichotomous ideologies for years, I’ve finally come to terms with a bad taste. Its in my mouth. We go on putting our time and energy into false hope or commodity fetishism[7], or spend it being contentious (publicly). We yearn for the free; the whimsical, unadulterated social relationship. We just need to make sure that when we find them, we’ll cherish them, embrace them, and never let them die. Hell, there is such thing as a free lunch. I’ve had hundreds of ‘em myself. In my neck of the woods, its served everyday at Peoples’ Park around two thirty. If that’s too late, you can table dive at Café Intermezzo, and if you’re too bashful, come over… I’m making hummus. Bring a lemon; they still grow all over Montgomery Street.

 

 

 

 

[1] That of The Great Good Place, for example.

[2] …which isn’t a word.

[3] The cinematic take on The Society of the Spectacle is a great drinking movie

[4] Q: How many Crimethinc kids does it take to change a lightbulb? A: We were sitting on a rooftop in Duluth, eating dumpstered bagels. Looking out upon the city’s darkness, we knew we changed more than a lightbulb that night; we changed the world.

[5] …they’re free, but at what expense? V-community idea borrowed from “Everything for Everyone, Nothing for the Zapatistas” in the excellent journal Politics is not a Banana.

[6] Read the aptly-titled essay, I guess.

[7] Useless crap can’t exist in a free world.

weird time

yesterday, some time before the sun came up, shaun warren died in his sleep. a very important piece of my childhood has passed away. i'm coincidentally visiting the place i grew up in, drinking heavily like we do here, and just now wondering how to feel.

cheese

sina gave me teese vegan cheese for christmas. we made a pizza.

its an almost perfect cheese substitute. but i still like nutritional yeast better.

i guess i'm just punk.

this weekend (in order)

veggie burger. mischa. fenno's birthday party, fruitvale. too much whisky. how did i get here? headache. bike tour of chinatown with jerry. candy. felt betrayal. spent time with kitty. i have no friends. hazmat xxxmas party. fire dancing. ran into surprise attendees. i have friends. stork club. cookie. dog under my room. milk movie. amanda, jr, chip. walking in the rain. too much coffee. hope for this world. soyrizo tofu scramble. two poops in 20 minutes. i have good friends. nacho cheese. jewish party.